What is God's Purpose in Allowing False Teachers to Flourish?

Have you ever slummed through a sermon by a preacher like Steven Furtick or Andy Stanley? Have you ever really just sat and listened to them preach. It's easy to be drawn in to the charismatic mood changing, emotionally-driven style of speech or worship. They quote from Scripture and speak with such passion that can leave you wondering, how could someone so passionate about what they're saying be so off?

Someone who seems to be so dedicated to their teachings -- so caring and so loving towards their congregations -- how can they be so far removed from the truth? Does God actually allow teachers who are truly dedicated to him and his word to be raised up undisciplined and allowed to shepherd a flock of such magnitude without any accountability to his truth? Can a false teacher be saved and just be wrong? Or are these truly wolves in sheep's clothing who are on their way to Hell?

Ever since the fall of God's creation through Adam, man has been a slave to sin (Romans 5:12). Sin affects every aspect of our lives. It affects the way we think, the way we feel, and the way we perceive and understand things as well as the way we communicate. It affects our desires, our motives, and our purposes. Apart from Christ, we are inseparable from sin.

Yet, God chose to allow sin to flourish without an immediate end to it. Instead of instantaneously stopping sin, he has chosen to redeem us through Christ while allowing sin to continue as we suffer the temporal consequences of it. As a result of our sin, 1 Corinthians 2:14 says

The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.

Apart from God, man -- in his own state of sin -- will not and cannot accept the truth.

So why do so many false teachers seem to be so caring, passionate, and sincere?

One thing you will notice with false teachers is that they always want to downplay the importance that Scripture places on warning against false teachers. You may hear defenses like "The Bible doesn't say a whole lot about false teachers, so we really shouldn't be too concerned with it," or "Christians need to stop bickering and judging each other, and just be more loving and Christ-like." Some false teachers, like Beth Moore, will refer to their critics as "scoffers," who are "stopping unity."

Christine Caine of Hillsong -- in the video below -- twists Scripture to make a point about an unbiblical form of unity.

Steven Furtick (below) refers to discerning believers as "haters" and says that they are afraid of change or afraid of anything that is "new" and "different."