CS Lewis has pointed out that one of Satan’s greatest methods of deception is selective emphasis of one truth at the cost of another.
For example:
1) Prosperity theology emphasizes that we should rely on God, not man, to supply all our needs, and that is true. But it DEemphasizes the fact that the Christian life is not primarily about material well-being.
2) Marxist pseudo-theologies, OTOH, would have us consider and care for the poor, and so we should, but those false gospels shift the focus of responsibility from Christ and his body the church to agents of human government, from voluntary self-sacrifice to statist coercion, and in so doing they subvert the kingship of Christ.
3) Cessationist theology rightly agrees with the Apostle Paul that some gifts of the Holy Spirit to the church are secondary and temporary (such as tongues), whereas some are irreplaceable and therefore eternal (such as love). But some cessationists have arrogated to themselves the power to set extrabiblical limits on when or where or how the Holy Spirit might act, and that is a bridge too far.
So yes, the scene is complex, but even if it is difficult for us to kept things straight, nothing is too hard for God, and that should comfort us.
Well said.
More and more I think of the “others” of Hebrews 11 (near end of chapter). Men of “whom the world was not worthy”, and yet men whom the world wants NOTHING to do with. They are the antithesis of worldly success—in or out of the Church—but they shine in God’s eyes!
Faith without seeing is better than faith with seeing. Jesus said so in many ways!