Posted on 05/07/2005 8:05:03 AM PDT by churchillbuff
What is the fastest-growing religion on Earth?
Most news reports suggest it is Islam.
But a new book makes a compelling case it is a new, or, perhaps, old form of biblically inspired evangelical Christianity that is sweeping through places like China, Africa, India and Southeast Asia.
In "Megashift," author Jim Rutz coins a new phrase to define this fast-growing segment of the population. He calls them "core apostolics" - or "the new saints who are at the heart of the mushrooming kingdom of God."
Rutz makes the point that Christianity is overlooked as the fastest-growing faith in the world because most surveys look at the traditional Protestant denominations and the Roman Catholic Church while ignoring Christian believers who have no part of either.
He says there are 707 million "switched-on disciples" who fit into this new category and that this "church" is exploding in growth.
"The growing core of Christianity crosses theological lines and includes 707 million born-again people who are increasing by 8 percent a year," he says.
So fast is this group growing that, under current trends, according to Rutz, the entire world will be composed of such believers by the year 2032.
"There will be pockets of resistance and unforeseen breakthroughs," writes Rutz. "Still, at the rate we're growing now, to be comically precise, there would be more Christians than people by the autumn of 2032, about 8.2 billion."
According to the author, until 1960, Western evangelicals outnumbered non-Western evangelicals - mostly Latinos, blacks and Asians - by two to one. As of 2000, non-Western evangelicals outnumbered Westerners by four to one. He says by 2010, the ratio will be seven to one.
"There are now more missionaries sent from non-Western nations than Western nations," he writes.
This trend, says Rutz, has been missed by Westerners because the explosive growth is elsewhere.
Hundreds of millions of these Christians are simply not associated with the institutional churches at all. They meet in homes. They meet underground. They meet in caves. They meet, he says, in secret.
And what is driving this movement?
Miracles, he says.
"Megashift" attempts to document myriad healings and other powerful answers to the sincere prayers of this new category of believer, including, believe it or not, hundreds of dramatic cases of resurrections - not near-death experiences, but real resurrections of actual corpses.
"When I was a kid in Sunday school, I was really impressed that 3,000 people were saved on the Day of Pentecost," he writes. "I thought, 'Wow, that'll never happen again!"
But, Rutz says, it now happens around the globe every 25 minutes.
"By tomorrow, there will be 175,000 more Christians than there are today," he writes.
The essence of Rutz's book is about how Western Christians can tap into what he sees as a mighty work of God on Earth.
"Very few people realize the nature of life on Earth is going through a major change," he writes. "We are seeing a megashift in the basic direction of human history. Until our time, the ancient war between good and evil was hardly better than a stalemate. Now all has changed. The Creator whose epic story flows through the pages of Scripture has begun to dissolve the strongholds of evil. This new drama is being played out every hour around the globe, accompanied sometimes by mind-bending miracles."
Agreed, that the Church is the Body of Christ. And even though I attend church and am part of that church, my opinion is that the modern day church, in whatever form it may take, is a rather human construct.
And you are right about the dynamic preaching of the apostles, but Paul himself cautions us in Colossians. 4:5,6..."Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, redeeming the time. Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye ought to answer every man." (Now, I'm not a KJV kinda guy, but I posted that version so I am not accused of perversion. But I like my favorite version, the New Living Translation for these verses)
I doubt Christ Himself, or Peter or Paul or any of the disciples would feel comfortable in the church of today, especially the time out for the offering or the serving of communion from gold or silver commemorative plates in little teeny cups and little teeny pieces of crust that get caught in your throat.
I like the original concept of meeting in houses and breaking bread and praising God together...but I can live with what we've been given.
**Can you cite some specifics, please**
See #117
The four marks of the true Church.
Perhaps you are unaware of the case where there was an old saint of a widow prayer warrior--I think the widow of a pastor or evangelist.
She was terminally ill with heart trouble or some such.
Hagin knew she believed and practiced as he taught. He prayed for her. She got worse. She died.
He fussed about it to God. God told him to never mention it or think of it again that essentially it was none of his business. AND TO GO ON TEACHING AS HE TAUGHT.
Certainly there are MORE LIKELY TO BE
AND THERE ARE
MORE MIRACLES in a context where Hagin's teaching is taught, believed and practiced
then there are where the beliefs of the rock throwers are taught and practiced.
They will give an account to God for that difference.
WOW. GREAT LINKS. THANKS.
I have a program called "Spybot". However, sometimes even it will not remove pesky stuff - because the programmers for the pesky software have put up barriers against removing it .. so here's what I do.
I have Windows XP - so I click on [start] then click on [search] - and in the search criteria there is a listing for [All files and folders] - click on that. Then .. you'll see another search criteria [More advanced options] (shown near the bottom) - and click on that. Now, you can enter the EXACT name of the files you are looking for. You will notice in this advanced search screen that you are now searching "hidden" and "subfolders". The search may take some time .. so don't get frustrated and end it - wait for it to complete the cycle.
THE KEY TO FINDING THE FILES - THE NAME OF THE FILE YOU'RE SEARCHING FOR **** MUST **** BE EXACTLY THE SAME - otherwise your computer will not find it.
I downloaded a program to be able to change my cursor. However, after I did that, Spybot registered these files - FunWebProducts - as suspect spyware. For some reason, I couldn't get rid of them. So, I went through the "search" method and found a folder with 96 FILES in it. I had to delete each file one at a time - because I tried using the "select all" and it would not get rid of the files. What was really weird - was the folder looked empty - but it really wasn't .. software writers are very sneaky.
Before I found the FunWebProducts junk - I tried to find it under Fun Products .. etc. When I finally got the name correct - my computer found it right away. Needless to say, I don't have a "red" cursor anymore - and I know better than to download that kind of junk.
Let me know what happens.
Amen!
If it doesn't hinder others getting some, I make it a point of grabbing several pieces of the 'broken bread.'
You're welcome. I keep them on my favorite subjects only, though.
Quix, I agree with you very often, on this thread and others on which you appear.
BTW, I think too many times, we assign evil to things we don't like, such as music, when in reality we just don't like it. So it's easy to attribute it to Satan.
I don't particularly like all the modern Christian music, nor do I particularly like the Mozart, Beethoven and Chopin stuff either (much of which was considered evil by the traditionalists of the time). To me, sitting in church with funereal organ music wafting over me would make me uncomfortable.
I'll agree with you that there's a serious problem with some of the churches in Africa. A lot of prosperity preachers selling snake oil. However, I have to choose to remain hopeful that God is still in control and that His Word won't return void.
And I try to post both sides of the growth picture! (Not always easy.)
Have done virtually all that and more.
That software I've had and didn'at do diddly for me. Let it slide.
Search function doens't do diddly on this one--even with hidden files revealed.
Even have a downloaded doc from web on step by step removal--doesn't work--none of the items seem to be where it says they are.
very frustrating.
Thanks much for your help.
I think there's a lot of overlap of your favorite subjects and my favorite subjects. LOL.
no insult intended!
Blush. Thanks.
VERY WELL SAID about music etc.
Excuse me .. MY PASTOR said it all the time (for 20 years) - and he never gave credit to Rod Parsley either.
And .. "THAT" IS A LOVING ATTITUDE - BECAUSE IN DEUT. 28-29 - GOD said - "I've set before you life and death, blessing and cursing - now you choose".
It's always an individual's choice to follow GOD - not to follow GOD - or just be a distruptor of everything GOD's doing.
So you know this because kh told you it was true? The man teaches false doctrine. Sure you will see some "miracles" because the devil and his demon buddies will do anything to fool the elect and that includes "empowering" those that teach false doctrine.
So you know this because kh told you it was true? The man teaches false doctrine. Sure you will see some "miracles" because the devil and his demon buddies will do anything to fool the elect and that includes "empowering" those that teach false doctrine.
So you know this because kh told you it was true? The man teaches false doctrine. Sure you will see some "miracles" because the devil and his demon buddies will do anything to fool the elect and that includes "empowering" those that teach false doctrine.
lol I posted and the post was there when it returned me to the page but there was no writing so I double posted. Maybe someone is trying to tell me something.
Plenty of snake oil being sold in America, too!
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.