“Let the wise listen and add to their learning and let the discerning get guidance,” Proverbs 1:5.

Discerning of spirits is a very important gift of the Holy Spirit, but it is much different than when we use suspicion.

Discerning of spirits can warn us against the presence and influence of evil spirits. It can cause us to also see the error in various teachings and doctrines that have gone astray, that are contrary to the word of God.

With discerning of spirits one can see into the enemy’s camp, and know when danger is coming. With discerning of spirits, the hearts and intentions of various people are laid bare, and one can see how various spirits and forces have been at work in their lives. However, when one becomes suspicious, then they are not operating in God’s discernment, but in labeling something as evil, when it is not.

One can be suspicious about the motives of a used car salesman, or someone who is trying to make a quick buck. One may be suspicious about a quick-rich scheme that promises to make someone a lot of money.

Saul was suspicious of David, and he imagined all kinds of things about him, and became overcome with jealousy. A person can be suspicious about their spouse and imagine that they are not being true to them. They may imagine all kinds of things about them, and yet their fear and anxiety may well not be grounded in truth, but in a suspicious spirit that has caused one to be led astray into all kinds of thinking.

True spiritual discernment is not rooted in fear but in love and in serving others. When it sees a red flag its desire is to warn others and to expose the darkness so that God’s light can fill it. Suspicion is rooted in darkness, and it attempts to distort and twist the truth, so that God’s light is seen through the lens of Satan’s counterfeit.

You see, everything of God is pure and light. The enemy attempts to produce a counterfeit. He has never understood the light, but cowers in the darkness attempting to masquerade as an angel of light. Thus, suspicion then attempts to be like discernment.

Psychic ability parades as prophecy. And the list can go on and on, but the fruits of the spirit can never be copied. For they come down from above, without the diminishing of light or truth.

“But there was a certain man, called Simon, which before time in the same city used sorcery, and bewitched the people of Samaria, giving out that himself was someone great,” Acts 8:9.

“And he caused his children to pass through the fire in the valley of the son of Hinnom: also he observed times, and used enchantments, and used witchcraft, and dealt with a familiar spirit, and with wizards: he wrought much evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger,” 2 Chronicles 33:6.

“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom can be no variation, neither shadow that is cast by turning,” James 1:17.

Selah,
~ Stephen Hanson

Stephen Hanson of In His Truth Ministries came to the LORD is a special way in 1975 and has prophesied regularly since. In these end-time birthing pangs we are reminded that judgment must first begin with the household of God. Will we be prepared and ready?

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