Finger of God or More Word-Faith Deception?
Brothers and sisters in Christ:
This post is one that may rankle a few feathers. That is not my goal. I mention it first because I know that the subject of Word-Faith theology is hotly debated today. That Word-Faith theology is defended is in my view a sad commentary on the Church of Jesus Christ. Clearly a large segment of the Church has lost its ability to discern between the doctrines of God and the doctrines of demons.
That brief critique serves to alert the reader that precious little Word-Faith theology is biblical. This is to be expected however, when the foundation of a belief system is laid upon something other than Jesus Christ, Son of God, Sovereign Lord, the God-man. Nevertheless, it is the responsibility of theologians and Bible teachers to take on the hard subjects and tread the paths where fearless people hesitate to go.
Hardly an introduction that inspires readers to continue, and yet, if you will engage what I have to say here I believe you will be the better off for it. The occasion of this writing is a response to a dear brother who asked me to watch and then critique ten YouTube videos all entitled “Finger of God.” At first I was hopeful that what I was about to watch would be encouraging and inspirational due to their Scriptural content and accurate reflection of our Wonderful God. That hope was short-lived. What I found instead was over one hundred minutes of video footage that purported among other things that God was miraculously giving people gold teeth, filling people’s Bibles with manna from heaven, sending angels to appear in group pictures of soldiers in Iraq, dropping gem stones out of thin air into people’s hands, and perhaps most interesting, miraculously healing people. Three prominent examples of such healings being: (1) a Mozambique man named Francis who was beaten to death by four men and then brought back to life because his church family, who had gathered together to pray, refused to press charges against the men who had earlier beaten Francis to death. Roland Baker states that Francis was raised from the dead because the church forgave the murderers; (2) a Bulgarian gypsy receiving a brand new kidney through the laying on of hands and prayer; (3) and a Muslim woman who was blind in one eye receiving sight through the laying on of hands and prayer.
At issue here brothers and sisters is not the sincerity of those believers involved in these activities, nor is it the power or ability of God to do any of the things claimed as His activities in the video footage. At issue here is whether or not the activities prominently displayed and credited as movements of God are in fact authentic, whether or not these claims can be verified, whether or not there is a solid biblical basis for defining these activities as from God, and lastly the complete body of teachings and doctrines espoused by those involved in promoting these activities as movements of God.
Let me dispel the most obvious objection to an article like this before I begin. There will be some who claim that Christians have no business “judging” other Christians. Those who object to the activities put forth as movements of God in the “Finger of God” videos are challenged with a rejoinder that typically follows some pattern of “God will judge those who teach falsehoods, so believers should never challenge other believers.” This is nothing more than a repackaged “Touch not God’s anointed” threat that the Word-Faith teachers have attempted to use for years to diffuse criticism of their teachings and activities. Thus the response to those who believe that “God will sort it all out” is to remind them that God has already told us to sort it out. For example, we read these words of our Lord Jesus Christ:
And Jesus answered and said to them, “See to it that no one misleads you. For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will mislead many” (Matthew 24:4-5 NAS).
“Then if anyone says to you, ‘Behold, here is the Christ,’ or ‘There He is,’ do not believe him. For false Christs and false prophets will arise and will show great signs and wonders, so as to mislead, if possible, even the elect. Behold, I have told you in advance. So if they say to you, ‘Behold, He is in the wilderness,’ do not go out, or, ‘Behold, He is in the inner rooms,’ do not believe them” (Matthew 24:23-26 NAS).
Some additional Scriptural directives to discern the doctrines of God from the doctrines of demons:
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world (1 John 4:1 NAS).
I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people; I did not at all mean with the immoral people of this world, or with the covetous and swindlers, or with idolaters, for then you would have to go out of the world. But actually, I wrote to you not to associate with any so-called brother if he is an immoral person, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or a swindler–not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Do you not judge those who are within the church? But those who are outside, God judges. REMOVE THE WICKED MAN FROM AMONG YOURSELVES (1 Corinthians 5:9-13 NAS).
Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others pass judgment (1 Corinthians 14:29 NAS).
I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths (2 Timothy 4:1-4 NAS).
But perhaps the most applicable passage outside of the admonitions of our Lord Jesus Christ to the current crop of New Order of Latter Rain/New Apostolic Reformation/Third Wave apostles and prophets is:
If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or the wonder comes true, concerning which he spoke to you, saying, ‘Let us go after other gods (whom you have not known) and let us serve them,’ you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams; for the LORD your God is testing you to find out if you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul. “You shall follow the LORD your God and fear Him; and you shall keep His commandments, listen to His voice, serve Him, and cling to Him (Deuteronomy 13:1-4 NAS).
I don’t want to get into a lot of commentary on the passages above (although I personally like doing it) as it does not serve the purpose at hand here. I believe these passages clearly teach that believers are to exercise discernment and not accept everything that comes along simply because it is purported to be of God. Remember that Jesus Christ said there would come a time when all sorts of false Christs would be raised. When Christ spoke of false Christs arising He was not limiting His prophecy to people who would claim to be a messiah but instead meant the whole spirit of the age when false teachers and self-proclaimed prophets would try and convince others that salvation could be found in all sorts of ways that they coincidentally promoted, and that God could be seen in the signs and wonders that they performed, thus verifying their claims to be His servants. I believe we’re living in those days now.
What struck me first and foremost about the “Finger of God” videos was not the miraculous healings that were claimed to have occurred, but instead was the major figures behind the activities. People like Bill Johnson of Bethel Church in Redding, California, Roland and Heidi Baker, John and Carol Arnott of the Toronto Airport Vineyard, and Georgian Banov. What might not be apparent to those unfamiliar with these people is that every one of them is connected with the so-called Apostolic Reformation, Third Wave, New Order of Latter Rain, and other spurious and outright heretical groups of radical experientialists, mystics, and self-promoting apostles, and prophets.
These groups all espouse some form of the Latter Rain heresies. This movement originated in North Battleford, Saskatchewan, Canada, among Pentecostal charismatics in 1948. The name “Latter Rain” was adopted based on interpretations of several Old Testament passages that adherents believed described God’s outpouring of His Spirit in the last days that was meant to restore the power of the Church through official offices that transcended denominational lines. According to the Latter Rain/New Apostolic Reformation teachers, these offices had been lost to the Church.
From those alleged outpourings arose many traveling evangelists, faith healers, and Bible teachers. The work of these individuals collectively came to be referred to as the Latter Rain Revival that lasted from 1948 through 1952. Men associated with this movement/revival from its inception and very early days include William Branham, Oral Roberts, Franklin Hall, T.L. Osborn, and Paul Cain.
Reception of the Latter Rain Revivalists was limited and within two years the Assemblies of God officially denounced the movement/revival and its abhorrent teachings and doctrines. Nevertheless many of those teachings and doctrines rejected as heresy have resurfaced and been received in many modern churches. Among the most prevalent are: (1) The supposed restoration of the fivefold ministry of Ephesians 4; (2) Positive Confession (name-it, claim-it); (3) The impartation of spiritual gifts through the laying on of hands; (4) The seed-faith doctrines; (5) Kingdom Now eschatology; and (6) The Manifest Sons of God teachings. These teachings and doctrines continue to be advanced today by such men as Bill Hamon, Kenneth Copeland, Fred Price, Creflo Dollar, Rod Parsley, Benny Hinn, C. Peter Wagner, Rick Joyner, Kim Clement, Todd Bentley, and the aforementioned John and Carol Arnott, Georgian Banov, Roland and Heidi Baker, and Bill Johnson.
Bill Johnson was featured prominently in the “Finger of God” videos. He pastors a church in Redding, California that operates a “school of ministry” that teaches its students to perform miracles of healing and then sends them out into the surrounding communities to practice their “gifts.” You would be hard-pressed to find anything wrong with the zeal his school of ministry students demonstrate for going out into the surrounding cities to heal people. One must wonder though at the basis for their zeal. Is it with or without knowledge? Are they proclaiming Jesus as Lord who calls us to suffer for His name sake or are they proclaiming a Jesus who says all Christians can enjoy health and wealth as a birth-right? Thus, at issue for this writer is the nature of what students are taught as the foundation for their ministry.
Some may misunderstand or miss the distinction here. That may be attributable to a misunderstanding of the entire Word-Faith theology. Throughout the Finger of God videos a subtle theme was presented. That theme was that God calls us to love and not judge. God calls us to heal and not declare the need for repentance and confession. God calls us to offer the Good News of His love for people apart from a call to these same people to transformed lives through faith in the Son of God. In other words, just love people and cast aside discernment; just love people and let God do whatever he will do; just love people and don’t concern yourself about making disciples. Obviously this directly contradicts the testimony of the Scriptures, especially the Great Commission of Matthew 28 where we are explicitly instructed to make disciples, teaching them all that Jesus said.
This is glaringly evident in the aforementioned scene where a Muslim woman allegedly received her sight when Heidi Baker laid hands on her and prayed. The local Christian pastor wanted to share the Good News of Jesus Christ with this Muslim in order for her to understand the basis of her healing and he was told “just love her.” Interestingly, as Baker left after praying for this woman, the video records the woman extolling her Muslim faith and the Koran.
Equally troubling in these ten video segments are the totally unsubstantiated claims of gold dust, manna, and gem stones appearing out of thin air. The Bible commends those who hold to the truth found in the Scriptures yet the Finger of God videos all commend those who promote and believe experiential signs and wonders. In their promotion of experiences over the Word, these Word-Faith teachers place themselves in direct contradiction to the Bible.
For instance, God ceased giving manna on the day after the Israelites ate of the fields in Canaan (Joshua 5:12). The instructions the Israelites received was to put some of the manna in a jar to keep as a reminder of God’s provision for them (Exodus 16:32-35). Jesus said manna would not be eaten again until His millennial reign commenced (Revelation 2:17). This passage is interesting in that Jesus describes the manna as hidden until that day.
Concerning the alleged gold dust and gold teeth, this is a hoax of the grandest proportions.[1] Beyond this, it can be proven that the sudden and unexplained appearance of gold dust is a demonic manifestation prevalent within pagan religions and is a prominent feature of Satanism. JMS explains:
Within Wicca and Shamanism sects are many splinter groups that embrace something called “fairy magic” . There is Fae Wicca, Fae Shamanism, The Third Road, Celtic Shamanism, etc. each of these sects practice something called “fae magic”, “faery magic” “faerie traditions” etc. This “magic” is often thought of as “white witchcraft” which is allegedly “good” witchcraft. Faeries (also known as sidhe, pixies, elves, sheoques, brownies, pookas, goblins, etc) are actually demonic spirits and I don’t care how “cute” some of them are reported to be, this type of ideology only serves to enhance the satanic deception of being involved with them. (note there are even churches that worship faeries, though not many in number)
The idea of gold apparitions (gold teeth?) or gold dust also known as faerie dust, pixie dust, stardust, and the gift of fae within the occult, is allegedly representative of the highest “spiritual” attainment and is associated with the presence of faery spirits.[2]
This direct connection between Word-Faith practices and the occult/demonic is documented exhaustively in scholarly works too many to list. Yet, thousands of otherwise seemingly intelligent believers continue to regurgitate ungodly and demonstrably false teachings mouthed by people who should have been judged as false teachers and excommunicated from the confessing Church of Jesus Christ. Again, that they have not is not a testament to the truthfulness of their error but is instead an indictment against the Church at large.
Consider these false teachings that Johnson, the Arnott’s, and others in the Finger of God videos subscribe to:
“Poverty is from the devil and that God wants all Christians prosperous” (Benny Hinn, TBN 11/6/90).
The similarities between the Word-Faith heretics and the New Age teachings concerning money are not a coincidence. They both drink from the same stream of paganism:
“Above all, as you rid yourself of old, stale feelings of guilt and obligation, you will understand that indeed, YOU DESERVE WEALTH, and you will feel greatly empowered to change your life so that you are now able to let this wealth into your life” (www.rebirthing.co.nz/money.html).
“The whole point is I’m trying to get you to see- to get out of this malaise of thinking that Jesus and the disciples were poor and then relating that to you- thinking that you, as a child of God, have to follow Jesus. The Bible says that He has left us an example that we should follow His steps. That’s why I drive a Rolls Royce. I’m following Jesus steps” (Fredrick K.C. Price, “Ever Increasing Faith” program on TBN, December 9,1990).
“If you keep talking death, that is what your going to have. If you keep talking sickness and disease that is what your going to have, because you are going to create the reality of them with your own mouth. That’s a divine law” (Fred Price, Realm 29).
“What you are saying is exactly what your getting now. If you are living in poverty and lack and want, change what you are saying….The powerful force of the spiritual world that creates the circumstances around us is controlled by the words of the mouth” (Kenneth Copeland: The Laws of Prosperity, Kenneth Copeland Publications).
The Word-Faith teaching of positive confession or as it is commonly known, “name it, claim it,” demonstrates roots in the mind science cults and Christian Science particularly as well as Satanism:
“A Word, as defined by this Initiate, is a conceptualization of those trends, actions, and forces set in motion which have taken Magicians to a certain point in time ……..” (The Power of a Word by James Lewis; Magus of the Temple of Set [a satanic coven]).
“Here is something to ponder; adepts who practice the right way to live also practice the right way to think. They have learned to work hand in hand with the force. They have learned to adjust their thinking accordingly. Being chips off the old block, they realize they are creators, some to more extent than others. Of course this all comes with practice” (Satan’s Bible by Daemon Egan; The Book of Leved; The Seven Scrolls; [the ‘force’ mentioned is Satan]).
“Why settle for what someone else has created, when instead you can create your own realms to absolute perfection? Afterall, you are the God, the creator and master of all you survey in your very own heaven”(Satan’s Bible by Daemon Egan; The Sermons of Lucifer).
“Positive thoughts concerning yourself and others will produce positive results, and negative thoughts will result in just the opposite.”(Satan’s Bible by Daemon Egan; The Book of Leved; The Seven Scrolls; Scroll 3)
The Word-Faith doctrine of “name it, claim it,” is the same thing as the New Age method of “name it and claim it.” Both are methods of “manifesting.” This demonic doctrine is promoted as a way for believers to get what they have become convinced they need and/or have a right to but is nothing more than satanic imagining and visualization. Consider the historical trail of the development of the name it, claim it heresy:
This teaching was given by a “spirit” [devil] named ‘Omni” through (channeling) a man named John Payne. Payne is quoted as saying “manifesting is the art of creating what you want at the time you want it” [author’s parenthesis].
“Manifesting is an eclectic hodgepodge of creating your own reality, visualization techniques, positive thinking, goal setting, self-analysis, selective thinking and post hoc reasoning, supported by tons of anecdotes. The purpose of manifesting is to get what you want by actively making your dreams come true, rather than passively waiting for someone to fulfill your dreams. Anne Marie Evers recommends “affirmation” [positive confession – author’s emphasis] as the best way to manifest one’s desires.” (Info taken from the ‘Skeptics Dictionary’ by Todd Carroll, on Manifesting).
Actually all “manifesting really is, is an acceptable and perhaps palatable version of spell crafting, and invocations; in other words, it is a nice acceptable rendering of practicing nothing more than witchcraft. The devil is simply making his evil look pretty by covering it up, disguising it and giving it a nice respectable name.
The point of citing the above (and there is much more on this subject) is to simply show the reader, if you are using little formulas, gimmicks, or tricks to obtain what you desire, if you are using doctrines outside of God’s will and His Word, if you have some little “ritual” or pattern or technique you are using…then you are engaging in witchcraft, even if it is unknowingly. The doctrine of “YOU can have what YOU say” is a doctrine void of the biblical principals of seeking God for His will on an individual basis.You may note from the above, YOUR will is the only one that matters in getting what you want, God is not sought nor considered. It is my opinion (within some christian circles) the Bible has been used as a type of “magick book” to get what one may want.. Even more, this seriously depletes the sovereignty of Almighty God, reducing Him to that of a spirit that has to do our bidding, very much like the occult. You can have what YOU say; according to witchcraft you can, for example within New Age and Wiccan philosophy:”saying mantra’s (a form of witchcraft and magic) is a wonderful way to raise your light levels. Mantra’s are holy words or expressions which when thought, spoken aloud or chanted (recited) draw great light to us and build a spiritual force.”(Taken from Mantra’s and Meditations; elevated therapy; author unknown) This doctrine may be likened to word of faith philosophy on “faith being a force”.
Yes, YOU can have what YOU say according to witchcraft and its components.[3]
The most troubling aspect of the latest signs and wonders movement represented in the Finger of God videos is the underlying doctrinal beliefs of Bill Johnson and others concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. Johnson has declared in his book “Heaven Invades Earth” that, “Jesus laid aside his divinity . . . the anointing Jesus received at his baptism was the equipment necessary to make it possible for Jesus to live beyond human limitations” (page 79).
Johnson’s doctrine of the “kenosis” is a heresy shared by all Word-Faith teachers who teach that Jesus laid aside His divinity at the incarnation, received the Holy Spirit at His baptism, lost this anointing when he died on the cross and was subsequently “born again” in hell. Aside from the obvious blasphemy this teaching represents, Bible believing Christians must understand that anyone who denies the essential attributes of Jesus Christ – His divinity in this instance – and then has the audacity to teach that Jesus was a man that needed to be born again just like the created man, is not a Christian. It doesn’t matter how many spectacular signs and wonders appear to accompany a ministry, the man or woman who espouses this teaching is not a Christian and is not being used of God to lead others to Christ through saving faith.
On the basis of the doctrines Johnson and his ilk believe and teach the entire Finger of God video series that purports to demonstrate the works of God through miraculous signs and wonders must be rejected as manifestations of demons through the teachings of deceived men and women.
Orrel Steinkamp was right when he stated that the current version of Christian Evangelicalism is terminally ill due to the immune system of discernment being switched off.[4] It’s time to awaken the Church of Jesus Christ from its slumbers so that it can once again become the watchmen on the wall it is called to be.
[1]See http://intotruth.org/tb/gold.html Additionally, both WV Grant and Peter Popoff were exposed as frauds. This hasn’t prevented the modern Word-Faith charlatans from promoting the same heresies. See http://www.apologeticsindex.org/487-peter-popoff and http://www.bible.ca/tongues-encyclopedia-pentecostal-preachers.htm#grant All three websites accessed February 15, 2010.
[2]See http://www.deceptioninthechurch.com/dod2.html Accessed February 9, 2010.
[3]All quotes in this section available at http://www.deceptioninthechurch.com/dod2.html Accessed February 9, 2010.
[4]Orrel Steinkamp, The Plumbline, Vol. 14, No. 6, November/December 2009.
Thanks for being faithful to your call Mike. Thanks for teaching sound doctrine. God bless you. Jeff.
Thank you Jeff.
praise lord in jesus name .my name is joseph from india our god one or three tell me
Hi Joseph:
Thank you for writing. Below is an article written by James White that provides a good presentation on the subject of the Trinity.
The Trinity, the Definition of Chalcedon, and Oneness Theology
by James White
I. Introduction
The doctrine of the Trinity requires a balanced view of Scripture. That is, since the doctrine itself is derived from more than one stream of evidence, it requires that all the evidence be weighed and given authority. If any of the foundational pillars of the doctrine (monotheism, the deity of Christ, the person of the Holy Spirit, etc.) be ignored or even rejected, the resulting doctrinal system will differ markedly from the orthodox position, and will lose its claim to be called “biblical.” For centuries various small groups have rejected the doctrine of the Trinity. In modern times these groups have frequently attracted quite a following; Jehovah’s Witnesses as the modern heirs of Arius have over 3 million people actively engaged in their work; the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons) are heirs of ancient polytheism and mystery religions, and nearly 10 million adhere to their teachings. A smaller number of people, however, cling to the third-century position of modalism – the teachings of men such as Sabellius or Praxeas or Noetus. Though fewer in number, it is this position, popularly called the “Oneness” teaching, that prompts this paper’s clarification of the Biblical position regarding the doctrine of the Trinity and the Person of Jesus Christ. Oneness writers strongly deny the doctrine of the Trinity. In the words of David K. Bernard,
“The Bible does not teach the doctrine of the trinity, and trinitarianism actually contradicts the Bible. It does not add any positive benefit to the Christian message….the doctrine of the trinity does detract from the important biblical themes of the oneness of God and the absolute deity of Jesus Christ.”[1]
The attack on the Trinity launched by Oneness writers can be divided into two camps. There are some writers who know what the doctrine is and disagree with it; unfortunately, many others don’t know what it is and attack it anyway, normally misrepresenting the doctrine in quite obvious ways. For example, one writer, while ridiculing the use of the term “mystery” in reference to the Trinity said, “When asked to explain how God could be one and three persons at the same time the answer is, “It’s a mystery.” “[2] Of course, the doctrine of the Trinity does not say God is one person and three persons or one being and three beings, but that within the one being of God there exists eternally three persons. It is easy to see why many find the doctrine unintelligible, especially when they trust writers who are not careful in their research. This Oneness teaching is quite attractive to the person who wishes, for whatever personal reason, to “purge” the faith of what they might consider to be “man’s philosophies.” There are a number of Oneness groups in the United States, located primarily in the South and Midwest. The United Pentecostal Church is the largest of the Oneness groups in the U.S.; others include the Apostolic Overcoming Holy Church of God, the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World, and the Church of our Lord Jesus Christ of the Apostolic Faith. Each of these groups has thousands of followers, many of whom are quite evangelistic in spreading their faith. Given that many of the issues that Oneness addresses are not familiar ground for most Christians, it is good to examine these issues in the light of Biblical revelation and theology so that the orthodox Christian will be able to “give a reason” for the hope that is within us. This survey will be broken into four sections. First, the important aspects of the doctrine of the Trinity relevant to the Oneness position will be examined. These would include the Christian definition of monotheism, the existence of three persons, the pre-existence of the Son and the internal operations of the Trinity. Secondly, vital issues relevant to Christology will be addressed, such as the Chalcedonian definition, the unipersonality of Christ, and the relationship of the Father and the Son. Thirdly, the Oneness position will be defined and presented, and finally that position will be critiqued.
II. Trinitarian Concepts
The very word “Trinity” is made up of two terms – “tri” and “unity.” The doctrine travels the middle road between the two, and neither can be allowed to predominate the other. Trinitarians have but one God – the charge of polytheism or tritheism leveled at the orthodox position ignores the very real emphasis, drawn from the Biblical witness to one God, on monotheism. This can be seen, for example, in the definition of the Trinity given by Berkhof:
A) There is in the Divine Being but one indivisible essence (ousia, essentia). B) In this one Divine Being there are three Persons or individual subsistences, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. C) The whole undivided essence of God belongs equally to each of the three persons. D) The subsistence and operation of the three persons in the divine Being is marked by a certain definite order. E) There are certain personal attributes by which the three persons are distinguished. F) The Church confesses the Trinity to be a mystery beyond the comprehension of man.[3]
Twice the emphasis is made that the essence or being of God is indivisible. There is but one being that is God. The doctrine of the Trinity safeguards this further by asserting that “the whole undivided essence of God belongs equally to each of the three persons.” This follows logically on the heels of asserting the indivisibility of the being of God, for if three Persons share that one being, they must share all of that being. The Father is not just 1/3 of God – he is fully Deity, just as the Son and the Spirit. The Biblical evidence for monotheism is legion, and it is not within the scope of this paper to review all those passages. The Shema might be sufficient to demonstrate the point, for this recital begins at Deuteronomy 6:4 with the words, “Hear, O Israel; Yahweh is our God; Yahweh is one.” This concept of monotheism separates Judaism (and Christianity) from any kind of polytheistic religion. Given monotheism as a basis, it must be stressed that the bald statement of monotheism does not imply nor denote unitarianism. When the Bible says God is one, this does not mean that God is unitarian (i.e., uni-personal) in his mode of existence. Frequently individual writers will quote from the many passages that teach that there is one God and will infer from this a denial of the tri-personality of God. This is going beyond what is written. It is vital, if justice is to be done to the Biblical teaching, that all of the witness of Scripture be given due consideration. If the Bible presents more data that clarifies the meaning of God’s “oneness,” then this information must be taken into account. Does, then, the Bible indicate the existence of more than one Person in the divine nature? It most certainly does. John Calvin expressed the proper balance well in the Institutes:
“Again, Scripture sets forth a distinction of the Father from the Word, and of the Word from the Spirit. Yet the greatness of the mystery warns us how much reverence and sobriety we ought to use in investigating this. And that passage in Gregory of Nazianus vastly delights me: ” “I cannot think on the one without quickly being encircled by the splendor of the three; nor can I discern the three without being straightway carried back to the one.” Let us not, then, be led to imagine a trinity of persons that keeps our thoughts distracted and does not at once lead them back to that unity. Indeed, the words “Father,” “Son,” and “Spirit” imply a real distinction – let no one think that these titles, whereby God is variously designated from his works, are empty – but a distinction, not a division.”[4]
Before looking at the particular Biblical data, it is good to make the same emphasis as made by Gregory via Calvin – though this paper will emphasize the triunity of God, this is only because of the object of clarification, that being the Oneness teaching. Balance demands that both elements – the existence of three persons as well as the absolute claim of monotheism – be maintained. The Christian church maintains that the terms Father, Son and Holy Spirit refer to actual Persons, not simply modes of existence. As the popular, short definition goes, “There is within the one being that is God three co-equal and co-eternal Persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” The Father is not the Son, the Son is not the Spirit, the Spirit is not the Father, etc. Each is eternal – the Father has always been, the Son has always been, and the Spirit has always been. No person precedes the other, no follows another. Charles Hodge said in reflecting on the early church councils,
“These Councils decided that the terms Father, Son, and Spirit, were not expressive merely of relations ad extra, analogous to the terms, Creator, Preserver, and Benefactor. This was the doctrine known as Sabellianism, which assumed that the Supreme Being is not only one in essence, but one in person. The Church doctrine asserts that Father, Son, and Spirit express internal, necessary, and eternal relations in the Godhead; that they are personal designations, so that the Father is one person, the Son another person, and the Spirit another person. They differ not as allo kai allo, but as allos kai allos; each says I, and each says Thou, to either of the others. The word used in the Greek Church to express this fact was first prosopon, and afterwards, and by general consent, hupostasis; in the Latin Church, “persona,” and in English, person. The idea expressed by the word in its application to the distinctions in the Godhead, is just as clear and definite as in its application to men.”[5]
Some Oneness writers have gone so far as to say, “To say that God is three persons and find substantiation for it in the Scripture is a work in futility. There is literally nothing in the Bible that supports God being three persons.”[6] However, as the Church throughout the ages has seen fit to reject the modalistic presentation, there must obviously be some reason for this. Such reason is found in the teaching of Scripture itself. The Bible presents a number of categories of evidence that demonstrates the existence of three Persons all sharing the one being that is God. First, the Persons are described as personal; that is, the attributes of personhood and personal existence are ascribed to the three. Secondly, clear distinctions are made between the Persons, so that it is impossible to confound or confuse the three. The second Person, the Son, is described as being eternal (as is the Spirit, but in this context, given the denial of the eternal nature of the Son by the Oneness position, and the acceptance of the eternality of the Spirit by the same group, this point is more tangent to the issue) and is differentiated in this pre-existence from the Father. Finally, we see real and eternal relationships between the Persons (the opera ad intra.) One of the characteristics of personal existence is will. Few would argue the point in relationship to the Father, as He obviously has a will. So too, the Son has a will, for he says to the Father in the Garden, “not as I will, but as you will.” (Matthew 26:39) The ascription of will to the Persons indicates the ability to reason, to think, to act, to desire – all those things we associate with self-consciousness. As we shall see later, there is a difference between nature and person, and one of those differences is the will. Inanimate objects do not will; neither do animals. Part of the imago dei is the will itself.
Another aspect of personhood seen to exist with each of the Persons is the ability to love. In John 3:35 we read that “the Father loves the Son…” This is repeated in John 5:20. In John 15:9 the Father loves the Son, and the Son in return loves those who are His own. In Jesus’ prayer to the Father in John 17, we are again reminded of the Father’s love for Jesus in 17:23, and in verse 24 we are told that this love between Father and Son has existed from all eternity. That love marks every word of Jesus concerning the Father is beyond dispute, and is it not fair to say that the giving of the Holy Spirit to the Church is an act of love as well? Hence we see that the persons described in these passages (and in many others) are capable of love, a personal attribute. It might be argued that these personal attributes are simply applied to the three manifestations of God, but that this does not necessarily mean that there are three Persons. However, the Bible clearly differentiates between the three Persons, as the brief survey to follow demonstrates. One of the more well-known examples of the existence of three Persons is the baptism of Jesus recorded in Matthew 3:16-17. Here the Father speaks from heaven, the Son is being baptized (and is again described as being the object of the Father’s love, paralleling the Johannine usage), and the Spirit is descending as a dove.[7] Jesus is not speaking to himself here (as many non-Christian groups tend to accuse the Trinitarians of making Jesus a ventriloquist), but is spoken to by the Father. There is no confusing of the Persons at the baptism. The transfiguration of Jesus in Matthew 17:1-9 again demonstrates the separate personhood of the Father and the Son. The Son’s true pre- existent glory is unveiled for an instant in the presence of the Father in the cloud. Communication again takes place, marked with the familiar love of the Father for the Son. Both the deity and the separate personhood of the Son is clearly presented in this passage. The Father spoke to the Son at another time, recorded in John 12:28. Again, the distinction of person of the Father and the Son is clearly maintained.
Some of the most obvious passages relevant to the Father and the Son are found in the prayers of Jesus Christ. These are no mock prayers – Jesus is not speaking to Himself (nor, as the Oneness writer would put it, is Jesus’ humanity speaking to His deity) – He is clearly communicating with another Person, that being the Person of the Father. Transcendent heights are reached in the lengthiest prayer we have, that of John 17. No one can miss the fact of the communication of one Person (the Son) with another (the Father) presented in this prayer. The usage of personal pronouns and direct address put the very language squarely on the side of maintaining the separate personhood of Father and Son. This is not to say that their unity is something that goes far beyond simple purpose; indeed, given the background of the Old Testament, the very statements of the Son regarding His relationship with the Father are among the strongest assertions of His Deity in the Bible.
But, as stated before, the doctrine of the Trinity is pre-eminently a balanced doctrine that differentiates between the being or nature of God and the Persons who share equally that being. If there is more than one God, or if there is less than three Persons, then the doctrine of the Trinity is in error. Striking is the example of Matthew 27:46 where Jesus, quoting from Psalm 22:1 cries out, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” That the Father is the immediate person addressed is clear from Luke’s account where the next statement from Jesus in his narrative is “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” (Luke 23:46)[8] Some early heresies (predominately gnostic in character) had to posit some kind of “separation” of the Deity from the human Son at this point (and indeed, some Oneness writers could be accused of the same problem). That this is the Son addressing the Father is crystal clear, and the ensuing personhood of both is inarguable.
One of the high-water marks of Synoptic Christology is to be found in Matthew 11:27. Here the reciprocity between the Father and Son is put forth with exactness, while at the same time dictating the absolute deity of both. The relationship of the Father and Son is the topic under discussion in both John 5:16ff and John 8:12ff. The Apostle again walks a tight line in maintaining the distinct personhood of Father and Son while asserting the full deity of Jesus Christ. Outside of a Trinitarian concept of God, this position of John’s is unintelligible. Important in this discussion is the fact that in the very same passages that the Deity of the Son is emphasized his distinction from the Father is also seen. This causes insuperable problems for the Oneness position, as we shall see. In John 5:19-24, Jesus clearly differentiates himself from the Father, yet claims attributes that are only proper of Deity (life, judgment, honor). In John 5:30 the Son says He can do nothing of Himself, yet in 37-39 he identifies Himself as the one witnessed to by the Scriptures who can give eternal life. Only Yahweh of the Tanakh can do so.
Hence, the deity spoken of by Jesus is not the Father dwelling in the Son, but is the Son’s personally. This is seen even more plainly in chapter 8. Here it is the Son who utilizes the phrase ego eimi in the absolute sense, identifying Himself as Yahweh. It is the Son who says He is glorified by the Father (v. 54) and yet only four verses later it is the Son who says, “Before Abraham came into existence, I AM!” Clearly the Son is fully deity just as the Father. And what of the Spirit? Jesus said in John 14:16-17 that the Father would send another (Gr: allos) comforter. Jesus had been the Comforter for the disciples during His earthly ministry, but He was about to leave them and return to heaven where he had been before (John 17:5). The Holy Spirit, identified as a Person by John (through his usage of the masculine ekeinos at John 16:13), is sent both by the Father (John 14:16) as well as by the Son (16:7).[9] The Spirit is not identified as the Father, nor as the Son, for neither could send Himself.
Hence, it is clear from this short review that the Scriptures differentiate between the Person of the Father and the Person of the Son, as well as differentiating between these and the Spirit. The next area that must be addressed is the Biblical teaching of the pre-existence of the Son, or, as often referred to by Oneness writers, the “eternal Son theory.” That the Son, as a divine Person, has existed from all eternity, is a solidly Biblical teaching. Most denials of this teaching stem from a misunderstanding of the term monogenes[10]or the term “begotten” as used in Psalm 2:7. Such denials cannot stand under the weight of the Biblical evidence. Though other passages could be examined, we will limit the discussion to seven Biblical sections that clearly teach the pre-existence of the Son as a Person within the divine being. What may be the most obvious passage is found in Colossians chapter 1, verses 13 through 17. Here the “beloved Son” is described as “the image of the invisible God, the firstborn (Gr: prototokos) of all creation.” He (the Son) is then described as the Creator in what could only be called exhaustive terms. Certainly, if the Son is the creator, then the Son both pre-existed and is indeed eternal, for God is the creator of all that is. It will not do to say that this passage says that God created all things for the Son who was yet to exist; for verse 16 is emphatic is announcing that it was “in Him” that all things were created (the usage of en is the instrumental of agency). Without doubt the Son is presented here as pre-existent.
The same can be said of Philippians 2:5-7, the Carmen Christi. This passage has spawned literally hundreds of volumes, and an in-depth exegesis is not called for here. Rather, it is obvious that the Son is presented here as eternally existing (huparchon) in the very morphe tou theou – the form of God. This One is also said to be “equal with God.” Note there is here no confounding of the Persons (just as throughout Scripture) yet there is just as plainly an identification of more than one Person under discussion. It was not the Father with whom the Son was equal who became flesh and “made Himself of no repute”; rather, it was the Son who did this. The opening chapter of the book of Hebrews identifies the Son as pre-existent as well. Verse 2 echoes Colossians 1:13-17 in saying that it was “through the Son” that the worlds were made. This Son is the “radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His being.” Again the distinction of the Son from the Father is maintained at the exact same time as the absolute deity of the Son is put forward, a balance found only in the doctrine of the Trinity and not in non-Christian theories. The Son, verse 3 says, “upholds all things by His powerful word.” This is directly analogous to the final statements of Colossians 1:17, and demands the continuous and eternal existence of the Son to make any sense whatsoever. In light of this, it is clear that the interpretation of verse 5, which quotes from Psalm 2, that asserts a beginning for the Son misses the entire point of the opening of Hebrews. In its original context, this passage did not indicate that God had literally fathered the king to whom the Psalm was addressed; certainly, therefore, such a forced meaning cannot be placed on this usage either. Rather, the writer of Hebrew’s purpose is to exalt the Son and demonstrate His superiority even to the angels, going so far as to clearly identify the Son as Yahweh in verses 10 through 12. It would be strange indeed if the writer tried to show the real nature of the Son by saying that He, like the angels, was a created, non-eternal being. The Lord Jesus Himself never attempted to say He had a beginning, but was instead aware of His true nature.
In the real “Lord’s prayer” of John 17, he states in verse 5, “And now you glorify me, Father, with the glory I had with you (para seauto) before the worlds were made.” Jesus is here conscious of the glory which He had shared with the Father in eternity, a clear reflection of Philippians 2, Hebrews 1, and, as we shall see, John 1. As Yahweh declares that he will give his glory to no other (Isaiah 48:11) yet another identification of the Son as being one with the Father in sharing the divine name Yahweh is here presented. This glorious pre-existence of which Jesus here speaks is also seen in John 14:28 when Jesus, having said He was returning to the Father, points out to the disciples that they should have rejoiced at this, for rather than His continued existence in His current state of humiliation (the “being made of no repute” of Philippians 2), He was about to return to His glorious position with the Father in heaven, a position which is “greater” than the one He now was enduring.
Many passages in the New Testament identify the Lord Jesus Christ as Yahweh. One of these is John 8:58, where, again speaking as the Son, Jesus asserts his existence before Abraham. As pointed out above, it does not do to say that this was simply an assertion that the deity resident within Him pre-existed (in Oneness teaching, the Father) but rather it was He as the Son who was “before Abraham.” In John 3:13 Jesus said, “no one has gone up into heaven except the one who came out of heaven, the Son of man.”[11]Jesus’ own words indicate that He was aware of His origin and pre-existence. What is also interesting is the name for Himself that is used – the Son of Man. One would expect the Son of God to be used here, but it is not. Jesus was one Person, not two. The Son of God was the Son of Man. One cannot divide Him into two Persons.
The most striking evidence of the pre-existence of the Son is found in the prologue of the Gospel of John. This vital Christological passage is incredible for its careful accuracy to detail – even down to the tenses of verbs the author is discriminating in his writing. It again must be asserted that, without a Trinitarian understanding of God, this passage ends up self-contradictory and illogical. John defines his terms for us in verses 14 and 18. In verse 14 he tells us that the Logos of whom he has been speaking became flesh in the person of Jesus Christ. He also tells us that it is Jesus Christ who, though clearly not the Father Himself, is the one who “makes the Father known” and who is, indeed, the monogenes theos[12] the “unique God.” That verse 18 has under consideration two separate Persons is beyond disputation. That these two Persons are the Father and the Son is just as sure, for John so identifies them. With this in mind, the first three verses are crystalline in their teaching. John asserts that the Logos was “in the beginning,” that is, the Word is eternal. This Logos was “with God” (Gr: pros ton theon.)[13] This latter phrase can only refer to personal contact and communion, a point to be expanded on in much of the Gospel of John. Hence, from this phrase, it is clear that one cannot completely identify the Person of God (in John’s usage here, the Father) with the Logos (i.e., the Son). However, he goes on in the third clause to provide that balance found throughout the inspired text by saying, “the Word was God.” The NEB renders this clause, “and what God was, the Word was.” Perhaps Dr. Kenneth Wuest came the closest when he translated, “And the Word was as to His essence absolute deity.” By placing the term theos in the emphatic position, and by using that term itself (rather than theios – a “godlike” one), John avoids any kind of Arian subordinationism. At the same time, John does not make logos and theos identical to one another, for he does not put an article before theos. By so doing he walks the fine line between Arianism and Sabellianism, subordinationism and modalism. Finally, John asserts, as did Paul before him, that the Logos is the Creator. “Through him were all things made which have been made.” This is exactly the point of Colossians 1:15-17 and Hebrews 1:2. As John identified the Logos as Jesus Christ, the Son of God, then his testimony must be added to all the others in proclaiming the pre-existence of the Son. Having seen the pre-existence of the Son, then we are forced by the Biblical data itself to deal with the internal relationships of the Persons who make up the Godhead. Though many Oneness writers would object to the terminology utilized to discuss this subject, it is they, not the Trinitarian, who are ignoring the Biblical material and its clear teaching. Though an in-depth discussion of the opera ad intra is not warranted in this paper, it might be good to point out that we are obviously here not discussing simply an economic trinity. All of the above evidence points to real and purposeful distinctions (not divisions) within the Being of God that are necessary and eternal, not temporal and passing. God has eternally been trinal and will always be so. The relationship between the essence of God and the Persons is not a subject of Biblical discussion directly; but we are forced to deal with the issue nevertheless – by the Scriptural testimony itself. G. T. Shedd expressed it this way:
“The essence…is not prior, either in the order of nature or of time, to the persons, nor subsequent to them, but simultaneous with them. Hence, the essence is not one constituent factor by itself, apart from the persons, any more than the persons are three constituent factors by themselves, apart from the essence. The one essence is simultaneously three persons, and the three persons are one essence. The trinity is not a composition of one essence with three persons. It is not an essence without distinctions united with three distinctions, so as to make a complex. The trinity is simple and uncomplex. “If,” says Twesten,… “we distinguish between the clearness of light and the different degrees of clearness, we do not imply that light is composed of clearness and degrees of clearness.” Neither is God composed of one untrinal essence and three persons.”[14]
With these Trinitarian concepts in mind, the specific Christological questions must now be addressed.
III. Christological Concepts
“Therefore, following the holy Fathers, we all with one accord teach men to acknowledge one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, at once complete in Godhead and complete in manhood, truly God and truly man, consisting also of a reasonable soul and body; of one substance [homoousios] with the Father as regards his Godhead, and at the same time of one substance with us as regards his manhood; like us in all respects, apart from sin; as regards his Godhead, begotten of the Father before the ages, but yet as regards his manhood begotten, for us men and for our salvation, of Mary the Virgin, the God-bearer [theotokos]; one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, Only-begotten, recognized in two natures, without confusion, without change, without division, without separation [en duo phusesin, asungchutos atreptos, adiairetos achoristos]; the distinction of natures being in no way annulled by the union, but rather the characteristics of each nature being preserved and coming together to form one person and subsistence [hupostasis], not as parted or separated into two persons, but one and the same Son and Only-begotten God the Word, Lord Jesus Christ; even as the prophets from earliest times spoke of him, and our Lord Jesus Christ himself taught us, and the creed of the Fathers has handed down to us.”[15]
In 451 A.D. the Council of Chalcedon formulated this definition of the Person of Christ. The council was called as a result of the controversy concerning the relationship of the divine and the human in the Lord Jesus.[16] The Nestorian controversy, monothelitism, the Eutychian controversy, and others, had precipitated the council. It can be safely said that we have yet to get beyond Chalcedon in our theology – modern orthodox Christological formulations have not proceeded beyond the Chalcedonian definition. Chalcedon’s emphasis on the two natures but one person in Christ was anticipated in its main elements by the Athanasian creed. A portion of that creed reads, “He is perfect God and He is perfect man, with a rational soul and human flesh…Although He is God and man, He is not two but one Christ…because He is one person.” The relationship between the divine and the human in Christ is as unique as the God who brought this situation about. Indeed, to understand this relationship one must first define the terms being utilized, and this was one of the main contributions of Chalcedon. Schaff noted that one of the main importances of Chalcedon was
“The precise distinction between nature and person. Nature or substance is the totality of powers and qualities which constitute a being; person is the Ego, the self-conscious, self-asserting, and acting subject. There is no person without nature, but there may be nature without person (as in irrational beings). The Church doctrine distinguishes in the Holy Trinity three persons (though not in the ordinary human sense of the word) in one divine nature of substance which they have in common; in its Christology it teaches, conversely, two nature in one person (in the usual sense of person) which pervades both. Therefore it cannot be said: The Logos assumed a human person, or united himself with a definite human individual: for then the God-Man would consist of two persons; but he took upon himself the human nature, which is common to all men; and therefore he redeemed not a particular man, but all men, as partakers of the same nature of substance. The personal Logos did not become an individual anthropos, but sarx, flesh, which includes the whole of human nature, body, soul and spirit.”[17]
In his discussion of the Person and work of Christ, Dr. Berkhof gives the following information:
“The term “nature” denotes the sum-total of all the essential qualities of a thing, that which makes it what it is. A nature is a substance possessed in common, with all the essential qualities of such a substance. The term “person” denotes a complete substance endowed with reasons, and, consequently, a responsible subject of its own actions. Personality is not an essential and integral part of a nature, but is, as it were, the terminus to which it tends. A person is a nature with something added, namely, independent subsistence, individuality.”[18]
What does all of this mean? It means that when Jesus spoke, He spoke as one Person, not two. One cannot say that, when claiming deity, Jesus’ “deity” spoke, or when He referred to His humanity, it was His “human nature” that spoke. It can be seen from this that natures don’t speak – only Persons do. And, since Jesus is one Person, not two, He speaks as a whole Person. Hence, when Jesus speaks, He speaks as Jesus. This is in direct contradistinction to Oneness teaching that is fond of making either the Deity in Jesus speak (whom they identify as the Father) or the humanity (the Son). The two natures (divine and human) make up but one Person, Jesus Christ. The divine nature is the Son of God, the eternal Logos. The Chalcedonian definition defines the unipersonality of Christ.[19] Jesus was a true Person; he was not non-human, nor less than human, nor a multiple personality. He had two natures, but those natures were made personal by only one Person, the Word made flesh. Hence, though Jesus may say things that indicate his two natures, what he says represents His whole being, not a certain part thereof. One might well ask the question, what does Scripture say concerning this question? How does the Bible present this teaching? Stuart Olyott answers that question:
“It does so by three strands of teaching. The first is its entire failure to give us any evidence of two personalities in our Lord Jesus Christ…In all that is recorded of our Lord Jesus Christ there is no word spoken by him, no action performed and no attribute predicated of him, which suggests that he is not a single indivisible person…A second line of biblical evidence is found in considering the terms in which the New Testament writers wrote of Christ…There is not a hint that two personalities came to redeem them that were under the law, but one. Both natures are represented as united in one person…But there is a third line of scriptural proof which settles the issue beyond question…It is the fact that what can be true of only one or the other of Christ’s two natures is attributed, not to the nature, but to the one person. He is spoken of in terms true of either one or the other of his natures.”[20]
Olyott gives a number of Biblical examples. Acts 20:28 is cited. Here Paul speaks of the Church of God which “he purchased with His own blood.” Christ’s blood, of course, was part of his human nature, yet this attribute (the blood) is predicated here directly of the divine nature (“God”). “What could only be true of his human nature is said to have been accomplished by the divine person. There is not a human Christ and a divine Christ – two Christs. There is but one Christ.” (p. 105) Another example is 1 Corinthians 2:8 which speaks of the fact that the rulers of this age “crucified the Lord of glory.” Again, though Christ died in human terms, it is the divine Person who is said to have been crucified. No hint is given whatsoever of two persons in the one Jesus; rather, Christ is one Person composed of two natures. But could the term “Father” simply refer to the divine nature in Christ, as Oneness writers assert? The New Testament does not allow for this. As we have already seen, the Biblical witness sharply distinguishes between the Father and the Son. We have seen that Jesus Christ is unipersonal; He is one person. It is just as clear that the Lord Jesus Christ is never identified as the Father, but is shown to be another Person beside the Father. A large class of examples of this would be the greetings in the epistles of Paul. In Romans 1:7 we read, “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”[21] 1 Corinthians 1:3 is identical, as is 2 Corinthians 1:2. Galatians 1:3, Ephesians 1:2, and Philippians 1:2. Nowhere does Paul identify Jesus as the Father. Even more significant in this respect is what is known as Granville Sharp’s Rule. This rule of Greek grammar basically stated says that when two singular nouns are connected by the copulative kai, and the first noun has the article, while the second does not, both nouns are describing the same person. There are a number of Granville Sharp constructions in the New Testament that emphasize the deity of Christ, most especially Titus 2:13 and 2 Peter 1:1. But, no Granville Sharp construction ever identifies the Father as Jesus Christ. The care taken by Paul and the other apostles in differentiating between the Father and Jesus Christ speaks volumes concerning their faith. Some might object to the Trinitarian doctrine of Christ by saying that if we say the Son is (to use a human term) “begotten” eternally by the Father (i.e., there is a relationship that is eternal and timeless between the Father and the Son) that we are in effect positing either subordinationism or tri-theism, depending. Dr. Shedd replied as follows:
“But if the Father is unbegotten, does it not follow that he alone is the absolute Being? and is not this Arianism? Not so. For one and the same numerical essence subsists whole and undivided in him who is generated, as well as in him who generates; in him who is spirated, as well as in those two who spirate. There can therefore be no inequality of essence caused by these acts of generation and spiration.”[22]
Such language seems, to many, to be foreign to the “simple” message of the Gospel. But such an objection ignores the heights of Ephesians 1, as well as the object under discussion – that being the very Person of the Lord of glory. One writer expressed it this way:
“Jesus cannot be analyzed and calculated. But whoever speaks of him in human words is entering into the realm of “rational” speech. There is no unique language for the realm of the incalculable and the “irrational.” Thus, where we express “eschatological history,” the origin and the goal, God’s reality in the man Jesus, our language collapses; it becomes paradoxical. We could also say that our language then expresses awe. It says those things which leave men “speechless.” Its terms are not then a means for grasping but rather for making known that we have been grasped. It is not then a form of mastery, but testimony to the overpowering experience which has come upon man.”[23]
IV. Oneness Theology Defined Having examined some of the pertinent issues relevant to Christian theology, the statements of Oneness exponents themselves will now be examined. The following material is taken from original sources and materials. Following the definition of the position, specific objections will be dealt with. David K. Bernard presented a paper at Harvard Divinity School in 1985. In this paper, Bernard provided a good summary of Oneness teaching:
“The basis of Oneness theology is a radical concept of monotheism. Simply stated, God is absolutely and indivisibly one. There are no essential distinctions or divisions in His eternal nature. All the names and titles of the Deity, such as Elohim, Yahweh, Adonai, Father, Word, and Holy Spirit refer to one and the same being, or – in trinitarian terminology – to one person. Any plurality associated with God is only a plurality of attributes, titles, roles, manifestations, modes of activity, or relationships to man.”[24]
He added in his book, The Oneness of God,
“They believe that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are manifestations, modes, offices, or relationships that the one God has displayed to man.”[25]
Hence, from Bernard’s statements it is clear that the Oneness position adheres to the classical modalistic terminology of such ancient writers as Praxeas of Sabellius or Noetus. However, it would be an error to think that, from the Oneness perspective, the Father, Son and Spirit are one Person. To see exactly what this position is stating, it would be good to look at statements regarding each of the “Persons” as seen by the Trinitarian perspective. First, the question can be asked, “Who is the Father in Oneness theology?”
“The term Father refers to God Himself – God in all His deity. When we speak of the eternal Spirit of God, we mean God Himself, the Father.”[26]
“If there is only one God and that God is the Father (Malachi 2:10), and if Jesus is God, then it logically follows that Jesus is the Father.”[27]
Hence, from this perspective, God is the Father. All that can be predicated of God is predicated of the Father and the Father only. This shall be seen more clearly as we examine the other required questions. “Who is the Word in Oneness theology?” This question receives two answers from Oneness writers – there is a seeming contradiction in response to this question. John Paterson identified the Word as the Father Himself:
So we conclude that the Word was the visible expression of the invisible God – in other words, the invisible God embodied in visible form;…From the Scriptures quoted it should be obvious that the Word was not merely an impersonal thought existing in the mind of God but was, in reality, the Eternal Spirit Himself clothed upon by a visible and personal form…”[28]
In distinction to this, other writers put forward a non-personal “Word”:
“The Logos (Word) of John 1 is not equivalent to the title Son in Oneness theology as it is in trinitarianism. Son is limited to the Incarnation, but Logos is not. The Logos is God’s self expression, “God’s means of self disclosure,” or “God uttering Himself.” Before the Incarnation, the Logos was the unexpressed thought or plan in the mind of God, which had a reality no human thought can have because of God’s perfect foreknowledge, and in the case of the Incarnation, God’s predestination. In the beginning, the Logos was with God, not as a separate person but as God Himself – pertaining to and belonging to God much like a man and his word. In the fulness of time God put flesh on the Logos; He expressed Himself in flesh.”[29]
Bernard further added in The Oneness of God:
“The Word or Logos can mean the plan or thought as it existed in the mind of God. This thought was a predestined plan – an absolutely certain future event – and therefore it had a reality attached to it that no human thought could ever have. The Word can also mean the plan or thought of God as expressed in the flesh, that is in the Son. What is the difference, therefore, between the two terms, Word and Son? The Word had pre-existence and the Word was God (the Father), so we can use it without reference to humanity. However, the Son always refers to the Incarnation and we cannot use it in the absence of the human element. Except as a foreordained plan in the mind of God, the Son did not have pre-existence before the conception in the womb of Mary. The Son of God pre-existed in thought but not in substance. The Bible calls this foreordained plan the Word (John 1:1, 14).”[30]
Thomas Weisser adds, “The Logos of John 1 was simply the concept in the Father’s mind. Not a separate person!”[31] But Robert Brent Graves muddies the water even more by stating, “Only when we begin to take John at his word that God “became flesh” can we begin to understand the power and the authority of Jesus Christ.”[32] Hence, one group of Oneness exponents seem to be saying that the Word was the Father Himself, but manifested in the flesh (Paterson and possibly Graves) while others see the Word as simply the plan of God put into place at the opportune time. Asking the further question, “Who is the Son in Oneness theology?” might shed some light on the Word issue as well. The answer to this is unanimous – the Son is the human aspect of Christ. The Son is a created being who is not in any way divine. The Son did not pre-exist, and indeed, the “Sonship” of God will cease at a time in the future.[33] Important for Oneness teachers is the idea of a begotten Son (see footnote #10 and discussion at that point).
Robert Brent Graves says,
“Although some religious authors have depicted Christ as an “eternal Son. Actually the concept of an eternal Son would not allow the possibility of a begotten Son; for the two would be a contradiction in terms.”[34]
For the Christian to understand just what the Oneness position is asserting, it is necessary that, before continuing looking at each Person individually, we must look to Jesus and the Oneness teaching concerning Him. The key to understanding this theological viewpoint is found in the teaching that Jesus is both the Father and the Son. Paterson explains as follows:
“Therefore, when we say that Jesus is both God and Man, we mean that He is both Father and Son. As the Father, He is absolutely and PURELY God; as the Son, He is absolutely and PURELY Man. When Jesus claims to be God, it is with respect to His Essence as the Eternal Spirit, the Father; and when He says, “My Father is greater than I” (John 14:28), it is with respect to His created nature as Man, the Son…In this connection, let me make this point crystal clear – the doctrine enunciated in this booklet emphasizes the very real humanity of Christ; it is not at all the same as teaching that the Father IS the Son, or that the Son IS the Father. Such teaching is confused, illogical, and unscriptural – but when we say that Jesus is BOTH Father and Son, BOTH God and Man, that is a vastly different matter.”[35]
Likewise, Bernard states,
“Oneness believers emphasize the two natures in Christ, using this fact to explain the plural references to Father and Son in the Gospels. As Father, Jesus sometimes acted and spoke from His divine self-consciousness; as Son He sometimes acted and spoke from His human self-consciousness. The two natures never acted in conflict, for they were united into one person. Aside from their emphasis on the two natures of Christ, Oneness teachers have given inadequate attention to many areas of Christology. Some have made statements that sound Apollinarian because of failure to define and use terms precisely, but Oneness scholars overwhelmingly reject this implication. If carefully developed, Oneness may be seen as compatible with the Christological formulation of the Council of Chalcedon, namely that Christ as two complete natures – deity and humanity – but is only one person.”[36]
Despite Bernard’s assertion, the Oneness position patently denies the uni-personality of Christ. To maintain the uni-personality of God, the Oneness position has to make Jesus into two persons, the Father and the Son. Even Bernard demonstrates this when he says, “Sometimes it is easy to get confused when the Bible describes Jesus in these two different roles, especially when describes Him acting in both roles in the same story…He could speak as man one moment and then as God the next moment.”[37] As we’ve seen, natures do not speak, only persons do. Bernard seems aware of the weakness of the Oneness position at this point, for he is much more willing to admit the depths of the subject than most Oneness writers. He says,
“While the Bible is clear in emphasizing both the full deity and full humanity of Jesus, it does not describe in detail how these two natures are united in the one person of Jesus Christ. This, too, has been the subject of much speculation and debate. Perhaps there is room for divergent views on this issue since the Bible does not treat it directly.”[38]
Bernard is one of the few Oneness writers who does not directly attribute the doctrine of the Trinity to Satan. He seems aware of the fact that the Oneness position avoids the supposed “philosophical language” by basically ignoring the issue that was faced squarely at Nicea and Chalcedon.
This viewpoint gives a unique twist to what otherwise might sound somewhat like orthodox teaching:
“From the Bible we see that Jesus Christ had two distinct natures in a way that no other human being has ever had. One nature is human or fleshly; the other nature is divine or Spirit. Jesus was both fully man and fully God. The name Jesus refers to the eternal Spirit of God (the Father) dwelling in the flesh. We can use the name Jesus to describe either one of His two natures or both. For example, when we say Jesus died on the cross, we mean His flesh died on the cross. When we say Jesus lives in our hearts, we mean His Spirit is there.”[39]
But what Biblical support can the Oneness teacher gather? One of the favorite references is Colossians 2:9, which, in the King James Version (which seems to enjoy predominance in their camp) reads, “For in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” For them, the Godhead would refer to all that makes up God, i.e., the Father:
“According to these verses of Scripture, Jesus is not a part of God, but all of God is resident in Him. If there were several persons in the Godhead, according to Colossians 2:9 they would all be resident in the bodily form of Jesus.”[40]
However, even here the position is foundationless, for the Greek term, theotetos, is best rendered “Deity” and refers to the being of God – “that which makes God God” is how B. B. Warfield expressed it. Not only this, but the same epistle had already clearly differentiated between the Lord Jesus Christ and the Father in 1:3, and had asserted the pre- existence of the Son in 1:15-17.
The many passages that teach the pre-existence and separate personality of the Son cause the Oneness position great difficulties, as can be seen from the attempts to fit these passages into the system. Hebrews chapter one gives a good example:
“Hebrews 1:2 states that God made the worlds by the Son. Similarly, Colossians 1:13-17 says all things were created by the Son, and Ephesians 3:9 says all things were created by Jesus Christ. What does creation “by the Son” mean, since the Son did not have a substantial pre-existence before the Incarnation? “Of course, we know that Jesus as God pre-existed the Incarnation, since the deity of Jesus is none other than the Father Himself. We recognize that Jesus (the divine Spirit of Jesus) is indeed the Creator. These verses describe the eternal Spirit that was in the Son – the deity that was later incarnated as the Son – as the Creator. The humanity of Jesus Christ could not create, but God who came in the Son as Jesus Christ created the world. Hebrews 1:10 clearly states that Jesus as Lord was the Creator. “Perhaps these scriptural passages have a deeper meaning that can be expressed as follows: Although the Son did not exist at the time of creation except as the Word in the mind of God, God used His foreknowledge of the Son when He created the world.”[41]
Elsewhere Bernard added,
“According to Hebrews 1:2, God made the worlds by the Son. Certainly, the Spirit (God) who was in the Son was also the Creator of the worlds. This passage may also indicate that God predicated the entire work of creation upon the future manifestation of the Son. God foreknew that man would sin, but He also foreknew that through the Son man could be saved and could fulfill God’s original purpose in creation. As John Miller stated, “Though He did not pick up His humanity till the fulness of time, yet He used it, and acted upon it, from all eternity.” “[42]
Likewise, the problem of Jesus’ prayer life elicits some intriguing interpretation:
“The prayers of Christ represent the struggle of the human will as it submitted to the divine will. They represent Jesus praying from His human self-consciousness not from His divine, for by definition God does not need to pray. This line of reasoning also explains other examples of the inferiority of the Son in power and knowledge. If these examples demonstrate a plurality of persons, they establish the subordination of one person to the other, contrary to the trinitarian doctrine of co-equality. “Other examples of communication, conversation, or expression of love between Father and Son are explained as communication between the divine and human natures of Christ. If used to demonstrate a distinction of persons, they would establish separate centers of consciousness in the Godhead, which is in effect polytheism.”[43]
“Do the prayers of Christ indicate a distinction of persons between Jesus and the Father? No. On the contrary, His praying indicates a distinction between the Son of God and God. Jesus prayed in His humanity, not in His deity…How can God pray and still be God? By definition, God in His omnipotence has no need to pray, and in His oneness has no other to whom He can pray…Some may object to this explanation, contending that it means Jesus prayed to Himself. However, we must realize that, unlike any other human being, Jesus had two perfect and complete natures – humanity and divinity.”[44]
The above hardly squares with Bernard’s earlier statement that the two natures are joined into one person. Communication between natures is illogical; between persons it is normal. If Oneness teachers wish to maintain a surface acceptance of Chalcedonian definitions, they should at least make it clear that they are defining terms in a completely different way than orthodox theology.
Finally, a common element of Oneness-Pentecostal writing is the criticism of the usage of non-Biblical terminology to answer the questions of God’s existence and being. This is a common attack utilized by many anti-Trinitarian groups. Why use such terms as “nature” or “person” or “ousia” or any of the other terms borrowed from philosophy? Doesn’t this indicate a reliance upon pagan sources? we are asked. Though this point will be answered more fully below, it might be pointed out that the Oneness position is faced with the same choice as the Trinitarian – questions can be put to their position that cannot possibly be answered in solely Biblical terminology. Either these questions must be ignored or they must be answered by using words or phrases not drawn directly from the Scriptural witness. In summary, the Oneness position asserts that God is uni-personal. All the titles of Deity are applicable to the one being who is God – Father, Lord, King, Holy Spirit, Jehovah, etc. The Son of God is the manifestation of the Father in the flesh. The Son is not eternal nor pre-existent. Jesus is the Father and the Son – Father in his divinity and Son in his humanity. Hence, the Trinity is said to be a misunderstanding of the Biblical teaching, and many Oneness writers attribute the doctrine to pagan sources.[45]
V. Brief Criticism and Reply
Since the opening of this paper dealt with the Scriptural witness concerning the doctrine of the Trinity, space need not be taken in rebutting many of the statements of the Oneness position. The following points should focus on the particular problems:
A) The Oneness position cannot explain logically or Biblically the clear references to the pre-existence and Creatorship of the Son such as Colossians 1, Hebrews 1 and John 1.
B) This position fails to demonstrate any kind of identification of Jesus Christ as the Father, and ignores or inadequately explains the many references that demonstrate the personal distinctions of Father and Son.
C) This position relies heavily on assumed and unproven presuppositions, such as the uni-personality of Yahweh. These writers tend to be very selective in their choice of facts, which can also be seen in their easy rejection of textual evidence that contradicts their position.[46]
D) The Christological formulation of the Oneness position is untenable and without Scriptural support. There is no evidence that Jesus was two persons, nor that the two “natures” communicated with one another.
E) The understanding of the Logos given in Scripture is totally lacking in the Oneness perspective. The clear personal nature of the Logos must be sacrificed to maintain the system.
F) The position asserts historical claims[47] that are not solidly based in fact.[48] For example, Oneness writers will assert that the “three persons theory” was a late innovation, while noted patristic authority J.N.D. Kelly has noted,
“Before considering formal writers, the reader should notice how deeply the conception of a plurality of divine Persons was imprinted on the apostolic tradition and the popular faith. Though as yet uncanonized, the New Testament was already exerting a powerful influence; it is a commonplace that the outlines of a dyadic and a triadic pattern are clearly visible in its pages. It is even more marked in such glimpses as are obtainable of the Church’s liturgy and day-to-day catechetical practice.”[49]
These criticisms, substantiated by earlier references, are sufficient to allow the student of Scripture to reject the Oneness position as holding any real claim to being a “biblical teaching.” The only remaining question is the validity of the criticism regarding the usage of non-biblical language and terminology. It has already been pointed out that any theological system that makes any kind of brave attempt to answer the inevitable questions that arise when the nature, attributes and being of God is discussed will have to utilize non-Biblical terminology in framing its answers. Why? First, since the Scriptures themselves rarely ask these questions, and the questions themselves are often derived from non-Biblical sources and utilize non- Biblical language and categories of thought, the honest respondant will have to express truth in such as way as to both be intelligible to the questioner, as well as be honest with the subject. The important question is, are we willing to sacrifice the true teaching of Scripture on the imaginary altar of slavery to the limited terminology of the Biblical writers? Benjamin Breckenridge Warfield aptly addressed this very question:
“The term “Trinity” is not a Biblical term, and we are not using Biblical language when we define what is expressed by it as the doctrine that there is one only and true God, but in the unity of the Godhead there are three coeternal and coequal Persons, the same in substance but distinct in subsistence. A doctrine so defined can be spoken of as a Biblical doctrine only on the principle that the sense of Scripture is Scripture. And the definition of a Biblical doctrine in such un-Biblical language can be justified only on the principle that it is better to preserve the truth of Scripture than the words of Scripture. The doctrine of the Trinity lies in Scripture in solution; when it is crystalized from its solvent it does not cease to be Scriptural, but only comes into clearer view. Or, to speak without figure, the doctrine of the Trinity is given to us in Scripture, not in forumulated definition, but in fragmentary allusions; when we assemble the disjecta membra into their organic unity, we are not passing from Scripture, but entering more thoroughly into the meaning of Scripture. We may state the doctrine in technical terms, supplied by philosophical reflection; but the doctrine stated is a genuinely Scriptural doctrine.”[50]
References: 1. David Bernard, The Oneness of God, (Hazelwood, Missouri: Word Aflame Press) 1985, p.298 2. Thomas Weisser, Three Persons from the Bible? or Babylon, (U.S.) 1983, p. 3. 3. Louis Berkhof,Systematic Theology, (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdman’s Publishing Company, 1941) pgs. 87-89. 4. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, John McNeill, ed. (Philadelphia: Westminster Press) 1960, pp. 141-142. 5. Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology, 3 Volumes, (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdman’s Publishing Company) 1986, 1:459. 6. Weisser, Three Persons, p. 2. 7. The particular responses of the Oneness theologians will be noted at a later point in the presentation. 8. The words of Jesus at Matthew 27:46 have come in for many kinds of interpretation. Unfortunately, many of the theories have compromised both theology proper, as well as Christology. That the Father never was separated from or abandoned the Son is clear from many sources. The second person is utilized by Jesus, not the third in verse 46. Immediately on the heels of this statement Jesus speaks to the Father in the vocative (“Father, into your hands…”). Whatever else Jesus was saying, He was not saying that, at the very time of His ultimate obedience to the Father, that the Father there abandoned Him. Rather, it seems much more logical to see this as a quotation of Psalm 22 that is meant to call to mind all of that Psalm, which would include the victory of v. 19ff, as well as verse 24 which states, “For he has not despised or disdained the suffering of the afflicted one; he has not hidden his face from him but has listened to his cry for help.” 9. It would be a grave error to identify the Father and the Son as one person, or to say that Jesus is both the Father and the Son, simply due to their mutual work and actions. As there is only one God, overlapping of work and action is hardly to be thought unusual, and does not indicate an identity of person but rather an identity of nature. 10. James Hope Moulton, George Milligan, The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament. (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdman’s Publishing Company) 1930, pp. 416-417. See also Barclay Newman and Eugene Nida, A Translator’s Handbook on the Gospel of John. (New York: United Bible Societies) 1980, p. 24. 11. The variant reading “…who is in heaven.” is opposed by P66 and P75 along with Codex Sinaiticus and Vaticanus. These witnesses are joined by the Coptic versions, a few uncials, minuscules, and Fathers. 12. The reading monogenes theos is strongly supported by the manuscript witnesses. This is the reading of P66 and P75 as well as the original reading of Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, a few other uncials, and a large number of the early Fathers. That there is good reason to see monogenes huios as an assimilation to John 3:16 is obvious; just so, that monogenes theos has no logical antecedent is just as true. 13. Some try to render this as “the Word was pertaining to God” on the basis of the occurrence of pros ton theon in Hebrews 2:17 and 5:1. However, this attempt fails for the two instances in Hebrews are different syntactical constructions; the presence of the neuter plural article before the phrase in Hebrews changes the subject to an assumed “things.” Also, John 1:1b represents a sentence structure using the verb form en while this is not so in Hebrews. 14. William G. T. Shedd, Shedd’s Dogmatic Theology. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers) 1980, pg. 253. 15. As cited by Henry Bettenson, Documents of the Christian Church. (New York: Oxford University Press) 1963, pp. 144-145. 16. For a discussion of the Council of Chalcedon, see Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church. (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdman’s Publishing Company) 1910, 3:740-762. 17. Schaff, History of the Christian Church, 3:751. 18. Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology, (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdman’s Publishing Company) 1941, pp. 321-330. 19. See Berkhof,Systematic Theology, Doctrine of the Person and the Work of Christ, Section III, “The Unipersonality of Christ.” 20. Stuart Olyott, Son of Mary, Son of God, (England: Evangelical Press) 1984, pp. 103-105. 21. Some Oneness writers such as Robert Brent Graves have attempted to assert that the copulative kai found here and in the other epistolary greetings should not be translated in its normal sense of “and” but rather as the equative “even.” Hence, Graves translates 1 Cor. 1:3 as “Grace to you and peace from God our Father even the Lord Jesus Christ.” That there is no scholarly support for such an assertion is clear, for Graves would hardly be consistent and say “Grace to you, even peace…” which would be required should he follow his own suggestion through. 22. Shedd, Dogmatic Theology, p. 303. 23. Otto Weber, Foundations of Dogmatics, (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdman’s Publishing Company) 1962, 2:116. 24. David K. Bernard,Essentials of Oneness Theology, (Hazelwood, Missouri: Word Aflame Press) 1985, p. 8. 25. Bernard, The Oneness of God, p. 15. 26. Bernard, The Oneness of God, p. 98. 27. Bernard, The Oneness of God, p. 66.28. John Paterson, God in Christ Jesus, (Hazelwood, Missouri: Word Aflame Press) 1966, p. 29. Bernard,Essentials in Oneness Theology, p. 22. 30. Bernard, The Oneness of God, p. 103. 31. Weisser, Three Persons, p. 35. 32. Robert Brent Graves, The God of Two Testaments, (U.S.) 1977, p. 35. 33. See Bernard, The Oneness of God, p. 106. 34. Graves, The God of Two Testaments, p. 44. 35. Paterson, God in Christ Jesus, p. 22. 36. Bernard, Essentials in Oneness Theology, p. 19. 37. Bernard, The Oneness of God, p. 88. 38. Bernard, The Oneness of God, p. 90 39. Bernard, The Oneness of God, p. 86. 40. Bernard,The Oneness of God, p. 57. 41. Bernard, The Oneness of God, p. 115. 42. Bernard, Essentials in Oneness Theology, p. 21. 43. Ibid., p. 22. 44. Bernard, The Oneness of God, pp. 176-177. 45. See Weisser, Three Persons, pp. 17-28. 46. Bernard rejects, for example, the reading of monogenes theos at 1:18 by saying, “We do not believe these variant readings are correct…This verse of Scripture does not mean that God is revealed by God, but that God is revealed in flesh through the humanity of the Son.” Here theology determines textual criticism. 47. Bernard, The Oneness of God, pp. 236 ff as an example. 48. Kenneth Scott Latourette, A History of Christianity, 2 Volumes, (New York: Harper and Row) 1975, 2:144-145 gives
Roger Oakland’s website Understand the times has an article related to the movement of Bill Johnson and these False Signs and Wonders. These types of signs are taking place all over the globe. I ran across a similar youtube post from a small church in South America. I exhorted them to pray and repent and seek the Lord to purge whatever demon had established residency in their church since they too were getting gold dust and jewels. I don’t recall one instance of gold dust or jewels appearing as a sign of anointing in the bible! It seems so obvious that it’s demonic, it’s truly Strong Delusion, that has gripped insatiable signs and wonder ‘seekers.’ Maybe because they simply are “Churched” now and not saved from their sins? (a bit of sarcasm) It is truly sad to see people deluded, but again a true sign of the times in which we live. Keep Contending yourself. It’s good and fruitful to alert your brethren of these falsehoods, because more than 1 member has probably sought after such signs and probably more than 1 has fallen prey to these false teachers! Keep up the work of the Kingdom!
Excellent commentary, Mike. Thanks for the insite! At first glance the videos can be deceptive. Thank you for inspiring our fellowship to read scripture with ‘our eyes open’…we would all do well to sift all the information that we receive (especially from the internet!) in the same manner. God bless you, brother, keep contending for the Faith!
As a suggestion, to not further dellusion and potential spreading of more filth, i would only quote the person/false teaching you are dealing wtih, and then hold it up in the Light of God’s Word to expose the lie from the serpent for what it really is. When falsehood is compared with other (while false) yet unrelated quotes from other cults, there is more of a risk of people absorbing the poisin. Shine the Light into the darkness, and use clear passages of scripture to show the scriptural intent of others. But, stay away from showing the darkness of the lie by compariong it to another darker, lie. The Word of God is the Sword of the Spirit, and will not return to Him void, and just remember this, as you are used by God to fight spiritual battles for the sake of Truth:
I AM the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. John 5:5
or you might have to learn hear this, as i did:
Is the axe to boast itself over the one who chops with it? Is the saw to exalt itself over the one who wields it? That would be like a club wielding those who lift it, Or like a rod lifting him who is not wood. Isaiah 10:15
May God bless you richly, in Jesus’ Name
But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you. John 14:6
Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. John 17:17
Thanks Mike. I appreciate hearing from you. Interestingly, I am teaching in Isaiah 10 tonight.
Pastor Mike:
Thank you for this information, I had not heard about the Word-Faith theology, New Order of Latter Rain/New Apostolic Reformation/Third Wave apostles and prophets. It is very eye opening and I am not surprised that all the FREEMASONS listed below are spawning this deception. They keep finding new ways to lead people away from Christ cloaked in evil, blinding the people just like in their initiation rituals. True discernment is needed in these days so we don’t fall frey to false teachings. Thanks again
and may God bless you as you continue to speak the truth.
Connie
“These teachings and doctrines continue to be advanced today by such men as Bill Hamon, Kenneth Copeland, Fred Price, Creflo Dollar, Rod Parsley, Benny Hinn, C. Peter Wagner, Rick Joyner, Kim Clement, Todd Bentley, and the aforementioned John and Carol Arnott, Georgian Banov, Roland and Heidi Baker, and Bill Johnson.”
i have been influenced by Franklin Hall’s literatures about 15 years ago and still believe that he is the man of God.who is in that line of all numerous populations of the world heared his sermon and participated in his conferenc? almost all have gone do you know why? the road leading to Life is very narrow.He is abiblical Evangelist. in your writing you are not sure as to what to say in some instances. go back and check once more.
feel free to say any thing i am as open as i can who can read and digest any material.
one thing i want to add many things have been said about word power in the Bible.I want to make you
know that i am a simple believer.Read many scholars view point regarding religion.
Maintain up the great work mate. This weblog publish shows how well you realize and know this subject.
Thank you for the encouraging words. God bless you today as you seek to live for Him.
You are a great writer. You unmistakably get the message across.
Thank you Adolph.
Thank you Dr. Spaulding for being a voice for Truth in a very deceptive time.
I attend a Pentacostal church and our pastor just recently used Eugene Peterson’s “The Message” interpretation of scripture for our Christmas Eve service. He also has a love for the book “The Shack” by Paul Young.
What is your view on these two publications? How can I best speak to my pastor in regards to this?
Thank you and God bless.
Hi Jason:
Thank you for your kind words. I do not recommend either one. The Shack is fraught with theological error that leads to confusion and The Message is little more than a child-level paraphrase of the Scriptures. Would you like me to email you some resources that critique both? If so, is the email you provided here the one to use? God bless you today.
Mike
Sure, that would be great. Thank you. Yes, the e-mail provided will work fine. These are some of the ones I’ve found so far in regards to “The Message”, “The Shack”, “Purpose Driven Life”, and U2’s connection to Eugene Peterson.
God bless,
Jason
http://www.crossroad.to/Bible_studies/Message.html
http://www.thebereancall.org/files/Purpose%20Driven%20Critique.pdf
http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/08/shack.htm
http://www.atu2.com/news/connections/peterson/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=STPVvd_II08
Yes, if you could please e-mail those resources/links Dr. Spaulding that would be wonderful.
Thank you again.
Excellent review, Mike. There is a DVD called “Finger of God” which is probably the source of the YouTube videos. Fortunately it doesn’t seem to have made much impact.
However, I would question your claim that the gold teeth and dust associated with this bunch of loonies are demonic in origin. I think they are mostly fake (there was once a lady who put gold glitter in her hair, shook her head, and pretended it was a miracle) or else figments of people’s imagination. There’s a lot of psychological trickery used by these people, even hypnotic techniques, and I’d treat eyewitness reports as highly suspect for this reason.
Thank you Ian. I agree with you that some of the so-called manifestations are nothing more than deliberate trickery. I would also remain committed to the statement that some of the alleged manifestations are of demonic origin directly. In the least the deliberate deception of God’s people is clearly of the flesh and therefore demoniacally inspired. God bless you today. Run well in His service.
Hi Dr. Spaulding. Thank you for your thorough research on the Finger of God topic. Our pastor posted the U-Tube video and suggested that the reader listen to all 10 and give him some feedback. I listened to the first one and did not want to waste my time listening to the other nine because I sensed something terribly wrong. So then I decided to research Finger of God on Google. That is where I ran into your website. Can you suggest to me how I should approach him on this? I don’t think I want to reply to him on Facebook, since then the whole world would think I am a horrible critical person. I would like to perhaps print out your article and hand it to him in church (just something I thought of). Or, I suppose I could, with your permission, take snippets of your writing here (to make it more concise and to the point).
I welcome your thoughts on this.
Hi John:
Thank you for writing. I agree with you that replying on Facebook would not be the way to go. You may use all or parts of the article as you see fit. I watched all 10 at the request of a fellow pastor who asked me to let him know what I thought of the videos. The article you read are my thoughts on the so-called finger of God. God bless you today my brother. Keep contending for the faith once for all delivered to the saints.
Mike
WOW…a friend loaned me the “Finger of God” DVD for me to watch. I am a pastor and have been exposed to some of the heresy this Charismatic group has espoused when I was on staff with some false teachers that our church hired (big mistake) Anyways thanks for your commentary and insight…good to know SOMEONE is watching the gate!
Hi Mike,
A very good explanation.
Regarding the “name it, claim it” part, can you please expound on Mark 11:24?
Thanks,
Santosh (India)
Hello Santosh:
Although a lengthy explanation, Dr. Kirk MacGregor’s article on Mark 11:20-25 is worth the read. Enjoy!
Understanding “If Anyone Says to This Mountain…” (Mark 11:20-25)
in Its Religio-Historical Context
Kirk R. MacGregor
Originally published in the Journal of the International Society of Christian Apologetics 2.1 (2009): 23-39.
To obtain the definitive version see http://www.isca-apologetics.org.
Mark 11:20-25 stands among those texts most misunderstood by Christians in general and most
exploited by New Religious Movements in particular, perhaps most notoriously by the Word-Faith
Movement. The passage is best known for its promise that “if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up
and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will
be done for him” (v. 23). Traditionally most Christians have taken this text to mean that if they ask for
something in prayer and harbor no doubts, then God will necessarily grant their request. Not only does
such a reading contravene divine freedom, but it also inverts the divine-human relationship by turning
God into the servant of humanity rather than the sovereign over humanity. However, presupposing the
truth of this misreading, the Faith Movement proceeds to retranslate echete pistin theou as “have the faith
of God” or “have the God-kind of faith” and places a quasi-magical emphasis upon the function of speech.
Consequently, Faith leaders both historically and presently find warrant in this text for the metaphysical
concept that words constitute unstoppable containers for the force of faith, enabling all who infuse their
words with the God-kind of faith to “write their own ticket with God” and so have whatever they say. As
Gloria Copeland explained the passage quite recently on the nationally televised Believer’s Voice of
Victory:
“I can’t think of anything that changed my life more after I was born again and filled with the Spirit
than learning how to release faith, because this is the way you get anything – healing, money, the
salvation of your children, the salvation of your husband or your wife – anything you’re believing
for, it takes faith . . . to cause heaven to go into action. . . . It says in Mark 11 . . . remember, now,
the message was you can have what you say. You can have what you say. . . . Here’s the
Scripture. . . . For verily I say unto you, that whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou
removed and be thou cast into the sea, and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that
those things which he saith shall come to pass, he shall have whatsoever he saith. I say – look at
that, say, say, saith, saith, say – I say unto you, what things soever you desire when you pray,
believe that you receive them, and you shall have them. Man!”1
Appropriately, much attention has been paid by Christian scholars to showing that the text cannot
substantiate its Faith exegesis. The standard response correctly points out that echete pistin theou is not
a subjective genitive but an objective genitive, thereby depicting God as the object of faith and
necessitating the translation “have faith in God.” Less frequent but equally incisive is the observation that
even if echete pistin theou were a subjective genitive, the lack of a definite article before pistin would
connote “faithfulness” not “faith,” thus precluding the translation “have the faith of God” and instead
exhorting believers to “have God’s faithfulness.” While this negative task of showing what the text does
not mean has proven successful, the positive task of explaining what precisely the text does mean should
be judged insufficient at best. For the prevailing scholarly interpretation largely concurs with the prima
facie reading of lay Christians but simply qualifies the alleged promise of receiving whatever one prays for
by God’s will, often via the proviso in 1 John 5:14-15 that “if we ask anything according to his will, he
hears us . . . and we have what we have asked of him.”
This interpretation is plagued by problems along three lines: pastoral, procedural, and
hermeneutical. While the first two lines are comparatively minor and require only brief rejoinders, the
hermeneutical issues are critical and will occupy the bulk of this study. Pastorally, this interpretation has
led some Christians to doubt the truth of God’s Word when requests ostensibly consistent with the divine
will fail to materialize. Procedurally, the prevailing view confuses the task of the systematic theologian
(allowing Scripture to interpret Scripture in order to deduce valid doctrine) with the task of the exegete
(grammatico-historically determining the meaning of the particular text intended by the original author and
understood by the original recipients). It goes without saying that at the respective times when the
pertinent statement was made and was recorded, Jesus and Mark could not have expected their
audiences to draw upon an insight from an epistle not yet composed. But even more, given the Markan
context and Johannine independence from the Synoptic tradition, it is far from obvious that Mark 11:20-25
and 1 John 5:14-15 are indeed discussing the same topic. Nor, it should be noted, is there any statement
comparable to 1 John 5:14-15 from the Hebrew Bible that would have functioned as a limiter in the minds
of the original hearers.
Hermeneutically, the prevailing reading grants the crucial presupposition of the identified
misinterpreters that “this mountain” is a figurative expression for any obstacle because it fails to take into
account both Jesus’ first-century Jewish religio-historical context and the function of the pericope in the
larger literary framework here utilized by Mark. This hermeneutical flaw, I will argue, is fatal and can only
be positively remedied by a contextually grounded interpretation based upon precisely those historical
and literary factors which the misreading overlooks. Turning to the historical Jesus research of N. T.
Wright and the monograph on this passage by William R. Telford, it is precisely such an interpretation that
this study endeavors to provide. In addition to exegetical accuracy, this interpretation will garnish the
added pastoral benefits of upholding Scriptural reliability and the added procedural benefits of enhancing
our apologetic against the pericope’s abuses.
A Grammatical and Structural Analysis
Our investigation shall appropriately begin with a careful examination of the pericope’s grammar
and its larger function in Mark’s Gospel. We note at the outset that Jesus does not say “if anyone says to
a mountain” but “whoever says to this mountain (tō orei toutō),” literally “to the mountain – this one,”
where Mark uses both the definite article tō and the demonstrative pronoun toutō. Since either of these
alone plus orei would indicate a specific mountain, Mark’s striking combination of the definite article with
the demonstrative pronoun serves to intensify the identification and so permits no doubt that one
particular mountain is in view. While some commentators have, as a result, associated the mountain with
the Mount of Olives, this identification depends upon the dubious assumption that Mark has redistricted
the saying from a pre-Markan Olivet Discourse tradition to its present location. This hypothesis will not
stand because, as E. J. Pryke has meticulously demonstrated, the characteristically Markan grammatical
and syntactical features of both chapters 11 and 13 indicate that neither derives from a pre-Markan
Urtext.2 So what mountain are Jesus and Mark designating? In his cataloging of the Synoptic sayings of
Jesus containing the term “mountain” (oros), N. T. Wright observes, “Though the existence of more than
one saying in this group suggests that Jesus used to say this sort of thing quite frequently, ‘this mountain,’
spoken in Jerusalem, would naturally refer to the Temple mount.”3 Telford concurs, noting that in Jesus’ day
the Temple “was known to the Jewish people as ‘the mountain of the house’ or ‘this mountain.’”4
This high initial probability for a Temple referent is reinforced by the fact that Mark 11:20-25 concludes an
intercalation or ABA “sandwich-like” structure where A begins, is interrupted by B, and then finishes. Such
a stylistic device renders the frame A sections (the two “slices of bread”) and the center B section (the
“meat”) as mutually interactive, portraying A and B as indispensable for the interpretation of one another.5
The intercalation focuses on Jesus’ controversial Temple actions precipitating his crucifixion and runs as
follows:
A begins: On the next day, after they had set out from Bethany, Jesus was hungry. Having seen a
fig tree in leaf from a distance, he came to see whether he might find something on it. But
when he came to it, he found nothing except leaves, for it was not the season for figs.
And he said to it, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.” And his disciples were
listening (Mk. 11:12-14).
B begins and ends: Then they came to Jerusalem, and having entered the Temple, Jesus began
to drive out the ones selling and the ones buying in the Temple, and he overturned the
tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves. He was not allowing
anyone to carry things through the Temple, but he was teaching and saying to them,
“Has it not been written, ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all the nations?’
But you yourselves have made it a den of robbers.” The chief priests and the scribes
heard this, and they were seeking how they might destroy him; for they were afraid of
him, as all the crowd were amazed at his teaching. And when it became late, Jesus and
his disciples went out of the city (Mk. 11:15-19).
A ends: And passing by early in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots. Peter
remembered and said to Jesus, “Rabbi, look, the fig tree which you cursed has been
withered.” Jesus answered them, “Have faith in God. Truly I say to you, if anyone says to
the mountain – this one – ‘Be lifted up and be thrown into the sea,’ and does not waver in
his heart but believes that what he says is happening, it will be so for him. For this reason
I say to you, everything which you pray and plead for, believe that you received it, and it
will be so for you. And when you stand praying, forgive if you have something against
someone, in order that your Father in the heavens may also forgive you your
transgressions” (Mk. 11:20-25).6
This literary device inextricably links the Temple with Jesus’ mountain saying, as Wright declares:
“Someone speaking of ‘this mountain’ being cast into the sea, in the context of a dramatic action of
judgment in the Temple, would inevitably be heard to refer to Mount Zion.”7 Hence the intercalation
verifies that “this mountain” indeed refers to the Temple mount. According to Telford, such usage
harmonizes well with the meaning of the phrase “uprooter of mountains” in Rabbinic literature, where the
phrase connoted either “a Rabbi with an exceptional dialectic skill . . . [who] was able to resolve by his
wits and ingenuity extremely difficult hermeneutical problems within the Law” or someone who destroys
the Temple.8
An example of the latter is found in the Babylonian Talmud, in which Baba ben Buta advises
Herod the Great to pull down the Temple and rebuild it. When Herod asks Baba ben Buta if such an
action is licit in light of the halakhah that a synagogue should not be pulled down before another is built to
take its place, Baba ben Buta replies: “If you like I can say that the rule does not apply to Royalty, since a
king does not go back on his word. For so said Samuel: If Royalty says, I will uproot mountains, it will
uproot them and not go back on its word.”9
Hence Herod can pull down the Temple mount immune from any charge of illegal procedure. Since the
context of the Jesuanic statement is clearly not exegetical, Telford maintains that consistency with
expected connotation demands that Mark 11:20-25 is a Temple statement: “The double entendre . . . in B.B.B.3b . . .
is a suggestive parallel to our Markan passage, for there too Mark has employed the mountain-moving image in
its capacity to suggest in its context the removal of the Temple mount.”10
But what type of statement is directed at Mount Zion? In his magisterial commentary on Mark,
Robert H. Gundry points out that this statement represents a curse analogous in meaning to Jesus’ curse
on the fig tree: “[B]eing lifted up and thrown into the sea makes the mountain-moving a destructive act. Its
destructiveness makes the speaking to the mountain a curse, as much a curse as Jesus’ speaking to the
fig tree that no one should ever again eat fruit from it.”11
However, the passive verbs arthētai (be lifted up) and blēthētai (be thrown) indicate that the denouncer
lacks the power to personally carry out the curse but is invoking someone else to execute it. As Gundry
reveals, this fact explains Jesus’ faith directive:
“Because of the command to have faith in God, the passive voice in ‘be lifted up and be thrown into the
sea’ means, ‘May God lift you up and throw you into the sea’ . . . The element of faith comes into this
mountain-cursing because in themselves the disciples . . . lack the power to speak a mountain into the
sea.”12
We already see a major dissimilarity between the Word-Faith reading and the true significance of
this pericope: its central promise has nothing to do with blessings for the speaker but instead pertains to
curses proclaimed against external things.
A Historical and Canonical Analysis
In order to understand the passage in its historical context, we must now inquire as to the nature
of Jesus’ actions in the Temple. Although understood by previous generations of commentators as simply
a cleansing, a virtual consensus has surfaced among Third Quest historical Jesus researchers across the
liberal-conservative theological spectrum that, regardless of whether or not cleansing comprised part of
Jesus’ agenda, the major thrust of Jesus’ action was to enact a symbolic destruction of the Temple.13
In the summation of Craig A. Evans, “[A]t the time of his action in the temple Jesus spoke of the temple’s
destruction . . . not simply . . . calling for modification of the sacrificial pragmata or, having failed to bring
about such modification, for sacrifice outside of the auspices of the temple priesthood.”14 Foremost
among the evidence supporting this conclusion is Jesus’ intentional evocation and deliberate
performance of Jeremiah 7-8, a trenchant condemnation of corruption within Jewish society and
unmistakable warning that the Temple must be destroyed as a result:
Thus says Yahweh Almighty, the God of Israel . . . do not trust in these deceptive words: ‘This is
the Temple of Yahweh, the Temple of Yahweh, the Temple of Yahweh’ . . . But here you are,
trusting in deceptive words to no avail. Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely,
burn incense to Baal, and follow other gods you have not known, and then come and stand
before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, ‘We are safe’ – safe to do all these
detestable things? Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your
sight? But I have been watching, declares Yahweh. Go now to my place that was in Shiloh, where
I made my name dwell at first, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of my people
Israel. . . . Therefore, what I did to Shiloh I will now do to the house that is called by my name, the
Temple you trust in, the place I gave to you and your fathers. I will thrust you from my presence,
just as I thrust all of your brethren, the people of Ephraim. So you, neither pray on behalf of this
people nor offer plea or petition on their behalf . . . for . . . my anger and my wrath will be poured
out on this place . . . it will burn and not be quenched. . . . But are the people ashamed of their
loathsome conduct? No, they have no shame at all . . . at the time when I punish, they shall be
overthrown, says Yahweh. When I wanted to gather them, says Yahweh, there are no grapes on
the vine; there are no figs on the fig tree, and their leaves are withered (7:3-4, 8-12, 14-16, 20;
8:12-13).
Jeremiah’s coincidence of the Temple condemnation with the portrayal of its worshipers as a fruitless fig
tree overtly furnishes the meaning of Jesus seeking fruit on the barren fig tree, subsequently cursing it,
and finally cursing “this mountain.” As Wright elucidates,
“The cursing of the fig tree is part of his sorrowful Jeremianic demonstration that Israel, and the
Temple, are under judgment. The word about the mountain being cast into the sea also belongs
exactly here. . . . It is a very specific word of judgment: the Temple mountain is, figuratively
speaking, to be taken up and cast into the sea.”15
Viewing Jesus’ actions against this prophetic backdrop, three features emerge as prominent:
(1) Jesus militates against the Temple not as the place where robbery occurs but as the den of
robbers, namely, the robbers’ lair where they return for safe haven after committing acts of robbery in the
outside world. Moreover, both Mark’s Greek word for “robbers” (lēstēs) and its Hebrew cognate parisim
from Jeremiah refer not to “swindlers” but to “brigands” or “bandits” in the sense of “revolutionaries.”16
Barabbas, the leader of a murderous uprising in Jerusalem, was a lēstēs, as were the two crucified
alongside Jesus and scores of “holy rebels” described by Josephus.17 Thus, economic impropriety is not
in view here; in fact, no evidence exists from late antique Judaism of such exploitation transpiring in the
Temple.18 For the Temple required pure animals and birds for sacrifice, which were most safely
purchased at a place near the sacrifice and where the priests could guarantee their suitability.
Moreover, the money changers were indispensable for turning all the many currencies offered
into the single official coinage. Hence the text supplies no hint that anyone was committing financial or
sacrificial misconduct.19 Rather, as in the sixth century B.C. against the Babylonians, the Temple had
become the talisman of nationalist violence housing those religio-political leaders who propagated a
violent messianic scenario as the solution to the Roman problem. Since the Romans had made the
Jewish people slaves in their own homeland and progressively enacted sanctions robbing them of their
religious liberties bit by bit, the Sanhedrin, or “Men of the Great Assembly,” popularized an interpretation
of the Hebrew Bible concept of mashiach, or messiah, along the lines of previous national deliverers. Like
Moses, this messiah would be a compelling religious leader, but even greater than Moses, he would
successfully enforce Torah upon all who dwelt in Palestine. Like Cyrus, he would be king of an empire
who conquered his enemies with the sword, but surpassing Cyrus’ governance of a pagan empire, the
Messiah would, after violently ridding the Holy Land of all Roman and other pagan influences, turn Israel
into the superpower of the Ancient Near East, restore Israel’s borders to at least their original expanse
following Joshua’s Conquest of Canaan (if not militarily extending these boundaries), and employ the new
Israelite empire’s political influence to spread Israelite justice and the Jewish way of life throughout the
Mediterranean world.20
Such a messianic “job description” stood in diametric opposition to the type of Messiah Jesus
claimed to be. By embracing the Sanhedrin’s violent messianic aspirations, Jesus proposed that the
Jewish people found themselves in a far deeper slavery than simply to Rome: they had voluntarily
become slaves to the Kingdom of the World, the philosophical system of domination and oppression ruled
by Satan according to which the world operates.21 In Jesus’ assessment, the Sanhedrin, backed by
popular opinion, were chillingly attempting to become the people of God by capitulating to the worldly
kingdom, aiming to employ political zeal and military wrath to usher in God’s great and final redemption
and perpetuate it throughout the globe. But Jesus saw that any attempt to win the victory of God through
the devices of Satan is to lose the battle.22 For by trying to beat Rome at its own game, the Jewish
religious aristocracy had unwittingly become “slaves” and even “sons” of the devil, “a murderer from the
beginning,” whose violent tendencies they longed to accomplish (Jn. 8:34-44) and who were blindly
leading the people of Israel to certain destruction (Mt. 15:14; 23:15; Lk. 6:39). Hence the Sanhedrin
comprised the “robbers” fomenting revolution in the synagogues, streets, and rabbinic schools who holed
themselves up in the Temple. By uncritically accepting their program, Jesus contended that Israel had
abandoned its original vocation to be the light of the world which would reach out with open arms to
foreign nations and actively display to them God’s love.23
(2) In the underlying prophetic text, Jeremiah chastised the Temple for the inextricable
combination of social injustice and idolatry committed by its worshipers. So what comparable idolatry
linked with Israel’s false messianic hopes led Jesus to stage his Temple demonstration? Jesus held that
implicit idolatry proved far more damning than explicit idolatry, since the second is just as easily avoidable
as the first is alluring with its subtlety and façade of godliness. After all, from the darkened perspective of
the world, what could make more sense than a politically conquering and dominating Messiah? It would
be far easier for a professed monotheist to steer clear of falling down to worship idols than it would be to
steer clear of the even more unholy alliance with the World’s “might makes right” methods of oppression,
abuse, and discrimination in hopes of effecting God’s victory over the World.24
(3) We call attention to Jesus’ distinctive phrase “pray and plead for” (proseuchesthe kai aiteisthe)
in the promise “everything which you pray and plead for, believe that you received it, and it will be so for
you.” While proseuchomai and aiteō are common Koinē Greek verbs found regularly throughout the New
Testament, their conjunction is hapax legomena and so cries out for an explanation. Stumbling at the
clause, most translators have paraphrased proseuchesthe kai aiteisthe as “ask for in prayer,” despite its
lack of grammatical warrant and the fact that either proseuchesthe or aiteisthe alone would carry the
proposed meaning, thereby doing nothing to explain the conjunction.25
Hence this paraphrase should be rejected as lacking both plausibility and explanatory power. But once
Jesus’ intentional evocation of Jeremiah 7-8 is disclosed, then the meaning of proseuchesthe kai aiteisthe
comes into sharp focus. It immediately becomes apparent that Jesus is here employing metalepsis, or
allusion “to an earlier text in a way that evokes resonances of the earlier text beyond those explicitly cited,”26
with God’s command to Jeremiah, “So you, neither pray (titepalēl) on behalf of this people nor offer plea or petition (tiśā’ . . . rināh
ûtepilāh) on their behalf” (7:16). For the second-person Hebrew verb titepalēl and the second-person
Greek proseuchesthe are exact cognates meaning “to pray,” and the Hebrew clause tiśā’ . . . rināh
ûtepilāh (to offer plea or petition) is the virtual definition of aiteō, namely, “to ask for with urgency, even to
the point of demanding – ‘to ask for, to demand, to plead for.’”27 Putting himself in God’s place, moreover,
Jesus commands his disciples to act in consequence of his pronounced judgment (“For this reason I say
to you . . .”) in the same way that God commanded Jeremiah to act in consequence of his pronounced
judgment (“So you . . .”). Thus we have established that Jesus is recalling Jeremiah 7:16 in such a way that he is
expecting his hearers to take the next logical step. But if the Temple administration in the first century A.D.
is functionally equivalent to its corrupt sixth-century B.C. predecessor, and if God ordered the faithful not
to pray or plead in behalf of the predecessor, then in what sense can Jesus exhort the faithful to pray and
plead concerning the existing administration? Well, if the faithful cannot pray and plead for the Temple
regime, it follows logically that they can only pray and plead against the Temple regime if they are to offer
petitions concerning it at all. Just as Jeremiah responded to God’s exhortation not to intercede for the
religio-political system of his day by declaring God’s destructive verdict against it, so in its context “to pray
and plead for” means “under God’s Kingdom authorization, to pronounce a divine judgment of destruction
upon.” Again we emphasize that if Jesus had intended for this to be a general word about prayer or how
to pray for blessings, he would have used either proseuchesthe or aitesthe, not both; their unparalleled
joint usage strongly indicates that a radically different theme is in play, an inference certified by Jesus’ 6
undisputed outworking of Jeremiah 7-8. Moreover, such fits perfectly with Jesus’ “mountain-uprooting”
exhortation to invoke God’s judgment upon the Temple: the fate befalling the Temple will also befall all
other systems of religiously legitimated sin. For these historical and intertextual reasons, the phrase
“everything which you pray and plead for” means “every unjust system operating in the name of religion
which you, as God’s ambassadors, proclaim divine judgment upon” and cannot plausibly be interpreted
as “everything you ask for in prayer,” thus precluding the fallacious inference that we will receive
whatever we ask with sufficient faith.
Positive Hermeneutical Solution: Piecing Together What the Text Actually Means
Armed with the necessary background, we are now in a position to spell out precisely what Jesus
meant in Mark 11:20-25 by his carefully crafted synthesis of word and deed as well as the passage’s
contemporary significance. Following his symbolic destruction of the Temple and Peter’s observation that
the fig tree he “had cursed” (katērasō) had withered, Jesus was poised to explain his acted parable to his
disciples. When faced with exploitative systems claiming religious support that oppress and persecute
God’s people and deceive those whom God desires to save, his followers must have faith in their all-just
and all-powerful God to vindicate them by overthrowing these systems.28 God’s justice, as corroborated
by Jesus’ actions, ensures a divine verdict of condemnation against these systems, and God’s power
guarantees that the verdict will be fully executed at the Day of Yahweh if not before. Knowing the mind
and power of God on this score, Jesus therefore gives his followers the right to pronounce a sentence of
divine judgment against both the Temple (the mountain – this one) and all other prima facie religious but
de facto worldly institutions (everything which you pray and plead for). Further, notice Jesus’ indication
that the judgment is currently taking place (what he says is happening; ginetai, present tense) and
actually has already happened (you received it; elabete, aorist tense).
Here an illustration from modern jurisprudence is instructive. When a judge pronounces an
irrevocable sentence, such as life without the possibility of parole, by the authority of the legal system, we
consider the sentence as accomplished as soon as it is spoken due to its inevitability, even though the
sentence is not immediately carried out in its entirety. Similarly, as representatives of God, our verdict is
currently being carried out and has in fact already been accomplished, since we are merely proclaiming
an inevitable sentence previously reached in the divine court. Thus we find another example of the “now
but not yet” motif that runs throughout the fabric of Jesus’ Kingdom proclamation and the rest of the New
Testament. While Jesus inaugurated the Kingdom of God with his first coming, it arrived only in part but in
such a way as to guarantee its later coming in full; the final victory over evil has been won but not yet
implemented. So we who live between Jesus’ first and second comings experience our triumph over the
worldly kingdom as here in principle, which will be completely actualized when Jesus gloriously returns.
However, Jesus makes three important caveats regarding his followers’ vindication. All three
concern essential attributes or, in Pauline terms, “fruit of the Spirit” (Gal. 5:22) that one evinces if one
belongs to the Kingdom of God. First, the speaker will be vindicated against the pertinent evil if “he does
not waver in his heart,” namely, if the speaker makes no attempt to have one foot in the Kingdom of God,
so to speak, while having the other foot in the Kingdom of the World, of which the evil is a part. In that
case, the speaker is a hypocrite guilty of the very crime he is denouncing and thus will certainly not be
among the company of the redeemed.29 Second, the speaker will be vindicated if he “believes what he
says is happening” and that “he received it,” which would naturally occur given the speaker’s faith in an
all-just and all-powerful God. However, if the speaker has faith in a different kind of god or no god at all,
then such confidence will obviously not materialize, showing the speaker’s separation from the true God.
The third caveat, in addition to its admonitory function, simultaneously prohibits a possible
misunderstanding of the Jeremiah subtext. A close reading of Jeremiah 7-8 reveals that God condemned
the Temple leadership as a collectivity (hā‘ām haōzeh, “this people” singular not ’anāsîm ha’ēl, “these
persons” plural) – namely the institution or system they comprised – and not the concomitant individuals
themselves; in fact, the subsequent chapters plead with those very individuals to repent and be saved.
Hence Jesus’ disciples may only announce judgment against unjust religious institutions or systems and
never the individuals who belong to them, as the latter act militates against the raison d’être of the
Kingdom of God – being the forgiveness-of-sins of people. Rather, believers must always forgive tinos, or
“any individual,” who has wronged them, even (and especially) as they denounce the worldly institutions
which unsuspectingly enslave those forgiven persons. But condemning individuals to destruction is to cut
off the branch of grace one is sitting on, thereby illustrating one’s own spiritually lost state. In short, each 7
of the three caveats is a different way of expressing the same point: “Only if you really are part of God’s
Kingdom will your announced vindication against the systems of evil be ultimately realized; otherwise,
you’ll unwittingly be found within the worldly kingdom and so face condemnation yourself.”
In conclusion, far from promising that a person can possess whatever they pray for with sufficient
faith, Mark 11:20-25 encourages believers to exhibit sufficient faith in God to stand up against religiously
legitimated sin. Believers should expose such affairs resting secure in Jesus’ promise that, if they resist
compromise while maintaining lives of forgiveness, they will be vindicated against the wickedness on the
Day of Yahweh. Instead of a stumbling block that incites doubt in biblical authority following unanswered
prayer, the message of this text is both plausible in light of and consistent with the broad canonical
panorama once understood contextually.30 Examples of individuals who understood and embodied its
message include the apostles before the Sanhedrin (Acts 5:29-32), Stephen (Acts 7:46-53), and Paul
(Rom. 9:31-33), who remarkably knew the relevant pericope as part of the oral Jesus traditions that would
later be enscripturated.31 But, as we follow their example, we would do well to heed Paul’s poignant
abstract of and admonition from this passage: “If I have all the faith so as to remove mountains but do not
have love, I am nothing” (1 Cor. 13:2).32
NOTES
1 Gloria Copeland, Believer’s Voice of Victory, 10 May 2007, emphasis hers.
2 E. J. Pryke, Redactional Style in the Marcan Gospel: A Study of Syntax and Vocabulary as Guides to
Redaction in Mark (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978), 19-21, 145-46, 167-68, 170-71.
3 N. T. Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God, vol. 2 of Christian Origins and the Question of God (Fortress:
Minneapolis, 1996), 422.
4 William R. Telford, The Barren Temple and the Withered Tree, JSNTSup 1 (Sheffield: JSOT, 1980), 119.
5 John Dominic Crossan, Who Killed Jesus? (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1996), 62-63.
6 For the sake of analysis, I have directly translated all biblical passages in this article from the Greek (UBS
4th / Nestle-Aland 27th) and Hebrew (Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia) primary texts in a woodenly literal fashion.
7 Wright, Jesus, 334-35.
8 Telford, Barren Temple, 110, 115, 118.
9 Babylonian Talmud, Baba Bathra 3b.
10 Telford, Barren Temple, 112.
11 Robert H. Gundry, Mark: A Commentary on His Apology for the Cross (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans,
1993), 653.
12 Ibid.
13 For verification see John Dominic Crossan, The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish
Peasant (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1991), 357; Marcus J. Borg, Conflict, Holiness and Politics in the
Teachings of Jesus (Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen, 1984), 174, 384; E. P. Sanders, The Historical Figure of Jesus
(New York: Penguin, 1993), 257-69; Jacob Neusner, “Money-Changers in the Temple: The Mishnah’s Explanation,”
New Testament Studies 35 (1989): 287-90; Ben F. Meyer, Christus Faber: The Master-Builder and the House of God
(Allison Park, PA: Pickwick, 1992), 262-64; Craig A. Evans, “Jesus’ Action in the Temple: Cleansing or Portent of
Destruction,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 51 (1989): 237-70; C. K. Barrett, “The House of Prayer and the Den of
Thieves,” in Jesus und Paulus: Festschrift für Werner Georg Kümmel zum 70. Geburtstag, eds. E. Earle Ellis and E.
Grässer (Göttingen: Vandenhoek & Ruprecht, 1975), 13-20; Wright, Jesus, 413-28; Richard J. Bauckham, “Jesus’
Demonstration in the Temple,” in Law and Religion: Essays on the Place of the Law in Israel and Early Christianity,
ed. B. Lindars (Cambridge: James Clarke, 1988), 72-89; Scot McKnight, “Who is Jesus? An Introduction to Jesus
Studies,” in Jesus Under Fire, gen. eds. Michael J. Wilkins and J. P. Moreland (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1995),
65; Ben Witherington III, New Testament History (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2001), 137.
14 Craig A. Evans, “Jesus and the ‘Cave of Robbers’: Toward a Jewish Context for the Temple Action.”
Bulletin for Biblical Research 3 (1993): 109-10.
15 Wright, Jesus, 422.
16 Johannes P. Louw and Eugene A. Nida, eds., Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament Based on
Semantic Domains, 2 vols. (New York: United Bible Societies, 1989), 1:497-48; Walter Bauer, William F. Arndt, and
F. Wilbur Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 2nd rev. ed.
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1979), 473; Francis Brown, S. R. Driver, and Charles A. Briggs, The BrownDriver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon, rep. ed. (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2004), 829.
17 Josephus, War of the Jews, 2.125, 228, 253-54; 4.504; Antiquities of the Jews, 14.159-60; 20.160-61, 67.
18 Wright, Jesus, 419-20.
19 Crossan, Who Killed Jesus, 64. 8
20 Kirk R. MacGregor, A Molinist-Anabaptist Systematic Theology (Lanham, MD: University Press of
America, 2007), 269-70.
21 Jesus reinforces this point by thrice acknowledging Satan as the “archē of this world” (Jn. 12:31; 14:30;
16:11), where archē semantically comes from the domain of politics and denotes the highest ruling authority in a
given region. The followers of the Way would later echo the acknowledgment of their Master in 2 Corinthians 4:4,
Ephesians 2:2; 6:12, 1 John 5:19, and Revelation 9:11; 11:15; 13:14; 18:23; 20:3, 8.
22 Wright, Jesus, 595.
23 Telford summarizes: “For Mark, it is Jerusalem and its Temple that have fallen under this curse. Their
raison d’être has been removed. . . . An eschatological judgement has been pronounced upon the city and its exalted
shrine. For Mark and his community, Jesus himself was the agent of that judgement. Had he not after all cursed the
barren fig-tree? . . . ‘[T]he moving of mountains’ expected . . . in the eschatological era . . . was now taking place.
Indeed, about to be removed was the mountain par excellence, the Temple Mount” (Barren Temple, 231, 119;
emphasis his).
24 MacGregor, Systematic Theology, 271-73.
25 A representative sample of instances where proseuchomai means “to ask for in prayer” includes Matthew
5:44; 6:5-6, 9; 24:20, Luke 6:28; 18:1; 22:40, Acts 8:24, and Rom. 8:26, and an analogous representative sample for
aiteō includes Matthew 6:8; 7:7, Luke 11:9, 13, and John 14:13-14; 15:7, 16; 16:23-24, 26.
26 Richard B. Hays, The Conversion of the Imagination: Paul as Interpreter of Israel’s Scripture (Grand
Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2005), 2, emphasis his.
27 Louw and Nida, Greek-English Lexicon, 1:407.
28 Cf. Luke 18:7-8: “But will not God by all means bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to
him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I say to you, he will bring about their justice with speed.”
29 Cf. Luke 16:13/Matthew 6:24: “No servant is able to serve two masters. For either he will hate the one
and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and he will despise the other.” Also note Matthew 7:21: “Not everyone
who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of the heavens, but only the one who does the will of my Father,
the one in the heavens.”
30
As review editor David Cramer pointed out, the usage by the Word-Faith Movement, then, seems to be an
ironic example of “religiously legitimated sin,” keeping the poor and oppressed in bondage to the false hopes of their
“prosperity gospel.”
31 Anthony C. Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, NIGTC (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2000),
1041. Further, as Robert M. Grant illustrates (“The Coming of the Kingdom,” Journal of Biblical Literature 67 [1948]:
301-2), our exegesis is consistent with the way Mark 11:20-25 was read by the Church Fathers, which cannot be said
for the typical contemporary reading.
32 I.e., “If I have all the faith in God necessary to courageously and confidently proclaim God’s judgment
against the most powerful injustices masquerading in the name of religion but do not have love, I am nothing.
Hi Santosh:
More reading for you. Enjoy!
Recognizing and Successfully Averting the Word-Faith Threat to Evangelicalism
Kirk R. MacGregor
Originally published in the Christian Apologetics Journal 6.1 (2007): 53-70. To obtain the definitive
version see http://theapologeticsbookstore.com/christianapologeticsjournal.aspx.
Judging by its extraordinary success in both the religious and secular marketplaces, the WordFaith Movement is one of the fastest-growing and most influential ideologies claiming allegiance to the
Christian tradition. This fact is evidenced, for example, by Church Report’s 2006 list of “50 Most
Influential Christians in America,” which includes a total of eleven Word-Faith leaders, four of whom (Joel
Osteen, Joyce Meyer, T. D. Jakes, and Paul Crouch) rank among the top ten.
1
It is also illustrated by
Time Magazine’s 18 September 2006 cover story “Does God Want You To Be Rich?” focusing on the
teachings of Joel Osteen and Joyce Meyer, whom the piece identifies as “Protestant evangelists” and
“within [the] ranks” of evangelicalism.
2
At least three ostensibly Christian television networks – TBN,
ISPN, and Daystar Television – devote over three-quarters of their airtime to Faith programming.
Moreover, some of these programs, especially Joel Osteen’s Lakewood Church, Joyce Meyer’s Enjoying
Everyday Life, Kenneth Copeland’s Believer’s Voice of Victory, and Benny Hinn’s This Is Your Day,
comprise regular staples in the secular market. The popularity of the Faith Movement has also grown
through its publications, which are prevalent (and sometimes dominant) in Christian bookstores as well as
the inspirational racks of secular bookstores. Thus Joel Osteen, pastor of Houston’s Lakewood Church,
boasting to be America’s largest congregation with an average of over 30,000 worshipers weekly,
reached the top of the New York Times Bestseller List with his 2004 Your Best Life Now.
3
This feat has
been more than equaled by his prolific female counterpart Joyce Meyer, whom the Detroit News
describes as “the country’s leading female evangelist” and “the top-selling female Christian author in
America.”
4
As a historian of Western religion in general and Christianity in particular, I find all of this quite
disturbing, not so much for what is happening on the surface but what is happening below the surface.
That is to say, as initially appalling as it may be, I am far less concerned with the “health and wealth”
aspects of the movement, which historically are nothing new, as I am with the underlying theological
infrastructure upon which the movement is based and from which its views on abundance are an
outgrowth. Thus, while greed and faith-healing among professed Christians does not imply Word-Faith
theology and could logically emanate from a plethora of belief-systems utterly distinct from the Faith one,
5
the Faith system does logically necessitate that its adherents are entitled to material and bodily prosperity.
Despite its use of Christian vocabulary, this system of thought is radically different from historic Christian
orthodoxy on, minimally, theology proper, anthropology, and soteriology.
6
For these reasons, if belonging
to the Christian tradition is defined as subscription to essential Christian doctrine as encapsulated in the
ecumenical confessions of the first five Christian centuries, then the Word-Faith Movement is not
Christian but should instead be regarded as a new religious movement (NRM). Sadly, the average
layperson is unable to see beyond the surface-level employment of traditional terms, such as “faith,”
“being born again,” “image of God,” and “eternal life,” to the strikingly different meanings that Faith
churches ascribe to them. These observations, in my judgment, disclose the ultimate danger of the Faith
Movement. While it is very easy for laypeople to hear Faith broadcasts or read Faith books and believe
they are encountering sound doctrine, they are, in fact, gradually being initiated into a new worldview, as
they immediately observe its deceptively appealing fruits and then, once those fruits are embraced, they
begin to seek out and gradually accept the proposed theological rationale for their production.
One can profitably compare the Faith proselytizing strategy to that of Mormonism. In its television
advertising campaigns and evangelistic pamphlets, the LDS Church never explicitly presents its sine qua
non doctrine of eternal progression – namely, that we, like God the Father, must follow the path of
Mormonism to ourselves become gods who procreate spirit-children and eternally rule over our own
worlds – as this would sound too bizarre. Hence the average layperson (and even some prominent
scholars)
7
would never dream that such represents the theological rationale for the LDS teachings that
are commonly presented, such as strong family values, peace with God, and enhanced knowledge of
Christ. But when one decides to become a Mormon, one assimilates over time the proposed doctrinal
causes for the effects one has come to cherish, without objecting to one’s overseers that since the
alleged causes cannot be logically deduced from the effects, the latter furnish no guarantee of the 2
former’s validity. Such would be analogous to questioning a physician’s explanation for the effectiveness
of a prescribed drug after that medication has provided healing. Similarly, if the typical church attender
were to watch a Lakewood Church or Enjoying Everyday Life broadcast, having never previously heard
Joel Osteen or Joyce Meyer, one would immediately understand the prosperity message (comprising at
least 28 minutes of the half-hour) but would also hear one or two traditional doctrinal ideas (comprising a
maximum of 2 minutes) discussed in contexts where they seem somewhat out of place; in other words,
where their usage neither makes much sense nor appears particularly objectionable. Writing these off as
at worst trivial mistakes that in no way detract from the overall message, analogous to those made by
one’s local pastor every Sunday, one tries the so-called “name it and claim it” mechanism and, when
desired events occur, one interprets this as proof of the Faith message. One then begins to watch the
television program on a regular basis, naturally wishing to mature in one’s insight by discovering why the
formula works and therefore paying more careful attention to the elements one previously found
confusing. Over about a month’s time, one gradually sees the causal links between these threads of
doctrine and the Faith formula as well as how the threads fit together, finally coming to apprehend the
overall theological fabric. Like the Mormon convert, one will not be so presumptuous as to disbelieve the
resulting construction; after all, how dare the pupil suggest that one’s instructors lack understanding of
their own praxis? From this point forward, the person is on a path leading to divorce from biblical
Christianity and initiation into a new religion devoid of salvific power.
Foundations of Word-Faith Theology
If one watches Lakewood Church, Enjoying Everyday Life, Believer’s Voice of Victory, This Is
Your Day, or any other Faith program for a month (which I have done as part of my research), then one
will apprehend the basic Faith theological structure coupled with some extraneous beliefs unique to a
particular teacher or set of teachers. Employing the criterion of multiple attestation to separate universally
held tenets from ideas embraced by some but not all of the movement’s leaders, the following summation
of essential Word-Faith doctrine emerges. In other words, the subsequent tenets constitute the
metaphysical presuppositions to which all Faith teachers demonstrably subscribe.
First, God is a spirit, where a spirit is construed as the organ that produces the force of faith. It
should be emphasized that the premise “God is a spirit” constitutes an identity statement, such that any
further spirits which come into being will, by definition, be gods.
8
Faith, in turn, is understood as the most
elemental substance of all matter and thus the raw substance out of which all material objects are created.
To illustrate, the composition of a piece of paper consists of pulp, molecules, atoms, subatomic particles,
and ultimately, faith. Moreover, words are the containers of faith and the instruments by which faith
produces its material effects; therefore, by speaking faith-filled words, a god can create her or his own
reality. Accordingly, God spoke the universe into being via words filled with faith, a notion which Faith
teachers support by a woodenly literalistic reading of Genesis 1.
9
Second, the imago Dei is understood as the imago Dei essentialis, or comprising the same
species of being as God, and not, as historically affirmed by Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox thought,
the imago Dei accidentalis, defined positively as the freedoms of pleasure, counsel, and choice and
negatively as the freedoms from misery, sin, and necessity.
10
Due to the equation of deity and spirituality,
Adam and Eve, essentially speaking, were spirits and so “little gods,” whom God gave two accidental
faculties for survival on Earth, namely, bodies for physical movement and souls for analytical thinking.
11
During the 1980s and 90s, Faith teachers frequently and unreservedly asserted that primal humans were
“little gods,” which doctrine plus its corollaries met with sharp and widespread denunciation by
evangelicals.
12
Therefore, in this decade they have generally but not entirely avoided the language of
“little gods,” which has led some observers to claim that the movement has dropped this and similar
concepts from its repertoire.
13
However, such changes are cosmetic rather than substantive, as the Faith
Movement has retained exactly the same anthropology but recast it in theological vocabulary acceptable
to most Christians. This new terminology either logically or contextually necessitates that original
humanity is of the same species of being as God: examples of logical entailment include “having the (very)
nature of God,”
14
“the nature of Jesus,”
15
“the life of God,” and “the God-kind of life,”
16
and examples of
contextual entailment include “the champion in you,”
17
“the new nature,”
18
and “the champion God made
you to be.”
19
Third, the biblical notions of spiritual death and spiritual rebirth are construed literally as the death
and revivification of the spirit, where in the interim the spirit does not cease to exist but lies dormant like a 3
corpse, leaving the other two parts of the trichotomous anthropology intact. In the Fall, Adam and Eve
suffered spiritual death, meaning their spirits died, such that they ceased to be little gods and
degenerated to mere body-soul humans lacking the faculty to generate the force of faith and to speak
things into being.
20
Owing to the Word-Faith traducian view of the Fall, every human is born with all three
parts – body, soul, and spirit – but only the first two parts are alive while the spirit is nonfunctional. But by
accepting Jesus as Lord and Savior, we are born again, namely, our spirits are reborn or brought back to
life, thus restoring us to our divinely intended status as little gods who have power to speak words of faith
and create material blessings, including health, wealth, and prosperity. While John 10:34 and Psalm 82:6
are used as proof-texts for this position, to avoid controversy it has frequently been couched in Pauline
nomenclature as our being “sons and daughters of God” and “joint-heirs with Jesus.”
21
These phrases
Faith teachers interpret as our being the natural children of God, i.e. having the same nature as God, and
conspicuously omit Paul’s insistence that we are instead children by adoption with a nature qualitatively
distinct from, and ontologically lower than, God.
While it has been amply demonstrated that such beliefs (as well as further deviations from historic
Christian orthodoxy) are embraced by veteran Faith teachers like Kenneth Copeland and Benny Hinn,
22
many people would find it shocking and therefore dispute that newer and more popular teachers, such as
Joyce Meyer and Joel Osteen, truly subscribe to the aforementioned system. To definitively settle the
issue, I will allow these teachers to speak for themselves with excerpts from their recent oratory.
Addressing the loaded and admittedly controversial topic of “who you are in Christ” in 2003, Joyce Meyer
makes explicit the convictions that she usually leaves implicit in her preaching, even citing John 10:34
and Psalm 82:6 as support.
You know, why do people have such a fit about God calling his creation, his man (not his whole
creation, but his man), little gods? If he’s God, what’s he going to call them but the God kind? I
mean, if you as a human being have a baby, you call it a human kind. If cattle has another cattle,
they call it cattle kind. So, I mean, what’s God supposed to call us? Doesn’t the Bible say we’re
created in his image?…The Bible says right here, John 10:34, let’s read this again: “And Jesus
answered, Is it not written in your law, I said, you are gods,” little “g”? So men are called gods by
the law, men to whom God’s message came, and the Scripture cannot be set aside or cancelled
or broken or annulled. Now if this is true, “Do you say of the one whom the Father consecrated
and dedicated and set apart for himself and sent into the world, You are blaspheming, because I
said, I am the Son of God?” See, when he began to say, “I am the Son of God,” then they began
to yell, “Blasphemy.” Well, how many of you know that we are sons and daughters of Almighty
God? He has birthed us, we are born again, new creatures in Christ Jesus….You ought to study
Psalm 82. God stands in the assembly of the representatives of God. That’s us, you know? See,
I am a representative of God. The Bible says here that God stands in the midst of those
representatives. In the midst of the magistrates or the judges he gives judgment as among the
gods, little “g.” Verse 6, “I said, you are gods, since you judge on my behalf as my
representatives, indeed, all of you are children of the Most High.” It is important that we know
who we are and that we walk with that power-consciousness.
23
Notice that for Meyer, we are sons and daughters of God in exactly the same way that Jesus was,
a notion expressed by more brazen Faith teachers as “being every bit as much an incarnation of God as
was Jesus of Nazareth,” thus making Jesus “no longer the only begotten Son of God.”
24
In his 2005
sermon “Receiving God’s Mercy,” Joel Osteen echoes this sentiment, denigrating “religion” (obviously
historic Christianity) for its doctrine of sin and ascribing to the born-again believer the language formerly
reserved by the Nicene and Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creeds for Jesus.
25
I want to talk to you today about learning to receive the good things that God has in store. And
really, God has already done everything he’s going to do. It says in Ephesians that God has
blessed us with every spiritual blessing – past tense, he’s already done it. I know when I first
started ministering, before I would come out to speak, I would pray and pray, “God, please give
me your anointing; God, please help me, please, God.” But one day I found in the Bible that God
has already anointed us. He’s already given us his power and ability. You don’t have to beg God
for that; you’ve simply got to start acting on it. Now before I come out, I just boldly declare, “I am
anointed. I am well able to do what God has called me to do.” See, I don’t have to pray about 4
that, I don’t have to beg God for that. I just have to rise up and receive it by faith. And really,
begging God doesn’t get his attention….And I don’t mean this to sound wrong, but many times
this goes against everything that religion has taught us. You will never rise up in your authority as
long as you have some kind of feeling of inferiority. One time I was praying at this big event here
in town and there were several other ministers there with me and the man that went right before
me, he is a very well-respected leader in the community and a very fine gentleman. But he
prayed about the most depressing prayer that I think I have ever heard. He said, “God, you know
how unworthy I am to even stand up here before you. God, you know what a wretched sinner I
am, and I don’t deserve your goodness, and God, how could you even use anybody like me,” on
and on. Man, by the time he got finished, I felt like I needed to go repent. I felt like I was about
that tall. I just wanted to hang my head in shame….I wanted to ask him afterwards, “Did you
really mean what you prayed? You said you were weak, you were defeated, you were an old
sinner, you were unworthy.” Listen, I’m not going to declare that kind of junk over my life. I’m
going to put on my robe of righteousness. I know God approves me. I know God is pleased with
me. I know that I have been accepted; I have been made worthy. Well, you say, “Joel, we are
just all old sinners saved by grace.” No, the truth is, we were old sinners, but when we came to
Christ, we are not sinners anymore; we are sons and daughters of the Most High God. We have
been changed. We’ve been born into a new family. We are new creatures and, sure, we may sin
every once in a while; you may make some mistakes. But that doesn’t make you a sinner.
You’ve got the very nature of God on the inside of you.
26
Further, in his audio abridgement of his 2004 bestseller Your Best Life Now, Osteen draws the
Word-Faith consequences of our having “the very nature of God”:
Just as it is imperative that we see ourselves as God sees us and think about ourselves as God
regards us, it is equally important that we say about ourselves what God says about us. Our
words are vital in bringing our dreams to pass. It’s not enough to simply see it by faith or in your
imagination. You have to begin speaking words of faith over your life. Your words have
enormous creative power. The moment you speak something out, you give birth to it. This is a
spiritual principle, and it works whether what you are saying is good or bad, positive or
negative….Our words become self-fulfilling prophecies….The Bible clearly tells us to speak to our
mountains. Maybe your mountain is a sickness; perhaps your mountain is a troubled relationship;
maybe your mountain is a floundering business. Whatever it is, you must do more than think
about it, more than pray about it; you must speak to that obstacle. The Bible says, “Let the weak
say I’m strong. Let the oppressed say I’m free. Let the sick say I’m healed.” Start calling
yourself happy, whole, blessed, and prosperous. Stop talking to God about how big your
mountains are, and start talking to your mountains about how big your God is!
27
Both of these quotes disclose the ultimate objective of Faith theology, namely, a deistic view of
God from the advent of one’s spiritual life to the grave. That is to say, while God’s transformative power
is necessary for our regeneration and for providing everlasting life upon death, during our time on earth
God simply provides us with a source of objective morality and companionship – he cannot be relied upon
in the midst of our deepest problems. Rather, God has already done everything for us that he will ever do
– namely, turned us into little gods with the same ability to generate faith that he has – and now expects
us to use that ability to solve our own problems. By coming to God in prayer and asking him to solve our
problems, we are, on the Faith view, actually spitting in his face, every bit as much as a person who is
given a new car by a friend does by refusing to drive it but begging the friend for transportation. Kenneth
Copeland makes these points with chilling clarity in a 2005 sermon.
Now, just in a nutshell, let me give you God’s plan, why Jesus was born in Bethlehem. God said
to Adam, “Go into all the world, subdue it, replenish it; have authority over everything that walks,
flies, crawls, swims, and creeps.” Now that’s the will of God. Adam gave it away. Jesus came to
get it back. He got it back. And in the 28
th
chapter of Matthew, moments after he was raised
from the dead, he said, “All authority has been given unto me both in heaven and in earth, both in
heaven and in earth.” And then he immediately, the first thing he did with that God-given
authority was exactly the same thing that Father did in the Garden of Eden. He said, “Therefore, 5
you go in my name into all the earth.” Now what he has authorized or given us authority to do, he
will not do for you. He said, “Whatever you bind on earth, I’ll back it. Whatever you loose on
earth, I’ll back it.” Now let me tell you what he did not say; sometimes you can learn as much by
what he didn’t say as by what he did. He did not say, “Boys, I’m going into all the earth. I’m
going to preach the Gospel. I’m going to lay hands on the sick and they’ll recover. I’m going to
speak with new tongues, and I’m going to cast out the devil. If I drink any deadly thing, it will not
harm me. I’m going; you boys, come follow me.” He did not say that! What did he say? “You go
into all the world. You preach the Gospel to every creature. You lay hands on the sick and they’ll
recover. You bind the devil. You cast him out. You drink any deadly thing, it will not harm you.”
Now you try to get him out of the boundaries of that will of God, and he won’t go. “Oh, Jesus, if
you’d just come lay your hand on my fevered brow. If you’d just send an angel, it would be alright
with me.” You say, “Oh…oh, brother Copeland, I just don’t have that kind of authority, I just need
Jesus to come do it for me, I’m just waiting on the Lord.” He’s not going to get out of God’s will
for you or me or anybody else – no. I’ve had the Lord say this to me: “Get up from there, you big
baby, and take authority! I gave you the authority.”
28
It is perhaps the greatest irony of the Faith Movement that a system of thought which arguably
focuses more on supernaturalism than any other actually yields a more dangerous humanism than those
who profess the appellation, since the supernatural power one relies upon is not God, but one’s own.
This seemingly furnishes an advantage over secular humanism, which forces one to persevere through
life via only one’s natural power.
Word-Faith leaders know full well that a straightforward presentation of their teachings would
prove incredibly offensive to the average Christian. Herein lies the danger of the Word-Faith appeal: by
clearly, and seemingly presenting from Scripture, only the “bait” of prosperity, when laypeople bite they
are “hooked” by metaphysical commitments which fly in the face of biblical truth. Since a great deal of ink
has already been spilt over refuting these commitments, no time will be lost here rearticulating such
critiques.
29
However, virtually nothing has been said by way of helping pastors and other Christian
leaders eliminate people’s motivation to take this bait – namely, the idea that health and wealth constitute
entitlements of the covenant the believer has with God. Until people are rationally persuaded that this
idea is false, generic denunciations of the movement’s greed and self-centeredness from the pulpit will
prove counterproductive: not only will it be seen as rock-throwing, but it will convince people of the Faith
teachers’ frequent charge that their opposition is “watering down the promises of God” based on
“tradition” and “religious brainwashing.”
30
Therefore, we must present to our congregations and church
groups an apologetic showing that the Faith bait is biblically impossible, the formulation of which will
occupy the remainder of this presentation. Our apologetic will proceed in two steps: first, by supplying the
necessary background information; and second, by employing that information to refute the alluring bait.
In this way, we shall cut the Faith Movement off at the pass and rescue our sisters and brothers in Christ
from embracing its errors.
Demonstrating the Faith “Bait” as Biblically Impossible
We shall begin by adopting the Apostle Paul’s assessment of God’s covenantal work with Israel.
For Paul, the various bĕrîthim (covenant-related promises) from the time of the Patriarchs to the Jews’
return from the Babylonian Exile may be summarized as the outworking of two distinct covenants: the
Abrahamic Covenant, initiated in Genesis 12 and 15; and the Mosaic Covenant, foreshadowed with
Abraham in Genesis 17 but implemented on Mount Sinai (Gal. 3; Rom. 4). We may profitably employ this
Pauline dichotomy as an interpretive framework for shedding light on the Old Testament historical data.
The Abrahamic Covenant, as David J. A. Clines points out, may be subdivided into three divine promises:
to give Abraham an heir and nation; to bestow the Promised Land upon this nation; and to enter into a
saving relationship with anyone who places faith in Yahweh.
31
While promises one and two are
unconditional and concern the Jewish community, the final promise is conditional, non-ethnic, and
individual in nature, made between God and the believer.
32
It is this third aspect of the Abrahamic
covenant, which Clines helpfully styles the “relational covenant,” that concerns our purposes here.
33
Unlike the relational covenant, the Mosaic Covenant is God’s communal pact between himself and the
totality of biblical Israel as a tribal confederation or nation.
34
6
As reciprocal dealings between various persons and God, the relational and Mosaic covenants
not only possess distinct beneficiaries (the individual believer regardless of ethnicity vis-à-vis the ethnic
Jewish community) but also contain separate terms and consequences for either adhering to or violating
those terms. Hence these covenants feature differing mutually contingent human obligations and divine
obligations. For the relational covenant, the human terms comprise personal commitment to and trust in
God as the sovereign ruler of all earthly affairs (Gen. 15:6; Gal. 3:6-9; Rom. 4:3-5, 17); in response, God
promises to accompany the individual throughout life as one’s guide and friend who can be relied upon
amidst all earthly tragedies (Gen. 26:24; 28:15) and to protect the individual in the hereafter, assuring the
individual’s dwelling “in the house of Yahweh forever” (Ps. 23:6). With the advent of the general
resurrection model between the eighth and sixth centuries B.C., the previously vague assurance of
protection in the afterlife was given substance: at death, the soul or spirit of the believer would temporarily
inhabit a penultimate state, called Paradise or “Abraham’s bosom,” until being rejoined with its
transfigured resurrection body on the Day of Yahweh, at which point the complete person, body and soul,
would reside in the transfigured physical universe or “new heaven and new earth” (Isa. 65:17; 66:22).
35
Interpreting the Genesis references to “blessing” (12:2-3) and “seed” (12:7; 13:15) christologically, Paul
terms the promises of the relational covenant “the blessing of Abraham” (Gal. 3:14). The basis for this
covenant, insists Paul, is the imputed righteousness that God graciously credits to the believer upon faith
in him (Rom. 4:1-12), defined not as a intellectual adherence to certain facts about God, but rather as
entrance into a “spiritual marriage” with God the Husband marked by the personal commitment and trust
of a bride (Isa. 54:5; Jer. 3:14, 20; Ezek. 16:32; Hos. 2:16; 2 Cor. 11:2).
36
By contrast, the terms of the Mosaic Covenant are communal obedience to the Decalogue plus
the 613 other mitzvoth, which include circumcision, animal sacrifices, kashrut or dietary laws, a yearly
calendar of festivals, and a host of detailed regulations fostering a national identity as God’s “set-apart” or
holy people (Ex. 20:1-23:19; all of Leviticus; Deut. 4-27). In exchange for obedience, God would furnish
the Israelite community with protection, stability, and prosperity in the realms of politics, economics,
finance, and health (Deut. 28-30). These rewards had nothing whatsoever to do with the afterlife, but
were strictly concerned with the earthly maintenance and success of the Israelite nation.
37
At this point
we must emphasize the fact that the Mosaic Covenant never promised these benefits to any individual
Israelite obedient to Torah, but to the community as a unit if obedient to Torah. The Hebrew text of
Deuteronomy 28-29 makes this fact explicit, as it addresses God’s “holy people” (28:9) and “all the
Israelites” (29:2) with the second-person singular pronoun ’attāh and second-person singular verbs rather
than with the second-person plural ’attem and second-person plural verbs, thereby making the promises
applicable to the group at large and not each member within the group. Moreover, as the Prophets
remind us, the Mosaic Covenant was an all-or-nothing agreement, where, within certain self-disciplinary
limits by which Israel could “purge the evil from among” themselves (Deut. 13:5; 17:7; 19:19; 21:21; 22:21,
24; 24:7), 100% of Israel was either inside or outside the covenant depending on whether there existed
full communal obedience to its mitzvoth. If Israel were outside the covenant, then the extensive curses
listed in Deuteronomy 28:15-68 would befall the nation irrespective of the piety of any particular Israelite,
the sum total of which curses Paul styles “the curse of the Law” (Gal. 3:13). However, such exclusion
from the Mosaic Covenant due to the sins of the community did nothing to exclude the pious Israelite from
the relational covenant, as evident by the Prophets who were often simultaneously under the Mosaic
curse but enjoyed a personal relationship with God, and were thus recipients of ultimate salvation, under
the Abrahamic relational blessing.
Paul’s argument in Galatians is directly addressed to a congregation, during a time when the
“Way” or primitive church was still a sect of Judaism (c. A.D. 56),
38
under pressure from Pharisaic
believers in Jesus, the so-called “Judaizers,” to submit to the terms of the Mosaic Covenant. Far from
divorcing the Way from Judaism, Paul insists that belonging to the Way constitutes the only path to truly
being Jewish, as the Way, alone of all the sects of Judaism, teaches the only path to salvation by which
anyone in history has ever been saved, including Abraham.
39
Thus Paul can write to the Romans in the
same decade, “A person is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision something outward and
physical. No, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by
the written code” (Rom. 2:27-28). But if the Way is Judaism in its purest expression, the question arises,
how can its adherents fail to keep Torah without falling under its curses? Paul responds that the original
Abrahamic Covenant represented God’s overarching vehicle for relations with humanity and was in no
way set aside by the Mosaic Covenant, which God installed as a temporary measure to block sin among
the Israelites until the coming of Messiah (Gal. 3:19-25). Upon Jesus’ inauguration of the Kingdom of7
God, the divine purpose of Torah was completed;
40
however, since God cannot lie, its curses still had to
be borne. According to Paul, this assumption of the curse was performed by Jesus at the cross; by
becoming a curse for us, Jesus neutralized “the curse of the Law” for all believers, such that the Mosaic
Covenant in its entirety – terms, blessings, and curses alike – has been annulled, leaving the Abrahamic
Covenant, brought into dramatically sharp focus by God’s self-revelation in Jesus,
41
as the sole means of
divine-human relations for both Jews and Gentiles.
In sum, Paul informs this Way Jewish assembly, comprised of ethnic Jews and Gentiles, that
Christ has brought an end to the Mosaic Covenant. Because of this fact, and also because the
community is not keeping the prerequisite mitzvoth, it is doubly impossible for the Way to receive the
earthly blessings in Deuteronomy 28:1-14. Hence for Paul the foil of “the curse of the Law” is not “the
blessing of the Law,” as the Law has been taken out of the way; rather, its foil is the qualitatively better
“blessing of Abraham,” as it ensures their intimate communion with God the Trinity in time and eternity.
As F. F. Bruce pointed out in his 1982 essay “The Curse of the Law,” this conclusion is guaranteed by the
fact that the two hina clauses of Galatians 3:14 – hina eis ta ethnē hē eulogia tou Abraam genētai (in
order that the blessing of Abraham would come to the Gentiles) and hina tēn epangelian tou pneumatos
labōmen dia tēs pisteōs (in order that we would receive the promise of the Spirit through faith) – are
coordinate to each other, such that “the ‘blessing of Abraham’ which Gentiles receive ‘in Christ Jesus’ is
incomparably greater than the sum of all the blessings which in Deut. 28.1-14 are set over against the
curses of the preceding chapter; it is their reception of the Spirit through faith.”
42
Despite Paul’s distinction, Word-Faith teachers are notorious for their confusion and subsequent
conflation of these two covenants. This strategy allows them to combine favorable aspects and delete
unfavorable aspects of both covenants into a sort of “revisionary covenant” considerably different from
either of its two constituent elements in terms of its scope, terms, and rewards. Regarding the scope of
the revisionary covenant, it is individual in nature, pro relational, and not merely applicable to a larger
group, pace Mosaic. Regarding its terms, Faith teachers nominally take from the relational covenant faith
in God as focused upon Christ, where faith itself is not spiritual commitment or marriage but a spiritual
force, and disregard the Mosaic stipulation of keeping the over 600 mitzvoth. Regarding its rewards,
Faith teachers combine the relational benefits in the afterlife with the Mosaic material benefits in the
earthly life. Thus from the historian’s perspective, the Faith Movement not only falsifies the relational
aspect of the Abrahamic Covenant by invalidating biblical faith (as has been copiously argued
elsewhere),
43
but also takes a series of blessings never given to an individual but to a nation conditioned
upon obedience to an extensive list of commands and turns it into a series of blessings made to
individuals conditioned by no such obedience. In sum, the Faith understanding of the covenant between
God and the believer is extraordinarily bad history and therefore biblically invalid.
Conclusion
It is my sincere hope that the aforementioned apologetic may be rapidly disseminated from
pulpits and, in turn, propagated by laypeople and clergy alike in their relationships with fellow travelers on
the path of following Jesus and in their evangelistic encounters with non-Christians. Once laypeople are
equipped with this comprehension of Paul’s evaluation of the Hebrew Biblical covenants, the appeal or
“plausibility structure”
44
of Word-Faith theology collapses. As an added benefit, it will enable people to
better understand the Bible, God, and the nature of his salvific work. In this way, we can thwart the rapid
growth of this new religious movement and, through persistence, excise it from the popular perception of
evangelicalism while replacing it with one predicated on advancing the Kingdom of God.
NOTES
1
“50 Most Influential Christians in America,” The Church Report, January 2006.
2
David Van Biema and Jeff Chu, “Does God Want You To Be Rich?” Time, 18 September 2006.
3
Lois Romano, “The ‘Smiling Preacher’ Builds on Large Following,” The Washington Post, 30 January 2005.
4
Kimberly Hayes Taylor, “Her Ministry Reaches Millions,” The Detroit News, 12 September 2003.
5
As, for example, these aims emanated from much of sixteenth-century Spiritualism, including the Zwickau
prophets and the peasant forces led by Thomas Muntzer in the 1524-25 Peasants’ War, who certainly had no
theological affinities to Word-Faith thought.
6
D. R. McConnell, A Different Gospel, rev. ed. (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1995), 185. 8
7
I am here referring to Richard Mouw’s outlandish but highly publicized allegation that the pivotal LDS
doctrine of essential identity between God and humanity has become passé in Mormon theology, which allegation
Ronald V. Huggins has decisively refuted in “Lorenzo Snow’s Couplet: ‘As Man Now Is, God Once Was; As God Now
Is, Man May Be’: ‘No Functioning Place in Present-Day Mormon Doctrine?’ A Response to Richard Mouw,” Journal of
the Evangelical Theological Society 49.3 (2006): 549-68.
8
Joel Osteen, Lakewood Church (TBN, 5 November 2006); Joyce Meyer, Enjoying Everyday Life (INSP, 20
November 2006); Kenneth Copeland, Believer’s Voice of Victory (TBN, 26 November 2006); Benny Hinn, This Is
Your Day (INSP, 9 November 2006); cf. McConnell, Different Gospel, 116-21.
9
Joel Osteen, Lakewood Church (TBN, 8 November 2006); Joyce Meyer, Enjoying Everyday Life (INSP, 1
November 2006); Kenneth Copeland, Believer’s Voice of Victory (TBN, 19 November 2006); Benny Hinn, This Is
Your Day (INSP, 10 November 2006); cf. Robert M. Bowman, Jr., The Word-Faith Controversy: Understanding the
Health and Wealth Gospel (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2001), 105-14.
10
Kirk R. MacGregor, A Central European Synthesis of Radical and Magisterial Reform (Lanham, MD:
University Press of America, 2006), 44-46; Richard A. Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms
(Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1985), 143-45. It should be underscored that the Faith interpretation of imago Dei will not
stand in light of Genesis 1:26, which portrays humanity as created in both God’s tselem (image) and his demuth
(likeness). The term demuth qualifies tselem in order to indicate that humans were created as a finite reflection or
shadow of the infinite divine majesty rather than as a divine duplicate. As the Theological Wordbook of the Old
Testament (Chicago: Moody Press, 1981) points out, demuth “defines and limits” tselem “to avoid the implication that
man is a precise copy of God, albeit miniature” (1:192).
11
Bowman, Word-Faith Controversy, 97-104.
12
Hank Hanegraaff, Christianity in Crisis (Eugene, OR: Harvest House, 1997), 107-20; McConnell, Different
Gospel, 122-23; John F. MacArthur, Jr., Charismatic Chaos (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1992), 331-36.
13
Ted Rouse, Understanding the Grace and Covenant of God (Huntsville, AL: MileStones International,
2005), 47.
14
Kenneth Copeland, Now Are We In Christ Jesus (Fort Worth: Kenneth Copeland Ministries, 1999), 6; Joel
Osteen, “Receiving God’s Mercy,” CD #JC0262 (Houston: Joel Osteen, 17 April 2005).
15
Joyce Meyer, “Me and My Big Mouth”: Your Answer Is Right Under Your Nose (New York: Warner Faith,
1997), 230-31.
16
Benny Hinn, “The Glorious and Eternal Power of the Blood of Jesus” audiotape (Irving, TX: Benny Hinn
Ministries, 2001).
17
The motto of Osteen’s Lakewood Church, displayed on the church’s website as
well as during the introduction of every Lakewood Church telecast.
18
Meyer, “Me and My Big Mouth,” 229.
19
Joel Osteen, Your Best Life Now (New York: Warner Faith, 2004), 64.
20
Joel Osteen, Lakewood Church (TBN, 19 November 2006); Joyce Meyer, Enjoying Everyday Life (INSP,
13 November 2006); Kenneth Copeland, Believer’s Voice of Victory (TBN, 7 November 2006); Benny Hinn, This Is
Your Day (INSP, 28 November 2006); cf. Bowman, Word-Faith Controversy, 137-45.
21
Copeland, In Christ Jesus, 2, 8; Osteen, “Receiving God’s Mercy,” CD #JC0262; Joyce Meyer, “Authority
and Opposition,” audiotape #1236 (Fenton, MO.: Joyce Meyer Ministries, 2003).
22
See, for example, Bowman, Word-Faith Controversy and Hanegraaff, Christianity in Crisis.
23
Meyer, “Authority and Opposition,” audiotape #1236.
24
Kenneth E. Hagin, “The Incarnation,” The Word of Faith (December 1980): 14; Copeland, In Christ Jesus,
8.
25
Particularly Osteen’s unwitting evocation of the phrases “very God of very God” and “one in nature with
the Father” in his provocative depiction of believers as possessing “the very nature of God.”
26
Osteen, “Receiving God’s Mercy,” CD #JC0262.
27
Joel Osteen, Your Best Life Now (New York: Time Warner Audiobooks, 2004), CD 3.
28
Kenneth Copeland, “The Believer’s Voice of Victory” program on TBN, 1 May 2005.
29
For thorough critiques see Bowman, Word-Faith Controversy, 97-228, McConnell, Different Gospel, 101-
220, Hanegraaff, Christianity in Crisis, 59-276, and MacArthur, Charismatic Chaos, 322-53.
30
Kenneth E. Hagin, “How Jesus Obtained His Name” (Tulsa: Kenneth Hagin Ministries, 1989), tape
#44H01.
31
David J. A. Clines, The Theme of the Pentateuch, JSOTSup 10 (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1978), 26.
32
Paul R. House explains that this aspect of the covenant “amounts to one friend’s trust of another friend’s
promises. Because of his faith, God considers [Abraham] righteous, or rightly related to God, and thus secure in the
Lord….Paul concludes that Jesus fulfills the promise of international blessing, for Jesus is the offspring of Abraham
who mediates salvation to all persons” (Old Testament Theology [Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1998], 74,
76); cf. Andrew E. Hill and John H. Walton, A Survey of the Old Testament, 2
nd
ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan,
2000), 74.
33
Clines, Theme of the Pentateuch, 26-27. 9
34
An understanding reinforced by George Mendenhall’s demonstration that the Mosaic Covenant is cast in
the form of a Suzerainty-Vassal treaty, which Ancient Near Eastern kings made only with redeemed or conquered
nations and never with individuals (Law and Covenant in Israel [Pittsburgh: Biblical Colloquium, 1955], 11-12).
35
Jay A. Holstein, The Jewish Experience, 3
rd
ed. (Minneapolis: Burgess, 1990), 169, 306-07.
36
Bernhard W. Anderson, Understanding the Old Testament, 4
th
ed. (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall,
1998), 276-81; House, Old Testament Theology, 291-92.
37
Hill and Walton, Survey of the Old Testament, 140-41; House, Old Testament Theology, 191-92.
38
Although Galatians could be dated as early as 48 (if sent to South Galatian rather than North Galatian
churches), the religio-historical context of the epistle would remain the same in any case; for a thorough discussion of
the chronological issues see Donald Guthrie, New Testament Introduction, 4
th
rev. ed. (Downers Grove, IL:
InterVarsity Press, 1990), 465-81.
39
Oskar Skarsaune, In the Shadow of the Temple: Jewish Influences on Early Christianity (Downers Grove,
IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002), 171-75; cf. Acts 22:1-16; 24:14.
40
This is not to suggest, however, that believers are exempt from natural law, or the moral law that Paul
insists in Romans 2:12-16 is written on the heart of every human being regardless of culture or spatio-temporal
location (many aspects of which law appear in the Decalogue), for its requirements are amply attested outside the
Mosaic Covenant as universal ethical imperatives for all humanity in both Testaments of Scripture (for a handful of
illustrations see Prov. 6:16-19; Ps. 94:1-6; Isa. 33:15; Jer. 7:5-10; Mt. 15:19; Mk. 7:20-23; 12:29-31; Gal. 5:19-21; 1
Cor. 6:9-10; 1 Tim. 1:9-11). Rather, Paul argues that regulations based exclusively on the Mosaic Law – namely,
those which were socio-culturally particular to biblical Israel – need no longer be kept. (Hebrews 7:11-10:18 would
push the argument one step further by insisting that they should no longer be kept since their symbolism has now
been definitively realized in the time-space order by Jesus.)
41
That the covenant announced by Jesus was both a continuation and extension of the Abrahamic
Covenant is the reason why the two form-critically earliest oral traditions reporting the Last Supper, the pre-Markan
passion narrative and the Eucharistic creed (both formulated in the A.D. 30s), respectively depict the cup as “my blood
of the covenant” (Mk. 14:24) and “the new covenant in my blood” (1 Cor. 11:25); for a thorough analysis of these
traditions see Rudolf Pesch, Das Markusevangelium, 2 vols. (Freiburg: Herder, 1977), 2:21, 364-77 and Joachim
Jeremias, Eucharistic Words, tr. Norman Perrin (London: SCM, 1966), 101-05. As E. J. Carnell aptly summarizes:
“Abraham is a blessing to all nations because Jesus Christ is the true offspring of Abraham. There is one covenant; it
unites both economies in the Bible” (The Case for Orthodox Theology [Philadelphia: Westminster, 1959], 18).
42
F. F. Bruce, “The Curse of the Law,” in Paul and Paulinism: Essays in Honor of C. K. Barrett, eds. M. D.
Hooker and S. G. Wilson (London: SPCK, 1982), 33.
43
Bowman, Word-Faith Controversy, 197-99; McConnell, Different Gospel, 132-46; Hanegraaff, Christianity
in Crisis, 65-71.
44
I borrow this phrase from Peter L. Berger, The Sacred Canopy (New York: Anchor Books, 1967), 45.
Hi Thomas. Thanks for writing. I’ll respond soon. God bless you today.
Mike
Thanks, Dr. Spaulding. Any idea what happened to my original comment? I can’t see it. Is it being hidden until you have a full reply?
Hi Thomas:
Would you be able to resend your previous comment(s)? Thank you.
Mike
I don’t have a copy. It starts “Dr. Spaulding, Thank you for your thoughts on this film. I googled the film title soon after watching it and came across your blog. I hope you will take the time to read my thoughts as well. It seems that the vast majority of what you’ve written does not really have much to do with […]”
There’s just a big black line where it should be.
Hi Thomas:
I found the original. It is shown below. I apologize for the delay in responding. I am traveling. God’s blessings to you today.
Mike
Thomas Chiasson commented on Finger of God or More Word-Faith Deception?
Dr. Spaulding,
Thank you for your thoughts on this film. I googled the film title soon after watching it and came across your blog. I hope you will take the time to read my thoughts as well.
It seems that the vast majority of what you’ve written does not really have much to do with the film at all, from about the 5th paragraph to the paragraph beginning “Some may misunderstand…”, and then a large section of quoting occult and demonic sources after that. You mention a lot of names of people who never appeared in the film, pick some quotes from them, and then argue against those quotes as if you’re arguing against the film itself. You quote quite a bit of demonic scripture, but you hardly quote the film at all. What’s the connection between all these occult quotes and the film? You seem to think that they carry the same theology, but from what I could tell, the theology presented in the film was simply about the power of God, the existence of miracles, and the importance of love. You’ve built a straw man out of quotes, people, and doctrines never presented in the film, slapped some labels on it like latter day rain, and then destroyed it. Now, I don’t know half the names you’ve dropped in this blog or half the labels you’ve slapped on them, so I’m just going to talk about what was in the movie and what’s in the bible.
First, the manna. Revelation 2:17 doesn’t seem to specify a timeline for getting the “secret manna”, only that it will happen to those who conquer. And even if it doesn’t happen till later, could this simply be a foreshadowing, the same way the manna itself was a foreshadowing of the body of Christ?
Second, the gold. Is it possible that the gold in churches is an authentic work of the Holy Spirit, and that Satan has been imitating it in the occult? We know from Moses’ experience with Pharoah’s magicians that Satan does like to imitate God’s miracles.
Third, ‘kenosis’. The only reason I mention this is because it’s the only theology you mention that you explicitly claim is promoted by someone who actually appears in the film. I don’t know what ‘kenosis’ is and won’t try to argue for or against it, but looking at the quote from Johnson, it appears that Johnson is simply talking about how Christ took the form of a slave as Paul says in Philippians, and how He required the Holy Spirit before He began His ministry. I don’t necessarily see any attack on His divinity here. Now, I don’t know what the context for this quote was, and maybe there’s more I’m missing. But either way this issue is peripheral; it was never in the film, it’s not what the film is about.
Finally, and most importantly, is the scene where Heidi Baker argues with the Turkish translator. Now this I think is more worth arguing about that anything else; this is really the thesis of the film and the biggest thing I took away. From what I could see, Heidi never downplays the importance of discipleship in this scene. Instead, she simply argues that loving others is even more important than discipling them. This statement hits me hard and true like a rock in the chest. Jesus says to make disciples out of all nations, teaching them to obey all of His teachings. But one of the foundations of Jesus’ teaching is that the law and all the prophets can be summed up by loving God and loving each other. “If you love me you will obey my commands,” He says, “And this is my command: Love one another.” Paul reiterates this countless times, going so far in 1 Corinthians 13 to say that love is the most important gift or quality for a christian to have. Without love, he says, nothing else we do or have counts for anything, and although he doesn’t explicitly mention discipleship, I think it’s very clear that he could have.
The scene with the muslim woman is a poignant illustration of this dilemma: the woman refuses discipleship and simply trying to preach the gospel to her is not getting Heidi and her translator anywhere. What do we do when the gospel is refused? When people refuse to be taught, refuse to be discipled? It is here that our true colors come out and our motivations are revealed. If we do are not preaching the gospel out of love, if we don’t love people whether they receive the gospel or not, then we are no better than the pharisees. This is what the message of the cross is all about, God loved us so much, He went to the cross and died for us even when we refused to believe Him, when we rejected Him. That’s what the film seemed to be getting across, and if my interpretation is inconsistent with anything else in the film, please let me know.
I hope you take the time to read this and respond. Thank you very much!
Great article. There is a lot of good information here, although I did want to let you know something – I am running Redhat with the most recent beta of Firefox, and the look and feel of your blog is kind of weird for me. I can read the articles, but the navigation doesnt seem to work properly.
I have read the part on the finger of God and wonder if you believe in healing through the laying of hands or do you think that praying for someone and laying of hands on a person is completely nonsence for you?
Hi Andre:
Yes, I believe God still heals people today. Have a blessed day in the Lord.
Mike
I know this is an old post but I wanted to thank you for the article. My father became affiliated with the Toronto Airport “church” a few years ago. From the start I have felt that this movement is wrong. He now only speaks about things like “love is all you need” “just love people”…this was puzzling to me and I didn’t understand where it was coming from until I read this article.
What is even more troubling is that this “latter rain” movement is becoming more accepted by believers. Places like IHOP (International House of Prayer) are deceiving many Christians. In fact, John and Carol Arnott recently visited IHOP…what are your thoughts on this place? I truly believe that the core of this movement is from the devil under the guise of being from God. Please continue to spread the word!
Thanks for writing. Yes the article was posted a couple of years ago. Surprisingly it generates a lot of views and a few nasty responses. Given that adherents of this false teaching embrace the belief that their words are power, it is surprising that they would put voice to what they otherwise consider negative confessions. I have been thinking recently that I should update the theme with some articles that detail the origins of the so-called Word Faith Movement. History demonstrates that Word Faith is occultic, with roots in the Mind Science cults, Nation of Islam teachings, and even Mormonism. Stay tuned for more posts that illuminate the blasphemy behind the health and wealth pseudo-gospel.
Hi Mike, I was encouraged to go along and hear Bill Johnson speak at a church here in Western Australia by my very sincere brother in law. Since then I have been watching the whole Bethel thing with interest. Other very close friends have become quite enamored with Johnson. There seems to me to be quite a substantial movement growing here. Reminds me of the Wimber/Cain stuff that hit here in the early 90s. Very helpful book is “Blessing the Church” by Clifford Hill, Peter Fenwick, David Forbes, David Noakes – can’t recommend it highly enough. Centred around Wimber and Cain but it goes into Latter Day stuff and Branham’s influence in particular.
Your work here, while dealing with things from a different angle pretty much covers the same ground. Valuable that you are here taking the time.
This has all been kicked off afresh for me, as a colleague – wonderful Christian brother – told me and then showed me Father of Lights – the third in the trilogy that appears to be backed by Bethel et al. Seems… pretty compelling. What I was wondering though upon reflection was; are we watching a documentary of events unfold or are these a series of re-enactments. Regardless – once I heard that Bethel was involved the old alarm bells went off.
God Bless. These, I am finding, are tough times.
Hi Justin:
Thank you for writing. John Wimber came out of the Calvary Chapel Movement (my affiliation). He was more interested in the experiencial and mystical at the expense of simply teaching the Word. Wimber’s fascination has led to some of the aberrations we see today. The current “Finger of God” and similar so-called manifestations cannot be supported biblically. Branham, Latter Rain, and the entire Word of Faith Movement is heretical in the least and in some instances are clearly blasphemous (for example, their teaching that Jesus Christ went to hell and was “born again” there; another example is Ken Copeland claiming he is “I Am” as Jesus is “I Am”). Keep the faith once for all delivered to the saints Justin.
Lol this review really made me laugh, god is love and all this theoligy analysing i dont get, dont get me wrong we do have to anaylse the teachings we get to the bible but jesus died on the cross for us and us who belive in him are saved as simple as that just because god might manifest his power ( that we should not limit to our intelligence) in a way that we dont understand we cant say its a manifestation of the devil. Jesus is love and we as his children bring love to this world and yes bring people to christ but sometimes our job is just to give love, anyway i cant wait to meet you all in heaven!
Dave:
Thanks for writing. I agree with you that Jesus’ death and resurrection provided salvation to all who will believe. Pardon me for pointing out the obvious but that is theology. Theology is derived from the Bible says. It isn’t made up of our opinions. To go beyond the clear teachings of the Scriptures and say that because some people say that certain things happen and that they are evidence of the Holy Spirit or in this case the “finger of God” is dangerous in the least and patently false/heretical/blasphemous in the extreme. There is no evidence in the Scriptures that God has ever manifested Himself in the way these videos proclaim He is/has. There are however plenty of examples from the occult demonstrating that is exactly how our enemy and his minions manifest themselves. They’re called counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders.
The Word Faith teachers I mentioned in this article are heretics in the least. Perhaps you are unaware that Word Faith teachers believe and teach that Jesus was just a man who became “the” Christ at His baptism. He then lived His “ministry years” as the Christ, but the Holy Spirit left Him on the cross and He died an ordinary man. It was then necessary for Jesus to go into hell and there be born again. It was this experience – Jesus’s descent so that He could be born again – that secured our salvation. It was not Jesus’ death on the cross and subsequent resurrection that secured our salvation. Kenneth Copeland for example is on record as saying this. Did you know that? When Word Faith theology is examined it is shown to be blasphemous. That is no laughing matter.
God bless you as you seek Him and seek His truth.
there is no doubt i know jesus was god and not an ordinary man and i dont really know any of this word faith you speek of, (im from a protestent pentecostal background) its just that i do believe that god still does miracles today, and what i appreciated of finger of god is that it makes me realize that the more i read his word the more a have a personal relationship with jesus, i discover that his love and power has no end, these people have an active ministry helping people to know and accepte jesus, that can not come from the devil. if we judge the ministry and its fruits we will know if it is from god or the devil, but of course these are humans and there will be flaws (here i am talking of those who understand that jesus is god not that word faith thing,) the bible is our guide and i base my life on this, but finger of god i think we can take some and leave some, miracles do still happen by the power of god and it helps me realize that god calls us to live a life through him so we can see extraordinary things instead of going to church once or twice a week and thats it,
I know i am writing this to born again christian( and im glad cause we will meet someday) the reason i decided to reply is not to argument but more to encourage to see that in finger of god there are things that are from god and that living like in the time of the act of the apostles is still what jesus wants that is why he gave us the holy spirit.
from a dude in quebec, that is why my english might be a little off, im french god bless my friend
God bless you today Dave.
Random question – has anyone bothered to fact check the Finger of God etc. docos? When watching one they were saying that only muslims were allowed in the Dome of the Rock, but from my research it looks like that simply isn’t true and certainly wasn’t at the time of filming (though this is crucial to the big finale “miracle”). Combined with a good understanding of the placebo effect you can see that the healing ideas presented don’t work so well. The biblical case against it is also sound, but it doesn’t take much to see that it’s bogus to the core.
Rob:
That is a great idea. If you or someone you know does that let me know the findings.
God bless you today.
Mike
Great write up, Dr. Spaulding. Thank you! My question for you is how do you deal with the music that comes out of Bill Johnson’s church – Bethel? Jesus Culture is everywhere and played in many Calvary Chapels. Would you ban their music for fear that someone is lured into that heresy?
Hi Tony:
That is a good question. Some do refuse to use any of it because of the origin while others pick and choose carefully based on lyrical content. Personally I would exercise caution and make sure the song is saying what you think it is. We do use some Vineyard and Hillsong music in our worship services. I know people who do not use these sources either.
I like your blog. Thank you for being a Berean and encouraging the saints to be disciples who make disciples.
Mike