Category: discernment

Posted in discernment, theology

Many Christian Celebrity Moms are Distorting Biblical Motherhood; Part 1

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

This part one will present the problem. Part two discusses the biblical correction/solution.

“She lived and labored for her boys and her husband. At home she was a wife and mother and a model of what each should be. She taught the Bible to her sons and pleaded with them to turn to Christ. Thomas traced his early conversion to her pleading and her example.”
~Thomas Spurgeon’s memory of his mother Susannah, wife to preacher Charles Spurgeon.

Images and PR (public relations) matter. Ask the advertising, marketing, and PR industry why they spend so much money on it every year. The images and concepts they perpetuate onto the consuming public are important because those are the images and concepts they want people to adopt. The constant barrage of them, they hope, will cause a shift in their target audience’s perception of reality.

Even unintentional PR causes a shift in reality. If images and concepts are constant enough, eventually the mind begins to accept them as real.

Second-Wave Feminism emerged in the secular culture from roughly the mid-1960s to the mid-1980s. Since the Christian world is slower to adopt secular fads, the last twenty years or so in Christian world has followed suit with its own version of feminism. One reason this distortion has occurred is partly because of Christian(ish) female celebrities living and touting a life of motherhood that’s far from the biblical model, all the while claiming it is.

Eventually, the distortion became the reality in Christian circles, at least for many. Others who are more discerning became confused nonetheless.

These women write Bible “lessons” that sell by the millions. They write devotionals that women clamor for. They appear on television and social media, teaching and touting the ‘have it all’ life. They write books. They’re active in churches as speakers.

Here are a few examples of these women who claim to be Christian and to put their motherhood first as the Bible commends, but don’t. They include Beth Moore, Rachel Hollis, Raechel Myers, Diana Stone, and Joanna Gaines. I’d like for you to get a true sense of how repugnant these lives are by carefully reading their words and seeing their deeds. I also offer them as proofs you can use to contrast the lives of these celebrity Christian (ish) mothers and what the Bible calls mothers to be in the eyes of Jesus.

1. Beth Moore

Beth Moore said to Christianity Today in 2010 that her man demanded a regular home life, so she only travels every other Friday and comes right back home the next day.

“We walk the dogs together and eat out together all the time and lie on the floor with pillows and watch TV,” Moore says. “My man demanded attention and he got it, and my man demanded a normal home life and he got it.”

That’s nice. But it’s disingenuous in the extreme. The reality is that when I researched her schedule (in 2012), Mrs Moore was gone from home at least 20 weekends per year on her Living Proof tours- which usually occur on the weekends. On top of that, Mrs Moore taped sessions for her weekly show on the Life Today (these days, she has her own show), she travels for weeks on book tours, travels or tapes sessions for interviews, spends extended private time for weeks in a cabin by herself in Wyoming to write (as stated in the preface to “When Godly People Do Ungodly Things”). She is the President of her own company that in 2011 brought in 4.1 million dollars, with an excess after expenses of 1.3M. Her tax forms say that she spends 50 hours per week working for Living Proof.

And she did all this when she was raising younger children. A ‘normal home life’? Hardly.

In fact, my contention was confirmed and vindicated several years after writing that essay when the magazine The Atlantic quoted both Moore children (adults now) as saying when they were growing up “they ate a lot of takeout”. The article also stated that “Though she often performs domestic femininity for her audience, in her own life she has balanced motherhood with demanding professional ambitions. … Moore has never cared much for the delicate norms of Christian femininity. Her days are tightly scheduled and obsessively focused on writing.”

——————————————

2. Diana Stone

Diana Stone formerly wrote for the website She Reads Truth, developing female-oriented Bible devotionals for social media, as well as writing for the Huffington Post, New York Times, and other print and social media platforms. We read in Diana Stone’s bio that, “You can find her in the mornings with a cup of coffee and her Bible flung open, preparing for the day ahead.” Awww, admirable! “With a sweet daughter in tow, Diana clings to God’s Word daily.”

Mrs Stone relaxes with the Bible “flung open” … after she drops her daughter to daycare.

At the time of the writing, in 2014, for the past two and a half years, the couple had employed a part time nanny care for their daughter in their home so Mrs Stone could work as a freelance writer. After bumping along with several nannies, they eventually decided to put their child in daycare so Mrs Stone could continue to write at home.

“There’s a constant tug on me to be in both worlds 100%. Work should come first. Life should come first. What is a priority? Who gets my time that day – and is choosing one over the other wrong? When I’ve committed to being a mama and being paid to write, both need my top priority.” Source

First of all, there should be no distinction between “life” and “work.” Colossians 3:23 says “Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men,”

Secondly, Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. (Psalm 127:3).

Thirdly, you commit to the children, to being a mother. If committing to work that causes you to wonder “who should get your time that day”, you’re doing biblical mothering wrong.

Mrs Stone’s mothering got in the way of writing about being a mom, so the mothering was outsourced.

————————————

3. Raechel Myers

Raechel Myers is founder of She Reads Truth, a Bible devotional social media company. She identifies herself also as a sewist, writer, photographer, designer, author, CEO of a Limited Liability Company, Conference Fundraiser, Conference speaker, and world traveling Justice Activist. Oh, and mom. And wife.

In addition to her work at She Reads Truth, Myers makes trips to Africa to help women develop self-sustaining micro-economies. In an Instagram photo Raechel Myers published, her two young children are perched on a chair and on a table watching a laptop playing a video of their mother being interviewed at If:Gathering, with this caption,

“My husband just texted me this photo of the kids watching our @shereadstruth interview at the @ifgathering. Seeing my baby girl perched on the table watching her mommy talk about her Jesus- so blessed!!!!”

Perching your children on a table while daddy babysits so they can see you talking about Jesus to others through a screen is definitely not biblical motherhood. Another CEO-mother with divided time and loyalties.

————————————

4. Rachel Hollis

Rachel Hollis is an author, CEO of her event-planning company, speaker, social media darling, television broadcast guest commentator, podcaster, conference producer, and has been dubbed as a “motivational powerhouse for women.” She has four children. Here is her bio:

I’m Rachel Hollis, a proud working mama with four kids and an ultra hunky husband. I worship coffee like a deity, I read books like my life depends on it and think vodka with La Croix is one of the greatest inventions of the last decade. When it comes to women, there always seems to be a question about how we can balance everything. Girl, I don’t even try!
I’ve got four kids (one of which is the gorgeous queen I’m holding above) and whether I’m at home with them or at Chic HQ with the team, life is never calm and balanced. Instead, I embrace my chaos and seek only to feel centered amongst the flurry. The babies and housework and spreadsheets and meetings and 5th birthday parties to plan, along with a million other things that might overwhelm me? They are just a list of my many, many blessings.

Did you get all that? Read it carefully. Her opening lines referred to worshiping coffee as a deity and drinking Vodka. Her life is so busy she can’t prioritize her children or figure out a way to balance all her work outside the home with her kids, so she doesn’t even try. Her life, according to her, is chaos, a flurry, overwhelming, never calm, and unbalanced.  Kids love lives like that. Sadly, this is the norm that’s being presented to Christian women as motherhood: Happy-go-lucky chaos with the kids coming in last.

———————————–

Joanna Gaines is a television personality and co-star along with her husband of Fixer Upper, which a few months ago just ended a five-year broadcast run. Joanna maintains she is a mom first, stating at every opportunity possible that they remained committed to filming in Waco only because they wanted to be near their young children since the couple is dedicated to parenting first. Family first. etc and ad nauseum.

However, that is patently not so.

What they’ve got going is-

–a television show,
–home renovations,
–a realty office with employees,
–4,000-square-foot store with 140 employees,
–two vacation rental properties (not B&B’s),
–speaking engagements at $62,000 per,
–Magnolia Farms and its own apparel line,
-Magnolia Silos,
–Magnolia Villas, a gated subdivision of 37 garden homes in a pocket neighborhood. Chip’s first house flip earned him $30,000 15 years ago. Today he said he invested seven figures for the gated community,
–a new partnership with case goods manufacturer and importer Standard Furniture to create a comprehensive furniture collection called Magnolia Home. Joanna is designing the pieces,
–a bakery,
–Magnolia Market’s online business, ships 700 packages a day, employing 32 people,
–an autobiography due out in Fall 2016,
–a 600 square foot working garden,
–a 40-acre working farm with chickens, goats, cows, turkeys, horses, cats, dogs and bottle calves. Over 60 animals in all,
–craft workshop with tickets costing $100 per,

Chip and Joanna have added more companies, projects, and tasks since 2016 when this list was compiled. This month, the couple announced this month they are expecting a fifth child.

————————————–

In my 2016 essay about Joanna and her version of motherhood, I called her a hypocrite for saying one thing about motherhood, but doing the opposite. I was slammed for saying so. I can’t relate to you just how slammed I was. I received a torrent of abuse, criticism, and outrage just for pointing out the physical impossibility of actually living according to what they were saying. There are not enough hours in the day for Joanna to do all she needed to do for the companies AND biblically mother her children.

Daryl Austin of USA Today wondered the same thing. In his piece he asked, ‘The Gaines family says they put family first, but do they have time to live it? He listed all Joanna is into work-wise, then said:

That’s all incredible. For anyone else, I would be shouting my admiration from the rooftops. But I see Chip and Joanna differently, because they don’t want to be seen simply as a couple that can do it all. They want to be seen as a couple that can do it all while at the same time making their family their top priority.

This is just not possible, and it does a disservice to the parents who really are putting their children first. No matter how rich and famous, we are all limited by the same 24 hours in a day. You cannot do all they’ve done (or even a fraction of it) and still have any real time left over for family. Frankly, I wonder where they even find the time to brush their teeth, let alone spend quality, one-on-one time with each child daily.

Daryl Austin again:

Unchecked ambition for any of us is a bottomless pit. We live in a world where every social media user compares his worst to everyone else’s best, and mommy bloggers work tirelessly to portray unattainable perfect homes and families. Instead of correcting distorted realities, Chip and Joanna are adding to the problem. Not just in what they say, but also in what they show.

Many of the women above do display an unchecked ambition, distorting what God said a home should be like and turning it into a temple for self-gratification and career fulfillment. They SAY they love being a mom, but what they DO is show us they worship themselves. Many regular women suffer from this distorted reality. It’s confusing, being told that a career of helpmeet and mother is God’s desire if possible, yet seeing unchecked ambition, private jet flights, book tours, and fame as equally desirable- and attainable.

There are thousands and millions of behind-the-scenes Christian moms who are doing exactly what the Bible says to do in their roles. The sad part is that the image of the CEO-busy-divided loyalty-mom is the one that is seen. Their reach and influence has unfortunately normalized the have-it-all working moms’ lifestyle who give lip service to mothering, but in fact are fomenting a distorted reality for real Christian mothers and mothers-to-be.

Today, I wrote of what biblical motherhood isn’t. Tomorrow, the solution: Biblical Motherhood according to Jesus. What it is, why it’s important, and how it’s actually a call to war.

Susannah_photo
Susannah Spurgeon with her twin boys, Thomas and Charles

Posted in discernment, theology

Throwback Thursday: Does God Speak in Unidentified Promptings?

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

This post first appeared on The End Time in September 2016

A quick lesson on discerning a meme. I saw this on Facebook. Here is a lesson on how to parse the silly sayings we see on social media. Let;s take it apart phrase by phrase and really think about what it is trying to communicate.

“Unidentified promptings” contradicts his word on the face of it, because He always identified Himself as the One speaking. Even when God spoke to pagans they knew this was an authoritative and undeniable voice of a God they must obey.

Would God speak behind a veil of uncertainty as to the source? No, never. Further, the Lord never spoke unclearly to an audience. He was always open and authoritative when He spoke. (Matthew 7:29). Did the Lord say “I shall give Pharaoh unidentified promptings to let My people go”? (Exodus 4:22). Does Exodus 7:17 say, “Thus prompts the LORD in unidentified manner, In this thou shalt strongly suspect through an inner voice that I am the LORD: behold, I will smite with the rod that is in mine hand upon the waters which are in the river, and they shall be turned to blood. Probably. If you discern the prompting correctly.”

In addition, if the promptings are unidentified, how do you know they are from God? We know the devil speaks. (John 8:44). We know our own heart speaks too, for out of it come evil thoughts–murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander; says Matthew 15:19. Why would you want to risk acting upon something that could either be from the devil or your own dark heart?

Third, do you ever act on unidentified promptings in other cases in real life? If an unidentified voice whispered over the intercom at work to go do something, would you? If an unidentified voice left on your phone messages urged you to an action, would you do it? No. You’d probably say ‘This is creepy’ and delete the message or ignore the intercom. Why risk following an unidentified prompting that more than likely is coming from the devil or your own foolish heart?

Next, ‘promptings’ cannot be confirmed by the word. A prompting is a nebulous, gossamer thought like the last remnant of a dream you’re trying to hold on to before full consciousness erases it. How can the word of God confirm something so tenuous? In the Bible, is there a Book of Unidentified Promptings to which we turn blank pages and write our own indefinite and unclear words in invisible ink?

Last, ‘promptings’ are not a communication. They are an unidentified feeling, more than likely generated by ourselves from ourselves to ourselves.

Leave the unidentified promptings alone. Better to just read God’s word, make decisions according to His commands and precepts, and take responsibility for them.

Posted in discernment, theology

“Evil is a made-up concept”

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

  • “I’m a good person”
  • “People are basically good.”
  • “There’s no such thing as evil.”
  • “Can we all just get along? Can we get along?” (Spoken by Rodney King whose 1992 acts of resisting arrest and beating by LA police was videotaped by amateur video & sparked massive riots in the city).

The unsaved mind rejects evil in the world. Why? Because then they would have to face their own evil. As cartoonist Walt Kelly’s character Pogo famously said,

“We have met the enemy and he is us.” 

In contrast to the world’s view of humanity, the Bible says of us humans that we are enemies of God, doing evil in His sight all day long. (Genesis 6:5).

  • “as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one”; (Romans 3:10)
  • For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; (Romans 3:23)
  • The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? (Jeremiah 17:9)
  • For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. (Matthew 15:19)

Emerging this month is a tragic story out of Tajikistan. Two idealistic and optimistic twenty-somethings from the US decided to quit their jobs and see the world. Being avid cyclists, they decided to do it by bicycle. They pooled their life savings, which wasn’t much since they were 27 year olds who’d just started their professional careers in Washington DC.

I can understand that urge to be a part of the world by seeing it and experiencing it. I did that with my husband. We both quit our jobs, and being avid sailors, bought a boat and sailed down the coast of the US to the Bahamas to see what we could see. Some people just have a wanderlust.

These two twenty-somethings remarked again and again that the people they met along the way were kind and hospitable to strangers.

As they biked along with two others they had met, one from Switzerland and one from the Netherlands, a car loaded with men spotted the group. The men turned the car around, sped up, aimed for them, rammed all four cyclists, ran them over, and then on the dusty roadside they stabbed the cyclists to death like dogs. They later claimed allegiance to ISIS and vowed to kill all unbelievers.

Jay Austin and Lauren Geoghegan had documented their journey on their blog and on Instagram. They basked in the hospitality of strangers, reciprocated kindness, and loved the world as it unfolded before them. Some say they saw it through dreamers’ eyes.

An unsanctified mind overlooks the evil we do, rejecting that our own evil is against a holy God for which we deserve punishment. The world is evil. It is under the dominion of the evil one. Unsanctified minds see the world as good, because they are so embedded in evil they don’t see it. The cyclists tragically misunderstood human nature, in choosing to believe that the surface kindness they experienced went deeper than it did.

Here is Jay explaining their worldview, written in a blog last April as they entered Morocco.

You watch the news and you read the papers and you’re led to believe that the world is a big, scary place. People, the narrative goes, are not to be trusted. People are bad. People are evil. People are axe murderers and monsters and worse.

I don’t buy it. Evil is a make-believe concept we’ve invented to deal with the complexities of fellow humans holding values and beliefs and perspectives different than our own—it’s easier to dismiss an opinion as abhorrent than strive to understand it. Badness exists, sure, but even that’s quite rare. By and large, humans are kind. Self-interested sometimes, myopic sometimes, but kind. Generous and wonderful and kind. No greater revelation has come from our journey than this.

There is a difference in believing that we can connect with people on a friendly level despite differences in shared values, and realizing that we humans are all the same because we share the most fundamental similarity of all: an inherent evil.

Evil most certainly is not a make-believe concept. Satan was highest and most beautiful of the cherubim until the day evil was found in him. (Ezekiel 28:15). He perpetuated his unrighteousness with Eve and Adam, persuading them to rebel against God. Ever since, humans have been born evil. (Psalm 51:5).

I was born evil. Jay and Lauren were born evil. They did evil every day of their lives (Romans 5:12). It is important to recognize evil for what it is. Baker’s Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology defines evil by first stating that what is morally good is not what human society decides is in its best interest, but what the revealed will of God declares. Evil is opposition to God’s declared will. Psalm 5:6 says that God hates evil.

Recognizing one’s one evil and our own culpability before a holy God is a first step in understanding our need for Jesus. His Gospel commands us to repent of evil. If one denies that evil exists, then one is effectively stating that one does not need Jesus. We need Him to rescue us from our evil. It’s strange to think that the hopeful, evil-denying bikers are seen by God as just as evil as the ISIS men who stabbed them to death.

The question of the reality of evil, is not just a philosophical debate. When one eventually enters the other side of the veil, there are two destinations. One is for evil people. The other is for forgiven evil people. Evil is indeed real. But the grace of God gave us His Son, who took on all of God’s wrath for those evil deeds we do, and God punished Him instead of us evil-doers. If we repent of our evil deeds and ask Jesus to forgive us, He will. Otherwise, on His Day when many say to Jesus that they were good people,

Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’ (Matthew 7:23 NIV)

This isn’t an academic issue. It’s a heart-rending issue. I’m not making light of the cyclists. In the world this very day, four sets of parents are mourning the loss of their children. Mothers are weeping and fathers are mourning. Evil is very real. The parents know it. Evil took their children. But the fatal flaw in that thinking is believing that they themselves are not evil.

Satan delights in deluding people that evil either doesn’t exist, or it’s a problem ‘out there’… or ‘somewhere else.’ The reality is, evil is in every heart. Only repenting to Jesus for our evil thoughts, speech, and deeds can absolve us of being punished for it.

If Jay and Lauren were not saved (and I suspect they were not), it is too late for them. It is not too late for any person still consciously drawing breath to appeal to the Son for forgiveness of our own evil.

FMI on the cyclists:

The Danger of Being Dreamers

ISIS Terror Attack on Cyclists

I’m always interested in passing along sermons, essays, or books that discuss evil from a biblical perspective. There are a lot of kooks out there ‘teaching’ about the devil and his demons. This sermon from Grace Community Church is good. I listened to all of it. It’s called The Domain of Darkness,  and teacher Chris Gee focuses on satan, demons, hell and what the Bible has to say about them.

 

Posted in discernment, theology

On empowerment

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

We hear so much these days about women being empowered. Needing empowerment. Wanting power. We hear from the feminists that women in today’s church have been oppressed, marginalized, and discriminated against because they do not have the same ‘opportunities’ that men do. Meaning, the feminists are saying women have been denied the equal opportunity to teach men, preach or pastor a church.

This is bunk, of course.

If we go all the way back to Genesis 1:28, we see that God made us male and female. After making humans in 2 genders, God gave both humans a job:

God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

God said to THEM. Is there any additional power women need than with men as partner to jointly care for all of the creation? And to do so within clearly defined boundaries, which is a gift, not a restriction?

Along the way, as the Old Testament and New Testament progressed, we see women with amazing abilities being used by God, as well as men. Esther, the Queen who saved her people. Mary, the humble servant given opportunity to first share the Good News of the resurrection. Lydia, Asia’s first convert and host of one of the earliest home churches. The Samaritan Woman, who was discipled one-on-one by Jesus, then she shared news that helped convert a whole village.

Challies says in his book review of John MacArthur’s Twelve Extraordinary Women, that the author writes about-

-the high position given to women within Scripture. Women are never relegated to a secondary status and, unlike so many other religions, are never degraded and considered less important than men. From the beginning of the New Testament era to the close of the canon of Scripture we see God granting extraordinary privilege to women. There are countless women in the Bible who stand as examples of faithfulness, integrity, hospitality and every other admirable virtue.

What more do you want, women who demand empowering?

We see the eternal discontent of feminists as a reflection of what happened in the original Garden. God gave Adam and Eve everything, absolutely everything, except for one thing. It was that one thing satan enticed Eve to want.

So it doesn’t matter if the feminists push their way into the pulpit. Their discontent never stops, because there is always that one thing they will want. The Bible says they cannot preach? They want to. Can’t teach men? They want to. Can’t lead men in spiritual authority? They want to. Can’t be master in the home? They want to. We could capitulate and give it all to them and they’ll still want more. That is because sin is a bottomless pit.

Their discontent stems not only from wanting what is forbidden, but from a failure to be grateful for all the opportunities we women DO have. Want to teach other women? We can. Want to raise children? We can. Want to teach children? We can. Want to be hospitable and open your home to others in His name? We can. Want to minister to the brethren? We can. Want to disciple younger ladies? We can. Want to share the Good News of the Gospel? We must.

And so much more.

We have power, power that God gave us. It’s when women step outside the boundaries of that power that our lives go awry. We ladies should be content with the magnificent privileges God has given us. We should be joyful at the stately way Jesus treated women in His day. We should be busy doing ministry in His name within the bounds of the myriad opportunities He did give us.

As for empowerment itself? What IS power?

Jesus has all power. He gives it as He wills. (Luke 9:1).
The angels have power (2 Peter 2:11).
Jesus gave His two witnesses power. (Revelation 11:6).

Salvation and glory and power belong to our God, (Revelation 19:1).
His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. (2 Peter 1:3).
An entire level of angels is called powers. (Colossians 1:16).

When you hear women saying they want to be empowered, they are not pushing for power from the men who lead churches or denominations. They are making demands of God. How do I know this? John 19:11a

Jesus answered, You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above.

All power comes from God. So before you might be tempted to listen to women who go around clamoring for empowerment, stop and think of what they are really demanding and who they are demanding it from.

If we are content, we will be doing what Paul advised in 1 Thessalonians 4:10b-11,

But we urge you, brothers, to excel more and more 11and to aspire to live quietly, to attend to your own matters, and to work with your own hands, as we instructed you.

If we work hard, attend to our own business, and live quietly, we will be doing much better than the loud women who roar for empowerment and make evil claims against a holy God. After all, we have a co-charge to be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth. That’s power enough, don’t you think?

power of god verse

Posted in discernment, theology

Can you leave Christianity?

Posted on by elizabethprata

This essay appeared on The End Time on August 5, 2010.

By Elizabeth Prata

Ann Rice is famous for her vampire series of books, her bi-sexual erotica, and her very public conversion to Catholicism ten years ago. Her announcement that she is quitting Christianity is, of course, just as public. She said:

“Today I quit being a Christian. I’m out,” she wrote. “I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being ‘Christian’ or to being part of Christianity. It’s simply impossible for me to ‘belong’ to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious and deservedly infamous group. For 10 years, I’ve tried. I’ve failed. I’m an outsider. My conscience will allow nothing else…. In the name of Christ, I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control. I refuse to be anti-Democrat. I refuse to be anti-secular humanism. I refuse to be anti-science. I refuse to be anti-life. In the name of Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen.”

Note: Catholicism is not Christianity. That is why it is so evil- it looks like it could be a form of Christianity, but it is not. Adherents are deceived, sadly. Many of them are deceived eternally!

Rice wrote that she cannot get behind a religion that is “anti-gay”. The culture of our times, here in the last days before the Time of Jacob’s Trouble, is such that man’s personal choices and ideas always trump God’s. His standards for morality and purity are that His men and women refrain from sexual indulgence until marriage, that the married are opposite sexes, that they stay married, that they remain faithful until they die. This notion is mocked and scorned today. The literati firmly claim that it is hopelessly outdated. Even Federal Judge Walker said that the notion of opposite-sex genders as the only qualifiers for marriage is an “artifact from a past time” when he overturned the California constitutional amendment defining marriage as between one man and one woman.

Equally, the notion that God renders consequences on those who choose to set aside His standards is anathema to today’s culture. No one wants to be held accountable and no one wants to think that anything they do has any consequences whatsoever. Ann Rice’s renunciation of the religion, the Bible, yet claims of remaining faithful to Jesus are just another example of the tendency for fallen humans to pick and choose ideals with which they can remain fleshly and indulge in their favorite pastimes.

It is particularly poignant that she states that she remains “committed” to Christ but quits adhering to His standards, and in His name, no less. One cannot remain committed to someone or something after you selectively decline so many precepts the entirety looks like a foundation-less house. It is not possible to remain “committed to Christ” and repudiate His Word and His standards for purity, marriage, life, and culture. It is simply not possible.

Further, her statement reveals just how little she understood genuine conversion. Upon renunciation of your sins, seeking forgiveness of Jesus for them, and last, submitting to His will for your life, The Holy Spirit then enters and seals you. (Ephesians 1:13). Thinking that even for a minute that man can tell the Spirit to come or go is ridiculous. Thinking for even a minute that man has the power to break a seal that God Himself set is even more ridiculous. And Jesus promised that the gates of Hades will not prevail against His church. (Matthew 16:18). Ann Rice never was a Christian. You can’t leave something you never went to. And sadly, Ann Rice believes she is a friend of God, has the power to break His seal, and can select at will the precepts to which she will adhere. This attitude is prevalent today, held not just by author Rice, but many, even most, Christians and non-believers.

Of course there is no such thing as an ex-Christian. (1 John 2:19). But it speaks to how far we have fallen and how blinded we have become to even say such a thing with a straight face. The only thing left in Ann Rice’s spiritual landscape is the name of her Savior; the very God who hung on the cross so that she would be allowed to claim Him as savior- or reject Him. Unfortunately, Rice, and all of who believes as she does, will discover the devastating choice she made when Judgment Day rolls around. She can refuse to be anti-gay, anti birth control, anti-feminist all she wants. And she, and all who refuse the Way of Jesus will hear this:

“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter. “Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ “And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.’ (Matthew 7:21-23)

Christian, if you have the Spirit in you, your walk should be closer each today to Him. If you wonder whether you are saved (or are considering “leaving Christianity”), then pray, pray hard and do a heart-check. Appeal to Him to forgive your sins and then repent, which means turn away from temptations and lifestyles that draw you back into lawlessness. It’s now, or then. And for eternity’s sake, turn from lawlessness NOW.

 

Posted in discernment, theology

What does Jesus think about discernment? This verse tells you

Posted on by elizabethprata

We live in an age where fellow Christians say that to speak of someone specific being a false teacher is mean, or ill-mannered, or inappropriate. “Just let them alone, God will take care if them,” they say. Or they claim that speaking against false teaching is uncivil, and to “Just pray for them.” Many of thems ay, “You can’t know if he/she is false, you don’t know their heart.”

The skill of discernment (and the gift, too) involves vigilance. It is extremely important. John MacArthur wrote,

In its simplest definition, discernment is nothing more than the ability to decide between truth and error, right and wrong. Discernment is the process of making careful distinctions in our thinking about truth. In other words, the ability to think with discernment is synonymous with an ability to think biblically.

Every book of the New Testament (except Philemon) has some passage or chapter devoted to its writer urging fellow Christians to practice discernment in order to combat some false teaching or other. Jude is entirely taken up with the topic. And the exhortations in those books of the Bible are not to stand by and let false teachers be. Those admonishments are not to tolerate false teaching and wait until Jesus comes back to judge it. Not only the NT writers, but Jesus also has some very explicit thoughts about churches that practice discernment. And those instructions are not to overlook it, be passive abou ti, or ignore it. Quite the opposite.

You might know that the book of Revelation is a considered an apocalyptic book. It deals with last things, and Jesus’ return in victory. However the first two chapters are letters to churches of the time, but also warnings and encouragements for us in this day and all present days. Some churches received a commendation only, some received a hard warning only and most churches received a little of both.

In the letter to the church at Ephesus, we read that Jesus directed the apostle John to write,

I know your works, your toil and your patient endurance, and how you cannot bear with those who are evil, but have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and found them to be false. (Revelation 2:2).

In this letter, Jesus opens by congratulating the church for being discerning. They are lauded for their persevering efforts to retain the highest purity possible in their church. How? First, they can’t bear the evil ones in their midst, and second, they tested those who call themselves teachers. Their discernment was apparently a skilled discernment, because Jesus congratulates them for worming out which teachers were false.

Never, ever let anyone tell you that discernment is unnecessary.

John MacArthur preached on this verse from Revelation, saying in part,

Beyond that, verse 3 says something else about them: ‘You cannot tolerate evil men. You cannot tolerate evil men.’ They were intolerant of sin. They were sensitive to the presence of evil. They hated evildoers as God hates evildoers. They resented evil; they resented evildoers. They resented sin; they resented sin in the church. They recognized the damage that sin does to the fellowship and the testimony. They saw that sin in the church destroys the unity of the church and destroys the testimony of the church. They hated all that was morally bad, all that was spiritually bad. They knew that a little leaven leavens the whole lump.

…Or, you could say this: ‘You put to the test those who call themselves apostles, and they are not, and you found them to be false.’ This is a church with discernment.

Where does discernment come from? Well, where does discernment come from; clearly, it comes from a knowledge of the truth, right? The only way you can discern error is know what? Truth. You have to have the truth in order to see the error.

Many evil people come into the congregations, particularly in the early church. Satan was infiltrating these early churches all the time. Judaizers, false teachers were everywhere. This church took the warning seriously.

Read or listen to the full sermon here

Practice discernment, whether you have been given the spiritual gift or not. It matters to Jesus. And if it matters to Jesus, it should matter to us.

discernment

Posted in discernment, theology

Music in worship

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

I saw a couple of quotes today one after the other (not linked or published on purpose, just happenstance) that made me think about music in worship once again.

Not to debate contemporary vs. traditional. Though I’m a huge traditionalist, I’m also a realist, and I know there has been good music written after 1900, though, lol.

I enjoyed my own church’s service yesterday, as I always do. We are a nearly three-year church plant. We have a plurality of elders (4), a time of confession during the service, and good music. It’s a mixture of old and new. The team takes care to select songs and hymns that match the theme of the sermon.

Music isn’t all there is to a service, meaning, it’s not primary. But it’s not secondary either. It’s important and has its place. Yesterday I was thinking about how important it is when we hear the word preached and when we sing and hear the song words sung. It is all supposed to edify us.

Ligonier tweeted,

Ligonier Ministries, @Ligonier
3:30 PM – 29 Jul 2018

We should be careful about the words of the music we sing and ensure that those words communicate truth. —@RCSproul

My friend Rachel tweeted,

Rachel, @REL4077
8:21 PM – 29 Jul 2018

I’ve listened to a lot of Christian music from the 70s/80s and a lot of CM from that time focused so much on Christ’s return, who Jesus is, and the need to share the Gospel. What happened since then that we have songs about reckless love and our “messed up” lives?!! Give me Jesus.

I agree. To that end, here is a thoughtful article from the Reformed Church in America. (Note: I liked the article but don’t know much about the website as a whole, but they seem a bit social justic-y to me “make the world a better place”, and they use the word ‘broken’.)

This article lists some thoughtful things about how we approach music in worship.

THE THEOLOGY AND PLACE OF MUSIC IN WORSHIP

Here are just a few quotes from the article, which again, I enjoyed. It outlines some facts about music in worship and then outlines a framework to think about when selecting music.

The church’s ministry of song is for the edification of God’s people

The church’s ministry of song is for the glory of God
It is also important that the emotional power of music in worship be evocative rather than manipulative, honest rather than manufactured, and that the congregation’s singing allow for the full range of emotions in worship.

Does our congregational singng include the many moods and types of prayer, including praise, thanksgiving, confession, lament, intercession, and dedication? A congregation which sings only “upbeat” praise choruses and hymns, for example, will have a diminished and restricted understanding of prayer.

I pray that you enjoy the thoughts here, the article at thelink, and most of all, music in worship.

music verse 1

Posted in discernment, theology

One more thought on direct revelation

Posted on by elizabethprata

Yesterday I wrote an essay describing the preeminence of Jesus and how God in Hebrews 1:1-2 said He has spoken through His Son. What this means, for claimants of direct revelation, is that once God said He has spoken through His perfect, holy, supreme being of His son, God then chose to speak to and through Joe Blow in Peoria and Jane Q. Public in Waco? No. Jesus’ preeminence means God has the perfect vessel through which to speak, He has spoken, and He is no longer speaking through prophets, bushes, donkeys, mountains, or men. I’d made the bold claim that if a person says they have heard directly from God or Jesus, they do not believe Jesus is preeminent.

This post is a PS to that thought regarding direct revelation. It involves the content of these supposed revelations.

One thing you notice about these revelations, visions, dreams and intuitions, is that the content of them is small. They usually involve advice on jobs, careers, or other personal mundanities. If they involve biblical content, the revelations do not usually align with the Bible. Sarah Young, author of Jesus Calling, comes to mind, where the totality of her revelations are strikingly similar to one another and to what a middle aged white woman in America would say or think, not God’s grand redemptive plan. For example,

Softly I announce my Presence. Shimmering hues of radiance tap gently at your consciousness, seeking entrance. Though I have all Power in heaven and on earth, I am infinitely tender with you…

Like He was with Saul/Paul? Thrown to the ground and blinded?

The-Conversion-of-Saul-by-Michelangelo
The Conversion of Saul, by Michaelangelo

My face is shining upon you, beaming out Peace that transcends understanding. You are surrounded by a sea of problems, but you are face to face with Me, your Peace… ~Sarah Young, Jesus Calling

‘Beaming out peace’ to even one of His believers?

zechariah
The angel strikes Zechariah mute

In the past, when God spoke to people or through intermediaries, did He dispense personal advice? Suggest jobs or where to buy a house? Promise career success? Give tips on how to resolve that prickly relationship with the mother-in-law? No, He only spoke of His redemptive plan or addressed immediate circumstances if it affected His redemptive plan, not the minutiae of personal life. See these excerpted thoughts from the Titus Institute. (Other than this one article I am not familiar with the Titus Institute, though it seems to be a good resource on first glance).

How Has God Spoken To His People Throughout the OT and NT?

After the fall, what we see throughout the Scriptures is God communicating with specific individuals at specific times for specific purposes that always involve his redemptive plan. He only addressed personal sin or other personal issues when it involved his redemptive plan.

God spoke to our forefathers (OT believers) through the prophets and has spoken to us (NT believers) in his Son.

God spoke to the people of Israel through intermediaries, the prophets. When he spoke to the prophets, it always had to do with his redemptive plan, not personal issues in their lives unless it involved his redemptive plan.

The pattern in both the OT and NT is God speaking to his people through intermediaries and those intermediaries receiving revelation only regarding matters involving God’s redemptive plan. Those intermediaries were then to speak to God’s people about righteousness. This involved preaching about what is good and right before God and about what is sin and evil before God which we as God’s people are to apply in our lives.

Those intermediaries then wrote that revelation down which became the OT and NT.
Even when God spoke to these intermediaries, we see infrequent communication rather than frequent regular communication.

He spoke to Noah 5 times over 950 yrs, Abraham 8 times over 175 yrs, Isaac 2 times and 1 time to Rebekah over 180 yrs, Jacob 7 times and 1 time to Laban over Jacob’s lifetime. These are just some examples.

We also see that God does not address personal issues, only issues that involve his redemptive plan.

In the New Testament,

Two major things we notice, the revelation from God was infrequent and it was purposeful, always concerning Peter and Paul’s ministry, not personal matters.
Most of the time, Peter and Paul were ministering for the Lord without receiving direct revelation from the Lord.

Even at important times of decision the Lord did not always speak to them. In Acts 1:21-26, Peter used the casting of lots to determine the Lord’s will. In Acts 6:1-7, there is no record of revelation regarding the selection of men for the widow’s ministry. In Acts 15, there is no record of revelation in the first doctrinal crisis of the early church regarding what is necessary to be saved.

We see that man forfeited at the fall, direct communication with God on a personal basis. He then only received direct revelation through intermediaries. God communicated infrequently and only as He deemed necessary to fulfill His redemptive plan.

When we get to heaven we will have direct communication with God again. That is part of the blessing of redemption.

Now Ladies, if you would, please think of how often we hear and see today’s ‘Bible teachers’ claim they heard personally from God. Then please compare with God’s actual activity recorded in the Bible. Think about how infrequently He spoke and about what kinds of things He said.

Beware of ‘teachers’ who claim to have had revelations apart from the Bible. If you think you have had a revelation yourself, please re-think that and refer again to the scripture in Hebrews 1:1-2. God spoke through His Son, who appeared in the flesh on earth to seek and save the lost, to die in our place for our sin, and who rose again to take His place next to the father. He is THE Word. His life and teachings are recorded in the Bible, which would take years and lifetimes to learn, understand.

The Bible is enough. More than enough, it’s a gift beyond measure. When we are glorified we’ll have an eternity of direct communication with our Savior. For now, rest on His written word, and do not seek vain communiques from a disembodied voice.

Posted in discernment, theology

If you think God is speaking directly today, here is what that means…

Posted on by elizabethprata

A follow-up to this essay is here, One more thought on direct revelation

By Elizabeth Prata

Women have for at least two generations now, grown up in the faith with famous or celebrity women Bible teachers claiming to have had personal revelations and interactions with Jesus. They say “God told me” or “God laid it on my heart to tell you” or “I want to share some of the messages I have received” or “I heard Him specifically say…” Their persistent claims of direct revelation outside of the Bible has normalized it when it was never even normal in Bible times! Worse, it has accomplished two things:

–de facto declared the insufficiency of the Bible
–made a generation of women illiterate, because why do the hard work of studying the Bible when it can just plop down from the sky?

God is not speaking today to people outside of His word.

Whenever I or any of my friends say this, we receive tremendous push back. We are charged with proving it. We are told we’re wrong/bad/ignorant of scripture or history. Or, demands are made for scriptures that say so. But when provided, those very scriptures are dismissed. We are given the excuse that we must not “put God in a box” because, after all, He has the ability to do anything He wants, including speak to us in any way or at any time He wants.

It’s true that in the past He spoke in many different ways. He spoke directly to man (Adam, Noah, Moses et al), through rituals, ceremonies, from the sky, from the mountain, a donkey, angels, prophets, and a burning bush.

I want to come at this from a different tack today. I was listening to Steven J. Lawson preach Hebrews 1:1-4. This is the classic text that declares that God has ceased speaking because, though He spoke in many ways in prior ages, He has spoken finally in this age, through His Son. WHat came to my mind as Lawson preached was this:

Jesus is the Supreme Being of the Universe. He is the unrivaled supreme one.

And that is why God is not speaking to you.

The previous ways God spoke to man described above are indicative of His progressive revelation. God was building revelatory knowledge of His redemptive plan thread by thread, weaving a picture in His tapestry of redemption through the ages. The pinnacle, the capstone, the zenith of that picture, is Christ. Jesus is God’s exact imprint. (Hebrews 1:3). He is the ultimate. He is the highest. He is all-authority. He said and did everything the Father wanted, perfectly. God’s words, His concepts, and His principles are supreme overall, and represent His final word through Christ.

People who insist that God or Jesus speaks to them, do you really think that after having set Jesus up as His apex, declaring Himself pleased, that God will then will go lower and speak through you? When He has Jesus He’s spoken through, He will speak through you instead?

Will God choose to speak through sinful flesh, when He has His own exact imprint of glory and perfection through which He has already spoken? What a ghastly thought! May it never be!

If you believe Jesus is speaking through you, or your favorite Bible ‘teacher’ or author, you do not hold Jesus as supreme. It is as simple as that.

No, the superiority of Christ drowns out every other voice!
~Steve Lawson sermon on Hebrews 1:1-4 The Unrivaled Supremacy of Christ

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. (Colossians 1:15-20).

god is not speaking he is preeminent

A follow-up to this essay is here, One more thought on direct revelation

Posted in discernment, theology

“Lord, Lord” is such a woeful verse

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ Mt 7:22.

How many is many? The word for ‘many’ is:

polýs – many (high in number); multitudinous, plenteous, “much”; “great” in amount (extent). (Strong’s).

This is terrible to think. It seems that the visible church is filled with believers, but the verse is saying that many aren’t believers after all. I worry for others, but also for myself. “Examine yourselves, whether you be in the faith“. 2 Corinthians 13:5.

Do business with Jesus today, this very day, while there is still time. Here are some resources

Is It Real? : 11 Biblical Tests of Genuine Salvation

What are some of the signs of genuine saving faith?

Assurance of Salvation: You Can Be Sure

Toshiba Exif JPEG