To borrow from false prophet Hal Lindsey, we might say 'Satan
is alive and well on the planet Earth'.
This 9 minute excerpt demonstrates the utter folly of the
modern Charismatic movement... and this has nothing to do with tongues.
We could expand the definition to Evangelicalism as many,
even those professing 'Bible-alone' Christianity succumb to this 'God told me'
type thinking. Failing to reflect on the nature of Biblical Prophecy they fall
into serious error and fail to realise they in fact do not hold to
'Bible-alone' or Sola Scripture Christianity.
The people on this programme certainly don't.
The Bible is but one component of their thinking, one facet
of their authority base. And just like with tradition and/or 'reason' whatever
is paired with Scripture in the end comes to dominate and overthrow it.
I would argue this is due to the nature of Scripture and how
it interacts with us as fallen beings. We accept Scripture by faith in the
Person of Jesus Christ. The call is to submit and obey, not dissect or
supplement.
Sola Scriptura becomes somewhat meaningless apart from a
robust doctrine of Sufficiency and (I might add) Providential Preservation. The
former is somewhat meaningless without the latter.
Thus many people and groups that seem to be very conservative
in terms of their adherence to Sola Scripture are exposed as weak on this
doctrine because they have all but rejected Sufficiency and Preservation.
Many give lip-service to these notions which ends up just
muddying the waters and adding to the confusion that reigns in the Evangelical
and Protestant world.
They're not easy questions.
But it's pretty clear to see what's happening in this video.
We either have some people that are very deceived... well,
that goes without saying.
They are deceived in the sense that they are dreaming dreams
that are sourced in their own hearts and depraved minds. They are making things
up.
Or, the voices and influence they are hear are demonic.
More often than not, I vote the latter.
I think those that fall into the former open themselves up to
the latter. Almost like New-Ager's they go 'inward' looking for revelatory authority.
They want to hear voices... and eventually they hear them. Sometimes they are
indeed in contact with spirits, just not the Holy Spirit.
The firefighter prophet is a fraud but he might be fraud just
in the sense that he's some poor deluded guy that really thinks he's put this
together. Or something far more sinister may be taking place.
But look how far they stray!
Triple-Crown winners?
And of course with regard to the Jezebel at the opening of the
clip... it's a clear and virtual textbook case of false prophecy. Scripture is
twisted and words are generated in order to affirm a socio-political agenda,
i.e. power.
Once again the illustration is clear and powerful.
Many conservative Evangelicals think the evil in the world
resides in the UN, at ISIS headquarters in Syria, on the streets and back
alleys of San Francisco and within computer hacker-dens in Shanghai.
There is evil at work in all those places. Don't
misunderstand me. But that evil is just the lost world being lost.
What's happening here, on this 'Christian' television
programme is far different. There is real demonism at work here. This is where
the assault is. This is the front in the real
war, the one the world cannot see but it's the one that really matters. The
prize is not America or its culture.
The UN can take over the world (which is laughable) but
that's not the real danger to the Church. Getting blown up by a terrorist or
having your credit card hacked or even being surrounded by Sodomites doesn't
present the same level of danger to your soul and the souls of others as do the
false prophets and the counterfeit Church.
It's a polluted jewel with a thousand facets, a false god
with a thousand faces. If you watched the video, then you've seen one of them.
Is Obama demon inspired? A case could be made that virtually every world leader
is under that influence to some extent.
The nature of my healthcare doesn't affect eternity, but if
Jezebel and the firefighter in this video are an authority, speaking for God,
then that does.
Finally notice how they twist Scripture. They treat these
prophecies as something light... to be evaluated. But what's the consequence?
None. They don't seem grieved by prophecies exposed as false.
The death sentence they would receive under Moses is today
rescinded, delayed and relegated to the Eschaton wherein Christ Himself will
judge.
In This Age, the call is for excommunication, which casts
them out of the boundaries of the Covenant and Kingdom. They are put into the
outer darkness. It is a spiritual death sentence.
What they treat lightly is actually far more serious and I
would argue the sanctions of Revelation 22 have fallen upon them.
They need to be rebuked and called to repentance, otherwise
they need to be reckoned outside the Kingdom.
I agree with your assessment of these people.
ReplyDeleteHaving said that: I'm not sure what kind of boundary we are talking about. Rebuked by whom and called to repentance to what? That's the problem with Evangelicalism etc. in America, there are no actual social bodies or organizations that actually exist, except in strange charismatic ways. These people are all charlatans, and people follow them, but they start their own organizations, standing on the Bible, claiming authority. That's what we're all doing. Whether they're demon possessed or not, they're going to claim the authority of the Bible, utilizing a hermeneutic that they've cobbled together out of verses. And who judges between? Certainly not a democratic process I hope!
I guess, what I'm asking is what Church are they being excommunicated from? Unless we want to devolve down to a kind of spiritualist, invisible, Baptistic model, which becomes anarchy of every man excommunicating the other, then what Church do they exactly belong to? They are their own Church. To me, it seems like the leopard changing its spots kinda thing. The whole thing makes me sad.
In the end, how do you present your own hermeneutic as 'the' proper way without falling into tautologies, special pleading or supernatural insight? I don't expect to see you on Mt. Carmel anytime soon!
I'm not advocating denominations or granting them any kind of validity. I'm a Congregationalist.
ReplyDeleteBut even in that capacity it needs to be made clear by blocks of the Church that these people are reckoned outside it. By blocks I'm not referring to any kind of institution.
Congregations can get together and formulate declarations and statements as per Acts 15. They are not apostolic in authority but they do contain a certain weight.
Today the common form is a 'statement' that's signed by individuals. That's para-church. Instead it should be congregations doing it, not just pastors and celebrities.
The differences may seem minor and I'll grant at this point there seems little likelihood in a mass transition toward Biblical polity. Dominionism abhors Congregationalism. You can't marshal your resources and built institutions without bureaucracy and institutional infrastructure. What the NT actually says? Well, it's clear no one really cares about that.
Will it make a difference? On one level.... no, not in the least. They will continue doing what they do. And yes, even individuals will just leave and go down the street to a congregation that tells them what they want to hear. That's fine. That's going to be the state of things. We don't need the state of denominational politics to fix that. The Holy Spirit keeps the Church together, not some man-made 'form'.
How do I and/or others demonstrate these people are false? Through Scriptural argument. Obviously not everyone will be convinced. But I contend our very hermeneutic and doctrinal epistemology can be derived from Scripture itself. It will not meet the criteria of many strains of the Christian tradition. If someone is committed to integrationism, syncretism, Rationalism, tradition etc..., they will not be convinced. The argument will smack of circularity and thus the argument has to start way back at the very foundations of prolegomena. As a non-Thomist and even a non-Anselmian I contend that like it or not all man-made arguments are necessarily caught in epistemological dependence and circularity. Scripture rescues us from this subjective-Idealist hamster wheel.
In a sense it is supernatural insight, much in the same way that in order for people to understand the discourses of Christ, they must have 'spiritual' eyes. Then the Scriptures are opened to them. Spiritual insight that presents doctrines contrary to Scripture, and insight that claims prophetic power contrary to what Scripture presents as 'prophetic' is necessarily false.
You seem to have a different take. What criteria would you employ to discern their error and pronounce them counterfeit?
This is the way I see it (tentatively):
DeleteWhile denominationalism is problematic and belongs to a spirit of sectarianism, the underlying rational is understandable and good. At the very least, it is a network of accountability. Issues of heresy forced this issue, whether it was Marcion or Valentinian or even the Montanists.
The way I read Scripture, I see particular figures that exist and become conjugated for particularity. One particular figure is the notion of episkope, oversight. I think this was different from congregational elders, and it coincided with the role of the Apostles. Paul's letters are authoritative because they exercise this sort of oversight, but they are inspired and infallible because God saw fit to move through the composition of such documents so that they contain a firm revelation of the truth.
So the question is to ask how this ecclesiatical function, episkope, is operative, a Scripturally mandated part of the Church's esse. Now of course, it has functioned in different ways, some of which are better or worse. We see this early on in a singular overseer of multiple congregations within the bounds of a city (Ignatius), but we see this also in how the collective of Elders exercised this in boundaries (college of presbyters in Alexandria).
The problem I see in a lot of Protestantism is the cultivation of an insistent sectarianism. This goes back to the beginning, so I'm not covering the Magisterial Reformers. That's why it's amusing to watch Calvin or Zwingli choke on their words as those further left of them demanded reforms or demonstrate a similar act of division. Hence why appeals to the magistrate ended up making the Magisterial Protestant worse than even Rome, despite unleashing the Scripture.
I'm not validating Rome, but what I am talking about is how the doctrine of the invisible Church becomes a sledgehammer upon any real ecclesiology. I believe in an invisible Church, but it is the uncreated vision of the Body of Christ that the Apostles speak of. It's not 'just' the sum-total of the righteous, there is an independent, corporate, existence, that is greater than the sum of its parts.
I do think Acts 15 is not an unrepeatable event, otherwise I struggle to understand why it is included in the Scripture. The problem of the Jew and the Gentile is not the only problem that has afflicted the life of the Church, though I do think it provides a vision. What the proper functioning of authority looks like Acts 15, but also, more importantly, what predicates it. In other words, the community of the saints, shared in mercy and humility, is necessary for the Church to be able to delegate decisions. In such a way we might say "It seemed good to us and the Holy Spirit".
I don't see inspiration as necessarily tied to inscripturation, as many righteous prophets dotted Israel and not all of them had their words or vision inscripturated. The latter is important, constitutionally, for the vision of the Church. And it is through such (in a similar process that you outlined) that the Scripture would be utilized to rebuke the false prophets.
But in the case such as the above, it would take a more "catholic" vision of the Church to appreciate rebuke. But of course, seemingly wild-accusations in a zeitgeist of DIY-religion means nothing, even if they ignore the condemnation to their own doom.
In this way, I'd call myself a more primitive episcopalian, not a congregationalist. Hope this makes some sense.
And as per your newest post on your other site:
DeleteWhether a Waldense or a Magisterial Protestant or a Radical Reformer, all have to come to blows with a kind of origin/distinction within the Church in the West. As you mention about the Gregorian reforms, I don't think we should take them seriously, as it is a complicated network. I most certainly agree that the power that the Roman pontiff has assumed to himself, de jure, is an outrage.
But of course, it's more complicated and every age and area has its own particular questions. The Jesuit/Jansenist debate is one for example. The whole question of Gallicanism is a fascinating one. Also, one might look at the era of Wycliffe or the complicated question of the Hussites. Sometimes the faithful relive the figure of the passion through their suffering. The hope is for purification and unification.
There is no one-to-one connection with the whore of Babylon, as Chic tracts attempt to do. It's certainly more complex than that. In Elizabethan England, English Catholics might have been the faithful depending on the situation. In Williamite England, the High-Church party might've been the same. Sometime it's when the powers-that-be turn against you, and a faction of the Church sells themselves to the figure of the Whore, it's when you wake up. Certainly, a man like William Law realized how stupid and corrupt royal politics had become, and he wasn't going to lie in order to preserve a fiction.
Though, I'm not sure you're right about the interplay of Church and culture. I think it's a bit more tricky. I think Hellenism and the Patristics era is a good case example of how one might be an evangelist of a kind (repurposing the grammar of an era for the Gospel) and syncretism (loving the world and subordinating God to that).
These are some loose thoughts,
cal
There's no doubt that it was heresy that forced the Church (generally speaking) to begin drawing lines and establishing the boundaries of Catholicity.
DeleteAnd even with the ecclesiastical hierarchy that developed, it's easy to see why it happened and that it was rooted in good (though misguided) intentions. Ironically the consequences led to an abandonment of the Apostolic Tradition, the very thing they were trying to preserve. By establishing what they perceived to be a more pragmatic, tangible and absolute authority in the form of hierarchy, they ultimately placed Scripture on a lower tier.
Philippians refers to the bishops in the plural. I don't think the distinction between bishops and elders developed until Ignatius which you seem to admit. Granted that's pretty early! But, there's a shift taking place.
Presbyterians argue for the regional body. It's not in Scripture and as much as they might try to extract it... it's not in Acts 15. The Apostolic polity in Acts 15 is more like episcopacy. But since we don't have apostles I take it as extraordinary.
I think Acts 15 testifies to Apostolic authority and its particular relevance relates to the issue of the Law and the Gentile inclusion.
The Church is certainly granted the keys and elders can make doctrinal declarations but both Rome and Presbyterianism treat (in different ways) these declarations as on par with Scripture.
There is no sectarianism if you have true Congregationalism. That's the beauty of it.
But I certainly understand where you are coming from. Actually I do consider Presbyterianism to be a form of proto-Episcopalianism. So did Milton.
However, the true or absolute form of Episcopalianism in many ways makes more sense, certainly has a greater pedigree and probably (in some ways) has a better Scriptural foundation upon which to stand than does Presbyterianism.
You don't think the Gregorian Reforms affected the whole of Western Society? I think this is what put heresy on the radar and generated the waves of persecution, brought about the Inquisition etc...
DeleteThe Jansenist episode fascinates me and in some ways I find them to be more interesting than the Calvinists of the period. Though he's somewhat of an oddity among them, Pascal is particularly insightful.
Law is also very interesting. While the Non-Jurist position is worthy of respect, I'm afraid the whole ecclesiastical framework was problematic to begin with. I don't think much of Thomas Moore, but I will grant he at least understood the implications of Royal Supremacy. It would seem that many of the subsequent episodes in Anglican history are the outworkings of this. From the Puritan episode to the Non-Jurists, it seems to be a question of already compromised men reaching the breaking point.
I agree there is no specific equation of Babylon or even Mystery Babylon. They're generalised and applicable in many different contexts. I'm not saying Medieval Rome or American Evangelicalism are 'the' Mystery Babylon. They're heads on the same hydra. I think one of the keys to Daniel, Zechariah, Revelation etc..., all Apocalyptic prophecy is to grasp the nuanced reiteration. It's helpful to understanding Church history and eliminates specificity with regard to an End Times chronological scheme.
My cultural analogy is necessarily a generalisation. You could tease out a lot more and yet at the same time (like all analogies) it breaks down at some point. It's a tendency, a spirit, a character and impetus.
I don't see Ignatius, or the proto-Episcopalian tradition forming around men like him, as a compromise. Rather, I see him perceiving and understanding Scripture. I think narrativally it's important that Scripture does not document any particular closing of an era. The Apostolic Age is still with us, though that does not imply the writing of more Scripture. There was something Unique about the Twelve and then the Thirteenth that tells us about the foundations of the Church, including the unsettling, but necessary, prophetic voice installed in the likes of a Paul.
DeleteThese characters represent figures that God has put on display for the benefits of the saints. In some ways, Clarence Jordan is Pauline in how he tried to undermine the racism of his South through his writings and community projects. That's a shaky example of what I mean.
And I'd go as far as to say Constantine wasn't even the problem, he was more like a Nebudchanezzer. But the precedent he set was followed in quite disturbing ways, and many Christian became quite comfortable with social conformity and becoming an acceptable cult in the Roman Empire (even becoming 'the' religion).
So, in a way that is not exactly how most people would mean it, I would say that the office of bishop over congregation(s) is the continuing of the Apostles. However, I'd deny any mechanical transferal policy as per the Augustinian tradition that has impacted both West and East about the special "grace" communicated.
I do think the Gregorian Reforms did affect the whole of the West. But it was because of what it revealed, rather than in what it tangibly accomplished. What I mean was that the idea to tighten up the belt turned out to reveal that Europe was hardly uniform, and not Christian in quite a few spots. This shock to the system and the attempt to quell it eventually compounded and built up until German princes were willing to back a Martin Luther and be free from nosy Papal legates. But the point I was making was that the Reforms did not change the fact that Catholic Europe was, in fact, hardly Catholic. And it took many centuries to finally pull all authority into the Roman Pope and his coterie.
And as for the Non-Jurors, perhaps I have more sympathy. It's hard to wake up to the realization that the whole system had a major crack through it. It's easy to see that looking back. I'm not willing to call them compromised men, perhaps ignorant of implications.
My only point about Babylon was that the figure comes and goes. There might be a time when the Roman Church will give up its pretenses. I think that's some of what wearied Benedict XVI, even though I was not a huge fan of some of his ornate traditionalism. The Medieval court politics is enough to drain any friend of God, I imagine!
This is just a general comment for any readers...........
ReplyDeletehttp://issuesetc.org/2016/08/26/2392-this-week-in-pop-american-christianity-contradictory-prophecies-about-donald-trump-pr-chris-rosebrough-82616/
I wrote this piece about a week ago when I discovered the prophetic fireman on YouTube. This morning (Sunday) I listened to this Issues etc. clip which aired on Friday. I was pleased to discover they briefly covered a portion of the same clip in addition to several others.
If you're interested in this topic, this 30min clip is worth listening to.
Having read your most recent post myself, I couldn't help but be reminded of the pro-life movement. On the surface, it's goals appear admirable: defending the rights of those completely unable to help themselves. However, it seems that beneath this veneer lies a more sinister agenda.
ReplyDeleteI think many who are not only involved but are in positions of leadership are driven by self-righteousness and the sense of power and superiority over others that comes with being a crusading busybody. I don't think their expressed concern for unborn infants is always genuine, especially when juxtaposed with their political beliefs concerning the economy (throwing the poor under the bus), foreign policy (hawkishness) and the environment (denial of the deleterious effects of modern industry on our ecosystem and how this potentially threatens the existence of ALL life). I also think the tactics they employ such as picketing abortion clinics, holding up grotesque pictures of aborted fetuses and harassing doctors and patients does nothing to halt the process of abortion and everything to draw attention to the fact that they're either fanatical and/or disingenuous. What's ironic is that despite the overwhelming participation of Christians, the Gospel is rarely explicitly proclaimed.
I grant that this is somewhat of a generalization but I say this knowing that you've addressed this before on your blog and have voiced similar concerns.
I think one of the most obvious aspects of disingenuousness comes to the fore when Conservatives make the Eugenics/Black genocide argument. Not to defend M Sanger, but I find they usually misrepresent her. But it's interesting that White Conservatives make such a big deal about caring for poor Blacks when at the same time a very strong argument could be made that their policies are in fact racist. It strikes me that their concern for the Black unborn is less than genuine but is instead a political ploy. That racism extends to their support for imperialism and militarism.
ReplyDeleteThis is where the academic hacks, Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams come in. Their job is to be the Black 'Scholars' that argue the position in order to demonstrate that the GOP isn't racist... even though in the South, it incorporated all the Anti-Civil Rights and pro- Jim Crow elements. The GOP in general is a pro-death party. It is Social Darwinist in its economics and geopolitics. For the Christian wing, they've simply thrown the word Biblical in front of everything they say, and the sheeple in the pews drink it up. It tickles their ears and vindicates their passions.