Commentary, analysis and opinion.

Are today’s Evangelicals following Jesus or following Trump?

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(Cal Thomas – Fox News) “What would happen in our culture and especially in our politics if all of those who call themselves evangelicals began obeying the commands of Jesus of Nazareth?”

“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other.” (Matthew 6:24)

The verse refers to money, but in light of today’s debate about the unaccountable devotion many Christian leaders have for President Trump it is not a stretch to apply it to their relationship with him. Continue reading →

‘Drag Kings’ Hope to Detoxify Masculinity by Dressing Up as Men (Who Act Like Women)

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(Faith Moore – PJ Media) “Is there such a thing as toxic femininity? If not, there should be. It would be the practice of claiming that anything male is inherently wrong and must be destroyed and replaced with femininity. Oh wait, that already has a name. It’s called ‘feminism.'”

For a while now, feminists have been trying to find a way to combat “toxic masculinity.” The feminist belief that rape and other sexual crimes stem from societal norms about masculinity has caused the term “toxic” to come to encompass any behavior that is traditionally considered male. … Continue reading →

Proof of God’s Judgment

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(Josh Buice – Delivered By Grace)  Yesterday morning, I had the privilege to preach Romans 1:24-32 in our series through Paul’s letter to the church in Rome. In our previous study, we covered Paul’s warning regarding God’s wrath and how it’s poured out upon those who continue to suppress the truth and ignore the reality of God’s existence and God’s grace. Many people in our present culture like to talk about God’s judgment as if it’s an eschatological judgment reserved for the future. Could it be that the judgment articulated in Romans 1 is already present in our culture today? If so, what is the evidence of such judgment? Continue reading →

Please don’t say ‘broken’ when we mean sin

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According to Elizabeth Prata of The End Time, the word broken is being used by Christians to change perceptions, even to redefine sin. “Is it acceptable to use the word broken when referencing already-saved Christians? Or even non-saved people?” inquires Prata.  No! “The truth is, we are not broken. We are sinners WITHOUT righteousness. We are totally corrupt. We need HIS external righteousness. We are not just broken, but beyond repair. We’re dead! That’s why the Bible says when we’re saved, we are a new person, from a new birth, regenerated, born again, given a new heart.”

Elizabeth has more thoughts on substituting the word brokenness for what the Bible calls sin. She writes: Continue reading →

Willow Creek Promises Investigation Amid New Allegations Against Bill Hybels

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(Bob Smietana – Christianity Today) Last night, Willow Creek Community Church made a promise to its members following the early departure of its founder and senior pastor, Bill Hybels.

“Even though Bill is no longer in his role, our work to resolve any shadow of doubt in the trustworthiness of [Willow] is not done,” the church’s board of elders told members in a Friday evening letter. “With the benefit of hindsight, we see several aspects of our past work that we would have handled differently, and we have identified several areas of learning.” Continue reading →

10 Reasons Why You Should RUN AWAY From Bethel Redding

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There are a gazillion reasons for those who attend Bethel Church in Redding, CA to RUN AWAY from that “church.” Steven Kozar of Messed Up Church lists 10:

1. Bill Johnson & Kris Vallotton (and other Bethel pastors) put their own words above the Word of God. Listen to them talk and you’ll hear very few actual Bible verses, but you will hear a lot of their own thoughts and ideas that they claim to have received directly from God. This is not accidental. They believe they are a new and better type of Christian leader who can hear directly from God and get “downloads” of new information. They believe the Bible is merely a good starting point that has useful information about God, but to really know Him you must go further than the Bible-you need to go “off the map.” Continue reading →

Courts Sentence Another Baby To Death, Again Showing Why Socialized Medicine Is Evil

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(Matt Walsh – Daily Wire) If you want to catch a glimpse of the horrific, dystopian implications of socialized medicine, you need not skim through a science fiction novel. Simply look overseas to Europe, where yet another sick child has been sentenced to death by a U.K. death panel. First Charlie Gard and now this.

Little Alfie Evans was put into a coma by a mysterious brain condition that doctors still have not been able to diagnose. Doctors at Alder Hey hospital in London have decided that Alfie will never get better and his life is no longer worth living. … Continue reading →

Christian Villain: Is an actor’s pretend sin still sin?

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(Clint Archer – The Cripplegate)  “They don’t use computer graphics to remove the clothes off actors in nude scenes; that’s them baring what God wants to be covered in public (Gen 3:7,21; 9:22-25). And they don’t CGI a finger on the Christian actor to create the illusion of a rude gesture.”

Actor William Shatner once did a parody performance of himself reacting to his obsessed fans at a Star Trek convention. He exploded with a sharp rebuke: “Get a life! It’s only a TV show!”

To a Trekkie that’s like being told Santa isn’t real…by Santa.

Continue reading →

Exorcism by cellphone: Beating the devil in the 21st century

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Catholics are not the only ones who make use of their Smartphones to communicate with spirits. While on stage in front of hundreds of (undiscerning) fans, Shawn Bolz, who supposedly has a prophetic and healing anointing, uses his phone to foretell a person’s future. He claims he can see deceased folks in heaven and pass down messages from them. If you’re thinking, “That’s spiritualism,” you’re right. Evidently Shawn Bolz isn’t aware that spiritualism is expressly forbidden by God. (Deuteronomy 18:9-14)

But this is not about John Edward wanna be Shawn Bolz.

In a piece from Reuters we learn that some Catholics have taken to their Smartphones to perform exorcisms on people who are allegedly possessed by demons. Philip Puella has the story: Continue reading →

Benny Hinn’s Nephew Calls Bethel Church Leader Kris Vallotton ‘False Prophet’ Who ‘Deceives People’

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(Leah MarieAnn Klett – Christian Post) “In a recent interview with Justin Peters, Hinn further opened up about the extreme lifestyle his uncle kept while traveling the world to preach his prosperity gospel.”

Costi Hinn, the nephew of Benny Hinn who frequently speaks out against his uncle’s “prosperity theology,” called Bethel Church leader Kris Vallotton a “false prophet” who rakes in “easy money” by “deceiving people.”

Vallotton, senior associate leader of Bethel Church in Redding, California, recently shared a photo on his Facebook page showing where his luxury car had been keyed by an unknown assailant. Continue reading →

Embracing Christ’s View of Scripture

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(Terry Mortenson – Answers In Genesis) Most Christians at least give lip-service to following Christ. But what about His view of the Old Testament? How highly did He esteem its claims, both in His life and in His teaching, and do we embrace Scripture with the same zeal?

How extensively did Jesus trust and live by the Scriptures, which in His day were only the books of the Old Testament? How did He treat them in comparison to other claims of truth? After all, if Jesus is our Savior and Lord, shouldn’t we share the same view? Continue reading →

Brian Houston: ‘Jesus became you, so that you could become Him…’

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(Churchwatch Central) Brian Houston recently made the claim that, “Jesus became you, so that you could become Him.” You can watch the footage below and read the transcript. Watch the clip in context and if you agree or disagree with us quoting him, ask yourself this question – why does he think this and why did he even say it? [The video is no longer available – it was pulled from Youtube, as often happens. So CWC did an update that includes Houston’s sermon podcast. Watch it here.]

What other biblically qualified teacher would say this?

The reality is that we have been waiting for Brian Houston to say something like this for a long time. Why? … Continue reading →

Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry – Normalizing Mysticism

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Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry is nothing of the sort. It’s a sham. Just a way Bethel Church leaders have devised to get their hooks into people, especially undiscerning young people. If you’re unfamiliar with Bethel Church in Redding CA, the senior pastor is the notorious  “Apostle” Bill Johnson.  For reasons that will become clear, Bethel is considered by some to be a cult. (More on Bethel Redding here.)  Its leaders prey on those who are unschooled in the scriptures, as you will see in Rick Becker’s piece over at Famine In the Land. Becker begins with this warning: Continue reading →

The Four Terrible Things That Are Destroying Boys In Our Culture

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(Matt Walsh – Daily Wire) “He goes to school and his female classmates are dressed like strippers. He goes anywhere and that’s how the women are dressed. It seems that everyone is doing everything they can to make a degenerate and a creep out of him, even as they demand that he control himself.”

Our culture is very bad for boys. It’s bad for girls, too. It’s bad for everyone. But I think we fail to recognize and appreciate the unique struggles that boys face. Partly we fail to recognize it because we are too busy worrying about the Patriarchy’s persecution of women. Partly we fail to recognize it because, collectively, we just don’t care that much about boys. Partly we fail to recognize it because men are not as likely to talk about their own plight. And partly a man will not talk about it because everyone, even his fellow men, will only laugh at him and downplay the problem. Continue reading →

You Can’t Love Jesus with a Heart Full of Hate: 7 Reasons to Love and Forgive Your Enemies

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Bible study author, speaker and blogger Michelle Lesley offers 7 reasons God gives us in His Word to love and forgive our enemies. Here’s one example: You Can’t Love Jesus With A Heart Full Of Unforgiveness. The reason she gives is that “Your enemy – that person you hate and refuse to forgive because he hurt you – has sinned infinitely more against a holy and righteous God than he could ever sin against you.”  Sadly, most Christians never even consider that all sin is first and foremost against a holy God.

Now discover 6 more reasons Christians must forgive those who have sinned against them: Continue reading →

I’m old enough to remember when ‘evangelical’ was a bad word

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According to Jesse Johnson “evangelical suffers from an ambiguity largely owning to its diversity. The National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) is different than the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, yet members of both would sign the Manhattan Declaration. If you believe the gospel and the fundamentals (inerrancy, virgin birth, bodily resurrection, personal conversion, etc.), does that make you evangelical? There is no clear answer to that question.”  But what is clear says Johnson is that “an evangelical is someone who says with their feet that Catholicism and liberalism are wrong, but they just would never say so with their mouths. They leave the Catholic church on Sundays, but turn around and call Catholics our brothers in the Lord on Tuesdays. This is evangelicalism’s squishy middle.” Continue reading →

‘Chappaquiddick’ Star: ‘Everybody Gave [Ted Kennedy] a Pass’

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(Christian Toto – NewsBusters) Jason Clarke got quite the education after accepting the lead role in Chappaquiddick.

The movie, out April 6, follows the events surrounding the 1969 death of Mary Jo Kopechne. Sen. Ted Kennedy (Clarke) was driving Kopechne, a campaign worker for his late brother Robert F. Kennedy, home on the Massachusettes island of Chappaquiddick when he crashed his Oldsmobile through a fence, landing the car in a pond. Continue reading →

How To Do Online Discernment Ministry, part 1

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Photo credit: 8:28 Ministries

“No matter if you are in your pew listening to a sermon, choosing a book at the Christian bookstore, or reading some essays online, you need discernment to determine if what you are absorbing aligns with God’s word or is a lie designed to incrementally steer you away from the narrow path.”

In this 2 part series, Elizabeth Prata of The End Time offers her perspective on assessing whether an online apologetics and discernment ministry is “operating appropriately within an edifying sphere of the gift, or is just a critical crank out to get someone or has an ax to grind.” Here’s part 1: Continue reading →

Hybels steps down from Willow Creek following allegations of misconduct

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(Manya Brachear Pashman and Jeff Coen – Chicago Tribune)  Forty-two years after founding one of the nation’s most influential evangelical megachurches, the Rev. Bill Hybels told his congregation Tuesday night that he would step down from the helm of Willow Creek Community Church six months ahead of schedule.His departure comes less than a month after a Chicago Tribune investigation disclosed that Hybels had been the subject of inquiries by church leaders into claims that he ran afoul of church teachings by engaging in inappropriate behavior with women in his congregation — including employees — allegedly spanning decades. The inquiries had cleared Hybels. Continue reading →

Francis Chan: ‘God Might Kill You If You Criticize Church Leaders’

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Francis Chan praying with false teacher Mike Bickle

During a speaking engagement*, popular preacher and author Francis Chan told the group that God will destroy anyone who questions or criticizes the teachings of Christian leaders. Steven Kozar of Messed Up Church has the story which includes a must watch video of Bethel’s guest speaker so that we can see for ourselves that he was not kidding around; he was as serious as a heart attack. Here’s Steven Kozar’s post:

There’s a recent video sermon from Francis Chan which has eerie similarities to a cult leader indoctrinating his followers. His basic argument is this: Continue reading →

Boston Marathon Runners Can Compete as Gender ‘They Specify Themselves to Be’

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(Heather Clark – Christian News) The Boston Athletic Association, the group behind the Boston Marathon, has confirmed that it allows runners to compete as the gender with which they self-identify—a controversial allowance that has raised questions about whether it gives male runners who identify as female an unfair advantage.

“We take people at their word. We register people as they specify themselves to be,” Tom Grilk, chief of the Boston Athletic Association, told the Boston Herald. “Members of the LGBT community have had a lot to deal with over the years, and we’d rather not add to that burden.” View article →

Bethel medical conference raises concerns

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(Anita Brady – Record Searchlight) “[Bethel] has the goal of infiltrating all aspects of society (the Seven Mountains Mandate) and locally/globally influence it to their version of Christian faith. Angel feathers and gold dust, grave sucking, fire tunnels, faith healings, and praying in tongues are on the agenda of this ‘church.’”

Mid-April, Bethel will hold its fourth annual Medical Healing Conference in Redding. Be assured the word “medical” is used to try to make this conference seem legitimate. It is not. Continue reading →

A warning about Hillsong’s Facebook marketing ‘con job’.

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(Churchwatch Central) Brian Houston often says that it’s by the grace of God he is where he is today. This is completely fraudulent on so many levels. With that in mind and given its wordwide impact, it is worth examining the marketing arm of Hillsong.

While biblical Christianity trusts that Jesus will grow His church through the preaching of His gospel, Hillsong has relied heavily on marketing research and innovations to grow their empire. In this example, we highlight their latest marketing ploy. Continue reading →