Stand back - I'm cornering the market
Posted on 06/07/2015 2:27:43 PM PDT by Gamecock
There is something gaining more attention in some circles of the charismatic world called "grave sucking," "grave soaking" or "mantle grabbing."
Evidently, this refers to the practice of a believer going to the grave of a departed saint they revere (for example, Charles Finney or Kathryn Kuhlman) and lay on top of it and/or kneel in front of it so they can receive an impartation of the anointing (or mantle) of the departed saint.
Also, regarding the possible connection between a manifestation of God at the grave of a departed saint, there is a story in 2 Kings 13:20-22 in which a person came back to life after he was inadvertently thrown into the grave of Elisha the prophet and happened to touch his bones!
While I am sure there are many well-intentioned and even some effective ministers who practice "grave sucking," I have serious concerns regarding it.
Before I list these concerns I want to say up front that I appreciate the fact that there is now more and more respect for church history. Furthermore, Hebrews 12:1-2 teaches us that the present day church is surrounded by a cloud of witnesses; this refers to the saints who have passed on to glory before us. This means that the church of the past is connected to the present and future church and that the First Testament saints are part of the New Testament church!
To be fair, I think any time we come face to face with a significant historical artifact, it can have a profound effect on us because the reality of the biblical or historical story becomes more real. This is why we visit museums; this is why many people are greatly affected when they visit one of the death camps of the Nazi Jewish Holocaust and why many Christians go to Israel and are blessed. It is an amazing experience to see firsthand the land of the Bible and to physically see the places where the saints of old walked with God.
I am sure that if I visited the grave of one of my heroes like Finney, Calvin or Luther, I would be greatly blessed. Not because their anointing is still in the grave but because the physical marker (their graves) may aid me in believing and remembering their lives and legacies, which could open me up by faith to go to another level with God. If that is all these so called "grave suckers" are doing then I am fine with it.
However, this is not the impression I am getting from what I have heard. Stay tuned for Part II: 7 Biblical Arguments Against 'Grave Soaking'
Superstitious idiots.
I paid $50.00 for that blessing.../ S
Some people will believe any nonsense...curse those that prey on their ignorance..
We think Catholics and their relics are strange...
“grave soaking” “grave sucking” and “mantle grabbing” is found in both the Old and New Testament Scriptures, only better known as witchcraft.
**We think Catholics and their relics are strange...**
Same strangeness, just a different gift wrap.
““grave soaking” “grave sucking” and “mantle grabbing” is found in both the Old and New Testament Scriptures, only better known as witchcraft.”
You beat me too it. This is the sin of Saul.
It is the same thing as the Catholics asking a saint to pray for them. Communicating with the dead is the basis of occultism.
I got the same feeling when I toured the Alamo.
Didn’t HOUDINI do the same thing to his mother’s grave after she died?
Stand back - I'm cornering the market
Then why does the book of Revelation talk about our prayers ascending to the angels?
Sorry you’ve been burned like that. I’ve been raised in, grew up in and follow what my father told me many years ago - ‘Son, don’t trust me or man, but fully put your trust in Christ, the Solid Rock’.
When someone truly does that - you will see real integrity, honesty and selflessness. But I, like you, have also seen shiesters, manipulators and the weak people that follow them - follow the trappings or ‘things’ whether it be works, manifestations, or personalities. These people will be let down hard - and become disillusioned.
I knew Dave Hunt. He was a very interesting man who knew his stuff. Didn’t always agree but on many things I did.
——Then why does the book of Revelation talk about our prayers ascending to the angels?——
You do understand that Saints are not angels...?
Per reference to the post about praying to saints...
You are right. My mistake.
Beware of the Finney.
http://www.spurgeon.org/~phil/articles/finney.htm
A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing
How Charles Finney’s Theology Ravaged the Evangelical Movement
Copyright © 1998, 1999 by Phillip R. Johnson. All rights reserved.
IT IS IRONIC that Charles Grandison Finney has become a poster boy for so many modern evangelicals. His theology was far from evangelical. As a Christian leader, he was hardly the model of humility or spirituality. Even Finney’s autobiography paints a questionable character. In his own retelling of his life’s story, Finney comes across as stubborn, arrogant—and sometimes even a bit devious.
(excerpt)
http://www.spurgeon.org/~phil/articles/finney.htm
Finney vs. Substitutionary Atonement
What seemed to chafe Finney most about evangelical Christianity was the belief that Christ’s atonement is a penal satisfaction offered to God. Finney wrote, “I had read nothing on the subject [of the atonement] except my Bible, & what I had there found on the subject I had interpreted as I would have understood the same or like passages in a law book” [Memoirs, 42].
Thus applying nineteenth-century American legal standards to the biblical doctrine of atonement, he concluded that it would be legally unjust to impute the sinner’s guilt to Christ or to impute Christ’s righteousness to the sinner. As noted above, Finney labeled imputation a “theological fiction” [Memoirs, 58-61]. In essence, this was a denial of the core of evangelical theology, repudiating the heart of Paul’s argument about justification by faith in Romans 3-5 (see especially Rom. 4:5)—in effect nullifying the whole gospel!
Further, by ruling out the imputation of guilt and righteousness, Finney was forced to argue that Christ’s death should not be regarded as an actual atonement for others’ sins. Finney replaced the doctrine of substitutionary atonement with a version of Grotius’s “governmental theory” (the same view being revived by those today who tout “moral government theology”).
The Grotian view of the atonement is laden with strong Pelagian tendencies. By cutting the sinner off from the imputation of Christ’s righteousness, this view automatically requires sinners to attain a righteousness of their own (contra Rom. 10:3). When he embraced such a view of the atonement, Finney had no choice but to adopt a theology that magnifies human ability and minimizes God’s role in changing human hearts. He wrote, for example,
“There is nothing in religion beyond the ordinary powers of nature. A revival is not a miracle, nor dependent on a miracle, in any sense. It is a purely philosophical result of the right use of the constituted means—as much so as any other effect produced by the application of means. . . . A revival is as naturally a result of the use of means as a crop is of the use of its appropriate means” [Charles Finney, Lectures on Revivals of Religion (Old Tappan, NJ: Revell, n.d.), 4-5].
Thus Finney constantly downplayed God’s work in our salvation, understated the hopelessness of the sinner’s condition, and overestimated the power of sinners to change their own hearts. When those errors are traced to their source, what we find is a deficient view of the atonement. Indeed, Finney’s denial of vicarious atonement underlies and explains virtually all his theological aberrations.
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