In a small town in New Jersey even. Apprising Ministries takes a look at Jakes’ latest fleecing of the flock.
The Roman Catholic Church is now a Christian denomination?
Dominion Theology and the true mission of the Church
The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. 1 Timothy 1:5, ESV
The point of this piece is to show that the genuine Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ does indeed have ethical implications and the Church is obligated to live these out in tangible ways. However, the missional people who have created their own contextualized version of this in order to appeal to post-modernism, will probably not agree with what I am about to say here about these true ethical implications of the gospel. To them it is all in the framework of cultural reform and Dominionism or Dominion Theology with an emphasis on justice and fairness. Are these the true makeup of the call of the church as it lives this out as it should?
James Robison to pope Francis “in Christ we are brothers”
Christian unity
Παρακαλῶ οὖν ὑμᾶς ἐγὼ ὁ δέσμιος ἐν κυρίῳ ἀξίως περιπατῆσαι τῆς κλήσεως ἧς ἐκλήθητε, μετὰ πάσης ταπεινοφροσύνης καὶ πραΰτητος, μετὰ μακροθυμίας, ἀνεχόμενοι ἀλλήλων ἐν ἀγάπῃ, σπουδάζοντες τηρεῖν τὴν ἑνότητα τοῦ πνεύματος ἐν τῷ συνδέσμῳ τῆς εἰρήνης· Ephesians 4:1–3, NA28
Therefore, I, the prisoner of the Lord, encourage you to walk worthy of the calling by which you were called, with all humility of mind and meekness with long-suffering forbearing one another in love, being eager to keep the oneness of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace. Ephesians 4:1–3, translated from the NA28 Greek text
The requests I receive from readers of these posts concerning discernment issues in their own churches seem to be on the upswing. It is as if we have moved from the trauma of the Purpose Driven/Seeker Sensitive devastation of so much of Evangelicalism to something even more insidious. The seeker movement was blunt force trauma. Now what I am hearing about more and more resembles covert operations deep from within the leadership of churches. One or two of the Elders of a church are solid while others are actively promoting the teachings of men (and women) that are ecumenical, man-focused instead of God-focused, centered around mysticism such as Spiritual Formation or Prayer Circles, or taking the Church’s focus away from the Great Commission and changing it to “social justice” or even “Dominionism.” The “solid Elders” profess to know nothing about what is going on. The requests I receive about these things are nearly always centered around the concern about maintaining “unity.” The concern is that if they address their concerns they will be looked as “divisive” or even as a “hater.” Yes, I get emails and contacts about all that. My reply here is based within my own journey through those choppy waters.
Tsunami of pro-homosexual books from “gay christians” and supporters
Catalyst contemplative lab led by CSM guru Phileena Heuertz
Contemplative/centering prayer today at Catalyst conference
Glenn Beck preaches Mormon theology and “inspires” Liberty University
Saving faith is the product of God’s grace
In that day you will ask nothing of me. Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. John 16:23, ESV
Saving faith, the product of God’s grace (Romans 4:16; Ephesians 2:8–9) is possessed only by the regenerate. This faith is alive whereas before God’s grace quickened it, it was completely incapable and unwilling to believe in Christ as Lord and Saviour. This dead faith is inherited from Adam and the product of the fall (Genesis 3). Without God’s grace according with man’s faith, there is no possibility of belief and, therefore, no possibility of salvation. However, when God quickens a sinner (we are all sinners) his or her faith comes alive. The spiritual blindness that marked them before regeneration is washed away.
The world won’t believe; but you can be forgiven
The parable of the wedding feast
These are of one mind, and they hand over their power and authority to the beast. They will make war on the Lamb, and the Lamb will conquer them, for he is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those with him are called and chosen and faithful. Revelation 17:13–14, ESV
The parable of the Wedding Feast, which we find in Matthew 22:1–14 is part of Matthew’s discourse on the Kingdom of God, which has many parts. Chapters 18:1–23:39 makes up The King’s Administration part of the Kingdom of God, therefore, the parable of the Wedding Feast would definitely be within that. Jesus tells this parable as part of a set of Kingly parables after his Triumphal Entry, the cleansing of the Temple, and the cursing of the Fig Tree in Matthew 21. Matthew describes our Lord’s Triumphal Entry in Matthew 21:1–11. He describes His cleansing of the Temple in vv. 12–17. In vv. 18–22 He curses the Fig Tree. Following that His authority is challenged by the Jewish leaders in vv. 23–28. In response to that, He tells them several parables. The first is the Parable of the Two Sons in vv. 28–32. Then He tells the Parable of the Tenants in vv. 33–45. I pray you see the pattern.
And why not do evil that good may come?
And why not do evil that good may come?—as some people slanderously charge us with saying. Their condemnation is just. Romans 3:8, ESV
The debate in the visible Church in our time concerning the need for Christians to walk in Repentance is actually quite perplexing to those of us whose hearts and consciences are bound to the Word of God. It clearly exhorts us all to repent and walk in righteousness. I had a conversation with a Pastor a several years ago at lunch following his sermon that Sunday morning. We discussed the dreadful condition in the visible Church in which most professing Christians appeared to be very immature and in bondage to their flesh. I asked for his opinion of why that was so. His response was that it was the result of the Church not being the Church as God designed. There was little or no Church discipline. There was little preaching of the Law and the Gospel together. There was hardly ever a mention of walking in repentance before our Holy God. I agreed completely with his analysis. He also shared that he did not believe that a very large percentage of the professing Christians were genuine.
Ready for “The Rob Bell Show” on Oprah’s network?
Born from above
ἀπεκρίθη Ἰησοῦς καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ· ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω σοι, ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ ἄνωθεν, οὐ δύναται ἰδεῖν τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ θεοῦ. John 3:3, NA28
Jesus answered and said to him, “Amen, amen I say to you, unless one is born again, he is not able to see the Kingdom of God.” John 3:3, translated from the NA28 Greek text
In John 3:3 (above) is a term that is unique to Christianity and is not well understood even by those have been γεννηθῇ ἄνωθεν. The word translated above as “again” is ἄνωθεν or anōthen, which is comprised of ἄνω or anō, “above, upwards,” and the suffix θεν or then, which denotes “from.”
God’s sovereignty is not subjective
Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not part of my flock. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.” John 10:25–30, ESV
God is Sovereign. That sovereignty is not partial. It is not subject to any conditions or forces outside of God. He has never nor will He ever relinquish any portion of His sovereignty. What He sets out to do, He does. What Men believe or refuse to believe about these truths changes nothing. Just because professing Christians cling to the fallacy that they are saved because they exercised their Free Will does not in any way diminish the truth from God’s Word that tells us the very opposite.
Man is fallen. All born of Adam are children of God’s wrath. No one seeks after God because none are righteous (Romans 3:10–18). God’s people are part of our Lord’s flock. Those of His flock believe God, seek God, and know the Lord’s voice. The Lord gives them eternal life. Notice that the veracity of their eternal life is not subject to them or their behavior. No, the Son holds them and no one can snatch them out of His hand.
What does it take for men to see the Kingdom of God?
ἀπεκρίθη Ἰησοῦς καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ· ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω σοι, ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ ἄνωθεν, οὐ δύναται ἰδεῖν τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ θεοῦ. John 3:3, NA28
Jesus answered and said to Him, “Amen, amen I say to you, unless one is born again, he is not able to see the Kingdom of God.” John 3:3, translated from the NA28 Greek text
What causes corruption of the Gospel message? An exegetical study of John’s account of our Lord’s contention with the Jewish religious leaders during His earthly ministry reveals that Jesus came to Israel to reveal the Father to Israel proving that He, the Son, was deity, to live a perfect, sinless life and then lay His life down voluntarily to purchase those who were chosen before the foundation of the world with the price of His blood? His perfect sacrifice was their propitiation. We learn these things and so much more by going to the Word and learning from the Holy Spirit as He transforms our minds as we submit to it. Studies into the Word like these are sorely needed in the Body of Christ. I would hate to be a Pastor whose time has come to stand before our Lord to give an account that had sold out and ministered in a way that simply tickled itching ears.
For the troubled
Dan Haseltine of Jars of Clay in support of homosexual marriage
Efficacious faith as opposed to man-made faith
Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” John 4:13–14, ESV
Efficacious adj. producing the desired effect. The Oxford New Desk Dictionary and Thesaurus, Third Edition
Christian faith has appeared to many an easy thing; nay, not a few even reckon it among the social virtues, as it were; and this they do because they have not made proof of it experimentally, and have never tasted of what efficacy it is. For it is not possible for any man to write well about it, or to understand well what is rightly written, who has not at some time tasted of its spirit, under the pressure of tribulation; while he who has tasted of it, even to a very small extent, can never write, speak, think, or hear about it sufficiently. For it is a living fountain, springing up into eternal life, as Christ calls it in John iv. Martin Luther, Concerning Christian Liberty – an open letter to Pope Leo X, 6 September 1520
Saving or efficacious faith is not the same thing as the best faith man can muster through the exercise of the will. According to our Lord Jesus in John 4:13–14 (above), efficacious faith is that which is given to the believer by God and this same faith will become in the believer a spring of water welling up to eternal life. This is not belief that is the product of reason or intellectual assent. It is not a belief that the believer must generate and desperately hold onto lest it be diminished and be lost. In the excerpt from Martin Luther’s letter to Pope Leo X, Concerning Christian Liberty, we read that those who conceive of faith as something done by the believer count it as simply a social virtue and that is an easy thing.
Luther says that those with this concept of faith believe as they do because they have not experienced efficacious faith and have never tasted the great strength there is in it. I contend that the purveyors of the Seeker-Sensitive, Emergent, and Missional forms of “Christianity” are of the same sort of faith Luther is contrasting in this letter with genuine believers who are so because they have drunk of the water given to them by the Lord that has become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life. These of the New Type of Christianity have a faith consisting of works-righteousness. This is a man-made faith not the efficacious faith that is a gift of God (Ephesians 2:1–10).
Tonight on TBN Jan Crouch interviews Franklin Graham
Belief vs. unbelief
Therefore, when the LORD heard, he was full of wrath; a fire was kindled against Jacob; his anger rose against Israel, because they did not believe in God and did not trust his saving power. Psalms 78:21–22, ESV
There are only two groups of people in the world. There are Christians, the elect, and everyone else, the non-elect. What separates them? What is the difference? It is not that different streams of faith, as new agers and the “emergents” say, which are all equal and going to the same place and color people in different ways. No, that is what universalists of every variety are selling, but that is most definitely not what God’s Word explicitly says. No, the difference between those in Christ and everyone else is that the former are possessors of faith, which is the Greek word πιστις, which is transliterated as pistis. It and its many grammatical forms are translated as “assurance,” “faith,” “belief,” et cetera throughout the New Testament. Before we define “unbelief,” let us define biblical faith, πιστις, so that we can see very clearly what marks the true believer from the false professor.
Recovering the gospel: evangelism in Sardis
Private interpretation and subjectivism
When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. John 16:13–14, ESV
Even though it is discounted by many today, the Protestant Reformation was a wonderful work by God in that the Gospel was freed from the captivity of the apostate Roman Catholic Church. Over the centuries the Gospel had become obscured as the Bishop of Rome was declared perfect with authority over Scripture. Any resistance to his authority was dealt with through excommunication followed by being burned at the stake. The Reformation not only recovered the Gospel and Justification by Faith, the Bible became available to the common people whereas before this, no one was allowed to read it by the edicts of the Pope. At Luther’s trial at the Diet of Worms when pressed to recant of His teachings he proclaimed,
“Unless I am convicted by Scripture and plain reason—I do not accept the authority of popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other—my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. God help me. Amen.”