Bible Study Is the Charismatic Movement Dangerous and Heretical?

[for_his_glory]

Charismatic is one who claims divine inspiration which inspires devotion in others. But, there is a fine line between emotionalism and the actual movement of the Holy Spirit displayed within the gifts of the Spirit of God.

I've been in many charismatic services where you knew the Holy Spirit was definitely present as all things within the gifts of the Spirit were done with a proper order. What I mean by proper order is that of the gifts of the Holy Spirit being exercised within the service as the Spirit of God lead the service.

I've also been in charismatic services that was more emotional than Spiritual and prophecies uttered that were not from God, the whole service was music with maybe two scriptures read by the Pastor or just a feel good message.

If you are indwelled with the Holy Spirit you will know right away if all is from man or the Holy Spirit.

 

[JLB]

it happens

Maybe so.

does your church ,

allow unintereptsd tongues spoken in worship ,persons rolling on the ground in worship ,climbing chairs and proclaiming healing by running to touch the pulpit ?

We worship and sing in the spirit, and we also worship and sing with the understanding.


For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my mind is unfruitful. So what shall I do? I will pray with my spirit, but I will also pray with my understanding; I will sing with my spirit, but I will also sing with my understanding. 1 Corinthians 14:14-15


When there is a tongues message that comes forth, there is always an interpretation.

No flopping around, running to touch the pulpit, climbing the chairs, barking or clucking like chickens.

On the other hand, I have nay been going for a couple of months.


We like the Pastor.

He is humble, and prays a lot. Faithful to his congregation, goes out on the street to feed the homeless and witness. Prayer every Wednesday.

Home groups.


So far my wife and I find it refreshing.






JLB

 

[jasonc]

Maybe so.



We worship and sing in the spirit, and we also worship and sing with the understanding.


When there is a tongues message that comes forth, there is always an interpretation.

No flopping around, running to touch the pulpit, climbing the chairs, barking or clucking like chickens.

On the other hand, I have nay been going for a couple of months.


We like the Pastor.

He is humble, and prays a lot. Faithful to his congregation, goes out on the street to feed the homeless and witness. Prayer every Wednesday.

Home groups.


So far my wife and I find it refreshing.






JLB

so you disagree that worship in church is to edify the members .
paul said praying in,the Spirit without intepretation is private .He wouldn't in church and did it in private .

 

[JLB]

so you disagree that worship in church is to edify the members .

Worship in Church is to worship God.



JLB

 

[JLB]

paul said praying in,the Spirit without intepretation is private

Maybe you could share that passage with us.

 

[jasonc]

Worship in Church is to worship God.



JLB

you sing in Holy Ghost and don't know the lyrics as its not inperpretared

https://www.bible.com/bible/1/1CO.14.KJV

paul disagrees. I can't agree to what I didn't understand

 

[jasonc]

Maybe you could share that passage with us.

1 Corinthians 14:28

surely that means no,mumbling ,speaking softly .silence is not moving or opening the mouth .


there are those who pray so loud in,the spirit you don't need a microphone to hear them.I was around those .it was hard to tell if they were to be inteperrated

 

[jasonc]

can't bless another by a song,yes worship,music is to be used to bless another by a testimony .a reminder there are songs I get even from,my,charismatic days that I will remember and hear all day .

yet can't do that if it's not interpretated .paul desires that all understand in church

 

[jasonc]

I have been slain,and drunk in,the spirit ,prophecied and interpreted and laid hands on,some and they received the Gift .so yes I do understand these doctrines .

 

[PaulChristensen]

Made clear by whom?

Have you sat down with each Pastor, and person in those congregations you mentioned and ask them what the believe and teach?

Do you know how they live their lives?



JLB

I spent the first 12 years of my Christian life from 1966 to 1978 in Pentecostal churches. So I think I got a good impression of what Pentecostals do and teach. I know that genuine Pentecostals will not have a bar of the Bethel or Hillsong types. They would not see those groups as being true Pentecostals.

But then my direct experience of Pentecostals have been of New Zealand ones. I hear that African Pentecostal pastors are expressing deep concern about the heresies that are being taught by American lunatics from Bethel and Hillsong going over there and corrupting their churches.

My more recent experience with Pentecostals is that what they are doing is just play acting, talking the talk, but with no power. I have been to healing meetings where much has been said about healing, but no one got healed. My last one was at a crusade in Auckland NZ where Reinhard Bonnke came with a reputation of having had thousands healed in his African crusade. A guy got up and spent 30 minutes telling us all what a great guy Bonnke was. Then the great man got up and gave a rather tame message which lasted for 20 minutes, and then another guy got up and spent another 30 minutes teaching about divine healing. But even though hundreds came forward for healing, no one actually got healed. So, if it was a healing crusade, it was a total waste of time, because although all the talk was there, the actual presence of the Holy Spirit to heal the sick was absent.

During my 12 years in the Pentecostal church, I went to all the healing meetings, run by some of the most prominent American healing evangelists. I saw the same people go up time after time for prayer, but none of them actually got healed. Some sick people were "slain in the Spirit", and so if the Holy Spirit acted on them in that way you would think they would get up healed. But they didn't, so one has to wonder whether that was the Spirit at all.

So, my view on the modern "official" Charismatic claims of miracles and healing is, "the Emperor has no clothes!" In all my 53 years of Christian life I have never seen a blind person see again as the result of prayer. Nor have I ever seen a person with terminal cancer healed. I have seen meetings where people came in wheelchairs, and went out the same way. These have been in meetings where divine healing is preached, and people have been invited to go to the front to be healed. But the people who went to the front, returned back to their seats still as sick as they were when they went up.

I believe that Jesus really does heal the sick today, and so it is a mystery to me, why He doesn't choose to honour the prayers of these "famous" healing evangelists in their healing meetings? All sorts of excuses are made, like the person "doesn't have enough faith" or "it's not God's will to heal you right now", or "the Lord has decided to heal you through the doctor", or "Jesus doesn't heal people today". But none of these excuses wash with me. Jesus never gave excuses like that. When He touched a person for healing they were totally healed on the spot. Blind men got their sight, deaf folk got their hearing, lame men walked, the dead were raised, people were cerebral palsy were cured, lepers were made clean.

So, I would say that most of the so-called healing ministry today is nothing more than theatre play acting and pretending that Jesus is healing people when in most cases He isn't. So we need to find out what is wrong and put things right so the power of the Holy Spirit can really been seen in our evangelism and Christian meetings.

 

[PaulChristensen]

it happens
does your church ,

allow unintereptsd tongues spoken in worship ,persons rolling on the ground in worship ,climbing chairs and proclaiming healing by running to touch the pulpit ?
I have seen that ,its possible what passes as prophecy isn't at all. a bit of skepticism is wise .I spent 10 years in,that .I can't say that church is a heretic but it is wrong on that ,they are very loud charismatic churches that have no order to service at all or very little .pray and the Spirit shows up.

to say that can't go far is bit much .if a oneness pastor says you need the Holy Ghost ,is the Holy Ghost also the Son or the Father given He won't speak(testify) of himself ?

my brother saved in that church is no longer charismatic .doesn't as I do believe in female pastors ,deacons and that church has verifiable miracles.I can mention Herman Stalvey and they will mention the tent revivals ,the healings ,some might mock others I know that we're there will testify .

there are out there charismatics.my church is rented out by a Spanish charismatic church with a female pastor ,elders who are cessonist have allowed them for 17 years .we had fellowship with them for a Seder service and the 25th anniversary of my church.the founding pastor was raised in a Pentecostal snake handling church in Kentucky .I met him as he is ecumenical and preached at mine .I attended his service twice and his Saturday men's fellowship .I didn't know he wasn't a charismatic until last year .he was burned by his childhood experience .yet when he got going about Jesus he jumped,danced .ya wouldn't know he wasn't .

Probably they got sick and tired and disillusioned with the play acting and pretence while the real power of the Holy Spirit was absent, and so they accepted the reality that God was not honouring their prayers for the manifestations of the true gifts and the healing of the sick, and gave up all the pretence and went back to what they knew was real.

Quite frankly, I wouldn't go to their church and depend on their prayers if God doesn't answer them. Because Charles Finney became a Christian he was invited to a church. He observed what went on at that church and he told the minister than he would not join their church because God doesn't answer their prayers, and if he wanted to belong to a church it had to be one where God did answer their prayers.

That's why I don't go to healing meetings any more. What's the point? God doesn't answer their prayers in spite of all the talk and quoting of Scripture, so why should I trust something that isn't working?

 

[PaulChristensen]

Can you site scripture references to support the above statement?

Thank you, Dan

Anyone can call themselves an apostle or a prophet, but the reality is that a person has to be one. And the evidence of that is he has to preach the Gospel based on the finished word of Jesus on the Cross and the Resurrection; he has to be personally chosen and appointed by Jesus Himself; his ministry must feature signs and wonders as validation of his apostleship; and he must be fully accepted over all the body of Christ and not just his particular faith group or denomination. A prophet needs to show the power of the Holy Spirit to bring conviction of sin through his prophetic utterances, and if he gives predictive prophecies they must come to pass; also he must be fully accepted as a prophet of God throughout the whole body of Christ not just a movement (ie: Charismatic movement).

I have heard of a number who call themselves apostles and prophets, but I don't see them meeting the Scriptural qualifications. Therefore I see these men as self-appointed and given themselves the name, but the Holy Spirit has not given them the validation. This means they are pretending without the reality.

 

[PaulChristensen]

My statement —





Scripture —


And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, Ephesians 4:11-14

• He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith.

JLB

Although the Scriptures you have quoted are correct, the ones who claim they are apostles and prophets are pretending, because although they have the name, they are not real apostles. In a previous post I gave the Scriptural qualifications for apostleship and being a prophet. All the ones who name themselves as apostles and prophets are limited to the Charismatic movement and therefore not accepted across the whole body of Christ, and they are unable to demonstrate real signs and wonders to validate that they have been actually appointed by the Holy Spirit.

If a guy claims to be an apostle and cannot even get a flea healed of a headache then to me he is pretending and nothing more than another Bible teacher limited to his own religious movement.

 

[PaulChristensen]

timothy isn't mentioned in the didache .no one who is against apolostic sucession,is arguing for it .

so two of these modern day apostles would agree totally ,100 percent on,doctrine if so post these. modern day apostles

your definiton of unity is unifornitaruan

For information purposes, there is no such thing as Apostolic succession. An apostle is directly appointed by Christ and validated by genuine signs and wonders to support his preaching of the Gospel, just the same as Peter and Paul.

 

[PaulChristensen]

Yes sir.


Please understand, when a person says about someone who has the baptism of the Holy Spirit and speaks in tongues that they are operating by the devil, and that they are demon possessed, that person is blaspheming the Holy Spirit.

They are calling the Holy Spirit who is operating through that person, the Devil.


Plain and simple.




I know you understand what that means.






JLB

In the same way, someone pretending to have a healing ministry, or says he is an apostle or prophet without the necessary qualifications and attested by genuine signs and wonders is merely pretending. The definition of "blasphemy" is to "make light of", "bring into disrepute". The Holy Spirit is a holy Spirit and so pretending to have a ministry in the Holy Spirit when no appointment by the Holy Spirit has been made, is an insult to the Spirit and therefore blasphemy. That would apply to most prominent "healing" ministries, "apostles" and "prophets" that we hear about today. Because they are all talk and no power, they are discrediting the ministry and therefore discrediting the Holy Spirit Himself.

 

[PaulChristensen]

How do you know if each and every person received a false tongue?


Is there any teaching in the Bible about false tongues?




JLB

Without faith it is impossible to please God. Receiving the gift of tongues comes by faith. Faith comes by hearing the Word of God. If the person ignores the Scriptural steps of faith (the will of God, asking, receiving, believing) then he is acting with presumption and not faith. Anyone can go forward in church, have a group praying over him and getting him to speak in tongues without him taking any of the steps of faith. What he comes out with could very well be gibberish and not tongues because he is acting on the presumption that the prayers of the group will impart the gift to him. But if he is in a church where God doesn't answer their prayers, ie: they pray for the sick but no one gets healed, then there is no guarantee that the prayers of the group are going to be answered by God either. And if the person is expecting some sort of sensory experience or ecstatic emotion in order to be able to speak in tongues, the devil is always there to give him one.

 

[PaulChristensen]

I went to a church where there was rolling in the aisles and drooling at the mouth.
And that was the mild stuff.
I thought they were crazy and that I would never go there.
But I did go there and they laid hands on me and I started speaking in tongues.
I was baptized in the Holy Spirit and my spiritual life took off from there.
Yes, I become am active member for 13 years until I moved away.
Did I ever roll in the aisles and drool from the mouth?
No, but I've done a lot of other things through the years.

Most of what you saw in that church was merely theatre play acting and not the Holy spirit at all. The reason why you didn't do the same is that you weren't into play acting and pretending. You wanted the real thing, and God honoured your faith and gave you the true gift of tongues. It wasn't anyone or anything in that church that enabled you to receive the gift. It was God when you believed the Scripture and asked Him for the gift and stepped out in faith to receive it. It won't matter if you continued to belong to that church or went and joined a non-Charismatic church, your ability to pray in tongues will not cease, although you will no longer speaking it in front of others in church. But you will continue to speak it to God in private prayer and He will bless you as a result.

 

[JLB]

Without faith it is impossible to please God.

Amen

Receiving the gift of tongues comes by faith. Faith comes by hearing the Word of God. If the person ignores the Scriptural steps of faith (the will of God, asking, receiving, believing) then he is acting with presumption and not faith.

But if he is in a church where God doesn't answer their prayers, ie: they pray for the sick but no one gets healed, then there is no guarantee that the prayers of the group are going to be answered by God either. And if the person is expecting some sort of sensory experience or ecstatic emotion in order to be able to speak in tongues, the devil is always there to give him one.

If a person does ask God for the Spirit, will he receive “false tongues” from the devil?


For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
“Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” Luke 11:10-13

• Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?

Jesus teaches us we can trust Him, that if we ask Him for the Holy Spirit, we are not going to get a demon spirit or something evil instead.

• how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

This comes back to my initial question that asks... how do you know if each and every person who asked for the Holy Spirit, received “false tongues”?




JLB

 

[JLB]

I spent the first 12 years of my Christian life from 1966 to 1978 in Pentecostal churches. So I think I got a good impression of what Pentecostals do and teach. I know that genuine Pentecostals will not have a bar of the Bethel or Hillsong types. They would not see those groups as being true Pentecostals.

UPC folks don’t see anyone outside of the United Pentecostal Church as being Christians much less “true Pentecostals”.


Labeling every single person that goes to a certain Church as a false Christian because that church has a certain reputation is not something Jesus would teach us to do.


Personally, I don’t care for the teachings that come out of Bethel, nor do I believe everything Hillsong teaches is biblical.


However, I won’t label everyone in those churches as being false Christians with false tongues, because I don’t know what each and every person there believes or practices.


I do know some of the things that John MacArthur teaches because I have listened to some of his sermons.



That doesn’t mean I believe everyone in his Church has blasphemed the Holy Spirit or that they believe the false doctrine of Calvinism;
ie OSAS.





JLB

 

[Rollo Tamasi]

This thread is filled with so much negativity.
People would walk away not wanting to be a Christian after reading all this.
First of all, pentacostal is not charismatic.
I went to a pentacostal church once, then never again.
A true charismatic church is not negative, so all that you are talking about is blah, blah, blah.
Good bye.