“For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, 4and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.” (2 Timothy 4:3-4).
Itching ears…an itch must be scratched, right? Have you ever had an itch and tried not to scratch, just to see how long you can go? LOL, I do that. I can’t go very long in resisting it. If it is at a hard to reach place like the middle of my back I go find the screwdriver or the scissors and get back there and scratch it. It feels so good to get that itch satisfied!
Have you ever heard the phrase, “I’ve got an itch to…”? Like, ‘I’ve got an itch to drive to town and get some ice cream.’ In this sense, itch means to have a persistent, restless craving. For the ungodly whose ears itch, they have restless cravings that must be satisfied- but never are. Only the Lord satisfies. We feel full after a good meal of the word. A believer’s ears don’t itch.
Joel Osteen’s crowd stays large because though their ears were satisfied on Sunday with the feel good message, it didn’t satisfy the itch because it didn’t reach a regenerated heart. So they go back there and try to get it scratched again….and again…and again.
They’re listening to the wrong message from the wrong person at the wrong place.
“You have neither listened nor inclined your ears to hear, although the Lord persistently sent to you all his servants the prophets,” (Jeremiah 25:4).
May your ears never itch!
The antidote for ensuring we do not wander off into myths and have our ears become consumed with itching, is what Paul said in the verse immediately prior to the itching ears one.
“preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching.” (2 Timothy 3:2)
Study the word, preach the word, and be ready at all times, in season and out of season. That’s the antitdote!
“For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, 4and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.” (2 Timothy 4:3-4).
Why is sound doctrine important? At the World View Weekend conference in Branson MO, Mike Gendron explained why. A former Catholic for 30 years, Mr Gendron became saved. He left a career as a rocket scientist (really) and evangelizes widely. He is specifically ministers in bringing the Gospel to Catholics. A graduate of Dallas Theological Seminary, he writes at Proclaiming The Gospel. He said at the conference,
“Why there is so little discernment in the church? Preachers preach what the people want instead of what they need. They don’t want sound doctrine, so pastors give feel good messages that tickle their ears build up their self-esteem. So without sound doctrine many in the church today don’t really think it matters what you call a Christian as long as you label it Christianity…they want to feel good, not made good by the preaching of God’s word. … So what’s at stake if we abandon sound doctrine? The glory and honor of our great Lord. The purity of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Ultimately, the eternal destiny of those who are not hearing the truth from pulpits today. … Without discernment we will not know if we are believing and proclaiming the true gospel or a compromised distortion.”
“Today, as we’ve been saying, evangelical church and leaders are saying anyone who says he’s a Christian is a Christian. Anybody who says they believe in Jesus is a Christian…liberal, Protestants, charismatic, Roman Catholic, orthodox, sort of free-floating unattached people who believe in Jesus. Anybody who claims to be a Christian can be tested by truth and virtue. This is critical. Real deliverance produces a changed life.”
Remember not everyone who says they are a Christian IS a Christian. The proof is the fruit produced from a Holy Spirit empowered changed life. In order to even see fruit (or lack of fruit) we need to be discerning.
“If there’s any problem that outstrips all other problems in the church, it is this problem of a lack of discernment, the lack of spiritual discrimination because then everybody is vulnerable. And imagine living in a time when not only is the church undiscerning, but sees discernment as a threat to its life and unity. It’s just amazing. Widespread ignorance, shallow understanding of Scripture, superficiality interpreting the Bible, faulty reasoning, bad decisions just bring horrendous agony to the church. How foolish can we be? I mean, the Bible is so consistent in telling us beware of ear-tickling teachers, beware of departing from the faith, beware of heresies, doctrines of demons, destructive myths, perverse teachings, commandments of men, speculations, controversial issues, old wives fables, deceitful spirits, worldly tales, false knowledge, science falsely so-called, empty philosophy, traditions of men, worldly wisdom, adulterations of the Scripture and on and on and on and on.” “The Responsibilities of the Church“
“As a result, evangelical Christianity, listen to this, is fighting for its very life. I’ll say that again, evangelical Christianity, in my view, is fighting for its very life. And our time cries out for people with discernment.” “A Call for Discernment, Part 1“
You can see it nowadays, can’t you. Christianity is under assault from every direction, every day. The Lord said that His church will not fail, so we can thank Him for stalwart believers. But the assaults to the faith are real and very potent.
AW Tozer wrote, “The healthy soul, like the healthy blood system, has its proper proportion of white and red blood cells. The red corpuscles are like faith: they carry the life giving oxygen to every part of the body. The white cells are like discernment: they pounce upon dead and toxic matter and carry it out to the drain. Thus the two kinds of cells working together keep the tissues in good condition. In the healthy heart there must be provision for keeping dead and poisonous matter out of the life stream.”
It’s a vivid and apt metaphor, isn’t it? I can really picture how faith and discernment works in the body. I’d like to add one more medical metaphor to the situation, Paul’s use of the word gangrene in 2 Timothy.
“But avoid irreverent babble, for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness, 17and their talk will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus, 18who have swerved from the truth, saying that the resurrection has already happened. They are upsetting the faith of some.” (2 Timothy 2:16-18)
Paul’s use of gangrene is good here. In his time, the smallest cut could render a person dead in days. Even in the twentieth century, blood poisoning was an extreme issue. The Earl of Carnarvon died that way. George Herbert (Earl of Carnarvon) family was of the family that owns Highclere Castle, the setting for the well-known British production of the television show Downton Abbey. The 5th Earl of Carnarvon was the chief financial backer on many of Howard Carter’s Egyptian excavations, and sponsored the excavation that discovered King Tut’s tomb. While in Egypt on expedition on March 25, 1923, the Earl Carnarvon/George Herbert got a mosquito bite. He nicked it with his razor when shaving, and the bite became infected. He died on April 5th. It only took ten days for blood poisoning to kill a healthy man.
Gangrene was a worse killer in Paul’s day. It’s important to realize that the white blood cells (the discerning among the body) must leap on the toxic cell. The toxic cell is not there to unite with you, praise Jesus with you, or do good works with you. The toxic cell is there to kill you.
What does gangrene do to a body? Staying with the medical analogy for a moment, put into your mind the Tozer analogy of the white and red blood cells and the blood flowing in your veins. Blood actually flows in your body as it metaphorically flows in the body of Christ.
The medical definition states, “Gangrene is the death of tissue in part of the body.” We know the global born-again church is a body. Jesus uses the metaphor of us being the body and He being the head. (Colossians 1:18). Gangrene is literally the death of some of the living tissue by not allowing the blood to pass through. No blood means death to living tissue.
Gangrene spreads fast. Where the dead tissue exists, it must be cut out, or it will contaminate the adjoining tissue and kill it too. So in continuing the metaphor, if the infectious doctrine is not cut out immediately, it will spread like a toxic wildfire and consume the flesh of all who come into contact with it and deny the blood. The corrupted flesh must be excised, either by a medical procedure called a debridement, or an amputation.
Jesus said in Matthew 18:8, “And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire.”
The word is the answer. The word is always the answer! In order to proclaim it, one must read it and study it. Paul was speaking to Timothy as pastor, and we are all not pastors, but we are all evangelists. We must be ready in season and out of season to know our doctrine. The absence of sound doctrine means you could make a shipwreck of your faith. (1 Timothy 1:20).
When you’re at sea and in a storm, what’s the first thing they do for you? Throw out a life ring.
If you hang on to sound doctrine, you will not be shipwrecked, you will be reeled back in. Knowing your sound doctrine means also that you will be discerning. If you think of it this way- reading your bible and studying sound doctrine is the most loving thing you can do not just for yourself, but for your brother. If you see a fellow sister or brother wandering off to myths and turning away, don’t you want to have the right tools to throw out to them?
“And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.” (Philippians 1:9-11)
David sang to the LORD after being delivered to a military victory.
“The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold and my refuge, my savior; you save me from violence. I call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies. (2 Samuel 22:2-4)
How much more should we sing of the Lord who delivered us from the enemy of sin, and the violence of the devil? How much more should we praise His holy name for being our fortress and deliverer, accomplished by using His own body, broken and punctured, dead on the cross while enemies mocked? How much more should we sing of Him who rose from the dead, conquering death so that we could conquer death, and be with Him forever? How much more should we sing of Jesus who is our shield and is the very horn of salvation?
Praise our Lord today! Sing, laugh, praise, and proclaim His goodness for all His works! I pray you are victorious in Jesus today!
There is a lot going on in the Eastern part of the world. Uprisings and police action in Turkey, election in Iran, pressure on Israel for peace talks, Russia and US at odds…and a lot going on in the US with wildfires, storms, and our own political problems (Obamacare, PRISM, IRS spying. etc).
There is a lot going on inside the church, too with apostasy and false doctrines popping up everywhere. It is really like a tsunami of falling away right now and keeping up with what is happening in the global church and from what direction is enough to give a watchman whiplash and nausea.
A kind reader let me know that there is stuff going in in South America. Let’s take a look at a different hemisphere for a moment. Brazil is currently having the biggest protests that nation has seen for 20 years.
“As many as 200,000 demonstrators marched through the streets of Brazil’s biggest cities on Monday in a swelling wave of protest tapping into widespread anger at poor public services, police violence and government corruption. The marches, organized mostly through snowballing social media campaigns, blocked streets and halted traffic in more than a half-dozen cities, including Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Belo Horizonte and Brasilia, where demonstrators climbed onto the roof of Brazil’s Congress building and then stormed it. Monday’s demonstrations were the latest in a flurry of protests in the past two weeks that have added to growing unease over Brazil’s sluggish economy, high inflation and a spurt in violent crime. While most of the protests unfolded as a festive display of dissent, some demonstrators in Rio threw rocks at police, set fire to a parked car and vandalized the state assembly building. Vandals also destroyed property in the southern city of Porto Alegre.”
The citizens on reddit who post there, insist that the protests are for the most part, peaceful. One reader answered, “Since a lot of people are asking why the people are upset: It began with a raise on Bus Fares, and now it’s growing to corruption and the world cup bill. We have really bad public services, and we pay a lot of taxes.”
On the video above, the citizen journalist says that the protests in Brazil are not being reported in the West, and that admittedly “you may not have heard of this with Turkey and Syria’s uprising, it is difficult to keep track with everything that goes on in the world. Eventually, international news outlets might report what is happening down here, but they might portray the protesters as criminals and vandals and delinquents. It is of extreme importance that the truth reaches you before they do.”
His channel is called #ChangeBrazil. He goes on to say specifically of the current protests (he recorded it on June 14, 2013), and note his perception of the wealth and social gap, which I’ll go back to in a moment-
“This is what happens when a society is forced to put up with ludicrous and nonsensical laws that are created only to only benefit the lawmakers themselves, and which results in wealth and social gaps so outrageous it would be cause for hilarity if they were not not so true.”
The rise in bus fares for the poor in the face of a wealth gap; plus excessive government spending to prepare for the World Cup, is inflaming the beleaguered hearts of the Brazilian populace. In another video a woman named Carla said of the World Cup, that the spending to prepare for this year’s World Cup of 30 Billion dollars by building a new stadium is more spending than the last three World Cups put together, which was about 25 Billion.”
Her concern is that in a country where illiteracy can reach 21%, and averages 10%, and which ranks 85 in the human development index, where 13 million people are underfed every day, “does that country need more stadiums?”
“As many as 200,000 people have marched through the streets of Brazil’s biggest cities, as protests over rising public transport costs and the expense of staging the 2014 World Cup have spread. The biggest demonstration was in Rio de Janeiro, where 100,000 people joined a mainly peaceful march. In the capital, Brasilia, people breached security at the National Congress building and scaled its roof. The protests are the largest seen in Brazil for more than 20 years. … The way these initial marches were policed – with officers accused of firing rubber bullets and tear gas at peaceful protesters – further incensed Sao Paulo residents and shifted the focus from rising transport costs to wider issues. “For many years, the government has been feeding corruption, people are demonstrating against the system,” Graciela Cacador told Reuters news agency.”
“The underlying frustration people feel about their lives runs deep. A specific frustration (bus fares, World Cup stadium) once expressed in a civic demonstration of whatever kind, often touches off the general dissatisfaction a person feels about the injustice of life in general. It’s the same thing as when we argue with our spouse over who drank the last of the milk and put the empty carton back in the fridge. He or she asks, “what’s the matter? and you get a churlish “Nothing” in response, and after further pressing, the argument explodes. As the argument goes on, you hear “Yeah? And another thing…remember that time you…!!” Once you give voice to the frustration past frustrations pile on and angrily come out.
The mass of people gathered at Sao Paulo’s Largo da Batata was impressive – but more impressive was that after the demonstration began, thousands more kept arriving, streaming peacefully towards the city’s main avenues in a constant flow. Their bright banners bore diverse demands – but all reflected a fatigue with what people here get from the state. I repeatedly heard the word “tired”: protesters told me they were tired of corruption, of nepotism, of high taxes paid for poor public services. … This protest was mirrored on the streets of Rio, Brasilia, Belo Horizonte and other cities. Brazilians are asking for change – in a scale the country hasn’t seen for decades.”
The world is in a stage of collapse.
I’ve written before about former Soviet Union citizen Dmitry Orlov, who emigrated to the UN after the collapse of the USSR. An acutely perceptive writer, he took his first hand observations of his home society’s collapse and wrote a blog and then a book, called “The Five Stages of Collapse.” He began his public writing on this topic in 2008, when the world collapse was just gathering steam. Note Mr Orlov’s concept of the ‘mental flip’ another thing I’ll get to in a moment. He wrote,
“In this article, I proposed a taxonomy of collapse, splitting it out into five stages—financial, commercial, political, social and cultural—and tied each of the five collapse stages to the breaching of a specific level of trust, or faith, in the status quo. Although each stage causes physical, observable changes in the environment, these can be gradual, while the mental flip is generally quite swift, because it is something of a cultural universal that nobody (but a real fool) wants to be the last fool to believe in a lie.”
As social relations disintegrate their effects are felt most profoundly at the psychological level. (source) Stage 1: Financial collapse. Faith in “business as usual” is lost. Stage 2: Commercial collapse. Faith that “the market shall provide” is lost. Stage 3: Political collapse. Faith that “the government will take care of you” is lost. Stage 4: Social collapse. Faith that “your people will take care of you” is lost. Stage 5: Cultural collapse. Faith in “the goodness of humanity” is lost.
To hone in on the last two stages, Orlov wrote,
“Stage 4: Social collapse. Faith that “your people will take care of you” is lost, as local social institutions, be they charities or other groups that rush in to fill the power vacuum run out of resources or fail through internal conflict.
Stage 5: Cultural collapse. Faith in the goodness of humanity is lost. People lose their capacity for “kindness, generosity, consideration, affection, honesty, hospitality, compassion, charity” (Turnbull, The Mountain People). Families disband and compete as individuals for scarce resources. The new motto becomes “May you die today so that I die tomorrow” (Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago). There may even be some cannibalism.”
OK, let’s go back to the three things I noted in the articles:
1. wealth and social gap 2. a tired society 3. the mental flip
The one without Christ has the spirit of antichrist. (1 John 2:22-23). John wrote in that verse that the spirit of antichrist is already in the world. And so it is.
It is constantly being revealed that the world is a disbelieving world, and is against the true God. This means that the world has the spirit of antichrist. Indeed, satan is the god of this world. (2 Corinthians 4:4). The world has always had the spirit of antichrist, but we didn’t notice as much because for the most part societies seemed to behave. They seemed to be satisfied with their lives. Unless you really think about it and then you see this is not so. The world has always been in turmoil, and it shows.
The scars from war after war and uprising after uprising is the constant in history, not peace. French Revolution, American Revolution, WWI, WWII, killing fields, pogroms, concentration camps, atomic wars, protests, Occupy Wall Street, collapse of Soviet Union, Arab Spring, all these are the constant. And I haven’t even gone back very far in time, nor touched all the uprisings on other continents. As Mr Orlov wrote of the five stages of collapse, “A casual perusal of history books will show that these various stages of collapse occur with great regularity.”
It is a wheel that is spinning faster and faster. Let’s look at this diagram of the cycle put up by Health as a Bridge for Peace (HBP) project illustrating their view of the stages of conflict:
It’s an endless cycle of peace, frustration, war, reconciliation. This, of course, mirrors the life of Israel as described in the Old Testament, which in itself is a picture of man’s war with God due to sin.
The difference today is not that these protests are happening, because they always have, but that the pace of the protests in one country after another is quickening.In other words, that wheel is spinning faster and faster.
As the spirit of antichrist reveals itself more and more, and as more and more people fall away from the faith, things will get worse in every aspect of our lives, especially government. Can we expect godless leaders to be moral, just, and compassionate? In the short term, maybe for a little while. In the long run? No.
The bible says that government is supposed to serve. (Matthew 20:25-28). Government is supposed to treat us fairly and justly but sometimes it doesn’t. When that happens, we Christians are still supposed to obey because God set up all authorities on earth. (Romans 13:1-2).
An unbelieving beleaguered world population tired of the same old corruption (which is really corruption of the heart) and is calling for change, will get it. The world will be ready to submit to the antichrist’s government because as Orlov outlines, the changes that lead to external societal change happen slowly, but the mental flip happens fast.
Can you see that happening now, biblically? The antichrist will be revealed when the falling away is complete. (2 Thessalonians 2:3). Pulpit Commentary says of the falling away, that it is a religious falling away and not a political one. The verse “is to be taken generally to denote that remarkable “falling away” from Christianity concerning which Paul had instructed the Thessalonians (comp. 1 Timothy 4:1-3).”
But the religious falling away feeds into the political one. If men do not have God, they do not know how to behave. This lack of a moral structure and an unhitching from a higher power of accountability will only lead to rampant sin. And we see that it has, all over the world. As the falling away increases, sin rises, and bad behavior deepens. In other words, the feeling is, “I’m in power, I can do what I want, so why not?”
Brazilian powers-that-be have been acting this way for a long time and the people are “tired” of it. Tired of the same old lies, oppression, greed, and self-absorption. It’s the same everywhere. Is there anything more egregious than an IRS that steals from the working man with “ludicrous and nonsensical [tax] laws” as the Brazilian man said, and spends our money to stay in $3,500 a night hotel rooms? Is this a government that serves? That is fair and just?
As society is collapsing all around the world, what can’t be seen is the mental collapse. Weariness, anger, frustration, despair characterize those who are being governed. There is no relief any more from the periods of corruption in government to release the citizen to secular hope. After WWII in America, the fifties and early sixties was a period of great hope, but then there came the gender and sexual revolution, and culture radically shifted. Now we don’t catch a break for 20 years or even 10, but every five minutes it seems, some place is going bananas.
It is clear to all secular people now, that there is no hope. Yet they still look for it. They’ve tried communism, dictatorships, kings, capitalism, fascism, feudalism, papacy, socialism, every -ism possible.
Philosophers have tried their hand, too. Aristotle thought that the highest form of community is the political community because public life was more virtuous than the private. The Pharisees would eventually come to emody Aristotles’s false notion, to the disaster of Israel. Kant wrote his essay called “Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch” in 1795, describing three basic requirements for organizing human affairs to permanently abolish the threat of present and future war, and, thereby, help establish a new era of lasting peace throughout the world. It didn’t work. Joseph Smith, the Mormon, tried to usher in a theo-democracy. It didn’t work. Karl Krause suggested in his essay titled “The Archetype of Humanity”, that all the world needed was to form five regional federations: Europe, Asia, Africa, America and Australia, aggregated under a world republic. Hasn’t happened.
They are running out of ideas as to what will make the world work. The world is getting tired of trying and failing to govern itself. This pace will quicken eve faster as each day falls below the horizon and the next day arises. It is all happening so fast now.
The antichrist will have a solution for the world’s despair and frustration, and the world will buy it, to the disaster of the globe.
In the end, Jesus will show via His wrath that only He is the solution. After that, He will usher in the final government!
“For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” (Isaiah 9:6).
The universe exists so that God will accomplish the redemption of man.
It’s that simple.
“As we read in Colossians, “All things created by Him and for Him.” And what is this grand design? What is this grand purpose? What is God doing? Why did He create this universe? Why did He create the earth? Why did He put on the earth all these creatures? Why did He make man? What is the point of all of this? (Colossians 1:16).
“And the answer is, “The grand design is redemption.” The grand design is the gathering of a redeemed people into eternal glory for the purpose of worshiping Him forever and ever.” ~John MacArthur, “The Theology of Creation”
To that end, Jesus commissioned emissaries to go forth with the message of redemption, AKA the Good News AKA the Gospel. Some proclaim it nearby and others go far afield. The ones who go far are missionaries, bringing the good news to every nation, tribe, and tongue. (Matthew 18:16-20; Acts 1:8).
God will sovereignly ensure all will occur as He designed it to occur as He said in Isaiah 46:9. It will happen. He said in Isaiah 46:9. “Remember the former things long passed. I am God, there is no other. I am God, there’s no one like Me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things which have not been done saying, ‘My purpose will be established, I will accomplish all My good pleasure.’”
However, that is not to say that from our one-dimensional view down here on earth, that there won’t be heartbreaks, apparent setbacks, and distress among us as His plan is being carried out from above.
I keep up with a couple of missionaries who our denomination supports, via the Southern Baptist Convention and International Mission Board. The couple is in Central America, in the jungle. They have worked with a local man for a year who is a Pastor. This pastor travels over rough jungle roads to reach a family who lives in the jungle who had opened their home to the Pastor. He travels long to reach the place, and does the weekly bible studies. He travels so long he must stay overnight there. They had hopes to plant a church there, eventually. Above, Jungle, Wikipedia commons
This month’s mission report says that though we all expect opposition from without, the missionary couple were blindsided from within.
The local pastor who travels to the jungle there each week, “was told by the head of this family that they will no longer host the Baptist meetings. The reason: they have been led to believe by leaders of their church that Baptists do not believe in the Holy Spirit because we do not speak in tongues and have experiences like being “slain in the Spirit.” This is not the first time we have encountered this attitude from those we call our brothers in Christ.”
Until now, the worst battles had been against shamanism, Mayanism and Catholicism, all of which are so rampant in Central & South America. But now missionaries must also battle the worst examples of Pentecostalism from inside our own Protestant denominations? Sad!
The same is happening in Africa. Pastor Conrad Mbewe of Reformed Baptist Church in Lusaka, Zambia speaks often about evangelical issues in Africa. One of the issues with the decline of the church in his native land, he says, have also been the excesses of Charismatic Pentecostalism. Above, Africa.
“A century or two ago, Christian missionaries came from the West and taught us the Bible. As a result of this, we did away with polygamy, cannibalism, tribal feuds, etc. We were taught to put on more clothing to hide our nakedness. We learned to desist from tattooing our bodies, which were now temples of the living God. We even stopped sacrificing our babies to ancestral spirits.”
“I am reminded of the many claims to healings that are made by “anointed” Charismatic preachers. Every week, there are tens of thousands of miracle services conducted across the country and the continent. When I say that these are just publicity and fundraising gimmicks, sincere Christians are often horrified at my saying so. When I then ask them to give me the name and address of one person whom they know who was once blind but now sees, or was a cripple (on a wheelchair or on crutches) who now walks, or was deaf and dumb but now speaks, they suddenly sober up and admit that they do not know anyone. “Sources” have told them of many people who have been healed.”
“What information would be helpful for Evangelicals in the West to know about the state of the African church?“
Pastor Mbewe responded,
The Christians in the economically and educationally challenged areas of Central Africa are in a state of what I call “blessed ignorance.” I find that in general their hearts are with Christ and they are faithful followers of His, but they lack the theological refinement necessary to get all their ducks in a row. The people have “low expectations of their leaders’ educational qualifications to preach.” It is in these areas where rampant health-wealth-prosperity preaching and extreme charismatic practices are most common and leave the church in a state of immaturity.
As for what’s happening in Asia, there is a terrible influence of the healing-miracle-prosperity church there, too, especially in Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, and Cambodia, thanks to a charismatic South Korean named Pastor Lee at Manmin Church. We read,
“Abundant Fruit of the Holiness Gospel Has Been Borne in Thailand “ “Amazing works of the Holy Spirit unfolded and abundant fruit of the holiness gospel was borne even in Thailand where the 95 % of population is Buddhist. … Additionally, Thai Com 5 satellite TV has broadcast GCN TV programs, such as Dr. Lee’s sermons and the programs on the works of God’s power, nationwide. Since innumerable people watch the programs, the holiness gospel is being spread rapidly. Amazing works took place through the handkerchief prayer on which Dr. Lee had prayed. Even sorcerers and shamans accepted the Lord through the handkerchief prayer (Acts 19:11-12). Pastor Sungchil Lee has given glory to God by holding meetings in many areas of Thailand in September 2009, November 2010, and February 2011. Countless people were healed of their diseases in the meetings.”
“This book explains why Pentecostal and Charismatic Christianity is a rapidly growing global phenomenon. Although often caricatured and reduced to speaking in tongues (glossolalia), prosperity, or snake handling, this volume reveals that the primary appeal of pentecostalism is divine healing and deliverance from demons. Globalization heightens the threat and fear of disease, fueling growth of religions that are centrally concerned with healing. In Latin American, Asian, and African countries where world Christianity is growing most rapidly, as many as 80 to 90 percent of first-generation Christians attribute their conversions primarily to healing for themselves or family members.
Even in the United States, 62 percent of Pentecostals report healing experiences. Contrary to popular stereotypes of flamboyant, fraudulent, anti-medical “faith healing” televangelists who preach a materialistic, “health-and-wealth gospel” or sensational “exorcism” of demons, this book offers a more nuanced portrait. The chapters illumine local variations, hybridities, and tensions in practices, depict human suffering and powerlessness, and explain the attractiveness to many of a global religious movement that promises material relief and empowerment by invoking “miracles” and spiritual resources. Achieving the twin goals of thick description and comparative analysis of global practices is best achieved by bringing area experts into conversation. Sociologists, anthropologists, historians, political scientists, theologians, and religious studies scholars from the United States, Europe, and Africa write about illness and healing on six continents. Read together, these chapters generate and set the agenda for a new program of scholarly inquiry into some of the largest forces of change reshaping today’s world—globalization, pentecostalism, and healing.”
I’ve striven to show you both personal and widespread examples of the worst excesses of the
Charismatics that are happening in Latin America, Asia and Africa and the devastating impact on the church. The tomfoolery you view each day on TBN is not just contained in American broadcast media and a few churches at the fringes of the faith. It is a widespread, global phenomenon that is killing the church.
“However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”” (Luke 18:8b).
The answer is yes, because God purposes to bring a group He’s selected for His son to redemption as His Son’s bride. It will happen. But the falsity of the false church which abuses the Holy Spirit is daily being revealed and the stain of is is spreading.
When I refer to the excessive charismatic aspects of Pentecostalism, I’ve said “fringe” or “excesses” etc, so it is clear to you that I do not indict an entire denomination. As John MacArthur said in his essay, “Encouragement to Faithful Pentecostals,” “There are those in charismatic and Pentecostal churches who love Christ, serve His people, and—like John—are disturbed by the sinful excesses they see dominating the charismatic movement.”
He said, however, that they need to speak up against the abuses against the Holy Spirit with the ridiculous excesses of tongues, slain in the spirit falling down, toking the spirit, laughing in the spirit and so-called miracles and alleged healings. Speak. Up.
John MacArthur and colleagues are speaking up. He has organized a conference called Strange Fire. The Strange Fire conference “will boldly and thoroughly deal with prosperity preachers, faith healers, and many of the other familiar charismatic aberrations and blasphemies of the Holy Spirit.”
MacArthur, along with Phil Johnson, RC Sproul, Conrad Mbewe (I mentioned him up above), Tom Pennington, Steve Lawson, Nathan Busenitz, Justin Peters (I refer to him frequently regarding his monumentally helpful series “A Call For Discernment”), Todd Friel, and Joni Eareckson Tada. These speakers’ bios can be read here.
He said,
“If you believe that the baptism of the spirit is subsequent to and separate from salvation, you have now created two classes of believers. If you believe in mystical experience, transcendent esoteric kinds of supernatural things, then what you will do is depreciate study, spiritual discipline, and the means of grace by which you grow. If you exalt feeling you will denigrate reason and open the mind and the spirit, the powers that people cannot understand or deal with. And as long as these kinds of things lie at the core of Pentecostal tradition, the potential for disaster is there, and if you believe that God is still giving revelation of any kind, the lid is off.” (source)
It’s as if satan had said, “Cry ‘Havoc!’, and let slip the dogs of war,” as Shakespeare wrote in Julius Caesar. “Dog has its ordinary meaning; havoc is a military order permitting the seizure of spoil after a victory, and let slip is to release from the leash.” (Wiki)
The lid is indeed off, and nobody likes what was released. Fortunately, in this long essay for the third time, I refer back to Isaiah 46:9. “Remember the former things long passed. I am God, there is no other. I am God, there’s no one like Me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things which have not been done saying, ‘My purpose will be established, I will accomplish all My good pleasure.’”
His good pleasure is to bring a Bride to His son- us, believers in the resurrected, holy and divine Jesus. As our wedding day approaches, please pray for your own church to withstand this worldwide onslaught of Holy Spirit perverted-charismatic excess, and pray for those who are caught up in it. There are many, and we weep for them as much as we do the lost in Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Mormonism, atheism…
Won’t you be glad when satan is thrown into the Lake of Fire to deceive the nations no more! (Revelation 20:3, 10).
Writing in the mid-1500s, John Foxe was living in the midst of intense religious persecution at the hands of the dominant Roman Catholic Church. In graphic detail, he offers accounts of Christians being martyred for their belief in Jesus Christ, describing how God gave them extraordinary courage and stamina to endure unthinkable torture.
From the same link, the book’s purpose was fourfold:
Showcase the courage of true believers who have willingly taken a stand for Jesus Christ throughout the ages, even if it meant death,
Demonstrate the grace of God in the lives of those martyred for their faith,
Expose the ruthlessness of religious and political leaders as they sought to suppress those with differing beliefs,
Celebrate the courage of those who risked their lives to translate the Bible into the common language of the people.
Luke
Luke was a Gentile, possibly a Greek. It’s not known as to when or how he was converted. He was a physician in Troas and was probably converted there by Paul, especially since it was at Troas that he attached himself to Paul’s party and started traveling with them. Notice in Acts 16:8-10, that it is at Troas he switches from “they” to “we” in his text-
“So, passing by Mysia, they went down to Troas. 9And a vision appeared to Paul in the night: a man of Macedonia was standing there, urging him and saying, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” 10And when Paulc had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go on into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.”
Luke went with Paul to Philippi, but was not imprisoned with him and did not travel with him after his release. He apparently made Philippi his home and stayed for some time. It’s not until Paul’s visit to Philippi (Acts 20:5-6) about seven years later, that we again meet with Luke. From this time he again traveled with Paul and stayed with him during his journey to Jerusalem (Acts 20:6-21:18). But he disappears once more during Paul’s imprisonment at Jerusalem and Caesarea, and only shows up again when Paul starts for Rome (Acts 27:1). He then stayed with Paul through his first imprisonment (Philemon 1:24; Colossians 4:14). Many bible scholars believe Luke write his Gospel and Acts when in Rome with Paul during this time. During Paul’s second imprisonment, Luke apparently stayed nearby or with Paul, but because just before his martyrdom, Paul wrote to Timothy and said, “only Luke is with me.” (2 Timothy 4:11).
After Paul’s death, Luke apparently continued to evangelize as he had learned to do with Paul. Exactly when and how he died is unknown. One ancient source states “He served the Lord without distraction, having neither wife nor children and at the age of 84 he fell asleep in Boeatia (Place unknown), full of the Holy Spirit.” Another early source said he went to Greece to evangelize, and was there martyred by being hung from and olive tree in Athens in AD 93.
United States Geological Society (USGS) rates a quake major if it is over 6.0 in magnitude. Each year, the average number of 6.0-6.9 quakes occurring in that range for the entire year is 134. So far this year (2013) there have been 60 in the 6.0+ range. There have been four this week.
Comparing last year at this same time, the number of quakes in the 6.0-6.9 range was 59.
Let’s compare this half-year to last year’s half-year. The number of quakes in the year 2012 between magnitude 4.0-9.9 from Jan 1- June 15 are 4,266.
The number of quakes in the year 2013 between magnitude 4.0-9.9 from Jan 1- June 15 were 6,130.
Looking at a longer term trend for quakes between 4.0-9.9 magnitude, from Jan-June for the last 7 years:
Now, looking at only half a year is not the best way to look at data for this data set, because earthquakes don’t occur in a predictable or proportional way over the course of a year. But if wanting to use this year’s data at all, it is important to look at apples-to-apples, so I compared it that way for the previous years.
As a note, USGS changed their pages. The search page is still functional, but one critical piece is missing from the way they offered the search results before: the total count. If I want to get a total count for any search data on earthquakes, I have to copy the USGS result into Word, manually delete the extraneous information, copy all, press the number button, and look at the last line to see how many there are. It is cumbersome. As with any data gathering, the more you introduce humans monkeying with the data, the more chances there will be to introduce human error. In addition, I can’t find out how many quakes there are for the entire year because the sheer volume of copied information will crash or freeze Word.
Come on, USGS, give us the total number of quakes for our search function again. Please?
So there ya go, just FYI, some information for you at the half-way point in 2013. Does it feel like half the year is gone already? It is going so fast. Maybe July-December will be the time frame the Savior will come! One can hope for the Blessed Hope, and pray too. :). Maybe tomorrow will be the Day.
A few days ago, I read an interesting article about a man who had been living in Minnesota for decades was really a WWII SS Nazi Commander. For him to have been a commander in WWII, he’d have to be really old by now, and the story says he is 94 years of age.
I thought that was an interesting coincidence because I’d just watched a movie called “The Stranger”. This is a fictional 1946 movie about a Nazi who had masterminded the genocide of the Jews and when the war was over managed to flee Germany to the United States. He settled in a small village in New Hampshire, obtained a teaching position at an academy, and married the town scion’s daughter. It starred Orson Welles as the Nazi, Edward G. Robinson as the FBI man chasing him, and Loretta Young as the wife who married the Nazi.
The movie built its suspense, making the conclusion a sneak attack of horror. Its chosen location was a burb so guileless that patrons of the General Store helped themselves to pouring the ever-percolating pot of coffee behind the counter while the genial proprietor sat playing checkers near the woodstove with anyone who’d take him on for a quarter. There were happy teens running track, a well-attended church, and a luminous bride chirping about her white wedding.
Harper, NH is a kind of town every person could admire, life there is what we hope for, and wants life to be like. A town that’s safe, pretty, innocent, and upright.
Its stomach-turning, gasping horror was due to the juxtaposition of the clean-cut innocence of the town being gradually overcome with the stain of the evil heart of the Nazi. It was like watching a baby just out of the bath being approached by a rabid, drooling, mangy dog ready to devour it.
The movie gradually descended you into the mind of the Nazi, but the resistance of our mind to recognizing such horror is strong, especially by the young wife who had just married the evil man masked as a thoughtful teacher. In response to her father’s question about walking home after dark, she had said, “In Harper, there’s nothing to be afraid of.”
The fictional town of Harper, NH where the Nazi had come to live
The wife resisted the clear implications of her husband being a murderous Nazi, even after he confessed to two killings. He had (made up) a good reason, after all. She resisted facing the truth to the point where Robinson had to show her film of a recently liberated Concentration Camp, complete with wasted skeletons of people weakly and pitifully thanking their liberators, right down to close-ups of the skeletons in the ovens. The Stranger is said to be be the first to show actual footage of the German camps.
Loretta Young’s character had a problem facing such evil, because one would surely be able to spot it? Something about the person would set him apart from all the other people who are not so evil, surely? We as rational, innocent, good people, would be able to distinguish ourselves from the Nazis who harbored such hellish minds and dark hearts? Surely we would not … marry a person like this?
Loretta Young’s character finally broke down and faced the truth. The movie is called The Stranger and the title is apt. The stranger is not the man who came to town with all his WWII evil hidden away, the stranger is the evil that is in all of us, a potential that waits coiled up like a snake at the base of our hearts, waiting to be fed.
So having just seen the movie the night prior and then reading the article about the Minnesota man, was interesting to say the least.
Report: Former Nazi SS Officer Living In Minnesota A 94-year-old man who allegedly was a top commander of a Nazi SS unit responsible for the massacre of civilians during World War II is reportedly living quietly in Minnesota, according to an exclusive report by The Associated Press. The news agency says it obtained records through the Freedom of Information Act that show Michael Karkoc
“A June 3, 1944, photo provided by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum shows SS chief Heinrich Himmler (center) as he reviews troops of the Galician SS-Volunteer Infantry Division.” Source
lied to officials in 1949 about his past in order to immigrate to the United States. According to the AP, Karkoc concealed his military service during World War II as an officer and founding member of the SS-led Ukraine Self Defense Legion and later as an officer of the SS Galician Division. “The Galician Division and a Ukrainian nationalist organization he served in were both on a secret American government blacklist of organizations whose members were forbidden from entering the United States at the time,” the AP reports.”
Michael Karkoc Revelations: Nazi Unit Leader’s Minneapolis Life Prompts Shock “The revelation Friday that a former commander of a Nazi SS-led military unit has lived quietly in Minneapolis for the past six decades came as a shock to people who knew him, prompted harsh condemnations from World War II survivors in the U.S. and Europe, and led prosecutors in Poland to say they would investigate. … “I know him personally. We talk, laugh. He takes care of his yard and walks with his wife,” his next-door neighbor, Gordon Gnasdoskey, said Friday. Gnasdoskey, the grandson of a Ukrainian immigrant himself, said he was disturbed by the revelations about his longtime neighbor.”
St. Michael’s and St. George’s Ukrainian Orthodox Church
Karkoc is a member of the St. Michael’s and St. George’s Ukrainian Orthodox Church, seen at right, and is a member in good standing, said his pastor. The implication being, how could such a quiet man, who the day before had been seen doing normal suburban things such as cleaning his gutters, have participated in brutal and evil crimes against humanity?
Paul Washer has the answer.
“Hitler was not an anomaly. Hitler was not a phenomenon. Hitler was what everyone in this room has the potential of being. Not only that, you need to understand that even in all the wickedness of Hitler, he was still restrained by the common grace of God. And you need to know this, that if it were not for the common grace of God, restraining you in your unconverted state, you would make Hitler look like a choirboy.” Paul Washer.
The “shock” is not that there is a Nazi living among us. The shock is, that any one of us could be a Nazi.
When we come to grips with our own terrible evil, evil we use and wield against God every day, we come to better grips with His love for us. His holiness is so pure, so strong and majestic, so piercing, that even a glimpse of it terrifies the common man.
“When Moses came down from Mount Sinai, with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand as he came down from the mountain, Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God. Aaron and all the people of Israel saw Moses, and behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him.” (Exodus 34:29-30).
His perfection and holiness puts fear into us. That is because we recognize how depraved and evil we are.
Isaiah saw immediately how depraved he was, when confronted by the holiness of God. “And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5).
The delusion satan brings is that we are good, we are innocent, we are pure. Or, at least to the slightly more honest among us, we’re not so bad. “We’re not like HIM” our minds cry out when we discover that our neighbor is a Nazi. We use each other as a benchmark of progress in the goodness department, when the true standard is God. Our minds want to shrink from using Him as a benchmark because deep down we know what we are:
“The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” (Genesis 6:5).
Do you see how complete that statement is, “so great”, “every intention”, “continually”? We are saturated with sin, permeated down to the last molecule. Washer is right, “All men are born evil.”
Washer is right to say that Hitler was restrained from worse. The restrainer is holding back the full potential of sin in the human heart, and so we enjoy His common grace. But once the restrainer is out of the way,
“Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. And then the lawless one will be revealed, … The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders…” (2 Thessalonians 2:7b, 8a, 9).
In other words, watch out! ‘Satan with all power’. Everyone on earth except those who believe in Jesus after the rapture will make Hitler look like a choirboy. God’s common grace will have been removed- which will reveal the undeniable fact that everyone is not just a Hitler, but is an antichrist.
Once we understand this, the shock shifts. We are no longer shocked by the Nazi man puttering in his garden, because we see ourselves as having the same potential. The shock is, GOD LOVES US ANYWAY.
We can have a higher and deeper awe and love for Holy God because he loved each and every little Hitler on earth. Our precious Jesus died and shed His blood to save us!
“but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8).
If the Nazi in the camp had turned from the ovens and bent down and asked the Lord to forgive his sins, Jesus would have, and the Nazi would go to heaven and the Jewish man on the slab about to be put into the oven would go to hell. His infinite love forgives any sin- except the sin of rejecting Him. His love is eternal, infinite, unstoppable, and would blanket you in glory in an instant,
“because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” (Romans 10:9).
The Lord will unhesitatingly save you, and change your evil heart to a holy heart.
Last night, I was thinking about something Beth Moore said. I want to look closely at the content of what Beth Moore said in this example I will show you. I am personally offended by it and I’m spiritually grieved by it.
In a LifeToday with James Robison, a televised Christian program, Mrs Moore said, [deleted from Youtube, can now see the video here) ,
“We could live our whole believing lives through, and never make it to our promised land. We get to heaven and go ‘You were not faithful to me! You didn’t do what you said you were gonna do!’ ‘Child, I was holding every single bit of that for you. But I will insist that you cooperate with me.’ What it says over and over in this particular chapter, the number one hindrance to our calling becoming a reality, is unbelief. This is the heart of our study. Listen carefully. What God began to say to me about five years ago, and I’m telling you it sent me on such a trek with Him, that my head is still whirling over it. He began to say to me, ”I’m gonna tell you something right now, Beth; and boy, you write this one down. And you say it as often as I give you utterance to say it: ‘My Bride is paralyzed by unbelief. My Bride is paralyzed by unbelief’ … Starting with you.’ ” … Amen.”
Let’s examine each part of what she said through a biblical lens.
1. Her ‘oh, no’, scare tactic, try-harder faith is on display here. This is Legalism, also exemplified here. Example; “We could live our whole believing lives through, and never make it to our promised land.” Really? We can lose our salvation and not make it to heaven? That’s not what the Bible says. (John 3:16, Romans 8:38-39, John 10:28-29). Perhaps she was talking about unbelievers, one may protest. No, she said “believing lives.” Another may protest that perhaps she meant believers may not make it to our promised land here on earth. But this is not what the Bible teaches, either. The Bible says we are not promised ease on earth. (John 16:33; Acts 14:22). As a matter of fact this earth isn’t even our home. We should not consider earth our promised land whatsoever.
2. She degrades the holy relationship with an almighty God and promotes an earth-centric focus. Example: “We get to heaven and we might say something like this to GOD: “You were not faithful to me! You didn’t do what you said you were gonna do!” Really? When we get to heaven we are going to still be greedy for the things on earth? No. (Matthew 6:20-21).
When we get to heaven we are going to argue with God? Not hardly. We will be so overcome by His glory we will fall down. (Revelation 4:10, Isaiah 6:5, Revelation 1:17). Even Daniel when confronted with an angel from heaven, he fell down. (Daniel 10:8). But Mrs Moore teaches that when we get to heaven we’re going to cry for the things of earth and make a charge against God for their lack. This is ludicrous. In my opinion, it is blasphemous.
In actuality, Zephaniah tells the people, “Be silent before the Lord GOD! For the day of the LORD is near; the LORD has prepared a sacrifice and consecrated his guests.” (Zephaniah 1:7). And the LORD tells Zephaniah to say it again, “Be still before the LORD, all mankind, because he has roused himself from his holy dwelling.”‘ (Zephaniah 2:13).
3. She says she is a prophet. No, she doesn’t come right out and say “I am a prophet”. But she uses personal revelation and biblical language about the context of her supposed revelations to teach people that she is hearing from God and has a message from Him to proclaim. Example: “boy, you write this one down. And you say it as often as I give you utterance to say it:”
Read how God interacted with the Prophets:
“Therefore say to them, Thus declares the LORD of hosts” (Zechariah 1:3)
“Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this.” (Revelation 1:19)
“Then the LORD replied: “Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it.” (Habakkuk 2:2)
“Therefore speak to them and say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD:” (Ezekiel 14:4)
“Boy, you write this one down. And you say it as often as I give you utterance to say it:” (Moore 1:1)
Just kidding on that last one.
Either Beth Moore is a prophet like John and the rest, or she should heed what Ezekiel, a true prophet, has proclaimed from the LORD,
“Her prophets have smeared whitewash for them, seeing false visions and divining lies for them, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord GOD,’ when the LORD has not spoken.” (Ezekiel 22:28).
4. She confuses people with internally contradictory statements. Example: “My Bride is paralyzed by unbelief.” First, who is the bride? Let’s get clear on that. GotQuestions says, “The imagery and symbolism of marriage is applied to Christ and the body of believers known as the church. These are those who have trusted in Jesus Christ as their personal savior and have received eternal life. In the New Testament, Christ, the Bridegroom, has sacrificially and lovingly chosen the church to be His bride (Ephesians 5:25-27).”
So the Bride is the Church. The Church is the body of believers.
So what Moore is saying is that the global church is in a state of paralyzing unbelief. She says God told her that the church doesn’t believe. This is impossible. If you believe, you’re a member of Christ’s church. If you do not believe, you aren’t. She speaks a self-refuting idea.
Also, about being “paralyzed”. If we take her statement to be true, then what she is saying is that the global body of believers on earth, the Bride, is not operating in the Holy Spirit. If the Spirit dwells in every true believer, (and He does) and every believer is frozen and paralyzed, (what she says) then this means the Spirit is not operating, or can’t. She is saying God said the Spirit is paralyzed, frozen, and inoperable. Can this be so? No. (2 Corinthians 4:6-7). Worse, she is saying Jesus told her this. Worst of all, she said Jesus told her to teach it.
The truth is, the Spirit indwells every believer, (Romans 8:4, Ephesians 1:13b-14), and we already know that the body of Spirit-filled believers is the Bride, so what Moore is saying is that the church isn’t working. In fact, the Bible says Christ is in us, and Christ is always working. John 5:17 and Ephesians 2:2 testify that all three Persons of the Trinity are always working. To say that He isn’t, that the Spirit in His Church is paralyzed, is malignant in the extreme. I’m serious. Only satan would say that the Holy Spirit, Jesus and God is frozen and paralyzed. It is the Modern Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. Below, John MacArthur from the linked sermon:
“A way to perceive this would be to see it as a contrast to what we see in Matthew chapter 12, for example. The leaders of Israel committed the unpardonable sin and what was that unpardonable sin? It was attributing to Satan the work of the Holy Spirit. You remember that? It was attributing to Satan the work of the Holy Spirit, Matthew 12:31-32. What’s going on today is the opposite, attributing to the Holy Spirit the work of Satan. That’s what’s going on. Attributing to the Holy Spirit the work of Satan. Satan is alive and at work in deception, false miracles, bad theology, lying visions, lying dreams, lying revelations, deceptive teachers who are in it for the money and power and influence. Satan is alive and well and the work of Satan is being attributed to the Holy Spirit, that is a serious blasphemy just as attributing to Satan the work of the Holy Spirit is a serious blasphemy.”
5. Extra-biblical revelation is not to be trusted. I’ve focused on Moore’s claims of personal revelation before, here and here.
What does the Bible say about forthcoming revelation of God? (Hint: It ain’t happening).
“But in the days when the seventh angel is about to sound his trumpet, the mystery of God will be accomplished, just as he announced to his servants the prophets.” (Revelation 10:7)
Did you catch that? Just as he announced (past tense). God announced to His prophets what He was going to do. (Amos 3:7). That announcement is contained in the Bible. He has been working and will continue to do work. God’s work on earth will not be finished until the last trumpet, as Revelation shows us, but His announcement of it was. The revelation of His work on earth is concluded. Yet Beth Moore is making additional proclamations from God. Either God is lying, or Moore is. (Hint: Jesus IS the Truth, and the truth is in Him; John 14:6, Ephesians 4:21). Friends, the canon is closed and the announcement of what God plans to do was already proclaimed.
Gill’s Exposition on Revelation 10:7 says: “As He said to Isaiah 60:3, &c. and Isaiah 66:8; and to Daniel, in Daniel 2:44 Daniel 7:25; and to Zechariah, in Zechariah 14:9, and others;” Beth Moore’s name is not on that list.
For those who want to cling to Beth Moore as a teacher and defend her, saying perhaps that she didn’t mean what she said: I’m sorry. The Bible says that teachers are held to a higher standard. (James 3:1). In order to even BE a teacher one must be mature, self-controlled, vigilant and possess a host of other qualifications that qualify a deacon/teacher/overseer. This is so they will teach rightly and they can spot a false doctrine in the first place- one aspect of protecting and feeding the flock. (Acts 20:28, John 21:17). Teachers are supposed to teach rightly. (2 Timothy 2:15).
Teachers rightly dividing the word for their pupils are raising up pupils who can then turn to the scriptures to see if these things are so. (Acts 17:11). This makes the student stronger. How can a student of Beth Moore examine the scriptures to see if these things are so, if they came from her head, or a vision, and not the Bible? They can’t. And so in this way, she actually raises up people who do not rely on the word, and are weaker.
The word is all-sufficient. (2 Timothy 3:15-17). That’s why we rely on it!
We don’t judge a teacher as false by one thing they said, once. We give the benefit of the doubt, and watch carefully for a long time, comparing their words and teachings to scripture. One misstep does not make a false teacher, perhaps, but a long pattern of variance with the Bible, does.
Mrs Moore has passed the time of benefit of doubt and has proven over long years that her words, doctrines and actions are not to be trusted. I am not the only person who has compared what she says and does to the sterling Word and found that she is not to be recommended. The Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry has found the same, and so has Rev. Mike Abendrothof Bethlehem Bible Church, and Rev. Jim Murphy of First Baptist Church at Johnson City, NY, and Shai Linne, Modern Reformation, and Pastor Tim Challies, and so on.
In this post, I’ve striven to not only open your eyes to the poor theology and confusing doctrines of Beth Moore, but I’ve also striven to show you how to parse these things for yourself. To stop and really think about what a teacher is saying, phrase by phrase, and to compare it carefully to the Bible. The Bereans sought the scriptures to see if these things were so, and that bespeaks of having a constant stance of asking ‘are these things so?’ If they believed Paul on his face they would not have sought the scriptures, would they? Constantly testing all things, all spirits, is what we are called to do. (1 John 4:1). And don’t stop there. If you have found things that are NOT so, don’t keep it to yourself. The church at Thyatira tried to do that, (Revelation 2:20) and were charged by Jesus for it. Speak up. Be brave.
Do not rely on external feelings or teachers who claim to have had an experience. This today from No Compromise Radio, quoting BB Warfield:
“In the history of Christian thought mysticism appears accordingly as that tendency among professing Christians which looks within, that is, to the religious feelings, in its search for God. It supposes itself to contemplate within the soul the movements of the divine Spirit, and finds in them either the sole sources of trustworthy knowledge of God, or the most immediate and convincing sources of that knowledge, or, at least, a coordinate source of it alongside of the written Word . . . There is nothing more important in the age in which we live than to bear constantly in mind that all the Christianity of Christianity rests precisely on “external authority.” (Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield, The Biblical Review, ii. (New York: The Biblical Seminary, 1917), 169-191.)
And what is that external authority? The One True God as revealed in the Holy Bible. Sola Scriptura!
Isaiah 19 along with the more ‘famous’ prophecy in Isaiah 17 (Damascus destroyed) are two prophecies that have not yet come to fruition. Isaiah 17’s oracle regarding the city of Damascus (Syria) being razed to the ground with not one inhabitant hasn’t come to pass yet because Damascus is the longest continuously lived-in city in the world- about 5500 or 6000 years. Isaiah 19’s companion prophecy about the future of Egypt also has not come to pass-yet, though some parts of it have come to pass once already. Coffman’s Commentary on the Old Testament explains the double fulfillment concept like this:
“This well organized chapter naturally divides into two sections. The first (Isaiah 19:1-15) falls into three stanzas or strophes: (a) strophe 1 (Isaiah 19:1-4) prophesies the overthrow of Egypt through strife and their suffering under a cruel ruler; (b) strophe 2 (Isaiah 19:5-10) prophesies the drying up of the Nile and the total collapse of Egypt’s economy; (c) strophe 3 (Isaiah 19:11-15) foretells the incompetence of Egypt’s vaunted wise men. The total picture that emerges in these fifteen verses is that of the total ruin of Egypt. “We may see in this section of the oracle Isaiah’s determination to persuade the court of Judah not to embark on any alliance with Egypt against Assyria.”
“The second division of the chapter (Isaiah 19:16-25) is Messianic and is composed of five sub-paragraphs, each of them beginning with the words “in that day.” The paragraphs begin in Isaiah 19:16,18,19,23,24. Although the prophecies of this section could refer to historical events prior to Christianity, to the extent that this might be true, we believe that the great thrust of the passage is Messianic and that whatever fulfillments might have come in pre-Christian times such fulfillments were typical of the far more perfect fulfillments in Christ and the age of the Gospel. For example the return of Judah from captivity is far more adequately fulfilled in the acceptance of Christ by the “righteous remnant” of Israel and their release from the captivity of sin.”
Isaiah 19 is not a long chapter, I recommend you read it.
In any case, with the usual attention to Turkey, Syria, Israel, Russia, and Iran in prophecy, I wanted to bring some attention back to Egypt in prophecy. The LORD has a plan for the Egyptians, it is a glorious plan, too! Though it will be dark for the Egyptians for a while, they are one of three nations specifically mentioned to be receiving a blessing in the Millennium! Here is what the LORD says,
“In that day Israel will be the third with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the earth, whom the Lord of hosts has blessed, saying, “Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel my inheritance.” (Isaiah 19:24-25).
Isn’t it fantastic that Egypt, terrible Pharaoh-ruled Egypt who oppressed the Israelites, are going to be blessed? Perhaps it is because that nation was chosen to harbor the savior Babe when the family fled Herod’s plans to kill the Jesus and all the children. Don’t count Egypt out just yet. They will be front and center of prophetic plans from our LORD!
Meanwhile, back to today, there is a part of the Egypt prophecy that I’d like to look at in view of some news.
“And I will stir up Egyptians against Egyptians, and they will fight, each against another and each against his neighbor, city against city, kingdom against kingdom;” (Isaiah 19:2)
Egypt has had a long history of strife, external and internal. One Arab Spring or one dictator falling doesn’t mean imminent fulfillment, but it is confirmatory of the character of the people throughout history, as described in the bible. With that caveat, here is the news,
“Egyptian Cabinet member caught on hot mic discussing war with enemies Israel and America“ “Just last month, Secretary of State John Kerry quietly sent Egypt an additional $1.3 billion, even though Egypt has failed to live up to democracy standards. That largesse didn’t stop a prominent Egyptian politician from talking about Egypt’s “enemy” the United States in what some pundits are classifying as a classic and embarrassing “hot mic” moment. President Mohammed Morsi gathered a group of politicians last week who thought they were speaking privately at a parliamentary meeting. But as seen in an Egyptian television video of the meeting — excerpts of which were later translated by the Middle East Media and Research Institute (MEMRI) — they were actually on live television, cringingly discussing secret ways to stop Ethiopia’s Nile River dam project which threatens water flowing to Egypt.”
“Before being told he was on television, Hussein described the U.S. as an enemy:
I’m very fond of battles. With the enemies, of course – with America and Israel, but this battle must be waged with maximum judiciousness and calm. Even though this is a secret meeting, we must all take an oath not to leak anything to the media, unless it is done officially by sister Pakinam [el-Sharkawy, a Morsi aide]. We need an official plan for popular national security, even if we…”
“The viewer sees him being handed a note, which presumably points out that his words are not confined to the room. Hussein laughs, then continues with the anti-American and anti-Israel rhetoric: “Okay… Fine… The principles behind what I’m saying are not really secret… Our war is with America and Israel, not with Ethiopia. Therefore, engaging in a war… This is my opinion…”
Another part of the Isaiah 19 prophecy involves one of the world’s great rivers, the Nile. The ‘secret
meeting’ the Cabinet held to discuss their mutual enemy (America/Israel) was over the contentious issue of the Ethiopian Dam which Egypt feels would staunch the flow of precious water into their country. The prophecy says, Isaiah 19:5-10,
“And the waters of the sea will be dried up, and the river will be dry and parched, and its canals will become foul, and the branches of Egypt’s Nile will diminish and dry up, reeds and rushes will rot away. There will be bare places by the Nile,on the brink of the Nile, and all that is sown by the Nile will be parched, will be driven away, and will be no more. The fishermen will mourn and lament, all who cast a hook in the Nile; and they will languish who spread nets on the water. The workers in combed flax will be in despair, and the weavers of white cotton. Those who are the pillars of the land will be crushed, and all who work for pay will be grieved.”
That is specific. Its fulfillment will be devastating, because a great many millions of people depend on the river for income, as you can see in the prophecy. It was true when it was written around 700 BC and it is true today. When that prophecy comes to pass, it will mean total economic devastation for Egypt.
I’ve been watching a development which I’ve written about once, and that is the new dam that some claim will dry up the Nile River. It is variously known as the Grand Millennium Dam and the Renaissance Dam. I’d written,
“One thing that may hurry this disaster along is the dam that Ethiopia is building. We read above that the headwaters were only discovered a century ago and they are in Ethiopia. Ethiopia (and other nations) are tired of Egypt dominating the River. The Ethiopians are building a huge dam so they, too, can control the waters.”
And seven months later to this very day the tiff is escalating into a full-blown war room plan to stop the dam. Egypt is serious about their water, and they have to be. See what Morsi’s cabinet member said in that same meeting, with Morsi present and in attendance
“I say to the Egyptian people: Nobody can turn off your water supply – unless they want to turn the Egyptians into the world’s most extremist people. Imagine what this people would do if its water were turned off – what all 80 million of us would do to Israel and America if our water were turned off,” Hussein concluded.”
Ethiopia shrugged off Egypt’s threats over the dam. “Mohamed Morsi, promised to “defend each drop of Nile water with our blood” and other senior Egyptian politicians called for the dam’s destruction.” Ethiopia should not be too hasty to shrug off those threats, the serous intentions of which were revealed in the hot mic gaffe.
Barry Rubin at GLORIA wrote, “The televising of a meeting held by President Muhammad Morsi allowed listeners to hear plans for military attacks on Ethiopia because of a dam that country is building on the Nile in order to generate electricity. Participants didn’t know the meeting was being aired on live state television. Egyptian leaders discussed covert operations to destroy the dam or giving covert support to rebel groups.”
Source Commons Wikipedia
Forbes speculated on the practical ways Egypt might carry out their threat. “As Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Kamel Amr said June 9 following Ethiopia’s refusal to halt construction of the dam and ahead of his trip to Addis Ababa to discuss the project, Egypt will not give up a “single drop of water from the Nile.” “No Nile, no Egypt,” he said.”
Forbes’s speculation included Egypt convincing N. Sudan to allow them bomber landing privileges so that Egypt could bomb the dam … a bombing Morsi alluded to in the hot mic gaffe The Blaze, MEMRI, and Barry Rubin reported on.
Today the Egyptian Parliament ratified a new Nile sharing agreement. “Ethiopia’s parliament on Thursday ratified an accord that replaces colonial-era deals that awarded Egypt and Sudan the majority of the world’s longest river.” The article goes on to say that the agreement for water sharing will include five other Nile River countries: “Ethiopia, and Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya and Burundi”.
South Sudan is said to be getting on board with the pact, but not North Sudan. So perhaps North Sudan will cooperate with Egypt after all as Forbes speculated, and the dam will be history soon. Or not, but the prophecy says the Nile will be dried up. How that happens is anybody’s guess, but right now the dam is the front runner contender.
When Morsi’s people say, “No Nile, no Egypt” they are right. Not because they are so wise, but because the bible is. Isaiah 19 depicts a very dark time for Egypt. Their main artery of the Nile River dries up and their economy totally collapses. Whether that time is imminently in front of our eyes or is still in the future is unknown to us.
One thing is for sure, it will happen. My advice is to keep watching the news of this tiff over this dam.
One last note.
Morsi held a secret meeting and talked of the war against Israel. This echoes the Psalm 83 language, verses 3-4a
“They lay crafty plans against your people; they consult together against your treasured ones. They say, “Come, let us wipe them out as a nation;”
Our glorious God will not let that happen. And even though they vainly plot against His people now, He will hold His nation Israel in His hand and personally protect Israel. And alongside Israel in the Millennium He will raise up Assyria and Egypt, and bless them. God is surely loving and forgiving! Egypt will think so too, they will worship Him!
“In that day there will be an altar to the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a pillar to the Lord at its border. 20It will be a sign and a witness to the Lord of hosts in the land of Egypt. When they cry to the Lord because of oppressors, he will send them a savior and defender, and deliver them. 21And the Lord will make himself known to the Egyptians, and the Egyptians will know the Lord in that day and worship with sacrifice and offering, and they will make vows to the Lord and perform them. 22And the Lord will strike Egypt, striking and healing, and they will return to the Lord, and he will listen to their pleas for mercy and heal them.”
“23In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria, and Assyria will come into Egypt, and Egypt into Assyria, and the Egyptians will worship with the Assyrians.”
“24In that day Israel will be the third with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the earth, 25whom the Lord of hosts has blessed, saying, “Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel my inheritance.”
