British Muslims: Christmas is evil

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A recent article by Ethel Fenig at The American Thinker (link below) once again demonstrates the absurdity of the Muslim propaganda machine.  Here is the short article:

Just in time for Christmas, as a Christmas present to the people of England, some British Muslims have plastered fliers around the country announcing Christmas is evil. Parodying the Twelve Days of Christmas, the not so merry red and black ads sing

On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me an STD

‘On the 2nd day debt, on the 3rd rape, the 4th teenage pregnancies and then there was abortion, raves, claiming god has a son, blasphemy, exploitation, promiscuity, night clubs, crime, paedophilia, paganism, domestic violence, homelessness, violence, vandalism, alcohol, drugs…
In contrast, the fliers proclaim

In Islam we are protected from all of these evils. We have marriage, family, honour, dignity, security, rights for man, woman and child.

The Muslim organizer of this ad campaign unapologetically stated

‘Christmas is a lie and as Muslims it is our duty to attack it.

‘But our main attack is on the fruits of Christmas, things like alcohol abuse and promiscuity that increase during Christmas and all the other evils these lead to such as abortion, domestic violence and crime.

But there is a way out! Of course!

‘We hope that out campaign will make people realise that Islam is the only way to avoid this and convert.’

And if you don’t…

Like their hate filled counterparts of the Seattle anti Israel bus ads, organizers will self righteously invoke freedom of speech to justify these sentiments.

Meanwhile in Iraq, where the remaining Christians are still terrified after more than 50 were slaughtered in a church a few months ago, holiday festivities have been canceled.

Yes, canceled. There will be no church services, no holiday decorations.

Freedom of speech, of religion doesn’t exist in Muslim countries.

But we must learn to be tolerant of the intolerant.You know the drill: Diversity, pluralism and multi culturalism and all that.

Where does one start in addressing such a perspective?  The view that Islam is the answer for America’s moral woes is beyond comprehension.  I’m amazed that otherwise seemingly rational people who investigate Islam on even a cursory level do not see the blatant contradiction and double-speak inherent in it.  A conversation with an Islamist related to morality or moral issues is nonsensical from the beginning because Islam as a moral system is inherently evil.

Islam as the pinnacle of morality is a demonstrably false and outrageously disingenuous statement.  Islamic doctrine/theology is not moral by any standard of morality unless one believes that the deliberate harassment, imprisonment, and murder of innocent people for no reason or any reason is moral.

Your thoughts?

British Muslims: Christmas is evil.

Answering Islam

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I recently received an email from a Muslim living in Ohio.  She was aghast at the breaking news of the US Government’s sponsorship of STD testing on unsuspecting Guatemalans in the 1940’s.  Her shock took the form of the statements and questions below:

I couldn’t believe my ears hearing this!!!! so is THIS an act of terrorism or what??? or if it’s only on “regular white American people” THEN and only THEN we would call it “TERRORISM”???? How I would appreciate answers from White American Friends who were really concerned about Sept 11, AND on any attack on white Americans only???

This is not the first correspondence I have had with this Muslim woman.  Her previously stated positions include the position that 9-11 was an US Government sponsored plot and that Islamic terrorism is the result of evil US foreign policies concerning Islamic nations and Israel.  Aside from her obvious belief in the inherent racism of white Americans, there are many “holes” in her confused argument.  My response to her request for a response is shown below.

Continue reading →

Wake Up Christian!

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The book of Isaiah is known for a lot of different things.  I was reminded recently that nearly 1/3 of Isaiah’s prophecy has to do with God’s warning to His people not to trust in other nations for their security.  Again and again, through the various “oracles” or woes upon the nations Isaiah reminds his listeners that they must place their trust in God alone or perish.

God issues a warning to his people at the very outset:

Isaiah 1:2

“Listen oh heavens and hear oh earth; for the Lord speaks, Sons I have reared and brought up, but they have revolted against me.”

In what ways have God’s people revolted against Him?  God’s people have revolted against Him in the sense that they look for security in things or people rather than in God alone.  Today, God’s people are busy being religious but not godly, spiritual but not filled with the Holy Spirit.

Those of you that have spent any amount of time “culture” and/or “church” watching understand that seismic shifts in perspective and practice are underway.  Some within the Christian community have embraced these changes as a means to reach the culture. 

Unfortunately, what is being sacrificed in order to reach the culture is the only thing that can save them – the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The so-called culture wars that America is in the throes of currently, are nothing more than a conflict between Protestant Evangelical Christianity that remains rooted in the authority of the Bible, and a government that has taken it upon itself to create and subsequently mandate morals based on humanistic and thus atheistic concepts that elevate mankind and relegate faithful expressions of Christianity to the realm of personal and subjective expressions not welcomed in the public square.

This is an interesting development to me.  All information is welcomed to join the cacophony except that information that calls individuals and nations to accountability before a holy and righteous God.  I am left to surmise that a message of peace and hope interrupts and brings too much order to the confusion.

Back to this point though – we live in a time that is aptly characterized as the age of information.  We have information at our finger tips 24/7/365.

What escapes the understanding of most people and unfortunately large numbers of Christians is that this constant barrage of information is not “value-neutral.”

What do I mean by that?  I mean to say that all information conveys a viewpoint, a perspective, an opinion, and often, some truth.  We cannot escape the fact that communication is a vehicle for these things.  Postmodernists of course insist that truth is socially or individually constructed, and is not objective in any sense and therefore is not suited as a foundation for the construction of a metanarrative.  This of course is a very underhanded way of pushing Christian theism to the sidelines.  More about that later.

My point is this brothers and sisters – we live in an information age where the exchange of information, i.e. communication, is dispensed much like groceries.  Grocery stores are still called markets in some places and I like this picture when it comes to information.  Americans live in a culture that is controlled through a “market place of ideas” that functions in part to filter and disseminate information.

And much like our grocery shopping habits, we must pay attention to the labels and nutritional value information as it relates to the content of what we choose to believe.

In fact I believe that our apathy toward the nutritional contents label of the ideas, philosophies, and politics Christians in America have unwittingly absorbed, is in large measure responsible for the sad state of the Protestant Evangelical Christian church today.  I make this distinction (Protestant, Evangelical) because most of the so-called church falling outside of these descriptors is already apostate.

It was Neil Postman, who in 1985 first brought to my attention the sometimes symbiotic relationship between media and culture in his book Amusing Ourselves to Death:

“. . . it is, I believe, a wise and particularly relevant supposition that the media of communication available to a culture are a dominant influence on the formation of the culture’s intellectual and social preocuupations” (p.9).

My plea today is therefore two-fold.  One, I call on all Bible-believing Christians, the remnant found within confessing, professing, Protestant Evangelicalism, to return to our first love – the Lord Jesus Christ.

Secondly, I call on these same Christians to once again take up the mantle of sound biblical scholarship.  We have wasted so much spiritual capital formulating fuzzy, anemic, egalitarian, ecumenistic “Christianity-light,” so that today, the teaching of sound biblical doctrine and faithful Christian living according to the Scriptures is seen as radical, narrow-minded, unloving, and according to the main stream media, “fundamentalism.”  That’s not a compliment by the way.

We must continue to insist that ideas have consequences, and not all ideas are equal as evidenced by the myriad consequences manifested.  Douglas Groothuis makes this point clear in his article entitled “Tolerance, Pluralism, and the Christian,” where he says:

“. . . while we should be egalitarians when it comes to people we must be elitists when it comes to ideas – and not the reverse.  All ideas – whether religious or ethical or whatever – are not equally true.  Americans have freedom of religion but this hardly renders all religion right or reasonable.  The Branch Davidians were neither.  It is nothing less than intellectual suicide to presume that the perennially profound issues of life – concerning the existence and nature of God, the nature of humanity, spiritual salvation, etc. – have no right and wrong answers, like a multiple choice test with no answer key.  Christians know otherwise because we are the humble recipients of God’s answers revealed through Christ and in the Holy Scriptures (online article at www.ivpress.com/groothuis/doug/archives/000107.php).

The path forward is surely to remain obedient to the Scriptures and the leading of the Holy Spirit.  I submit to you that we must also engage our brothers and sisters in the faith and especially those we attempt to reach in our cities with the gospel of Jesus Christ, within the “market place of ideas.”

This is then, an appeal for the Church to embrace the field of apologetics as one vehicle for engaging unbelievers and even the downtrodden within our own ranks.  Let me be clear.  I am suggesting that apologetics is one plank of the evangelistic effort that must be renewed and that must become a focus of our ministries.

Evangelism is about sharing the life-changing message of God’s salvation freely offered through faith in the finished work of Jesus Christ.  The apologetic task is often a necessary step in clearing the “minefield” of objections that an unbeliever might raise, in order that they may have a clear view of the cross of Christ where sin’s penalty was paid. 

Apologetics rightly understood is the discourse Christians enter into, that thoughtfully and rationally provide answers for the concerns of unbelievers.

We are losing the culture wars precisely because pastors and laypersons alike, have not understood this responsibility and are not teaching and leading others in doing it.

We need do nothing more than pick up the daily newspaper, turn on the television, or radio, or log onto the internet to see the truthfulness of this statement.  Becoming conversant within the secular market place of ideas is no longer optional brothers and sisters.  It is a necessity.

Let me illustrate my thesis by presenting to you some examples of a culture that has lost its way.

I want to show how disconnected and ill-informed we have become to the ways of the enemy and the path that America has taken that has resulted in the outrageous decisions we witness from our courts and Congress, not to mention the current and past presidential administrations.

Author George Weigel, in an April 2008 article in First Things journal entitled The Sixties Again and Again, describes 6 crucial incidents that helped shape American culture into what it is today.  One of the incidents Weigel cites caught my eye because it illustrates my point in this teaching.

Weigel describes it thusly:

“In 1961, the executive director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut, Estelle Griswold, opened a birth-control clinic in New Haven in collaboration with Dr. C. Lee Buxton, a professor at the Yale School of Medicine. Their purpose was to test the constitutionality of Connecticut’s 1879 law banning the sale of contraceptives, a law that had never been enforced and which the U.S. Supreme Court had recently declined to review.

What appears to have been a carefully crafted strategy then unfolded: The state authorities acted; Griswold and Buxton were charged, tried, convicted, and fined $100 each; and the lower court decision was upheld by the relevant Connecticut appellate courts (including the splendidly named “Connecticut Supreme Court of Errors”).

 Griswold and Buxton then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which accepted the Case and, in the 1965 decision, Griswold v. Connecticut, struck down both the convictions and the Connecticut statute on the ground that the law violated what Justice William O. Douglas’ majority opinion called “the right to marital privacy.” Justice Douglas conceded that the Constitution did not mention a “right to privacy,” marital or otherwise, but famously opined that such a right was to be discerned in “penumbras (an indistinct, unclear, uncertain area –definition mine) formed by emanations” from the Constitution’s enumerated rights.

 In dissent, Justice Potter Stewart described the Connecticut law he believed constitutional as “uncommonly silly”—which, in retrospect, was a phrase he could have used to describe Griswold v. Connecticut, adding “pernicious” to “silly.” For in terms of our legal culture, Griswold was the Pearl Harbor of the American culture war, the fierce debate over the moral and cultural foundations of our democracy that has shaped our politics for two generations.”

That last statement is what originally caught my attention.  As I read the rest of Weigel’s argument I became convinced that he was absolutely correct in his conclusions and that this same understanding would explain every other tool of the liberals, both secular and religious, as well as their allies in the media and especially in our government.

Here in Weigel, we find a clear example of the importance of Christians working within the market place of ideas.  In the best Paul Harvey impression I can muster, “Here is the rest of the story.”

“As Edward Whelan has already put it, who knew that contraception could have such generative power? Griswold begat Eisenstadt v. Baird, the 1972 decision in which the court extended the protections of the “right of privacy” to nonmarried couples.

Then Eisenstadt begat Roe v. Wade, in which the “right to privacy” was cited to strike down state abortion laws from sea to shining sea, in what Justice Byron White described as an exercise in “raw judicial power.”

Roe, in turn, begat Casey v. Planned Parenthood, which positioned the “right to abortion” as a Fourteenth Amendment liberty right. Roe and Casey then begat the 2003 Supreme Court decision in Lawrence v. Texas, which struck down a state antisodomy statute, with Justice Anthony Kennedy making an explicit reference to Griswold’s “right to privacy” as “the most pertinent beginning point” for the line of reasoning that led the Court to Lawrence.

And if Eisenstadt, Roe, Casey, and Lawrence were the direct descendants of Griswold, it is not difficult to see how Goodridge v. Department of Public Health, the 2003 Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court decision mandating so-called “gay marriage,” was a collateral descendant of Justice Douglas’ discovery of a constitutional “right to privacy.”

This judicial artifact of the Sixties has had tremendous impact on our political culture. Just as the oral contraceptive pill facilitated the sexual revolution technologically, Griswold facilitated it constitutionally. Governmental indifference to contraception was soon construed to imply governmental indifference to abortion, via the misconstrual of abortion as a matter of sexual privacy rather than as a matter of public justice; and the “right to abortion” soon became a defining issue in our politics.”

The ‘right to abortion,’ with its theme of sexual liberation,” as Hadley Arkes puts it, “has become the central peg on which the interests of the Democratic party have been arranged,” just as, “since the days of Ronald Reagan, the Republican party has become… the pro-life party in our politics.”

Careful observers will note here a profound inversion. If abortion and related life issues are in fact the great civil-rights issues of our time— in that they test whether the state may arbitrarily deny the protection of the law to certain members of the human community—then Griswold eventually led to a situation in which the Democratic and Republican positions on civil rights flipped, with members of today’s Democratic party playing the role that its Southern intransigents played during the glory days of the American civil-rights movement. (I’m not sure what is the greatest travesty here – the Democrats being painted today as champions of the civil rights movement of the 1960’s which they clearly were not; they were largely KKK members who did all they could to suppress civil rights; or, the inversion of good becoming evil and evil becoming good;  how else can you explain abortion being defined as a civil right that is good, wholesome, and healthy for a society?)

The Supreme Court was not the only actor in these momentous changes, of course. The invention of the oral contraceptive pill must rank with the splitting of the atom and the unraveling of the DNA double helix as one of the three scientific achievements of the twentieth century with world-historical impact. The sexual revolution was also influenced by trends in philosophy, particularly existentialism’s emphasis on authenticity. The inability of many modern moral philosophers to get beyond Hume’s fact-value distinction in order to think their way through to a contemporary form of natural-law moral reasoning (which would in turn have helped discipline the public debate on abortion) also played its role. The supine surrender of most religious authorities to the sexual revolution removed one cultural obstacle to the sexual revolution’s triumphant progress, which was in turn supported by developments (or, perhaps better, deteriorations) in popular culture.

Still, in measuring the impact of the Sixties on the politics of 2008, the legal consequences of Griswold must be underscored. Here the Supreme Court began to set in legal concrete the notion that sexual morals and patterns of family life are matters of private choice or taste, not matters of public concern in which the state has a legitimate interest. That this trend should have eventually led to claims that marriage is whatever any configuration of adults-sharing-body-parts declares it to be ought not have been a surprise.

Nor should it have been a surprise that the Court, having successfully claimed for itself the authority to write a “living Constitution” based on penumbras and emanations, should assume the roles of National Metaphysician and National Nanny (as it did in Casey, with its famous “mystery of life” passage and its hectoring injunction to a fractious populace to fall into line behind the Court’s abortion jurisprudence). The royal road to the imperial judiciary may not have begun with Griswold, but Griswold certainly accelerated the pace of the coronation procession.”

 When the law becomes something other than it was intended to be, morality becomes something other than what God has stated.

Some results in America’s shifting morality were captured in a World Net Daily article entitled “What Were 2009’s Worst Attacks on Christianity?” dated January 4, 2010 in which author Drew Zahn lists what were in his opinion the top 10 acts of religious bigotry and discrimination aimed at Christians. http://www.wnd.com/index.php/index.php?pageId=120976

President Obama has a decidedly anti-Christian bent as demonstrated in his continued appointments of individuals hostile to Christianity.  See for example these articles on President Obama’s recess appointment of Chai Feldblum who defends gay sex as morally good and as a newly appointed member of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has been very transparent in her anti-Christian position.  Consider for example this statement Feldblum made related to gay acceptance: “This is a war that needs to be fought, and it’s not a war overseas where we are killing people in the name of liberating them (typical liberal socialist anti-American slant – comments mine). It is a war right here at home where we need to convince people that morality demands full equality for gay people.” See http://www.wnd.com/index.php?pageId=112003 and http://www.cnsnews.com/news/print/59965 Feldblum is also the principle author of ENDA, the oxymoronic law banning discrimination that discriminates.  See http://www.ccv.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/909Courier.pdf

You need to understand that when Feldblum and others like our President talk of convincing people they don’t mean through rational dialogue but by the force of law.  There is no intention on the part of Mr. Obama and his crowd to try to convince Americans of anything.  His strategy is to force his agenda down our throats hoping that (1) we’ll not understand what he is doing until it is too late; (2) bury new laws so deep that they won’t be discovered until many years down the road and by that time entrenched;and/or  (3) play on the very real attention deficit disorder and general apathy Americans demonstrate.

I’ve shared all of this with you to underscore the need to become more outspoken about our faith and its foundational place in American cultural life.  This is the apologetic task in a nutshell.

Brothers and sisters, I do not take on this subject lightly.  Nevertheless I am reminded of the words of Edmund Burke who said, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men to do nothing.”

Far better still are the words of our Lord Jesus Christ.  “This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil.  For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.  But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God” (John 3:19-21).

May God have mercy on us and ever lead us in the Light.

Finger of God or More Word-Faith Deception?

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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.

History of ideas . . .

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It’s been a while since I’ve posted.  I’ve been very busy reading and researching the development of the ideas, philosophies, and politics that have led historically to tyrannies.  I will be presenting some of my findings on New Year’s Eve during my annual Prophecy Update.  You can watch it live via our church website – www.cclohio.org beginning at 7PM.  Thank you for your continued prayers.

Stay tuned for a post on the Obama political machine and his tyrannical tendencies.