We’ve faked the power of Pentecost long enough. Let’s set aside the imitations and reclaim the real deal.
Shortly after Elijah was carried to heaven in his fiery chariot, a group of young prophets asked Elisha to go with them to build new living quarters near the Jordan River. While one of the young men was cutting down a tree, the blade of his axe fell in the water and sank into the murky depths of the riverbed (see 2 Kings 6:1-7).
The construction project came to an abrupt stop. This was before the days of flashlights and sonar devices. These guys were in trouble.
“Let’s ditch our counterfeits and our cheap substitutes, and ask the Lord to restore the axe blade. Let’s cry to Him for a pure, unadulterated, genuine, life-changing, planet-shaking revival.”
Knowing that his friends could not replace this expensive iron tool they had borrowed, the young prophet cried to his mentor Elisha for help. The wise prophet threw a stick in the water where the axe head had sunk. Immediately the heavy iron blade floated to the surface—defying the laws of physics and proving that nothing is impossible with God. Elisha’s faith saved the day.
We can gain so much comfort from this story. It reminds us that God has power over the natural world. It also proves that He cares about the seemingly trivial details of our lives—and that He is even willing to bail us out of the messes we make.
As I have meditated on this passage in recent days I’ve also applied it to our current situation in the American church. It illustrates how desperately we need to recover what we’ve lost.
Perhaps you’ve noticed that our blade is missing. I don’t know exactly when it fell off the handle, but it seems as if we’ve been trying to build God’s house without the sharp edge of His genuine anointing. We’ve traded the real for the phony. We’ve cheapened Pentecost to the point that it’s been reduced to dry religious programs and circus sideshow antics.
We’ve mastered the art of hype. We know how to fake the anointing. We push people to the floor during our altar times. We know how to manipulate music and crowds so that we can create the atmosphere of the anointing. But in so many cases the real anointing isn’t there. In its place is a hollow imitation.
Some charismatic leaders today are even selling specially handcrafted oils that promise the Holy Spirit’s power. Others sell scented candles that claim to bring God’s presence. And last year one brother was traveling the country with feathers in a jar—claiming that these belonged to an angel with healing powers.
Lord, forgive us for our charlatanism. We need the blade back! We must cry out to the God Who has the power to raise iron from the bottom of a river.
We are not going to advance Christ’s kingdom, or build His victorious church, using scented oils, fake charms, ear-tickling prophecies and goofy charismatic gimmicks. This is all wood, hay and stubble destined for the furnace. What we need today is the sharp blade of the Word that is empowered by the Holy Ghost and fire.
In my world travels during the past few years I have met humble Christians who carry the genuine anointing of the Spirit. I’ve spent time with Chinese believers who see miracles inside their prison cells. I’ve met an Indian evangelist who has seen six people raised from the dead. I’ve met a Pakistani apostle who regularly sees Muslims healed during outdoor gospel meetings.
Last week I interviewed an Iranian church leader whose ministry is leading 5,000 Iranians to faith in Christ every month. In the midst of persecution and political upheaval, a New Testament—style revival is erupting in that Shiite Muslim stronghold-all because the church in Iran is weilding the axe head of genuine Holy Spirit anointing.
Where is the God of Elisha? There is a cry in the American church today that resembles the cry of the desperate young prophet in 2 Kings 6. We have not been good stewards of the Holy Spirit’s gifts, and now the precious power of God has eluded us. We dropped it. Yet we are beginning to acknowledge our blunder.
Let’s fully humble ourselves. Let’s repent of fakery and fraud. Let’s ditch our counterfeits and our cheap substitutes, and ask the Lord to restore the axe blade. Let’s cry to Him for a pure, unadulterated, genuine, life-changing, planet-shaking revival.
I just saw the video of Rick Joyner announcing that Todd Bentley is back ministering every night at Morningstar in North Carolinaand now they have so-called “revival” manifestations eerily similar to Lakeland. They also announced that they are streaming these big meetings every night on their new TV channel - and they are greatly promoting the whole thing.
Now I am a tongues-speaking Pentecostal myself - but can I ask a simple question here please? What kind of “spirit” was it operating in the Lakeland revival - when the leader and main focal- point of the meetings (Todd Bentley) was having an adulterous affair behind the scenes? Was it truly the “Holy” Spirit that was anointing something so sensual and unholy? And now that Todd divorced his wife and married his mistress - are we supposed to welcome him back and this “anointing” with him? What is going on here? Rick Joyner has been warned very specifically by high level ministries not to do what he is doing now - bringing Todd Bentley back into the limelight. And yet it seems he does not care. Apparently the “manifestations” are all that matter.
So what exactly are these ‘manifestations’ if they are seemingly at home in such an unholy environment? Are they from God at all? (I am talking here about the violent “jerking”, uncontrollable laughter, bodily contortions, drunkenness, ‘portals’, strange “angel” encounters, etc.) Why do we not see such an ‘anointing’ in the Bible? Why aren’t Jesus or the apostles promoting these manifestations if they really are true Revival? Why instead do we see these things all the way through the New Age and Hinduism, etc? Do we not realize that many false religions have their own version of “laying on of hands” that results in these very types of manifestations? This ’spirit’ is not in the Bible - but it is all the way through Kundalini-type Hinduism! Don’t you think this should alarm us?
WHAT is KUNDALINI?
If you search for Kundalini and Shakti on the Internet, you will find that multitudes of people in the New Age and Eastern religions still experience these powerful manifestations. Often this is with the help of a Guru, who touches them on the forehead so that they can experience a “Kundalini Awakening”.
As researcher Robert Walker wrote in 1995:
“The meetings which mystic Hindu gurus hold are called ‘Darshan’. At these meetings devotees go forward to receive spiritual experience from a touch by the open palm of the hand, often to the forehead, by the guru in what is known as the Shakti Pat or divine touch. The raising of the spiritual experience is called raising Kundalini. After a period when the devotee has reached a certain spiritual elevation they begin to shake, jerk, or hop or squirm uncontrollably, sometimes breaking into uncontrolled animal noises or laughter as they reach an ecstatic high. These manifestations are called ‘Kriyas’. Devotees sometimes roar like lions and show all kinds of physical signs during this period. Often devotees move on to higher states of spiritual consciousness and become inert
physically and appear to slip into an unconsciousness…”
And as the guru Shri Yogãnandji Mahãrãja wrote:
“When Your body begins trembling, hair stands on roots, you laugh or begin to weep without your wishing, your tongue begins to utter deformed sounds, you are filled with fear or see frightening visions. the Kundalini Shakti has become active.”
In China there is a popular Kundalini-type movement called ‘Qigong’. When a Chinese Qigong spiritual master spoke in the USA in 1991, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that many in the crowd began to experience “spontaneous movements”. The master told
his audience, “Those who are sensitive might start having some strong physical sensations - or start laughing or crying. Don’t worry. This is quite normal.”
When you see videos of these “kriyas” or other Kundalini-type manifestations, you would often swear that you are watching a modern “Impartation”-type church meeting. (And I say this as someone who believes strongly in the gifts of the Holy Spirit. I just don’t believe in “alien” anointings infiltrating the Body of Christ! There is a big difference between Kundalini and the real Holy Spirit).
Since 1993-4, I believe a foreign spirit has been allowed to invade the church - first through Rodney Howard-Browne’s ministry – then Toronto, then the Prophetic movement (which I was part of at the time) and on into Lakeland and many other ministries and movements. I urge people now to “test the spirits” just as we are commanded to in Scripture. Do not let just anyone lay hands on you. This is a powerful spirit and it has the backing of a lot of big-name ministries. In fact, these men and women are the very ones responsible for allowing it to spread right through the body of Christ. And one day they will be answerable to God for doing so.
We are specifically warned in the Bible that the Last Days will be a time of “seducing spirits,” false prophets, ‘lying signs and wonders,’ and that we always need to watch for “angels of light” masquerading as the real thing. Why does the modern church not take these warnings seriously? Aren’t we living in the very days that the Bible warns about?
Right now I need to do something that I have never done in such a way before. I have never before published a list of ministries or movements to watch out for. But this time I have to. This sickness has gone on long enough. I urge you to cut yourself off from the following ministries and their tainted “anointings” my friends. Even though some of these people say “good things” at times, it is simply not worth having any involvement with them due to the tainted anointing that they endorse or minister in themselves. Here
is the list-
(1) Todd Bentley.
(2) Rodney Howard Browne - the so-called “Holy Ghost Bartender.”
(2) Rick Joyner or anyone connected with Morningstar Ministries.
(3) John Arnott & any connected with TACF (The “Toronto Blessing”).
(4) Peter Wagner of the ‘New Apostolic Reformation’ who claims to be head of a worldwide network of ‘apostles’ - who publicly endorsed Lakeland and will soon preach at Toronto TACF alongside other “false anointing” advocates.
(5) Mike Bickle and IHOP Kansas City (-I lived nearby for over two years - and know how much they are into all this stuff. Mike Bickle promotes it in his book).
(6) Bob Jones - the Kansas City prophet whose ministry is utterly tainted by it all.
(7) Patricia King and anyone else from ‘Extreme Prophetic.’
(8) John Crowder & anyone connected with “Sloshfest.”
(9) Bill Johnson of Bethel church, Redding - who says some good things but publicly endorsed Lakeland and promotes the “false anointing” very strongly behind the scenes.
(10) Heidi & Rolland Baker of IRISMinistries - who do good work amongst the poor in Mozambique - but who have also carried and promoted this tainted anointing for years.
(11) Randy Clark, Wes & Stacey Campbell, and other key figures from the “Toronto blessing.”
(12) The Elijah List - and almost anyone featured on it.
Of course there are a huge number of lesser-known preachers and ministries who carry or endorse this Kundalini-type “anointing” around the world. But I have concentrated here on the most influential that I know of. It really is an enormous issue in the church. I urge anyone who is a supporter of any of the above ministries to really check them out thoroughly. If you find (as I have) that they carry or endorse this false Kundalini spirit in the church, then please stop supporting them in any way - and whatever you do, don’t let them “lay hands” on you!
I am putting everything on the line to be “naming names” like this. But I believe it is that serious. How on earth did we get to the point where “kriyas” just like Hinduism are spreading through the church?
Please forward this email to everyone you know, blogs and boards, etc. These people are trying to “relaunch” this whole thing right now. Help us get this warning out. To see a video showing “kriyas” and other Kundalini-type manifestations, please click on the
Youtube links below-
“D” writes:
I went to Lakeland 3 times. I was so drawn to go there. I really thought it was of God… I had so many supernatural experiences - to seeing a mystical Jesus with a third eye, angels talking to me, visions, being transported. I had one experience with my daughter being in the room and her experiencing it too. I was roaring like a lion, had gold dust and many other experiences. The worst thing that happened to me is that it got sexual. This false Jesus was approaching me sexually and I fell into it. I still to this day do not understand how I could have been so deceived. I have been a Christian since the age of 16. I am 49 now… I fell right in… hook, line and sinker. When I came home that last viist I became aware it was demonic, and I was surrounded and covered with demons literally, it was so horrible, all that I went through, you cannot imagine… I was seeing demons and being touched sexually and tormentingly constantly.. it has been 1 1/2 years and I am still battling these demonic spirits. I cry out to the Lord everyday for total deliverance. It has been horrible. I have renounced and repented, but still fighting. How do we get free of this?
SHERIE writes:
I can testify that I was infested with this foul eastern spirit, the kundalini. I was in a movement from 1992 - 2000 which had close links with the Toronto movement. From 2000 - 2006 I joined a church with links to Bill Johnson.
I was desperate for God to move in my life and change situations and heal hurts and was very open to ministry - I had many in this movement touch my forehead and experienced the manifestations you describe - drunkenness, laughing and crying, shaking. I got dreams and visions and just before I left the structure (church) I had a vivid dream of a huge python that came through the back door and attached itself to my car, and also to rooms in my home. I was very disturbed and sought the Lord for an answer.
It took about 6 months before I was delivered, but God brought a couple over my path who God had trained and had victory over spiritual entities. Every time I was in their presence, I would get very anxious, and they would calmly pray for me and I could feel darkness leaving and my sanity restored. It was only after 6 months of these episodes, I was again in their presence and sensed a fight ensue in the Spirit. I was very anxious and fearful and could feel a huge snake in my spine - I was rigid and very uncomfortable - It
felt as if this thing wanted to throttle me and rob me of my life. I called out to God and they quietly prayed - then I asked the Lady to pull this serpent out of my head - it felt as if it could exit near the top of my crown. She continued to pray and I got the word “kundalini ” in my spirit and just commanded this thing by its name to go in the mighty name of Jesus Christ. I pled the blood as it was very frightening, and it left. I felt like a washed out rag, but I was free!
That was the last lime I had deliverance and my spiritual eyes have since opened and God has done a mighty work in me outside of the structure… Afterwards they were amazed and asked me what strange term I had used and where it came from - I had no idea
except that it was God who gave me knowledge in that situation. Thank you for the info that has made everything clear to me! I Now have confirmation from where I was infected! May many of your readers heed the call of God to “come out and sever yourselves” from Babylon and its lies and deception and foul spirits, while
there is time…
LUCY writes:
David Wilkerson also mentioned the kundalini spirit, and I researched it in late October, after having attended the Fredericks-burg (Virginia) Prayer Furnace at which Che Ahn ministered. There, I saw many of the manifestations you mention: hopping and jumping during “worship”, falling backward at Che Ahn’s touch, extreme jerkiness in several cases. Very uncomfortable with this, I came home and watched (my first time ever) videos of Todd Bentley. Needless to say, I was appalled…
SARAH writes:
I’m just about in tears over all of this…
May and I watched the very first nights of the recent “outpouring of the Holy Spirit” on the IHOP webstream and boy, did that turn sour fast. Aside from the singing on the first night, everything was just messed up. AHH! It’s breaking my heart! How many people
do we know and love in KC?! I’ve watched my beloved siblings laugh uncontrollably, jerk as though sick, stumble and speak as though drunk, and “sing in tongues” in complete chaos and without interpretation. I’ve raised the issue among friends of being “drunk in the Spirit” and even though I prove over and over that God is for self-control, which they agree with, they continue to act like drunken fools! (See Titus 1:8 and 2:2; 1 Thessalonians 5:6-7 which compared in the NKJV and NIV relates self-control with being sober, pointing to the fact that the Holy Spirit is not one who takes delight in being drunk at all, but in being sober-minded - fruit of the Spirit, what? Drunkenness
is the complete opposite of being filled with the Holy Spirit! For sober-mindedness is a filling of Him!; 1 Peter 1:13, 4:7, and 5:8 …
BRENDA writes:
A very dear friend of mine who has been my prayer partner for years were lured into the enemy’s web of deception about many of the ministries and manifestations that you spoke about. After reading and listening to your web broadcasts we had a powerful
prayer session repenting, renouncing, and commanding any spirit that we had picked up from these false prophets/doctrines of demons, etc. to go from us in Jesus’ name. We broke all kinds of things off of us. Most of it was deep repentance and renouncing - thank you for exposing the enemy and his tactics and all the deception that the church body has fallen deeply into…
ANDREW STROM: Yes - if you have had “hands laid” or done “soaking prayer” under any of these kinds of ministries, it is very important to RENOUNCE (from the very depths of your being in Jesus’ name) and also COMMAND OUT these ‘kundalini’ spirits
or any other “anointing” that you have received. Remember, you must VIOLENTLY EXPEL these things in the name of JESUS. Be FREE in His mighty name!
I truly wonder what God is going to do to those ministries who have been spreading this alien spirit right through the Body of Christ. Truly, Judgment must begin “at the house of God.”
The following websites have useful profiles and documentation regarding William Branham and the movements in which he and his teachings have played a significant part. Some have a number of relevant articles. Most such websites have a search function that you may use to pinpoint articles on the site related to the topic or person for which you are seeking information.
William Branham and His Message This site is the most comprehensive source of detailed information on Branham available on the Web.
By David J. Phillip, AP
Annise Parker, the newly-elected happens-to-be-lesbian mayor of Houston was sworn in Monday and the opening prayer was given by … Rev. Joel Osteen.
Is your head spinning? Osteen heads the nation’s most mega of evangelical non-denominational megachurches, Lakewood Church in Houston where about 45,000 people cycle through a revamped sports stadium for services every weekend.
Osteen has been all over telling folks (Larry King, Whoopi Goldberg) for years that homosexuality is not “God’s best.” I presume he means “God’s best choice” because otherwise I’m lost in the dropped or implied rest of the sentence. But “God’s best” is phrase Osteen never finishes so I’m just guessing.
Yet, Osteen hasn’t joined the more strident wing of the religious right in damning gays. Indeed, Osteen takes heat from other evangelicals who condemn him for not laying down a line of fire about sin of any kind. That’s not his style, says the preacher known for his broad smile and sermons that God wants you to be happy. Osteen’s best seller was titled, Your Best Life Now.
Now (hat tip to Mark Silk for pointing me to the Box Turtle Bulletin) writer Timothy Kincaid suggests to his gay readership that they look at Osteen more fully and fairly. Kincaid’s post (which carries a disclaimer that others on the staff of the webzine don’t necessarily agreed) says:
I think it would be useful for our community to adopt a more nuanced view of religious leaders. By doing so, we might find ourselves with unexpected allies.
Joel Osteen does not agree with my understanding of Scripture; but his disagreement does not make him a hater or a bigot. And I recognize the value in having a lesbian politician — elected despite her opponent’s religion-based homophobic campaign — being given blessing by the pastor of the largest congregation in the nation.
If you have your Bible, if you have your Bible I’d like you to turn with me to Acts chpt. 20. I’d like to read a few verses from this passage which I believe are very apropos today.
Talking to the elders in the church of Ephesus as he is preparing to go to Jerusalem where he will be bound by the Jews, and later to die. The apostle writes these words or speaks these words and Luke records them. I take you to record this day v.26, Acts 20:26. That is a direct quote from Ezek. 34 where the scripture says if you do not warn the wicked man of his wicked and he dies in his sin, I will hold you accountable for it. So we are suppose to warn the wicked of the wickedness they perform and also of the judgment of God upon them. If we don’t we become accessories after the fact of their sins. |
So, Ezek. 34 is what Paul is definitely referring to. I want you to know I am free from the blood of all mankind because I am giving you the whole counsel take heed there unto yourselves and all the flock unto which the Holy Spirit has made you rulers. The Greek word episcopos- a ruler to fend or tend therefore the church of God which he has purchased with his own blood. “For I know this after I leave you savage wolves shall enter in among you and will not spare the flock.” No mercy and notice this from your own selves men shall arise speaking contrary things to draw away disciples after themselves. Therefore watch and remember for a period of three years I did not cease to warn everyone night and day to the point of tears.” Now there is a twofold warning to the Christian Church.
Now we are speaking this morning on the warnings of God, the warnings of God. This passage tells you that after the apostles would leave the Church there would be savage wolves, they are characterized as wolves. Ravenous wolves who will enter in, and they will not spare the flock. Which means they will attack the flock from without, they will penetrate the sheepfold and they will chew up the sheep. Now that’s as clear as crystal right here. I know this after I leave, this is going to happen.
We have those savage wolves today. We have theologians in theological Seminaries and departments of religions of schools who literally chew up the flock. They chew up the people who are studying for the ministry and then they spit them out into our pulpits where they can chew us up. These are the savage wolves who come in not sparing the flock. Apostate’s in positions of authority in the Christian Church. Apostate’s who advocate the ordination of homosexuals, forbidden and cursed of God. Apostate’s who deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ. Apostate’s who will ordain you if you deny the Trinity, the deity of Christ, the virgin birth, the bodily resurrection, and the 2nd coming. Apostate’s who dominate our denominational structures and our educational institutions. Apostate’s who have come in and are chewing up the church. That is very clearly stated here that we are to lookout for these people. Paul said I warned you day and night for three years to the point of tears. Very important.
Now there is a 2nd part of this that is seldom preached on because when you preach on it people get upset in my ministry what else is new. It’s an occupational hazard because you have to tell them the whole counsel of God. Notice Paul’s emphasis here, “I have not avoided declaring unto you verse 27 “all or the whole counsel of God.” The whole counsel of God is to warn against the savage wolves, cultists occultists, non Christian religionists, atheistic and skeptical philosophers, psychologists whatever they may be, who have attacked the church from without and some have penetrated and chewed up the church.
Now there’s a 2nd warning from God, this warning is one the Church has paid very little attention to and because we have paid so little attention to it, it has thrived and become lethal. Why? Because what’s close to you that you don’t see, it does you far more harm than something you can get in perspective and easily identify. So let’s take a good look at what he saying here. From your own selves v.30 you ought to mark church itself, men will arise. It does not say possibly, could, he said will arise. They will speak contrary the meaning of the word in the Greek, King James says perversion, the word in the Greek is contrary. They will speak contrary things for the purpose of drawing disciples after them selves.
So the warning of God is against people in the church in positions of leadership and respect. Who will draw disciples surrounding themselves, whose allegiance is not to Christ, but to that person. And they will draw the disciples after themselves from within the church so that there is no accountability for what they say. Now this isn’t my message this is the Pauline counsel to the Church at Ephesus. Warnings from the Holy Spirit. Look out for the wolves and lookout for the divisive schismatic leaders who will split and fragment and divide the church by attracting disciples to follow them.
Now the Scripture has many statements about false teachings and false prophets. Mat.7 gives one of the most frightening passages in all divine revelation it says and this is the lord Jesus speaking on the subject ( — dressed as sheep but inwardly or spiritually you are dealing with savage wolves, you will know them by what they produce). Now Jesus has said something else that the Church has forgotten today. Jesus said in my name or if you want the actual meaning of the Greek text, by my authority- name means authority.
When you say “stop in the name of the Law” to criminal fleeing, you are saying stop by the authority of what? The law. The law says you can’t do that. Stop! When a King pronounces judgment in Old Testament times and recent times until kings went out of fashion. In the world a ruler person would say open the door in the name of the king….
Alright once you get that concept in you mind Jesus said there will come men who will speak claiming their authority is from me. Now get that in your head carefully. There will come men who will speak in my name. That is, I am supposedly saying this to you, that is a very important phrase. There going to come and say I’m speaking to you in Jesus in my name they will work miracles in my name they will cast out devils… they will prophesy and preach. But when I meet them I will say leave me I never knew you workers of iniquity.
Why? Because they use his authority and his name, because the power was in Jesus name, or Jesus’ authority not in them. And God honored the name of his Son. And they took that as a means of teaching there own false doctrines and false prophecies and because of that they corrupted the faith of the church. But inwardly, spiritually, they really roooaaar! And if you don’t know fleece from fur your dinner, dumb dum. And the only way you can know fleece from fur is to know how to test them. You don’t test them by Walter Martin, or by Norman Geisler, as good as the apologist and defenders of Christianity might be and as much as you trust them. You don’t test them by other people, you test them by Scripture.
Then if your fidelity is the Scripture, and your allegiance is the Scripture, you reject them! But says Paul in the last days, men are going to be drawn away by false teachers and prophets in the church speaking in the name of Jesus. And you’re not going to test them you’re going to go along with them. And there gonna fragment and divide the Church because you wont’ test them.
Well its about time that we test them.
Kenneth Copeland delivered the following prophecy during a three day victory campaign held in Dallas Texas. It is reproduced in the Voice of Victory 20th anniversary of his ministry. Found on page 9 his prophecy came from Jesus Christ, Copeland says, He quotes Jesus as saying:
“You remember in my word I said to my disciples this kind comes not out by prayer and fasting.” He’s talking now about the power of prayer. He goes on “Don’t be disturbed (this is Jesus) when people accuse you of being God. The more you get to be like me God. But I didn’t claim I was God; I just claimed I walked with Him and that He was in Me. Hallelujah.”
That is a lying spirit. Look at me read my lips. That is a lying spirit. That is not the Holy Spirit. Now for ten years I have warned and I’m on tape and in print on this. That we were heading into the kingdom of the cults with the faith teachers. You are no longer heading there baby, you are there!
Just so you are not mistaken let me give it to you again. Jesus speaking:
“The more you get to be like me (Jesus) the more there going to think that way of you. They crucified me for claiming that I was God. But I didn’t claim I was God; I just claimed I walked with Him and that He was in Me. Hallelujah.” That’s what your doing.”
Now this was on TBN this on Christian Television and radio stations. This is tolerated by the Christian Church, particularly the charismatic wing because they will not obey the Lord Jesus Christ and they will not obey; what the Scripture says. They are taken by people and ministries. And by large crowds and jet airplanes and by affluence as supposedly the seal of success. If you’re big and you’re powerful and you’re rich and people come to hear you, automatically it must be from God. No! Automatically it isn’t from God. You’re supposed to test what the person says by Scripture. And if you don’t test it by Scripture you can be taking in spiritual arsenic or cyanide and it can ruin your Christian life and take your eyes off Christ. The Scripture says it will overturn the faith in the Church.
This is far beyond doctrinal disputes. He speaks it in the name of Jesus. He’s a liar, and the truth is not in him. Isa. 8:20 “If they do not speak according to this word they have, what? NO light in them,” in fact the Hebrew says there is no dawn.
What deceives people about these false prophets is that out one side of their mouth they preach the gospel and out of the other side of their mouth they deny him who is the core of the gospel. And if you don’t put the two sides together you think you’re hearing Christianity. But you’re not!. The false prophets know that to get crowds they have to preach Christianity. The false prophets know that in order to have financial support they have got to get the church to contribute to them. So they will sound like the Church and they will prophesy in Jesus name, they will heal in Jesus name they will work miracles in Jesus name and then at the proper they will deny him.
How do you know he’s a false prophet? It’s easy he said so. I wonder if people who read this THOUGHT! THOUGHT!
“They crucified me for claiming I was God, but I didn’t claim I was God.” He didn’t? That’s strange language, John chapter 8, “your father Abraham rejoiced to se my day coming he saw it and he was glad. But they said your not even 50 years old yet. You saw Abraham?” Jesus said, “before Abraham came into existence I AM.” And they reach for stones to kill him. Who’d they think he was? Obviously God. John Chpt.10 “for thy Good works we stone thee not but for blasphemy. That you being a man make yourself out to be”, Who? GOD!
Now we are dealing here with the doctrine of antichrist. And its not coming from an apostate professor of a theological seminary its not coming from a Jehovah’s Witness that knocks on your door. It’s not coming from the Mormon missionary that peddles up. Its coming from Kenneth Copeland on your television set on your radio and in print and if you resist the false doctrines of antichrist elsewhere, why will you not resist here?
The answer is very simple because people hear the gospel being preached and they automatically assume that the person preaching is a true prophet of God. No Jesus said, the false prophets can do it. They only way you can find out is test them. I’ve not avoided declaring to you the whole counsel of God for the space of ten years. I have told you day and night to the point of rage.
Now it’s come full circle. There it is. Quote on TBN “Dogs beget dogs cats beget cats, and God beget Gods, you are little Gods.” Close quote. That’s Kenneth Copeland on your television set. You are Gods!
No you’re not, your sinners saved by grace. And he’s not a God, he’s a sinner professing to be a Christian, and denying in prophesy in the name of Jesus what Jesus said. That’s a false prophet, I don’t care how you spell it, if you say but look at the healings, look at the meetings, look at the miracles. READ Matthew Chapter 7, use your brains. Jesus said that’s exactly what’s going to happen, there going to preach and prophesy in my name. They do! In my name there gonna work miracles, they do. In my name they cast out devils, they do! And then they deny Him. Jesus said look out for them, because they’re here! And they are here now. They are on our television sets our radios and print.
Now the question is, will you tolerate it? We should be bombarding TBN and every Christian channel that produces and distributes this stuff. And we should be telling them we will not support the doctrine of the Anti-Christ. You may not do this with my money, and furthermore I’m not going to send any money. And then in addition to that I’m going to actively discourage everybody I know from sending you any money. And when you hold financial support they listen, but not until.
So I’m suggesting over the Bible Answer Man program that we start holding support to people and ministries that do this. And I’m going to get a lot of flak, you’re going to hear a lot of people coming after me, and I want you to know, I could care less. This is the TRUTH, what I’m telling you is the truth and if it is a voice crying in the wilderness it’s the truth. And the Holy Spirit will see to it that they will listen. Because I am a prophetic voice in this and have been for decades, of course I don’t for a moment believe I am a prophet, anymore than I believe I am an apostle. I’m a teacher, but you can speak with a prophetic voice, you can exercise apostolic office in given situations.
Believe me we’re in trouble, and if we don’t something about really quickly your going to be in more trouble than you know what to do with. Because people keep accepting these as Christian representatives. What we’re getting is the doctrine of anti-Christ. If you deny that you don’t know your Bible.
Jesus says through Copeland “I never claimed to be God.” That is not the Jesus of the Bible, you want me to tell you who it is, turn in your Bible to 2 Cor.11, I will tell you who it is. V.3 “But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. For if he who comes preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, … a different spirit … a different gospel” ….Then he goes on to say that there are false apostles, deceitful workman who transform themselves on the outside to look like the ministers of Christ but inwardly you are dealing with the imitation of Satan.
I don’t bring judgment or play God, that is not my role or yours. But if Jesus Christ said it and the New Testament teaches it and it is Biblical theology and we reiterate what the text says we are not playing God, we are being faithful to what God said.
Is Kenneth Copeland a Christian? If he is a Christian let him repent! Let him apologize to the church, let him forsake these false doctrines. He is not a God, he lies when he says anyone in the Church is a God. He lies when he says Jesus Christ gave him this prophesy, this did not come from the Lord Jesus Christ.
The apostle Paul calls Jesus our great God and savior Titus 2:13. Acts chapter 20 which I just read says, God purchased the Church with his own blood. Well who died on the cross? God in human flesh and purchased the Church with his own blood. The whole new testament declares the deity of Jesus Christ. “In the beginning was the word and the word with God and the word was God.” And Kenneth Copeland knows it as well as I do! But he’s denying it, when you take your eyes off Scripture as the criterion for authority and you place it on experience and on people, and on revelations, and on messages that allegedly come from God, you are a set up for deception, you’re made for it. Because you don’t have any way to check it. But you must check it.
The title of his article is “Take time to pray.” That’s the title “Take time to pray.” No take time to obey, take time to obey Christ and to obey him is to proclaim him Lord of all. I am the alpha and omega the beginning and the end the first and the last the Almighty Rev. 1:7-8. Who is He? “He is coming with Clouds and every eye shall see him and he is the almighty.” Well that’s what Christ said about himself. Thomas said my Lord and my Jehovah. And worships him and Jesus said because you have seen me you believe Blessed is they that have not seen and believe.
Kenneth Copeland quoted every one of these verses and then in a prophecy originating with Jesus Christ he can deny the identity of Jesus Christ. You are now dealing with false prophets. I don’t presume to judge the eternal destiny of men that is not our task but I will tell you one thing Biblically speaking If you say you are Christ’s property then you have Christ’s spirit. Romans 8:9. And whoever does not have Christ’s spirit is not Christ’s property. Christ’s spirit does not deny Jesus Christ. Christ’s spirit exalts him. This is a denial of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is Jesus speaking “I never said I was God, never claimed to be God.” No that’s a lie, “let God be true and every man a liar.”
I want a repudiation of this and a removal of these men from the Trinity Broadcasting Network station until they apologize to the Christian Church and repent of this evil. And if they won’t, then it must be the task of the Christian Church to oppose them vigorously, publicly. And tell it to the whole Church. And read this until people can’t stand to hear it anymore. Until they will act on it. Don’t you dare talk about fidelity to Jesus Christ, and love to Jesus Christ and allegiance to Jesus Christ and sit by while men deny him! You’re gonna be consistent then be consistent in obedience.
You may sit here and say “You sound very angry!” I am. I may be one of God’s last angry men, but I’m angry for the right reason. I’m in the presence of the doctrines of the anti-Christ and I plan to be angry that way the rest of my life. And if you don’t hear me angry about those kinds of doctrines please come and tell me as quickly as possible, because I have defected from the ministry.
So I’m going to ask you to covenant with me in prayer that God will bring Kenneth Copeland to repentance for this blasphemy and there may be a open apology and repudiation of it in the Christian Church. And then until this is done we will remain constant in prayer and we will not support what we know to be evil doctrine. If we do that God will bless us and honor us, if we don’t do it were gonna reap an awful harvest.
This morning was a very difficult message to preach, the warnings of God. Because whenever you talk this way you bound to be misinterpreted and people are bound to think somehow or another you’ve got some ax to grind and your after somebody’s neck. I’m not but if I sit still in the presence of the doctrine of antichrist I’m an accessory to those doctrines and I fall under the condemnation of Acts chpt.20.
If you go further into revelation chpt.2 later on, you will find that the Holy Spirit commends the Church in Ephesus, above all the seven Churches because they tested these people, just as Paul told them to and they found out they were liars. And the Spirit says, good job, you did what you were suppose to do and he commends the Ephesians for it.
May God make us faithful in the tradition of the Ephesians. The lord Jesus Christ paid the price for all sin on the cross. The Lord Jesus Christ rose victoriously from the dead for our redemption we are saved by his life. The Lord Jesus Christ has given us spirit so we can walk with him, he has also given us his spirit so we might discern evil, as well as good.”
Pastor Rick Warren, the Orange County evangelist who generated controversy for giving the invocation at President Obama’s inauguration, has called on followers to donate nearly $1 million in the next two days to make up for a shortfall in donations.
Late Wednesday night, Warren posted a letter on his Saddleback Church website telling congregants that Christmas offerings were far less than anticipated.
“This is an urgent letter unlike any I’ve written in 30 years,” Warren wrote. “On the last weekend of 2009, our total offerings were less than half of what we normally receive — leaving us $900,000 in the red for the year, unless you help make up the difference today and tomorrow.”
A spokesman for the Lake Forest church said Saddleback provides many charity services each year, based on what it anticipates in donations. Because of the struggling economy, Christmas time donations are down, while demand for services like food pantries is up.
“Basically, the church is having to do more with less,” said A. Larry Ross. According to the website, 10% of the “church family” is out of work.
Ross said it was still unclear what the potential consequences of the shortfall would be.
It was almost a year ago that Warren chose to deliver the invocation at Obama’s inauguration. The choice generated protests from civil rights groups that were angered by Warren’s support of Proposition 8, the California measure that banned same-sex marriage in the state.
Toward the end of the nineteenth century. . . the Age of Exposition began to pass, and the early signs of its replacement could be discerned. Its replacement was to be the Age of Show Business.
Neil Postman1
In this Age of Show Business, truth is irrelevant; what really matters is whether we are entertained. Substance counts for little; style is everything. In the words of Marshall McLuhan, the medium is the message. Unfortunately, that kind of thinking rules the church as surely as it does the world.
A. W. Tozer wrote these words in 1955:
For centuries the Church stood solidly against every form of worldly entertainment, recognizing it for what it was—a device for wasting time, a refuge from the disturbing voice of conscience, a scheme to divert attention from moral accountability. For this she got herself abused roundly by the sons of this world. But of late she has become tired of the abuse and has given over the struggle. She appears to have decided that if she cannot conquer the great god Entertainment she may as well join forces with him and make what use she can of his powers. So today we have the astonishing spectacle of millions of dollars being poured into the unholy job of providing earthly entertainment for the so-called sons of heaven. Religious entertainment is in many places rapidly crowding out the serious things of God. Many churches these days have become little more than poor theaters where fifth-rate “producers” peddle their shoddy wares with the full approval of evangelical leaders who can even quote a holy text in defense of their delinquency. And hardly a man dares raise his voice against it. 2
By today’s standards, the issues that so inflamed Tozer’s passions seem trifling. For example, churches were attracting people to Sunday evening services by showing Christian films. Young people’s rallies featured up-tempo music and speakers whose specialty was humor. High-energy games and activities were beginning to play a key role in church youth work. Looking back, it may seem difficult to understand Tozer’s distress. Hardly anyone these days would be shocked or concerned about any of the methods that seemed radically innovative in the fifties. Most of them are generally regarded as conventional today.
Tozer, however, was not condemning games, music styles, or movies per se. He was concerned with the philosophy underlying what was happening in the church. He was sounding an alarm about a deadly change of focus. He saw evangelicals using entertainment as a tool for church growth, and he believed that was subverting the church’s priorities. He feared that frivolous diversions and carnal amusements in the church would eventually destroy people’s appetites for real worship and the preaching of God’s Word.
He was right about that. In fact, Tozer’s rebuke is more fitting than ever as the church approaches the end of the century. The incipient trend he identified has come into full bloom in our generation. What the church was flirting with thirty-five years ago has now become an obsession.
A recent article in The Wall Street Journal described one well-known church’s bid “to perk up attendance at Sunday evening services.” The church “staged a wrestling match, featuring church employees. To train for the event, 10 game employees got lessons from Tugboat Taylor, a former professional wrestler, in pulling hair, kicking shins and tossing bodies around without doing real harm.”3 No harm to the staff members, perhaps, but what is the effect of such an exhibition on the church’s message? Is not the gospel itself clouded and badly caricatured by such tomfoolery? Can you imagine what Tozer would have thought?
That wrestling match is not an obscure example from some eccentric church on the fringe. It took place in the Sunday evening service of one of America’s five largest churches. Similar examples could be drawn from many of the leading churches supposedly in the mainstream of evangelical orthodoxy.
Some will maintain that if biblical principles are presented, the medium doesn’t matter. That is nonsense. If an entertaining medium is the key to winning people, why not go all out? Why not have a real carnival? A tattooed acrobat on a high wire could juggle chain saws and shout Bible verses while a trained dog balanced on his head. That would draw a crowd. And the content of the message would be thoroughly biblical. It’s a bizarre scenario, but one that illustrates how the medium can cheapen and corrupt the message.
And sadly, it’s not terribly different from what is actually being done in some churches. There seems no limit to what modern church leaders will do to entice people who aren’t interested in worship and preaching.
One noted pastor of a very large church, for example, boasts about the time his staff staged a pie fight during a Sunday morning church service.
Just how far will the church go to compete with Hollywood? A large church in the southwestern United States has installed a half-million-dollar special-effects system that can produce smoke, fire, sparks, and laser lights in the auditorium. The church sent staff members to study live special effects at Bally’s Casino in Las Vegas. The pastor ended one service by ascending to “heaven” via invisible wires that drew him up out of sight while the choir and orchestra added a musical accompaniment to the smoke, fire, and light show.4 It was just a typical Sunday show for that pastor: “He packs his church with such special effects as. . . cranking up a chain saw and toppling a tree to make a point. . . the biggest Fourth of July fireworks display in town and a Christmas service with a rented elephant, kangaroo and zebra. The Christmas show features 100 clowns with gifts for the congregation’s children.”5
Shenanigans like that would have been the stuff of A. W. Tozer’s worst nightmares. Surely even he could not have foreseen the extreme to which evangelicals would go in paying homage to the great god Entertainment.
Driven by Pragmatism
There’s no denying that these antics seem to work—that is, they draw a crowd. Many churches that have experimented with such methods report growing attendance figures. And a handful of megachurches—those that can afford first-class productions, effects, and facilities—have been able to stimulate enormous numerical growth. Some of them fill huge auditoriums with thousands of people several times every week.
A few of these megachurches resemble elegant country clubs or resort hotels. They feature impressive facilities with bowling lanes, movie theaters, health spas, restaurants, ballrooms, roller-skating rinks, and state-of-the-art multi-court gymnasiums. Recreation and entertainment are inevitably the most visible aspects of these enterprises. Such churches have become meccas for students of church growth.
Now evangelicals everywhere are frantically seeking new techniques and new forms of entertainment to attract people. Whether a method is biblical or not scarcely matters to the average church leader today. Does it work? That is the new test of legitimacy. And so raw pragmatism has become the driving philosophy in much of the professing church.
Pragmatism is the notion that ideas may be judged by their practical consequences. A pragmatist concludes that a course of action or concept is right if it brings good results, wrong if it doesn’t seem to work.
What’s wrong with pragmatism? After all, common sense involves a measure of legitimate pragmatism, doesn’t it? If a dripping faucet works fine after you replace the washers, for example, it is reasonable to assume that bad washers were the problem. If the medicine your doctor prescribes produces harmful side effects or has no effect at all, you need to ask if there’s a remedy that works. Such simple pragmatic realities are generally self-evident.
But when pragmatism becomes a guiding philosophy of life or ministry, it inevitably clashes with Scripture. Spiritual and biblical truth cannot be determined by what works and what doesn’t. We know from Scripture, for example, that the gospel does not usually produce a positive response (1 Cor. 1:22-23; 2:14). On the other hand, Satanic lies and deception often are quite effective (Matt. 24:23-24; 2 Cor. 4:3-4). Majority reaction is no test of validity (cf. Matt. 7:13-14), and prosperity is no measure of truthfulness (cf. Job 12:6). Pragmatism as a guiding philosophy of ministry is inherently flawed.6
Nevertheless, an overpowering surge of ardent pragmatism is sweeping through evangelicalism. Methodology has replaced theology as the main issue many church leaders are concerned with. Pastors are turning to books on marketing methods in search of new techniques to help churches grow. Many seminaries have shifted their pastoral training emphasis from Bible curriculum and theology to matters of style and technique.
Perhaps most telling is the growing number of churches that now feature drama and entertainment instead of traditional services where God’s Word is proclaimed. The new pragmatism sees preaching as passé. Plainly declaring truth is deemed too offensive and utterly ineffective. We’re now told we can get better results by first amusing people and thus wooing them into the fold. Once they feel comfortable, they’ll be ready to receive biblical truth in small, diluted doses.
Gimme That Showtime Religion
And so church buildings are being constructed like theaters; instead of a pulpit, the focus is a stage. Churches are hiring full-time media specialists, programming consultants, stage directors, drama coaches, special-effects experts, and choreographers.
Most of the new pragmatists believe the four priorities of the early church—the apostles’ teaching, fellowship, the breaking of bread, and prayer (Acts 2:42)—make a lame agenda for the church in this day and age. They view our Lord’s Great Commission as a marketing manifesto. They believe the church is in business to promote a product, and church leaders, they say, had better pay attention to the methods of Madison Avenue. The church, after all, competes with secular amusements and a host of worldly goods and services. We’ll never win people, the pragmatists believe, until we develop effective marketing campaigns to capture their attention and loyalty away from the world’s offerings.
One best-selling author has written, “I believe that developing a marketing orientation is precisely what the Church needs to do if we are to make a difference in the spiritual health of this nation for the remainder of this century.”7 He adds, “My contention, based on careful study of data and the activities of American churches, is that the major problem plaguing the Church is its failure to embrace a marketing orientation in what has become a marketing-driven environment.”8
What’s wrong with that? For one thing, the church has no business marketing its ministry as an alternative to secular amusements (2 Thess. 3:3-4). That corrupts and cheapens the church’s real mission. We are not carnival barkers, used car salesmen, or K-Tel pitchmen. We are Christ’s ambassadors (2 Cor. 5:20). Knowing the terror of the Lord (v. 11), motivated by the love of Christ (v. 14), utterly made new by Him (v. 17), we implore sinners to be reconciled to God (v. 20).
Moreover, instead of confronting the world with the truth of Christ, the market-driven megachurches are enthusiastically promoting the worst trends of secular culture. Feeding people’s appetite for entertainment only exacerbates the problems of mindless emotion, apathy, and materialism. Quite frankly, it is difficult to conceive of a ministry philosophy more contradictory to the pattern our Lord gave us.
Proclaiming the gospel message of redemption for sinners, and expositing the Word for saints should be the heart of every church’s ministry. If the world looks at the church and sees an entertainment center, we’re sending the wrong message. If Christians view the church as an amusement parlor, the church will die.
Nothing in Scripture indicates the church should lure people to Christ by presenting Christianity as an attractive option. Nothing about the gospel is optional: “There is salvation in no one else. . . there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men, by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). Nor is the gospel meant to be attractive in the sense of modern marketing. To most, the message of the gospel is “a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense” (Rom. 9:33; 1 Pet. 2:8). There’s no way to “market” that. The church must realize that its mission has never been public relations or sales; we are called to live holy lives and declare God’s truth—lovingly but uncompromisingly—to an unbelieving world.
Is Numerical Growth a Legitimate Goal?
Lest anyone misunderstand, perhaps I should say that I am no opponent of large churches or of church growth. GraceCommunityChurch was founded more than thirty-five years ago and has experienced tremendous growth through most of its history. On a typical Sunday about ten thousand people attend our services. We have experienced cycles of growth followed by plateaus. We’re currently in another phase of strong growth.
What I oppose is the pragmatism often advocated by church growth specialists who believe they can induce numerical growth by following whatever techniques seem to be working at the moment. The faddism bred by that philosophy is becoming more and more unruly. It is diverting many churches from biblical priorities, while producing a handful of megachurches whose growth is dependent on their ability to anticipate and respond to the next cultural trend. The church has been drawn away from true revival and is being seduced by those who advocate the popularization of Christianity. Tragically, most Christians seem oblivious to the problem, satisfied with a Christianity that is fashionable and highly visible.
Is numerical growth a legitimate goal in church ministry? Certainly no worthy church leader would seriously argue that numerical growth is inherently undesirable. And no one believes that stagnation or numerical decline are to be sought. But is numerical growth always the best gauge of a church’s health?
I agree with George Peters, who wrote,
Quantitative growth. . . can be deceptive. It may be no more than the mushrooming of a mechanically induced, psychological or social movement, a numerical count, an agglomeration of individuals or groups, an increase of a body without the development of muscle and vital organs. It may be Christendom in the making but not Christianity breaking through. Many mass movements of the past and community and tribal movements have been just that. An example is found in the mass accessions in Europe, particularly in France and Russia, when many were driven to baptism and drawn into the church, resulting in a mass of people professing Christendom but not in a dynamic, vibrant, growing, and responsible church of Jesus Christ. . . . It must be admitted. . . that to a great extent this expansion of the form, profession, and name of Christendom has little resemblance to the Christianity defined in the New Testament and the church portrayed in the book of Acts.
In many ways the expansion of Christendom has come at the expense of the purity of the gospel and true Christian order and life. The church has become infested with pagan beliefs and practices, and is syncretistic in theology. . . Large segments have become Christo-pagan. 9
Nothing in Scripture indicates that church leaders should set numerical goals for church growth.10 Here’s how the apostle Paul described the growth process: “I planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth. So then neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but God who causes the growth” (1 Cor. 3:6-7, emphasis added).
If we concern ourselves with the depth of our ministry, God will see to the breadth of it.
What good, after all, is numerical expansion that is not rooted in commitment to the lordship of Christ? If people come to church primarily because they find it entertaining, they will surely leave as soon as something comes along to amuse them more. And so the church is forced into a hopeless cycle where it must constantly try to eclipse each spectacle with something bigger and better.
The Pragmatic Roots of the Church Growth Movement
Pragmatism as a philosophy of ministry has gained impetus from the church growth movement that has flourished over the past fifty years or so. Donald McGavran, the father of the modern church growth movement, was an unabashed pragmatist:
We devise mission methods and policies in the light of what God has blessed—and what He has obviously not blessed. Industry calls this “modifying operation in light of feedback.” Nothing hurts missions overseas so much as continuing methods, institutions, and policies which ought to bring men to Christ—but don’t; which ought to multiply churches—but don’t. We teach men to be ruthless in regard to method. If it does not work to the glory of God and the extension of Christ’s church, throw it away and get something which does. As to methods, we are fiercely pragmatic—doctrine is something else.11
As a young missionary in India and son of missionary parents, McGavran had noticed that it was not unusual for missions organizations to labor in India for years and have little or no fruit to show for it. McGavran’s own agency had planted only twenty or thirty small churches in several decades of missionary work.12 McGavran determined to devise a strategy of missions that took note of which methods seemed to work and which ones didn’t. “As he declared in the preface to a book he coauthored in the 1930s, he had dedicated himself to ‘discarding theories of church growth which do not work, and learning and practicing productive patterns. . . ’”13
McGavran’s pragmatism seems to have been initially prompted by a legitimate concern for stewardship. He “became alarmed when he saw all too many of God’s resources—personnel and finances—being used without asking whether the kingdom of God was being advanced by the programs they were supporting.”14 But pragmatism became the philosophical basis for nearly all that McGavran taught, and that in turn set the agenda for the whole church growth movement.
McGavran founded the Institute of Church Growth, which in 1965 united with the Fuller School of World Mission. From there the pragmatic precepts of the church growth movement have reached into virtually every mission field worldwide.
C. Peter Wagner, professor of church growth at the Fuller School of World Mission, is Donald McGavran’s best-known student. Wagner is the most prolific if not the most influential spokesman in the church growth movement today. He writes of the movement’s inherent pragmatism:
The Church Growth Movement has always stressed pragmatism, and still does even though many have criticized it. It is not the kind of pragmatism that compromises doctrine or ethics or the kind that dehumanizes people by using them as means toward an end. It is, however, the kind of consecrated pragmatism which ruthlessly examines traditional methodologies and programs asking the tough questions. If some sort of ministry in the church is not reaching intended goals, consecrated pragmatism says there is something wrong which needs to be corrected.15
Wagner, like most in the church growth movement, claims that the “consecrated pragmatism” he advocates does not allow compromise of doctrine or ethics. “The Bible does not allow us to sin that grace may abound or to use whatever means that God has prohibited in order to accomplish those ends He has recommended,” he notes correctly.16
“But with this proviso,” Wagner continues, “we ought to see clearly that the end does justify the means. What else possibly could justify the means? If the method I am using accomplishes the goal I am aiming at, it is for that reason a good method. If, on the other hand, my method is not accomplishing the goal, how can I be justified in continuing to use it?”17
Is that true? Certainly not. Especially if “the goal I am aiming at” is a numerical goal with no biblical warrant, or if “my method. . . not accomplishing the goal” is the clear preaching of God’s Word. That is precisely the kind of thinking that is moving biblical exposition out of Christian ministry and replacing it with vaudeville.
One recent best-seller goes even further:
It is. . . critical that we keep in mind a fundamental principle of Christian communication: the audience, not the message, is sovereign. If our advertising is going to stop people in the midst of hectic schedules and cause them to think about what we’re saying, our message has to be adapted to the needs of the audience. When we produce advertising that is based on the take-it-or-leave-it proposition, rather than on a sensitivity and response to people’s needs, people will invariably reject our message.18
What if the Old Testament prophets had subscribed to such a philosophy? Jeremiah, for example, preached forty years without seeing any significant positive response. On the contrary, his countrymen threatened to kill him if he did not stop prophesying (Jer. 11:19-23); his own family and friends plotted against him (12:6); he was not permitted to marry and so had to suffer agonizing loneliness (16:2); plots were devised to kill him secretly (18:20-23); he was beaten and put in stocks (20:1-2); he was spied on by friends who sought revenge (v. 10); he was consumed with sorrow and shame—even cursing the day he was born (vv. 14-18); and finally, falsely accused of being a traitor to the nation (37:13-14), Jeremiah was beaten, thrown into a dungeon, and starved many days (vv. 15-21). If an Ethiopian Gentile had not interceded on his behalf, Jeremiah would have died there. In the end, tradition says he was exiled to Egypt, where he was stoned to death by the Jews. He had virtually no converts to show for a lifetime of ministry.
Suppose Jeremiah had attended a church growth seminar and learned a pragmatic philosophy of ministry. Do you think he would have changed his style of confrontational ministry? Can you imagine him staging a variety show or using comedy to try to win people’s affections? He may have learned to gather an appreciative crowd, but he certainly would not have had the ministry God called him to.
The apostle Paul didn’t use a system based on merchandising skill, either, though some self-appointed experts have tried to make him a model of the new pragmatism. Reading into the Bible’s white space, one advocate of marketing technique asserts, “Paul was one of the all time great tacticians. He perpetually studied strategies and tactics to identify those that would enable him to attract the most ‘prospects’ and realize the greatest number of conversions.”19 Of course, the Bible says nothing like that. On the contrary, the apostle Paul shunned clever methods and gimmicks that might proselyte people to false conversions through fleshly persuasion. Paul himself wrote,
When I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. And my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God (1 Cor. 2:1-5).
He reminded the church at Thessalonica,
For our exhortation does not come from error or impurity or by way of deceit; but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not as pleasing men but God, who examines our hearts. For we never came with flattering speech, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed—God is witness—nor did we seek glory from men, either from you or from others, even though as apostles of Christ we might have asserted our authority (1 Thess. 2:3-6).
Biblical truth is the only framework by which we can evaluate the rightness or wrongness of ministry methods.
Any end-justifies-the-means philosophy of ministry inevitably will compromise doctrine, despite any proviso to the contrary. If we make effectiveness the gauge of right and wrong, how can that fail to color our doctrine? Ultimately the pragmatist’s notion of truth is shaped by what seems effective, not by the objective revelation of Scripture.
A look at the methodology of the church growth movement shows how this occurs. The movement studies all growing churches—even those with false doctrine at the core of their teaching. Sometimes Mormon assemblies, Roman Catholic churches, even Jehovah’s Witness Kingdom Halls are held up to the specialist’s scrutiny. The church growth expert looks for characteristics common to all growing churches and advocates whatever methods seem to work.
Are we to believe that growth in non-Christian congregations is proof that God is at work? Why would we want to duplicate the methodology of religious groups that deny the gospel? Isn’t it fair to question whether any growth resulting from such methods is illegitimate, engineered by fleshly means? After all, if a method works as well for a cult as it does for the people of God, there’s no reason to assume positive results signify God’s blessing.
Utterly missing from most of the church growth literature is any critical analysis of the faulty doctrinal platform on which much contemporary church growth is built. One author has said of Peter Wagner:
Wagner makes negative assessments about nobody. He has made a career out of finding what is good in growing churches, and affirming it—without asking many critical questions. This enables him to hold up as models of church life not only Wimber’s Vineyard, but Schuller’s Crystal Cathedral, the entire Southern Baptist denomination, and just about any other church that is growing. 20
The fact that a church is growing is often mistaken for divine sanction. After all, people reason, why be critical of any teaching that God is blessing with numerical growth? Is it not better to tolerate doctrinal flaws and lapses of orthodoxy for the sake of growth and unity? Thus pragmatism molds and shapes one’s doctrinal outlook.
Wagner himself, for example, has embraced the signs and wonders of the Third Wave movement for reasons that are largely pragmatic. He is candid about this:
I am proud to be among those who are advocating power evangelism as an important tool for fulfilling the great commission in our day. One of the reasons I am so enthusiastic is that it is working. Across the board, the most effective evangelism in today’s world is accompanied by manifestations of supernatural power. 21
Obviously, then, Wagner’s pragmatic perspective has shaped his doctrine, not vice versa.
Wagner virtually concedes this point. He says the methodology of the church growth movement is “phenomenological,” not theological. That approach “may appear altogether too subjective to many traditional theologians,” he admits.22 He continues, “As a starting point, church growth often looks to the ‘is’ previous to the ‘ought’. . . . What Christians experience about God’s work in the world and in their lives is not always preceded by careful theological rationalizations. Many times the sequence is just the opposite: theology is shaped by Christian experience.”23
That being the case, isn’t Wagner’s assertion that his pragmatism “is not the kind. . . that compromises doctrine”24 rendered meaningless? After all, if experience suggests signs and wonders are effective tools for church growth, and if it is legitimate to allow our experience to shape our theology, it is quite logical to amend one’s doctrine—as Wagner himself did—to accommodate some pragmatic, heuristic observation.
It is folly to think one can be both pragmatic and biblical. The pragmatist wants to know what works now. The biblical thinker cares only about what the Bible says. The two philosophies inevitably oppose each other at the most basic level.
The Age of Pragmatism
Nevertheless, philosophical pragmatism has never been more popular in evangelical churches. The church growth movement, which for years was a major factor in world missionary activity, is now having enormous influence in the backyard of Western evangelicalism. North American churches by the hundreds are experimenting with pragmatic methodologies, and the result has been an explosion of interest in innovative church growth techniques. The church growth movement has formed an unofficial alliance with those who believe evangelism is primarily a marketing venture.
Pragmatism in the church reflects the spirit of our age. Books with titles like Marketing Your Ministry, Marketing the Church, and The Development of Effective Marketing and Communication Strategies for Churches are all the rage. The Christian publishing industry is now producing more advice for church leaders drawn from secular fields of study—psychology, marketing, management, politics, entertainment, and business—than all the commentaries, Bible study helps, and books on biblical issues put together.
The role model for contemporary pastors is not the prophet or the shepherd—it is the corporate executive or the politician. The contemporary church is preoccupied with corporate image, statistical growth, financial profit, opinion polls, demographic charts, census figures, and other pragmatic issues. Gone is the church’s passion for purity and truth. No one seems to care, as long as the response is enthusiastic.
Tozer noticed that pragmatism had crept into the church of his day, too. He wrote, “I say without hesitation that a part, a very large part, of the activities carried on today in evangelical circles are not only influenced by pragmatism but almost completely controlled by it.”25 Tozer described the danger posed to the church by even so-called “consecrated” pragmatism:
The pragmatic philosophy. . . asks no embarrassing questions about the wisdom of what we are doing or even about the morality of it. It accepts our chosen ends as right and good and casts about for efficient means and ways to get them accomplished. When it discovers something that works it soon finds a text to justify it, “consecrates” it to the Lord and plunges ahead. Next a magazine article is written about it, then a book, and finally the inventor is granted an honorary degree. After that any question about the scripturalness of things or even the moral validity of them is completely swept away. You cannot argue with success. The method works; ergo, it must be good.26
User-Friendly Churches?
Now the experts are touting the concept of the “user-friendly church.”27 Borrowing a term from the high-tech industries, church growth specialists are advocating a new approach to church ministry. Church growth can be accelerated, they say, if pastors and church leaders will concentrate their energies on making the church as non-threatening as possible for the unchurched. Provide non-Christians with an agreeable, inoffensive environment. Give them freedom, tolerance, and anonymity. Always be positive and benevolent. If you must have a sermon, keep it brief and amusing. Don’t be preachy or authoritative. Above all, keep everyone entertained. Churches following this pattern will see numerical growth, we’re assured; those that ignore it are doomed to decline.
Do you see how that philosophy necessarily undermines sound doctrine? It discards Jesus’ own methods—preaching and teaching—as the primary means of ministry. It replaces them with methodologies utterly devoid of substance. It exists independently of any creed or canon. In fact, it eschews dogma or strong convictions as divisive, unbecoming, or inappropriate. It dismisses doctrine as academic, abstract, sterile, threatening, or simply impractical. Rather than teaching error or denying truth, it does something far more subtle, but just as effective from the enemy’s point of view. It jettisons content altogether. Instead of attacking orthodoxy head on, it gives lip service to the truth while quietly undermining the foundations of doctrine. Instead of exalting God, it denigrates the things that are precious to Him. In that regard, pragmatism poses dangers more subtle than the liberalism that threatened the church in the first half of the century.
A major Christian magazine recently published an article by a well-known charismatic speaker. He mused for a full page about the futility of both preaching and listening to sermons that go beyond mere entertainment. His conclusion? People don’t remember what you say anyway, so most preaching is a waste of time. “I’m going to try to do better next year,” he writes; “that means wasting less time listening to long sermons and spending much more time preparing short ones. People, I’ve discovered, will forgive even poor theology as long as they get out before noon.”28
That perfectly sums up the attitude that dominates much of modern ministry. It is sheer accommodation to a society addicted to entertainment. It follows what is fashionable but reveals little concern for what is true.
A recent best-selling Christian book warns readers to be on guard against preachers whose emphasis is on interpreting Scripture rather than applying it.
Wait a minute. Is that wise counsel? No it is not. There is no danger of irrelevant doctrine; the real threat is an undoctrinal attempt at relevance. The nucleus of all that is truly practical is found in the teaching of Scripture. We don’t make the Bible relevant; it is inherently so, simply because it is God’s Word. And after all, how can anything God says be irrelevant (2 Tim. 3:16-17)?
The radical pragmatism of the “user-friendly” school of thought robs the church of its prophetic role. It makes the church a populist organization, recruiting members by providing them a warm and friendly atmosphere in which to eat, drink, and be entertained. The church becomes more like a saloon than a house of worship.
That is no overstatement. One recent best-selling book advocating pragmatic church-growth ideas included this suggestion:
Remember how the corner tavern used to be the place where the men of the neighborhood would congregate to watch major sports events, like the World Series or championship boxing matches? While times have changed, that same concept can still be used to great impact by the Church. Most churches have a large hall or auditorium which could be used for special gatherings built around major media events—sports, political debates, entertainment specials and the like.29
That entire scenario is built on a set of presuppositions that are patently unbiblical. The church is not a lodge recruiting members. It is not a pub for the neighborhood. It is not a frat house enlisting pledges. It is not a community center where parties are held. It is not a country club for the masses. It is not a city precinct meeting where the community’s problems are addressed. It is not a court to rectify society’s injustices. It is not an open forum, or a political convention, or even an evangelistic rally.
The church is the body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:27), and church meetings are for corporate worship and instruction. The church’s only legitimate goal is “the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ” (Eph. 4:12)—not mere numerical expansion. The notion that church meetings should be used to tantalize or convert non-Christians is a relatively recent development. Nothing like it is found in Scripture; in fact, the apostle Paul spoke of unbelievers’ entering the assembly as an exceptional event (1 Cor. 14:23). Hebrews 10:24-25 indicates that church services are for the benefit of believers, not unbelievers: “Let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together.”
Acts 2:42 shows us the pattern the early church followed when they met: “They were continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.” Note that the early church’s priorities clearly were to worship God and uplift the brethren. The church came together for worship and edification; it scattered to evangelize the world.
Our Lord commissioned His disciples for evangelism in this way: “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations” (Matt. 28:19). Christ makes it clear that the church is not to wait for or invite the world to come to its meetings, but to go to the world. That is every believer’s responsibility. I fear that an approach emphasizing a palatable gospel presentation within the walls of the church absolves the individual believer from his personal obligation to be a light in the world (Matt. 5:16).
The preaching of God’s Word is to be central in the church (1 Cor. 1:23; 9:16; 2 Cor. 4:5; 1 Tim. 6:2; 2 Tim. 4:2). “In season and out of season,” it is the task of God’s ministers to “reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction” (2 Tim. 4:2). The pastor who sets entertainment above forceful preaching abdicates the primary responsibility of an elder: “holding fast the faithful word which is in accordance with the teaching, that he may be able both to exhort in sound doctrine and to refute those who contradict” (Titus 1:9).
I’ve often been curious about how advocates of user-friendly methodology deal with the account of Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5. They lied, so God struck them both dead in front of the entire Jerusalem church. Acts 5:11 says, “Great fear came upon the whole church, and upon all who heard of these things.” It’s hard to reconcile that with the concept of a user-friendly church. Yet the early church continued to grow exponentially. Verse 14 goes on to say, “All the more believers in the Lord, multitudes of men and women, were constantly added to their number.”
The church’s strategy has never been to appeal to the world on the world’s terms. Churches aren’t supposed to compete for the consumer on the same level as Miller Lite or MTV. We can’t stimulate genuine growth by clever persuasion or inventive techniques. It is the Lord who adds to the church (Acts 2:47). Human methodologies cannot accelerate or supersede the divine process. Any additional growth they produce is a barren imitation.
Artificial or unnatural growth in the biological realm can cause disfigurement—or worse, cancer. Synthetic growth in the spiritual realm is every bit as unhealthy.
Good Technique? No, Bad Theology.
The philosophy that marries marketing technique with church growth theory is the result of bad theology. It assumes that if you package the gospel right, people will get saved. It is rooted in Arminianism, which views conversion as nothing more than an act of the human will. Its goal is an instantaneous human decision, rather than a radical transformation of the heart wrought by almighty God through the Holy Spirit’s convicting work and the truth of His Word. An honest belief in the sovereignty of God in salvation would bring an end to a lot of the nonsense that is going on in the church.
Moreover, this whole ad-agency approach to the church corrupts Christianity and caters to the fleshly lusts that are woven into the very fabric of this world’s system (1 Jn. 2:14). We have a society filled with people who want what they want when they want it. They are into their own lifestyle, recreation, and entertainment. When churches appeal to those selfish desires, they only fuel fires that hinder true godliness.
The church has accommodated our culture by devising a brand of Christianity where taking up one’s cross is optional—or even unseemly. Indeed, many members of the church in the Western world suppose they can best serve God by being as non-confrontive to their world as possible.
Having absorbed the world’s values, Christianity in our society is now dying. Subtly but surely, worldliness and self-indulgence are eating away the heart of the church. The gospel usually proclaimed today is so convoluted that it offers believing in Christ as nothing more than a means to contentment and prosperity. The offense of the cross (cf. Gal. 5:11) has been systematically removed so that the message might be made more acceptable to unbelievers. The church somehow got the idea it could declare peace with the enemies of God.
When on top of that punk-rockers, ventriloquists’ dummies, clowns, knife-throwers, professional wrestlers, weight-lifters, body-builders, comedians, dancers, jugglers, rapmasters, and show-business celebrities take the place of the preacher, the gospel message is dealt a catastrophic blow. “How shall they hear without a preacher?” (Rom. 10:14).
I do believe we can be innovative and creative in how we present the gospel, but we have to be careful to harmonize our methods with the profound spiritual truth we are trying to convey. It is too easy to trivialize the sacred message.
Don’t be quick to embrace the trends of the high-tech megachurches. And don’t sneer at conventional worship and preaching. We don’t need clever approaches to get people saved (1 Cor. 1:21). We simply need to get back to preaching the truth and planting the seed. If we’re faithful in that, the soil God has prepared will bear fruit.
But if the church in America does not get back to biblical Christianity, we will soon see the end of our influence for Christ. Everyone is astonished to see how rapidly the face of the modern world is changing. What few Christians seem to realize is how frighteningly fast the church is declining at the same time. We may be witnessing the last days of biblical evangelicalism in our nation. It is not really far fetched to imagine that ten years hence, missionaries from Romania might be evangelizing America.
The reality of that possibility greatly alarms me. We who know and love the truth must be the prophetic voice of our God and affirm the holiness of His Name. We must demand that any effort in the name of our Lord manifest the integrity of His nature. He is holy, holy, holy (Isa. 6:3) and must be so represented. Anything less is not worthy of our Lord’s majesty, awesomeness, and holiness.
The challenge for Christ’s church is this: “Let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God” (2 Cor. 7:1). It isn’t the cleverness of our methods, the techniques of our ministry, or the wit of our sermons that puts power in our testimony. It is obedience to a holy God and faithfulness to His holiness in our daily lives.
We must wake up. The cold war may be over, but the spiritual battle rages on. We cannot afford to be indifferent. We cannot continue our mad pursuit of pleasure and self-gratification. We are called to fight a spiritual battle, and we cannot win by appeasing the enemy. A needy world must be confronted with the message of salvation, and there may be little time left. As Paul wrote to the church at Rome,
“It is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light (Rom. 13:11-12).
Once a reporter asked me if I was driven by a desire to build a great church. I responded that I am driven by a great desire to preach the Word (2 Tim. 4:2). Christ said He would build the church (Matt. 16:18), and I certainly don’t want to compete with Him.
Added to Bible Bulletin Board’s “MacArthur Collection” by:
Notes1. Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death (New York: Penguin, 1985), 63.
2. A. W. Tozer, The Root of the Righteous (Harrisburg, PA: Christian Publications, 1955), 32-33.
3. R. Gustav Niebuhr, “Mighty Fortresses: Megachurches Strive To Be All Things to All Parishioners,” The Wall Street Journal (13 May 1991), A:6.
4. Robert Johnson, “Heavenly Gifts: Preaching a Gospel of Acquisitiveness, a Showy Sect Prospers,” The Wall Street Journal (11 Dec. 1990), A:1-8.
5. Ibid., A:8.
6. For a further discussion of the dangers of pragmatism, see John F. MacArthur, Our Sufficiency in Christ (Dallas: Word, 1991), 113-165.
7. George Barna, Marketing the Church (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 1988), 13.
8. Ibid., 23.
9. George W. Peters, A Theology of Church Growth (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1981), 23-24.
10. cf. C. Peter Wagner, ed., Donald A. McGavran, Understanding Church Growth, Third ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1990), 265-281. Here Wagner and McGavran argue that numerical goal setting is an essential part of a biblical approach to church growth: “Setting membership goals is in accordance with God’s eternal purpose. Goal setting in the service of the Great Commission is pleasing to God…. Scripture is solidly on the side of careful planning for church growth” (p. 270). Yet the only passage of Scripture they cite in support of that statement is Acts 18:4-5, 9, which says nothing about the setting of goals, numerical or otherwise.
11. Donald McGavran, “For Such a Time as This,” (unpublished address, 1970), cited in C. Peter Wagner, “Pragmatic Strategy for Tomorrow’s Mission,” in A. R. Tippet, ed., God,Man and Church Growth (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1973), 147.
12. Wagner, ed., Understanding Church Growth, viii-ix.
13. Ibid., ix.
14. Ibid., ix.
15. C. Peter Wagner, Leading Your Church to Growth (Ventura, CA: Regal, 1984), 201
16. C. Peter Wagner, Your Church Can Grow (Ventura, CA: Regal, 1976), 160-61.
17. Ibid., 161 (emphasis in original).
18. Barna, Marketing the Church, 145 (emphasis added).
19. Ibid., 31-32.
20. Tim Stafford, “Testing the Wine from John Wimber’s Vineyard,” Christianity Today (8 Aug. 1986), 18.
21. C. Peter Wagner, The Third Wave of the Holy Spirit (Ann Arbor: Vine, 1988), 87.
22. C. Peter Wagner, ed., Church Growth: State of the Art (Wheaton: Tyndale, 1986), 33.
23. Ibid.
24. Leading Your Church to Growth, 201.
25. A. W. Tozer, God Tells the Man Who Cares (Harrisburg, PA: Christian Publications, 1970), 71.
26. Ibid., 70.
27. George Barna, User Friendly Churches (Ventura: Regal, 1991).
There is in our day a teaching that has become very popular, and this teaching nullifies in the minds of many the clear and unmistakable truth of 1 John 3 which is nothing but a systematic statement of what we find from Genesis to Revelation, namely, that a man saved by the grace of God will be a holy man. A man saved from the penalty of his sin will be a man who seeks day by day to walk from the defilement of sin. And yet there is a teaching in our day, which has negated the clear implications of 1 John 3.
I have found again and again when I would set forth the Biblical doctrine of holiness, biblical holiness, not an experience, but a walk in conformity to the will and law of God. Whenever I would set forth the Biblical doctrine, and lay out the truth that no man has a right to claim he is a Christian unless he is a holy man, immediately people would bring up this red flag and wave it in front of me. Do you know what that red flag has written on it? What about a Carnal Christian? I’ve had that question asked me I don’t know how many times. The moment the Spirit of God began to stab the consciences of men who were professing to know Jesus Christ but who were not pressing on in the path of holiness, immediately they sought to hide behind this popular doctrine, that for sake of a better term and one which will identify it in our minds, I will call the Carnal Christian Doctrine. I would rather use a stronger word, and call it the Carnal Christian Heresy for this is indeed what it is.
Now it is going to be my purpose to seek to examine this doctrine in the light of the word of God because I feel in my own heart that you and I have been brought up in a generation when this doctrine has been popularized and made very wide spread in our fundamental circles. Now this is my purpose, I feel that for the sake of your souls I must do this. And I am asking you as we come to the word of God to come with a teachable childlike spirit, come like the Bereans who will search the scriptures to see whether these things are so. And so shall we search these things in an attitude of prayer and ask God to help us as we embark upon this study which is not pleasant but which is absolutely necessary for our soul’s well being.
Let us pray: Our Father, we thank thee that thy word is truth. We praise thee that by comparing scripture with scripture, and that having an open heart and a teachable spirit, the Holy Spirit will lead us into truth. We pray as we seek to deal with this problem and this confusion that has wrought havoc in the church that the Holy Spirit himself shall be present to be our teacher and to cause us to see thy truth, and by thy grace to bow beneath it’s implication. We ask in Jesus’ name; Amen.
Now in order to think our way through this I want to, first of all, answer the question what is this doctrine called the Carnal Christian Doctrine? Some of you may say what am I talking about? You may not know it under that title but when I describe it you will recognize it. Then I want us to consider an exposure of this doctrine in the light of the scriptures. Now as we do this I don’t want us to do it academically, I don’t want us to do this from the standpoint of just gaining more information. I want you to do it from this standpoint. Supposed it was suddenly announced over all the radios in your area that a number of people in your area were afflicted with a dread disease, which was of such a nature that it would kill people within a month after contracting it. But the symptoms were so indiscernible to the average person that many people could be walking about, afflicted with this dread disease and not know it. What would your attitude be if suddenly they announced that in every school and every public building there will be lectures by competent medical men to explain the subtle symptoms of this disease that you might discover whether you may have it and take the proper remedy? If you went to such a meeting, how would you listen? You would not listen merely academically to learn something more about this disease. You would listen as a matter of life and death. You would listen with this attitude, I must see if these symptoms, which the doctor talks about are in any way, in any shape or form, present in my life. I must not give the disease the benefit of the doubt! I must at any cost discover if I’m inflicted with this disease and seek the proper remedy. You would not listen to this as a mere lecture on medical terms. You would listen to it as a matter of life and death. This is the kind of hearing that I beg of you in this study.
As we seek to expose this doctrine I’m not doing it from an academic standpoint. I do not want you to read this from the mere standpoint of gaining information. I am convinced that there are men and women, boys and girls, whose souls are in jeopardy because they have believed this heresy. And unless you allow the Holy Ghost to open your eyes some of you may perish and wake up in hell that thought you were going to wake up in heaven when you die. I am convinced of this! It is the only reason I am seeking by the enablement of God to deal with this subject. It is not enough that I pray for you and to cry out to God that the Holy Spirit would open the eyes of any who may be deceived about their soul salvation, it is my responsibility to preach the truth that will aid you to see your sin and to expose the error that would keep you from seeing your sin. Our Lord Jesus who preached positive truth and said I am the way also said beware of the doctrine of the Scribes and the Pharisees. He called it leaven. He warned people and he named it and he sought to keep his disciples from falling prey to it. This is the motive in which I speak to you, and I trust it will be kept before you constantly.
Now what is the doctrine? The doctrine is basically this, that there are three kinds of people in the world, and they generally take it from 1 Corinthians 2 and 3 where you find these three words occurring, natural man, carnal man and spiritual man. This is usually the way in which the doctrine is presented. People who have never received Jesus Christ are natural men. They are sinners by nature and by practice, they are dead in their sins and have no knowledge of God. This is true; this is the Bible doctrine of human depravity.
Then they say the next class of people is the carnal man. This is the man or woman who has received Jesus as his savior, he believes that Christ died on the cross for him, and believing that he has been made a child of God, but, (listen carefully), you never know he is a child of God because although he is saved by the blood of Jesus he lives just like natural man. He lives addicted to the flesh, to the world and to self. You cannot discern the fruit of the Spirit or any pursuit of holiness, but you must not ever call him an unregenerate unsaved man because he has accepted Jesus. He is a man who is saved from hell but who is not yet saved from himself. And so this is the carnal man, the man who is saved but still living like he was not saved.
Then there is the third man. He is the spiritual man, the one who has not only been saved, but the one who has received Christ as his Lord after he has received him as his Savior. He has learned how to walk in the Spirit and you can see real evidence of Jesus Christ living out his life in him. This is the spiritual man.
But when you ask them, well how about this carnal man? Suppose he should die? Oh well, he will be saved so as by fire, he will lose some rewards, but because he has accepted Jesus he’ll go to heaven. And then when they try to deal with this carnal man, here is the way that they deal with it, they say listen, it is not right for you to be carnal. Don’t you know you will be ashamed when Jesus comes? You ought to be a spiritual man. And they present holiness as a very nice thing, and as necessary if he is going to be a good testimony, and if he is going to have rewards. But holiness is not essential to his salvation. Holiness is not an essential proof that he is saved. And so this man called the carnal man is told he ought to be holy, but he really need not be holy. If he is not holy he might lose some rewards and lose some blessings here and now, but he will still sneak into the gate, and he will make it to glory. Now this is basically the Carnal Christian Doctrine. This, I believe, is an accurate portrayal of this doctrine, a man who is saved but still walks in the flesh.
Now what are the results from the wide spread teaching of this doctrine? Will you listen to me carefully? What have been the results of the preaching of this doctrine for a period of probably at least eight decades, about three generations of Christians in out fundamental circles?
Firstly, there are many who name the name of Christ in our fundamental churches who are convinced in their own thinking that they are the children of God but they are people who seem to be at home in the realm of sin. They will confess that there is sin and failure in their lives, but they do this without any grief. They glibly claim 1 John 1:9 in the promise of forgiveness to those who confess. But all of this is a cut and dried heartless sort of ritual that has very little meaning, perhaps not even as much as the sincere Romanist who confesses his sins to the priest. Now this first result is that of producing a people who make no bones and have no reservation in naming the name of Christ but who seem to be perfectly at home in the realm of sin, who claim to be saved from hell, but who give no evidence of being saved from the love and the practice of their sins.
The second result in the thinking of people, that has been a terrible thing, is that it has raised a generation of people who are convinced that holiness of character, life, thought and motive, though it is good and commendable, is something that is optional. They do not view holiness as an absolute essential to genuine Christian profession, but is something that may or may not be present according to the spiritual desire and whims of the individual.
Now I firmly hold the Biblical truth that was brought into clear focus in the Reformation, having been lying buried for a number of years because of the teaching of Rome; that a man is not saved by his works. If we could somehow live a perfect life for a billion years this would not add one ounce of merit to the infinite merit to our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the absolute sufficiency of his death on our behalf. We are absolutely saved by grace. But the same Bible that teaches that we are saved by grace also teaches that when a man receives the gift of grace he is transformed by the Holy Spirit from a lover of sin to a lover of righteousness. So that the same scripture that says by grace ye are saved through faith and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not of works lest any man should boast. Also states, that without holiness no man shall see the Lord.
We must never hold the doctrine that we are justified by grace through faith at the expense, or hold it in such a way, that we will not face the clear implications of the biblical doctrine of holiness. For the Bible says that except a man be born again he can not enter the Kingdom of Heaven also states very clearly without holiness no man shall see the Lord.
What have been the results of separating these doctrines? First of all there have been some drastic results in the pew. There are many in the pews convinced that they are saved but they have never been transformed. They have managed to somehow deceive themselves into believing that you can receive Jesus without undergoing a moral reformation. That it is possible to have the Eternal Son of God dwell in your bosom by faith and still not experience what the Bible calls a new creation. Multitudes in their thinking have come to believe this.
It has had drastic results in the pulpit. I know of men who preach on Bible Conference platforms across our nation who are afraid to preach on 1 John 3. The results of this doctrine of the Carnal Christian being believed have shut the mouths of preachers because they are afraid to set out the fruits and the marks of a true Christian, and to tell men if they do not produce the fruits of repentance they have never been born again. They are afraid to do it! And this doctrine preached, believed and embraced is an easy one because it’s the natural heart that loves it and has produced these results in our fundamental churches. Dear ones, I would rather die crying out against this doctrine and be called a fool and die a failure in the eyes of my generation than to ever preach that a man can enter into heaven who loves his sin. I don’t care if I ever see a convert. It is truth! And oh dear ones my heart yearns for some of you reading this, because you have heard this doctrine, and you believe it and cling to it. And you are never going to get saved until you are ready to relinquish it, and God will meet you.
Now secondly, we want to examine this doctrine in the light of scripture. We have presented what this doctrine is, the three classes of people, the natural man, the carnal man and the spiritual man. We have seen some of the results of this doctrine in the thinking of people and in the actual experience in the pew and in the pulpit. Now we want to seek to expose this doctrine in the light of the scriptures. And as we do, let’s keep before us constantly two principles, they ought to act as guide rails for us.
Whenever you come to deal with a problem in the scriptures keep these two principles before you. Number one; there is no contradiction within the scriptures. In other words Paul can’t say something that will contradict James because the same Holy Ghost who spoke through Paul speaks through James. Right? The same Holy Ghost who spoke through John spoke through Paul; so that we can never receive one portion of the scripture in such a way that it makes us shut our eyes to another portion of scripture. The truth of God is a unit, now we may not be able to reconcile everything this side of glory, in fact there are a lot of questions that I have, and I’ve tried to reconcile them and wrestled with them until my brain was about to break. And I just had to say, Lord I see through a glass darkly, I thank you I’ve seen, but I sure see darkly. But though we can’t reconcile everything we should never hold one truth so that it makes us embarrassed when we face another truth. If you are embarrassed by reading any portion of scripture then you are not rightly understanding another portion of scripture. Let’s keep that principle before us. In other words, whatever Paul says about those people at Corinth being carnal, he certainly can’t contradict what John said in 1 John 3 that he that is born of God does not practice sin. Whatever he is saying, he can’t contradict this clear statement!
The second principle flows right out of this. You always interpret an obscure passage in the light of a clear passage. If you have a problem about a thing that is taught in 1 John check your cross references and you look over and you say here is another verse that deals with this, this is as clear as the nose on my face! John says he that is born of God does not practice sin, his seed remaineth in him. Now that is kind of obscure, what is that seed? So we turn to James and Peter, which says that the seed is the Word of God. So we brought the clear passages to the obscure passage and we got some light! Now we are going to do the same with this matter of the Carnal Christian.
The passage in 1 Corinthians 3 is not a doctrinal passage. It’s a passage dealing with a particular problem at Corinth. Now if we are to understand what Paul is teaching in 1 Corinthians 3 let’s first of all find out what Paul taught when he dealt with the great doctrines of holiness, sanctification and justification. Let’s find where he is giving a doctrinal lecture. And whatever he says there let’s interpret this other passage in the light of these.
Now, will you turn to Romans 8, and I want you to follow closely when you read verses 1 through 14. And I want you to notice two or three words that occur constantly. “There is therefore now no condemnation to them that who are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus made me free from the law of sin and of death. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. To be carnally minded is death; to be spiritually minded is life and peace: the carnal mind is enmity against God; it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be: so then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. But if any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ Jesus from the dead shall give life also to your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh: for if ye live after the flesh, (ye shall lose some rewards?) ye shall die; but if through the Spirit ye do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are (Spiritual Christians? No, they are what?) sons of God.”
Now in this doctrinal passage in the book of Romans, in which Paul is setting forth the great doctrines of the grace of God and the work of the Spirit; I want you to notice in Romans 8. He contrasts two things constantly, the realm of the flesh and the realm of the Spirit. The carnal mind and the spiritual mind, and notice what he says. These two are mutually exclusive. Lets look now at verse 5. They that are after the flesh, they mind the things of the flesh, fleshly desire, fleshly longings. Those that are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. Carnally minded, death, a man who is given over to his baser appetites and to the flesh, the end of that is death. The end of the Spiritually minded man, life and peace. The carnal mind is at warfare with God, it is not subject to God, it cannot be. They that are in the flesh cannot please God. But you say, ‘Pastor? That’s referring to the man who is saved but who is still living in the flesh, and he can’t please God in that state.’ Is it? Look at verse 9, “But ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. But if any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.”
Do you know what Paul is saying? Get this now! He says a man who is living in the realm of the flesh cannot please God. If his basic desires and interests are this life and this flesh he can’t please God. But Paul says this isn’t true of you IF the Holy Ghost dwells in you, and when you got saved he came to dwell in you. And if he hasn’t come to dwell in you, you are none of his. But he has come, you have been basically taken out of the realm of flesh and you have been put in the realm of Spirit, See? I don’t know if you do, but this thrills me. Two spheres, two, not three, carnally minded - death, spiritually minded -life. And then he moves on in verse 13, if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die. ‘Oh, that means the sin unto death!’ Does it? The most spiritual people I know die, this is not speaking about physical death. It is talking about spiritual death! If you live after the flesh ye shall die. But if by the Spirit ye do mortify, or put to death the deeds of the flesh ye shall live. (For) as many as are led by the Spirit of God they (and only they) are the sons of God.
Ah, but you say, ‘pastor, you mean a Christian never stumbles?’ Wait a minute now we are going to deal with that problem. But let’s get this first. Don’t jump ahead of me. Do you see what he is saying? We have two spheres of existence, flesh - Spirit. We have two destinies, life - death, not three, two, degrees within them, yes, but only two spheres. Study this chapter, read it over till the Spirit of God opens your eyes on this.
Go to Galatians 5 for a moment. Paul is dealing again with the two spheres of activity and interest. Now here is a doctrinal passage. We are going to interpret the obscure in the light of the clear. We are going to interpret in the light of the fact that there is no contradiction of what God says. Now beginning with verse 16. “This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, Idolatry, witchcraft, (So far we can all breathe easy, but notice the next ones.) hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like:” Anything that comes under the category of disobedience to the revealed will of God, that’s the works of the flesh, Paul says. Now what is he saying? Notice carefully. Of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall (lose some rewards? No, what is it saying?) They shall not inherit the kingdom of God! Now Paul says, I made this clear to you. I told you this when I was with you before, and I will tell it to you again. Those who are given over to the flesh shall not inherit the Kingdom of God.
Now, he is going to draw a contrast. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.” Now you’ll be stopped there, and the preacher tenderly says, ‘now dear Carnal Christian, you are saved, you are born again, but you have given over to nothing but the flesh and you would be so much better if the fruit of the Spirit were in your life. Now yield to Jesus as your Lord and begin to manifest the fruit of the Spirit in your life, and you will get some rewards.’ That isn’t what Paul says. Notice the next verse. After giving us two spheres, the works of the flesh and what they are like, then the fruit of the Spirit and what it’s like, now notice verse 24. “And they that are Christ’s have (past tense) crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.” He does not say only those that are spiritual. All who belong to Jesus have basically severed themselves from the realm of the flesh. Not perfectly, not completely. That is why he says in the next verse: “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.” But basically he says those that belong to Jesus have crucified the flesh with the affections and the lusts thereof.
Now beloved, either these verses mean what they seem to teach, and the doctrine of the Carnal Christian is a damning heresy, or I have to rip out page after page from my Bible and twist the obvious meaning of Holy Scripture. This I will not do, and this you dare not do. Are you Christ’s? Do you belong to him? Then demonstrate that the flesh and the affections have been basically crucified, and that the fruit of the Spirit is manifest.
But oh, sometimes in my life I know it is hard, nubby fruit. At times there is even some rotten apples hanging on the tree. Beloved, if there is nothing but rotten apples on the tree of your life then you need to hear what Jesus said. Make the tree good and it’s fruit good, or the tree corrupt and the fruit corrupt for a tree is known by it’s what? By it’s fruit.
I am taking this time because this thing is so deeply ingrained I feel there is nothing but the sheer authority of the Word of God, reading it, looking at it, that will expunge it from our minds. Turn please to Romans 6 where again Paul is dealing in this doctrinal book with the basic issues of our allegiance, where it lies. Notice now what he says in verse 15. “What then? Shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid. Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?” Notice now, two spheres, sin unto death - obedience unto righteousness. But then he says, “But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.” That is just another way of saying you’ve committed yourself to Christ as he was offered in the Gospel, and what happened? “Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness,” from the mastery and dominion of sin as your lord that you loved and obeyed and served. You are basically severed from it, and you became the servants of righteousness. “I speak after the manner of men because of the infirmity of your flesh: for as ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity; even so now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness. For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness. What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, (that’s conversion) ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.”
Get that verse and get it now. Conversion is a change of masters. I exchange the master, sin, for the new master Christ who will work out in me the path of righteousness. What is the fruit? The fruit is unto holiness, and the end everlasting life. No man gets everlasting life but in the pathway of holiness, and no man can be holy until he is converted and has a change of masters by the grace of God. Isn’t that what the book says? But we’ve read it this way. ‘But I accepted Jesus, even though I am serving the flesh, and I have my fruit unto Carnal Christianity, and in the end the loss of a few rewards.’ I am not going to butcher my Bible beloved! I am going to let God say what he says and preach it the way it is written. And preach it by his grace.
You ask, pastor, what does 1 Corinthians 3 teach? We will take that up in the next lesson. So I am going to close with this exhortation. Regardless of what it teaches, It can not contradict 1 john 3 where John says he that is born of God does not make a practice of sin, he is never at home in the realm of sin. Why? Because the Divine Seed is at work within him, and if he is in sin as a child of God, if he stumbles he feels unclean and disturbed until he is back in the way of holiness. He has an advocate with the Father if he stumbles, yes, John said. If any man sin we have an advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the Righteous, but that is for the man whose basic desire is to walk in the Light, walk in obedience and in all these other birthmarks that John gave us. Whatever Paul teaches us in 1 Cor. 3 he can’t contradict 1 John 3. He said he wouldn’t even contradict himself in Romans 8 where he said there are only two spheres, flesh and Spirit, two destinies, life and death. The child of God is one indwelt by the Spirit, and that indwelling severs him from the flesh. He can’t contradict Galatians 5 where he says the works of the flesh will have no inheritance in the kingdom of God.
Those possessing the fruit of the Spirit, those who belong to Jesus, are basically committed to this. By whatever he says in 1 Cor. 3, I’m not going to contradict what he says anywhere else. Will you dare to do it? I could number many passages, which sets this truth forward.
I plead with you, young man and young woman, father and mother, if you are not pressing on in the path of holiness, if you are content with your present measure of grace, you’ve better beware. Listen to me parents, your children made a decision back when they were little children. Yet you don’t see any evidence of the new birth, yet you have been breathing kind of easy and say, ‘oh well, they aren’t going on as they ought but they have accepted Jesus.’ Is this true of you? Some of you parents listen to me. If your children die today and they wake up in hell, and you’re not concerned about them, and you are not pleading to God for them because you believe this damnable heresy that they are saved but they are just carnal, why? Why?
I want my son to grow up knowing that until he is in the way of holiness he is not a Christian. I want him to know he cannot get in that way until he is born again, I want him to know that it is by grace, I want him to know that. But I don’t want to raise a child who thinks he is saved because he has nodded his head to what his daddy believes and preaches. I want a boy who knows by the revelation of the Holy Ghost and faithful preaching of the Word, that until the Holy Ghost has sanctified his heart and has given him a heart that is holy he has no ground to claim he is saved. Oh, may God have mercy on some of you parents.
Some of you believe this ignorantly, I’m not scolding you. It is what you have been taught. But now you have no further reason to believe it. Some of you have believed it willingly because you’ve deceived yourself, and if you know that if your children don’t have the real thing, then you are going to have to confess you don’t have it because you don’t have any more than they’ve got. That’s why some of you parents believe this. You dare not say your children aren’t saved because they bear as much fruit as you do. Does this strike fear to your heart? It does mine.
I have to give an account for you dear ones to whom God has sent me. Will you go on believing and confessing you are a Christian while you are at home in the realm of sin? Will you? Will you go on professing to know Jesus Christ as your savior, though you have never bowed to him as your Lord? Then my friend, unless God awakens you and turns you from that course you will go right on believing those things and go right on to judgment and out into eternity a lost soul. God grant that today, recognizing the error of your way, you might cry out unto God for mercy. It’s a terrible thing for a man or woman to die having never heard the message of Christ and to go out into eternity. It is a terrible thing for a person to hear the message and never believe and go out into eternity. It’s thrice terrible for a person to hear the message and believe a false truth about that message, or believe in a false doctrine that lets them be at home in their sins while they profess to belong to Jesus, and then go out into eternity. I think hell will be more tolerable for the demons than for such people who turn the grace of God into a license for their sins, and turn the blood of Jesus into an excuse to carry out their rebellion against God without any fear of punishment. Oh, may God awaken you, and God disturb you. Beloved this is a sobering thing; I am not talking about something that is out in right field in China somewhere. This is right here.
Let us bow in prayer, soberly reflect upon our own hearts and ask ourselves this question. Am I at home in the realm of sin? Am I at ease in my present state? Having made a trip to an alter five or ten years ago, have I breathed easy ever since I’ve done the ritual? Have I made my almighty decision, therefore God must take me to heaven? Oh dear one what a lie
If the students ever bring 1,000 friends to a service, he wants to let one of them zap him with a Taser.Pastor Turner concedes that the first night of the “Fearless” program was mostly about creating a buzz. But all three ministers talk about the challenge of fighting for teenagers’ attention in a world where they’re swamped by video games, music videos, new media like Twitter and Facebook, and the temptations of drugs, sex and alcohol. Wyatt explains that the youth ministers have to be willing to be extreme to even register on kids’ radars. “We have to plan to get them in the door, and then trust that God is going to do what God is going to do once they’re here,” he says.
Certainly, Celebration is not the only church using these tactics. A Google search for “youth groups + fear factor” turned up multiple discussions of ways to make Christian kids vomit with games like eating chili out of a diaper, and recipes for gross concoctions. It’s a trend that doesn’t please Karen McKinney, director of the youth ministry program and an associate professor of Biblical and theological studies at Bethel University in St. Paul, Minn. McKinney finds programs copying “Fear Factor” and other puke-inducing events to be a contradiction to the church’s message of stewardship. “What did we just teach?” she wonders rhetorically when told about the youth program. “What value is it when we know there are kids starving?… There are ways to teaching young people to be bold without wasting food.”
As an example, McKinney remembers how she was invited to speak about sexual boundaries to a teen group at a church in downtown St. Paul. After brief introductions, she broke the 12 students into two groups and told them they were going to play strip Pictionary. For every round lost, the losing group would have to take off an item of clothing. Before they even started, she says she could hear a 13- year-old girl say under her breath, “This is wrong.” But she said the group went through three rounds before the 13-year-old stood up and said, “I thought the topic was boundaries. We should not be playing this game.” McKinney then asked the other students if they also thought the game was wrong and why they didn’t voice those concerns. “They got the message loud and clear what it means to stand up when it comes to crossing these kinds of boundaries,” she says. Licking peanut butter off somebody’s armpit, she observes, crosses those boundaries without drawing valuable lessons for the Celebration students. “It’s just totally inappropriate,” she says.
Pastor Wyatt doesn’t agree. “Whatever we’re doing, it’s working. We saved 35 young people that night. That’s 35 teenagers saved from drugs, saved from abortion, saved from premarital sex. There are life transformations happening here, and it’s incredible. Thirty-five people’s lives were changed forever. They were saved from an eternity of burning in hell. “I’m sorry the peanut butter was offensive.”
Yeah, want to read more on pragmatism and “ends justifying the means”? (as always I don’t agree with every single letter, but there’s a lot of good stuff in these two articles)
What you are about to read is disturbing and shocking, especially if you have children who attend a church youth group. Please be aware that what is detailed below is happening in many churches in America, and may be coming to yours very soon. Prepare to be outraged.
Those churches who rely on their slick marketing schemes to “draw a crowd” have sunk to new lows as of late. This is especially evident in the area of the foreign-to-Scripture concept of the church youth group led by the ever-so-popular (and equally absent from Scripture) youth pastors.
For those who have no idea what kind of shenanigans have been going on in the name of “youth ministry,” here are a few samplings that DefCon’s addressed in the past:
But these past examples are mild compared to what’s taking place now. Countless churches are going out of their way to pander to the youth culture by means of the basest of juvenile humor (the very humor formed, cultivated, and driven by the world).
Because these so-called churches are constantly chasing after the hem of the garment of their elusive mistress of cultural relevance, they must constantly come up with something new, something more radical, something more shocking, something more like the world in order to attract and keep their “customers.”
But as with all fads, what was hip, cool, and relevant yesterday loses it’s impact tomorrow, so something even more vile, shocking, and wicked (yes, wicked) must take the place of yesterday’s flavor of the month.
To see this spiral into depravity I submit two articles for your consideration.One was written by a Christian journalist for a Christian news source from August 2002, the other was written by a secular journalist for a secular news source in September 2009.
The following is the 2002 article from World Magazine’s Gene Edward Veith:
Stupid Church Tricks
by Gene Edward Veith
Four sets of parents are suing a church in Indiana for what happened at a New Year’s Eve lock-in. A youth leader chewed up a mixture of dog food, sardines, potted meat, sauerkraut, cottage cheese, and salsa, topped off with holiday eggnog. As if this spectacle were not disgusting enough (let the reader beware), he then spit out the mixture into a glass and encouraged the members of the youth group to drink it!
Some of those who did, of course, became sick, whereupon their parents sued the church. According to the Associated Press account, the youth pastor said that the “gross-out” game, called the Human Vegematic, was just for fun and that the church forced no one to participate. The lawsuit accused the adults in charge of pressuring the 13- and 14-year-olds into activities that caused them physical and mental harm.
Such “gross-out” games have become a fad in youth ministry. Since adolescents are amused by bodily functions, crude behavior, and tastelessness following the church-growth principle of giving people what they like as a way to entice them into the kingdom many evangelical youth leaders think this is a way to reach young people.
The Source for Youth Ministry, a popular and widely used resource center, posts scores of games on its website, many of which were contributed by youth group leaders in the field. There is Sanctuary Softball, which involves whacking a Nerf ball in church, with home plate being the area of the altar, and running through the pews, as the fielders then try to hit the batter with the ball to make an out. Another fun activity is Seafood Catch, which involves putting minnows in the baptistery, then catching them by hand. (“Extra points for eating them after it is done.”)
Then there are games designed to appeal to adolescents’ hormones. These include kissing games like “Kiss the Wench.” “Leg Line Up” has girls feel boys’ legs to identify who is who. Some of them have odd homosexual subtexts, like “Pull Apart,” in which guys cling to each other, while girls try to pull them apart. Another has girls putting make-up on guys, leading to a drag beauty show. Then there is the embarrassingly Freudian “Baby Bottle Burp,” in which girls put a diaper (a towel) on a boy, then feed him a bottle of soda, and cradle him until he burps!
These are presented as just ordinary games, good ways to break the ice at youth group. But there is another category of “Sick and Twisted Games.” Many of these involve eating and drinking gross things, like at the Indiana church. (“Toothbrush Buffet” has youth group leaders brushing their teeth and spitting into a cup. Each then passes it along to the next in line, who uses what is in the cup to brush his teeth. The last one drinks down everyone’s spit.) Others are scatological, and are too repellent to describe.
What do teenagers learn from these youth group activities? Nothing of the Bible. Nothing of theology. Nothing of the cost of discipleship. But they do learn some lessons that they can carry with them the rest of their lives.
*Lose your inhibitions. Young people usually have inhibitions against doing anything too embarrassing or shameful. These exercises are designed to free people from such hang-ups. For some reason, post-Freudian psychologists whose “sensitivity groups” are the model for these kinds of exercises maintain that such inhibitions are bad. Christians, though, have always insisted that we need to feel inhibited about indulging in things for which we should feel ashamed. This is part of what we mean by developing a conscience.
Though being “gross” may not be sinful in itself, overcoming natural revulsions can only train a child to become uninhibited about more important things.
*Give in to peer pressure. Defenders of these kinds of activities maintain that they help create group unity. The way they work, though, is to overcome a teenager’s inhibitions with the greater desire to go along with the group. In other words, these exercises teach the teenager to give in to peer pressure. Instead, youth groups need to teach Christian teenagers not to go along with the crowd and to stand up against what their friends want them to do.
*Christianity is stupid. Status-conscious teenagers know that those who are so desperate to be liked that they will do anything to curry favor are impossible to respect. Young people may come to off-the-wall youth group meetings, but when they grow up, they will likely associate the church with other immature, juvenile phases of their lives, and Christianity will be something they will grow out of.
Teenagers get enough entertainment, psychology, and hedonism from their culture. They don’t need it from their church. What they need and often yearn for is God’s Word, catechesis, and spiritual formation.
Here are some quotes from this article along with my commentary interjected in red.
As the youth leader held his arms aloft, the teenagers gaped at the hair, furred into a strip matted by sweat and deodorant. They watched as Pastor Turner dug into a jar of peanut butter and smeared gobs of it onto the exposed underarms, then turned to the audience. Did anyone, he asked, have the guts to lick it clean and swallow it down without puking? He got two volunteers. As the audience roared with excitement and disgust, the two male teenagers approached the youth leader and began to lick his armpits, burrowing their faces in the peanut butter and eating it. Neither puked. Their only prize was bragging rights. [This one needs no comment.]
It may seem hard to believe, but the genesis of the “Fearless” program was a marketing impulse.[No, it’s not really that hard to believe. It’s what we’ve come to expect from those who think they can “do church” better than God.]Pastor Turner and his creative team say they wanted to do something that would shock and astound their teenage audience. [If you really want to “shock and astound” the teens, try preaching the Word!] They hoped to get students talking about Celebration Church and about the Wednesday night service. [Because talking about Jesus and His finished work on the cross just isn’t as cool.]They wanted a buzz that would go viral, that teens would text and Twitter about. They wanted the kids to share their cell phone pictures and videos. Ultimately, they wanted hordes of kids to show up the following Wednesday to see what crazy things the youth ministry would think up next. [Makes the church leadership feel good seeing all those kids show up to see what crazy world-mimicking things the youth ministry would think up next. What about the novel idea that kids should be showing up to church to learn more about God and to fellowship with the brethren? Oh, and don’t forget, what you attract them with is ultimately what you have to keep them with. And here’s the paradox: Take away the contrived entertainment and you lose the kids, “They’re not doing what attracted me, dude, so I’m outta here.” Keep the same level and you lose the kids, “They’re not cutting edge, they’re like so 5 minutes ago, I’m outta here.” So the only solution is to push the envelope more and more.]
The program isn’t confined to the church’s Deerfield Boulevard campus. [Why not just say church? What is so offensive to all these megachurches that they hide behind the name “campus?”]Across town, at the Orange Park campus, another youth minister was hosting his own “Fearless” event. . . . Instead of an armpit, [22 year-old Pastor Shawn] Kelley smeared peanut butter on a youth leader’s feet and challenged two teens to lick it off. It was pretty gross, the pastor assures. “This leader’s feet are pretty bad.” . . . Still, Kelley says he did not, as Folio Weekly heard from a concerned parent, spread the peanut butter on his own feet, or between the youth leader’s toes. “We didn’t want to put it in between his toes,” he says. “That would be pushing it.” [Oh, so now we’re taking a lesson on morality and what is and is not “pushing it” from Mr. Kelley. We’d love to know by what standard you rely on to define what’s “pushing it” and what’s not.]
Pastor Turner wants to send kids home from church thinking, “I don’t believe what just happened here tonight.” [Not thinking about their utter sinfulness before a holy God and the only propitiation for their transgressions being the spotless Lamb of God nailed to a cross because without the shedding of blood their is no remission of sins.] That’s a fair approximation of what one area mother felt when her son came home from the Orange Park service with video footage of the toe-licking. . . . She was so upset that the next morning she contacted Pastor John Wyatt, the head youth pastor for all six Celebration locations. She was stunned when he didn’t agree that having a child lick anything off an adult’s feet was inappropriate. . . . [She may have been stunned, but we’re not. In fact, just wait till you see the comments start pouring in on this post defending this foolishness.]The mother suggests that the act between a minor and an adult in a private home would seem not only inappropriate, but perverse — and possibly illegal. [Wow, she hit the nail on the head!]But she says Pastor Wyatt, 37, and other church leaders didn’t concede there was anything wrong with what they’d done. [And they never will.] The woman decided not to allow her son to attend the church again. . . . [Although I question why she let him attend in the first place, this decision is wise.] “When you send a kid to church, you aren’t expecting they are going to be exposed to something like that. It just does not really make sense how Bible study turns into fish eating and eating peanut butter off a grown man’s toes.” [We’ve been trying to make sense of this foolishness too, but in the end, it’s just silly men who have never grown up, getting paid to play silly games with kids who will eventually be inoculated against true Biblical Christianity.]
“The idea is to get students here to meet our Savior. They are getting all this crazy stuff out there in the world all the time. We are trying to show them that God is cooler.” [1. No, no, no. The “church” was never meant to be the place for people to “meet our Savior.” The church is for the Believers, not the unbelievers. If an unbeliever attends a church service and he “meets our Savior” then great, but this was not the purpose of the assembly of the brethren. Actually reading your Bible would clarify the confusion.
2. So you’re essentially using the old “bait and switch” tactic to sucker teens into your church? I guess if you’re offering a fuzzy, non-offensive, feel-good Jesus then you can get away with it.
3. You’re “crazy stuff” is somehow better than the “crazy stuff” in the world, how? Because you’ve “Christianized” it?
4. God is not “cool.” For crying out loud, if you can’t comprehend or even remotely understand the nature of God you have no business being a pastor. Have you forgotten that “cool” is defined by the world? Your god is an idol formed in the imaginations of your “creative team.” You can keep your god. I’ll stick to the true God revealed in Scripture who is not hip, cool, or what’s happening now, but who is holy, holy, holy.]
Asked whether there was a religious lesson behind the grotesquerie, Wyatt offers, “It’s all about what it means to be fearless and know God is with you.” Pastor Kelley describes the “Fearless” stunts as metaphors for the courage it takes to be young and openly Christian. “It’s about being fearless, by allowing them to do something that took boldness, that they might possibly get made fun of for doing,” he says. “Standing up for Christ in the world requires you to be fearless.” [So let me get this straight. Standing up for Jesus requires boldness and fearlessness, but instead of instilling that in the youth by having them actually stand up for Jesus, or even showing them by example, instead you have them perform sick, twisted, and erotic games and this will somehow help them stand up for Jesus? And if they need to perform these juvenile games to stand up for Jesus then does that not mean that you’re suggesting to them that their source of strength comes not from God but from them and their willingness to act like fools? Here’s a novel idea: Try having them become “fearless” by actually proclaiming Jesus Christ, and start with you by boldly preaching Jesus Christ. Then encourage the one’s that are really sincere to take missions trips to countries where standing up for Jesus will get you imprisoned, tortured and/or killed. Somehow I don’t think the countless martyrs throughout church history and today needed to lick peanut butter off someone’s toes in order to stand up for Jesus.]
Wyatt also points out that it’s much easier for a kid to talk about church with other teens when the conversation is about chugging a Happy Meal or bobbing for chicken feet. “They experience God here on Wednesday nights,” says Pastor Wyatt, “and they can’t always articulate that to their friends. This gives them something to say. ‘Wow, you’ve got to come to church, you’ve got to check this out. This is amazing! ’” [Of course it’s easier to talk about Happy Meal chugging or bobbing for chicken feet if you’re unregenerated. Preach the pure, unadulterated, hard truth of the gospel then sit back an watch the kids talk to other kids. A word of caution though, if any of them do get truly converted, they’ll probably be telling other kids about Jesus Christ and his sacrifice instead of your church, and they probably won’t remain in your church for very long either.]
“Unfortunately, somebody was offended, and we apologized right away,” says Pastor Wyatt. “But the other side of that is, there was a whole bunch of kids who gave their life to Christ that night. Ultimately, our goal is to get people into church and into a relationship with Jesus.” [Ah, the old “someone gave their life to Christ” card. Always employed when someone questions the worldly, Chirst-less, and wholly unbiblical marketing tactics of today’s cool, hip, and relevant social clubs. Somehow, we’re told not to judge them, but they are quick to judge others, claiming to know the hearts of these kids and pronounce that they’re saved. Here’s an experiment I suggest trying. Take these kids who you claim to have “given their life to Jesus,” separate them from the toe-licking and armpit licking shenanigans, and teach them the hard things. Teach them the whole counsel of God. Teach them doctrine. Teach them that they are expected to lay down their life daily, that they’re to die to self, that they’re to take up their crosses daily and follow Christ. Teach them that those who choose to live holy lives will be persecuted. Teach them that friendship with the world is enmity to God and that those who love the things of this world are enemies of God. Then we’ll check back in with you in six months and see where those kids who “gave their life to Christ” are. If they were truly converted they will be right there desiring more of the meat of the Word. If they were false converts they’ll have left for the other megachurch down the street who has bowling/pizza nights, whip cream fights, rock concerts, gross-out games, and the weekly “rededicate your life to Christ” alter call.]
This article also interviews Karen McKinney, a director of youth ministries and associate professor at Bethel University who opposes the foolishness of what you’ve just read above. But just when you think there’s a voice of reason, we read this:
McKinney finds programs copying “Fear Factor” and other puke-inducing events to be a contradiction to the church’s message of stewardship. “What did we just teach?” she wonders rhetorically when told about the youth program. “What value is it when we know there are kids starving? … There are ways to teaching young people to be bold without wasting food.” [McKinney is about to offer an example of how she taught teens valuable lessons by means of a much better technique. Brace yourselves.] As an example, McKinney remembers how she was invited to speak about sexual boundaries to a teen group at a church in downtown St. Paul. After brief introductions, she broke the 12 students into two groups and told them they were going to play strip Pictionary. For every round lost, the losing group would have to take off an item of clothing. Before they even started, she says she could hear a 13-year-old girl say under her breath, “This is wrong.” But she said the group went through three rounds before the 13-year-old stood up and said, “I thought the topic was boundaries. We should not be playing this game.”McKinney then asked the other students if they also thought the game was wrong and why they didn’t voice those concerns. “They got the message loud and clear what it means to stand up when it comes to crossing these kinds of boundaries,” she says. Licking peanut butter off somebody’s armpit, she observes, crosses those boundaries without drawing valuable lessons for the Celebration students. “It’s just totally inappropriate,” she says. [So it’s all right to “cross boundaries” as long as a lesson is learned? And encouraging 13-year-olds to play strip Pictionary is an acceptable ends-justifies-the-means lesson? Good grief, the inmates are running the asylum!]
Welcome to the American Christianity where worldly wisdom reigns from the pulpit and rules the day. Those who lower Christianity to such base levels are showing that they do not believe that the Gospel is enough to save as the Apostle Paul believed it was when under inspiration of the Holy Spirit he penned Romans 1:16: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes . . .”
Faith comes by hearing the Gospel, not by quaint little stories about how to be bold like Danielwhile having kids perform gross and even erotic acts before their peers.
The defense commonly used by proponents of this worldly behavior in church is usually that they’re trying to reach a certain group, and in order to do that, they say, “you must first relate to that group and become like that group.” But I have to ask: If you have to reach people where they’re at, tell me, how do you reach the abortionist? How do you reach the homosexual? How do you reach the intravenous drug user? How do you reach the pedophile? I’ll stop there as I do not want to give these youth leaders any new ideas for their next big thing.
In seven years we went from teen girls feeling teen boys’ legs in youth group, to teens licking peanut butter off an adult’s feet and playing strip Pictionary. I can only imagine what the next seven years will bring.
I conclude with a quote from Gene Edward Veith who summed up the whole problem in his article posted above:
Status-conscious teenagers know that those who are so desperate to be liked that they will do anything to curry favor are impossible to respect. Young people may come to off-the-wall youth group meetings, but when they grow up, they will likely associate the church with other immature, juvenile phases of their lives, and Christianity will be something they will grow out of.
Published: Saturday, November 28, 2009 at 3:30 a.m.
Last Modified: Friday, November 27, 2009 at 4:43 p.m.
SEATTLE | The sight of a woman being tattooed live on the altar accompanied by the sound of a buzzing ink gun provided a startling backdrop to Sunday’s evangelical sermon.
Your parents’ church service this was not. In the drive to stay relevant, the Gold Creek Community Church has been hosting a series called ‘Permanent Ink’ that featured Sunday’s live-tattoo finale.
The Mill Creek, Wash., church is not exactly staid — booming 20-minute rock sets launch regular sermons — yet the pastors acknowledge this series was pushing societal norms.
‘We’ve said from the start that we are not advocating tattoos — nor discouraging them,’ said pastor Larry Ehoff.
‘We think of it as amoral. It’s neither immoral nor moral, it’s just the choice of a person.’
Ehoff said the church is telling the same story of Jesus as always, it’s just finding different ways to tell it.
Sharon Snell was one of several congregants who volunteered to be tattooed Sunday. At the noon service, she got on stage and faced away from about 150 parishioners while tattoo artist Matt Sawdon worked on the image of a police shield on her lower back.
It was Snell’s third tattoo and represents her husband’s work as an Everett, Wash., police officer. Snell said last month’s shooting death of Seattle police Officer Timothy Brenton forced her to confront the fragility of life and the dangers inherent in her husband’s job.
‘Anything can happen at any time,’ Snell said. ‘Him being an officer is a big part of my life and of who I am.’
As Snell’s tattoo took shape, pastor Dan Kellogg told the congregation that permanent markings, both good and evil, are mentioned in the Bible. The most famous symbol, he said, is ‘666,’ the sign of the devil.
But there’s also mention in the Bible of markings on Jesus, saying he is the king of kings and lord of lords, Kellogg said.
Another congregant who volunteered, Erica Armendariz, was getting work done on an arm tattoo she calls her ‘faith sleeve.’
‘Surprisingly, I was not nervous to get up on stage,’ she said, adding that the tattoo process, which in her case stretched through two sermons, was getting painful toward the end.
Tattoo artist Matt Sawdon said he’d never tattooed anyone at church before. Aside from the limited time he had during each sermon, he said, it wasn’t much different from a normal day’s work.
Last week, as part of the Permanent Ink series, a member of the church had a tattoo of Texas removed.
Because the equipment was too cumbersome to transport, parishioners watched a video of the process.
The man now lives in Washington, and he doesn’t see much need for the Lone Star State anymore.
What you are about to read is disturbing and shocking, especially if you have children who attend a church youth group. Please be aware that what is detailed below is happening in many churches in America, and may be coming to yours very soon. Prepare to be outraged. 
Entries (RSS)