Posted on 11/30/2013 1:28:20 PM PST by metmom
This is a first in a series of three messages. In this, No. 1, I’ll seek to analyze a problem that has arisen in many sections of the church and in many parts of the world. In the next message I’ll seek to analyze how the problem arose. And in the third message I’ll consider ways to guard against that problem arising again. The title of this first message is Let Us Honor God’s Holy Spirit.
There has been in recent years a worldwide explosion of signs and wonders. Some have been biblical and helpful. Others have been bizarre and unbiblical. Signs and wonders are not new. They are recorded in various passage of the Bible, and in different periods of church history. However, the current explosion extends more widely than any other particular church or denomination, and has attracted worldwide attention in both the religious and the secular media. I want to make it plain that I have no personal prejudice or anxiety concerning unusual manifestations. In actual fact, I have in my own lifetime experienced quite a number of them. They do not frighten me. I’m not negative about them.
As I recorded in my booklet Uproar In The Church, my own personal encounter with Jesus in World War II began in a very unconventional way. In the middle of the night in the barrack room of the British Army, I spent more than an hour on my back on the floor with my body first racked by convulsive sobs, and then filled with a river of laughter which grew continually louder. Next morning I found myself a completely different person. Changed, not by any act of my will, but by yielding to the supernatural power that had flowed through me.
(Excerpt) Read more at dpmuk.org ...
Yeah, I’ve heard those deals too. I don’t think what they do in public is “tongues of angels”. If it is in public it had better be something somebody can interpret.
One of the gifts I see most often publicly abused is the gift of healing. Benny Hinn comes to mind.
There are far more documented frauds that I’ve seen than actual recorded, verifiable healings.
Of course, the old, and I consider legitimate, question is why, if all these people really do have the gift of healing, do they not go to rehab facilities and ICU’s and heal people.
You know, freely you have received, freely give?
Joni has a lot to say about faith healing and the role of suffering in the life of the believer.
Joni on A Deeper Healing at John Mac Arthur’s Strange Fire Conference.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NI22o5u32z0
Which has led me on this investigation of abuses in the charismatic movement.
Joni spoke at a conference I was at once. I’ve read a lot of her stuff.
Yep... There's not a verse in there that suggests that the speaker will not be able to understand what he himself is speaking...
I just can't imagine Paul going around asking people, 'hey, can someone tell me what I just said'???
LOL I don’t think so either.
LOL. No flying pies other than bringing a hot button topic from another thread to this one. I was told that was forbidden fruit so won’t take a bite.
Prince did a very good job discussing the fruit and tree relationship. You just don’t hear many sermons on holiness these days. I heard an Army chaplain once say “they are the 10 commandments not the 10 guidelines.”
The only language I can think of that sir Francis is speaking is “trollish.”:)
Good point on the gift of healing. My first stop would be a children’s cancer ward. But as you stated that is not seen or has seriously been under reported.
The problem is, in these meetings where all this stuff, tongues, slain in the spirit, “healings”, shaking, etc, are manifest, people are being taught, and have come to believe, that that IS the fruit of the Spirit.
They are confusing the manifestations with the fruit. The fruit isn’t the showy stuff. It’s what happens internally, and after all the show is over and everyone goes their way, there’s simple precious little that can be done to see the fruit of all this.
What I know is that in one charismatic church I attended, the same people were going forward and dropping on an almost weekly basis. You know who was going to go up and go down.
And I have not noticed any significant change in then spiritually. For all the deliverance some of them have been through, they still have the same problems.
I got filled with the Spirit one night at home alone, after praying and dealing with some forgiveness issues. No tongues, no slain in the Spirit, but my life has not been the same since then. It was as dramatic a change as my salvation experience.
Here is one instance of a verified healing.
Aaron Shust - Michael’s Miracle Story.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVRy-t3S0ts
Hopefully we ALL want to do that!
Well; disrupt our entrenched, pre-conceived ideas anyway.
I am READY to be disrupted by the WORD!!
Maranatha!
Holy! Holy!! HOLY!!!
Other than THIS one?
1 Corinthians 14:13
For this reason the one who speaks in a tongue should pray that they may interpret what they say.
Amen, brother.
That’s the criteria we need to use.
Instead of measuring Scripture by our experiences, we need to measure our experiences by Scripture.
And most of what I see in Pentecostalism cannot stand when held up to Scripture.
Demonic came to mind.
Other than THIS one? 1 Corinthians 14:13
1Co 14:13 Wherefore let him that speaketh in an unknown tongue pray that he may interpret.
Not even that one...
If you walk into a church in Uzbekistan and start praying out loud, you may also want to pray that you can translate into their language, if you want to get out alive...
I see what you MEAN!!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_in_Uzbekistan
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.