Mission Support

Truth Matters Newsletter – February 2006 – Vol. 11 Issue 2 – Mission Support for March

Pastor Andrew Nicolas wrote us asking for help. Here is a portion of the e-mail:

I shall appreciate it if you send me English Hoy Bibles to shall to the Pastors and Revs to continues spreading the word of God. If the Lord provides the resources please include 50 New Testaments in English. Also send any other Bible related materials for winning more people to Christ.

Please note: I serve in poor community were the majority are not able to buy Christian materials. And also we have Crusade, Revival meetings, Seminars, Leadership training for both Woman and Men, and personal Evangelism. Your assistance in this matter will be highly appreciated. May the good Lord bless you as you remember the needy.

_________________________________

MISSIONS UPDATE

Through your financial support I am very happy to announce that our fist shipment of Bibles and DMI materials arrived in Rwanda. DMI sent a small initial box of Bibles and Bible Software programs to Nepal. We will be sending the rest of the shipment of Bibles (in the picture) and other materials when we know the first shipment has arrived.

Advertisement

The Dreaded Curse of the charismaniac

Truth Matters Newsletters – December 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 12 – The Dreaded Curse of the Charismaniac – By Robert S. Liichow

Discernment Ministries International 

The Dreaded Curse of the charismaniac

The content of several recent e-mails to our ministry expose an untaught but often practiced doctrine within the charismatic extremist movement from which I was delivered, the dire practice of “cursing” those who oppose charismania for one reason or another.

Cursing someone is basically invoking the name of a deity or using supernatural power to cause destruction, harm or calamity to another person. Normally one associates cursing with voodoo, Santeria (1) or some other form of witchcraft and not with Christianity, especially not with folks who claim to have a higher “dose” of the Holy Ghost whose love is alleged to be shed abroad in their hearts. (see Romans 5:5) !

What is sad is that some professing Christians couch their curses in the name of our Lord Jesus. The usual manner for curses to be unleashed by charismaniacs (2) occurs in two basic ways. First, curses are proclaimed as an alleged prophetic directive from the Lord. The example I will shortly site from Mr. Hinn is a manifestation of this type of curse. Secondly, curses are uttered in the name of the Lord against those who disagree with someone, usually over doctrinal issues or against those who call into question not only the biblical teachings of someone but also their lifestyle. This second form is often simply unmasked anger or hatred for someone, but done in the name of Jesus to sanctify it. This variety is seen by the Charismaniac as a legitimate form of righteous anger as typified by Jesus overturning the tables in the temple (see Matthew 21:12) or His verbal excoriation of the Scribes and Pharisees (see Matthew 23:27). My first example is of the second type and was uttered by Mr. Paul Crouch, the Founder of the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN) against all the Christian Apologists who dared question Mr. Crouch and his cronies about doctrinal issues being transmitted globally via TBN.

That old rotten Sanhedrin crowd, twice dead, plucked up by the roots…they’re damned and on their way to hell and I don’t think there’s any redemption for them…the hypocrites, the heresy hunters, that want to find a little mote of illegal doctrine in some Christian’s eyes…when they’ve got a whole forest in their own lives…” I say, to hell with you! Get out of my life! Get out of the way! Quit blockin’ God’s bridges! I’m tired of this!…This is my spirit. Oh, hallelujah!” …There’s a spiritual application here….I want to say to all you scribes, Pharisees, heresy-hunters, all of you that are around pickin’ little bits of doctrinal error out of everybody’s eyes and dividin’ the Body of Christ…get out of God’s way, stop blockin’ God’s bridges, or God’s goin’ to shoot you if I don’t… let Him sort out all this doctrinal doodoo!….I refuse to argue any longer with any of you out there! Don’t even call me if you want to argue doctrine, if you want to straighten somebody out…criticize Ken Copeland…or Dad Hagin. Get out of my life! I don’t ever want to talk to you…I don’t want to see your ugly face! (3)

See a Video here :

According to my research Mr. Crouch has never recanted or repented for such hatred and anger. Crouch says that those of us who question him regarding doctrinal issues are “damned and on their way to hell.” Obviously, Crouch has become the one who holds the eternal life and knows who is damned and on their way to hell (and he is not even a Calvinist!!). “There is no redemption for them,” my Bible says that God so loved the world that He sent His Son to die for sinners (read John 3:16) and in another place the Holy Writ says that our Father desires that all men be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth (read 1 timothy 2:4). So how can there be “no redemption” for us po’ heresy-hunters? “To hell with you…” when was the last time you pointed your finger at Christian brothers and sisters (or even outright sinners) and said “go to hell”? Hopefully never, but Mr. Crouch is on a higher spiritual plane than the rest of us and so the following dictum does not pertain to him:

Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth. But that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. Eph. 4:29

Crouch brings God into his tirade by declaring that those of us with legitimate doctrinal concerns regarding orthodox Christian dogma are blocking God’s bridges (aka TBN) and says we are guilty of dividing the Body of Christ. What is more if we do not stop challenging Crouch, Copeland, Hagin and others then “God’s gonin’ shoot” us if Crouch does not first.

See Video here – Paul Crouch: God’s gonna shot you if I don’t:

It seems various Christian Apologists were contacting TBN and contending for the faith once delivered unto the saints (read Jude 3) and Crouch was fed up with our calls, letters and e-mails. I say this because he mentions doctrine four times in his curse along with Copeland, Hagin, two unabashed heretics.

To the charismatic extremist the battle cry is “doctrine divides.” As long as one calls Jesus his Lord and believes He ascended back to heaven is all the doctrine one needs to inspect. Crouch is not upset by a little illegal doctrine in a Christian’s life, but he is upset by anyone who would dare to try to lovingly correct those who are in error. Crouch has obviously lost sight of what Jesus warned when He said —

Then Jesus said unto them, Take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees…How is it that ye do not understand that I spake [it] not to you concerning bread, that ye should beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees? Then understood they how that he bade [them] not beware of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees. Matthew 16:6,11-12

No one has perfect doctrine and no one in the Apologetic arena of ministry I know has ever made such a claim. Speaking for myself, the more I study God’s Word the more I learn how little I do know. However, there are cardinal doctrines which must be universally agreed upon in order to be considered a genuine Christian. These are the issues we are chiefly concerned about.

Jesus warns His disciples about the danger of false doctrine and we echo His warnings today to our brothers and sisters. There is no such thing as harmless false (illegal) doctrine. True, none of us is 100% doctrinally pure, but it is one thing to lack understanding concerning some facet of biblical truth and quite another to embrace something that is erroneous. The Apostle Paul rebukes the Galatians who were being bewitched by legalism. He reminds them—

Ye did run well; who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth? This persuasion [cometh] not of him that calleth you. A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. Galatians 5:7-9

Crouch is very willing to “wink” at a little leaven (illegal doctrine), DMI is not. Truth Matters to God and His truth is worth fighting for. When you know God’s truth in a certain area and keep silent knowing your brethren believes a lie how are you walking in love towards them? Paul understood that everything produces after its own kind and thus he knew the danger of allowing the Galatians to cling to anything, no matter how small that was unsound biblically.

The following is another example of this type of curse directed at me personally in a recent missive of “love” from an alleged brother in Christ. Note the tone and language. Not only does this misguided soul violate the Holy Scriptures, he does not even take time to use his spell and grammar checker! Nor does he cite any specific examples of where our ministry has misrepresented Mr. Hagin. We stand by the well documented fact that he stole intellectually from E.W. Kenyon Finis Dake and other authors. We also do not recant that he was a false teacher and false prophet, all of which is well documented on our website and other websites and books if anyone cares to take the time to research. So enjoy the following e-mail and I believe it speaks for itself and helps answer why I am glad to consider myself an “X-charismaniac.” (Bold type and underlining are added for emphasis on my part- spelling corrected).

“Dear Robert, I just read your article on the web. It’s great that you are investigating religion, but you got the Kenneth Hagin situation wrong. I’m a born again Christian and realize that some people do not understand Kenneth’s ministry. I have an organization speaking against you since you don’t seem to know what you’re talking about.  He is not a false prophet at all. These things were revealed to him. No I will not argue with you, there are plenty of people on the forum who already think you have this all wrong. He was not a part of TV or TBN after the 80 since he was told not to go on TV by the LORD JESUS CHRIST. Your judgment is coming as well and you who don’t really know what you’re talking about. You have started a war—- but not with sweet innocent children but ones that can go into the spirit realm and destroy you. Think about it Jesus Christ won’t help you once the curse is upon you. PS we are born again Christians too.

This e-mail would be funny if this guy was not trying to be serious. It appears this man has an entire organization “speaking against me” (keep in mind curses are generally verbalized in order to be effective). It seems my judgment is coming due to the powerful curses released by these unsweetened negative nabobs of doom, despair and agony. Gee whatever happened to being harmless as doves (read Matthew 10:16) ?

Due to our exposure of Mr. Hagin we have started a “war” with bitter (as opposed to sweet), guilty (as opposed to innocent) Christians who can ascend into the spirit realm and destroy me.

Let me address his first accusation regarding my not understanding Mr. Hagin’s SINistry. Oh really?  We have almost every one of his books, untold numbers of his cassettes, videos and I have seen him in person, up close and personal, even been in prayer lines where he was imparting his special ‘anointing” so special it is not even mentioned in the Bible! No, quite the contrary, as a former Word of Faith Pastor/teacher I am extremely familiar with his doctrine and it is unsound biblically. His so-called visions and out-of-body experiences with Jesus are farcical.

What kind of a dolt is this guy?  Doesn’t he realize that after Crouch, and as you will shortly read ‘Benny the healer Hinn’ have cursed you…you’ve been cursed?  All I can say is, “hey take your best shot pal.”

I wish I had a dime for every time somebody was going to go up to the spirit realm (he must have been reading too much Mary K. Baxter or Howard Pittman) and destroy me, my family and marriage. Sounds more like witchcraft versus the character of Christ Jesus, who commanded us to turn the other check when struck (read Matthew 5:39). Golly, even Jesus Christ, God the Son Himself won’t help me (and by inference others) who dare to speak out against what we know to be false doctrine. I guess since “dad” Hagin assumed room temperature, speaking out against him has been elevated to the status of blaspheming the Holy Spirit (I think not).

I on the other hand must and do bless these misguided souls. We pray for all of them as well as the remaining Hagin family that our gracious Lord Jesus Christ will open their eyes to the truth of the Gospel and they will recant their false doctrines and pull the books that contain them from the shelves.

I wrote this man back and here is the less than godly response from our so-called brother. His language and hatred betray him. Read with sadness the following:

“We are human Christians not sweet get your –ass –kicked –by —religion–and the — Gov’t don’t care what you write about us. GET IT? And we still gave our lives to Jesus Christ. Even the devil was mad for the day of vengence, write more and get destroyed more. We do not accept your fake ass apology as PS ask the Lord Jesus Christ if we are not of HIM? You’ll be more than surprised and ‘17 million of us know you will not reveal when He truly answers you.’ Some people need to keep their mouth shut and their websites. The demonic attacks are ones you and your church can’t fight off,  judgment starts in the house of the LORD “

Uh, what planet is this guy from? I guess we counter-cult apologists, myself in particular, are sweet non-human Christians [sic] who get our “ass kicked by religion.” I readily admit that I am sweet, which beats being sour and bitter. I also confess that I am an alien and pilgrim on this planet (read Hebrews 11:13; 1 Peter 2:11). I guess he did not read about the Apostle Paul getting his “ass kicked” by religion—

I speak as concerning reproach, as though we had been weak. Howbeit whereinsoever any is bold, (I speak foolishly) I am bold also. Are they Hebrews? So [am] I. Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I [am] more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I forty [stripes] save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods. Once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep; [in] journeying often, [in] perils of waters, [in] perils of robbers, in perils by [mine own] countrymen, [in] perils by the heathen, [in] perils in the city, [in] perils in the wilderness, [in] perils in the sea, [in] perils among false brethren; In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Beside those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches. 2 Corinthians 11:21-28

Paul must have been too sweet, innocent and passive when faced with such opposition. Why didn’t he go into the spirit realm and hurl down curses on those who withstood him? Maybe Paul was emulating the faith of those we read about in the following text:

Women received their dead raised to life again: and others were tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection: And others had trial of [cruel] mockings and scourging, yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment: They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented; (Of whom the world was not worthy;) they wandered in deserts, and [in] mountains, and [in] dens and caves of the earth. Hebrews 11:35-38

Could it be that Paul had heard James or John recount their experience with the Samaritan villages who rejected Jesus?

And they did not receive him, because his face was as though he would go to Jerusalem. And when his disciples James and John saw [this], they said, Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did? But he turned, and rebuked them, and said, ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of. For the Son of man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save [them]. And they went to another village. Luke 9:53-56

Mr. Crouch and others who proclaim curses desiring the destruction of their enemies do not know what spirit they are of. These folks have lost sight of the mission of Jesus which is salvation and not destruction.

Back to the e-mailed curse! In our response DMI did not apologize for anything we have written regarding the false prophet Kenneth Hagin Sr. What we did say was that we would “bless” him, and we did in our prayer time, I guess those coals get pretty hot when they get heaped on his head, ergo the vitriolic response. I need not ask our Lord if he is “of Him,” his fruit speaks loudly enough so we have no need to bother the Ancient of Days with such a question. If he wants to reject our prayers and blessings that is his right, but the bible says that “love believes the best” and obviously he is not walking in love because he doubts our sincerity. Again, pray for this misguided soul and may God have mercy upon him and those caught up in calling darkness light and light darkness. I pray God has mercy on the individual who sent the above email to us. Feel free to express your love to him; it seems he really needs a hug or something! His email address is atiragepro@gmail.com.

Let’s consider the type of curse that is given in the quasi-prophetic form. This one is very popular among the so-called restored prophets for obvious reasons. I will cite an example given by Mr. Hinn since he is one of the most widely known and accepted false prophets plaguing the church today. The following curse was literally growled by Mr. Hinn at a miracle crusade held in Denver, Co.

“Yes Lord I’ll do it! I place a curse on every man and woman that will stretch his hand against this anointing I curse that man who dares to speak a word against this ministry.”   (4)

See Video Here: Benny Hinn puts a curse on people:

Hinn would want us to believe that our Lord (the One who came to not destroy but save, the One who on the cross said :Father forgive them”) told him to curse every man and woman who comes against Benny’s alleged anointing and ministry! It is sad to think that people actually believe that Hinn has been sanctioned to curse people and since God is no respecter of persons other lesser “lights” in the extremist movement have taken to placing curses on those who disagree with them. This is a perfect example of the “little leaven“, (cursing in this case,) spreads to others in the Body if it is not dealt with biblically.

The Biblical Attitude Regarding Cursing

The Bible does have quite a bit to say regarding the matter of cursing our enemies. We read the following comment from the lips of Job:

If I rejoiced at the destruction of him that hated me, or lifted up myself when evil found him: Neither have I suffered my mouth to sin by wishing a curse to his soul. Job 31:29-30

We all know what happened when Balak tried to pay Balaam to curse God’s people:

…Balak the King of Moab hath brought me from Aram, out of the mountains of the east, saying Come, curse me Jacob, and come, defy Israel, How shall I curse, whom God hath not cursed? Or how shall I defy, whom the LORD hath not defied? Num. 23:7-8

Furthermore, we are commanded by the Holy Spirit through the Apostle Paul in Romans 12:14 to “Bless them which persecute you: bless, and curse not.” Mr. Crouch, Hinn, the e-mailer and others are in direct violation of God’s Word when they attempt to proclaim and place curses on others. In Luke 5:44  Jesus commands us to “But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you,”

What a shame that many in the sign-gift movement have spiraled down to this level of unbiblical diatribe and unwillingness to admit that many of their leaders have feet of clay and sinful hearts, like the rest of us. They too are in continual need of God’s forgiveness and mercy.  ♦

Copyright © 2005 Robert S. Liichow

End Notes

1. Santeria is one of the many syncretic religions created in the New World. It is based on the West African religions brought to the new world by slaves imported to the Caribbean to work the sugar plantations. These slaves carried their own religious traditions, including a tradition of possession trance for communications with the ancestors and deities, the use of animal sacrifice and the practice of sacred drumming and dance. Obtained from http://sparta.rice.edu/~maryc/Santeria.

2. Charismaniac, a term I believe I coined but I could be wrong is meant to refer only to those people who embrace the latest pseudo-spiritual beliefs and practices such as holy laughter, strategic level spiritual warfare, being druck in the spirit, the heresies of the Word of Faith cult, aberrant faith healing practices and the like. DMI is not lumping all Pentecostals and charismatic/sign-gift believers into this category. DMI works with both Pentecostal and biblically sound sign/gift people who have not been carried away by the prevailing winds of false doctrine swirling around in their circles.

3. This is only a portion of a rather long rant by Mr. Crouch one can view him in action on various websites and videos. Transcripts of all he said zre also widely distributed on the internet. This portion was obtained from http://cnview.com/on_line_resources/paul_crouch_curses_those_who_contend_for_sound_doctrine.htm.

4. Obtained from http://www.christian-witness.org/archives/cetf1999/bhinnlower.html. There are many websites which show the actual video clips in which Mr. Hinn’s demeanor changes, his voice changes and he hurls his “Spirit-led” curse at those who oppose him and his ministry. The underlining has been added for emphasis.

Tragedy in Uganda – The Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God

Truth Matters Newsletters – 2001 –  Tragedy in Uganda — As Many as 700 Dead & Murdered: The Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God –  (A Post-Catholic Movement) – by Robert S. Liichow

This issue has been devoted to explaining why the local church needs Apologetic Ministries built into their vision of ministry. Our local church, Grace Community Church, has gone to Uganda on two occasions to work with local evangelicals and teach some of their youths how to play baseball. Currently we have no idea if any of their friends or family were caught up in this latest bible-base cult group. The following information was gleaned from CNN and others on-line news sites.

The History of the Group—

This cult was started in the middle 1990’s by a woman name Cledonia Mwerinde, she was a former prostitute. She was assisted by a former Roman Catholic priest name Joseph Kibweteere.

At one point the group operated a school which housed almost 300 students. The school was closed in 1998 when the government investigated it and determined it did not meet adequate standards for food and housing.

Their Beliefs—

The members of the movement were commanded to communicate only by gestures. They were permitted to vocalize only when singing or preying.

It is currently believed that the mass deaths were a result of Kibweteere’s prediction that the world would end on December 31, 1999. This date was revised to 12-31-00 after the earlier date passed without event.

Kibweteere’s beliefs in the end of the world was allegedly based on a conversation he claims to have had with both Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary. Mary is suppose to have told him that the world was going to be destroyed because its people were not adhering to the Ten Commandments.

The End Results?—

The death count linked to a Christian doomsday sect climbed ever higher Wednesday—to nearly 700 — in what officials say is one of the largest mass murders in recent history. Authorities initially called the conflagration a mass suicide. But within days, investigators discovered six strangled, mutilated corpses in a pit latrine on the compound, triggering a murder investigation.

Days after the fire, 153 more decomposing bodies were found buried in a Buhunga village compound belonging to the sect. Then, on Friday, police discovered the first Rugazi mass grave when they came to inspect Kataribabo’s compound. Investigators found the bodies in the house after Kataribabo’s nephew, Bart Bainomukama, told them his uncle had said he was digging a pit for a refrigerator. A hole driven through the floor quickly revealed a human leg. That led to the discovery of the 81 additional corpses.

Three Other Incidents of Bible-Based Cults In Uganda

The Holy Spirit Movement—

A violent Christian cult led by “prophetess” Alice Lakwena, who led a failed uprising against the government from 1985 to 1996. Followers often died in suicidal attacks, convinced magic oil would protect them from bullets.

The Lord’s Resistance Army —

Led by Joseph Kony, its goal is to run Uganda according to the biblical Ten Commandments. It is notorious for kidnapping Children and using them and using them as soldiers and sexual slaves.

The World Message Last Warning —

This doomsday group was started by Wilson Bushara, it was disbanded by Ugandan police last September after the leaders were charged with rape, kidnapping, illegal confinement and murder.

The Future For Evangelism?

The internet is one of the fastest growing means that is reaching across man-made borders. The genuine gospel of Jesus Christ can be effectively shared in nations which do not permit evangelism. ICCDM is working towards increasing our influence in cyberspace. Will the Church lag behind in this arena too?

Jesus Could Have Sinned! (According to Kenneth Copeland)

Truth Matters Newsletter – November 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 11 – Jesus Could Have Sinned! (According to Kenneth Copeland) By Robert S. Liichow

As I was waiting to take our daughter to school on Wednesday morning (10-26-05), I was surfing around the television dial and happened to stop briefly at Kenneth Copeland’s morning broadcast. He was speaking at one of his “Believer’s Conventions” and I heard him emphatically state that although Jesus was perfect and sinless, He could have sinned. After all, Adam was created perfect and he sinned, thus it was a real possibility that Jesus, God the Son, could have sinned and ended up in need of redemption Himself. Copeland held forth the basic belief of many Arminian preachers who posit that in order for the temptations to be real temptations Christ had to have had the option of sinning. Theologically this view is called “peccability.

Orthodox evangelical Christianity does not uphold this view and we hold to the theological position of “impeccability,” or that Jesus Christ could not have sinned. I like the manner in which our view is stated by brother Roy L. Howdyshell:

The purpose of the temptation was not to see if Christ could sin, but to show that He could not sin. The temptation came at a critical time: the beginning of Christ’s public ministry. The temptation was designed to show the nation what a unique Savior she had: the impeccable Son of God. It is also noteworthy that it was not Satan who initiated the temptation but the Holy Spirit (Matt 4:1). If Christ could have sinned, then the Holy Spirit solicited Christ to sin, but that is something God does not do. (James 1:3). Christ’s peccability could relate only to His human nature; His divine nature was impeccable. Although Christ had two natures, He was nonetheless, one Person and could not divorce Himself of His deity. Wherever He went, the divine nature was present. If the two natures could be separated then it could be said that He could sin in His humanity, but because the human and divine natures cannot be separated from the Person of Christ, and since the divine nature cannot sin, it must be affirmed that Christ could not have sinned.

The theologian William Shedd makes the following seven statements regarding the impeccability of Christ and I believe they will prove an invaluable aid when this topic comes up (as it has a way of doing among Christians and cultists alike).

(1) The immutability of Christ (Heb. 13:8). Christ is unchangeable and therefore could not sin. If Christ could have sinned while on earth, then He could sin now because of His immutability. If He could have sinned on earth, what assurance is there that He will not sin now?

(2) The omnipotence of Christ (Matt 28:18). Christ was omnipotent and therefore could not sin. Weakness is implied where sin is possible, yet there was no weakness of any kind in Christ. How could He be omnipotent and still be able to sin?

(3) The omniscience of Christ (John 2:25). Christ was omniscient and therefore could not sin. Sin depends on ignorance in order that the sinner may be deceived, but Christ could not be deceived because He knows all things, including the hypothetical (Matt. 11:21). If Christ could have sinned then He really did not know what would happen if He would sin.

(4)  The deity of Christ. Christ is not only man but also God. If He were only a man then He could have sinned, but God cannot sin and in a union of the two natures, the human nature admits to the divine nature (otherwise the finite is stronger than the infinite). United in the one Person of Christ are the two natures, humanity and deity; because Christ is also deity He could not sin.

(5) The nature of temptation  (James 1:14-15). The temptation that came to Christ was from without. However, for sin to take place, there must be an inner response to the outward temptation. Since Jesus did not possess a sin nature, there was nothing within Him to respond to the temptation. People sin because there is an inner response to the outer temptation.

(6) The will of Christ. In moral decisions, Christ could have only one will: to do the will of His Father; in moral decisions the human will was subservient to the divine will. If Christ could have sinned then His human will would have been stronger than the divine will.

(7) The authority of Christ  (John 10:18). In His deity, Christ had complete authority over His humanity. For example, no one could take the life of Christ except He would lay it down willingly (John 10:18). If Christ had authority over life and death, He certainly had authority over sin; if He could withhold death at will, He could also withhold sin at will.

Mr. Copeland is simply parroting the very heresy that got Rev. Edward Iving (1792-1834) excommunicated from the Scottish Presbyterian Church in 1833. Irving was one of the early fathers of Pentecostalism and he was one of the earliest Pentecostals to believe God was restoring both prophets and apostles back to the New Testament Church, which naturally , he started. ♦

 

Copyright © 2005  Robert S. Liichow

 

 

The Fivefold Fallacy

Truth Matters Newsletter – Oct. 2005   Vol. 10 Issue 10 – The Fivefold Fallacy – by Rev. Robert S. Liichow

Discernment Ministries International

The Fivefold Fallacy

One of our primary ministry objectives is to equip our readers with enough accurate biblical information so they can defend the truth of God’s Word when confronted with the various biblical errors and heresies that are swamping the Church.

Defeating heresy requires going to the root and laying the axe there first, once the root has been severed the various limbs lose the source of their strength and wither and die. This is why DMI spent six months dealing with the core doctrines of the Word of Faith cult. Once a person sees the biblical fallacies within the central tenants of their belief system the truth of God’s Word will indeed set them free to begin to worship and follow Christ in spirit and in truth.

In my former ignorance as a charismatic extremist I studied the history of Pentecostalism and their leaders and began back then collecting original source materials from as many of these leaders as I could, the bulk of which now serves as the DMI archive. I was an active extremist when the “prophetic” became a movement in the early 1980’s according to its farcical father “Dr.”, “Bishop,” “Apostle,” Bill Hamon who is on record making the following statement:

That company of prophetess is being raised up in the 1980’s, God revealed to me that there are 10,000 prophets on the North American continent alone being prepared to be released within the Church. (1)

The fact that today virtually every Pentecostal and sign-gift charismatic believes that God has indeed restored prophets and apostles to the Church (2) are merely branches from the poisonous tree whose tap root is found in the false doctrine commonly referred to as the fivefold ministry.

Before we dive into the murky depths of this doctrine of men you must understand a key term of “restoration.” All of Pentecostalism from Montanus in 170 AD (3) to Edward Irving in the 1800’s to the so called Azusa revival and then later on the “Healing” revival of Post World War Two have seen themselves as a divine movement of restoration by God. Initially the belief in restoration was confined to divine healing, then later it included the sign-gifts, especially the alleged ability to speak in other tongues (4) and a general restoring of supernatural miracle power to the Church.

According to the extremist leaders (past and present) the Church somehow lost a great deal of its biblical knowledge, truth, insight and power. Obviously, this means somewhere down the line our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Head of the Church (read Eph. 1:22) dropped the ball and allowed great truths to be forgotten or lie dormant until He could get through to certain anointed individuals to “restore” them back to the Church and bring us back on track. Hamon, a firm believer in dispensational demarcations gives us the following “chart” of divine restoration of the Church:

Hamon, Bill. Prophets and Personal Prophecy God’s Prophetic Voice Today. Shippensburg, PA: Destiny Image Publishers, p.20, 1987. This statement is from vol. one of a three vol. set on the Prophetic Movement.

Obviously, there are some exceptions. Some of the traditional Pentecostal denominations and other independent charismatic congregations do not believe God has set apostles and prophets back into the Church. However, these groups are in the minority. It is fair to say that easily 90% + people involved with some form of Pentecostalism endorse the reality of prophets and apostles today.

According to historic Pentecostalism, the gift of tongues was given for missionary purposes because the leaders of that time firmly believed that Jesus Christ was returning very soon and the Gospel needed to be preached throughout the World. There was simply no time to go to a mission school and learn foreign language. They believed God was restoring this gift to get the “Word” out. It was not until almost 50 years later when the fledgling charismatic movement was started that the concept of having a personal private prayer language became popular, that was not the original belief of Pentecostalism.

Year        Restoration Movement               Major Truth Restored

1500                  Protestant (5)                               Salvation thru grace thru faith

1600                     Puritan                       Water Baptism, separation of Church and state

1700                    Holiness                 Sanctification, the Church set apart from the world.

1800               Faith-Healing                      Divine healing for the physical body

1900         Pentecostal movement         Holy Spirit Baptism and speaking in tongues

1950      Latter Rain Movement              Prophetic presbytery, praise and worship

1960            Charismatic                                        Renewal of all restored truth

1970          Word of Faith                                      Faith confessions, prosperity

1980             Prophetic                              Prophets and the gifts of the Holy Spirit (6)

 

Four Major Movements

All Christians who have received God’s present truth (7) accept the last four groups —Protestant, Holiness/Evangelical, Classical Pentecostal and Latter Rain/Charismatic — as movements that were Holy Spirit directed and established by God. They are called major movements because each one restored one of the seven doctrines of Christ listed in Hebrews 6:1,2.   (8)

Present Truth or Present Day Truth is extremist code and it refers to the new revelations being given by the accepted restored prophets and apostles to the Church. These may be doctrines previously unknown and untaught in the history of the Church, they are “new” and must be accepted by faith in the one delivering the new revelation.

Doctrine of Christ                          Approx. Date            Restoration Movement

1. Repentance from dead works               1500         ……….        Protestant

2. Faith toward God                                        1800         ……….        Holiness/Evangelical

3. Doctrine of Baptism                                 1900          ……….         Classic Pentecostal

4. Laying on of Hands                                   1950          ……….         Latter Rain/Charismatic

5. Resurrection of Dead                                  ?                                             ?

6. Eternal Judgment                                       ?                                             ?

7. Ultimate Perfection                                   ?                                             ?

 

Hebrews 6:1,2 are not dispensational. The author gives no indication that he is referring to anything more than foundational doctrines that comprise orthodox Christianity. The writer is in a way unbraiding these Christians because they ought to be well established in these truths. In the prior verses he bemoans the fact that they ought to be teachers (Heb. 5:12) but are still only fit for the milk of God’s Word and not the weightier matters. According to Hamon and the other Latter Rain adherents it has taken God something like 450 years just to “restore” these doctrines to the Church, teachings that any well equipped pastor is transmitting to his flock to his Sunday school classes or from the pulpit.

Yet it is crucial that people buy into the concept of God continuing to “restore” lost truths and give new revelations to empower the Church for the last great world-wide revival which will Christianize the world and prepare it to be a suitable place for Jesus to return to. (10) If one is willing to believe that God has been in a process of restoring the Church then they are in perfect position to accept the next major fallacy which is the foundation of today’s so-called Prophetic/Apostolic movement.

The Fivefold Ministry

He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heaven, that he might fill all things.) And he gave some, apostles; and some prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ: Eph. 4:10-13

This is the text that has been used since the mid 1940’s to make the case that the Church needs to have, in the words of the Latter Rain extremists, all five ascension gifts active in the Church for it to be brought to the full stature of Christ.

What gave strength to the false belief that the Church needed all five of the ministries mentioned in Ephesians 4 was the advent of the ministry of William Branham. Without going into detail Mr. Branham was a unique individual, whose life was marked by many paranormal events. He grew up in the backwoods of Kentucky in 1909 and was virtually uneducated. Around 1946 he began a major thrust of his divine healing ministry.

He was supposed to be able to reveal to the individuals standing before him their names, what was wrong with them, where they lived, etc… Often before he would pray for them he would say “do you believe I am the Lord’s prophet?” the person would respond “yes” and he would say, “then go on your way your faith has healed you.” Branham attributed his ability to discern the thoughts and intents of people’s hearts as a gift from God who has appeared to Branham an told him He would bestow these two signs to him. (11) Due to Branham’s unique ministry and his own claims to be God’s prophet he drew a huge following. His ministry combined with some of the writings of Franklin Hall (12) was the impetus behind the formation of a new revival called “The New Order of the Latter Rain.”

There is some confusion over this aspect of Branham’s ministry, because on some of his audio tapes in the DMI archive he admits that he is helpless until his “angel” appears on the platform and that it was this being who actually revealed people’s lives to Branham. Once he was asked if what he did was by the power of the Holy Spirit, he said “no it was his angel.” Also it is well documented on tape and video that Branham used prayer cards that people filled out, and although uneducated, he may well have had a photographic memory which gave him to appearance of knowing these facts about people.

Franklin Hall wrote a book which became somewhat of a manual for this next “great’ move of God entitled “Atomic Power With God Through Prayer and Fasting.” This book is out of print today but it along with other out-of-print resource materials is available on a DMI CD entitled: The New Order of the Latter Rain for $15.00. Hall was a complete nut who wrote about how to levitate, how to achieve physical immortality and how to raise the dead. Hs writings were crucial to a sub-group within the NOLR called “The Manifest Sons of God.”

What has always amazed me about Mr. Branham’s ministry is that even though he was acknowledged as a false teach by other charismatic ministers he was accepted as a genuine prophet by them. He denied the Trinity of God, he taught that belonging to any denomination was a sign of the beast and would damn a person to hell. This teaching alone was primarily responsible for the mass exodus of pastors from the Assembly of God denomination, which came out with a statement against the New Order of the Latter Rain in 1949. It was also the reason behind the creation of all the independent charismatic congregations we have today. Not to mention the various false and unfulfilled “prophetic” words Mr. Branham is on record of spouting.

Some Canadians who attended some of Branham’s meetings took their enthusiasm back to their Bible school in North Battleford. It seems that from this seedbed the concept of a restored “Fivefold” ministry was birthed:

One of the points of controversy between the North Battleford brethren and the established Pentecostal denominations was the belief of the leaders at Sharon that the church had present-day apostles and prophets. Some of the first indications of controversy along these lines are in the June 1948 issue of The Sharon Star. According to George Hawtin: When one starts talking about prophets and apostles being in the Church in our day, the poor saints are shocked half to death. They raise their hands in holy terror and cry, “heresy! Heresy!” Now MY BIBLE SAYS: “GOD HATH SET SOME in the church, FIRST APOSTLES, SECONDAIRLY PROPHETS, THIRDLY TEACHERS, and after that miracles, then gifts of healings, etc. (13)

The movement became associated in people’s minds with the brethren in North Battleford who played a large part in initially spreading the revival. It also became associated with the practices of these brethren, including the laying on of hands and acceptance of present-day apostles and prophets. (14)

Mr. Hamon received his ”call” into ministry in October 1953 in one of the fledgling break away Latter Rain congregations. (15) from one of the restored prophets, which made an indelible impression theologically on the rest of his life. This initial false teaching of a restored fivefold ministry, like yeast in bread has spread throughout all of Pentecostalism and the Charismatic movement and today it is not even questioned as valid.

One of the hallmarks of the New Order of the Latter Rain (LRM) and subsequently the Charismatic Renewal Movement is a doctrine of imparting the Holy Spirit and His gifts through the laying on of hands. In response to this error let me simply cite Dr. Martin Luther in his Smalcald Articles:

In these matters, which concern the external, spoken Word, we must hold firmly to the conviction that God gives no one his Spirit or grace except through or with the external Word which comes before. Thus we shall be protected from the enthusiasts—that is, from the spiritualists who boast that they possess the Spirit without and before the Word and who therefore judge, interpret, and twist the Scriptures or spoken Word according to their pleasure…Even so, the enthusiasts of our day condemn the external Word, yet they do not remain silent but fill the world with their chattering and scribbling, as if the Spirit could not come through the Scriptures or the spoken word of the apostles but must come through their own writings and words.

In short, enthusiasm clings to Adam and his descendants from the beginning to the end of the world. It is a poison implanted and inoculated in man by the old dragon, and it is the source, strength, and power of all heresy… Accordingly, we should and must constantly maintain that God will not deal with us except through his external Word and sacrament. Whatever is attributed to the Spirit apart from such Word and sacrament is of the devil. Luther, in dealing with the extremists of his day simply said that God does not give the Holy Spirit apart from His Word and sacraments. Whatever people want to attribute to the Spirit apart from the external word of God and sacraments is from the devil. (16)

This relegates the belief that one can bestow the Holy Spirit and His gifts (as if He was some commodity) through the laying on of hands as being of the devil and I agree with Luther on this matter. Like all error unless it is biblically excised from the Body it will spread. So the LRM enthusiasts took their initial error further and teach that not only is the Spirit given through their hands, but now also ministry offices are imparted (or activated) through their hands as well.

What is the role of these restored ascension gifts of apostle and prophet in the Church according to the extremists today?

The full restoration of apostles and prophets back into the Church will then bring divine order, unity, purity and maturity to the corporate Body of Christ. The saints will be equipped and activated in the supernatural power of God to be a witness and demonstration to all nations of the powerful kingdom of God. (17)

According to Hamon and may others in this movement, they see their role as being pivotal in bringing the Church to a place of completion thus enabling Jesus Christ to return. They base this belief on the following proof-text:

Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the time of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord; And he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you; Whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began. Acts 3:19-21

They interpret this text to mean that Jesus must stay in heaven until the times of restitution (restoration in some translations) of all things, which, obviously, has to include the ministry of both the apostles and prophets. Without all the five ascension gifts mentioned in Ephesians 4 being active with the apostle and prophet having the preeminent roles in activating (18) the other ministries the church will remain out of divine order, in disarray, impure and immature.

Hamon and others see the restored fivefold ministries as a divine hierarchy, with the apostle being at the top and the prophet either next to or directly beneath him or her (depending on whose book you read). Everybody else is beneath them. The restored apostles and prophets are to give divine direction to the Church. These heretics have set themselves up not only to be the judges of doctrine but also the formulators of new doctrines.

Please understand that the stated goal of this movement is to demolish every denominational distinction and to enforce spiritual unity through the use of supernatural power. They foresee the day when every city will have one Church with many pastors, but each city will be led by a group of apostles and prophets, who will hear from God and give direction for the Church without walls. Hamon has gone so far as to explain how the fivefold “mafia” will work within the “city church.”

When the fivefold ministers come together to consider doctrines and practices this way, they will need to keep in mind several areas of insight; (1) the claimed revelation from God; (2) the fruit of the ministry among those who have received the doctrine or practice; (3) the supernatural working of God accompanying it; (4) the Logos and rhema word of God application and authority for the doctrine or practice; and (5) the witness of the Spirit and the unified consent of those present. (19)

All five of these principles for establishing doctrine, as Hamon calls them, are completely subjective. Let me break omerta and decode the lingo in Hamon’s directive. The claimed revelation from God refers to the belief that God is giving forth-new revelation to/through His restored prophets and apostles. Then they look at the subjective experiential fruit among the people espousing the latest revealed truth. Are the people happy? Is it causing numerical growth and financial giving, are people reporting a deeper walk with Christ in a pietistic sense? Number three, we have to check out the signs and wonders, after all, God confirms His word with signs following (mark 16:20). Any new doctrine or practice must have some variety of paranormal activity validating its divine origin. These signs do not have to have a biblical precedent (see rule number 4), thus just have to be accepted as coming from God and can easily fall under the aegis of being “new wine” of the Holy Spirit such as was seen in the Toronto Blessing experience. Fourthly, the Word of God must be considered. Not to worry, if what is currently being proposed as new doctrine or practice, even if hitherto unknown in the 2,000 years of recorded Church history, cannot be found within the context of Scripture there are tow fall-back positions. (1) What is being taught and experienced is present day truth (read 2 Peter 1:12). (2) What is being taught and/or experienced is part of something Jesus did, but it is not recorded in the Bible (read John 21:25). (20)  These two arguments are commonly cited today. They are used as a means to get away from the absolute authority of God’s external word, the Bible. Lastly, we have the subjective “witness” of the spirit by the restored fivefold ministry. In other words, this means that the gathered group of apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers all sit around and say “yup seems ok to me.” It is very apparent that the Word of God is not central in their thinking, It no longer serves as the sole source of all faith and practice.  Please keep in mind, this aspect of the charismatic movement is growing very rapidly and almost universally endorsed within the movement overall.

Does The Fivefold Ministry Exist Today?

In a word, no it does not exist today. The LRM has twisted this text, like so many others, and have tried to make it say something that it does not say at all. To begin with we have to allow Scripture to interpret Scripture and even that must be done within the context of the verses examined.

Jesus said “I will build my church”  (read Matt 16:18)  so we know that the Church is being constructed by no less than God the Son. Furthermore we see in the Scriptures that Jesus is referred to twice as the “Head of the Body” (read Eph. 5:23 and Col. 2:19). What is more He is also referred to as “being the chief corner [stone];“ Eph. 2:20.

Most theologians would agree that The Lord Jesus Christ began to build His Church on the Day of Pentecost. By that time He had already chosen who would be His Apostles and they had received the Holy Spirit (read John 20:22). (21) For simplicity’s sake let me just say that the foundation of the Church was laid in the beginning and is detailed for us in the Book of Acts.

Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God; And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner [stone]; In whom all the building fitly framed together growth unto an holy temple in the Lord; In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit. Eph. 2:20-22.

When you build a house you first lay the foundation. The foundation of the Church was laid by the genuine Apostles and Prophets with Christ Jesus as the chief corner stone. Once the foundation has been laid the master builder proceeds to erect the superstructure.

According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise master builder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; …1 Cor. 3:10-12

This is exactly what the Apostle Paul stated in the text above. He has laid (past tense) the foundation and others build on that foundation. There is no other foundation which can or needs to be laid than that which has already been laid, which is Christ Jesus! Then Paul goes back to commenting on how one may build on that original foundation.

Brothers and sisters Jesus Christ is not asleep at the right hand of the Father, but is active and alive among us today. He has been superintending His Church since its inception. He has been building upon the original foundation laid by the original genuine Apostles and Prophets through the faithful ministry of the proclamation of the Gospel and sacraments carried out by evangelists and pastors. I might as well add at this point that the Greek text does not divide pastors and teachers as two gifts but is better-translated pastor-teachers. I acknowledge that in other places teachers are mentioned apart from pastors, but this text, which the heretics abuse does not even hold forth the concept of a fivefold ministry linguistically! At best, if they wanted to be honest with the text they would have to say God is restoring a fourfold ministry.

God does not need to “restore” apostles and prophets to the Church in order to bring us to perfection. No one apart from the lunatic fringe has ever claimed such a thing until the advent of the neo-Montanist movement. They laid the foundation, they received the Word of God and the canon is closed. The Scriptures are all we need as our guide for faith and practice and anything which is not in accord with the context of the Bible is to be rejected as false doctrine and false practice. These deceivers insult the authority of the Scriptures by their claim to additional revelation and restoration and what is worse they insult the Author of the Scripture and the Holy Spirit Himself. The so-called restored apostles and prophets are on very dangerous ground indeed and the Church needs to mark them and sound a warning to our brothers and sisters not to be led astray by such people.

Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them.     Romans 16:17    ♦

Copyright © 2005  Robert S. Liichow

End Notes

1. Hamon, Bill    Prophets and Personal Prophecy God’s Prophetic Voice Today.   Shippensburg, PA: Destiny Image Publishers, p. 20, 1987. This statement is from vol. one of a three vol. set on the Prophetic Movement.

2. Obviously, there are some exceptions. Some of the traditional Pentecostal denominations and other independent charismatic congregations do not believe God has set apostles and prophets back into the Church. However, these groups are in the minority. It is fair to say that easily 99% + people involved with some form of Pentecostalism endorse the reality of prophets and apostles today.

3. DMI has one of the few books in publication on Montanus entitled Montanus, Father of Charismatic Extremism. It can be ordered for 8.00

4. According to historic Pentecostalism, the gift of tongues was given for missionary purposes because the leaders of that time firmly believed that Jesus Christ was returning very soon and the Gospel needed to be preached throughout the world. There was simply no time to go to a mission school and learn a foreign language. They believed God was restoring this gift to get the “Word” out. It was not until almost 50 years later when the fledgling charismatic movement was started that the concept of having a personal private prayer language became popular, that was not the original belief of Pentecostalism.

5. I will not be too exacting regarding Mr. Hamon’s inaccurate assessment of Church history, however he is referring to Martin Luther (as he does later in his book). Luther and Lutheranism are not part of the Protestant Reformation, nor are Lutherans Protestants denominationally; we are original “Evangelicals”.

6. Hamon, Bill,   Prophets and the Prophetic Movement God’s Prophetic Move Today.  Shippensburg, Pa; Destiny Image, p. 24, 1987.

7. Present Day Truth is extremist code and it refers to the new revelations being given by the accepted restored prophets and apostles to the Church. These may be doctrines previously unknown and untaught in the history of the Church, they are “new” and must be accepted by faith in the one delivering the new revelation.

8. Hamon, Bill,   Prophets and the Prophetic Movement God’s Prophetic Move Today. Shippensburg, Pa; Destiny Image, p. 37, 1987.

9. Ibid. p. 38

10. The New Order of the Latter Rain which has its beginning in the mid 1940’s differed from classic dispensational systems in that it taught that the goal of restoration was to enable the Church to take complete dominion over the entire world (often referred to as Kingdom Now or Dominion Theology). The leaders of the prophetic/apostolic movement do not teach in a pre-tribulation rapture of the Church which is common among mainline Pentecostal groups, most Baptists, and even the Word of Faith cult.

11. There is some confusion over this aspect of Branham’s ministry because on some of his audio tapes in the DMI archive he admits that he is helpless until his “angel” appears on the platform and that it was this being who actually revealed people’s lives to Branham. Once he was asked if what he did was by the power of the Holy Spirit, he said “no it was his angel.” Also it is well documented on tape and video that Branham used prayer cards that people filled out, and although uneducated, he may well have had a photographic memory which gave him to appearance of knowing these facts about people.

12. Franklin Hall wrote a book which became somewhat of a manual for this next “great” move of God entitled “Atomic Power With God Through Prayer and Fasting.” This book is out of print today but it along with other out-of-print resource materials is available on a DMI entitled The New Order of the Latter Rain for $15.00. Hall was a complete nut who wrote abut how to levitate, how to achieve physical immortality and how to raise the dead. His writings were crucial to a sub-group within the NOLR called “The Manifest Sons of God.”

13. Riss, Richard.  Latter Rain,  Etobicoke, Ontario; Honeycomb Products, p. 71, 1983.

14. Ibid p. 76. Underlining added for emphasis.

15. Hamon, Bill   Prophets and Personal Prophecy God’s Prophetic Voice Today.  Shippensburg, PA. p.2 1987

16. Tappert, Theodore  The Book of Concord the Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church.  Philadelphia, PA Fortress Press, pp. 312,313. 1959. Underlining added for emphasis.

17. Hamon, Bill. Prophets and Personal Prophecy God’s Prophetic Move Today. Shippensburg, PA. , p59 1987.

18. The term “activate” is a term used within the prophetic/apostolic movement to refer to the alleged ability to not only impart the Holy Spirit and His gifts, but also to anoint and empower men and women into every ministry field including that of apostle and prophet. The concept of activation is central to Latter Rain Theology because God only uses these restored apostles and prophets to genuinely impart ministry gifts to God’s people.

19. Hamon, Bill.  Prophets and Personal Prophecy God’s Prophetic Move Today. Shippensburg, PA. , p 180 1987.

20. This is an especially dangerous position that the charismatic movement has taken regarding judging so called new doctrines and experiences. When questions about the total lack of biblical precedent regarding being slain in the spirit, holy laughter, spiritual drunkenness or other novelties, they simply respond that they were no doubt found in Jesus’ ministry but not recorded in the Bible. We are then required to take it on “faith” when the restored leaders tell us that this is indeed proof of a new “move” of God. Every bible-based cult group took this approach when they attempted to support their views, eventually the cult group took this approach when they attempted to support their views, eventually the bible is always cast aside the writings of the cult leader or becomes interpreted by the cult leaders insights.

21. A careful reading of the Book of Acts will demonstrate that only the Apostles were authorized to “impart” spiritual gifts. Those who were empowered by God through these genuine Apostles are never shown bestowing the Holy Spirit or His gifts to others. Throughout Church history it is only people captivated by spiritual enthusiasm or who are heretics that have believed/taught that they had the authority and power to give the Spirit to others.

TRUTH MATTERS and It Is Worth Fighting For

Truth Matters Newsletter – October 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 10 – Truth Matters and it is Worth Fighting For – by Rev. Robert S. Liichow

Discernment Ministries International

TRUTH MATTERS

And

It Is Worth Fighting For

Maybe Paul should not have publicly rebuked Peter for playing the hypocrite before the Jewish believers (read Gal 2:11). Perhaps he should not have dared to “name names” in some of his epistles (read 2 Tim 4:14). Obviously Paul was emotionally overwrought and an alarmist when he told the Ephesian elders warning them night and day for three years with tears about the wolves from without and the danger of false brethren from within (see Acts 20:27:31).

Pelagius taught man’s will was totally free and that original sin was a myth, perhaps Augustine and Jerome should have agreed to disagree with him. What if Athanasius had said ‘well brother Arius has a different revelation of the Godhead, nothing to break fellowship over” instead of sounding the alarm and condemning the man as the heretic he was? Possibly Irenaeus was too harsh on the false prophets and teachers attacking the Church in his day, and he even had the gall to name the miscreants in his book “Against Heresies.”

What if Martin Luther seeing Tetzel selling salvation and said “wow, what a shame, but what can one person do against an entire religious system? And walked away thinking “ the Lord will settle the matter”?  Where would we be today?

My dear brothers and sisters it is costly to take a stand for God’s Word in a world that grows spiritually darker by the minute. It is even more difficult to stand up for righteousness within the Church that drifts further from the secure anchor of their souls, the Word and sacraments.

We are fast coming to a time when the cry again is being sounded ‘who is on the Lord’s side?” (read Luke 11:23), which is it in your life and mine? To follow the Lamb is to be in the minority, it is to carry the cross outside the camp (read Hebrews 13:13); suffer humiliation and be considered a fool for forsaking all the “goodies” YOU COULD HAVE HAD, YET DID NOT FOR His names sake. To be a disciple means to take a stand for God’s truth regardless of what it may cost you in family, friends, or societal position. It means not being popular or in with the in crowd.

Like Abraham, we are pilgrims in this world, yes in it, but not of it…at least that is the way it is supposed to be. Is this true in your life and mine? Or have we become bewitched with the baubles and glitter of a system decaying before our very eyes? Judas sold Jesus out for 30 pieces of silver, today too many sell Him far more cheaply I fear.

I wish I could write you and say “hey folks, its ok,” but I’d be lying. It is not “ok” not by a long shot. The Church is under attack just as Paul warned almost 2,000 years ago. False apostles, prophets and teachers make merchandise of the sheep and if anyone dares to raise their voice against them they are engulfed with cries of “you’re accusing the brethren; you’re causing division; who died and made you judge?”   Evil prevails when good men keep silent and I for one refuse to keep silent and allow evil to prevail in my generation.

Brothers and sisters, God has never used the “many” He has always used a select group. For example: He chose Israel not because of their great size and might, for exactly the opposite reasons “ The LORD did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye [were] the fewest of all people” (Deut. 7:7). When Gideon went out to fight, We know that God made a separation and sent all but 300 soldiers back home (read Judges 7:4) so that the victory would be clearly seen as coming from Him and not their own abilities and numbers. Our Lord Himself chose twelve men to turn the world upside down (read Acts 17:6). The early Church itself was small but it spread from Jerusalem to Judea, then Samaria to the uttermost parts of the earth (read Acts 1:8)

Often Apologists are called “accusers of the brethren” by our detractor’s. Yet it is Satan who falsely accuses the brethren before God. We in the Church are called to judge those within the Church (1 Cor. 6:3). We are called to exhort (Titus 1:9) and rebuke with all authority (2 Tim. 4:2) when we see people departing from the standards of God’s holy Word. In fact, for Christians not to serve as watchmen on the wall would be a dereliction of duty.

Discernment Ministries International is one voice that God has raised up to stand as a watchman on the wall and shout out a warning to the Body of Christ saying “test the spirits to see if they are of God.” We are in the minority within a sleeping Church, one that we are striving to rouse from its slumber. DMI and others are swimming hard upstream against every wind of doctrine which so many lovingly are bodysurfing downstream on.

However, DMI cannot do the work alone I am sending out this appeal with the hope that God still has a legitimate remnant of people who are spiritually dissatisfied with the current religious status quo. That there are a people whose righteous indignation has been stirred up by the Holy Spirit to the degree where they will faithfully support a ministry that dares to say  “the Emperor has no clothes on” regardless of the cost.

DMI needs more faithful partners to help us expand our mission of Teaching Truth & Exposing Error. Won’t you join our ranks and get involved in the battle for the integrity of the Gospel?  We thank God daily for those He has raised up thus far, but we need many more people to wake up to the reality of the battle we are all involved in and help support those of us who’ve dedicated their lives to sounding the alarm. Please pray about supporting us, we need your help more now than ever. ♦

His servant and yours,

Rev. Bob Liichow

 Copyright © 2005  Robert S. Liichow

Morris Cerullo – Indicted by a Federal Grand Jury for Tax Fraud

Truth Matters Newsletter – September 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 9 – Morris Cerullo Indicted by a Federal Grand Jury for Tax Fraud – By Rev. Robert S. Liichow

 

Morris Cerullo

Indicted by a Federal Grand Jury for Tax Fraud

More bad news for the highly anointed within the rarified air of the international charismatic leadership, Mr. Cerullo has been indicted by a federal grand jury on July 10, 2005 “on three counts of filing false individual income tax returns.” (1)

According to the newspaper report Mr. Cerullo somehow managed to underreport his income by $550,000 during the years 1998-2000. If he is convicted, which in all fairness he has not yet been, he faces a maximum penalty of three years in prison and $100,000 in fines.

Why should we care about what Cerullo has done? What impact does it have on our lives as individuals? Individually whether he is convicted or not will have little obvious effect on our personal lives, however what he does as a recognized “Christian” leader around the world does impact our witness as the people of God. Mr. Cerullo has been a very visible and prominent entity speaking in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ on a global scale for a long time. His moral failure is simply more fodder for the enemies of Christ to use in attempting to bolster their case against the claims of Christianity.

The Origins of Morris Cerullo

Like all the so-called “healing” evangelists Cerullo makes the claim that he was supernaturally appointed by God when he was a child:

The Holy Spirit revealed the truth of Jesus Christ as the Messiah to Morris Cerullo when he was only 14-½ years old, living in a Jewish Orthodox orphanage. God sent two angels to supernaturally lead him into the outside world on the first leg of a spiritual journey which has taken him to the very forefront of worldwide evangelism. (2)

Not only does God speak to him but his prophetic annunciations come with a special anointing of God’s Presence. He received a divine, supernatural call from God to preach at the age of fifteen when God took him into the heavens and revealed Himself to him by a supernatural vision. (3)

Every one of these roving healers claim that God has supernaturally brought them into their ministries. Kenneth E. Hagin wrote in his book I believe In Visions how as a young teenager he literally died three times and went to hell three times. On his third descend into hell he cried out to God and was saved. (4) Before Hagin’s tall tale the most widely revered of the healers, William M. Branham claimed to have been visited by angels and heard an audible voice which was his call into ministry. (5) Benny Hinn’s story of his supernatural dealings with God are well chronicled in the book The Confusing World of Benny Hinn. (6) A.A. Allen tells of how he shut himself up in a room and fasted and prayed to God until He came to him. Allen says that God revealed to him thirteen things that if he would do them it would cause the miracle healing power of God to manifest. (7) After Branham and before Allen there was of course the godfather of greed, Oral Roberts who has testified for over fifty years how “God” anointed his right hand with healing power (he started on the healing circuit in 1947). I would be remiss if I did not also mention Robert Liardon, whose claim to fame started with his alleged trip to heaven as an eight year old boy. His story, which is filled with unbelievable heavenly accounts, is written in his best selling book I Saw Heaven.

I mention all of the above individuals to simply point out that all of them make some outrageous claim, often trying to outdo one another concerning either how God called them or how He gifted them with some form of special anointing. In other words, each healer has his or her shtick and Cerullo is no different from the rest of the herd of heretics. Like all the rest he has seen angels, heard voices, no one else heard, been taken to heaven and thus we must accept that he is divinely qualified and empowered by God’s Spirit.

Not only does Morris claim to have divine healing power, his website makes the following claims regarding this man:

Dr. Morris Cerullo, Apostle and Prophet of the Lord Jesus Christ, is a man on the move for God. He is a man whose entire life is dedicated to fulfilling the call of God to take the Gospel of Jesus Christ to every living creature. In 1982, God gave him a specific call in Porte Alegro, Brazil when He said, “Son, build Me an army.” This army is made up of Nationals trained to take the Gospel to their villages, cities, states, and nations with the same anointing that rests upon Dr. Cerullo’s life and ministry. (8)

Morris makes the claim to be both an “Apostle” and “Prophet” of our Lord Jesus Christ. Not only this he is a man with a “specific call” from God Almighty. Armed with this specific call Morris founded: Morris Cerullo World Evangelism. His website enlightens us on the scope of this humble work:

Morris Cerullo World Evangelism is governed by a Board of Directors consisting of seven (7) committed and dedicated Christians men and woman with a common goal and vision to reach the lost of this world with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Morris Cerullo World Evangelism is known as the ministry upon which the sun never sets! At any given time, on any given day, somewhere in the world, ministry is going on under the banner of MCWE. Over the years, Dr. Cerullo has established and maintained tremendous relationships with “his sons and daughters in the Gospel” and his preaching, teaching, training, prophetic ministry and counseling is in great demand around the world. (9)

You’ve Read the Hype, Now Here Are the Facts

Morris the “Apostle” 

I like to eat cheese; doing so does not make me a mouse. Morris can claim to be an Apostle but that does not make him one. The mental wards are filled with people with delusions of grandeur, people who claim to be the President, Queen of England or even Jesus Christ! Cerullo can claim to be anyone or anything he likes, but as my sainted granny used to say “the proof is in the pudding.”

The Bible lays out some very clear and distinct marks which must be present in order for someone to claim that they are in fact biblical Apostles. Let’s take a quick look into the Gospel of Mark concerning the Apostles:

1. The Apostles responded immediately and unconditionally to the call from Jesus. Mark 1:18,20; 2:14.

2. The apostles left everything when Jesus called. Mark 1:18,20.

3. Jesus called the apostles to be His companions, to be an eyewitness to His ministry and to preach what He taught them. Mark 3:14

I might add that of the original twelve all were martyred with the exception of Saint John. I could also throw in that none of them were extravagantly wealthy, (unlike Cerullo). In its simplest and broadest terms an “Apostle” is one whom God has sent on a specific mission. If a Christian missionary goes into a city and establishes a church where there was none before, it might be loosely considered an apostolic work. That is far different than claiming one is an Apostle in the same sense as the New Testament Apostles, which is the teaching of today’s Apostolic Movement, which includes Cerullo.

The Book of Acts gives us some four insights regarding the requirements to be considered a true Apostle of the Lamb:

These special messengers or delegates were called by God. Because of that, there were some very specific requirements for an apostle. After Judas betrayed Jesus and killed himself, another apostle was selected and this selection process gives us the requirements to be an apostle. This process can be found in Acts 1:16-26. We’ll see there are basically four requirements to be a true apostle.

The first requirement  is to be a messenger. The name itself means messenger, so a requirement to be an apostle is to have a message and to deliver the message to the people. This was the “ministry of an apostle: and is spoken of in verse 17 of the text when Peter talks about Judas.

The second requirement  is a formal training period. The training is done by Jesus and covers a time of about three to three-and-a-half years. We get this from verses 21-22 of our text. As Peter and the group are trying to decide who to select to replace Judas, they only consider men who were with them and Jesus from the time of John the Baptist to the time that Jesus ascended into heaven. It’s estimated that from the time John the Baptist baptized Jesus to the time Jesus ascended was about 3 to 3.5 years. These men were with the group and personally trained by Jesus during this time.

The third requirement  is the person had to be a witness of the resurrected Jesus Christ. As the requirements are continued in verse 22, Peter says, “must one be ordained to be a witness with us of His resurrection.” In other words, they had to personally witness (see) Jesus after Jesus arose.

The fourth requirement  and final requirement is that God, not man, selects the person. Remember part of the definition of the word is that the apostle is “sent forth with orders.” It’s God who gives them the orders and sends them forth. Notice in verse 24 through 26 during this selection process, they prayed and cast lots, leaving the final decision up to God to control the lots and the lot fell upon Matthias. (10)

Cerullo does not meet any of these biblical requirements. However, some may try to argue that the Apostle Paul was not one of the twelve, he did not literally walk with Jesus nor was he there as a witness of His resurrection, ergo God has other “Apostles” which are not so narrowly defined. Well let’s take a few moments and consider Paul:

1. Paul was truly a messenger. He went on three primary missionary journeys and he wrote much of the New Testament. He clearly meets the broad definition of the word apostle and his ministry was one of a messenger. Also, Paul carried a very specific message, the letters of the New Testament.

2. To meet the second requirement, Paul would have had to have been trained by Jesus Christ just as the others apostles were. Notice what Paul says in Galatians 1:15-18. After he was called to be a messenger (to preach as he says in verse 16 of Galatians chapter 1), he didn’t confer (talk with) flesh and blood. Paul didn’t even go to the other apostles (Galatians 1:17). If he didn’t confer with flesh and blood, then he must have conferred with the Spirit-the Holy Spirit of god. We get an indication that Paul went out into the desert of Arabia and then after three years, started his ministry (Galatians 1:17-18). Paul was personally trained by the Spirit of the Lord for the 3-year period. Paul even tells us that what he is giving us, he got from the Lord (I Corinthians 11:23).

3. But, to be a true apostle, Paul would have also needed to be a witness of Jesus after the resurrection. In 1 Corinthians 15: 4-8, Paul mentions the resurrection of Christ and Paul mentions all the people who saw Jesus after the resurrection. In verse 8, Paul says he saw the Lord as well. Paul goes on to say he was born out of due time and he feels he is not worthy to be an apostle because of the persecution he has done to the church, but because of the grace of God, he did see Jesus and is an apostle (1 Corinthians 15:8-10).

4. Finally, we need to see if God personally called Paul to be an apostle. Notice the verse in Romans 1:1. If you have the true word of God, a true translation, the verse will read, “Paul a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God,”  Notice he says, called “to be” an apostle. He’s not just called an apostle, like a name, but he is called to the specific office of an apostle.  This same phrase is repeated in 1 Corinthians 1:1. Galatians 1:15 also says Paul was called by God. We see the start of Paul’s calling Acts 9:1-20. (11)

Paul meets the biblical requirements and what is more he demonstrated to those who doubted his Apostleship the “true signs of an Apostle” (read 2 Cor. 12:12). Paul’s claim was backed up by true signs and wonders wrought by the Holy Spirit through him.

Mr. Cerullo can call himself an “Apostle,” others may refer to him by that title but the biblical facts speak for themselves, Cerullo is not an apostle. At best he is self-deceived into thinking he is one or at worst he is a false apostle sent by Satan in the guise of a minister of righteousness (read 2 Cor. 11:13). In either scenario the results spell tragedy for himself and those who follow him.

Morris the “Prophet”

It is bad enough to claim to be an Apostle, but he also lays claim to be a “Prophet” of our Lord too. The Bible sets forth one basic standard for a prophet— 100% accuracy when one says they are speaking the word of the Lord (read Deut 18:20-21). God allows no wiggle room or margin of error for anyone who dares to say “thus saith the Lord” or “the Lord told me.” Anyone who does make such statements and they do not come from the Lord and do not come to pass that individual is not to be listened to, followed and is to be considered a false prophet. With this caveat in mind lets look at a few of Cerullo’s prophetic revelations:

“Take up your pen and write. I want you to warn my people. There are 5 major crises that are coming in the next decade of destiny, the 1990’s “ The world will be experiencing the greatest economic turmoil in the history of humanity.”….one of the greatest crises we have ever experienced.” It will be an incredible financial crisis and it’s going to plunge the world into a state of great turmoil and perplexity.” We’re going to see in this decade a complete collapse of the present worldwide monetary system.” It will make the Wall Street crash of 1929 seem like a picnic.” And that crisis will come before the year 1994. “ (12)

Morris gave this prophetic word in September, 1985, it is twenty years later and this alleged Word of the Lord failed to come to pass by any stretch of the imagination. Almost all of you reading this newsletter were alive in 1994 and none, zip zero nada of what the Lord revealed to Morris was fulfilled. Here is a more recent example:

“God showed me at the beginning of 1995 that He was taking us to a strategic level of warfare prayer. He gave us this revelation: God revealed to me that the Decade of the Holy Spirit is closing. He showed me that for three years there will be a new manifestation of true intercession of God’s people rises [sic] to heaven, God will begin to release the flood gates of heaven. God is bringing His intercessors to the frontlines of evangelism! He has strategically placed intercessors in key positions worldwide, where He will use them to effect changes, in the spirit, that will result in a worldwide harvest of souls! But in the midst of this darkness, God has shown me that this is the hour for the Church to unite as a mighty force to launch the greatest prayer assault in the history of the church against the satanic forces now working to establish dominion and control over Europe.” (13)

I am not going to waste your time by parsing everything “God” showed Morris in this encounter. If he is correct, then the ministry of the Holy Spirit ceased or was about to cease. Can anyone show me where His ministry officially began (hint read Genesis 1:2) or where the Bible says His ministry will close? As for the so-called “prayer evangelism” concept, that is pure nonsense. People are not “prayed” into the kingdom of God. People are saved by the means of grace God has given the Church, and prayer is not a means of grace. They are saved by the foolishness of preaching (read 1 Cor. 1:21). Nowhere does the Bible teach that through special intercessors people come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. At best our Lord did say that we are to pray that the Lord of the harvest send out laborers (read Matt. 9:38) i.e. workers, people who are obeying the command of their Master by preaching the Gospel to every living creature (read Mark 16:15). The bottom line is this; Cerullo lied in the name of the Lord and delivered false and misleading information he claims was given to him by God. Again we are faced with only two possible conclusions: (1) Morris is self-deceived and unwittingly deceiving others, or (2) is a false prophet, a tare amongst the wheat sown by Satan to lead God’s people astray.

“Dr.” Morris Cerullo

He claims to be an Apostle and we have seen that he is not. He has claimed to be a Prophet and again he failed the test. Is he a Doctor of Divinity and Humanities? No, not really. His doctorate is an honorary one bestowed on him by another fraud who happens to be the Founder an President of Oral Roberts University, yup you guessed, Oral Roberts gave Morris the degree. (14) On Cerullo’s website he is referred to as “Dr. Cerullo” in almost every paragraph. Why? To give the undiscerning the false belief that Morris is a biblical scholar and theologian when the fact is that he has no earned degrees in biblical studies for any accredited seminary!

Every claim this man makes about himself is a lie. He is neither an Apostle, nor a prophet and even his doctoral degree is worthless. What we do know is that he may be going to jail for attempting to defraud the Federal government out of their rightful share of taxable revenue. This latest grand jury indictment merely echoes a lawsuit brought against Morris by two of his own ministry executives in 2000:

John Paul Warren’s suit, filed last month in San Diego Superior Court, is the second such lawsuit this year against Cerullo, a 68-year-old San Diego-based evangelist known for his cable network and worldwide crusades. Another former executive sued in March, saying he resigned after confronting Cerullo about unspecified “fund-raising abuses.” Both suits were filed by the same lawyer. Cerullo, whose ministry says it has trained 1.3 million people around the world in Christian proselytizing, says the claims are completely false. “The Bible teaches us not to take our brothers to court, “Cerullo said. Warren’s suit says Cerullo reneged on a promise to give each $1,500 donor a satellite dish allowing access to the ministry’s Global Prayer Satellite Network. To Warren’s knowledge, none of the donors received a dish, according to the suit. The lawsuit also accuses Cerullo of hiring Warren for the unstated purpose of gaining access to the confidential 5,000-name donor list that Warren had built up during his 20 years as a minister in Northern California. The lawsuit says Cerullo hired Warren in 1998 with a promise to make him “second in command” and “successor” when Cerullo retired at the end of 2000. Instead, it says, Warren was given a lesser position and was fired in October 1999 after confronting Cerullo about “several integrity issues.” Warren’s lawyer, Dean Broyles, said Cerullo routinely coaxed money from donors by promising to spend it in certain ways, then didn’t follow through. “Both of my clients were very high up within the organization and they were privy to and personally observed a lot of ethical misconduct within the industry,” Broyles said. “In my humble opinion, that’s why they’re no longer there.” Broyles’ other client, Harry Turner, accuses Cerullo of taking back his bonus and saying bad things about him after Turner confronted Cerullo about his fund-raising methods. Turner, who was senior vice president with Morris Cerullo World Evangelism, resigned in December. (15)

Although these two individuals did not prevail in court against Cerullo I believe their accusations helped focus the vigilant eyes of Uncle Sam on this deceiver. If you know anyone who is currently supporting this man and his Sinistry I would urge you to share these facts with them. I equally urge us all to pray for Mr. Cerullo that our merciful Lord would open his eyes and grant him a repentant attitude. ♦

Copyright © 2005   Robert S. Liichow

End Notes:

1. Obtained from the San Diego Union-Tribune July 13,2005 via the http://www.religionnewsblog.com/11670

2. Obtained from http://www.mcwe.com/aboutus.php?SessionId=33f440af97b2d8623b7c78710b4b480b. Bold type added for emphasis.

3. Ibid. Bold type added.

4. This account can be found in the book I Believe In Vision, Kenneth E. Hagin. Kenneth Hagin Ministries, Tulsa, OK.

5. His account can be read in Gordon Lindsey’s book Twentieth Century Prophet.

6. You can order a copy of this excellent resource on Mr. Hinn by contacting http://www.pfo.org.

7. Obtained from http://www.jackieandsusan.com/Gospel_Forefathers/gh_titles/AA_Allen.html.

8. Obtained from http://www.mewe.com/aboutus.php?SessionId=33f440af97b2d8623b7c78710b4b480b.

9ibid. Bold type added.

10. Obtained from His Clear Path Ministries, P.O. Box 241962, Montgomery, AL 36124-1962.

11. Ibid.

12. Cerullo, Morris 5 Great Crises, Morris Cerullo Ministries cassette tape, September 1989.

13. Morris Cerullo World Evangelism web site, Copyright 1999 by Morris Cerullo World Evangelism. This “word” was given by Morris at the MORRIS CERULLO WORLD EVANGELISM EUROPEAN SPIRITUAL WARFARE PRAYER CONFERENCE May 27-31, 1999 Earl’s Court, London, England. Underlining added.

14. In fact with just a little digging around one can quickly learn that almost every charismatic leader of renown received their doctorate from Oral Roberts. Whether it is Marilyn Hickey, Joyce Meyer, Jesse Duplantis, etc…all of these are fake degrees given by a fake-healer to deceive the ignorant into believing these individuals are in fact biblical scholars when in reality none of them have any actual accredited degrees from accredited seminaries.

15. Obtained from http://religionnewsblog.com/11669.

  

The Need for Educated Pastors

Truth Matters Newsletter – September 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 9 – The Need for Educated Pastors – by Rev. Robert S. Liichow

Discernment Ministries International

The Need for Educated Pastors

“I also must be right up front with you about seminaries and Bible colleges, I believe all they do is produce rubber stamp “ministers” and when the ‘ministers’ are done, it seems most take the stance “Ok, I have absolute truth and nothing can change my mind”, and sadly nothing usually does. Peter never had any “formal” training, but yet Jesus decided to build His church with Peter being the Rock. I believe seminaries and bible colleges hinder people from truly being led of the Spirit.” (EMAIL comments from Shirl on 09-05-05). (1)

Every time I mention the need for pastors to obtain a sound seminary education I am met with the shrill email response of “knowledge puffs up. The above quote echoes what almost all the various proponents of biblical ignorance repeat, that being, the charismatic urban legend regarding the Apostles of Jesus being untrained men, thus people do not need any formal biblical education in order to serve as pastors or Bible teachers.

People who hold such views base them on two major premises. First, they have their own favorite teacher/preacher who has no biblical education and they are “blessed” by their ministry, ergo, a seminary education is unnecessary. Secondly, they look at the following many of these charismatic superstars have and assume that the masses of people and multi-millions of dollars they receive and indicative of the blessing of Almighty God upon the work they are doing in His name. “Dr.” Kenneth E. Hagin who constantly referred to seminaries as “cemeteries,” which always drew a cheap laugh from the audience. (2).

There is a great fear among many leaders, especially in the Word of Faith cult and many charismatic sects concerning their members obtaining any formal biblical education. They know that when they do these individuals will leave their movement, as did my wife and myself. Jesus said that if one would continue in His Word he would know the truth and the truth would set him free (read John 8:32) and that is exactly what happens when the Word of God is properly taught…people get set free. Unfortunately, the opposite is equally true. Where the scripture are taken out of context and taught by biblically ignorant teachers, those who swallow-and-follow what these blind guides teach end up in spiritual bondage, which they eventually perpetuate to others.

Their answer to the lack of sound biblical education is to simply establish their own schools. By doing this these leaders accomplish several things. First, it keeps people in the cult by further indoctrinating them and eventually sending them out as “pastors” over their own congregations. This leads to point number two: it is a way to garner in additional financial resources from their graduates/pastors who send their members to the school they came from. Thirdly, it helps give the cult leaders a degree of legitimacy, after all, they are Presidents of Bible Schools! Here are just a few of the “Bible” schools that some blind guides of renown have started: Spirit Life Bible College — “Dr.” Roberts Liardon; Rhema Bible Training Center — “Dr. “Kenneth E. Hagin; New Life Bible College — Norval Hayes; Jerry Savelle Ministries International Correspondence School — “Dr.” Jerry Savell; Word to the World College — “Dr.” Marilyn Hickey; Supernatural Ministries Training Institute — “Dr” Mark Barclay; School of Ministry — John Arnott. None of these schools possesses accepted accreditation and any legitimate college or seminary does not recognize their graduates diplomas or degrees. Please note that many of the founders of these schools always use the title “Dr.” in front of their names. The FACT is that none of them has an earned doctoral degree; in most cases they were given these titles by another fraud, “Dr.” Oral Roberts. They love to use the title without having to do the work to earn it. They use the title to deceive people into thinking they are biblically educated.

It is important to understand that when you see the superstars of charismatic televangelism you are looking at and listening to individuals who have (in the majority of cases) absolutely no biblical training or formal education whatsoever. Let me cite just a few of the more popular preachers one can see daily on the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN): Kenneth & Gloria Copeland; Mr. Benny Hinn; Jesse Duplantis; Kim Clement; Jerry Savelle, Joyce Meyer, Charles Capps; Marilyn Hickey; and Joel Osteen. None of these individuals have any biblical education, most of them have not even attended a secular college or earned a college degree, with the exception of Marilyn Hickey who did earn a teaching degree for primary school if memory serves me correctly. Yet these individuals are deemed as possessing divine insights into the Word of God and are seen by multitudes as being some of the greatest biblical exegetes of the Church!  Millions of people’s spiritual understanding is solely based on what these blind guides teach.

The Biblical Precedent For Educated Pastors

Contrary to popular charismatic thought the Bible is full of exhortations for God’s people especially those in ministry, to be well educated concerning the Holy Scriptures.

Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. 2 Timothy 2:15

Study in the Greek means “to exert one’s self, endeavor, give diligence” (3) We are to mentally exert ourselves in gaining a proper understanding of the Word of God so that we will not be ashamed before our God, rightly handling the word of truth. This implies it is very easy to wrongly handle God’s Word.

My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment.   James 3:1

When someone stands before the people of God and attempts to teach the Bible they had better know what they are talking about. Pastors who rightly divide the word of truth will be tools of liberation, those who wrongly teach God’s Word become instruments of bondage, often leading God’s people further from the goal of spiritual fruitfulness.

This is nothing new; Peter, regarding some of what the Apostle Paul taught, had to warn his flock of the dangers of being led astray by untrained clergy;

As also in all [his] epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest as [they do] also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction. 2 Peter 3:16

Let me state quite emphatically that no one has a perfect understanding of the Bible in this life. Every pastor is a sinner, each one of us is fallen and sees through a mirror darkly (see 1 Cor. 13:12). Knowing this fact it should drive those of us in public ministry to our knees all the more beseeching our Lord to grant us His mercy in understanding His Word.

If any man speak, [let him speak] as the oracles of God; if any man minister, [let him do it] as of the ability which God giveth; that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be praise and dominion for ever and ever. Amen. 1 Peter 4:11

We should approach our education with humility and when we stand before God’s people to speak to do so with godly fear and trembling. It is not a light matter to teach God’s Word. That is why it behooves us to get as much solid training as we can before we attempt to stand in the pastoral office.

Wisdom [is] the principal thing; [therefore] get wisdom; and with all thy getting get understanding. Proverbs 4:7

Buy the truth, and sell [it] not; [also] wisdom, and instruction and understanding Proverbs 23:23

With all our getting we are to acquire wisdom, understanding and instruction. When Proverbs 23:23 refers to “buying” it simply means to go acquire truth, wisdom and understanding, and once you have done this, do not let it go (sell I).

Defusing the Myths

“Now as touching things offered unto idols, we know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth.” 1 Cor. 8:1

Myth #1   “Brother you are just promoting the teachings of men and we all know that knowledge puff up, but love builds up.”

This charge is often leveled against those of us who expound the value of formal biblical training. The problem with this proof text is that they take it completely out of its context (a little something they would learn not to do if they took a class in hermeneutics). Paul is referring to the issue of eating meat sacrificed to idols.

There was evidently difference of opinion on the subject among the Corinthian Christians. Aspects of the matter come forward not touched on in the Jerusalem Conference to which Paul does not here allude, though he does treat it in Ga. 2: 1-10. There was the more enlightened group who acted on the basis of their superior knowledge about the non-existence of the gods represented by the idols. Ye know that we all have knowledge. This may be a quotation from the letter (Moffatt Lit of N.T., p. 112). Since their conversion to Christ, they know the emptiness of idol-worship. Paul admits that all Christians have this knowledge (personal experience, ), but this problem cannot be solved by knowledge. (4)

Paul was not an anti-intellectual by any means! Nor was he suggesting that love was superior to biblical knowledge. In the context of this passage love is the guide in solving social interactions. In fact he wrote his disciple, Timothy to remember to bring with him the books and especially the parchments when he came to Paul (read 2 Tim. 4:13). While testifying of Christ to Festus, even this petty potentate recognized Paul as a learned man. (read Acts 26:24).

By all historical accounts the Apostle Paul was one of the most highly educated men of his time. True he considered all his education to be of no value when compared to the glory of knowing Jesus Christ (read Phil. 3:8), but the fact still remains that God used Paul, a highly educated man to write approximately two-thirds of the New Testament.

Myth #2   “The disciples of Jesus were ignorant and unlearned men; they did not have any formal biblical education and look how God used them!”

That is the basic statement DMI receives, or as Shirl stated in her email  “Peter never had any “formal” training, but yet Jesus decided to build His church with Peter being the Rock.”  Defusing this myth requires no “formal” training, just a modicum of common sense. The disciples, the twelve specifically, spent three and a half years or around 1,277.5 days with Jesus. They were taught by God the Son personally 7 days a week, no Christmas or Easter breaks. They spent every waking moment with God the Son learning the Word of God from the Living Word! What is more, in preparing His disciples for His departure He gave them a tremendous promise:

But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.   John 14:28

The disciples were hardly “ignorant and unlearned” men with no formal biblical education. The exact opposite is true. They were personally instructed by two of the three persons of the Trinity. After His resurrection from the dead, a couple of the disciples obtained some more direct instruction in biblical theology.

And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all, the scriptures the things concerning himself. Luke 24:27

The only people who call the disciples ignorant and unlearned were the Sadducees and temple priests (read Acts 4:13). This was not a statement of fact because as we have seen the Apostles were in reality the best taught and biblically equipped people of all time!

Myth #3    “God used uneducated people in great ways, you’re just exalting knowledge.

Without a doubt, God does use people without formal biblical training in great ways…but not as effective pastors. I would remind our detractors of a few historical facts. Moses was one of the most highly educated men in all of Egypt and God used him to lead the Israelites, delivered the Law unto them, etc. The Bible says the following of Solomon:

And Solomon’s wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the east country, and all the wisdom of Egypt. 1 Kings 4:30.

Daniel and his cohorts were proven to be ten times wiser than all the wise men in Cyrus’ empire (read Dan. 1:20), the greatest one of its day. God has always used highly educated men to move His plan forward. I could mention men such as Justin Martyr, Augustine, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Jonathan Edwards and a host of other theological luminaries all of whom have added to the Church.

DMI and other Apologetic ministries are not “exalting knowledge,” but we are quick to add that there is no premium on ignorance either! It is really very simple; if you want to become a doctor you have to attend medical school, a veterinarian must go to veterinary school and even your barber (hopefully) attended Barber College. If we demand expertise from our plumbers, electricians, doctors, architects and pilots how much more should those in sacred ministry desire to be as highly trained as they can be? I am truly perplexed over why God’s people do not expect as much from their spiritual leaders as they do from their plumbers.

It is not about gaining “head knowledge” it is about being able to skillfully and accurately teach God’s Word to His people so that they may apply it correctly to their lives and bear fruit that glorifies their heavenly Father.

The reason I am so passionate about the need for good education is because I came from a background where it was not valued at all. As a charismatic extremist I served as a pastor and teacher for fifteen years before I went to seminary. Was my ministry invalid? No, not really, but I was ineffective in sharing God’s Word in its context. I was guilty of teaching heretical doctrines at times, because I was not equipped with the tools/knowledge of how to properly interpret the scripture thus I did not know when I was being fed spiritual garbage by other well intentioned heretics. (Hagin, Copeland, Savelle, Hickey, et al.) so I parroted what my “anointed” mentors taught me.

When my wife and I went to Michigan Theological Seminary our eyes were opened and it was if scales fell from our eyes with each course we took. I readily admit to being far from perfect, nor do I have perfect doctrinal understanding… and because I recognize this it has caused me to become a life long student of God’s Word. The more I learn, the more I realize how little I truly know and the hungrier I get to draw closer and closer to my Lord through His Word.

Not everyone needs to attend seminary in order to serve the Lord, that is a given, but I do encourage all of my brothers and sisters in Christ to avail themselves of every avenue open to them to learn about our Lord through in-depth study of His Word. There may even be a good (orthodox) seminary in your area and you might consider auditing some classes on systematic theology, church history or hermeneutics. Most seminaries charge very little to folks who just want to “sit in” without getting the college credit for the courses. It would be time well spent. Let me close this article out with the words of our Lord Jesus:

Let them alone: they be blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.  Mark 15:14      ♦

Copyright © 2005  Robert S. Liichow

End Notes

1. Shirl emailed DMI to complain about our article on Mr. Joel Osteen in which I mentioned the fact that he had absolutely no biblical education whatsoever and does not see the need to have one.

2. It is amazing that a man who made fun of seminaries and called people with Ph.D’s “Post-Hole-Diggers” would accept and use the title “Dr.” in front of his name and in his later publications. He did not mind being called “Dr. Hagin,” even though it was an honorary degree bestowed by his partner in crime, Mr. Oral Roberts, who have given out fake degrees to almost every major charismatic minister on television today.

3. Obtained from http://www.blueletterbible.org/tmp_dir/words/4/1125927988-3573.html

4. Robertson, A.T. Word Pictures, BibleWorks software ver. 4.0.035

A Cry For Help

Truth Matters Newsletter – September 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 9 – A Cry For Help – to Discernment Ministries International.

A couple of years ago DMI established a “policy” of helping at least one foreign ministry request for support in the form of our books, tapes, and CD’s. Almost every month DMI received requests for either materials or for Rev. Liichow to come and instruct their leaders.

As our readers know 9 times out of 10 either request is simply impossible to fulfill due to financial constraints. In 2005 DMI has not supported any foreign ministry and below is a cry for help that I believe you and I should respond to:

Dear Christian friend,

Please thank you for taking your time for contacting me and my church members. Please we also thank you for what ever you want to send to us. Please we are fasting and praying that what you able to send us. Our Almighty God will also pay you back as it is written in the bible at Luke 6:38 that, Give and it shall be given unto you. Please below is my address;

Pastor Asamoah Frepong

Church of the Pentecoste  P.O. Box SE 737    Suame-Kumasi,  Ghana-West-Africa

Please hope to hear from you soon, Please I am waiting for you good reply.

I would like to send this pastor our materials, especially our books which will help equip him and other leaders to discern truth form error. It is very expensive to send books overseas and DMI needs your help this month to help our brothers and sisters in Ghana. Currently, DMI simply does not have the funds to send pastor Frepong anything….however with your help we can and we will.

Please pray about helping DMI “teach truth & expose error” in Africa by making a donation to help us produce and ship our books to our brother in Christ.   ♦

 

Joel Repents!

Truth Matters Newsletters – August 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 8 – Joel Repents! by Rev. Robert S. Liichow

 

Shortly after his television interview Osteen’s office was inundated with letters of concern and no doubt some anger over his lack of clarity regarding salvation through Jesus Christ alone. Due to the tremendous amount of negative responses Joel did put a short statement on his web site apologizing to his fans regarding what he said. Here are some excerpts of his “mia culpa” (the underlining is added).

It was never my desire or intention to leave any doubt as to what I believe and Whom I serve. I believe with all my heart that it is only through Christ that we have hope in eternal life. I regret and sincerely apologize that I was unclear on the very thing in which I have dedicated my life. Jesus declared in John 14:1  I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me. I believe that Jesus Christ alone is the only way to salvation. However, it wasn’t until I had the opportunity to review the transcript of the interview that I realize I had not clearly stated that having a personal relationship with Jesus is the only way to heaven.  It’s about th individual’s choice to follow Him.

Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks (see Matt. 12:34) Actually Joel was very clear in what he said on Larry King Live, he stated that Jesus was the way for him personally, but people in other religions loved God too which clearly implied that Jesus was not the only way. Anyone with half sense knew exactly what Joel said which is why he got so much mail.

God has given me a platform to present the Gospel to a very diverse audience. In my desire not to alienate the people that Jesus came to save. I did not clearly communicate the convictions that I hold so precious.

Joel still does not “get it.” Preaching Christ crucified is a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles (read 1 Cor. 1:23). To those being saved we are an aroma of life and to others the stench of death. (read 2 Cor. 2:15,16) and if we are faithful to the Gospel message we will suffer persecution, it is inescapable.

Jesus did not worry about alienating people. After telling the crowd following Him one day that His flesh was food and His blood was drink and if they ate His flesh and drank His blood they would have eternal life, the crowd was upset at His words and Jesus said to them “Doth this offend you?” (John 6:60). The end result of His teaching was that those following Him left Him (John 6:66) and Jesus facing the twelve says “will ye also go away?” “Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life” (John 6:68).

Jesus spoke the truth in love and then He lets the “chips” fall where they may. Osteen needs to take a lesson from our Master and quit trying to please everyone because the result always ends in compromising the truth. I will try to believe the best concerning his apology and I do sincerely hope he does us this as a learning experience as he stated in the close of his letter. You can read his letter of apology at his web site: http://www.Joelosteen.com it was up there at the beginning of the month I do not know how long it will remain there. ♦

Copyright © 2005   Rev. Robert S. Liichow

 

OSTEEN’S IGNORANCE

Truth Matters Newsletters – August 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 8 – Osteen’s Ignorance by Rev. Robert S. Liichow

Discernment Ministries International

OSTEEN’S IGNORANCE

If there has been one article on our website which has drawn the most criticism is the reprint of “The Leaven of Lakewood.” DMI has received numerous emails from people who believe Joel Osteen is truly one of God’s most anointed servants and a force for good within the Church and world.

Almost all of the complaints and demands for us to take down that article seem to focus on my concern over his lack of theological training. Many people simply cannot see the need to go to seminary in order to be a pastor of a church. The following comments are taken from an interview given on Larry King June 20, 2005. I will let Joel speak for himself and you, the reader, be the Judge whether or not a formal biblical education is of benefit to someone who serves as “pastor” of the largest congregation in America. My comments will be in (Blue) King and Osteen’s will be in (Black type) I have tried to tie the salient points of the interview together, which at best can be described as a stream of consciousness on both King’s and Osteen’s part.

Regarding Sacred Ministry

On Preaching/Pastoring

King: Why are you a Preacher?

Osteen….He tried to get me to minister, I didn’t have it in me…But when my father died, I knew—-I don’t know how to explain it, it sounds kind of odd, but I just knew down in here I was supposed to step up to the plate and pastor the church. And it was odd because I had never preached before.

I do not doubt that one can have a second calling in life and become a pastor after having a career in some other field. However, most men who are engaged in pastoral ministry will almost universally tell you that they always “know” serving as a pastor was what God had for them. In his Charisma interview Joel told the readers that he never wanted to be a pastor/preacher. In fact when his father told him to preach his first message on a Sunday evening, Joel refused at first, then eventually got up and told some stories and found out he liked it and off he went.

Regarding Seminary

King: You didn’t go to seminary?

Osteen: No sir, I didn’t

King: They can just make you a minister?

Osteen: You can, You can.

King: That’s kind of an easy way in.

Osteen: Yeah, but I think it happens more than you think. But I didn’t go to seminary. I have a lot of great friends that did. But I didn’t. But I did study 17 years under my dad.

Sadly, Joel is correct when he says “it happens more then you think.” regarding people leading congregations without any formal education or training whatsoever. Almost every independent charismatic congregation’s pulpit is filled with a man or woman who has little or no accredited biblical education.

The extent of Joel’s education consists of what he was able to gleam from his father’s heretical Word of Faith cultic teachings and those of the other WOF heretics John Osteen had as regular guests in the pulpit at Lakewood Church. Joel has little or no concept of Church History; Systematic Theology; Hermeneutics; Expository Preaching; the Greek and Hebrew languages; Pastoral Counseling, etc…I refer back to his interview in Charisma when he stated that he does not teach theology because the people are really not interested in it! He is the epitome of the blind leading the blind. What little he knows comes from a polluted stream of charismatic extremism, theosophy, and positive thinking. What is sad is that the people who come to hear him do not demand more than pleasant platitudes. The mob welcomes his feel-good message since it in no way points out their shortcomings before a holy God.

Law and Gospel

Regarding Theology

King:….But when the people call you cotton candy theology. Someone said you’re very good but there is no spiritual nourishment. I don’t know what that means….,

Osteen: I think I hear it meaning a lot of different things. One I think a lot of it is that I’m not condemning people…

I could have told Larry King what people (like me and others) mean by that statement. We mean that Joel offers people no genuine spiritual “meat” but only gives them spiritual Twinkies. Yes, Joel is engaging; he smiles a lot and is upbeat. Those are good characteristics to have as a public speaker; however they have absolutely nothing to do with the truth of God’s Word.

Joel equates the criticism he receives regarding the abysmal lack of theological content in his message from other ministers to the fact that he is not “condemning people.” This means that Joel does not present the law of God to the people in his messages. The law magnifies God’s perfection, shows forth His righteous standard, and convicts us all of our lack of ability in and of ourselves to fulfill His requirements. This is called the second use of the Law in Evangelical theology “God’s law exposes the really of human sinfulness.

In Latin that was ‘usus theologicus,’ the law’s role in ‘driving us to Christ.” (1) In Joel’s mind he is taking the moral high ground by not “condemning” people. The reality is just the opposite. He is failing to carry out his sacred trust as a pastor by not showing them their desperately sinful condition by presenting the fullness of God’s Word to them. He is doing a grave disservice to the 30,000 people who listen to him at Lakewood and untold multitudes that hear him on television or read his best selling books.

Because Osteen refuses to preach the Law his presentation of the Gospel is anemic at best and not a gospel message at all at its worst. Any sound preaching will present both Law and Gospel in its content.

This difference between the Law and the Gospel is the height of knowledge in Christendom. Every person and all persons who assume or glory in the name of Christian should know and be able to state this difference. If this ability is lacking one cannot tell a Christian from a heathen or a Jew, of such supreme importance is this differentiation. This is why St. Paul so strongly insists on a clean-cut and proper differentiating of these two doctrines. (2)

The other word of God is not Law or commandment, nor does it require anything of us; but after the first Word, that of the Law, has done this work and distressful misery and poverty have been produced in the heart, God comes and offers his lovely living Word, and promises, pledges, and obligates himself to give grace and help, that we may get out of this misery and that all sins not only be forgiven but also blotted out and that love and delight to fulfill the law may be given besides. See, this divine promise of his grace and of the forgiveness of his is properly called Gospel. And I say again and yet again that you should never understand Gospel to mean anything but the divine promise of his grace and of the forgiveness of sin. For this is why hitherto St. Paul’s epistles were not understood and cannot be understood by our adversaries even now, they do not know what Law and Gospel really are. For they consider Christ a Legislator and the Gospel nothing but the teaching of new laws. This is nothing else but locking up the gospel and obscuring everything. For “Gospel” is Greek and means, “good news,” because in it is proclaimed the saving doctrine of life, of the divine promise, and grace and the forgiveness of sins are offered. Therefore works do not belong to the gospel; for it is not laws but faith alone, because it is nothing whatever but the promise and offer of divine grace. He then, who believes the Gospel and receives grace and the Holy Spirit. Thereby the heart becomes glad and joyful in God and then keeps the Law gladly and freely, without the fear of punishment and without the expectation of reward; for it is sated and satisfied with that grace of God by which the law has been satisfied. (3)

Joel Is A Confused Semi-Pelagian

King: Don’t you ever doubt?

Osteen: No I don’t —- I wouldn’t say that I do. I guess I do and don’t think about it too much.

I’m not trying to be too nit-picky but Joel throughout the interview is constantly contradicting himself. King asks if he ever has doubts regarding spiritual matters. Joel immediately says “no” I don’t “ then he contradicts himself in his next sentence by saying that he guesses he does have doubts at times but that he does not think about it too much.

In the real world it is perfectly normal to have some doubts and questions regarding God’s plan at times. These doubts and questions are part of our fallen nature and they should drive us deeper into God’s Word to seek answers for them. But in the fantasy world of the Word of Faith cult we (and Joel) were taught to  in Kenneth Hagin’s words “doubt our doubts.” Doubt to the cultist is a sign of a lack of faith versus a lack of understanding and any doubt will cut off the blesings of God in their minds.

King:   Well, 9/11

Osteen: Well, yeah,

King:  Didn’t you say what? Why?

Osteen:  You do. You definitely do.

King: And how do you answer?

Osteen: To me it comes back and God’s given us all our own free will. And it’s a shame but people choose….

King: The people in the building didn’t have free will.

Osteen: But the thing is, people can choose to do evil with that will. And that’s unfortunate. But you know, of course you always doubt, I mean, you have to override it.

Since 9/11 Larry King has asked this type of question to every preacher he has had on his show. Billy Graham gave about the same response as Osteen did. King’s real issue is that of the problem of the existence of evil and why do people sin. This is very obvious when you consider his interviews with Graham, Pat Boone, T.D. Jakes, Joyce Meyer, Robert Schuller, Tammy Faye Bakker Messner, etc. None of these people have given King a solid biblical answer. The question has a “simple” answer with exceedingly deep ramifications. The answer is: Due to Adam and Eve’s sin all humanity exists in a fallen condition. We are by nature sinners who love the darkness and hate the light. In the language of the Reformers, we are totally depraved. (4)

Due to Joel’s lack of a biblical education he does not understand that mankind does not have ‘free will’ in the way he conceives of it. Man is not totally free in his choices (to believe humanity is totally free is to follow the heresy of Pelagius). After the fall his will is bound to sin (read all of Romans Chapter 7). A great book to read on this subject is Dr. Martin Luther’s The Bondage of the Will. Joel fails to understand that man is indeed free to choose evil, but he is not equally free to choose to do God’s will apart from the enabling grace of God given through Christ Jesus. Note that Joel slips up and admits (again) that “you always doubt,” but he quickly recovered by saying “I mean, you have to override it.”

On Moral Issues

King: How about issues that the Church has feelings about? Abortion? Same-sex marriages?

Osteen: Yeah. You know what, Larry? I don’t go there. I just….

King: You have thoughts, though.

Osteen:  I have thoughts. I just you know, I don’t think that a same-sex marriage is the way God intended it to be. I don’t think abortion is the best. I think there are other, you know, a better way to live your life. But I’m not going to condemn those people. I tell them all the time our church is open to everybody.

Even though the Bible speaks very plainly about these two issues and condemns them as sinful Mr. Osteen simply does not go there when he addresses his congregation and the multitudes on television. Personally he does not believe that same-sex marriage the plan for God, but he apparently lacks sufficient conviction to share his beliefs, which I hope are based on a biblical world-view with his followers. He lacks the same moral fiber concerning abortion. It is poor leadership not to biblically address the tough moral problems in our society. Frankly, we are in the condition we are in because good men kept silent while the plague of immorality grew in our midst.

I agree with Osteen that our role as pastors and Christians is not to condemn people who are homosexuals or women who have had abortions. We are however, to make them acutely aware of what God position is on these issues and the pardon He offers by grace alone in His Son.

King: You don’t call them sinners?

Osteen: I don’t use it. I never thought about it. But I probably don’t ….So I don’t go down the road of condemning.

Jesus called people sinners and taught a great deal about sin. He used the word and concept quite a bit (as do all the biblical writers). Calling someone a “sinner” is not condemning them necessarily it is a statement of fact. We are all sinners in need of the free grace of God in Christ Jesus. To neglect to tell the lost of their condition before God is to send them happily on their way to hell. One caller did challenge Joel regarding salvation by asking if Joel believed that Jesus Christ was the only way to the father. Osteen replied “Yes I would agree with her.” (I’ve combined Osteen’s comments regarding salvation).

King: So then a Jew is not going to heaven?

Osteen: No. Here’s my thing, Larry, is I can’t judge somebody’s heart. You know? Only god can look at somebody’s heart, and so— I don’t know. To me, It’s not my business to say, you know, this one is or this one isn’t. I just say, here’s what the bible teaches and I’m going to put my faith in Christ.

King: What if you’re Jewish or Muslim, you don’t accept at all?

Osteen: You know, I’m very careful about saying who would and wouldn’t go to heaven, I don’t know…

King: If you believe you have to believe in Christ? They’re wrong, aren’t they?

Osteen: Well, I don’t know if I believe they’re wrong…I spent a lot of time in India with my father. I don’t know all about their religion. But I know they love God. And I don’t know. I’ve seen their sincerity. So I don’t know. I know for me, and what the Bible teaches, I want to have a relationship with Jesus.

I hope from these statements you can see the dire need for a sound seminary education. Here Osteen is on a global television show and he either cannot, because he does not know, or will not give a clear message regarding salvation in Christ and in Him alone.

Joel cannot have it both ways. Either Jesus Christ is the way the truth and the life and no man comes to the Father but by Him or He isn’t the only way. This is a very confused young man with seemingly no convictions concerning the unique claims that Christ made concerning Himself. All Joel had to do was quote for Mr. King the following text and let the chips fall where they may.

That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.   John 3:15-18

Osteen: “But I know they love God.”

Oh really, then I guess the Holy Spirit was wrong when He had Paul cite Isaiah. 41: 6 in his letter to the Romans. As it is written, There is none righteous, no ont one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God.  They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no not one. Their throat is an open sepulcher; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips; Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; Their feet are swift to shed blood ; Destruction and misery are in their ways; And the way of peace have they not known; There is no fear of God before their eyes. Romans 3:10-18

Love God, the natural unconverted man is at enmity with the God of the Bible, which Joel should know and not be ashamed to state clearly. Joel sounds very much like a man who is actually ashamed of the Gospel. When he could be speaking words of life to untold millions of viewers, he balks and refuses to stand up for the truth for the sake of the approval of fallen men. What a shame indeed.

Giving

King: I love to give.

Osteen: I know.

King: Giving is selfish. You get a great reward.

Osteen: I know, you really do. That’s what life is all about. We were not made to be ingrown. I believe, maybe I’m off.

King does give to many charitable works and stated in the interview that according to the Talmud giving is the greatest thing. King admits that he gives out of a selfish motivation, in giving he receives a great reward. Osteen agrees that giving is selfish! There are blessings in giving true enough. I will go as far as to say God does indeed reward our giving, but not in the manner the prosperity pimps teach. Joel did correctly state a little earlier in the interview that giving is the “whole spirit of Christianity.” Please keep in mind that Mr. Osteen is a multi-millionaire and that Lakewood Church receives millions of dollars a year in offerings. Osteen would agree that we “live to give” and with his millions of dollars personally and congregationally the next comments strike me as particularly troubling:

“Fontana, California Hello: Caller: Yes — Joel?

Osteen: Yes.

Caller: I have a question for you. We’re a small congregational church here and we’d like to come and see you next month, but you charge to get in and we’re a very poor congregation. Why do you charge to get in to your appearances?

Osteen: Yes. The only reason we charge—- I hated to charge. The only we charge….

King: Do you charge at the church?

Osteen: No, no never. Never.

King: When you travel?

Osteen: Yes. The only reason we did it is because when we went to New York Madison Square Garden they wouldn’t let us do an event without doing a ticketed event because of the crowds. We sold it out two nights and we turned so many people away in Anaheim and Atlanta, it was just a shame to do that.

When I was viewing the interview I had the exact same question. Osteen’s response was very feeble and dishonest. Billy Graham has held crusades at Madison Square Garden and never charged an admission, how come they “made” Joel charge one? All that Osteen had to do was simply pay the rental fee for the Garden and give away the tickets until the venue was filled. Even Benny Hinn, as money grubbing as he is has never charged for a miracle crusade! What is more after people pay the fee to listen to Joel he has a multitude of tables set up inside of each venue selling his books, tapes and CD’s. So Joel is not only guaranteed a dollar amount per seat, he makes additional money from the sales of his materials on top of it. Whatever happened to holding an event and asking for a donation from those in attendance? If they wish to purchase his materials on the way out then fine and dandy. (5)

Joel:  Hey, you know, you need to write the church, because we’ll make a way that anybody can get in to those events. I don’t like charging.

King: What do you charge?

Osteen: $10.00

I am glad to hear that if one writes Lakewood Church Joel has promised to make a way for anybody to get in. I plan to write them because he is coming to Detroit and I will not pay a cent to hear him or anyone preach.  My question is if Joel does not like charging, then why does he do it? Who is running the ship? It is not a question of money, he has enough money personally to bankroll the events and charge nothing at all. I am also curious to know where the proceeds go. Does the profit go to Osteen personally? Does it go to Lakewood Church?

The arena at Madison Square Garden seats 19, 522 people, at $10.00 a person that equals $195,220 per evening. Multiply this by two sold-out evenings you have $390,440, plus add in additional merchandise revenue. So in two evenings Osteen took in around half a million dollars. When he comes to the Palace of Auburn Hills, Mi. we have a seating capacity of 22,076, assuming he sells out this venue (minus the cost of my ticket) he will make a little over a quarter of a million dollars. He has 20 events scheduled for 2005. At a minimum Osteen will take in somewhere in the neighborhood of ten million dollars in appearances alone. When you add this amount to his undoubtedly large salary as senior pastor at Lakewood, plus the income from his best selling books along with the accompanying ‘Journal’ you can understand why Joel is always smiling… smiling all the way to the bank.

I would like to believe Joel is sincere and as down to earth as he attempts to be on television. Yet I am beginning to have my doubts about his sincerity as I begin to do the math and see the marketing. I have always been concerned over his lack of a sound biblical message, but now I am beginning to believe he is just another charismatic star, getting as much money out of sign-seeking people as fast as he can before the next superstar eclipses him. He is a young man and there is time for him to repent and obtain the pastoral training he so desperately needs. He might even wake up one day and see the poverty and suffering of his brothers and sisters in Christ around the world and begin to divest himself of his millions and actually live to give to those in need. Well at least that is my prayer for Mr. Osteen. I will keep you apprised of what happens regarding my ticket request or any other insights regarding the man with America’s largest congregation. ♦ 

Copyright © 2005  Robert S. Liichow

End Notes

1. Obtained from http://www.crossings.org/thursday/Thur121803.htm

2. Luther, Martin, sermon on Galatians in 1532. Underlining added.

3. Luther, Martin, Luther’s Works, Saint Louis edition, 11:81ff. Underlining added.

4. DMI offers a very good CD entitled “Total Depravity” taught by Rev. Liichow and it is available from DMI for $5.00 plus 1.00 for shipping and handling.

5. DMI has no problem with Joel or anyone selling their books or materials at a fair price. There are legitimate costs in production, time and marketing. It is completely another issue to “charge” people to hear one “preach” a message.

As of 08-0105 you could obtain the entire transcript of Osteen’s interview at

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0506/20/1k1.01

Sacred Cow Number Five – It Is God’s Will to Always Heal

Truth Matters Newsletter – June 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 6 – Sacred Cow Number Five – It is God’s Will to Always Heal – by Rev. Robert S. Liichow

Discernment Ministries International

Throughout this series I have been focusing on the major beliefs of the Word of Faith (WOF) cult. It is appropriate to delve into this topic due to the fact that the cult is also known as the “Health and Wealth” movement. This month I will consider their views on divine healing as oppose to what the Bible teaches and next month I will close this series out by exposing their twisting of biblical texts concerning God’s will and financial prosperity. But what good is money if you don’t have your health, eh?

It is vitally important for you to understand Discernment Ministries International (DMI) position regarding divine healing. DMI does not doubt that our Lord Jesus Christ still heals His people. Where orthodox Christians diverge from the WOF cult is that we believe that God heals people according to His sovereign good pleasure which is based upon His will for us as individuals. The Lord is the Healer and frankly, it may or may not be within His plan to heal an individual physically. I have often taught that God answers 100% of my prayers (yours too), however, the answers are not always what I want.

There is absolutely nothing wrong or sinful for Christians to pray for physical healing for themselves, family members, friends or others. It is doctrinally correct for the elders of a congregation to anoint the sick with oil and pray for their physical restoration (read James 5:14,15). Our Lord can and does heal through the proper reception of His grace when we come to the altar and celebrate the Lord’s Supper:

Those guilty of unworthy communion through non-discernment of the body and/or failure to examine themselves commit sacrilege against the most holy things, for which reason they are weak or sick or have even died (1 Cor. 11:27-31)…In the Large Catechism Luther confesses the other side of the coin presented by the Apostle in these verses. ‘We must never regard the sacrament as a harmful thing from which we should flee, but as a pure, wholesome, soothing medicine that aids you and gives life in both soul and body. For where the soul is healed, the body is healed as well’ (LCV.68). Positive bodily benefit may accrue, even in this life, to those who worthily (I.e.., contritely and with faith) partake of the Holy Supper. For it may please Almighty God to hold back the progress or even to drive back the depredations of bodily and mental disease through the life-giving body and blood of Him “by [whose] wounds we are healed (Is 53:5c; 1 Pt 2:24) (1)

It is with these texts in mind that we know that our Lord can and does heal His people. DMI is not anti-healing, we are against any teaching which takes something God may graciously do for one of His children and turn that grace into a work wrought by man and thus available to anyone who knows how to work the work, which is essentially what the WOF cult has done.

The WOF Teaching on Divine Healing

The problem with the WOF view of divine healing is that it is based on false premises, shoddy exegesis and is being propagated in many cases by wolves masquerading as genuine Christians. Their belief promises healing to all yet provides healing to none. The only ones who truly benefit from this deadly error are the so-called healing evangelists, all of whom have gotten extremely wealthy from presenting false hopes to the hopeless and desperate. Let’s drive a stake into this particular darkness.

 F.F. Bosworth, an early “healing” evangelist, made the following statement and as you can read Gloria Copeland’s comment echoes Bosworth’s and is now parroted by every WOF SINister on television and in pulpits today:

We see, from almost every conceivable angle throughout the Scripture, that there is no doctrine more clearly taught than it is God’s will to all who have need of healing, and that they may fulfill the number of their days, according to His promise. (2)

The Word of God will establish, without a doubt, that it is God’s will to heal everyone all of the time who will agree with Him. Agreeing with God puts you in a position to receive from God. (3)

There you have it folks, it is God’s will to heal everyone all of the time, end of story. Obviously people who are not healed are (1) out of the will of God for their lives and (2) not in agreement with God. Bosworth moved to Zion, IL a city founded by faith healer John Alexander Dowie (who later claimed he was Elijah returned and died of a stroke). His initial education and training came from his association with Dowie, Parham and E.W. Kenyon. In her healing school tape series Gloria goes on pontificating regarding the condition of the early Church:

In the early Church, they had this revelation. Sickness was no problem to them. They knew how to resist Satan and command disease to leave. They depended on the power of God to put them over in everything. Satan did not control the early Church, the believers kept him under control. (4)

The early Church she is referring to is the Church from its inception to the Dark Ages. The revelation they had was that it was God’s will to always heal people of everything every time. “Sickness was no problem to them.” Oh, really? What does she base that statement on? Paul in 1 Cor. 11 warned the Corinthians about abuses concerning the Lord’s Supper. That due to those abuses many were (1) weak; (2) sickly and (3) some had died. This seems like a bit of a problem to me. If people were not sick then James would not have written about the sick people calling for the church elders. Nothing is written in Acts about the rank and file believer “commanding disease to leave.” Both of Copeland’s statements are unwarranted and in fact, potentially quite dangerous a fact I will address later in this article. This much is certain, at least according to the WOF doctrine— healing is the will of God for all His people.

The fallacy behind their belief is that they teach that physical healing was also obtained for all of God’s children in the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross. “God heals today because healing is in the atonement.” Tilton is merely quoting Dr. T.J. McCrossan who attempted to write a scholarly apologetic for physical healing in the atonement in his book (read and cited by almost every WOF SINister) Bodily Healing and the Atonement:

Again, all Christians should expect God to heal their bodies today, because Christ died to atone for our sicknesses as well as for our diseases. (6)

Gloria Copeland in her “healing school” echoes this sentiment as well:

When He paid the price for sin, He paid the price for sickness and the chastisement of our peace (mental torment) for us…Forgiveness of sin belongs to you now. Healing of your body belongs to you now. Freedom from mental torment belongs to you now…When Jesus came out of hell, He brought us with Him. We are not bound by sin, sickness or disease anymore. (7)

Some WOF extremists teach that the 39 “stripes” which Jesus was lashed with by the Roman soldiers actually represent categories of disease. Each lash was a disease which is why Peter says that “by His stripes we are healed” (see 1 Peter 2:24).

I continued and said, ‘How many of you believe that Jesus took all our diseases on himself at Calvary? Every one of those 39 stripes he had on his back was a different disease…Can you imagine all the brain damage in the world on him? Can you see all the crippling disease on him? Millions of all kinds of diseases, all on Jesus at one time? (8)

He suffered in our stead because He did not want us to suffer disease. He took our specific diseases and infirmities upon His own sinless, perfect body in complete payment of the penalty of our sin. (9)

The Bible says in Isaiah, that on Calvary He was so disfigured, His body was so bent out of shape, His Spirit was so twisted, that He didn’t even look like a man any more. Sin had crushed Him in His Spirit; sickness and disease had taken hold of His body. He had cancer, tuberculosis, syphilis, gonorrhea, and everything else all at one time. All of this from the whole world, came on Him, and He took everybody’s sickness, everybody’s disease upon His own body. (10)

The obvious error here stems from their belief that Jesus literally became a sinner. He did not bear the penalty for our sin, but He actually became sin. Even so regarding our sicknesses; He was not punished for sickness (which is a result of sin) but actually bore/became literally plagued with all the illnesses of humanity past, present and future during His scourging.

Jesus our Lamb suffered in two ways. He shed His blood on the cross for our salvation from sin, and He bore the stripes on His BODY for our healing from sickness. In the intense spiritual and physical agony of Calvary, which Jesus suffered principally in His spirit…But in the excruciating physical agony of the Praetorium, where Jesus suffered in His BODY from the terrible Roman lash, He bare our sicknesses; for it was there by His stripes that He was made sick for us (Isaiah 53:10), and by His stripes we are healed. (11)

When Jesus bore away our sins, He also bore away our diseases. The cross pronounced a double cure for the ills of mankind. The church of Jesus Christ has been made as free from sickness as it has been made free from sin. A Christian may continue to sin after he has been born again, but he does not have to…A Christian may continue to be sick after he has been born again but he does not have to. He has been redeemed from sickness. The price has been paid for his healing. Sickness can no longer exert dominion over him unless he allows it. (12)

When the Bible talks about suffering, that doesn’t mean ‘sickness.’ We have no business suffering sickness and disease, because Jesus redeemed us from that…Yes, there is suffering, but not sickness and disease. Thank God you don’t have to suffer with that, because Jesus bore our infirmities. (13)

The reason I cited all of the above individuals is to show you (and anyone you may share this with) how widely this error is taught. No one can claim that DMI is setting up a straw man argument. On the contrary, I have in fact only referenced a few examples and could have easily added an additional twenty quotes from our library concerning divine healing.

It is the WOF cult’s contention that divine healing is part-n-parcel of our redemption. I have heard Kenneth Copeland on numerous occasions say that it is as easy to get healed as it is to get saved. It simply requires an individual to use the same force of faith for both. This only shows their ignorance concerning salvation, but since they are at best semi-Pelagian and at worst full blown Pelagians (as was Charles Finney) it is understandable. Let me remind you of what Dr. Martin Luther said regarding salvation in the Third Article on Becoming Holy in his Small Catechism:

A. I believe that I cannot come to my Lord Jesus Christ by my own intelligence or power. But the Holy Spirit call me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, made me holy and kept me in the true faith, just as He calls, gathers together, enlightens and makes holy the whole Church on earth and keeps it with Jesus in the one, true faith. In this Church, He generously forgives each day every sin committed by me and by every believer. On the last day, He will raise me and all the dead from the grave. He will give eternal life to me and to all who believe in Christ. Yes, this is true!

Salvation is not by our own efforts it is by grace alone through faith and the faith to believe in Christ Jesus is a gift from God (read Eph. 2:8). This is in direct opposition to their view where they have the lost man making a decision to receive Christ and in the same manner to make a decision to be healed as well. Yet if salvation is the gift of God and physical healing is indeed included in the atoning death of Christ, then divine healing would have to equally be a gift. Naturally, they do not see it this way. In answering their claim of divine healing being in the atonement I will cite Dr. Crenshaw:

Is there healing in the atonement? Certainly, and in exactly the way Matthew used the Isaiah passage. From Isaiah we learn that Jesus definitively and once for all removed the cause of sickness by atonement in bearing sin. From Matthew we learn that He occasionally removed the effects of sin during His earthly ministry by miracles. We have already seen that He did miracles to demonstrate Who He was, and once this was done, there was no reason to expect them to continue. The purpose had been completed. Since the healing aspect of the Isaiah passage was “fulfilled” in the life of the Lord, why should we look for it to be fulfilled again today? (14)

Christ died because we were sinners in need of redemption, not because we were sick in need of healing. The focus of the atonement is our being made righteous before the Father by the imputation of Christ’s righteousness. Crenshaw goes on to say:

The Word of Faith leaders, however, make one of the fruits of His death, healing disease, the essence of the atonement. They miss the whole point of sin, judgment, and Jesus’ death, for God has not charged us with diseases but with sin, with disobedience to His moral laws. Diseases are the result of sin, not the sin itself, and Jesus bore our sin, not the result…While in this life though, we shall always have some sin and thus some sickness. It is only when we are glorified that we shall no longer sin (1 John 3:2). Just as we do not expect sinlessness in this life, neither should we expect perfect health.

One day we shall be sinless and free of sickness, and one day the curse from the earth shall be removed, all as a result of the atonement, but not now. (15)

In the April, 2005 edition of Truth Matters the article dealt with the WOF heresy concerning the atonement of Jesus and it is obvious to any genuine Christian that the leaders of this cult are totally ignorant of the biblical Jesus and the biblical account of His death for us on the cross. So it is no wonder they are equally confused regarding healing and the atonement. They all teach that sickness comes from Satan, they do not teach that we live in a fallen world, thusly much of our woes stem from this fact. They give far too much credit to Satan while ignoring texts such as—

For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; 2 Cor. 4:16,17

If one reads the prior verses and the following ones the meaning becomes clear. Our body is dying, yet spiritually we are growing daily by the grace of God. The WOF leaders and their followers are dying physically daily, as are we all. Those who propagate faith healing ministries are no less prone to disease than anyone else in the Body of Christ.

The danger of this specific error is that those who hear these leaders actually believe what they proclaim and follow their so-called spiritual laws and principles often at the cost of their own lives. Meanwhile, the faith healers keep their own physical ailments out of the spotlight as long as possible and when they are sick they make use of the best medical facilities money can buy.

How Do We Tap Into God’s Healing Power?

(All you Need is Faith, Everybody Now, All You Need is Faith)   (16)

 This is really the $64,000 question the WOF pundits claim to have the answer to. But first allow me to give you a short history lesson. Prior to the formation of this cult (17) belief in faith healing was around for many years. Individuals traveled under the aegis of “healing evangelists.” Some of the more notable characters include: John Alexander Dowie, John G. Lake, and Aimee Semple McPherson. These and other people laid the foundation for the so-called “healing revival” of Post World War II. The healers of the late 40’s and 50’s took their cues from the healers which proceeded them. In the Post War days healing evangelists roved the nation. Names like William Branham, Oral Roberts, A.A. Allen, Jack Coe, T.L. Osborn, O.L. Jaggers and Franklin Hall were (and are) commonplace in Pentecostalism and the early Charismatic renewal movement. There was extreme competition (18) among these healers and each one claimed a stronger “anointing” or more dramatic miracles in their meetings. From Dowie up to the present day those seeking divine healing were led to believe that they needed to be in the presence of the man or women especially anointed by God to heal the sick. These charlatans (as history has proven) usually laid hands upon the sick and commanded evil spirits (the cause of sickness they claimed) to leave the infirmed. All of these former faith healers obtained both fame and great fortunes from those in need.

Due to the tremendous wealth which these fake-healers accumulated it caused many others to take their place when death or exposure ended their time in the spotlight. Today we have a host of individuals who teach that Christians need to come to them specifically for healing, that they (the healers) are the mediators of God’s power for those who will but “believe.” People such as Oral Roberts, Kathryn Kuhlman (deceased), Benny Hinn, R.W. Schambach, Leroy Jenkins, Peter Popoff, Robert Tilton, W.V. Grant Jr., Jim Whittington, Don Stewart and other healing evangelists can be seen regularly on television. Hagin and his clones took a different and less risky route then the healing evangelists. It was the WOF cult that began to write and teach about divine healing apart from needing to go to the big tent, traveling healing revivalists which have dotted the spiritual landscape. Divine healing began to become codified into a guarantee from God if people simply applied the correct spiritual laws or principles.

During the great healing revival, evangelists would hold short meetings, and I’d come along behind them with longer meetings. By the time I got there, I often found people who had been healed in those meetings already had lost their healing. This happened in my meetings, too, but I learned how to get them healed and keep them healed. (19)

Even though Hagin attempted to lump himself in with the “big” healing revivalist he never was seen as one of them. In fact, Hagin is not known for even having a divine healing ministry per se. Hagin would show up after the “big-boys” had left town and hold smaller meetings in which he would pray for those who had lost their healing and teach the attendees how to receive divine healing. The important point to remember is that Hagin states he ’learned how to get them healed and keep them healed.” In essence he is saying that he is really more powerful than the huge tent revivalists in that he had the needed revelation of how one can remain healed. Before considering how to keep divine healing, let’s get down to brass tacks and see what is taught on how to receive it in the first place!

Faith healing is exactly what it says it is: you are healed by faith, and you keep your healing by faith…Miracles and healing happen through faith: so if it happens through faith, then we need to find out about faith. (20)

Everything within the WOF cult is predicated by their concept of faith, (21) which as we studied last month does not mean a believer’s simple reliance and trust in God, the object of our faith as revealed in the Holy Scriptures. To these people faith is a mystical force which when properly use according to set spiritual laws will create and change spiritual and physical reality, including physical health and healing. So the initial piece to the healing puzzle is that people receive healing by releasing the force of faith within them for healing.

Your faith will cause the power of God to be manifested in your life. His power is always present. It will do what you need it to do. (22)

Notice how depersonalized Copeland’s statement is; “your faith will cause….it will do what you need it to do.” God’s power is separated from Himself (something the Bible does not teach). The power of our faith, i.e. our ability to conceive in our spirits what we desire will cause this power to be activated. God’s power is at our command and is only limited by the strength of our faith. If a person believes this way about God and faith, then when they fail to receive their healing by “faith” it can have some very dire implications for that individual, or their families.

“If Christ is our Passover lamb, His blood was most assuredly shed to save us from the wrath of God through the forgiveness of our sins, and His flesh was bruised and broken for our physical benefits.’ The logical conclusion to such reasoning is that if one gets sick, he really has not had his sins forgiven. To evade this logic, they make a distinction between forgiveness and healing, which is the Gnostic dualism… (23)

The Copelands assert that the faith that saves is the same faith that heals. It is only logical to believe if one is not healed, then one must not be saved either. Admittedly, the WOF cult does not make this distinction, but then logic is not their strong suit.

Let’s consider just a few of the biblical examples of people who received divine healing from God apart from exercising faith on their part. How do they explain the FACT that ten lepers were healed by Jesus, yet only ONE had faith (read Luke 17:12-19). How much faith did Lazarus exercise when Jesus raised him from the dead, death after all is a permanent result of sin & sickness (read the crippled beggar in Acts 3:3-8 ? The cripple asked for money, Peter and John had none, instead the man got physically healed, something he obviously did not believe for! I could mention the case where Jesus healed Peter’s mother-in-law in Mark 1:31. Nothing is mentioned of her faith in Christ, yet Jesus healed her. Most of you are familiar with the case of the man who was born blind. Jesus healed him and in this case the man had faith in Jesus AFTER he was healed, not before (read John 4:16).

Failure to Receive Divine Healing

All failure to receive the promised blessings falls squarely on the shoulders of the individual believer. It is never the fault of the healer. In closing I will cite seven of the most common excuses used to attempt to explain away the lack of success in the healing business. Space does not permit me to give direct citations, but I will list works which detail what I am sharing in the end notes. (24)

#1. The individual only had head knowledge of God’s will for healing and not a revelation from the Spirit to their spirit. The individual only had mental assent, which will not heal anyone. Remember the only way you can know if you have a spirit versus soul revelation is by the manifestation of what you have believed for.

#2. Hidden sin in a person’s life can block the flow of divine healing. Naturally this excuse does not explain why God allegedly heals unbelievers and admitted sinners in healing revivals. This mystery is attested to by Kuhlman and Hinn.

#3. A lack of tithing (off the gross vs. the net) will open the door for demonic attack. God will rebuke the devourer (I.e. Satan & demons in the WOF cult) on the behalf of the faithful tither (read Mal. 3:11). This is a frequently twisted text used by SINisters to bilk money from God’s gullible and often desperate sheep.

#4. A lack of knowledge concerning divine healing is a major cause of sickness in the Church. After all, doesn’t the Bible teach us that “My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge” in Hosea 4:6? How can one exercise faith for healing when one does not know it is God’s will to heal them?

#5. Sicknesses that come form unknown causes. This is a major source of confusion and depression among WOF cultists. Marilyn Hickey is well known for teaching that “the curse causeless shall not come” from Proverbs 26:2. So when sickness attacks the WOF devotee they immediately begin to search their lives and see if thee is any hidden sin, lack of giving or strife with others. There is always a cause for sickness and its root is to be found in Satan and the believer who has left the door open for him to attack them.

#6. An attack from Satan to hold back God’s plan. This excuse is usually reserved for the leaders in the movement itself. If the sheep get a disease, then it is obviously their fault in some way. If a leader gets a disease it is an attack from the Enemy to hinder the expansion of the Kingdom of God. For example, when Jan Crouch gets cancer it is because Satan wanted to stop her from giving donated toys to poor children in Haiti.

#7. The individual was healed, but lost their healing. This is a common excuse favored by the healing evangelists. They claim people were healed in their meetings and when they die later on, it is because they “lost” their healing. This is why so many books have been written on how to Keep your healing.

When you read the books published by individuals cited in this article do not be deceived by the testimonies they share. No information is ever given that will enable the reader to verify the claims being made. Anyone can write “ten people, born blind were healed in my Calcutta crusade’ or “Mrs. M. wrote us and said that after she sent in her last $100 God delivered her completely from the demon of stomach cancer.” Also, realize that the level of sickness and disease is as high, if not actually higher among the WOF leaders. The rate of cancer among their international leadership and their families is off the scale. One would expect to see a large (and growing larger) group of extremely healthy individuals and yet they are no better off than anyone else in the Church.

They promise much but they deliver nothing but false hopes and empty promises. I believe Jude must have know people like this in his day:

Woe unto them! For they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core. These are spots in your feasts of charity, when they feast with you, feeding themselves without fear: clouds they are without water, carried about of winds; trees whose fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots; Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever. Jude 1:11-13 ¨ ♦

Copyright © 2005  Robert S. Liichow

 

Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Kenneth Copeland (*But were Afraid to Ask)  By Rev. Robert S. Liichow

This Booklet is Only  Available from DMI – $15.00

 

 

 

 

 

End Notes

1. Stephenson, John R. The Lord’s Supper (Northville, SD: The Luther Academy), 2003 p. 200. Bold type added for emphasis.

2. God’s Word for Your Healing (Tulsa, Ok: Harrison House) 1993, p. 9 This comment is attributed to F.F. Bosworth by the unknown author of this book. F.F. Bosworth is best known today for his book Christ the Healer. The following comments were obtained from http://www.christianheroes.com/ev/ev014.asp: “Little is known of the early life of F.F. Bosworth. His family moved to Zion city whilst he was young and both he and his brother BB were to become preachers. FF Bosworth strongly influenced many of the early healing evangelists. This list includes Oral Roberts, T.L. Osborn, J.G. Lake and many others. His book ‘Christ the Healer is a tremendous book on the principles of healing through the finished work of Christ on the cross at Calvary. Bosworth worked with John Alexander Dowie for a number of years before starting his own healing ministry. Bosworth embraced Pentecostalism as a result of being influenced by Charles Parham in 1906. Bosworth was also influenced by E.W. Kenyon and his teachings on divine healing…In 1948Bosworth met William Branham. Bosworth supported Branham until his death. (Bosworth’s) in 1958” The underlining and bold type has been added.

3. Copeland, Gloria, Healing School (Fort Worth, TX: Kenneth Copeland Ministries), 1988, p. 5.

4. Ibid. p. 10

5. Tilton, Robert How to Receive & Keep Your Healing (Dallas, TX: Robert Tilton Ministries) 1987, p. 22 bold type added.

6. McCrossan, T.J. Bodily Healing and the Atonement (Tulsa, OK. Rhema Bible Church). 1982 p. 10.

7. Copeland, Gloria, Healing School (Fort Worth, TX; Kenneth Copeland Ministries 1988 pp. 28,29,30

8. Hunter, Charles and Francis, How to Heal the Sick, Kingwood, TX: Hunter Books), 1981, 9.85.

8. Roberts, Oral How I know God Wants to Heal You, (Tulsa, OK ; Oral Roberts Evangelistic Association) 1970 p. 3 Underlining added.

9. Price, Frederick K. Is Healing For All, (Tulsa, OK: Harrison House) 1976, p. 119. Underlining added.

10. Osborn, T.L. Healing the Sick and Casting Out Devils, (Tulsa, OK; The voice of Faith Ministry), 1950, pp. 179, 180.

11. Copeland, Gloria, God’s Will For Your Healing, (Fort Worth, TX; Kenneth Copeland Ministries) 1972, p. 30

12. Hagin Kenneth E. Must Christians Suffer?, (Tulsa, OK Kenneth Hagin Ministries). 1990 pp. 2, 41.

13. Crenshaw, Curtis, Man As God The Word of Faith Movement (Memphis, TN; Footstool Publications), 1994 p. 139

14. Ibid p. 133

15. Hum this to yourself using the Beatles tune ‘All you need is Love”

In saying ‘formation’ I am referring to the establishment of actual Word of Faith congregations. This did not really begin to occur until Kenneth Hagin had graduated his first class from Rhema Bible Training Center outside of Tulsa, OK. In the late 1940’s up to this day there have been many formerly Pentecostal congregations which separated themselves from their denominations and became independent charismatic churches, many of which began to teach WOF concepts as they became popular. One of the largest and most enduring WOF “denominations” was started by Buddy Harrison, Hagin’s son-in-law called Faith Christian Fellowship which has 100’s of congregations throughout America and overseas.

16. For many years there was an ongoing “battle” between A.A. Allen and Jack Coe over who had the largest healing revival tent. Branham claimed to see an angel feel demons in his right hand, Roberts said God had anointed his right hand with healing power. Jack Coe would inflate the results of his meetings and make outlandish claims. Each healer tried to find a “nitch” market among the sick seekers.

17. Hagin, Kenneth, How to Keep Your Healing (Tulsa, OK. Kenneth Hagin Ministries). 1989, p. 19

18. Tilton, Robert, How To Receive & Keep Your Healing, (Dallas, TX: Robert Tilton Ministries ) 1987, p. 18 Underlining added.

In Last month’s Truth Matters (May 2005) I delved into the WOF concept regarding faith and it would be redundant to devote much space re-explaining it in this issue.

19. Copeland, Gloria, Healing School (Fort Worth, TX: Kenneth Copeland Ministries) 1988 p. 4 underlining added.

20 Crenshaw, Curtis, Man As God The Word of Faith Movement (Memphis, TN. Footstool Publication) 1994 p. 143. In the beginning of this citation Crenshaw is quoting from McCrossan’s book on healing and the atonement. Bold type added.

21. Here are some titles which cover these excuses and many others: T.L. Osborn. One Hundred Divine Healing Facts; Gordon Lindsey Twenty-Five Objections to divine healing and Bible answers; K. Neill Foster Twenty-three Reasons Why Some Are Not Healed.

22. I have mentioned in many previous articles and on our website the fact that the rate of cancer among WOF leaders and their families far exceeds that of other international Christian leaders and their families.

By the Grace of God

Truth Matters Newsletter – June 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 6 – By the Grace of God – by Rev. Robert S. Liichow

Celebrate the Passing of Another Year By the Grace of God

(And much to the dismay of those who have been cursing him prophetically)

 I really do cherish each year the Lord allows me to spend on this planet. This particular facet of Christ’s ministry is a very difficult field to plow in many respects and when my eyes drift from Christ it is easy to become discouraged.

To those people – still trapped in false and aberrant belief systems, DMI represents the work of Satan tearing apart the Body of Christ, sowing discord among the brethren and we undoubtedly have a spirit of Jezebel as well as a Pharisaical spirit to boot! In the minds of many DMI has dared to touch God’s anointed in the public forum of books, radio, tapes, CD’s, conferences and on the Internet. They drive their point of view home with literally 100’s of emails each month, which call us everything but a Christian. Their statements and attacks replete with dire “prophetic” words do not sway me an inch off course, assaults such as these go with the territory.

I am not swayed by them because I am very pleased to report that many of those who once cursed me, now bless our Lord for raising people up who are willing to tell them the truth and expose the errors they were formerly following. In a word “good fruit” has been borne and is being brought froth by God’s gracious Spirit through us and others laboring in this field.

The great comfort and joy I receive from working in this ministry is two-fold: (1) I am doing what God has called me to do and therein lies a tremendous blessing. (2) The people our Lord has raised up to support us have become like family to us and we thank God daily for each and every one of you who do give to keep DMI a force to be reckoned with in the arena of ideas.

As the summer heat goes up and donations historically go down, it is my birthday wish (I know hope has no substance and that faith is the substance of things “hoped” for ) that this summer DMI will see an increase in finances to such a degree that by the fall we will be able to begin to implement some further stages of expansion of His ministry. Please pray for us and pray about what the Lord would have you do in support of this work. We really need all our readers giving something on a regular basis. 

Rev. Robert S. Liichow

 

Sacred Cow Number Four – The Laws of Faith & Confession

Truth Matters Newsletter – May 2005 – Vol. 10 Issue 5 – Sacred Cow Number Four – The Laws of Faith & Confession – by Rev. Robert S. Liichow

Discernment Ministries International

Sacred Cow Number Four

The Laws of Faith & Confession

“But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart that is, the word of faith, which we preach.”    Romans 10:8

Using a little Aussie slang “let’s fire-up the Bar-b,” because we have another couple of Word of Faith (WOF) steaks to throw onto the flames! We began by considering some Christological errors propagated by the WOF preachers because they fall into the true category of heresy in that they deal specifically with the nature and work of Jesus Christ. How we shall begin to consider some other areas of error which cannot properly be considered heresies but fall into the category of false doctrine or as Paul calls them in his warning to his disciple Timothy—

Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; 1 Timothy 4:1

Previously we have seen that there are only three sources of doctrine, the doctrine of God (Heb. 6:1); the doctrines of men (Col. 2:22); and lastly the docrines of devils as seen in the above text.

In this issue we will consider the WOF definition of faith and confession. After all, the cult is widely known as the “name-it-and-claim-it” movement. Some call it the “fake-it-till you make-it” movement, to others it is know as the “positive confession” movement. Regardless of what it is called, the real issue; is what they are teaching millions of people biblical or not?

The Word of Faith’s Concept of “Faith”

Since we are saved by grace through faith in Christ (Eph. 2:5,8) and we know that it is impossible to please God without faith (Heb. 11:6) it behooves us to properly understand what faith exactly is. Let us consider the words of the WOF cult’s true spiritual father, the heresiarch E.W. Kenyon:

Faith is giving substance to things hoped for. Faith is grasping the unrealities of hope and bringing them into the realm of reality. Faith grows out of the Word of God. It is the warranty deed that the things for which you have fondly hoped is at last yours. It is the “evidence of things not seen. (1)

According to Kenyon  (and the myriad of drones who have followed his errors) faith is a literal force which when released will give substance to the thing the individual has been hoping for. Kenyon goes on in his book to delineate faith into two types. The first is natural sense-knowledge based faith and then the real faith which comes by revelation to the spirit of an individual and it is not based on what is seen or felt.

Here are two kinds of faith in contrast. One is Sense Knowledge Faith, which is based upon physical evidence. We see and believe. We hear and believe. Jesus speaks of another kind of faith where they do not see, nor feel, nor hear, yet they believe. (2)

The faith that “counts” produces the hoped for results, i.e. Rolex watches, mansions, divine health, the man or woman of ones dreams, is the second type which is a mystical revelation directly from God’s Holy Spirit to your spirit. Kenyon is inconsistent in the prior quote because in many other instances he cites that “faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God” (Rom 10:17). Yet above he states that this biblical, supernatural faith does not hear! So which is it? Biblical faith comes hearing God’s Word ( DMI’s position) or does it come via supernatural means apart from hearing the Word of God? Kenneth E. Hagin (the Pretender to the WOF title of “father” of the cult) says:

Real faith in God—heart faith—believes the Word of God regardless of what the physical evidence may be. It’s believing with the inward man that causes it to be manifest in the outward man. (3)

We were taught that in order to obtain the results of what we believed for we had to receive a revelation of God’s Word from the Holy Spirit to our human spirits. From there our spirit man (the “real” us) had to renew our minds with this revealed knowledge which would eventually bring it to pass. The only way a person could know if they truly believed with their spirit versus mere mental assent was in obtaining the results. If a person received what they believed for, then they had exercised the second kind of faith, true biblical faith. If one failed to receive what they believed for, then either they had not yet renewed their mind sufficiently and the manifestation of their hope was in process, or they simply were using their soul and not their spirit. The important thing to remember is that results were the determining factor if one had faith or not.

The WOF cult makes a great dichotomy between the spirit of man and the physical body. In fact, they stress a belief that man is a tricheotomy, we are a spirit; we have a soul and live in a human body (which as we have already covered is what gives us authority in this earth realm). Kenneth Hagin, Kenneth Copeland and Fred Price (The “trinity” of the WOF cult) state this very plainly in what they teach regarding faith and the anthropology of man: Your body is not the real you, it is just the house you live in. If the body were you, Paul would have said, ‘I bring myself into subjection’ [Hagin is referring to 1 Cor. 9:27]. (4)

To be a powerful Christian your spirit, trained in the Word, must be in command of your mind and body. The chain of command is spirit (heart), soul (mind), body (flesh)…You are not bound to an ugly, sinful body and neither do you have two natures in you. God did not create you a spiritual schizophrenic. Your body is not you. Your spirit is you. You are a spirit, and you have a soul, and you live in a body. Do you have a human? No, you are a human. That body is not you. That body is where you live. If you will stand up on the inside, feed on the Word of God, and renew your mind, your stand up on the inside, feed on the Word of God, and renew your mind, your body will just tag along and do what it is told. (5)

God has created you a spirit being and it is only in the spirit that you can understand God. It is as your spirit is educated that your spirit can begin to educate your mind and your mind can learn how to act on God’s Word instead of acting on logic or human reasoning…God is a Spirit. Man is a spirit. He has a soul, and he lives in a body. God deals with man through his spirit nature… (6).

It is not heretical to believe man is a tri-part being, however, it’s a view that is not widely held by theologians today and has its origins in Platonic dogma and metaphysics. What is troubling about Hagin, Copeland and Price’s statements are that they do not view man as a totally integrated being.

Copeland adds that we do not have two natures in us, i.e. the WOF cult sees their followers as not possessing a sinful nature at all. They view themselves (wrongly) as becoming literally righteous in Christ (2 Cor. 5:21). If the Christian still is not hindered by a fallen sinful nature then why does he still sin? How does Copeland explain   1 John 8-10?

If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

Also, how do they explain the text that urges Christians to cleanse ourselves of both the filthiness of the flesh AND spirit?

Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. 2 Corinthians 7:1

A.T. Robertson, the Greek scholar says the following concerning the above text:

2 Cor. 7:1 – These promises . So many and so precious (2 Pe 2:4; Heb 11:39f.) Let us cleanse ourselves. Old Greek used (in N.T. only in Joh 15:2, to prune). In koine occurs in inscriptions for ceremonial cleansing (Deissmann, Bible Studies, p. 216f.) Paul includes himself in this volitive aorist subjunctive. From all defilement Ablative alone would have done, but with apo it is plainer as in Heb. 9:14. Is a late word meaning to stain (see on 1 Co 8:7). To pollute. In the LXX, Plutarch, Josephus. It includes all sorts of filthiness, physical, moral, mental, ceremonial, “of flesh and spirit.” Missionaries in China and India can appreciate the atmosphere of pollution in Corinth, for instance. Perfecting holiness. Not merely negative goodness (cleansing), but aggressive and progressive (present tense of holiness, not a sudden attainment of complete holiness, but a continuous process (1 Th 3:13; Ro. 1:4; 1:6)   (7)

If words mean anything (always keeping their context in mind) then it appears that the believer is not completely free from the fallen nature. We will consider their view of sinless perfection when we look into their doctrine of positive confession, which goes hand in hand with their beliefs about faith.

God is a faith God, we must always keep that in mind. We as Christians, are children of God. We are faith-children of a faith-God. We are not emotional children of an emotional God, but we are faith-children of a faith God. (8)

God has created certain spiritual laws by which His universe functions, laws that He himself is bound to. One of these laws is the “law of faith.” God uses the law of faith to created everything. According to WOF cosmology God created the universe by speaking (confessing) “faith-filled” words. God’s belief in His Words was complete and thus brought to pass exactly what He said. This argument is buttressed by many proof texts, I will cite just a few of them:

And God said, Let there be light: and there was light…And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters…And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear; and it was so. Gen. 1:3,6,9

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. Mark 11:23

Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear. Heb. 11:3

No true Christian doubts that God created the universe or that He literally spoke it into existence ex nihilo or out of nothing. Where the WOF cult errs is that they teach that God was using a spiritual law, the law of faith to create the universe. In fact I have heard WOF teachers say publicly that God did not create the universe out of nothing, He created out of faith and as we know faith is a “substance” (see Hebrews 11:1) it is tangible, it is something and not nothing.

Kenneth Copeland more cogently explains the WOF concept of spiritual law and the law of faith better than any other WOF teacher:

We need to realize that the spiritual world and its laws are more powerful than the physical world and its laws. Spiritual law gave birth to physical law. The world and the physical forces governing it were created by the power of faith— a spiritual force. God a Spirit, created all matter, and He created it with the force of faith… Faith is a spiritual force, a spiritual energy, a spiritual power. It is this force of faith which makes the laws of the spirit world function. When the force of faith is put to work, these laws of the spirit function according to the way God says they will. (9)

However, I must give credit where credit is due, the above concept did not originate with Copeland, he is simply parroting his spiritual father, the now deceased, Kenneth E. Hagin who twisted Mark 11:22 to say “have the faith of God” versus what it does say “have faith in God.” There is a HUGE difference in those two little words. Admittedly, some Bibles do translate Mark 11:22 using “of” versus “in,” but as Crenshaw rightly points out “it is a well established idiom of Greek to use ‘faith of God’ to mean ‘faith in God.” (11) However, Hagin takes this one word and weaves a tapestry of error from it saying that we too, as God’s children are to operate using the same type of faith as God uses: “This is the kind of faith that spoke the world into existence.”  (12)

Well, how does one come to the place where they can operate and use the God kind of faith (for now, we’ll assume there is such a thing)? To learn how to do this we must turn to a man Copeland considers one of the greatest living theologians today, Charles Capps to gain insight into how we can begin to actualize who we really are, little gods:

“God’s Word conceived in the heart, then formed with the tongue and spoken out of the mouth becomes a spiritual force releasing the ability of God. (13)

Capps is totally convinced that this is the principle by which we are to release the ability of God. He mentions it in almost every book he has written (and DMI has almost all of them). We saw that this was how God became a man, nothing miraculous about it, just Mary enacting the law of faith:

It was an act of the God-kind of faith that caused the miraculous conception…Mary conceived the Word of God in her heart; then she went to Elisabeth’s house and told her, ‘He hath done great things’…The Lord said to me, ‘My Word will get people healed and filled with the Holy Ghost the same way that the miraculous conception took place! Any believer can conceive My Word concerning healing in their spirits, and healing will manifest in their physical bodies! They can conceive My Word concerning prosperity of finances, and prosperity will manifest itself in their business affairs…The miraculous conception came through the God-kind of faith. The faith of God rose in Mary’s heart, and she received the Word. She conceived it in her spirit, and it manifested itself in her physical body. (14)

Before we launch off into seeing how this “God-kind of faith” is put into operation, let’s take a quick review of what we’ve covered thus far concerning the WOF cult teaching about faith.

1. God must use faith in order to create.

2. God has created us in His likeness and image, so we too must use the same spiritual law of faith in order to obtain God’s promises.

3. Faith is a literal force, a spiritual substance and a spiritual power.

4. The God-kind of faith only comes into manifestation when it has been conceived in the human spirit versus the human mind. The God-kind of faith never fails to produce the desired results.

5. The God-kind of faith must always be verbally expressed.

With these concepts in mind how do these pundits of power explain the following? Buddy Harrison  (Kenneth E. Hagin’s son-in-law) died of cancer. Buddy taught and practiced for over twenty years the WOF dogmas regarding faith, why wasn’t he healed? Mack Timberlake, another WOF televangelist got cancer and he died. Peggy Capps, Charles Capps wife got cancer and survived due to medical treatment (and God’s gracious mercy). Betty Price, Fred Prices wife, got cancer was medically treated and survived. Joyce Meyer, another WOF “maven” revealed on a televised broadcast that she had breast cancer and was going to believe God for her healing but her family urged her to obtain medical help and she did, she is cancer-free today. We all know of Jan Crouch and her bout with cancer (and medical treatment). Yet she is a very close friend of both Oral Roberts and Benny Hinn, two of the most widely acknowledged men who are allegedly used by God to heal multitudes, yet neither Benny or Oral could help Jan or any of the others I’ve mentioned. Tammy-Faye Bakker Mesner is well known for her various bouts with cancer and her medical treatment, successful thus far. None of the WOF leaders acknowledge that the true “father” of their cult, E.W. Kenyon  died of a cancerous tumor. (15) I could mention T.L. Osborn’s wife Daisy and her death from cancer. T.L. was one of my instructor’s at Tilton’s Bible School. All WOF preachers proclaim that the law of faith only works when the force of love is also enacted. After all, doesn’t the Bible teach that “faith worketh by love” (see Gal. 5:6)? Tilton even wrote a book entitled “God’s Royal Law of Love.” (16) In his book he shares various anecdotes on what happens when we operate in the God-kind of love and all the miracles of faith that transpire because of the power of love. He is on television today proclaiming himself a “prophet” of God and a man whose faith is so strong he can obtain whatever you need from God. Yet how can this be true when he has been divorced twice and is currently married to his third wife? If the law of faith is enacted by the law of love, then Tilton’s faith must not be active at all or he would not have gotten divorced from his first wife!!

It is shameless that these ministers teach a doctrine concerning faith and love that does not even work in their own lives! Not one of the people I mentioned (and I could mention many more) have received a manifestation of healing for themselves or their family members through using these so-called spiritual laws concerning the “God-kind of faith. It boggles my mind in the face of such as abysmal track record that people listen to them at all. If what they teach does not even work in their own lives and some of these people have been teaching these spiritual laws for over twenty-five years then what hope does the mere devotee have of obtaining the proffered results? NONE!

 The little dirty secret is that these folks know what they are spewing forth does not really work. How can I say such a thing? Simple!  Because by now Copeland, Capps, Tilton, Price, Hinn, and all the other teachers should be giants of faith and power and yet they are not. Well, you might ask “why do they continue to teach things they know not to work or even be true?”  That is a bit harder to answer because it goes to motive, which really only God knows for sure. Yet there are some Scriptures that might indicate why they continue along this destructive path:

But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of. And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you: whose judgment now of a long time lingered not, and their damnation slumbered not. 2 Peter 2:1-3.

Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron; 1 Timothy 4:1,2

For there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, specially they of the circumcision: Whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not, for filthy lucre’s sake.  Titus 1:10,11

But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. 2 Tim. 3:13

The Church has always been plagued with false teachers and sadly, large numbers “polus” will follow them. These false teachers simply make merchandise of God’s gullible people for their own personal gain. One thing is certain, all WOF teachers are very wealthy and they got that way by appealing to their followers carnal desires for power and wealth in their own lives. So without a doubt some, not all, but some WOF leaders are in it merely for the money. Others have had their own consciences seared, burned shut to the truth of God’s Word because they have taught lies in hypocrisy, i.e. they knew what they taught was not the truth. It becomes a vicious circle as they deceive others they themselves fall further into deception. I am willing to admit that some of these folks may have started out really believing what they taught was the truth. Yet after the years of obvious failure in their lives and those of their followers it becomes very hard to reconcile that these people genuinely believe what they proclaim. At best they are deceived and at worst they are frauds. In either case God’s people are lead astray and further from the Lord and not closer to Him. This is evident in the manner in which they even have defined biblical faith!

What all of the WOF teachers miss is the simple biblical definition of what faith is really all about. In the Greek the word for faith is “pistis”, which means a confident reliance upon God. The WOF cult is not concerned with the object of our faith, God; they have turned faith into a spiritual law independent of God. Crenshaw sums it up in a neat package in the following statement:

Man controls, not God. (There is no providence, according to them.) Faith, therefore, according to the Word of Faith leaders originates within man; its nature is metaphysical; its object is the metaphysical laws to manipulate the ‘force’ for one’s desires; and its purpose is for selfish ends. In Scripture faith is created within by God (Phil 1:29; Acts 13:48; 16:14; 18:27), its nature is moral and submissive, its object is the Triune God, and its purpose is to glorify God and to serve Him. We could not have more contradictory concepts of faith.   (17)

Crenshaw is absolutely correct in his assessment. For example, Kenneth Hagin wrote a book entitled “Have Faith in Your Faith”:

Did you ever stop to think about having faith in your own faith? Evidently Jesus had faith in His faith, because He spoke to the fig tree, and what He said came to pass. In other words, having faith in your words is having faith in your faith. That’s what you’ve got to learn to do to get things from God: Have faith in your faith. (18)

Hagin does not say “have faith in God” or even “trust in God’s Word.” On the contrary, he tells us to have faith in ourselves and our abilities and the power of our spoken words. If we, like Jesus, who as we learned two months ago, ministered only as a man, spoke to the fig tree and did not doubt His words would come to pass and presto they did! We too can possess whatever we confess (if it has been conceived in our spirit first). This leads us to the other portion of the sacred cow of “faith.”

Positive Confession Brings Possession

A person is literally what he thinks and believes. His personality is the sum total of his thoughts. You are today what your thoughts, beliefs, and convictions have made you…. Our confession is, in the final analysis merely the vocal expression of what we think and believe. (19)

According to the cult your life consists of exactly what you have spoken into existence either through “faith-filled” words or “fear-filled” words. What you really believe is what you will speak forth and since you really believe those words (have faith in them) as one created in the “God-class” of being, like God your words will create reality for the better or worse. It is due to this belief that the cult is often referred to as the “Positive Confession “ movement.

What is especially troubling to me about the above citation, apart from it being patently false; is that it was written by Dr. Hobart Freeman, who at one point was an esteemed theologian and Professor at Grace Theological Seminary. Somehow he got spiritually off tract and became a true believer  (21)  in many of the WOF doctrines. What he stated is the WOF position to this day. Theologically such beliefs would fall into the category of a “theology of glory.” The question is how does a person get to the place of walking in victory over all the circumstances of living in a fallen world every day? Although, not specifically mentioned, logically this implies that WOF practitioners must include victory over their inherent sinfulness in order to achieve this type of living.

The spirit world is controlled by the Word of God. The natural world is to be controlled by must speaking God’s Words. The spoken Word of God is creative power…God’s Word is just as powerful today as it was the day He spake it.  Not one bit of power has left God’s Word. God’s creative power is still in His Word…This is the thing I want you to see. YOU CAN SPEAK GOD’S WORDS AFTER HIM AND THEY WILL WORK FOR YOU. But, they must be formed in your spirit. They must become a part of you. They must abide in you continually. (22)

Our confession will either imprison us or set us free. Our confession is the result of our believing, and our believing is the result of our right or wrong thinking… It is our confession….that creates the reality, and then it becomes real in our lives. (23)

Although different WOF leaders teach a variety of principles regarding how to manipulate the spiritual laws which govern the universe (which can prove quite frustrating to the devotee who is desperately trying to gain mastery over his life’s circumstances) the most commonly accepted method is the one I was taught years ago.

Since we now have the nature of God we are to begin to act like Him and do what He did, after all, Jesus said we would do even greater works than He did, right? Jesus went around speaking to fig trees,  speaking to dead bodies, speaking to the weather and He got exactly what He said. Not because He was God, but because as a man anointed with the Holy Spirit He operated the spiritual law of faith perfectly. When He spoke He believed what He said would come to pass and immediately it did. Out of the abundance of His heart (not His mind) His mouth spoke and it came to pass (see Luke 6:45).

We know Jesus was a Rabbi, and that from His youth He had been planting the Word of God into His spirit and (the “real” Jesus, remember we are not our bodies, nor our minds). We know that by the age of twelve (see Luke 2:47) He was astounding the doctors of the law with His answers.

Ergo, to begin to obtain the same results Jesus did as an anointed man, then we too must begin to plant the Word of God down into our spirits. This is accomplished via several avenues

(1) MEDITATION. Meditating on the Word of God, which according to Hagin and others means to ponder and mutter (confess) to the promises being studied. Keep in mind if you need money you mediate on financial promises. If healing, then mediate/plant healing verses into the soil of your spirit.

(2) VISUALIZATION   We learned firsthand from Paul Cho   (24)   that we must begin to see ourselves as possessing what we have been meditating on. Our congregation avidly studied his book “The Fourth Dimension” which goes into great detail concerning visualization and the power of dreaming.

(3) PRAYER “Never pray your problem.”  If you pray the problem, it will get worse.” (25)   We were taught to pray/verbalize to God only His Word and the desire result. For example, I would not pray, “Lord I have the flu, please be merciful and heal me.” Instead, I would declare boldly to the Lord “Your Word says that by His stripes I am healed and I confess that I am healed and I command my body to get in line with the Word of God. I command this sickness to leave me in the name of Jesus and I bind the powers of the evil one in Jesus name!.”  If someone came up to me and told me I did not look well or how was I feeling I would say something like “it doesn’t matter how I may look or how I fee, all that matters is what God says about me and He says I am healed and so I agree with Him.” Another very important ingredient in obtaining strong Christ-like faith and effectiveness is exercising (4) PATIENCE Remember we are in the process of planting the incorruptible seed God (see 1 Peter 1:23) You do not plant a tomato seed on Monday and get a harvest on Tuesday. It is through “faith and patience” that we inherit the promises of God (see Hebrews 6:12). The problem is that many of us undisciplined WOF’ers were constantly digging up the seeds we had planted by making negative confessions!  We planted confessed/visualized healing but one day after we had begun the process we’d slip up and say something like “I don’t feel very well,” or maybe even call into work “sick.” In doing this we nullified all our previous efforts and had to go back to the drawing board and start to re-plant the seeds.

….I have just planted a field of cotton. Now wouldn’t it be foolish if I went out the next morning and said, ‘Man, something is wrong. This cotton is not coming up. Let’s plow it up and plant it again.’ Then the next day the same thing happened. If I kept doing that, I could plant 365 days and still not produce any cotton. We need to become as smart in the spiritual realm as we are in the natural…Our prayers many times have held us in bondage, causing spiritual bankruptcy. No one would dare plant a garden and the next morning dig it up. It takes time for these things to happen. (26)

Can you see how much true bondage we were in because of this false doctrine?  Even though we were taught that fear cancels out faith, we were (we’d never admit it) afraid of saying the wrong words. We were held in captivity by our confessions.

Excuses, Excuses, Excuses

That being said it is easy to see the “out” the WOF teachers give themselves when what their followers confession does not come to pass in their lives. The answer is obvious, either they “dug up their seed” by speaking words contrary to what they had been confessing. Or, the promises they’d been endeavoring to manifest in their lives had never gotten past their minds and they only ere at the head knowledge plane and the Word had yet to get into their spirits and germinate. Never forget the only way any WOF person knows that the Word of God has gotten into their spirit is that when they confess that promise it comes to pass in their lives.

If what you believe for is not manifesting then it is YOUR fault. If you are sick, you confess healing verses and die…it was your fault (or maybe those around you had weakened your faith through their own unbelief). If you follow all the steps, principles and spiritual laws given to you and still fail to obtain the goal ( total victory over al the circumstances in life according to Dr. Freeman), guess what?  You are the one to blame.  As I have heard Kenneth Copeland say on many occasions “if you play the game right you will.” In other words, you work God’s laws properly and they will always produce the desire results. In this article I made passing mention of all the WOF giants and many times their wives got cancer and died. I guess Kenny these folks did not “play the game right.”

This brings me another favorite excuse we were taught concerning faith failures, the parallel between our faith and human muscles. It goes something like this: imagine coming up to a four hundred pound weight, and you, who’ve had no prior weight training attempts to bench pres it. What will happen? You will not be able to lift the weight. Why not? Because you muscles are not sufficiently developed to handle lifting that much weight. The same can be said of our faith, which like our muscles must be developed. If you go to the doctor and he says “ you have cancer” and you begin to immediately confess healing verses you may in fact be trying to lift the four hundred pound weight when you can only lift a fifteen pound barbell ! Fred Price uses this analogy often and even wrote a book which I’ve previously cited How to Obtain Strong Faith (Six Principles). In this book Fred details that there are many levels or degrees of faith, he mentions “weak faith”; “little faith”; “strong faith”; “unfeigned faith”; and “shipwrecked faith”. (27)

According to the WOF cult the key to obtaining victory is to begin to plant the seed of God’s Word deep in your spirit BEFORE the need for healing, a good marriage, blessed children and finances even arises. This planting is done through the power released when we speak God’s Word from our spirits and not our minds. Fred explains the problem with most Christians and why the vast majority of us (at least in the WOF cult’s eyes) are low wattage believers:

Too many Christians are trying to educate their minds first, and then let their minds educate their spirits. That is not the way God works. God works through the spirit of man. When man’s spirit is fed properly on the Word of God, then man’s spirit will educate man’s mind and man’s mind will bring man’s body into subjection to the will of God. (28)

Confused? You ought to be. Fred does not explain how God bypasses the human mind in order to get His Word directly into the spirit of man. Again, I ask rhetorically the question how does one know if he is hearing with his spirit man or his mind?  We know that “faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Rom. 10:17).  There is absolutely nothing in the Greek text which implies a spiritual hearing of the spoken Word of God as opposed to a normal sense of hearing anything spoken to us, i.e. we think about it with our minds!

Let me close down the grill by way of a short summation. According to this dangerous and very popular cult:

(1) faith is a spiritual force, one that even God Himself must use.

(2) Since faith is a spiritual force, man who is created in the image of God, must in essence by a spirit being who has a mind and lives in a body.

(3)  In order to properly use the spiritual law of faith it must come from our spirits and not our minds.

(4) Somehow our spirits are to educate our minds, which in turn will control our bodies.

(5) Basically this process is done through enacting another spiritual law, that of confession.

(6) Through mediation/muttering/confessing  God’s Word concerning many areas of our lives His Word mystically gets down into our spirits. Once we plant the seed, we water it by continued confession, visualization, dreaming about the end result we desire, confessing it to others and by being patient.

(7)  We will only know if we have genuinely believed with our hearts versus our heads when what we confess becomes a reality in our lives. We confess healing and the cancer leaves. We confess for a mate and we receive one. We confess increased finances and presto new jobs, raises at work, inheritances come our way. The proof is in the pudding as the old adage goes.

What’s wrong With This Picture?

I have already cited some errors regarding their concept of faith previously. Quite simply, biblical faith is a GIFT given by God upon redemption (see Eph. 2:8). As previously cited our faith is in God not in ourselves.  Our trust and complete reliance is in Christ Jesus and what He did for us. We look to Him and not our own alleged spiritual power.

Nowhere in the Bible is faith ever referred to as a “force” or a tangible spiritual substance by which we create and direct reality. WOF cultists love to cite Hebrews 11 and the many examples of what happened when individuals trusted in God (not the power of their own faith).  Yet they usually stop reading at the following point because it does not line up with their paradigm of victory:

And others had trial of cruel mockings and scourging, yea, moreover, of bonds and imprisonment: They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented; (Of whom the world was not worthy: ) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth. Hebrews 11:36-38.

Today’s WOF SINisters would say these people lacked sufficient faith and did not understand how the laws of the spirit realm operate.  Obviously, they were confessing the problem and not the answer! Isn’t it funny how the Holy Spirit says that the world was not worthy of these apparent “losers.” In fact God says in v. 39 “And these all having obtained a good report through faith…” The issue was not whether some had stronger faith and received miracles and that others had weaker faith and were sawn asunder. All of those mentioned in the chapter had faith in God period. They looked to Him and trusted in Him to move in their lives according to the good pleasure of His will.

As to their view on confessing things into existence; it is nothing short of witchcraft which simply defined is manipulating reality through the use of spiritual power. The president of my first “Bible” School, Robert Tilton goes as far as to say that “You can tell God on the authority of His Word what we would like Him to do.” (29)  I distinctly remember Copeland telling us in a convention that God expected His children to tell Him what to do for us and even buttressed his statement with the following proof text ‘thus saith the LORD, the Holy One of Israel, and his Maker, Ask me of things to come concerning my sons, and concerning the work of my hands command ye me” (Isa. 45:11)!   Copeland totally ignores the context of the chapter which has to do with the deliverance by Cyrus and he has not done any research into the source language. If he had he would have discovered that God is not actually telling us to command Him at all, quite the contrary.

MAURER translates, instead of “command,” Leave it to Me, in My dealings concerning My sons and concerning the work of My hands, to do what I will with My own. LOWTH reads it interrogatively, Do ye presume to question Me and dictate to Me (see Isa. 45:9,10) ? (30)

This gives a totally different understanding of the text than the one Copeland spews forth. That is the major problem with this whole issue of positive confession.; it takes away the sovereignty of God and makes man the determiner of his destiny.  God is reduced to merely being an errand boy whose role is to make sure the WOF cultist gets all the goodies they have confessed.

My dear brothers and sisters the WOF concept of “faith” is aberrant and non-biblical; its companion “positive confession” does not come from the Bible but from various non-Christian metaphysical cults.

Sadly there are millions of people who are deceived by this cult. Multitudes are desperately trying to build up the faith muscles and create better lives for themselves through the manipulation of spiritual laws and positive words. They are all headed away from God, because they are not trusting in Him and the work of His Son. Instead they are building their spiritual houses on the doctrinal quicksand of false teachers. Jesus said when the storm beats against their house (and it surely will) great will be the ruin thereof. I know, I write this from my own personal experience and I have watched people literally die before my eyes confessing they were healed! Pray that our merciful High Priest will open their eyes and lead them out of the bondage of error. ♦

Copyright © 2005  Robert S. Liichow

 

 

 

Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Kenneth Copeland (*But were Afraid to Ask) By Rev. Robert S. Liichow

This booket is Available Only from DMI Ministries – $15.00.

 

 

Our God has always taken a very dim view (to say the least) of anyone who practices any form of witchcraft. Yet today, many internationally know charismatic leaders are practicing a form of witchcraft called “sympathetic magick,”

In this powerful radio interview names are “named” and the truth behind the use of point-of-contact items is revealed for what it really is,  a simple money-making scheme used by people who are seeking only to enrich themselves at the expense of God’s gullible saints.  This is a lively and very informative program!  (Available from DMI ministry)

End Notes:

1. Kenyon E.W., the Two Kinds of Faith (Kenyon Gospel Publishing Society, 1969), p. 7

2. Ibid. pp. 11,12 Underlining added for emphasis.

3. Hagin, Kenneth, The Real Faith (Tulsa, OK : Kenneth Hagin Ministries, 1978). p. 13 Underlining added.

4. Ibid. p. 14 ‘

5. Copeland, Kenneth, The Force of Faith (Fort Worth, TX : KC Publications. 1983); pp.2,4 Underlining added.

6 Price, Frederick, How to Obtain Strong Faith (Six Principles) Tulsa, OK; Harrison House, 1977) p.28 Underlining added.

7. Robertson A.T. Word Pictures of the New Testament (BibleWorks ver. 4.0.035 1995)

8. Price, Frederick, How to Obtain Strong Faith (Six Principles) Tulsa, OK; Harrison House 1977) p. 28 Underlining added

9. In the cult we were told that this verse meant that God created the worlds through faith. The proper understanding is that it is we who believe God creted the worlds, we the creature are the ones exercising “faith” and not God.

10. Copeland, Kenneth, The Laws of Properity (Forth Worth, TX: KCP, 1974), pp. 18-19 Bold type and underlining added.

11. Crenshaw, Curtis I, Man as God the Word of Faith Movement (Memphis, TN: Footstool Publishers, 1994) p. 205

12 Kenneth E. Hagin, Faith Edition Bible (Tulsa, OK: Harrison House, 1990) pp.lxxiv,lxxv.

13. Capps, Charles, The Dynamics of Faith & Confession (Tulsa OK: Harrison House 1987) p. 33

14. Capps, Charles, Authority Special Edition, Word of Faith Bible School (Tulsa, OK: Harrison House, 1984), pp. 80-84. This “special Edition” was one of my text books as a student at Robert Tilton’s Word of Faith Bible School in the mid 1980’s. Underlining added.

15. Kenneth Hagin used to tell a story how Kenyon ate lunch, went into his living room, sat in his rocking chair, his daughter walked in and Kenyon exclaimed “there’s Jesus good-bye” and entered into heaven. However, DMI obtained a previously unpublished thesis by Geir Lie, a Norwegian, on Mr. Kenyon which detailed his death, proving Mr. Hagin a liar and Kenyon’s concept of faith false and non-workable in his own life.

16. Tilton, Robert, God’s Royal Law of Love (Dallas,TX; Robert Tilton Ministries, 1989

17. Crenshaw, Curtis, I, Man as God the Word of Faith Movement (Memphis TN: Footstool Publication, 1994), p.73 Bold type added.

18. Hagin, Kenneth, Have Faith in Your Faith (Tulsa, OK; Kenneth Hagin Ministries, 1988) pp. 4-5 Underlining added

19. Freeman, Hobart, Positive Thinking and Confession (Warsaw, IN : Faith Publication), p.8 underlining added.

20. Ibid. p.7

21. I say “true believers” because Dr. Freeman actually believed the lies of the WOF cult. He did not teach one thing and live another. For example he did not preach divine healing and then make use of doctors and medicine of any kind. Over 90 people died in his church because of the fact he really believed the WOF doctrines concerning faith and divine healing.  In the end, he died also from an easily treatable aliment. He established several congregations, some of which still exist today and they still adhere to his aberrant beliefs. I must admit out of all these heretics, I respect Freeman, to a degree because he had a genuine conviction of what he taught. DMI has several of his books and many of his tapes.

22. Capps, Charles, The Tongue A Creative Force (Tulsa, OK; Harrison House, 1976), pp.9,12

23. Hagin, Kenneth, Right and Wrong Thinking (Tulsa, OK; Kenneth Hagin Ministries 1989) p.7

24. Paul Cho is the pastor of the largest church in the world of close to a million people. He is a giant within the WOF cult. I mention this because I want you, the reader, to understand that what DMI and other ministries are combating is a vast global plague of error and blasphemy which is spreading rapidly and is impacting the spiritual lives of millions of people.

25. Capps, Charles, Releasing the Ability of God through Prayer (Tulsa, OK; Harrison House, 1978), p.39

26. Ibid. p.41

27. Price, Fredrick, Ho to Obtain Strong Faith (Six Principles) Tulsa, OK; Harrison House 1977) p.27

28. Ibid. p.9 Underlining added.

29. Tilton, Robert, God’s Miracle Plan for Man (Tulsa, OK; Robert Tilton Ministries 1989) p.36

30. Jamieson, Fausset, Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, obtained from http://bible.crosswalk.com/Commentaries  on 05-03-05.

Some Good Reports

Truth Matters Newsletter – May 2005 – Vol. 10  Issue 5 – Some Recent Good Reports Made Possible Due the Generous Support Given by Our Readers to DMI

 

Dear Sir:

Thank you for printing the truth about this wicked cult! By the grace of God I have escaped from its deception 3 years ago. I was totally indoctrinated in it for years I found your info on K. Hagin by chance only because I am crying now as I write about my other family members. My brother is an ordained pastor from Rhema and has not spoken to me since I left his church 3 years ago. Presumably I am the one blinded by Satan and he will have absolutely nothing to do with me. My mother is totally indoctrinated also. My dad still attends there but is not a “true follower” of all the blasphemy. I wish things were different but realize it may never be unless their eyes are opened to the truth. Thank you for listening. I have paid a very high price emotionally and spiritually for leaving this cult. I wish I could have you give me some suggestions to on how to live with this totally unjustifiable situation, and is there any hope my family will see the light? PS Keep putting out the truth! Karen M.

__________

I can’t count the times I’ve been on your site. I don’t have the words so all I’ll say is WOW! I found you when I was searching the net for bible truths. You know I’ve never seen how big this thing really is and for the first time in my life I feel better after reading what the Lord gives. Thank you for taking the time to post your messages. John H.

__________

Dear Reverend Liichow,

I cried when I found your site. Praise God for the voice of reason I read there. My church is being taken over by this Apostolic movement and many have left. We feel powerless to fight this and fear our pastor is being lead into a full blown cult. I thought I was going crazy. I’ve been told I’m just not mature enough as a Christian to handle what God is doing in these last days (I’ve only been a Christian for 21 years). I can’t tell you how thankful I am to have found this web site. Thank you! In Christ, Lori Rieth Harrington Community Church

*******

If you are not currently supporting DMI, please pray about helping us continue to contend for the faith once delivered unto the saints.

                                                                                               Jude 3

                                                                          

Sacred Cow Number Three – Jesus Died Spiritually

Truth Matters Newsletter – Vol. 10 Issue 4 – April 2005 – Sacred Cow Number Three – Jesus Died Spiritually – by Rev. Robert S. Liichow

Discernment Ministries International

Sacred Cow Number Three – Jesus Died Spiritually

(see also special note at the end of article)

 The problem with doctrinal error is that when it is left unchecked, like leaven in bread, it spreads and expands into further deeper errors; which is why our Lord warned us:

Then Jesus said unto them, Take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees….Then understood they how that he bade them not beware of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees. Matthew 16:6,12

This is especially true of the Word of Faith (WOF) cult and their heretical stance regarding the Person of Jesus Christ. From their error concerning His humanity and deity the gyre of error widens and now must include the atonement for our sins by Jesus.

Last month Truth Matters examined the WOF belief that Jesus ministered only as a man while on earth, albeit a man anointed with the Holy Spirit. The Word of Faith (WOF) cult so divided His divine from human nature that, according to their belief, Jesus never operated as God from His divinity. This is an ancient heretical view taught chiefly by Nestorians, and is condemned as a damnable doctrine by various Church Councils, especially that of Chalcedon.

Since God had given Adam complete dominion over the earth and he in turn gave it over to Satan, Satan became the “god” of this world. In order to exercise any legal authority here one must have a physical body and be a human being, which is why Christ came in the flesh. So, according to the cultists, He could battle Satan as a man, just as the first Adam had done (and lost). This second Adam hopefully would be victorious where the first Adam failed. This time the battle ground was not in the Garden of Eden, but at the cross and beyond it into the bowels of hell itself. Let me allow E.W. Kenyon to explain his view:

Jesus the Sinner Man

“The Revelation that Paul received in II Corinthians 5:21 is that God actually made Him to become sins for us. he not only bore our sins, but the sin-nature itself was laid upon Him, until He became all that spiritual death had made man…1Timothy 3:16 reveals that Christ was justified in Spirit. He in identification, had become so utterly one with us that He Himself needed justification when man’s penalty was paid. The next step in Redemption was that He who had been made sin be begotten of God…Jesus Christ, when man’s penalty has been paid, had to be born of God and pass from death into life just as man, because He had become identified with our Spiritual Death. After Christ has been justified in spirit and born of God, He conquered Satan as a man. It is evident that Satan tried to hold Christ within his authority. Satan did hold Christ until God could declare man righteous.” (1)

He is the first born out of spiritual death, the first person who was ever born again…His spirit absolutely became impregnated with the sin nature of the world…Christ did not have sin reckoned to Him. He was made to be sin….This is a remarkable fact, that Jesus was born again before He was raised from the dead…Jesus, after He had been justified and made alive in the spirit, became Satan’s master. And ‘having despoiled the principalities and the powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it’ (Col. 2:15). It is more graphic in a marginal rendering. ‘Having put off from himself the principalities and the powers (It would seem as though the whole hosts of hell were upon him he was going through agonies beyond words, and suddenly is justified, made alive) ‘He hurls back the hosts of darkness’….He had conquered Satan. He had stripped him of his authority. Keys represent authority. Jesus was master of all hell. He did not conquer Satan for Himself. Jesus conquered Satan for us, for you and for me. (2)

Every WOF teacher proclaims this message regarding the atonement and it is nothing less than damnable blasphemy. According to Kenyon’s doctrine (which is parroted by Copeland, Meyer, Price, Capps, Butler, Tilton, Savelle, Duplantis, Dollar, et al.) Jesus did not bear our sins on the cross. He became an actual sinner. As any sinner, He needed to be regenerated spiritually (born-again) by God, which according to Kenyon this is what happened in hell.

Kenneth Copeland has popularized Kenyon’s heresy to such a degree he did a tape series entitled “What Happened From the Cross to the Throne” which is the exact title of one of Kenyon’s more “popular” books. The book and tape series are available in may non-discerning Christian bookstores.

Now here’s the part I want you to get When He said, “It is finished,” on that cross he was not speaking of the plan of redemption — the plan of redemption had just begun. There were still three days and three nights to be gone through before He went to the throne…See, you have to realize that He (Jesus) died; you have to realize that He went into the pit of hell as a mortal man made sin. But He didn’t stay there, thank God. He was reborn in the pit of hell and resurrected…The righteousness of God was made to be sin.

He (Jesus) accepted the sin nature of Satan in His own spirit and at the moment that He did that He cried, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? You don’t know what happened at the cross. Why do you think Moses, obeying the instruction of God, hung the serpent up on the pole instead of a lamb? That used to bug me. I said, “Why in the world would you want to put a snake up there the sign of Satan? Why didn’t you put a lamb on that pole.” And the Lord said, “Because it was the sign of Satan that was hanging on the cross.” He said, “I accepted in my own spirit spiritual death and the light was turned off.”    (3)

“It wasn’t a physical death on the cross that paid the price for sin…anybody can do that.    (4)

“It is finished” obviously does not mean that, now we have “greater light” on the true meaning of Jesus’ words. Christ did not win redemption for sinful humanity on the cross. NO! The human sinful man Jesus in hell won it for us after being tormented by Satan and his demons for 3 days! Lest no one thinks Joel Osteen, pastor of the largest congregation in America, is not a WOF heretic, at least regarding this most central tenant of our faith simply read the statement below from one of his sermons:

“The Bible indicates that for three days, Jesus went into the very depths of hell. Right into the enemy’s own territory. And He did battle with Satan face to face. Can you imagine what a show down that was?    (5)

Joel Osteen is on record stating in Charisma magazine that “people aren’t interested in theology.” Which unfortunately is true and sets them up to believe such utter nonsense as Osteen is cited spewing.

Kenneth Hagin’s (6) “son in the Gospel,“ Fred Price (raised a Jehovah Witness), pastor of the mega-church, Crenshaw Christian Center in California, teaches the same heresy:

Price explains  “Do you think that the punishment for our sin was to die on a cross? If that were the case, the two thieves could have paid your price. No, the punishment was to go into hell itself and to serve time in hell separated from God…Satan and all the demons of hell thought that they had Him bound. And they threw a net over Jesus and they dragged Him down to the very pit of hell itself to serve our sentence.     (7)

I do not want to be remiss and leave out one of America’s most popular female Bible “teachers” Joyce Meyer, on this subject since she is equally dogmatic in her assertions:

“Jesus said ‘It is finished.’ And He meant the Old Covenant. The job He had to do was just getting started. He really did the job the three days and nights that He was in hell. That’s where the job was done. He was pronounced guilty on the cross but He paid the price in hell. (8)

“There is no hope of anyone going to heaven unless they believe this truth I am presenting. You cannot go to heaven unless you believe with all your heart that Jesus took your place in hell. (9)

I could cite five or ten other televised WOF preachers, but they would all be saying the same thing. Sadly, to our knowledge none of these media stars has ever recanted their heretical views concerning Christ Jesus and His atoning death on the cross. Nor have any of them repented of their biblical inaccuracies regarding His nature as both God and man.

Did Jesus Atone For Our Sins, As a Sinner in Hell?

To begin with, the WOF cult faith has resurrected a concept of the atonement that was deemed heretical by the Church. The “ransom theory” of the atonement taught that Jesus died to buy mankind back from Satan. 

Remember that in the March issue of Truth Matters, I discussed the WOF view on how Adam gave Satan his authority in the fall, thus making Satan the “god” of this world. In their belief system, God had to buy back mankind, who, due to Adam’s sin were the property of Satan. Charles Hodge, the Reformed theologian gives us a good understanding of this concept:

The [theory] appeals to the old principle of the rights of war, according to which the conquered became the slaves of the conqueror. Satan conquered Adam, and thus became the rightful owner of him and his posterity. Hence he is called the god and prince of this world. To deliver men from this dreadful bondage, Christ offered Himself as a ransom to Satan. Satan accepted the offer, and renounced his right to retain mankind as his slaves. In answer to the question, How Satan could accept Christ as the ransom for men, if he knew Him to be a divine person? It was said that he did not know Him to be divine, because His divinity was veiled by His humanity. (10)

There are at least four reasons why the ransom theory was later rejected by the Church. First, Satan has no claim on the lost per se, they are not his property which have to be purchased by Christ’s death. Secondly, Satan is not the one who must be satisfied by the sacrifice before sinners can be redeemed.

Thirdly, in the Bible the Greek work for ransom simply means “redemption-price”, it does not necessarily imply a price paid to Satan. Fourthly, The Bible plainly teaches that Christ’s atonement was a sacrifice to God (read Eph. 5:2 and Isaiah. 53:10). So their initial premise is wrong and thus everything that springs from it equally wrong.

This WOF teaches that when Jesus said “it is finished” He was not referring to His atoning death (read John 19:20). They teach that what He meant was that the Abrahamic covenant was finished, redemption was yet to be completed. Jesus at this point, a sinner, had to be dragged into hell by demonic forces and suffer being tormented by Satan and demons for three days.

To begin with, Jesus was not a sinner. How can God ever sin? If He did then He would cease to be God and Jesus never ceased being God as we examined in last month’s issue. WOF heretics misinterpret 2 Cor. 5:21. Here is what A.T. Robertson, Greek scholar has to say regarding that text:

2 Cor 5:21 – Him who knew no sin. Definite claim by Paul that Jesus did not commit sin, had no personal acquaintance with it. Jesus made this claim for himself (John 8:46). This statement occurs also in 1 Peter 2:22; Heb 4:15; 7:26; 1 John 3:5. Christ was and is “a moral miracle” (Bernard) and so more than mere man. He made to be sin  The words “to be” are not in the Greek. “Sin” here is the substantive, not the verb. God “treated as sin” the one “who knew no sin.” But he knew the contradiction of sinners (Heb 12:3). We may not dare to probe too far into the mystery of Christ’s suffering on the Cross, but this fact throws some light on the tragic cry of Jesus just before he died: “My God, My God, why didst thou forsake me?” (Mt. 27:46). That we might become Note “become.” This is God’s purpose in what he did and in what Christ did. Thus alone can we obtain God’s righteousness (Ro 1:17). (11)

Jesus bore our sins, God the Father poured out His wrath on the Lamb of God who took our place on the cross. When Jesus said “it is finished” He was directly referring to His atoning death for the sins of the world.

Next, we have no evidence of Satan or demons dragging this “man” whose nature was now united with Satan’s into hell to be tormented. Satan is not currently in hell, he does not rule hell nor do his demon hosts. There is not one text which shows Satan as a ruler in hell. His followers will be cast into the lake of fire (read Rev. 19:20) and he himself will be cast into the bottomless pit (Rev. 19:2) but that has not yet happened. The only fallen angels/demons who are in “hell” are those who were locked up, imprisoned by God—

And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. {first estate: or, principality}. Jude 1:6

The Bible teaches us that our sins were atoned for by Jesus on the cross, not in hell. There is not one scintilla of biblical evidence to support what the WOF teaching, in fact, quite the opposite is true:

And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses; Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly,  triumphing  over them in it. {in it: or, in himself}. Col. 2:13-15

When Kenyon cites this text he teaches that these events took place in hell by conveniently leaving out the rest of verse 15 “And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it.” A better translation of this text would be triumphing over them on it. Either way “in it” or “on it” directly refers to the work done by Jesus on the cross. Kenyon and his followers simply ignore verse 14 where it states that all our sins against God’s holy law ere taken away by Jesus on the cross. A.T. Robertson says the following about verse 14:

And he hath taken it out of the way (perfect active indicative of airw, old and common verb, to lift up, to bear, to take away. The word used by the Baptist of Jesus as “the Lamb of God that bears away (airwn) the sin of the world” (John 1:29). The perfect tense emphasizes the permanence of the removal of the bond which has been paid and cancelled and cannot be presented again. “When Christ was crucified, God nailed the Law to His cross” (Peake). Hence the “bond” is cancelled for us. (13)

The Apostle Paul further states to the Church at Galatia that it was on the cross where Jesus became a curse for us:

Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: Gal. 3:13.

If the work of redemption took place in hell then why don’t any of the biblical authors state this? For that matter why don’t any of their followers (the early church fathers) write about this? It really is not until E.W. Kenyon comes along with his blasphemous theory which has never been supported by the Christian Church since inception.

We do confess in the Apostles Creed that “He descended into hell,” but that does not refer to His atoning work not being finished. Let me quote Crenshaw on this matter:

There are good exegetical reasons to reject the idea that He literally went to hell. First, in Luke 22:42, 43 we read “Then he said to Jesus, ‘Lord, remember me when You come into Your Kingdom.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Assuredly, I say to you today you will be with Me in Paradise.’ “ The Lord said that the thief would be with Him that very day in heaven, not in hell. That Paradise means heaven is seen from Paul’s statement when he speaks of the “third heaven” and “Paradise” as synonymous (2 Cor. 12:2-4)….Furthermore in Luke 223:46 the Lord said: “And when Jesus had cried out with a loud voice, He said, ‘Father into Your hands I commend My spirit.’ And having said this, He breathed His last.” He did not commit His spirit to Hades or to the devil…A correct understanding of Peter’s use of David’s words, “You will not leave my soul in Hades…(Acts 2:27), is necessary. Hades here does not mean the fire but the grave. The early church understood it to be the grave. Also, “Hades” sometimes mean the grave (1 Cor. 15:56). Peter used the word to speak of the bodily resurrection of Christ, proving from the Old Testament tht Messiah would rise from the dead (see v. 30), the dead being those who are in graves, not in hell. (14)

There is an in-house debate among genuine Christians regarding what the Apostles Creed means in this statement. Another view is that Jesus did descend into hell victorious and proclaim His victory to those “spirits in prison” (read I Peter 3:18). In this view Jesus is in Abraham’s bosom and in this upper portion proclaims that redemption is complete and at His ascension He took the waiting believers with Him to heaven. This is the position I believe, but I cite Crenshaw to give you a better understanding of what Christians believe regarding this matter.

Jesus the First “Born-Again” Man?

As I quoted from Copeland’s tape series earlier in this article it is the standard belief among the teachers of WOF that Jesus, as a born-again man defeated Satan in his own domain. Their favorite proof text they cite is found in Hebrews:

For to which of the angels did God even say, “You are my Son today I have become your Father”?  {5 Or have begotten you}  (5 Psalm 2:7) Or again, “I will be his Father and he will be my Son”? (5 2 Samuel 7:14; 1 Chron. 17:13} And again, when God brings his firstborn into the world, he says, “Let all God’s angels worship him.” {6 Deut. 32:43 (see Dead Sea Scrolls and Septuagint} Hebrews 1:5,6

They interpret this text to mean that at some point God the Son ceased to be God, His human nature being completely torn away from His divine nature, leaving Jesus as only a man in hell and that once Jesus was spiritually re-born (in hell) then “again” the heavenly Father say “and He will be my Son.”

Furthermore they teach that when Jesus was reborn and took the keys of death, hell and the grave from Satan (in hell) and ascends back to the earth and is physically resurrected that is when God “brings his firstborn into the world.” That is the teaching of the WOF cult regarding this text in Hebrews.

Is this the correct interpretation? The WOF preachers miss the point of this text altogether, most likely because their house of cards needs to be shored up by some biblical citation, even if it is taken out of context.

In Hebrews 1:5 His deity comes to the forefront as He is presented as the exalted Son whom the angels are to worship. He is exalted in that He came into the world as the “firstborn,” the preeminent one. Jesus is “begotten” to this relationship with the Father, that is, recognized. The Father is not making Him God or giving Him something new regarding His deity but is not making Him God or giving Him something new regarding His deity but only recognizing what He is: son, begotten firstborn, and God…The today’ has no particular reference and the “begotten” is simply recognition that Jesus is the “Son, the Begotten, the Firstborn, and God” (Heb. 1:5-8). Again the context militates against the idea that He was morally born again. (15)

Crenshaw’s statement is very clear and A.T. Robertson’s comments on these verses also shed light on their true meaning and context:

Heb 1:5 – Unto which , “To which individual angel.” As a class angels are called sons of God (Elohim) (Ps. 29:1), but no single angel is called God’s Son like the Messiah in Ps. 2:7. Dods takes “have I begotten thee”, perfect active indicative of , to refer to the resurrection and ascension while others refer it to the incarnation. And again. This quotation is from 2 Sa. 7:14. Note the use of the predicate with the sense of “as” like the Hebrew (LXX idiom), not preserved in the English. See Mt. 19:5; Lu 2:34. Like Old English “to” or “For” See 2 Co 6:18; Re 21:7 for the same passage applied to relation between God and Christians while here it is treated as Messianic.

Heb 1:6 – And when he again bringeth in. Indefinite temporal clause with , the reference is to the Second Coming as in 9:28. It merely introduces another quotation (Ps. 97:7) parallel to; in verse 5, the reference is to the incarnation when the angels did worship the Child Jesus (Lu 2:13f.). There is no way to decide certainly about it. The first-born See Ps. 89:28. For this compound adjective applied to Christ in relation to the universe see Col. 1:15, to other men, Ro 8:29; Col 1:18 to the other children of Mary, Lu 2:7; here it is used absolutely. The world  “The inhabited earth.  See Ac 17:6 Let worship Imperative first aorist active third plural of here in the full sense of worship, not mere reverence or courtesy. This quotation is from the LXX MSS. (except F) have , but the substance does occur also in Ps. 97:7

The grammar is very clear as is the obvious meaning, the author of Hebrews was not referring to God the Father giving birth or reestablishing Jesus as God the Son. The WOF stresses the two words “again” in the verse in a vain attempt to prove their blasphemous doctrine regarding the atonement.

In putting a very sharp fork into this sacred cow, because it is finished, let’s be very clear that our Lord Jesus paid for the penalty of our sins by bearing them (not becoming a sinner) on the cross and certainly not in hell as a born-again man. This is one of the most damnable of the WOF sacred cows which demands cremation and then a scattering of its ashes over the grave of E.W. Kenyon.   ♦

Copyright ©  2005  Robert S. Liichow

 ** A SPECIAL NOTE CONCERNING THIS ARTICLE:

In writing about this “sacred cow” I used strong language such as “damnable heresy,” and “blasphemy.” It is important for you, the reader, to understand that when it comes to the nature of Christ and His atoning work on the cross it is essential that we have the correct biblical understanding. The WOF cult is wrong to such a degree that those believing what they teach concerning Jesus and His work on the cross cannot be considered Christians. This is no small issue. It is the center of the Gospel. You get this wrong then all that flows from that error leads one only into further darkness.

I am not saying that everyone who attends a WOF “church” is unsaved, only the Lord knows those who are truly His. Yet I do tremble with godly fear fro those who persistently teach such blasphemy even after being warned of their errors on several occasions by various ministers, including DMI.

Please pray for these teachers. They hold sway over millions of professing believers. Ask our Lord in His mercy to open their eyes and grant them repentance and the humility to publicly admit and recant their former doctrines.

________________________________________

End Notes

1. Kenyon, E.W. The Bible in the Light of Our Redemption Old Tappen, NJ 1969, pp. 165, 166,167. Bold type and underlining added for emphasis.

2. Kenyon, E.W. what Happened from the Cross to the Throne, Old Tappen, NJ, 1969, pp. 63,64,65. The reason for all of the ellipses is for the sake of space. You can find Kenyon’s book in almost any ‘Christian’ bookstore and read it for yourself, but what I have cited carries his main thought regarding the atonement of Christ. Bold type and underlining added.

3. Copeland, Kenneth. What Happened from the Cross to the Throne, side two of cassette one. Underlining added.

4. Copeland, Kenneth. What Satan Saw on the Day of Pentecost, audiotape #BCC-19, side 1.

5. Osteen, Joel. Sermon, CS-002 – April 23, 2000, “The Truth of The Resurrection.”

6. Kenneth Hagin senior, considered by many to be the “father” of the Word of Faith died recently. Sadly his legacy of error continues through his son and grandson, not to mention the several thousand graduates of his legacy of error continues through his son and grandson, not to mention the several thousand graduates of Hagin’s “Bible” school, Rhema Bible Training Center.

7. Ever Increasing Faith Messenger [June 1980] 7; quoted in D.R. McConnell, A different Gospel, 1988 120.

8. Meyer, Joyce. From the Cross to the Throne. Quote obtained from http://www.myfortress.org/DidJesusPayForOurSinsInHell.html Underlining and bold type added for emphasis.

9. Meyer, Joyce. The Most Important Decision You Will Ever Make. Pg. 37, 1991 edition. To DMI’s knowledge Joyce has not redacted her booklet which is given away to people who want to get “born-again.” In her mind if they do not accept the sinful man Jesus redeeming us then there can be no hope of them going to heaven! Pretty amazing when you consider that the Orthodox Christian Church has never taught such a doctrine nor accepted any aspects of what the WOF presents as the atonement.

10. Hodge, Charles. Systematic Theolgy vol. 2 pg. 564.

11. Robertson, A.T. Word Pictures, BibleWorks software ver. 4.0, 1999

12. Mary K. Baxter wrote a bestselling book which alleges she visited hell on 40 occasions with Jesus. In her book “The Divine Revelation of Hell” she shows Satan and demons ruling and reigning in hell tormented the damned. It is pure nonsense and contradicts the Bible on almost every page, yet has sold hundreds of thousands of copies and now is in something like 30 different languages!

13. Robertson, A.T. Word Pictures, BibleWorks software, ver. 4.0 1999

14. Crenshaw, Curtis. Man as God Foot Stool Publication, pp. 431,442, 1994.

15. Ibid. pp. 333-323. Underlining added.

16. Robertson, A.T. Word Pictures, BibleWorks software, vr. 4.0, 199.