Who said this?
...prayer that is line with the Word prepares the ground of people's hearts so the Word can be planted and bear eternal fruit in people's lives. That is the scriptural way to change cities and nations--not by spending our time supposedly warrign against spiritual forces ruling over cities and nations. Those spiritual forces have already been defeated by Jesus.
Before I tell you who wrote this, let me say I agree completely. I've said this many times before here that the Third Wave Charismatic revivalists are NOT changing places through all of their "warfare." Sadly, their followers will not see nor acknowledge this.
OK...here is who said the above quote. I know many of you will not be real happy but I call 'em as I see 'em. And you would be surprised at the really good things he said in his life.
The late Kenneth E. Hagin in The Triumphant Church
I think a good question that has been raised by some lately is the question in the title of this post.
Here is blogger Tim Challies' review of a new book, The Irresistible Revolution by emergent Shane Clairborn,
“His theology is an unbiblical and incoherent synthesis which might be described as popularized Christian anarchism for young, disaffected, middle-class Americans.”
(Source: http://www.challies.com/archives/book-reviews/book-review-the-irresistible-revolution.php)
After reading 21 books by emergent authors, I find many of them (but not all, especially not Dan Kimball) to be speaking almost like anarchists".....not politically, although I see that coming on the horizon, especially with McLaren's book, Everything Must Change; but spiritual and also cultural anarchism. If it is base, then do it and follow it. And I believe that is a problem for many of us. I like Kimball because he truly tries to explain what he is doing to the older evangelcical crowd without being arrogant, rude, base and smug.
Christian Carnival will be here at Crossroads this coming Wednesday, July 9.
To All Blgogers: To enter the carnival, send in your blog post from the last week to this link:
http://blogcarnival.com/bc/submit_1551.html
Posts must be from a Christian worldview (please no New Age or Buddhist-fusion) but doesn't need to be about a theolgical topic. They may also be about politics or finance, etc.
And now onto today's post here.
I've told you here before to follow the younger evangelicals as so many of them will switch to the left and some even dabble around with Marxist Socialism. Jim Wallis (New Christian Left) and Brian McLaren both are leading the way on this. McLaren's book, Everything Must Change was one of the clarion calls to this shift. It's becoming more and more obvious that except for the Young Calvinists, the young evangelicals are not going to come to our churches and want a more postmodern philosophical emergent church that is not black and white about truth but "grey, tolerant, 'authentic'" and so forth. Or as one evangelical critic of emergent says, "Trying to nail down what these people believe is like nailing jello to the wall."
George Barna, the Christian pollster, says that based on his polls Obama will win unless he makes a big misstep or a security issue erupts. Barna notes many born again Christians are switching to the Democratic candidate especially the young evangelicals......
Here is the link to see the results of his poll:
http://www.barna.org/FlexPage.aspx?Page=BarnaUpdateNarrowPreview&BarnaUpdateID=300
Diane
I realize that I have spent a great amount of time on the emergent movement. This is because it's literally flooding into our Christian colleges, seminaries and into church youth groups. And, the amazing thing is, almost none of church members over 40 know what is going on. Even many, if not most, pastors don't.
So, with that in mind, I will now pronounce that I firmly believe that the emergents have turned a corner. At first they were willing to "converse" with evangelicals (who they often call fundamentalists). When their doctrine was rebuffed, they tried to ignore us. When that didn't work many of them (but not all) got irritated and began to call us fundamentalists and say other not very nice things about us.
But now I believe they've turned a corner. They were mainly out to change evangelicalism into their postmodern vision and they have done amazingly well. Since they have cornered many major Christian colleges and seminaries and youth groups, they have achieved their goal. So, they are once again ignoring us because they can. And they can because they have the Christian youth in their camp and that is what their goal and agenda was.
We've lost the first round. Now, many churches are waking up to this fact, but most slumber on, or even think emergent is a fad, or a good thing, or something not to be contended with. Let's hope that pastors and denominational leaders wake up from their slumber before it's too late.
One tragic outcome of this is the number of Christian leaders either compromising with the emergent doctrine, or pretending they don't know what emergent pastors in their midst believe as they invite them to speak to their youth conferences and even their area pastors' conferences (are you listening Foursquare and So. Baptist Convention people among others?).
As I watched the Brownsville "revival" in the middle and late 1990's and into 2000 and beyond, and talked in a certain Third Wave chat room with many of them for 3 years, I was hoping beyond hope that many caught in that "revival" would eventually see the light. Now, thankfully a few voices are speaking up. It seems the Bently Lakeland "revival" is so way out there that even some Brownsville fans are questioning and for some, questioning the whole movement....thankfully. Here is a recent testimony from one who was deceived in defending and believing what was going on at Brownsville.
I had my life transformed in the Brownsville revival,
and knowing that many who were offended at Lakeland were from
the same camp as those who opposed Brownsville, I naturally took
what I thought to be "the proper side". Although I did say I was put
off by the hype surrounding Lakeland, I was open to the idea that it
was "from God", and I saw criticism from this board that I chalked
up to mostly phariseeism.
Then a couple of weeks ago I saw this video on YouTube. [-Linked
below]. It changed my mind once and for all. I don't know what
spirit was speaking to Bentley when he was told the revival wasn't
about getting people to Jesus, but it's about getting people to
believe in "the angel", but I've enough discernment to know it
wasn't God's Spirit!
This should be elementary, but since sharing this with others I
know who've supported Lakeland, I was shocked to find it really
didn't bother them in the least! The leader of the revival says it's
not about getting people to Jesus but getting them to believe in
"the angel"- SINGULAR. What the heck? Is this the delusion?
Well, I've seen the devil tip his hand and I've turned the other
direction. If God allowed me to see it and turn, He'll show others
too. I'm praying it happens, and I'm telling everyone I know about this.
I apologise to anybody I might have offended or misled in keeping
my "open mind" about Lakeland. I would exhort everyone who still
thinks this is "from God" to honestly listen to what's being said on
the video. Does the Holy Spirit lead people to Jesus, or angels?
Source: Andrew Strom's prophetic revival email dicussion list.
In keeping with the continuing discussion of Spiritual Formation, meditation seems to be the most problematic because of what is perceived by some as Buddhist, Hindu and New Age influences into what is passing for present-day Christian meditation. I thought the following quote really helps to understand the difference between Christian meditation and Eastern meditation.
In essence, Biblical meditation is thinking; and contemplative New Age meditation is simply not thinking ... and that is something to think about.
Source: http://lighthousetrailsresearch.com/blog/index.php?p=1135&more=1&c=1
I had almost forgotten about
The Beautiful Side of Evil by Johanna Michaelsen. Then today I read a post at the
From the Lighthouse blog by Berit Kjos. I had also forgotten that Michaelsen saw "angels" from whom she felt joy, light and peace. Kjos writes that this angel sounds very familiar to one we are hearing about today. Who? Think Todd Bently and his angel, Emma.
For those of you who haven't read Michaelsen's book, published in 1982, she tells the story of how her family moved to Mexico when she was young becuse of her father's job. She got into psychic phenomena and was what we would here term the New Age. This is the one big thing that I remember because it stood out so much for me. When she would go to the psychic healer's house, guess who was in the long line with her to see the psychic? Roman Catholic priests and nuns. I've heard this same thing from a missionary to Spain. He said that he had converted a witch there in Spain and when he asked how she learned satanism, she replied, "Through the [Catholic] Church of course."
I think Kjos has hit it on the head. Some of these Third Wave "leaders" are very naive IMO and do not understand the satan that satan has. If you don't believe that, just read Michaelsen's book. You can still get it through amazon.com. It costs under $9.59 there (excluding shipping).
Oh, by the way, Johanna Michaelsen is Hal Lindsay's sister-in-law and he wrote the preface to her book.
