When there is secrecy involved

Posted on 2018/08/02 by Guestspeaker

In this world there are lots of denominations in Christendom. Lots of Christians say that the non-trinitarian christians belong to cults or sects, but clearly than they forget what the characteristics of a sect or cult are.

The many non-Trinitarians who found one or another denomination in which they go to meetings are all free people with no obligations to that meeting, congregation or church except to live according to the commandments of God. In nearly all other Christian denominations of trinitarians we can find churches which dare to say they are the only church by which people can be saved or “go to heaven”. Nearly all of them are weekly asking money to their parishioners or even ask a tithing. Whilst in most of the non-trinitarian churches the parishioners are free to give or not to give any amount of money and are not pushed to do so. Never are they threatened by a so called burning in hell for ever, because such false teaching even does not exist by them.

Anna in Shadowland is a web-blog from a certain Andrea which represents the view of a disillusioned girl who left her own church to have an experience in a Charismatic church influenced by the New Apostolic Reformation. She writes

Every so often I receive testimonies from people who have read my “Leaving the NAR Church” series. There are more than 50 of them, and I am adding another. These stories are precious to me, and serve as a painful reminder that there is hope for the dear deceived ones caught up in this insidious movement. If you don’t know what NAR is, I hope you’ll take a moment and read What is the New Apostolic Reformation Movement. {Leaving IHOP and the NAR: Sammy’s story}

She has a testimony about how the good and faithful God she loves and wanted to serve opened her eyes and removed her from the clutches of the deception, lack of discernment, and false teachings of a movement that has invaded the worldwide church on a massive scale. {An open letter to the church I left}

In Christendom and Christianity we may see many churches who claim to be adhering to ‘authentic New Testament practices’ but when we look closer at them we find all sorts of practices which are not according to the lifestyle of the first Christians (which we can come to know from the Acts of the Apostles and from civil writings of the first century CE).

Today there are several churches who love to attract people with their “Speaking in tongues” and all sorts of trance movements, even not minding to have people in hysterics, shaking on the floor to the very contemporary music of Hillsong and Bethel (not to be confused with the Bethels of the non-trinitarians), surrounded by all their technological advances, big screens, and coffee bars, and all the other comforts of modern convenience that they manage to accumulate around them.

Although it sure is a whole lot of fun and I have to admit, you had me fooled there for a while. {An open letter to the church I left}

does the blogger says after her eyes were opened. Continuing

I was really starting to climb up that ladder to sit there with you because I’m sure the view is amazing. But thankfully I could never quite manage to get there, and these days I actually find it rather insulting that anyone can claim to be living ‘authentic Christianity’ just because they belong to a certain kind of church. {An open letter to the church I left}

The blogger Andrea thinks

seeking after a truly authentic apostolic life and experience would be completely unattainable, because I currently live in 2017. {An open letter to the church I left}

but than she forgets we do have enough civic papers, next to the biblical account, to give us a fair image how life was by the first century followers of the Nazarene Jewish master teacher Jeshua (Jesus Christ).

Naturally she should also know that life 2000 years later is so different that we should take that into account too.

Today we see a growing amount of people loving the ‘New Apostolic Reformation’ (NAR), a movement which seeks to establish a fifth house within Christendom, distinct from Catholicism, Protestantism, Oriental Orthodoxy, and Eastern Orthodoxy. Some of that church, at the moment, say they are ‘Charismatic’ others say they are a ‘New Testament’ or ‘Apostolic Household’ church and do not belong to the Charismatic movement.

For sure all the modern Holly-Bolly-Woody-Booly modern entertainment forms a very attractive asset to lure people in the community. At several places in the United States certain movements took place which were noticed by C. Peter Wagner to fall under the same denominator. Unlike several sects or cults groups it is not some secret society or shadowy organization. They started to find like-minded people who had no intention to overthrow world governments or undermining the Church. For many of them the “New Apostolic Reformation” started off as a name giving for a movement that was going through the established church. Nothing more but a term used to classify a subset of people throughout denominational and non-denominational Christendom who seem to share some common characteristics.

In Christendom we may find lots of churches which not only worship a Trinity, but also believe that the Holy Spirit is with them and moving around in their church even in such a way that this spirit would choose special pastors, giving them a special role in the Church of God and/or in the Kingdom of God. They may come up with many different stories even telling that people got ‘gold dust’ on their hands.

One of them was the wife of one of your pastors/elders, and she very excitedly and animatedly told us how the ‘spirit had been moving’ in a certain meeting, because the people had seen ‘gold dust’ on their hands. {An open letter to the church I left}

Andrea remarks

it is easy to dismiss the ‘manifestations of the spirit’ thing when someone is interpreting a verse of scripture about ‘being filled with the spirit’ or ‘being drunk in the spirit’, while you are sitting under the cloud of false teaching. But when you realize that these kinds of ‘manifestations’ are actually completely absent in scripture, and had been completely absent in the church until only a couple of years ago, that is when you sit up and take notice. And then when you realize that during all that time it had actually been present in the occult and Eastern mystic religions, that is when you start opening up a whole can of worms. That is when you get up and walk out of a meeting before the end, leaving behind some dear friends who are violently convulsing on the floor, and shaking in fits of ‘holy laughter’. That is when you walk out of a large WOF centre from a Jesus Culture ‘revival’ concert, feeling like you had just walked out of the depths of hell, and all the while absolutely hating yourself for having such feelings and for questioning ‘the work that God is doing through the moving of His spirit’.
And you’re asking yourself ‘Is this really the God that I know?’, but still you are convinced that the problem lies with you because you are ‘not open to the spirit’, because that is what you’re being told over, and over, and over again. And then you get pushed, and pushed, and pushed to get baptized so that you can also ‘receive the spirit’, and you’re left scratching your head because you had thought that because you were already a believer, you had already received the Holy Spirit, but the word ‘obedience’ gets thrown at you over, and over, and over again. And this is when you start to see the indoctrination above the doctrine. {An open letter to the church I left}

People should come to see that at such point they do come in the danger zone. There it is, where we would differentiate between a through church and a cult or sect. Whilst non-trinitarians do keep to the biblical teachings and are not pushing people to come into their church, afterwards demanding all sorts of obligations, and not letting people easily go, this is typical for the cult groups we notice in the trinitarian churches. Also when people then want to leave such a church or group we notice the leaders of such community want to give a ‘guilt feeling’ to the person who wants to leave.

Andrea gives a nice example how such cults or groups work

Instead you preyed on my hurt and my weakness, and used it to set your trap, so that you could be the ones who avoided the issue. This leads me to believe that, despite the deceptive façade, you actually have no idea who you are or what you believe, and you are carried about by every wind of doctrine. If this was not so, you would have had no problem answering all the questions I had first, despite any other issues that might have been present. {An open letter to the church I left}

Backsliding term used within Christianity to describe a process by which an individual who has converted to Christianity reverts to pre-conversion habits and/or lapses or falls into sin, when a person turns from God to pursue their own desire. – The story of the Prodigal Son has become a representation of a backslider that repented. Engraving of the Prodigal Son as a swineherd by Hans Sebald Beham, 1538.

In most such dominating churches we can see that they try to put the guilt feeling by accusing that person who has objections of being a backslider. Saying that the faith is watering down because the person is going the wrong way, spiritually. They want to have the doubting person to believe all lies within him or her. Saying that he or she is regressing rather than progressing and that there is no proof any more of a commitment to Christ or that a certain standard of behaviour is not there any more.

DivideTheWord.blog, a cloud-based ministry who claim to have as purpose to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the world in such a way as to be available to all of God’s children, saying it is free from denominational judgmentalism, free from race, colour or creed stipulations, brings a testimony

Having been a member of an independent Oneness Pentecostal (Apostolic) church for fifteen years, gaining a 4-year degree from a Oneness Pentecostal Bible College, and being involved in many ministries within that church, to them, I am now completely backslid. I know the doctrines. I learned the dogma. I defended it ardently.

I justified foul behavior for the purity of the doctrine and I even considered, as they do, all other Christians, lost. According to Apostolic Oneness Pentecostals (the majority, there are personal exceptions) all other Christians, be they Baptist, Lutheran, you name the group, they will not be going to heaven, because they do not follow the Pentecostal doctrines.

And when I finally had enough of the stink of judgmentalism, elitism, self-righteous pomp, the hypocrisy of their holiness standards, I backslid. I left the church. I’ll never return, nor attend another Oneness Pentecostal church again.

But something miraculous happened to me, and to hundreds, and thousands of others I’m connected to via this blog, my YouTube channel and many recovery based online groups;

I backslid, right into Jesus {I Backslid Into Jesus}

Also Andrea writes

I can assure you that I am anything but a ‘lukewarm’ Christian. {An open letter to the church I left}

The woman who likes to think of the NAR as a ‘mega cult’ or an ‘out-of-control cult’ seems to have not such nice experiences, though at first it looked even so attractive she left her ‘old’ traditional church.

For her

Praise and Worship during a Catholic Charismatic Renewal Healing Service.

It is probably important, at this point, to also note its interconnectedness with the Signs and Wonders, and Word of Faith movements. And that it is also known or characterized by a bunch of other terms, like ‘Dominionism’, ‘The Third Wave’, ‘Kingdom Now Theology’, ‘Joel’s Army’, ‘Manifest Sons of God Doctrine’, ‘Charismania’, ‘The Seven Mountain Mandate’, and ‘The Fivefold Ministry’, to name only a few. And that its precursor was ‘the New Order of the Latter Rain’, a discredited movement out of which a lot of current day NAR teachings is derived. It seems to be an ever changing, constantly evolving and expanding movement, which is what makes it so hard to pinpoint and, I believe, is part of its deceptiveness. {Eighteen Months in a Cult: Prologue}

In Pentecostalism there may be found so many subgroups that often people can not see the woods any more because of the trees. Some of those groups evolve around one ‘spiritual leader’ who can have many people under his spell. Some groups have an end to their existence when the pastor dies, others have a longer life.

In the book ‘A New Apostolic Reformation? A Biblical Response to a Worldwide Movement’, Geivett & Pivec writes:

“Whereas the Latter Rain revival lasted only a few years, NAR has been around for more than thirty years – since the 1980s, when the office of prophet began to be restored. NAR teachings have gained enough momentum for an entire generation of young people to be raised in churches that promote them. For these people, NAR teachings are at the heart of Christianity.”

Andrea was raised Reformed, and writes

– that is, the other reformation. Whereas the NAR is a falling away from the authority of Scripture towards ‘experiences’, ‘encounters’, and ‘new revelations’, the Protestant Reformation was a return to the light of Scripture. To the eternal things that God has already promised and revealed in His Word, and to recognizing it as the only truth and authority to live by. Hence one of the battle cries was Sola Scriptura – Scripture Alone. And even though I do not remember the emphasis ever really being placed on the fact that we were Reformed, or being taught exactly what that even meant, this was very much the culture and mind set I had grown up with. {Eighteen Months in a Cult: Prologue}

For the Mega-churches and Pentecostal Churches youngsters are an easy prey because they are not so much interested in pure words of the Scriptures, but like more “ambience” with song and dance and special actions, like seeing people going in trance or watching unbelievable things like people nearly going mad.

Andrea also admits

when you are a young person, still searching for passion and a sense of purpose, it is very hard to disagree with those who say that the traditional church is ‘dead’. And hymns, structure and doctrine simply does not seem all that relevant and exciting anymore.
So for me, when the opportunity presented itself to become part of a young, vibrant, hip & happening church, suffice it to say that I did not hesitate for very long. Even though the circumstances of how I came to be introduced to this church was accompanied by a sense of hurt and rejection, I nevertheless grabbed the opportunity to join what seemed like a genuinely committed, and caring, community of believers. I was hoping, and expecting, to have my faith nurtured and strengthened in the process. {Eighteen Months in a Cult: Prologue}

Question is how much such attractive groups can nurture a person in the good sense. We should know it is really god’s Word that must give guidance to people. It is the Bible which can give us the most correct education and foundation for a good faith.

When not much attention is given to the text from the Bible, people shall miss out edifying material, for reproof and profitable for correction for building up a life according to the Will of God.

When to much attention is giving to the pleasures of life or to the human or natural flesh the real faith can not grow. Mike sojournerphoto remembers

I (was) removed from these organisations many years ago – initially with judgement in my heart – but have since watched the ‘Toronto ‘blessing’ and such stuff thrive. I became increasingly appalled at what was happening and now am amazed that it continues, ever more subtle. I remember a dark day sitting in ‘my church’ sometime around 1986 or 7 and the band deciding to play on after the service to ‘continue to seek God’ and as looked down it was a though there was a dark pit (not visual, so much as metaphorical) and I felt compelled to leave the building. I later came to recognise so much of this as seeking after ‘the flesh’ and to equate it with James observation on the ‘earthly, natural, demonic’.

Therefore let us remember that a true Christian church should be open, have no secrecy for its members nor for the outside world, and should give most attention to the Word of God, it is to readings from the Bible.

Preceding

Lovers of God, seekers and lovers of truth

Some one or something to fear #3 Cases, folks and outing

All Souls’ Day

Additional reading

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Divisive pastors and Strange Fire conference

Posted on 2013/10/23 by Marcus Ampe

Weekend of Deep Spiritual Contrasts

Beginning last Wednesday during the Strange Fire Conference at his church in Sun Valley, Pastor John MacArthur continued his case against the Charismatic movement. A backlash of criticism from many in the Christian community resulted in the conference name and subject matter trending online over the last several days.

John MacArthur on Calvin’s Pulpit (Photo credit: six steps )

The Rev. John MacArthur, influential author, pastor, old school fundamentalist whose church draws over 8000 weekly attendees, and seminary president has (according to his words) hosted the Strange Fire conference to help the Church, and people who believe the Bible is the Word of God and that God has revealed Himself clearly and consistently and without contradiction.

Whereas the Jesus movement looked for ways to include people whom the church was not including (hippies, ’68 flower child counter-culture, etc), MacArthur’s movement is criticised because he seems bent on figuring out how to exclude a large majority of Christians from the movement they are already in. John MacArthur believes all Charismatics are blasphemers, misguided at best and perhaps even likely in league with evil forces, and ultimately hell-bound, which is the premise of his Strange Fire conference, based on his recent book of the same name. MacArthur spent the conference denouncing the prosperity gospel, the social gospel, charismatics….

Many think it is more a promotional tour of MacArthur using this gathering to promote his book and to have his ever-shrinking group of friends getting them back again as his followers.

Joel Osteen at Lakewood Church, Houston, Texas (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

MacArthur’s punches thrown during the three-day conference included calling out mainline, Pentecostal-influenced pastors such as T.D. Jakes and Joel Osteen, and congregations that he says focus on “spirit-filled” services rather than Christ-centered doctrine.

“If the Charismatic movement was being produced by the Holy Spirit, the glory of Christ would prevail everywhere,” said MacArthur during the morning session Thursday. “It would be Christ dominated and everyone in the movement would be bowing the knee to the true Christ in belief of the true Gospel.”

He continued,

“The people would be humble. They would be joyful. They would be sacrificial. They would be confessional. They would be declaring Jesus as Lord and themselves His slaves. They would be denying themselves, taking up their cross and following Him wherever He led.”

MacArthur called the Charismatic movement a “long war on truth.”

“The true people of God have always had to battle the false prophets and the liars,” he said. “What makes them effective is the deceptiveness of it. It is a strange irony to me, in the Charismatic movement, that if you criticize them, if you endeavour to be vigilant and discerning, and if you endeavour to contend for the truth and hold them to Scripture and expose their error, they will condemn you as the sinner … How do I know that? I have lived that.”

He responded to critics of the three-day Strange Fire conference at his Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, Calif., that many pastors believe is causing dissension among the faithful because he’s teaching that the Charismatic movement is leading people astray and dishonours the Holy Spirit.

MacArthur commented that some of his critics have said that he’s fixated on the Charismatic movement, a claim he countered by noting that in his 45 years in ministry, this was his first conference he’s held on the movement, and believes it has come too late.

“In response to this conference, there have been some attacks, and we’ve been unable to escape them,” MacArthur said to the more than 3,000 attendees at the conference Friday night. “I just want to address those, because I do think that it’s important to answer the criticisms that have come.”

Through the last decennia we heard of many “miraculous” works presented as the work of a sovereign God. The people ‘speaking in tongues‘ become more popular and by many shaking and moaning is considered to be divine.

Jeremy Egrerer, CP Guest Contributor writes:

“if acting drunk is something which proves the presence of the Almighty, then every clumsy fool and every epileptic should be canonized into sainthood, and every bar considered a temple.” {In Defense of John MacArthur, Strange Fire Conference and the Challenge to the Charismatic Mov’t}

“If Charismatics are speaking the language of heaven, let us record and prove it. Release every Christian scholar in its study; let us learn to speak it on our own, and therefore prove ourselves the sons of God. But if it remains a universally undecipherable mess, incomprehensible and unmanageable beyond every human means, then it is only fair to wonder either whether we really are speaking the language of heaven, or whether perhaps God divided the nations of angels because they built a tower of Babel in the clouds – a historical assertion neither provable nor sensible. And if we cannot even do this, then let us at least abide by the rules contained in Scripture for the orderly and Godly expression of spiritual gifts.”

Prophesy and speaking in tongues does not mean something Godly. with prophesy we should take attention and check what those called prophets told about future events and how they enrolled. Soon we shall see they have no such power to foretell the future correctly. It is just not given to man. Even the great prophet Jeshua, Jesus Christ could not tell when he was coming back to this earth to judge the living and the dead. You would think such an important event for mankind this son of God should surely know, but he did not.

Mars Hill Church Pastor Mark Driscoll at the Strange Fire conference on Friday, Oct. 18, 2013, hosted by Pastor John MacArthur’s Grace Community Church.

Mark Driscoll, pastor of Mars Hill Church in Washington state, made his way Friday to Pastor John MacArthur’s Strange Fire conference in California to hand out copies of his new book, A Call to Resurgence: Will Christianity Have a Funeral or a Future? and presumably share his views on the charismatic gifts of the Holy Spirit — which the Strange Fire conference challenges. He believes that people know they have the Holy Spirit if they speak in tongues, the primary evidence to Pentecostals that a believer has the Spirit.

Driscoll who used this conference as an opportunity to stir up some drama, has posted photos of himself talking with attendees at MacArthur’s Strange Fire conference on Friday, where he did indeed hand out copies of his new book — until they were reportedly seized by members of the Strange Fire security team. (find the photo: Handing out free copies of my new book, A Call To Resurgence) The director of the conference explained to Driscoll that those who are distributing books have gone through an extensive process and that they’d like him not to distribute them. After continuing to direct attendees to take the books, security offered to help him take the books back to his car. Driscoll insisted multiple times, “No, they’re my gift to Grace Church. I want you to have them.” After insisting that security not help him with the books back to the car, the conference director accepted the gift and brought them to GCC offices. This book clearly seems to bring disunity and dishonour to the Christian community.
The security people graciously asked Driscoll three times to stop hanging out books and he continued to do so. This shows how the ego went over the respectful attitude at some ones place. The Pentecostal movement shows the world it has also become as sick as the many other denominations in Christendom. Here we could see a pastor subverting a fellow pastor in his conference and attempting to dissuade people from MacArthur’s church to his own. I would consider that a very impolite action and calling it a terrible example. People have a right to share their ideas and point of view but they should know their place and consider where and when they want to take the word and attention.

Rob Shryock remarks:

Ironically, this whole incident highlights another similarity between Driscoll and MacArthur: besides both being relentless self-promoters who make their names by loudly denouncing others, they also hate when people call them out as self-promoters who loudly denounce others, preferring to be known as quiet, humble men of God who love and respect their enemies – despite all tweets to the contrary.

Christians like Driscoll and MacArthur thrive on conflict.

But Christians should be as followers of Christ brotherly united. Though brothers and sisters may argue with each other they always should be careful not having their fight s coming into public and damaging the name of the family.

MacArthur who commented that the conference wasn’t for nonbelievers within the Charismatic movement, for which there are many, he contends.

“I don’t expect nonbelievers to have a desire for the truth, a hunger for the truth or to search out the truth. That’s not what unbelievers do unless they’re being prompted by the Holy Spirit.”

pastor. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Though the task Jesus has given to his followers to get unbelievers and to bring them to him (Christ), getting them to know the Good News of the Kingdom of God. In the teaching of Christ Jesus it is shown to us that it would be unloving to leave people in darkness and error. So we should also meet the unbelievers and for the believers we should show them the right way and when they go wrong we also should show them their mistakes. Already very early in the beginning of Christianity perverse, deceptive men came to distract the community from the Word of God. already then there where preachers trying to get people away from the truth of Scripture and to lead Christians astray.

For this reason we should look at all those who like to preach and consider their attitude against each other. We also have the duty of to pointing out errors and giving biblical arguments also to those who call themselves pastors and church elders.

Do find:

Strange Fire Organisation: Strange Fire + Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California.

Find additional reading:

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‘Strange Fire:’ Addressing the Dangerous yet Popular Teaching of Charismatic Leaders (averageus.com)
What do Kenneth Copeland, Creflo Dollar, Joyce Meyer, Paul and Jan Crouch, John Hagee, Benny Hinn, and T.D. Jakes have in common?
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Charismatics are a large, diverse, loosely knit group who are difficult to define because they are often independent, united only by the personalities they follow, rather than being formally organized as groups of churches. But in general, Charismatics (and their theological first cousins, Pentecostals) are Bible-believing Christians with this distinguishing feature: They are committed to the ongoing miraculous work of God’s Spirit in Christians’ lives.
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Charismatics tend to be experience-driven, pursuing personal power, victory, and prophecy while placing a low value on doctrinal and theological training. They tend to appeal to their personal experiences for proof that a particular belief is true, or practice is valid. They crave ecstatic experiences, the miraculous, new revelations, and physical healing, and generally believe that these are all available to those who have enough faith. Since they prefer immediate experiences over life-long biblical learning and growth, they can be easily persuaded to believe whatever a convincing personality tells them. In other words, they are easily deceived. And according to MacArthur, they often are.
The Top Seven Strange “Strange Fire” Statements (holyspiritactivism.wordpress.com)
Here are the top seven strange Strange Fire statements!
John MacArthur’s *Strange Fire* Conference, Charismatics, & Christ (bjstockman.wordpress.com)
Christian’s should be known much more by what and who they are for than by what and who they are against. Yes, Christians must distinguish between that which we are for and that which we are against, and this comes from naming what we are against, but this should not be our central mark. Nevertheless, what follows is all done with what began here in mind.
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It is my understanding that CJ Mahaney, a charismatic, preached in his pulpit and that he has relationships with other continuationist pastors like John Piper. Maybe it was intended to be alarmist to better “market” the conference? After all, in a later video, he seems to clean this up a touch, as he gives a “word of encouragement to faithful Pentecostals” and says that the conference is addressing the aberrations and extremes of the movement. (Would of been nice to hear that the first time). But this was *not* communicated in the first video, even if it was intended.
Strange Fire Conference: MacArthur’s Appeal to His Continuationist Friends (challies.com)
Before addressing the accusations against the conference, MacArthur charged attendees to carefully read their copy of Strange Fire and to measure it against the Word of God. He is convinced that this book, with its well-documented research and extensive footnotes, will withstand careful scrutiny. He reminds us that this book and conference is intended for the Church. He has no expectation for either one to be helpful to non-believers, which he suspects makes up much of the charismatic movement.
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Here are the seven accusations, along with brief responses.
Lessons Learned at Strange Fire (challies.com)
Those who listened to the conference heard again and again just how many charismatics there are in the world—somewhere around 500 million. Conrad Mbewe made it clear that in many places in the world, and especially in the developing world, to be a Christian does not mean that you trust in Jesus Christ for salvation, but that you believe in and practice something akin to the miraculous gifts. Charismatic theology is a North American export that is making a massive impact elsewhere in the world.
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The charismatic/cessationist issue is polarizing. Before Strange Fire I did not know just how polarizing it could be, though I suppose others did know, and this is why we have been loathe to address it. Based on the reaction to the event and the discussions back-and-forth, it seems clear that this is an issue many of us feel as much as it is an issue we believe by reasoning it out from Scripture. It is one of those issues where we see our own position with utter clarity and look to the opposite position with shock that they can believe something so absurd. Those tend to be the most dangerous issues of all because they can turn sour so quickly and easily. In the face of such a polarizing issue, I need to consider how I can maintain unity in the faith while still holding fast to what I believe the Bible teaches.
John MacArthur vs. Mark Driscoll: Megachurch pastors clash over charismatic theology (religionnews.com)
Rich Gregory, assistant to John MacArthur, said he was there when it happened and that Driscoll’s books were not confiscated and there was nothing confrontational.“It was great, we were happy to have him at the conference. He brought books to hand out. We explained to him that all the books distributed on campus need to be approved. He told us that he wanted them to be a gift to us from him. One of our conference directors took that gift and brought them up to the offices. If you hear from him and he wants them back, we can send those back if he wants them. We were not looking at him like, ‘Boy you’re trying to stir up controversy.’ I don’t want to judge his motives for what he wasn’t trying to do. I wish they had actually stayed for the actual content of the conference.”
Samuel Rodriguez Takes on Strange Fire: Tells John MacArthur he Needs to ‘Focus on Preaching the Word’ (blackchristiannews.com)
“If the Charismatic movement was being produced by the Holy Spirit, the glory of Christ would prevail everywhere,” said MacArthur during the morning session Thursday. “It would be Christ dominated and everyone in the movement would be bowing the knee to the true Christ in belief of the true Gospel.”
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Rodriguez, who is considered the leading spokesperson for the Hispanic evangelical community, much of which is a part of or has a background in the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement, said in a statement sent to The Christian Post via email that MacArthur misses the mark by a wide margin. Rodriguez has been an Assemblies of God ordained minister since the age of 23. His bio includes the statement that in 2010, he was called to start a multi-ethnic, Christ-centered, spirit-filled, Bible-based church in Sacramento, Calif.
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“John MacArthur suffers from spiritual, cultural and theological myopia,” stated Rodriguez to CP. “With great due deference to a Christian leader many of us admire, his conclusions regarding the largest and fastest growing of global Christendom, the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement, speaks to a man ignorant of the community’s unbridled commitment to biblical orthodoxy.

“Unfortunately, this blessed Christian leader cannot differentiate between substance and style, or engaging a biblical metaphor, between Christianity’s ‘wine’ and the varied ‘wineskins.’ In other words, Mr. MacArthur should be focusing on the fact that while many in the church continue to abandon our Christian faith, the Pentecostal/Charismatic community continues to offer the church a legitimate growth mechanism.”
Strange Fire Conference: John MacArthur’s Opening Address (challies.com)
It is inevitable that at some point John MacArthur will be the subject of a biography (beyond the existing biography written by Iain Murray). Today he is beginning something that will, I think, appear in that biography. We will know better as the conference unfolds what impact it will make in his life and ministry and in the wider Christian world.There are 4,000 people in attendance at the Strange Fire conference and many thousands more who are watching the live-stream in English, Spanish, German, Portuguese, Arabic, Italian, French, Russian and Mandarin. Here is what they heard in the opening address.
Strange Fire Conference Wraps Up; John MacArthur Calls on Reformed Pastors to ‘Police the Charismatic Movement’ and Guide it Back to the Gospel (blackchristiannews.com)
Conrade Mbewe spoke again, delivering a message titled, “Are We Preachers or Witch Doctors?” As Tim Challies reported, “The first session of the final day at the Strange Fire conference brought Conrad Mbewe back to the pulpit. Phil Johnson introduced him by sharing how others have called him the Spurgeon of Africa. Today he brought message entitled, “Are We Preachers or Witch Doctors?” Though an odd question, it is pertinent to him because there has been a clear shift in how “evangelicals” relate to pastoral ministry. Mbewe’s aim is to give a broad sweeping picture of the landscape of African “evangelicalism.” Throughout this message his caveat is to put “evangelicalism” in quote and end-quote, because it does not represent biblical and faithful Christianity. There will be those in Africa who do not fit within the picture Mbewe portrays, but what he shares today is the trend and it is a dismal trend.
John MacArthur Responds to “Strange Fire” Conference Critics (blackchristiannews.com)
“This is for the true church, so that they can discern; so that they can be protected from error; and so that they can be a source of truth for others outside the church,” he said, adding that his book, Strange Fire: The Danger of Offending the Holy Spirit With Counterfeit Worship, can withstand the most intense scrutiny, when measured against the word of God in the Bible.

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Tag Archives: Charismatics