Skip to main content

The Biggest Con


   Victor Lustigly was called the king of the confidence men.  With forty-five known aliases, the mastery of five different languages, and nearly fifty arrests in the United States alone, Lustig could swindle even the brightest of marks.  His signature con was the Money Box, a so called "money-printing machine".  He would demonstrate the capability of the small box to clients, all the while lamenting that it took the device six hours to copy a $100 bill.  The client, sensing huge profits, would buy the machines for a high price.  Over the next twelve hours, the machine would produce two more $100 bills.  After that, it produced only blank paper, as its supply of $100 bills became exhausted. By the time the clients realized that they had been scammed, Lustig was long gone.  He had gall as well, he once conned Al Capone. He was so good (or bad really) he even sold the Eiffel tower for scrap metal. Twice!

   Victor Lustigly may be called the king but the true father of lies is the Devil (John 8:44).  His trademark con is one he has been pulling over on men and women for generations, convincing them that they what God says isn't really what he means.  It’s what he did in the garden (Genesis 3:3-5) and it is what he does today.  He will set himself as one you can trust, then convince you that the Truth isn't in fact the whole truth (1st Corinthians 1:1-15).  He (and his workers) will twist the scripture to show what they say is right (Matthew 4:5-6; 2nd Peter 3:16-17) even though it is all a lie.

   Don’t get conned.  Great con artists know the best way to get a mark to fall for a ruse is to make it something they want to be true.  In their desire, they will overlook what in hindsight, should be a red flag.  Then once the hook is set, they will reel you in (James 1:14-16).  When someone is telling you sin is acceptable, that verse doesn't really mean what it says, your opinion is on par with God word, and truth is relative, beware the con is on!

2 Peter 3:17

You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard so that you are not carried away by the error of unprincipled men and fall from your own steadfastness,
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I Know All Those Words, But That Sentence Makes No Sense To Me

  Let’s say you travel back in time six hundred years or so.  Luckily, you happen across a fellow that speaks English.  Upon hearing your tale, he describes you as nice, smart, and handsome.  Wouldn’t you feel good?   You shouldn’t.  As Sol Steinmetz in his book, Semantics Antics , explains; Nice originally meant someone who was foolish, ignorant, senseless, or absurd (middle English 1300). Smart for the first 300 years of its use meant causing pain, sharp, cutting, or severe, a sense that survives in the idiom "smart as a whip.” Handsome wasn’t complimentary. When coined around 1425, it just meant easily handled; it didn’t have its current positive connotation until 1590.   You might think he said you were a kind, intelligent, good looking bloke, when in reality he said you were a foolish pain easily dealt with.   Words have an annoying habit of changing meaning over time in the same language and it becomes even more compli...
Post a Comment
Read more

Master Your Self

  In a contest for the toughest president of the United States, it would be hard to go against Theodore Roosevelt.  He was known for his “manly” pursuits hunting big game, climbing the Matterhorn, participating in boxing match while president. (These weren’t play fights, he lost the vision on one eye because of them!)  Once before he was about to give a speech an assassin shot him in the chest.  Roosevelt refused to go to a hospital and insisted on giving his speech, still wearing his blood-soaked shirt!   Teddy might have become tough but he wasn’t born that way.  He was a sickly child that suffered from severe asthma that almost proved fatal.  As was a young boy, doctors discovered that he had a weak heart, and advised him to get a desk job and not strain himself.  He was homeschooled because of his many illnesses and spent most of his time indoors.   But then as a teen his father, whom Teddy Roosevelt revered, told his son, “ ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Until Midnight

    In Acts 20, there is the tragicomic event surrounding a young man by the name of Eutychus. He did what a lot of folks before and after him did, he fell asleep during a sermon. Unfortunately, he was setting in in the third story window at the time. So instead of nodding off and hitting the pew in front of him, he fell to his death. The good news was the apostle Paul was delivering the sermon and had the ability to bring him back.       I don’t know, however, if we can judge Eutychus too harshly. The sermon had gone on till midnight. Paul wouldn’t finish it up till daybreak. That’s a long lesson. I know some folks that might want to jump out of a window if I had a lesson that long, yet these Christians wanted to be there to hear Paul.   Don’t get me wrong, I’m not pushing for all night sermons but I think we might need to adopt these folks' dedication. They knew that Paul was only in town for a limited time only and they were determined to ...
Post a Comment
Read more