I regret that this blog has gone back to just one subject this week. I have been very busy and have not had time to write except to keep my readers up to date on this story - which does seem to attract readers here and hopefully provide some balance to the very negative perspectives I have found in some places.

Several writers in comments here and on other blogs have been asking questions about the role of the the four “apostles” who prayed for Todd Bentley, on stage at Lakeland, on 23rd June. These four are Bill Johnson, Che Ahn, John Arnott and Peter Wagner. Some comments have implied that these four have acted irresponsibly, or predicted that they will now abandon Todd. Others like Mark B claim to be asking questions when in fact these questions have been answered - if they had bothered to look for the answers. In fact, from the evidence I quote below, it is clear that all four are acting very responsibly, as expected of senior Christian leaders, are standing by their man while not condoning his sin, and are looking towards his restoration to ministry.

I have already quoted Trevor Baker about Bill Johnson’s current position and plan to meet with Todd next week:

Today I found a link to John Arnott’s response to the current situation. John notes that Todd’s “behavior is wrong before the Lord”, then writes:

Meanwhile Dan Curant has posted (unfortunately without giving his source, but I assume this is genuine) a letter from Doris Wagner, wife of Peter, going into the ins and outs of this situation. This is well worth reading. Here is Peter and Doris’ general perspective on Todd’s ministry:

It seems that Peter Wagner was reluctant to get involved with Todd, but did so precisely because he saw that Todd needed a higher level of oversight and accountability. Indeed the reasons for this started to come out soon after the 23rd June ceremony. And it is clear that he and the other three are taking very seriously the responsibility they accepted on that day, but within the limitations of busy interrnational ministry schedules. Doris writes:

So let’s all continue to pray for Todd, as well as for Shonnah and the children, for repentance, acceptance of help, and over time full restoration. And let’s pray for these four “fathers” as they facilitate this process.

I found today on the Revival Fires website the following message from Trevor Baker, who has worked closely with Todd Bentley and leads the Dudley outpouring meetings:

Amen! It is good to hear that Todd is prepared to address at least some of the issues, and that he will be able to address them with the wise pastor Bill Johnson quite soon.

Certainly the Outpouring will continue in some way, in various places round the world, but we need to wait and see in what form. Meanwhile meetings continue in Dudley four nights a week, with various special events planned including a visit from the same Bill Johnson.

PS: Rupert Ward has posted some very perceptive comments about Todd and Shonnah:

I have no time to write much tonight about Todd Bentley or anything else. So I will give little more than a couple of links.

Dan Curant writes about the Broccoli Revival. His main point is simple: broccoli grows better when the first sprout in the plant is cut off. Similarly, he predicts that the “fall” of Todd will lead to even greater outpouring worldwide. He concludes:

Richard Steel writes that the Florida healing outpouring revival is for global evangelism. Certainly it should be, and he correctly writes:

Abraham was a man of faith who did great things for God. He was also a fallible man who treated his wife badly at times and took a concubine. Yet he is the only person in the Bible called the friend of God - both in the Old Testament (Isaiah 41:8) and in the New (James 2:23). And he became the ancestor of God’s chosen people.

King David was a man of faith who did great things for God. He fell into an adulterous relationship which led him to murder. But through the intervention of Nathan and a period of repentance he was restored to his kingdom and his relationship with God. Yet God called him “a man after my own heart” (1 Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22). And God promised that his royal line would last for ever.

The Apostle Peter was a man of faith who did great things for God, even walking on water. He denied his Lord, but when he met that same Lord risen from the dead he repented and was restored to an even greater ministry. He is now recognised as the greatest, after Jesus, of the founding fathers of the Church.

Todd Bentley is also a man of faith who has been doing great things for God. But he is also fallible. Following the news I reported earlier that he is separating from his wife, there has now been issued a further statement which includes the following (please read the whole statement before commenting):

This relationship appears to be non-physical and so not adulterous, but is also clearly wrong. The Board of Directors to which Todd is accountable (don’t believe those who have accused him of being unaccountable!) have done the right thing by suspending his public ministry and taking steps intended for his restoration.

Let us expect and pray that as Abraham, David and Peter were, through painful experiences, restored to their ministries, so Todd also will, in the right time, be restored to his ministry and do even greater things that will make the Florida Outpouring look like a mere sideshow.

And let us also remember this, taken from the latest statement:

As one man is temporarily taken out of the way, that way is left open for many others to take over where he left off, to be men and women of faith who do great things for God.

Meanwhile let’s continue to pray for Todd and Shonnah as they work through these issues.

Again, as an exception to my normal comment policy, I will not allow any comments on this post which are negative about Todd or Shonnah. My other posts about Todd, except for the one before this one, remain open for comment.

It has been announced by Fresh Fire Ministries that Todd Bentley has separated from his wife Shonnah. Here is the relevant part of the statement on the Fresh Fire front page:

Michael Spencer reports a message from God TV which seems to be dependent on the above - and also noting that they are no longer broadcasting from Lakeland.

I have seen rumours purporting to give further information about Todd and Shonnah’s marriage difficulties, some of it from a former employee of Fresh Fire. This information may be true but if so the release of it was a breach of personal privacy and of confidence. As a Christian I am not prepared to pass on this gossip or link to it. I am saddened that bloggers who are not the usual Todd-bashing culprits have chosen to give credence and support to this kind of gossip by responding to it on their blogs.

One generally sympathetic blogger seems to imply that the current difficulties somehow prove right all the concerns of the critics “about the money, the angels, the use of scripture, the style etc.” This is the kind of rhetoric I would expect from those same critics. But compassion for Todd at this difficult time as well as simple logic should help us realise that these issues are independent. History proves that it is not only false teachers who have marriage difficulties. I think I warned months ago, and I certainly mentioned here, that the Lakeland meetings were putting a huge strain on Todd’s marriage and family. Indeed the Apostle Paul recognised how difficult it was to combine Christian ministry with a good marriage, 1 Corinthians 7:32-35.

I call on all my readers to join me in praying for Todd and Shonnah at this time, for a restful break from Todd’s ministry schedule, for a renewal of love and understanding between them, and for full restoration of their marriage. Please pray also for the children at this difficult time.

I at least will stand by Todd even when he is down and in the gutter.

As an exception to my normal comment policy, I will not allow any comments on this post which are negative about Todd or Shonnah. My other posts about Todd remain open for comment.

Perhaps my posts about Todd Bentley are like buses: none for ages and then two come along together. But following the news about the change of plans for Todd’s visit to England there is now news about what is happening in Lakeland, Florida. While reports of the death of Lakeland have been exaggerated, changes are on the way.

There have been nightly outpouring meetings in Lakeland since this whole thing started in April. In the early days Todd himself led all the meetings, leading to accusations that the outpouring was centred on one man rather than on God. No doubt it has also left Todd rather tired. He took a break in mid-July, then returned more quickly than many expected. Now Todd has made an announcement on his Fresh Fire Ministries front page:

In other words, Todd will still be in charge, although not necessarily present in person, for the next three weeks of meetings at Ignited Church, and then he is handing the reins back to Stephen Strader, that church’s pastor. It is right that continuing meetings in Lakeland are under the authority of a local church rather than of a foreign (Canadian) mission, an important principle in the USA as in the Third World.

The change of venue is possible because no doubt William Fawcett is correct to observe that “The crowds are dwindling”. There may be all kinds of reasons for this, not least that this is the holiday season, and it must be uncomfortably hot in a tent in Florida. It also seems clear from Todd’s words that there are financial issues here. Todd told USA Today that

But I remember reading somewhere that the average donation per person per night was just $5. So there was never any truth to accusations that Todd’s ministry is making massive profits from this. Rather, if the nightly attendance drops below 7,000, as it probably has, the ministry moves into the red. So, like any loss-making venture, it has to cut back on its activities. This may well also be a major reason for the change of Todd’s plans to come to England.

That is not of course the whole story. I doubt if Todd’s mid-July break was enough for him to recover physically and mentally from three months of exhausting nightly meetings. He needs more of a break. He won’t get much of one, as according to Fresh Fire over the next three weeks he has meetings scheduled in Fort Mill SC, Louisville KY and Spokane WA, followed by a tour of Sudan and Uganda from 25th August to 8th September. Meanwhile God TV is scheduling “LA Healing Outpouring Todd Bentley” for 4th and 5th August and back to “Florida Healing Outpouring Todd Bentley” for 6th August.

Todd’s next plan is an ambitious one:

I hope these 38 cities will be around the world, not just in North America. In this way this outpouring, which some have criticised for being too much focused on one place, will be taken out around the world. Lakeland may die, but

A little over a month ago I reported that Todd Bentley was planning a visit to England in September. Today I received a comment here which is also confirmed at the Revival Fires website indicating that this visit will now not be going ahead as previously planned. Kelvin Reed (I’m not sure if he is a spokesman for Revival Fires or simply passing on what he has read at their site) writes:

I must say I find this strange. To be fair, Revival Fires always made it clear that these details were provisional. But surely dates would not have been announced without checking that the NEC would be available on those days. So why would the venue become unavailable?

I can think of two possible reasons: one, that the NEC management has refused to accept Todd Bentley, perhaps because his ministry has been misrepresented to them; or two, that insufficient funds have been raised to make advance payments. As someone who has given to Revival Fires in response to a specific appeal for funds to hire the NEC for Todd, I would like to get some clarification on this issue, and on what Revival Fires will do with the money that has been raised. Of course I can allow them time to make their decision, and I have no objection to a change to a different venue. But I would like to see a clear explanation of what is happening.

In a post Using Reason to Judge Revelation Henry Neufeld asks an interesting question:

The following is the main part of a comment I made on that post, addressed to Henry:

I thought it was worth turning this into a post here because I think it illustrates a basic difference between my approach to Todd Bentley and that of most of the critics of Todd that I have been interacting with on this blog and elsewhere. No, this is not another post about Todd (and I will not allow comments here which are just about Todd and his ministry), but it is about how Christians can discern what is from God and what is not - in matters both of personal guidance and of whether to endorse or criticise ministries like Todd’s.

As I see it, the majority of the critics of Todd who claim to be applying “discernment” to him are in fact using Enlightenment principles of rationalism to reason for themselves an answer to this question. Now I don’t want to discount human reason and Enlightenment principles. They have led to major advances in understanding of this world and great scientific and technological discoveries which have mostly benefited humanity. But I do not consider Enlightenment rationalism to be helpful in discerning the ways of God.

The Enlightenment has given rise to two diverging streams of Christian thinking about God, both of which I consider to be fundamentally wrong.

The first, the more consistently based in Enlightenment thinking, rejected all kinds of appeals to authority including that of the Bible in favour of a thorough-going rationalism in enquiry about the divine, and about the events recorded in the Bible. This is basically theological liberalism. I understand this approach because I used to share its underlying worldview, but I have moved away from it.

In a second stream of theological thinking based on the Enlightenment all authorities were rejected, at least in principle, except for one, that of the Bible. The Bible was taken to be authoritative and inerrant, not really on any rational grounds (although sometimes rather weak rationalistic defences of it are put forward) but essentially as an axiom, something which cannot be proved but has to be assumed. The Bible was also read as a set of propositions about God and what he does. From these propostions were developed, using Enlightenment principles of reason, the system of theological thought labelled as “evangelical” and “fundamentalist”.

I prefer the label “fundamentalist” here because, it seems to me, all Christian fundamentalists think like this, whereas this is only one of a range of approaches taken by people who call themselves evangelical. OK, maybe it is also because I want to use a slightly pejorative label for a way of thinking I reject, rather than a label which I accept for myself. These are more or less the same people who I have called Bible deists and whose approach to studying the Bible I have previously criticised.

To be fair to at least some of the evangelicals and fundamentalists who think like this, they might be arriving at their axiom that the Bible is authoritative by the kinds of method that I outlined in my comment quoted above. This is basically the “Reformed” position as I understand it. It is also the fundamental reason why I find myself believing that the Bible is authoritative, although not inerrant on matters e.g. of science and history which it does not intend to address. But I would differ from fundamentalists in applying the principle of knowing what is true through a relationship with God much more widely than to the axiom of biblical authority.

I had written most of the above when I came across Nick Norelli’s review of what Roger Olson has to say about conservative and post-conservative evangelicalism. I think Olson is trying to make the same kinds of distinctions that I am, and he follows McGrath in showing how conservative evangelicalism, basically what I have called fundamentalism, is dependent on the Enlightenment. I’m not sure whether my own position, in Olson’s categories, is more pietistic or more post-conservative. I accept Nick’s criticisms of some directions in which post-conservatism might go, especially into anti-intellectualism, and I certainly don’t want to go there.

Some of the criticisms of Todd Bentley which I have read have come from the theologically liberal camp; I would put Doug Chaplin’s and Jim West’s critiques in this category. These are people who are fundamentally sceptical about claims of miraculous healing because this does not fit within their essentially rationalistic and materialistic worldview. I have some sympathy with their position because I too struggle with accepting the place of the miraculous in my worldview - but I know that I have to because I have seen with my own eyes (quite apart from Todd Bentley’s ministry) the evidence that prayers are answered and miraculous healing takes place today.

But most of the criticisms of Todd I have seen have come from people apparently following the fundamentalist way of thinking, that is, applying Enlightenment methods of reasoning, although often rather incompetently, to the Bible understood as a set of propositional truths. To this many critics add another axiom, or perhaps they claim to deduce this from the biblical text, that God cannot do anything which is not explicitly described in the Bible. So when they find Todd saying or doing things which are not exactly in line with the scheme they have deduced from the Bible text, they denounce him as a heretic and false teacher. They absolutise their own rationalistic theological system and don’t allow even God to do anything which does not fit within it.

Sometimes these people ask me how, when I defend Todd against certain charges, I can be so sure that I am correct. They expect me to answer them according to their own principles of Enlightenment rationalism. Well, sometimes I am able to do so, by appealing to the basic principle of Enlightenment scholarship that one argues from the facts - and unlike many of them I make some efforts to get the facts right, whether about what is written in the Bible or about what Todd has said or done.

But very often the only answer I can give to these critics is one which they seem unable to understand, because within their thoroughly Enlightenment worldview they have no concept of how God can communicate with people today - even while in principle believing that he did so in Bible times. My answer is that I have a relationship with God through the Holy Spirit, made possible by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and that it is because of that relationship that I am able to recognise when God is at work, even in apparently unlikely places. To that I could also add that I have a relationship with others, such as my pastor and his wife, who have a closer relationship with God than I do and help me to recognise when God is at work. In this way, and not through reasoning from Bible verses, I have been able to discern that, despite some less than perfect teaching and practices, God is indeed at work in and through Todd Bentley. And, gradually and always provisionally, I am able to discern what else God is saying to his church, and in particular to me.

NOTE: I repeat that I will not allow comments on this post which are just about Todd Bentley and his ministry without addressing the main issues of this post.

I had intended to take a break from blogging about Todd Bentley. But I can’t resist this quote, which appears to be genuine, from Jim West:

So Todd’s and Benny’s teaching is as valuable as that of the “Fathers” of the church? Why, I thought I was praising Todd rather highly in comparing him with Jesus and Paul, but I was only saying that he was trying to follow their example. I would never have dared to compare Todd’s teaching with that of any of the respected theologians of the church. But Jim West seems to value Todd and Benny above such towering figures as Tertullian, Origen and Chrysostom. High praise indeed!

When it was announced last week that Todd Bentley was taking a short break from his series of outpouring meetings at Lakeland, some people seemed to conclude that he would not be back, that this was the end of the Lakeland outpouring and even of Todd’s ministry. For example, Dan Curant (who has a helpful blog mostly about Todd and healing which I just discovered, including this transcript of Todd clearly preaching the gospel, and this testimony of his own partial healing) commented, without hostility, that

Even I was expecting that Todd would be taking a break of a month or so - and that I would not be blogging any more about him, at least for some time, after my last post.

But you can’t keep a good man down. This has just been announced:

Also there will be

And all of this will be broadcast live, and streamed to the Internet, by God TV.

So Todd is taking a break of barely a week. I would have expected him to want a longer break, at least for the sake of his family. But I suppose he is feeling under the same compulsion to continue his ministry that the Apostle Paul felt: