How to Spot a Fraud

A lab coat can make a bad product sound like medicine, and a religious title can do the same thing to bad theology. We start with a wild piece of advertising history, then pivot to the far more serious question: how do you recognize spiritual deception before it costs you clarity, joy, and faithfulness? 

Working through 2 Peter 2, we name three early warning signs Peter highlights about false teachers: they can draw massive followings, they excuse and even celebrate sinful lifestyles, and they end up damaging the public reputation of “the way of truth.” Along the way, we talk about why popularity is not the same as credibility, why some teachings feel “Christian” while quietly adding to Scripture, and why “inner impressions” are a dangerous substitute for the written Word of God. We also explore how a message can include real truths yet still become poisonous when it adds human merit, secret revelation, or spiritual shortcuts that blur the gospel of grace. 

We don’t approach this to start fights or score points. We want to protect people, strengthen discernment, and call ourselves back to humble repentance and courageous clarity. If you’ve ever wondered how to evaluate famous voices, bestselling spiritual advice, or leaders who demand trust without accountability, this conversation will sharpen your instincts. Subscribe for more Bible teaching, share this with a friend who cares about discernment, and leave a review. What’s one “red flag” you think Christians ignore too easily?

Transcript

Lucky Strikes And Fake Authority

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In the 1920s, the American tobacco company wanted to make their best-selling brand, Lucky Stripes, or Stripes. Strikes? Anyone know? How'd you know that? Lucky Strikes, that's a typo of my nuts. Lucky Strikes. They wanted it to be even more successful. They wanted it to stand out among their competitors, so they hired an advertising expert by the name of Albert Lasker, and he came up with uh a brilliant strategy that is used to this day. It was clever but as far from the truth as you could imagine, though they didn't recognize it fully then. Lucky strike, according to this campaign, was presented as a cure for sore throats caused by, you know, all those other cigarette brands. The campaign advertised that their tobacco was roasted in a special way that, quote, harmful acids were removed that caused throat irritation. They claimed that they had a secret process, I'm quoting, a secret process using ultraviolet rays, and this secret process purifies and removes harmful irritants. So it's good for you. Then he hired opera singers and other famous singers to talk about how Lucky Strikes was good for their throats and helped them sing. Let me tell you, if you can't sing, don't try this. Okay, it ain't gonna work, trust me. Well, then his campaign recruited doctors to explain, or people pretending to be doctors, uh the health benefits of smoking these cigarettes. One advertisement featured a doctor wearing a white lab coat holding a pack of these cigarettes and saying, and I quote, 20,000 other physicians say luckies are for your throat protection. Imagine that, a guy in a lab coat telling you they have a secret process to make your life better. And the public ate it up. Within a year, sales doubled. Within five years, this became the number one selling brand in the United States. That same strategy is working today. Commercials that feature a man or a woman, you know, in a lab coat, it just seems so much more believable, doesn't it? Wow, they're a doctor, you know, they're a dentist. I gotta use that toothpaste or whatever. They get you to believe that they use that product, and well, if they're using it, we don't want to be left behind. So we're gonna get it as well. That's one thing to be fooled by a commercial. It's another thing to be fooled by a spiritual counterfeit, a sales job, from somebody wearing a clerical collar or a robe, uh, some religious scholar or some author. As I uh began unpacking this detailed description of false teachers and false religions, where we arrive today back at 2 Peter chapter 2, and I invite your attention there, I want you to know ahead of time uh my purpose isn't to be offensive or mean-spirited or rude. If I name the names of false religion in our world or false teachers, some of them might even be believers, but they're teaching dangerous error. My my purpose isn't so much to condemn them as it is to protect you, to shepherd you. There is a difference between being offensive to someone and someone being offended by the truth. To be offensive means you just want to start a fight. To take the truth and offend someone with that is actually what we see the Lord doing in Matthew chapter 15, where he exposed the false religion and false teachers of his day. His harshest words were for religious leaders, the Pharisees. And on one occasion in Matthew 15, after he finished rebuking them, his disciples pulled him over, you know, to the side, and they said this, and and I quote, Lord, did you not know that the Pharisees were offended by what you said? And Jesus said, and I paraphrase, I'm not so concerned about them. They're blind, but they're they're leading blind people, and they're both going to fall into the pit. So I'm not really so concerned about offending those leaders, but warning those who follow them. In that same manner, I want the truth, frankly, to offend as many people as I can today. But I want to offend in order to protect. We frankly need less Christians, less Christian leaders who refuse to stand for unpopular truth, who kowtow to people uh uh in power. You know, as in my notes, in my notes I wrote the word kowtow, and then I asked I actually wondered what that meant. Uh it might not be used as much today, but kowtow is a Mandarin word, as I've found out, a little research, uh, from Imperial China, and it means to touch the forehead or to touch the head. It referred to bowing and touching your forehead to the ground in front of somebody of influence, somebody of power, somebody more important than you or me. And so that was adopted into our culture as bowing down, so to speak, submitting to, deferring to, somebody with money, somebody with power, somebody with fame, somebody with position, whatever, to the majority opinion, just bowing the head to that. Then realizing later, well, we were bowing to the wrong thing. I remember several years ago, Marcia and I were in England with a group of people from our church, including students from our seminary, and we visited John Wesley's chapel in London. It was built in 1778, it's a beautiful structure. Originally, the pulpit that you gained by walking upstairs was located near a side door in a corridor so that John Wesley could make a quick escape. It's refashioned now and rebuilt, uh, not so connected, but it was connected ultimately to his house where he could get on his horse and flee. And so we asked about that. And our tour guide told us that on one occasion John Wesley preached a sermon condemning slavery, and it so offended his audience that they rioted and broke pews apart, and he escaped with his life to preach another day. Now I plan to make it out of here alive, but I noticed that side door is a long way away. By God's will, I plan to preach another day. Well, Peter begins his description of false teachers here in 2 Peter chapter 2, we're now at verse 2, and I've broken down his opening lines into three characteristics of false teachers. Now, when we're finished with this, however long it takes us, there's gonna be a longer list than three. And I want to tell you ahead of time as well that all false teachers don't necessarily have all of these characteristics. These are characteristics in general that ought to get our alarm system, any one of them ought to get our alarm system buzzing, warning us, alert we might be in the presence of false teaching. So these are ways that you can spot a fraud. First, I'll give you the point and we'll read the text. False teachers develop massive followings. Again, in general. Peter writes here in verse 2, and many will follow. Stop there for a moment. You might want to circle the word many. Now, obviously, leaders lead people. They're leaders because they are leading people. That's what leaders do. They naturally have a following. But Peter is writing a warning here with that word many. Many will follow them. In other words, they they might very well be well known. They might be household names. Many of them might gain incredible followings. They will be extremely popular. They might be bestsellers. Part of the reason is that they will rarely teach enough truth to offend anybody. The umbrella is so broad, anybody can fit under it. This is true in Peter's generation and in ours. After my father's death a few years ago, I inherited much of his library. All of my books are at home, but his books are in my study here in church. And I was reading one of his commentaries on 2 Peter on this particular passage, many shall follow. And this commentator had written these words. And my father had written in the margin next to that sentence, the year 1952, with an exclamation point. As if to say, this is so true in 1952. Then he evidently was reading the same volume decades later, and the commentator added another sentence after that that reads, Many seem ready to follow anybody who comes along with any brand of fakery. And next to that line, my dad had written the date, 2006, with an exclamation point. So 50 years later, he's still writing an exclamation point. Because it's still true. It's true in 1952, it's true in 2006, it's true in 2026. In fact, when Peter's writing this letter, it's true in the year 66. False teachers are going to be around. False religion, the implication here, false religion will dwarf the size of the true church. And that's what Jesus himself predicted in Matthew chapter 7. He said, false religion, false teaching creates this broad path, and many are on it. And narrow is the way of life, truth. Matthew 7, 13. And all you have to do is do a little analysis, which I did. There are nine million Jehovah's Witnesses today who deny the gospel of grace through the divine Son of God. There are 18 million Mormons who believe Jesus was one of many sons of Elohim. There are 24 million Seventh-day Adventists who teach a works salvation related to Sabbath observance. In fact, they believe that when we worship on Sunday, we're following the mark of the beast. There are 500 million Buddhists that reject the creator of the universe and his son. There are 1.3 billion Hindus who have their hopes tied to reincarnation. There are 1.2 billion Roman Catholics who teach a works salvation through personal merit. There are two billion Muslims who deny the deity of Jesus Christ and his resurrection. So if you just do the math on that little list, you have six billion people on the planet in just those seven false religious systems. But I want you to get this. Peter really isn't talking about them. He isn't really warning us about them outside the church. He's warning us on the inside of a Bible-believing church. He wrote, there will be false teachers, verse one, among you. And he writes, many will follow. The implication is many inside the church will follow. That word follow them, follow out is a compound word in the original language, and the prefix is the word that gives us our word exit. Peter is concerned that people will exit the church, go out of and away from true teaching by following false teaching. They're going to leave, they're going to exit. So this is a warning to us. Satan is a master advertiser. He has campaign strategies in the church. And he certainly has campaign strategies around the world that are going on today. And part of the deception is that he is not a monster. He's an angel. He doesn't wear a lab coat. He doesn't pretend he's a doctor, but he pretends to be an angel of what? Of light. So he sells himself as representing the truth, as presenting the kind of life you want to have, as presenting the way you want to follow. He's a counterfeit Christ who said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. Satan's not a fool. He's a scholar. He knows the word of God and he can twist it to his ends. He's a counterfeit Christ. He's a church leader who might not teach outright heresy, but he's going to say things that open the door to dangerous error that lead people from the truth out or into confusion. And I, in my role, deal with this all the time in all kinds of different forms. It might be the error of a best-selling book by Sarah Young, who teaches that Jesus had spoken or is speaking to her beyond the revelation of Scripture. Jesus said this to her, Jesus said that to her. So what you need to do is get out a pad of paper and sit quietly and listen and write down those inner impressions because that's Jesus calling. That's Jesus talking to you. Beloved, that opens the door to the danger and the error of following extra-biblical revelation. It also opens the door to a world of spirit guides that are eager to give you inner impressions and ideas. You don't sit there waiting to hear something new from Jesus. You need to sit there and study and memorize and meditate on what Jesus has already said. And there's a lot of what he said we still don't know and are figuring out from his word. Just remember the book of Revelation ends with a period, not a comma. One of the difficulties of identifying false teachers is they don't necessarily deny biblical things you believe, they just add to them. They just turn them. They make additions. One of the dangers of false religion isn't that they teach things that aren't true, is that they teach things that are true and then add what isn't true. As, for instance, Roman Catholic theology, which believes many truths that we believe, like the Trinity and the deity of Christ and the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The problem is it adds to that teaching, false teaching like purgatory, without one verse of supporting Scripture where you're going to go and suffer in the flames of purgatory until you have paid the penalty for your sins. And after you've paid a penalty for your sins, whatever length of time that takes, then you get to go to heaven. So it believes in the crucifixion, but it misses the point of the crucifixion. So what they add effectively erases the truth of Christ's sacrifice, which was sufficient for your sin. He didn't say it is finished, and now you add to it. It's finished, completed, paid, literally, to telesty, paid in full. According to the Bible, beloved, you are already today, through faith in Christ, saved from any fire of judgment. There is even right now, because you're a believer in Christ, no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus. Romans chapter 8, verse 1. Now, in our opening study last time, Peter said in verse 1 that false teachers smuggle untruths into the church alongside the truth. And that opens the door to distraction and confusion. There is a massive following today among religions and religious leaders. Their appeal is universal, billions of people. And you know, many of them adhere to the Bible, something from the Bible. They use the Bible, no matter what it might be. Just keep in mind that false teachers are not Frankenstein's. They're Prince Charmings. Because of it, first of all, here, many of them develop massive followings. Now, secondly, they defend sinful lifestyles. Peter writes further here in verse 2 many will follow their sensuality. Could read sensualities, it's a plural noun. It indicates that the false teachers' sexual lewdness can come in all kinds of forms. All kinds of extremes. It has the idea of extreme lewdness, extreme immorality. A preacher or a teacher who claims to be God's spokesman, but if his life is characterized by corruption or lust or vulgarity or immorality that ought to get your alarm system again buzzing. He's a fraud. The word Peter uses here, translated sensualities, is an extremely vivid Greek word for blatant immorality. In other words, somebody who's actually proud of their sexual sin. They literally Have no shame. That's what he means. He's like the guy you might work with who comes in, you know, after a weekend of partying and he's he's bragging about his latest conquest. You know, he's showing off his porn collection. He's he's telling dirty stories. No shame at all. He isn't simply immoral. He loves being immoral. He longs to be immoral. He takes pride in his sexual immorality. I think of that whenever I hear the words gay pride. Some gay pride march. What irony it is to pair the word pride with homosexuality. They're proud of that. That lifestyle. It's a badge of honor. Your symbol is a rainbow, which to me again is ironic because God gave mankind a rainbow as a sign, a lasting symbol of his mercy following his global judgment of sin. Jeremiah refers to the one who is not ashamed of his sin, no matter what that sin is. He writes in chapter 6 Were they ashamed when they committed abomination? No, they were not at all ashamed. They do not even know how to blush. He's speaking of the people of Israel in general, who'd thrown off all sense of morality. By the way, sexual immorality was a part of, a key part of pagan religion. That's why Israel was warned to stay as far away as they could as possible. It would be so tempting to the flesh. Imagine a religion that endorsed sexual orgies as part of worship. So those pagan temples had female prostitutes and male prostitutes ready for so-called worshipers. The invitation was to come and worship our gods and then do whatever you want to do. No guilt here. You don't even need to blush about it. Let me tell you, Jeremiah delivers even stronger words of commendation to the spiritual leaders who modeled immorality through adultery without any sign of repentance. Jeremiah goes on to write in chapter 23 Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture, declares the Lord. You have scattered my flock. You have not attended to them. Behold, I will attend to you for your evil deeds. What did they do? Later in verse 14, we're told, in the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen a horrible thing. They commit adultery and walk in lies, and they strengthen the hands of evildoers so that no one turns from his evil. In other words, they're unfaithful to their wives and commit a host of other evils he doesn't mention. But since they're the leader, notice Jeremiah's writing, since they seem to be getting away with it, since they have no evidence of repentance, since they're not ashamed of it, since they're defensive that sin, well, it virtually encourages it, it strengthens, Jeremiah writes, their hands, that is, their resolve to do whatever they want to do. If the shepherd can do that, why can't the sheep? If they can do that, why can't I? And it just sort of cascades. That's why so great a condemnation is level that those who lead. Leaders can become sensual leaders rather than spiritual leaders. They're effectively living out what people would like to experience in their own sinful desires, and the leaders' wishes seem to be coming true. If their leaders are getting the life they wish for, well, why can't I have what I'm wishing for as well? Better be careful what we wish for. I was sent this rather humorous story from someone in our congregation about a couple who were out celebrating their 60th birthdays. They both turned 60 on the same day. So they went out to dinner, and then they went to a flea market in town where they were rummaging around, and they came across this little brass oil lamp, and the guy rubbed some of the dust off it, and sure enough, a genie popped out. And the genie said to the 60-year-old woman, I'm going to give you one wish. What do you want? And she said, Well, I don't want to offend my husband, but I'd like to travel more than he does. And he didn't want to spend the money to travel, but I'd really like to travel around the world and see the sights. The genie said, You get your wish, and poof, handed her and her husband first-class tickets around the world. Jeannie looked over at the 60-year-old husband and said, Okay, what do you what do you want? You have one wish. And the man said, Well, I won't I don't want to offend my wife, but I wish my wife was 30 years younger than me. And the genie said, No problem, poof, and the man was 90. Serves him right, amen. What are you wishing for? Better be careful. False teachers develop massive followings. They defend sinful lifestyles, but then is just modeled in their flock. And because of that, Peter now adds a third characteristic: false teachers destroy Christianity's reputation. Peter writes next year in verse 2: many will follow their sensuality, and because of them, the way of truth will be blaspheme. The way of truth, by the way, is a reference to the earliest expression of Christianity, which was first known as the way. Paul talks about persecuting those who belong to the way, Acts chapter 22 and verse 4. Paul is giving his personal defense to the governor in Acts chapter 24, and he says that he belongs to the way. More than likely, this title grew out of that exclusive claim of Christianity, which, by the way, disturbs all the other religions of the world. Where Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and nobody comes to the Father except through me. I'm the only way. Well, the way, Peter hints at here, is being blasphemed. That original word means to injure someone's reputation. The way of truth is being ruined by unrepentant, false teachers who live sensual, immoral lifestyles, and then the people that follow them do the same thing, and what happens? The reputation of Christianity is ruined. Satan loves that kind of drama. That kind of sensational discovery when a church leader turns out to be greedy or dishonest or abusive or immoral or you just add the word. An unregenerate world, by the way, loves it too. They love it because it makes them feel better. If those, you know, Christians, if those righteous people do that while I'm doing that too, then I must not be that bad. Let me tell you, the world knows better. Why is it that the world can spot a hybrid grid faster than the church can? Because they know. They know God has written his moral law on every human heart. No matter where you go in the world, they know it's wrong to steal a chicken or somebody's wife. They know right from wrong. They know justice from injustice. They know sexual purity from sexual deviancy. They know honesty from dishonesty. They know. Never more was that clear than watching the world, our culture, respond to the revelation of a movie mogul, Harvey Weinstein, who was exposed as a sexual predator, an immoral man, for decades using his power and his position to abuse women who came to him wanting a role in a movie. And when it finally came out, one actress encouraged other survivors of that same kind of activity to post the words, me too. You remember that? And post their own story on social media, and the me too movement just it just took off. The aftermath was a trainload of high-profile men who were exposed across all these platforms, media, entertainment, politics, business, academia, religion. Hundreds of men called to give an account to their accusers. It resulted in job losses, dismissals, resignations, suspensions, investigations, lawsuits, and on and on it just cascaded. It ended up rewriting workplace policies, bringing thousands of people to accountability, and their reputations were destroyed, ruined. Why? Because the world knew their behavior was corrupt. The world knew that. Women were finally being heard. What do you think happens to the reputation not only of the Christian leader, but of the Christianity supposedly represents when he's exposed as an embezzler, a drunkard, an abuser, a womanizer, a hypocrite. Warren Wearsby wrote on this text there are not many things that can harm the cause of Christ than a bad Christian. The worst advertisement for Christianity is a hypocrite, especially a hypocritical leader. And Satan loves to make that Christian he's caught, that big fish. And the bigger the fish, the more damage. Satan can inflict tremendous damage on the reputation of the church. And let me tell you, that Christian leader, that big catch is gonna be his advertising campaign for months. I've talked to people over the years about all sorts of people that influenced them who then were exposed. Talked to a lot of people who were devastated, confused, and hurt with the news of Ravi Zacharias when all of that unfolded, and it grieves me to use him as an illustration because I so appreciated and admired him. A brilliant apologist, a phenomenal speaker. He taught a lot of truth, impacted a lot of people for the gospel. And by the way, that can't be taken away from the lives of those people. God can use a donkey. I'm grateful for that, by the way, to deliver the truth. But at the height of his ministry, it circled the globe. There were international offices in Europe and India and Asia and North America, South America, Australia. An annual budget of tens of millions of dollars, hundreds of employees. And after 48 months of that exposure, years of immorality, in 48 months, that global ministry disappeared. Shut down. It doesn't exist. What happened in the minds of many unbelievers regarding the reputation of Christianity well tarnished at best destroyed at worst in the minds and hearts of many used as an example that Christianity doesn't really change anybody's life after all. And Satan and his kingdom loved it. When King David committed adultery with Bathsheba and then made sure Uriah didn't make it home from his Torah of duty. When David was finally exposed, fortunately he genuinely repented. But still the prophet of Nathan came to David and made this point of those tragic words. He says, You have given occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme him. Not the enemies of you, David. Not the enemies of Israel, David. The enemies of the Lord to blaspheme his name. See, when you and I sin, it isn't just our reputation. We're risking. It is the reputation of God. We're to bring him glory. We are to increase his fame. And we bring instead to him shame. What a warning. How do you spot a fraud? Well, Peter's just getting started, and so are we. But in the meantime, here are some lasting principles from what we've uncovered today that I want you to keep in mind. Let me give you three of them. First, be aware that something approved of by the majority around you might be deviant, might be deadly. But everybody says it's okay. The majority opinion is often absolutely, utterly, horribly wrong. Second, be cautious of listening to your inner impressions when they conflict with God's revelation. Don't listen to yourself. Listen to God's word. Finally, be careful when an expert, even someone in a lab coat, tells you what to believe or buy. Even if they tell you there are twenty thousand other experts who agree. Where'd they come up with that number? Even if they tell you they found a secret process that will make your life better. For the warning we need. To be wary and warned of an evil generation, but to shine as pure light. Give us a quicker resolve to repent, Lord. To not manage our sin. But to bring it to your cross, thanking you that you died for that. You offer a return to fellowship and forgiveness when we as believers confess it. Give us a greater resolve to stand for the truth of your word with grace, to speak the truth and love, caring for the souls of mankind. We talk today, Father, that there are billions of people walking a broad path. Flanked by flowers on either side, leading to the precipice and into hell. Sharpen our minds, our thoughts. Help us to be wary and alert. Pray. Pray it in Jesus' name. Amen. Now may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.