Beware of Deception

August 18th, 2023

Fellowship with like-minded believers, especially those in ministry, has been such an encouragement to those of us at Reasons for Hope. Today we are excited to introduce you to Julaine Appling, one of our friends who, like us, faces opposition daily as she strives to share truth and stand for justice.

Deception. It’s one of Satan’s greatest weapons—against both believers and unbelievers. Making truth look like lies and lies look like truth is as old as the dawn of human history. In the Garden of Eden, the serpent—the devil himself—lies to Eve about what God told her and Adam about eating of the fruit of the trees in the Garden.

Eve fell for Satan's lie and very soon learned that God meant what He said. Death, both physical and spiritual, fell on the entire human race, and deception has been with us ever since. Satan continues to use it to destroy lives now and for eternity.

I wish I could tell you deception is going to become less of a problem, but that would be incredibly wrong. Consider, for instance, Artificial Intelligence and the impact it is already having in our culture.

During our LEAD Wisconsin camp a couple of weeks ago, our worldview speaker Carl Kerby with Reasons for Hope spent an entire session on this topic. The 125 teens and the 20 or so crew in the room were mesmerized by what they saw and heard.

A couple of Carl’s points from that session included:

While serving to improve the early detection of diseases (sepsis and cancer, for instance) and providing quick and informative fraud detection services,
AI has and will continue to replace humans in the workforce, and through its superior writing features, will continue to deceive us through its integration in the media, politics, and advertising.

What became abundantly clear is that this AI is captivating the world and has the potential to deceive in ways we’ve never seen before. Essentially, AI has the ability to make discerning the true from the false basically impossible, because the look and feel of what we see and hear is, can be, and will be so realistic.

To deal with the deceptions we already have and those to come requires that we truly know and can recognize the real thing. That means we need to saturate our minds with God’s Word—and some have even posited that we should be making Scripture memory a top priority, since AI already has the ability to rewrite Scripture.

Psalm 119:11 KJV
Thy word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against thee.

Keeping hard copies of the Bible and devoting ourselves to reading, studying, and memorizing God’s Word gives us an infallible filter, and we have the promise that His Word is eternal and unchanging. Building our worldview based on the Word of God will help us discern whether we are being deceived—whether by Satan and his minions or by human or artificial intelligence.

If we think Satan won’t use AI as a tool in his deception arsenal, we are fooling ourselves. We need to be aware of his tactics and, as Scripture tells us daily, seek to have the mind of Christ—Who is the embodiment of truth. AI didn’t surprise God. He knew we’d be dealing with this, and thankfully He has equipped us to not be deceived. We just need to act on what we know.

Keeping hard copies of the Bible and devoting ourselves to reading, studying, and memorizing God’s Word gives us an infallible filter, and we have the promise that His Word is eternal and unchanging.

Author Bio:
Julaine Appling is president of Wisconsin Family Council (WFC), a statewide organization that works to strengthen, preserve, and promote God’s plan for marriage and family, the sanctity of human life, and religious freedom in The Badger State. A visionary, Julaine had for years dreamed of and sought ways to directly impact the next generation of Christian leaders. God ultimately granted the dream, and In 2021, WFC launched its LEAD WI teen worldview/leadership camp. LEAD WI has grown in three years from 80 teens to nearly 130 at this year’s week-long camp.. An educator at heart, Julaine is a sought-after speaker and frequently interacts with the media on the issues of the day. To learn more about Julaine and the organizations she serves with, please visit www.wifamilycouncil.org or www.leadwi.org.

We Have an App for That!

To expose you to more truth and to help equip you with answers for the reason for the hope that is in you (1 Peter 3:15), we encourage you to join over 20,000 others in downloading our app. Our app is FREE and will encourage you in your walk with Christ and to stay bold in your faith. Just click HERE, and look for the blue asterisk on the black background.