Where There's Smoke, There's Fire: Bad Doctrine Often Reveals Underlying Sin

The modern church landscape is rife with wolves in sheep's clothing, those charlatans who twist the Scriptures for their own personal gain. It's not just the galling falsehoods they preach—whether it be the prosperity gospel, egalitarianism, the New Apostolic Reformation, or the social justice gospel—that should alarm us. It's the stench of unrepentant sin that often wafts from their ministries, revealing the rotten core beneath their polished veneers.

The Bible, our ultimate authority, doesn't mince any words at all when it comes to false teachers. Jesus Himself declared, "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves" (Matthew 7:15). And the Apostle Paul, ever vigilant, warned Timothy that "the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions" (2 Timothy 4:3).

What does this teach us? There is often an inseparable bond between heresy and unrepentant immorality. True shepherds, who are truly born again, saved by the blood of Jesus Christ, don't peddle heresy—heresy is attractive to those who have not been washed by the blood of Jesus Christ, have not been transformed by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, and are still rooted in the carnal pleasures of the world. And they use religion as a tool to pursue these worldly lusts.

Take, for instance, the prosperity gospel peddlers. These spiritual con artists, with their saccharine smiles and glitzy productions, promise untold wealth in exchange for faith—a faith that invariably translates to fat checks written to their ministries. You've heard about Robert Morris and his abhorrent sins in the news recently—Morris has built an empire on his deceitful prosperity pimping. He should have been disqualified long before his sins were ever exposed. And the King of Prosperity Pimps, T.D. Jakes, has been accused of taking part in grossly immoral activities. Where there's smoke, there's fire.