Commentary, analysis and opinion.

Preaching for Doctrinal Discernment

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I want to challenge the notion that our pursuit of clarity in preaching for the average hearer, absent rhetorical flourishes that emphasize our being well-learned, equates to emptying our teaching of doctrinal terminology and intellectual rigor. Rather, I want to argue that it is pastorally imperative that we encourage our hearers to think hard and well. We must teach them doctrinal and biblical terminology that is largely foreign to the average person’s vocabulary.

(Chad Vegas – Founders Ministry)  For nearly twenty years of ministry I have heard Mark Twain’s words ringing in my ear, “Don’t use a five-dollar word when a fifty-cent word will do.” This has become like proverbial wisdom in preaching books, courses, and conferences. There is a certain admirable pastoral concern behind this phrase. … Continue reading →

Why God Hates The Occult…

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“The Occult is the breaking of the first two of the ten commandments of God, for we are to have “no other God’s before ” Him, and we are not to fashion out of our Imagination, how we choose to see who God is.”

(Bill Randles)  When God set up a theocracy, He very strictly warned and threatened against any who would ever touch the occult. There was a death penalty for those who participated in any form of the dark practices of the pagans.

The various occult practices were considered to be abominable to the LORD, and so also were the practitioners. Both the sin and the sinner were and are considered utterly detestable to the Holy God. … Continue reading →

The Rebirth of Socialism

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“Democratic Socialists” believe radical change can come from peaceful political action, like voting.  But the harder core Marxist socialists believe that radical change can only be implemented by violent revolution.  Can we expect Marxist terrorism, along the same lines as Islamist terrorism?  Let’s hope not, but it could happen.

(Gene Veith – Patheos)  With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, people were saying that socialism had been “consigned to the dust bin of history.”  Free market capitalism and liberal democracy were so ascendant that people were talking about the “end of history,” in the sense that the wars and ideological conflicts that make up so much of history were over with. Continue reading →

Farewell Francis

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“I think it is time to say that Francis has shifted so far that he has embraced false teachers and has disqualified himself from the benefit of the doubt. That does not mean that he is a false teacher, nor that he is beyond repentance. But it does mean that, as for me and my house, we will not only not recommend Francis Chan as a trusted resource, but I also encourage you to stay away from him.”  

(Jordan Standridge – The Cripplegate)  I’ll never forget the first time I heard Francis Chan speak. 

I was at a big music conference in California feeling really discouraged. The music was man-centered, the teaching was problematic, to say the least; it just really seemed like no one was there to exalt the Savior. It seemed to all be about money and fame. And then something happened. In between bands, a preacher came forward. …  Continue reading →

The Crisis and Comfort of Romans 7

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“We must…become honest about our struggle with sin and cling to the work of Jesus Christ our Lord as our hope now and for all eternity.”

(Josh Buice – Delivered By Grace)  Yesterday, in our series through Romans, I had the privilege to preach the concluding verses (24-25) of Romans chapter seven. As you may know, the seventh chapter of Romans is one of the most difficult passages to interpret in all of Romans—indeed in all of the Bible. There are many questions to answer including identifying the “I” of the chapter and explaining the relevance of the law of God for new covenant Christians. Continue reading →

Former Harvest Employees Say James MacDonald Lived Large on Church’s Dime

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“These expenditures were in addition to MacDonald’s salary, which the church continues to keep private. However, Dave Corning, a founding elder who chaired the elder board for 21 years, told me that in 2009, MacDonald was making a combined $550,000 from both the church and Walk in the Word, MacDonald’s broadcast ministry.”

(Julie Roys)  In 2015, James MacDonald went on a worldwide missions trip that was so stressful, he needed a safari in South Africa to help him recover from it. At least, that’s what MacDonald, the recently-fired founder of Harvest Bible Chapel, claimed to justify the church paying for the safari for him and two others, according to his bodyguard at the time, Jacob Ross.

But that’s not all. Continue reading →

Taken Captive By False Teachers & False Doctrines – 10 signs

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“The captivated are desperate to alleviate the cares of this world, or increase their comforts in this world. Promises of breakthrough, healing, favour, pleasant “suddenlies,” transfers of wealth, supernatural encounters and miracles, entice those with itching ears or troubled souls. Like clouds without water false teachers fail to deliver. They promise their followers an encounter with God, but instead deliver an emotional experience or Kundalini spirit.” 

(Rick Becker – Famine In The Land)  We’re closer to the end. Some would have us believe the greatest revival the world has ever seen is upon us, but scripture teaches the opposite. There will be false anointed ones, a departure from the faith, apostasy, and doctrines of demons will deceive many within the visible church. Those within the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) ignore what scripture teaches, they are hoping to be activated by a super apostle and be a part of a new breed of revivalist that will walk through walls, raise the dead, and conquer the seven spheres of society. These deluded folk have not been activated, but captivated by false teachers and false doctrines: Continue reading →

Why Are Young Christians Leaving the Church? It’s Simple Math

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“Make no mistake about it, the university setting will likely be a battlefield populated with people opposed to Christianity.”

(J. Warner Wallace – Cold Case Christianity)  Several years ago I had the opportunity to speak to an engaging group of Christians in Elgin, Iowa at the First Baptist Church of Elgin. The congregation was a wonderful combination of young families and older members who understand the challenges facing the younger Christians in their midst. I shared the overwhelming statistics chronicling the growing number of young Christians leaving the church during their college years, but many in the audience had already seen the departure firsthand. … Continue reading →

Top Democrat Tells Holocaust Survivors To Check Their Privilege

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According to Rep. James Clyburn’s logic, it’s OK to hate Jews if you rank higher than them on the pyramid of victimhood.

(Madeline Osburn – The Federalist)  Democratic Whip Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) defended his colleague Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) by reasoning that she is higher than Jews on the pyramid of intersectionality. In an interview with The Hill on Wednesday, Clyburn trivialized Holocaust survivors when he implied that Omar’s time in a Kenyan refugee camp outweighed the experiences of Jews. Continue reading →

‘A Consuming Fire’: Holiness, Wrath, and Justice

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“How often do we pastors give God equally profane worship when we dare to come into His presence without considering Him as holy, without seeing our primary responsibility in our celebration of worship as displaying the glory of God, revealing His majesty before the whole congregation? We need to think on this.”

(R.C. Sproul)  WE LIVE IN A CULTURE WHERE THE VAST MAJORITY of the people occasionally gives lip service to the existence of God but almost never regards Him as holy. If some do acknowledge that He is holy, very few add to that holiness any idea of divine justice. And if we are able to find a handful of people who agree that God is both holy and just, it is next to impossible to find someone who will add to these elements the idea that God is wrathful. Continue reading →

James MacDonald Recording Reveals Ungodly Evangelical ‘Celebrity Machine’

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“For the past year, I’ve been writing about the evangelical “celebrity machine” or “industrial complex”—a network of Christian media, publishers, and ministry “partners,” which rely on each other for promotion, book deals, conference invites, networking, and income. In the best of all possible worlds, this “machine” would be leveraged to inspire vision, support important initiatives, and hold Christian public figures accountable.  But as the MacDonald recording reveals in perhaps the most grotesque fashion I’ve ever witnessed, the machine is often used to protect the powerful and to crush truthtellers.”

(Julie Roys)  About two weeks ago, Mancow Muller aired vile, recorded comments by James MacDonald on his Chicago radio show on WLS/AM890. This shocked the Christian community and prompted Harvest Bible Chapel to fire MacDonald. Yet MacDonald’s comments apparently didn’t shock Johnnie Moore. Continue reading →

Same-Sex Relationships: Sorry Bishop, But The Meaning Of Holiness Does Not Change From Generation To Generation

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“The idea that God has revealed a different standard today is equally flawed. The Holy Spirit is himself God, and just as unchanging as God the Father. He cannot reveal something to be holy today that was condemned as unholy in the Scriptures that he breathed-out. The Holy Spirit is not a liar, and he has not learned anything new about human sexuality in the two thousand years since the closure of the Canon.”

(John Stevens – johnstevens.com)  One of the notable features of the debate raging in the Church of England over issues of human sexuality is the poor theological arguments used by those in favour of revising the historic position of the church, which reflects the clear Biblical teaching that sex is only appropriate for heterosexual marriage and that sex is determined by biology at birth. Continue reading →

Beth Moore and Sarah Young’s book Jesus Calling insanely popular and insidiously dangerous

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“I commend both men to you, but mainly I wanted to set before you the work of Mr. Dale Wilson, of which you may not be aware. His discernment critiques of Beth Moore were early, good, and remain today as a gold standard.” 

(Elizabeth Prata – The End Time)  Title on the site: The King’s Dale: A Commendable Resource for Beth Moore and Sarah Young Critiques and Book Reviews.

The popular definition of insanity is “doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.” For Christians with discernment, insanity is ‘being sure by the Spirit and the Bible, after research and prayer, that so-and-so is false, but literally NO ONE ELSE around you believes it or even entertains the notion for a second.’ Continue reading →

As New Evidence of Progressive Bigotry Emerges, Jack Phillips Finally Wins His Case

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“I’ve long argued that Justice Kennedy’s “narrow” opinion in Masterpiece Cakeshop was actually more far-reaching than many observers thought — in part because the anti-religious sentiments Kennedy condemned are far more common than many imagine. I’ve seen similar sentiments actually written into campus policies justifying their own acts of anti-religious discrimination.”

(David French – National Review)  Today my former colleagues at the Alliance Defending Freedom announced that the Colorado Civil Rights Commission will dismiss its pending discrimination charge against Masterpiece Cakeshop’s Jack Phillips. … Continue reading →

Time To Expose the Radical Gender Ideology

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The madness here is simply endless. Not only are more and more children being sucked up into this, but those who try to offer some sanity here – including biological sanity – are being penalised and punished for daring to do so. And now we have a major new growth industry: detransitioning, where those with sex-change regret seek to reverse what they have had done to themselves.

(Bill Muehlenberg – Cultural Warch)  The times they are a changin’, as Bob Dylan once crooned. No question about that. I have seen plenty of major changes during the course of my rather short lifetime. The world a century ago looked far, far different than it does today. Continue reading →

When being a Christian isn’t ‘decent’ anymore

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“We need to be ready to love our neighbors and our enemies and to bear witness in a culture that is increasingly hostile toward us. Christians may someday face fines and other penalties for their convictions on marriage.” 

(Denny Burk)  I woke up this morning to a troubling Op-Ed in The Washington Post by Cynthia Nixon. The entire article is a call for an end to civility toward anyone who holds Christian convictions about sexuality. In particular, the essay responds to the fact that former Vice-President Joe Biden recently referred to current Vice-President Mike Pence as a “decent man.” Nixon unloads on Biden for this flash of tolerance and civility, arguing that Mike Pence’s Christian convictions about sexuality are worthy of the severest public outrage and opprobrium. She writes, Continue reading →

Southern Baptists have a problem with God

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An honest examination of Southern Baptist churches reveals a much deeper problem than even sexual abuse. The real problem is spiritual before it is moral. That is, Southern Baptists have a problem with God. They trumpet their affirmation of the inerrancy of Scripture and unhesitatingly call it the written Word of God. Yet, at the same time the overwhelming majority of their churches blatantly defy the God of that Word.

(Tom Ascol – Founders Ministries)  The first story by the Houston Chronicle on sexual abuse within Southern Baptist churches and entities is horrific to read. The information that the authors compiled into a database was gathered primarily from public sources. The power of having all of that data from the last twenty years in one place is that the breadth and depth of the problem becomes undeniable. Continue reading →

The Gospel Coalition’s Christian ‘Gay Celibacy’ Movement is a Biblical Farce

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“Sam Allberry is one of the founders of the same-sex ministry, Living Out, which has an article on its website entitled Celibate Same-Sex Couples that the author essentially says that homosexuals of the same sex can live together — even be physically intimate with each other — so long as it doesn’t involve penetrative sex. …”

(Jeff Maples – Reformation Charlotte)  Unless your head has been stuck under a rock for the last few years, you’ve noticed a massive paradigm shift in Evangelical Christianity calling on Christians to embrace a new ideology — “gay celibacy.” Largely promoted from liberal outlets like The Gospel Coalition (TGC) and the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, the movement teaches that that people who experience attraction to others of the same sex need not be concerned, so long as they remain celibate. Continue reading →

Willow Creek Investigation: Allegations Against Bill Hybels Are Credible

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Independent Advisory Group releases report backing claims of pastor’s “sexually inappropriate words and actions.”

(Kate Shellnutt – Christianity Today)  An independent investigation has concluded that the sexual harassment allegations that led to Bill Hybels’s resignation last year are credible, based on a six-month investigation into the claims against the senior pastor and into Willow Creek Community Church (WCCC) and the Willow Creek Association (WCA). Continue reading →

Ray Ortlund Suggests ‘God No Longer Matters’ to People Who Voted for Trump

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“Here in lies the vastly obvious difference. Donald Trump is NOT translating his personal immorality into national policy.”

(Jeff Maples – Reformation Charlotte)  The Never-Trump movement in Evangelical Christianity is not a new phenomenon. It started well before Donald Trump was ever elected into the U.S. Presidency. A movement spearheaded largely by Russell Moore of the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), the vast majority of the TGC wing of Evangelicalism — who, for the most part, are incapable of thinking for themselves — have followed Moore’s footsteps with their tails wagging. Continue reading →