Bible verses about "heresy" | Twentieth_Century

⁸ Yet even if we--or if an angel from Heaven were to tell you any other 'Good News' than that which we told you, may he be accursed! ⁹ We have said it before, and I repeat it now--If any one tells you a 'Good News' other than that which you received, may he be accursed!

¹² God's Message is a living and active power, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing its way till it penetrates soul and spirit--not the joints only but the very marrow--and detecting the inmost thoughts and purposes of the mind.

²⁴ As we had heard that some of our number had upset you by their assertions, and unsettled your minds--without instructions from us--

⁷ Which is really no Good News at all. But then, I know that there are people who are harassing you, and who want to pervert the Good News of the Christ.

¹⁵ Leaving the straight road, they have gone astray and followed in the steps of Balaam, the son of Beor, who set his heart on the reward for wrong-doing,

³ Dear friends, while I was making every effort to write to you about our common Salvation, I felt that I must write to you at once to urge you to fight in defense of the Faith that has once for all been entrusted to the keeping of Christ's People. ⁴ For there have crept in among you certain godless people, whose sentence has long since been pronounced, and who make the mercy of God an excuse for profligacy, and disown our only lord and master, Jesus Christ. ⁵ Now I want to remind you--but you already know it all--that, though the Lord delivered the People from Egypt, yet he afterwards destroyed those who refused to believe in him; ⁶ and that even those angels, who did not keep to their appointed spheres, but left their proper homes, have been kept by him for the judgment of the Great Day in everlasting chains and black darkness. ⁷ Like Sodom and Gomorrah and the towns near them, which gave themselves up to fornication, and fell into unnatural vice, these angels now stand out as a warning, undergoing, as they are, the punishment of aeonian fire. ⁸ Yet in the very same way these men, too, cherishing vain dreams, pollute our human nature, reject control, and malign the Mighty. ⁹ Yet even Michael, the Archangel, when, in his dispute with the Devil, he was arguing about the body of Moses, did not venture to charge him with maligning, but said merely 'The Lord rebuke you!' ¹⁰ But these men malign whatever they do not understand; while they use such things as they know by instinct (like the animals that have no reason) for their own corruption. ¹¹ Alas for them! They walk in the steps of Cain; led astray by Balaam's love of gain, they plunge into sin, and meet their ruin through rebellion like that of Korah. ¹² These are the men who are blots upon your 'Love-feasts,' when they feast together and provide without scruple for themselves alone. They are clouds without rain, driven before the winds; they are leafless trees without a vestige of fruit, dead through and through, torn up by the roots; ¹³ They are wild sea waves, foaming with their own shame; they are 'wandering stars,' for which the blackest darkness has been reserved for ever. ¹⁴ To these men, as to others, Enoch, the seventh in descent from Adam, declared-- 'See! the Lord has come with his hosts of holy ones around him, ¹⁵ to execute judgment upon all men, and to convict all godless people of all their godless acts, which in their ungodliness they have committed, and of all the harsh words which they have spoken against him, godless sinners that they are!' ¹⁶ These men are always murmuring, and complaining of their lot; they follow where their passions lead them; they have arrogant words upon their lips; and they flatter men for the sake of what they can get from them.

¹⁹ The sins of our earthly nature are unmistakable. They are sins like these--unchastity, impurity, indecency, ²⁰ Idolatry, sorcery, quarrels, strife, jealousy, outbursts of passion, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, ²¹ Feelings of envy, drunkenness, revelry, and the like. And I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who indulge in such things will have no place in the Kingdom of God.

¹¹ for the man who welcomes him is sharing with him in his wicked work.

⁴ For, if some new-comer is proclaiming a Jesus other than him whom we proclaimed, or if you are receiving a Spirit different from the Spirit which you received, or a Good News different from that which you welcomed, then you are marvelously tolerant!

¹⁰ If any one comes to you and does not bring this Teaching, do not receive him into your house or welcome him;

¹ But there were false prophets also in the nation, just as there will be false teachers among you, men who will secretly introduce ruinous divisions, disowning even the Lord who bought them, and bringing speedy Ruin upon themselves.

¹⁰ If a man is causing divisions among you, after warning him once or twice, have nothing more to say to him.

¹ Dear friends, do not trust every inspiration, but test each inspiration, to see whether it proceeds from God; because many false Prophets have gone out into the world.

¹ But there were false prophets also in the nation, just as there will be false teachers among you, men who will secretly introduce ruinous divisions, disowning even the Lord who bought them, and bringing speedy Ruin upon themselves. ² There will be many, too, who will follow their licentious courses, and cause the Way of the Truth to be maligned. ³ In their covetousness they will try to make you a source of profit by their fabrications; but for a long time past their Sentence has not been standing idle, nor their Ruin slumbering. ⁴ Remember, God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them down to Tartarus, and committed them to caverns of darkness, to be kept under guard for judgment. ⁵ Nor did he spare the world of old; though he preserved Noah, the Preacher of Righteousness, and seven others, when he brought a flood upon the godless world. ⁶ He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and reduced them to ashes, holding them up as a warning to the godless of what was in store for them; ⁷ but he rescued righteous Lot, whose heart was vexed by the wanton licentiousness of his neighbors; ⁸ for, seeing and hearing what he did, as he lived his righteous life among them, day after day, Lot's righteous soul was tortured by their wicked doings. ⁹ The Lord, therefore, knows how to deliver the pious from temptation, and to keep the wicked, who are even now suffering punishment, in readiness for 'the Day of Judgment'-- ¹⁰ especially those who, following the promptings of their lower nature, indulge their polluting passions and despise all control. Audacious and self-willed, they feel no awe of the Mighty, maligning them, ¹¹ even where angels, though excelling them in strength and power, do not bring against them a malignant charge before the Lord. ¹² These men, however, like animals without reason, intended by nature to be caught and killed--these men, I say, malign those of whom they know nothing, and will assuredly perish through their own corruption, ¹³ suffering themselves, as the penalty for the suffering that they have inflicted. They think that pleasure consists in the self-indulgence of the moment. They are a stain and a disgrace, indulging, as they do, in their wanton revelry, even while joining you at your feasts. ¹⁴ They have eyes only for adulteresses, eyes never tired of sin; they entice weak souls; their minds are trained to covet; they live under a curse. ¹⁵ Leaving the straight road, they have gone astray and followed in the steps of Balaam, the son of Beor, who set his heart on the reward for wrong-doing, ¹⁶ but was rebuked for his offense. A dumb animal spoke with the voice of a man, and checked the prophet's madness. ¹⁷ These men are like springs without water, or mists driven before a gale; and for them the blackest darkness has been reserved. ¹⁸ With boastful and foolish talk, they appeal to the passions of man's lower nature, and, by their profligacy, entice those who are just escaping from the men who live such misguided lives. ¹⁹ They promise them freedom, while they themselves are slaves to corrupt habits; for a man is the slave of anything to which he gives way. ²⁰ If, after having escaped the polluting influences of the world, through knowing our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, men are again entangled in them, and give way to them, their last state has become worse than their first. ²¹ It would, indeed, have been better for them not to have known the Way of Righteousness, than, after knowing it, to turn away from the holy Command delivered to them. ²² In their case is seen the truth of the proverb-- 'A dog returns to what he has vomited' and 'A sow after washing to her wallowing-place in the mud.'