Republished May 20, 2009 (first published September 11, 2008) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

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I have been examining and re-examining the Pentecostal-Charismatic movements for more than three decades. In 1973, after I was led to Christ by a Pentecostal, I began to seek God’s will about tongues-speaking and the miraculous gifts of the early churches. I have built a large library of materials on this subject and have interviewed Pentecostals and Charismatics and attended their churches in many parts of the world. I have also attended large Charismatic conferences with press credentials.

I have approached these studies with an open mind in the sense of having a commitment only to the truth and not to anyone’s tradition, and each fresh evaluation of the Pentecostal-Charismatic movement has brought an increased conviction that it is unscriptural and dangerous.

Enlarged May 12, 2009 (first published July 18, 2006) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

From its inception the Pentecostal movement has been marred deeply by scandals, as we have documented in our illustrated 317-page book The Pentecostal-Charismatic Movements: Its History and Its Error. If the movement had the fullness of the Holy Spirit unction and power that it claims, we would not see such an exhibition of the flesh, but in fact moral and other scandals have continued to plague it in recent history. The following are some prominent examples:

In 1977 ORAL ROBERTS claimed that God had appeared to him and instructed him to build a medical center called the CITY OF FAITH. In 1980 he claimed that he had a “face to face” conversation with a 900-foot-tall Jesus who told him that he was going to solve the City of Faith financial problems. Seven years later, Roberts said that God had appeared to him yet again and told him that he would die if he did not raise $8 million within 12 months. The wild-eyed visions and unrelenting appeals could not save the City of Faith. In 1989 Roberts closed it to pay off debts! Yet the Pentecostal world in general did not decry Roberts as a false prophet and a religious phony. Thousands continued to flock to ORU from Pentecostal churches across the country, and millions of dollars continued to flow into Roberts’ ministry from gullible supporters.

From its inception the Pentecostal movement has been marred deeply by scandals, as we have documented in our illustrated 317-page book The Pentecostal-Charismatic Movements: Its History and Its Error. If the movement had the fullness of the Holy Spirit unction and power that it claims, we would not see such an exhibition of the flesh, but in fact moral and other scandals have continued to plague it in recent history. The following are some prominent examples:

In 1977 ORAL ROBERTS claimed that God had appeared to him and instructed him to build a medical center called the CITY OF FAITH. In 1980 he claimed that he had a “face to face” conversation with a 900-foot-tall Jesus who told him that he was going to solve the City of Faith financial problems. Seven years later, Roberts said that God had appeared to him yet again and told him that he would die if he did not raise $8 million within 12 months. The wild-eyed visions and unrelenting appeals could not save the City of Faith. In 1989 Roberts closed it to pay off debts! Yet the Pentecostal world in general did not decry Roberts as a false prophet and a religious phony. Thousands continued to flock to ORU from Pentecostal churches across the country, and millions of dollars continued to flow into Roberts’ ministry from gullible supporters.

Updated February 26, 2009 (first published March 6, 2006) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -
 
Pentecostals and Charismatics often teach that there are two types of tongues described in the New Testament: the “public language tongues” of Pentecost and the “private prayer” tongues of 1 Corinthians 14:4 -- “He that speaketh in an unknown tongue edifieth himself; but he that prophesieth edifieth the church.” Some call this distinction “ministry tongues” and “devotional tongues.”
 

Enlarged December 29, 2008 (first published July 18, 2006) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

From its inception the Pentecostal movement has been marred deeply by scandals, as we have documented in our illustrated 317-page book The Pentecostal-Charismatic Movements: Its History and Its Error. If the movement had the fullness of the Holy Spirit unction and power that it claims, we would not see such an exhibition of the flesh, but in fact moral and other scandals have continued to plague it in recent history. The following are some prominent examples:

In 1977 ORAL ROBERTS claimed that God had appeared to him and instructed him to build a medical center called the CITY OF FAITH. In 1980 he claimed that he had a “face to face” conversation with a 900-foot-tall Jesus who told him that he was going to solve the City of Faith financial problems. Seven years later, Roberts said that God had appeared to him yet again and told him that he would die if he did not raise $8 million within 12 months. The wild-eyed visions and unrelenting appeals could not save the City of Faith. In 1989 Roberts closed it to pay off debts! Yet the Pentecostal world in general did not decry Roberts as a false prophet and a religious phony. Thousands continued to flock to ORU from Pentecostal churches across the country, and millions of dollars continued to flow into Roberts’ ministry from gullible supporters.

In 1989 JIM BAKKER, head of the very influential Pentecostal PTL television program went to prison for defrauding his followers out of $158 million. He was paroled in 1994 after serving five years of a 45-year sentence. His trial brought to light his lavish lifestyle, which included six luxurious homes and even an air-conditioned dog house. Prosecutors charged Bakker with diverting to his own use $3.7 million of the money that had been given to his “ministry.” Bakker also committed adultery with church secretary Jessica Hahn and paid more than $250,000 in an attempt to hush up the matter. Bakker’s wife and the former co-host of the PTL Club, Tammy Faye, divorced him while he was in prison and married Roe Messner, an old family friend whose company helped build PTL’s Heritage USA resort complex. Today Tammy Faye has a non-judgmental ministry to homosexuals. She appears at “gay-pride” events nationwide, including a Tammy Faye look-alike contest in Washington, D.C., where she was “surrounded by men in falsies and pancake makeup…” (Charisma News, November 2002). In January 2000 Bakker told Larry King, “Every person who died in the [Jewish] Holocaust is in heaven.” Bakker defended this heretical doctrine in a letter to the editor that appeared in Charisma magazine in June of that year.

A year after the PTL scandal first hit the world’s headlines, JIMMY SWAGGART, one of the leading Pentecostal preachers of modern times, created his own scandal when he was caught with a prostitute. At the time, Swaggart had a 6,000-member congregation in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, a 270-acre headquarters, a Bible College, an influential television ministry that reached to many parts of the world (broadcast on 9,700 stations and cable outlets), and a ministry income of $142-million per year. Swaggart is the cousin of Jerry Lee Lewis and both can pound the piano, but whereas Jerry Lee pursued a flamboyant rock & roll career Jimmy pursued a flamboyant gospel career. A report from a Swaggart crusade in Calgary, Alberta, described the “gospel music at acid-rock volumes” and said “it is a good show” with Swaggart “hammering away at the grand piano, sweating and gesturing like Elvis Presley” and “working the audience like Frank Sinatra” (The Courier News, Elgin, Ill., May 20, 1991, p. 5A). Swaggart refused to stay away from the pulpit for a year as the Assemblies of God in Louisiana stipulated for his discipline, so he was disbarred but he continued preaching anyway. He lost three-fourths of his television audience and his Bible college students and a large percentage of his church members; his finances crumbled. But the Jimmy Swaggart scandal wasn’t over even though he claimed that when he asked God, “Lord, do you still want me to take this work?” God replied emphatically, “Yesssss! You’re in better shape today that you’ve ever been before” (“Swaggart Back in Pulpit with Tales of Nightmares and Revelation,” Religious News Service, May 23, 1988; reprinted in Christian News, June 3, 1988, p. 5). In a television broadcast in May 1988 Swaggart had the audacity to boast, “You are looking at a clean preacher!” and “I do not lie!” (Don Matzat, “The Same Ol' Jimmy,” Christian News, May 16, 1988). Perhaps this is because Swaggart had sought counseling from Oral Roberts and Roberts had observed demons with long fingernails digging into Swaggart’s flesh and had cast them out (Huntsville Times, Huntsville, Alabama, AP report, March 31, 1988; reported from Calvary Contender, April 15, 1988). Just like that. The exorcism didn’t last though. In 1991 Swaggart was again in hot water when police in Indio, California, stopped him on a traffic charge and found that the woman riding with him was a prostitute. In spite of all of this Swaggart is still swaggering, though his crowd isn’t very large. On his Sept. 12, 2004, program he said, “I’ve never seen a man in my life I wanted to marry. And I’m gonna be blunt and plain; if one ever looks at me like that, I’m gonna kill him and tell God he died.”

By the 1980s Pentecostal evangelist PETER POPOFF had a ministry on 51 television channels and 40 radio stations and an annual income of seven million dollars. He also held healing crusades in many cities, during which he would exercise a “word of knowledge” by calling out the names, addresses, and illnesses of strangers who were in attendance. In 1986 the news broke that Popoff’s amazing “revelations” were actually broadcast to him by his wife after she had conversed with members of the audience. She transmitted her information by radio signal and Peter could hear her voice through a tiny receiver in his ear. A team of skeptics discovered the ruse and recorded the private broadcasts using a scanning receiver and recording equipment (Los Angeles Times, May 11, 1986). When questioned about the matter by John Dart, religion writer for the Los Angeles Times, Popoff replied that his wife only supplied him with about 50% of the information and the rest he got from the Lord! Popoff was forced to file for bankruptcy in 1987 but by 1990 he was back in business with a new book entitled Dreams, which he announced in a full-page ad in Charisma magazine

ROBERT TILTON, who was voted one of the most popular Pentecostals by Charisma magazine readers in 1983 and appeared on the cover of Charisma in July 1985, was the founder of the Word of Faith Satellite Network, host of Success-N-Life broadcasts, and founder and pastor of the Word of Faith World Outreach Center in Farmers Branch, Texas. He taught the Kenneth Hagin Word-Faith doctrines and promised prosperity and healing to those who supported his ministry and exercised faith. He wrote, “You are ... a God kind of creature” (Tilton, God’s Laws of Success, pp. 170--71). In 1990 he said: “Being poor is a sin, when God promises prosperity. New house? New car? That’s chicken feed. That’s nothing compared to what God wants to do for you” (John Macarthur, Charismatic Chaos, p. 285). In 1991, when his ministry was taking in $80 million, Tilton’s empire was shaken when ABC-TV’s PrimeTime Live exposed his extravagant lifestyle and his shady fund-raising practices. His estate included an 11,000-square-foot home near Dallas, a condominium in Florida, a yacht, and other assets worth $90 million. The show reported that Tilton’s ministry threw thousands of unread prayer requests into the trash even though Tilton claimed to pray over them. He had even claimed: “I laid on top of those prayer requests so much that the chemicals actually got into my bloodstream, and ... I had two small strokes in my brain” (Robert Tilton, Success-N-Life, November 22, 1991). Though Tilton protested that he was the victim of falsehood and sued ABC for libel, the case was thrown out of the courts. Because of the scandal Tilton lost much of his television audience and most of his church members, but he is still on the air and still preaching the prosperity gospel and still begging for donations and still promising God’s blessing on those who give.

In 1991 Kansas City prophet BOB JONES’ tapes were removed from the Vineyard Ministries International product catalog after he admitted to “a moral failure” (Lee Grady, “Wimber Plots New Course for Vineyard,” Charisma, Feb. 1993, p. 64). Jones was using his alleged spiritual authority and “prophetic anointing” to induce women to disrobe.

Pentecostal preacher JAMIE BUCKINGHAM (1933-92) was the author of 40 books that sold 20 million copies, editor-in-chief of Ministries Today magazine, a columnist for Charisma magazine, and pastor of the 2,000-member Tabernacle Church in Melbourne, Florida. Buckingham began his ministry as a Southern Baptist pastor but after being “baptized by the spirit” at a Full Gospel Businessmen’s Fellowship meeting, he became a Pentecostal. Buckingham’s “spirit baptism” made him a radical ecumenist who called for unity between Catholics, Protestants, Baptists, and Pentecostals. In an article entitled “Bridge Builders” (Charisma, March 1992, p. 90), he said there is no higher calling than ecumenical bridge building and he praised David Duplessis for building bridges between Pentecostals and Roman Catholics, and Jewish rabbi Yechiel Eckstein for building bridges between Jews and Christians. Buckingham taught that God has promised healing through Christ’s atonement, and when he was diagnosed with cancer in 1990 many Pentecostals, including Oral Roberts, prophesied his healing. Buckingham said that God told him personally that he was going to live to be “at least 100 years of age in good health and with a clear mind.” The April 1991 issue of Charisma magazine featured this testimony in “My Summer of Miracles.” Note the following excerpt from that article:

“One day my wife … suddenly spoke aloud [and] said, ‘Your healing was purchased at the cross.’ … Here is what I discovered. YOU HAVE WHAT YOU SPEAK. If you want to change something, you must believe it enough to speak it. … If you talk poverty, you’ll have it. If you say you’re sick, you’ll be (and remain) sick. … despite what the doctors said, I refused to say ‘My cancer.’ It was not mine. It was the devil’s. I didn’t have cancer. I had Jesus. The cancer was trying to have me, but THE WORD OF GOD SAID I WAS HEALED THROUGH WHAT JESUS DID ON CALVARY. … I popped a videotape into my VCR and lay down on the sofa. … The tape was an Oral Roberts’ sermon … I came up off the sofa, shouting, ‘I’M HEALED!’ My wife leaped out of her chair and shouted, ‘Hallelujah!’ For the next 30 minutes all we did was walk around the house shouting thanks to God and proclaiming my healing” (Jamie Buckingham, “My Summer of Miracles,” Charisma, April 1991).

Ten months after the publication of this article, on February 17, 1992, Jamie Buckingham died of cancer about 40 years shy of his 100th birthday. Not only did Jamie Buckingham lead others astray with his false teaching but he also deceived himself.

The Cathedral at Chapel Hill near Atlanta, Georgia, founded by EARL PAULK, has been plagued with moral scandals and radical false teaching. At the height of his power Paulk was exceedingly influential. He authored many books, had a large television ministry, was the founder of the International Charismatic Bible Ministries, and a “prophet” in Bill Hamon’s Christian International Network of Prophetic Ministries. Paulk amalgamated the Word-Faith doctrine with Reconstructionist or Dominion theology and promoted it widely among Pentecostals. As for the Word-Faith doctrine, Paulk echoes Kenneth Hagin and Kenneth Copeland and others when he wrote: “Just as dogs have puppies and cats have kittens, God has little gods. Until we comprehend that we are gods, and begin to act like little gods, we can’t manifest the Kingdom of God” (Paulk, Satan Unmasked, pp. 96, 97). Paulk merges this Kingdom Now Word-Faith theology (that Christians are little gods with the authority of Christ on earth) with the dominion doctrine the churches are to unify and then retake the world from Satan and ruler over it before Christ returns. He gives this teaching in books such as Satan Unmasked (1984), Held in the Heavens Until (1985), and Ultimate Kingdom (1986). Paulk wrote in his book The Wounded Body of Christ, “We need not wonder whether He [Jesus] will come back; HE CANNOT. Christ can only return when the people of God have reached that place of unity in which the Spirit and the Bride can say, ‘Come’” (p. 73). By 1992, Chapel Hill Harvester Church had 12,000 members and was one of the most prosperous churches in America, but that year DON PAULK, who had taken over as senior pastor from his brother Earl, admitted having an “improper” relationship with a woman staffer. He resigned but was immediately reinstated by the church council. Allegations were made by a group of women about sexual relationships with the Paulks and in 2001 another female church member filed a lawsuit claiming that Paulk molested her when she was a child and into her teenage years, but the accusations were denied and swept under the rug. In August 2005 long-time church member and soloist Mona Brewer and her husband Bobby, who was a major financial supporter of the church, filed a lawsuit against Earl Paulk alleging that she was manipulated into being his paramour for 14 years. Brewer says that the members were conditioned to give unconditional obedience to the pastor, who called himself “Archbishop Paulk,” and that he taught her that those who are spiritually exalted can have sexual relationships and it isn’t adultery. He called it “kingdom relationships.” She says that Paulk even shared her with family members and visiting Charismatic preachers. This case was featured on CCN’s Paula Zahn Now program on Jan. 19, 2006, but as of March 2006 Paulk’s television program was still broadcast on Trinity Broadcasting Network.

In 2000, CLARENCE MCCLENDON, pastor of Pentecostal Church of the Harvest International in Los Angeles and prominent “bishop” in the International Communion of Charismatic Churches, divorced his wife and a mere week later married another woman. His first wife, who accused him of fathering a child out of wedlock, took their three children and moved to Hawaii, but Clarence went right on as if nothing had happened and he had all of the support he needed. Charisma magazine observed that “in just a few months, members of his new congregation were dancing in the aisles in their new facility, and the talented young preacher was back on the conference circuit, no questions asked. ... McClendon enjoys the spotlight on Christian television, and he shares pulpits with top leaders in our movement” (Lee Grady, “Sin in the Camp,” Charisma, Feb. 2002).

In 2002 ROBERTS LIARDON, pastor of Embassy Christian Center in Irvine, California, and influential Pentecostal author, acknowledged that he had “a homosexual relationship” (Charisma News, Jan. 31, 2002), though he was back in the ministry within weeks.

On September 12, 2004, the Los Angeles Times reported that PAUL CROUCH OF TRINITY BROADCASTING NETWORK had paid $425,000 in 1998 to Enoch Lonnie Ford, an employee at TBN, to keep him from going public with his allegation that they had a homosexual encounter. It was after Ford threatened to sue that Crouch paid almost a half-million dollars to keep the matter quiet. TBN also paid thousands of dollars in debts that Ford had accrued. Crouch denied the allegations and tried to blacken the character of his accuser, which was not difficult to do. Ford is a convicted sex and drug offender, but it seems very strange that Crouch would pay such a large sum to a man if there was no truth to his allegation. Ford wrote his testimony of the affair but it was sealed by the courts after Crouch sued to have the matter squelched.

In October 2004 PAUL CAIN, the most prominent Pentecostal prophet, was exposed as a homosexual and an alcoholic by Rick Joyner, Mike Bickle, and Jack Deere, who said that Cain had refused to submit to discipline (“Paul Cain, “Latter Rain Prophet of Renown Is Now Discredited,” The Plumbline, December 2004). Eventually Cain admitted his sin, saying, “I have struggled in two particular areas, homosexuality and alcoholism, for an extended period of time. I apologize for denying these matters of truth, rather than readily admitting them” (“A Letter of Confession,” February 2005, http://web.archive.org/web/20050225053035/http://www.paulcain.org/news.html).

In 2007 wrongful termination suits were filed against Oral Roberts University by former professors alleging that the founder’s son RICHARD ROBERTS and his wife LINDSAY misappropriated school money and other improprieties. According to the suit, they spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund their lavish lifestyle, including a stable of horses for their daughters, a $29,400 trip to Orlando and the Bahamas aboard a university jet for a daughter and her friends, and a $39,000 shopping spree at one clothing store for Lindsay (“Healing ORU,” Christianity Today, September 2008). The suit also alleges that the Roberts’ home has been remodeled 11 times in the past 14 years, that Lindsay spent nights in the ORU guest house with an underage 16 year old male, and that she frequently had cell phone bills of more than $800 per month, with “hundreds of text messages sent between 1 a.m. and 3 a.m. to underage males who had been provided phones at university expense” (“Oral Roberts University Faces the Blue Screen of Death,” http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2007/10/oral-roberts-university-faces-blue.html). The professors were fired for trying to expose “the leadership’s moral failings and financial improprieties.” On November 13, 2007, the tenured faculty of ORU approved a nonbinding vote of no confidence in Richard, and he resigned as president on November 23. Lindsay is his second wife. He and his first wife, Patti, divorced in 1979.

In August 2008 the four-month long “Lakeland Outpouring” led by TODD BENTLEY ended in scandal. Some had prophesied that the healing crusade in Lakeland, Florida, was the beginning of a national revival and that entire cities would be “shut down.” In fact, it was the Lakeland Outpouring that was shut down after Bentley announced that he was separating from his wife (“Todd Bentley, Wife Separating,” Charisma, Aug. 12, 2008). A week later it was further announced that Bentley was stepping down as head of Fresh Fire Ministries, after the ministry revealed that he had an “unhealthy relationship” with a female staffer (“Bentley Stepping Down,” OneNewsNow, Aug. 19, 2008). The Lakeland meetings began on April 2, 2008, at the Ignite Church, and continued nightly in various venues for more than three months, with Bentley dispensing his medicine by slamming people on the forehead, shoving them, flinging the Holy Spirit, yelling “Blah, blah, blah, blah,” crying out, “Come and get some,” and staggering around like a drunk. He has kicked an elderly lady in the face, banged a crippled woman’s legs on the platform, kneed a man in the stomach, and hit another man so hard that a tooth popped out. My friends, God has given us clear instructions in Scripture about healing, and James 5 does not describe a raucous “healing crusade.” We believe in divine healing for today, but we don’t believe in Pentecostal showmen. See “I Believe in Miracles” http://www.wayoflife.org/fbns/ibelievein-miracles.html.

Also in August 2008 MICHAEL GUGLIELMUCCI of the Assemblies of God in Australia admitted that he had been lying about having an advanced stage of cancer. For the past two years Guglielmucci, a popular contemporary worship leader and former pastor, had claimed to have terminal cancer. He even recorded a song called “The Healer” that became a hit and was featured on Hillsong’s latest album. For two years he allegedly fooled even his wife and parents and closest friends into thinking that he had cancer. He sent e-mails to his wife from phony doctors, shaved his head, walked with a cane, and carried around an oxygen bottle. In one church performance that attracted one-third of a million hits on YouTube, he sang with an oxygen tube in his nose! He claimed that God gave him the song after he learned that he had “an aggressive form of cancer.” Guglielmucci now claims that he faked cancer to hide a longtime addiction to pornography. He is the former pastor of one of Australia’s largest youth churches called Planetshakers. More recently he was the worship leader at Edge Church International, an Assemblies of God congregation pastored by his father, Danny. Hillsong is the ministry of Hillsong Church in Sydney, the largest church in Australia and prominent in the contemporary worship field. Brian Houston, who co-pastors the church with his wife, is the head of AOG in Australia (which has been renamed the Australian Christian Churches).

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THE PENTECOSTAL-CHARISMATIC MOVEMENTS: THE HISTORY AND THE ERROR. I have been examining and re-examining the Pentecostal-Charismatic movements for more than three decades since I was led to Christ by a Pentecostal in 1973 and began to seek God’s will about tongues-speaking and the miraculous gifts of the early churches. I have built a large library of materials on this subject and have interviewed Pentecostals and Charismatics and attended their churches in many parts of the world. I have also attended large Charismatic conferences with press credentials. I have approached these studies with an open mind in the sense of having a commitment only to the truth and not to anyone’s tradition. I am a member of an independent Baptist church but Baptist doctrine and practice is not my authority; the Bible is. Each fresh evaluation of the Pentecostal-Charismatic movement has brought an increased conviction that it is unscriptural and dangerous. This book begins with my own experience with the Pentecostal movement. The next section deals with the history of the Pentecostal movement, beginning with a survey of miraculous signs from the second to the 18th centuries. We then examine the movements in the 19th century that led up to the creation of Pentecostalism and the outbreak of “tongues-speaking” at Charles Parham’s Bible school in Topeka, Kansas, in 1901, and at William Seymour’s Azusa Street Mission in Los Angeles in 1906. We examine some of the major Pentecostal denominations, the Latter Rain Covenent, the major Pentecostal healing evangelists, the Sharon Schools and the New Order of the Latter Rain, the Manifest Sons of God, the Word-Faith movement and its key leaders, the Charismatic Movement, the Roman Catholic Charismatic Renewal, the Pentecostal Prophets, the Third Wave, and the recent Pentecostal scandals. We conclude the historical section with a look at the Laughing Revival. In the last section of the book we deal with the theological errors of the Pentecostal-Charismatic movements (exalting experience over Scripture, emphasis on the miraculous, Messianic and apostolic miracles can be reproduced, the baptism of the Holy Spirit, the baptism of fire, exalting the Holy Spirit, tongues speaking is for today, sinless perfectionism, healing is guaranteed in the atonement, spirit slaying, spirit drunkenness, visions of Jesus, trips to heaven, women preachers, and ecumenism). The final section of the book answers the question: “Why are people deluded by Pentecostal-Charismatic error?” David and Tami Lee, former Pentecostals, after reviewing a section of the book said: “Very well done! We pray God will use it to open the eyes of many and to help keep many of His children out of such deception.” And Mary Keating, also a former Charismatic, said, “The book is excellent and I have no doubt whatever that the Lord is going to use it in a mighty way. Amen!!” 317 pages. $9.95, available from Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061. 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org.
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Updated November 6, 2008 (first published September 19, 2006) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

The Pentecostal-Charismatic movement holds to the premise that signs and wonders produce faith. John Wimber, former leader of the Vineyard churches, taught this. His books Power Evangelism and Power Healing are predicated upon this idea:

“Clearly the early Christians had an openness to the power of the Spirit, which resulted in signs and wonders and church growth. If we want to be like the early church, we too need to open to the Holy Spirit’s power” (Wimber, Power Evangelism, p. 31).

Wimber said, “Once you’ve healed a person, it’s very easy to lead them to Christ.” He promoted this false doctrine in the controversial course taught at Fuller Theological Seminary in the early 1980s, called “MC510, Signs, Wonders, and Church Growth.” Wimber claimed that evangelism, to be most effective, must be accompanied by miracles.

The idea that miracles produce faith is contrary to the teaching of the Bible.

FIRST, THIS FALSE DOCTRINE IGNORES THE EXAMPLE OF SCRIPTURE.

Most of those who saw God’s miracles upon Egypt and during the wilderness wanderings did not believe (Heb. 3:7-12). Most who witnessed Jesus Christ’s incomparable miracles did not believe (John 6:66). By the day of Pentecost, there were only 120 disciples in the upper room. Where were the thousands who had witnessed Christ’s miracles firsthand?

SECOND, THIS FALSE DOCTRINE CONFUSES THE PURPOSE OF THE MIRACLES OF CHRIST AND THE APOSTLES.

Christ’s miracles were not a pattern for believers to follow throughout the church age but were the signs of His Messiahship.

“How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him; God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will?” (Heb. 2:3-4).

“If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works: that ye may know, and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him” (John 10:37-38).

Likewise, the miracles performed by the apostles were signs of their apostleship.

“Truly the signs of an apostle were wrought among you in all patience, in signs, and wonders, and mighty deeds” (2 Cor. 12:12).

The signs and wonders recorded in the book of Acts were done by the apostles (Acts 2:43; 3:6-8; 4:33; 5:12, 15; 9:40-41; 19:12; 28:3-5, 7-9). If any “ordinary” believer (meaning one who is not an apostle) could perform these miraculous wonders indiscriminately, the sign of an apostle would be rendered ineffective. If you tell me that you are meeting me at the airport and that I will recognize you because you will be wearing a red hat, the sign of the red hat would be destroyed if everyone in the airport wore the same hat.

When Dorcas died in Joppa, the believers there could not raise her from the dead. It was only when Peter the apostle came to Joppa from Lydda that Dorcas was raised up (Acts 9:36-43). It was the sign of an apostle.

THIRD, THIS FALSE DOCTRINE DENIES THE SUPREMACY OF AND PROPER SOURCE OF FAITH.

Faith does not come from miracles but from the Word of God itself.

“So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Rom. 10:17).

Miracles can draw people’s attention, but miracles cannot give people faith. Faith only comes by hearing and believing God’s Word.

FOURTH, THIS FALSE DOCTRINE DENIES THE SUFFICIENCY OF THE BIBLE AND OF THE MIRACLES RECORDED THEREIN:

“And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book: But THESE ARE WRITTEN, THAT YE MIGHT BELIEVE that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name” (John 20:29-31).

“All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Tim. 3:16-17).

Since the Bible is able to make the man of God perfect, it is obvious that it is sufficient for faith and practice and that visions and voices and miracles are unnecessary. “But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away” (1 Cor. 13:10).

FIFTH, THIS FALSE DOCTRINE DENIES THE PLAIN STATEMENTS OF SCRIPTURE ABOUT MIRACLES:

“But he answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas” (Matt. 12:39).

“And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead” (Luke 16:30-31).

“For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For he received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. And this voice which came from heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy mount. WE HAVE ALSO A MORE SURE WORD OF PROPHECY; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts: Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost” (2 Pet. 1:16-21).

These Bible passages destroy the doctrine that miracles produce faith and that Christians today must demonstrate apostolic signs and wonders. The apostle Peter experienced miracles far beyond anything imagined by today’s Charismatics, yet he did not exalt miracles; he exalted the Scriptures. He said the Bible is a more sure word than the most amazing religious experience.

The gospel does not have to be perpetually authenticated by signs and wonders. It is solidly established upon the greatest sign ever accomplished, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Those who do not believe this sign as recorded in the Holy Scriptures will not believe any sign they see with their own eyes. That is what the Bible tells us.

[This article is excerpted from the book THE PENTECOSTAL-CHARISMATIC MOVEMENTS: THE HISTORY AND THE ERROR. I have been examining and re-examining the Pentecostal-Charismatic movements for more than three decades since I was led to Christ by a Pentecostal in 1973 and began to seek God’s will about tongues-speaking and the miraculous gifts of the early churches. I have built a large library of materials on this subject and have interviewed Pentecostals and Charismatics and attended their churches in many parts of the world. I have also attended large Charismatic conferences with press credentials. I have approached these studies with an open mind in the sense of having a commitment only to the truth and not to anyone’s tradition. I am a member of an independent Baptist church but Baptist doctrine and practice is not my authority; the Bible is. Each fresh evaluation of the Pentecostal-Charismatic movement has brought an increased conviction that it is unscriptural and dangerous. This book begins with my own experience with the Pentecostal movement. The next section deals with the history of the Pentecostal movement, beginning with a survey of miraculous signs from the second to the 18th centuries. We then examine the movements in the 19th century that led up to the creation of Pentecostalism and the outbreak of “tongues-speaking” at Charles Parham’s Bible school in Topeka, Kansas, in 1901, and at William Seymour’s Azusa Street Mission in Los Angeles in 1906. We examine some of the major Pentecostal denominations, the Latter Rain Covenent, the major Pentecostal healing evangelists, the Sharon Schools and the New Order of the Latter Rain, the Manifest Sons of God, the Word-Faith movement and its key leaders, the Charismatic Movement, the Roman Catholic Charismatic Renewal, the Pentecostal Prophets, the Third Wave, and the recent Pentecostal scandals. We conclude the historical section with a look at the Laughing Revival. In the last section of the book we deal with the theological errors of the Pentecostal-Charismatic movements (exalting experience over Scripture, emphasis on the miraculous, Messianic and apostolic miracles can be reproduced, the baptism of the Holy Spirit, the baptism of fire, exalting the Holy Spirit, tongues speaking is for today, sinless perfectionism, healing is guaranteed in the atonement, spirit slaying, spirit drunkenness, visions of Jesus, trips to heaven, women preachers, and ecumenism). The final section of the book answers the question: “Why are people deluded by Pentecostal-Charismatic error?” David and Tami Lee, former Pentecostals, after reviewing a section of the book said: “Very well done! We pray God will use it to open the eyes of many and to help keep many of His children out of such deception.” And Mary Keating, also a former Charismatic, said, “The book is excellent and I have no doubt whatever that the Lord is going to use it in a mighty way. Amen!!” 317 pages. $9.95. Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061. 866-295-4143]

[Distributed by Way of Life Literature's Fundamental Baptist Information Service, an e-mail listing for Fundamental Baptists and other fundamentalist, Bible-believing Christians. OUR GOAL IN THIS PARTICULAR ASPECT OF OUR MINISTRY IS NOT DEVOTIONAL BUT IS TO PROVIDE INFORMATION TO ASSIST PREACHERS IN THE PROTECTION OF THE CHURCHES IN THIS APOSTATE HOUR. This material is sent only to those who personally subscribe to the list. If somehow you have subscribed unintentionally, following are the instructions for removal. The Fundamental Baptist Information Service mailing list is automated. To SUBSCRIBE or to UNSUBSCRIBE or to CHANGE ADDRESSES or to RE-SUBSCRIBE UNDER A NEW ADDRESS, go to http://www.wayoflife.org/fbis/subscribe.html. If you have any trouble with this, please let us know. And please be patient with us. We do not ignore any unsubscribe request, but we cannot always get to your request immediately as each person involved with maintaining the Way of Life web site does this only on a very part time basis and is busy with many other major activities, such as pastoring and missionary work. We take up a quarterly offering to fund this ministry, and those who use the materials are expected to participate (Galatians 6:6) if they can. Some of the articles are from O Timothy magazine, which is in its 25th year of publication. Way of Life publishes many helpful books. The catalog is located at the web site: http://wayoflife.org/catalog/catalog.htm Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061. 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org. We do not solicit funds from those who do not agree with our preaching and who are not helped by these publications, but from those who are. OFFERINGS can be made at http://www.wayoflife.org/fbns/offering.html. PAYPAL offerings can be made to https://www.paypal.com/xclick/business=dcloud%40wayoflife.org]

TODD BENTLEY AND THE LAKELAND DECEPTION

Updated September 16, 2008 (first published September 2, 2008) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

Some said that Todd Bentley’s recently-ended healing meetings in Lakeland, Florida, followed the lineage of the “Toronto Blessing” and the “Pensacola Outpouring” of the 1990s. Some had even prophesied that it was the beginning of a national revival and that entire cities would be “shut down.”

In fact, it was the Lakeland Outpouring that was shut down after Bentley announced that he was separating from his wife (“Todd Bentley, Wife Separating,” Charisma, Aug. 12, 2008). A week later it was announced that Bentley was stepping down as head of Fresh Fire Ministries, after the ministry revealed he had an “unhealthy relationship” with a female staffer (“Bentley Stepping Down,” OneNewsNow, Aug. 19, 2008). The two events are not unconnected, of course. The separation from his wife was due to the fact that he “had developed an ‘unhealthy’ emotional attachment to another woman” (“Legacy of Lakeland Outpouring Debated,” Lakeland Ledger, Sept. 13, 2008). The Ledger also reported that “there were reports that Bentley engaged in ‘excessive drinking.’”

The Lakeland meetings began on April 2, 2008, at the Ignite Church, which meets in a reconditioned building supply store and is pastored by Steve Strader.

Steve is the son of Karl Strader, who pastored the now defunct Carpenter’s Home Church where a “revival” broke out in 1993 under the ministry of Rodney Howard-Browne. Calling himself “the Holy Ghost Bartender,” he dispenses spiritual drunkenness and “holy laughter.” An estimated 100,000 people attended the Howard-Browne meetings at Carpenter’s home that year and the church grew from 1,500 to 8,000. A few years later the church fell apart after Strader’s son Daniel was convicted and imprisoned for “swindling investors, including church members” (Charisma Online, Aug. 24, 2005). In 2005 the church was sold to Without Walls International, but as of 2008 Without Walls was trying to offload the property after the “international” leaders of the organization, Randy and Paula White, got a divorce.

The Bentley meetings this year at Ignite Church also grew quickly. They had to rent larger facilities such as the Tiger Town baseball stadium, and the services continued nightly for more than three months.

Bentley wears metal studs in his ears and eyebrow and is covered with tattoos, some of which he got after he was converted. He claims that multitudes have been healed and some raised from the dead. He slams people on the forehead and shoves them. He has kicked an elderly lady in the face, banged a crippled woman’s legs on the platform, and kneed a man in the stomach. He hit another man so hard that a tooth popped out.

The meetings have a sideshow feel with raucous music blaring and Bentley crying out, “Come and get some,” and “[Miracles are] popping like popcorn.” He claims to know what is happening in the audience, calling out things like, “Someone’s getting a new spinal cord tonight.” He “flings” the Spirit upon people while weirdly yelling, “blah, blah, blah, blah.”

“Holy laughter,” spiritual drunkenness, violent shaking, and “falling under the power” are an integral part of the “revival.” People bend over and can’t rise up. Women shake in weird and violent ways.

Bentley’s healing claims are spectacular and strange. One man even came on stage with two prosthetic legs and a glass eye, claiming that he could see out of the glass eye and that one of the stumps of his leg had grown an inch and a half (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHAf3W3iPPY&feature=related). This was praised as a great miracle, but if it was it was certainly a pathetic half-way thing!

Bentley made the following statement on June 23:

“We have received thousands, if not tens of thousands, of healed people’s testimonies. I have staff working 80 hours a week working on the biggest catalogue in the world of such data with names, addresses and the medical verifications. We have medically verified doctor’s evidence of the dead raised. ... every conceivable miracle we have in this catalogue of outstanding medically verified miracles. We have blood tests, x-rays, even letters from the medical community. We are making these medical stories available to any media. We also have got a video catalogue with follow ups and literally thousands of testimonies for the media for the most notable miracles to present to a skeptical world--this could be one of the most well documented revivals in history!” (“Todd Bentley’s Type of Medically Verified Healings,” http://endtimespropheticwords.wordpress.com/2008/07/12/).

A few days later the Associated Press made an attempt to follow up on a list of 15 names that were given by Bentley’s ministry to represent healings that can be medically verified.

“Expecting critics, Bentley’s ministry distributed a list of 15 people it said were cured, and vetted by his ministry, with all but three of their stories ‘medically verified.’ Yet two phone numbers given out by the ministry were wrong, six people did not return telephone messages and only two of the remainder, when reached by The Associated Press, said they had medical records as proof of their miracle cure. However, one woman would not make her physician available to confirm the findings, and the other’s doctor did not return calls despite the patient’s authorization” (“Fast-rising Preacher’s Healing Draw Ire,” USA Today, July 10, 2008, Travis Reed, Associated Press, http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2008-07-11-revival-healing_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip).

ABC Nightline also tried unsuccessfully to follow up on Bentley’s healing claims.

“When asked to present evidence of the healings, Bentley promised to give Nightline the names and medical records of three followers who would talk openly about his miracles. He never delivered. Instead, his staff gave Nightline a binder filled with what he says are inspiring miracles, but with scant hard evidence. It offered incomplete contact information, a few pages of incomplete medical records, and the doctors’ names were crossed out.

“When pressed further, Bentley provided the name of a woman in California who had a large tumor in her uterus that shrank after she saw Bentley.

“Her husband, however, told Nightline that it could be a coincidence because she was still undergoing medical treatment. He said she was too ill to talk to the media. The husband did provide some of his wife’s medical records from a clinic in Tijuana, Mexico, where she went for cancer treatment after being turned away by American hospitals. The wife, however, insisted on obscuring the clinic’s name and the names of the doctors” (“Thousands Flock to Revival in Search of Miracles,” ABC Nightline, July 9, 2008, http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/FaithMatters/story?id=5338963&page=1).

Psychotherapist Bridget Piekarski wrote to the Lakeland Ledger and gave the following warning about Bentley’s healing claims:

“After the June 22 front-page article on the Florida Outpouring Revival [‘Signs and Warnings’], I simply have to speak up. I am a psychotherapist. Several weeks ago, the mother of a young adult patient of mine called for an appointment for her son. He had been stable for quite some time on his medications for schizophrenia. He had recently decompensated, and was hospitalized in order to stabilize him and restart his medications. He had attended one of Todd Bentley’s gatherings and was told by Mr. Bentley that he was ‘healed.’ He stopped his medications, only to relapse into psychosis. The outcome could have been worse. My client has very risky behaviors when psychotic. He might have died. Please, if you think you have been “healed” of mental or physical illness, please consult your doctor before stopping medications or treatment. Your life may depend on it” (“Healed: Double Check,” Lakeland Ledger, July 5, 2008, http://www.theledger.com/article/20080705/NEWS/588942307).

It seems to me that the ability to see out of a glass eye could be verified with great ease. Bentley could send the guy for a simple eye examination, and that would be that, BUT DON’T HOLD YOUR BREATH.

Bentley claims to be following in the footsteps of the apostles and exhibiting “kingdom power,” but he is doing no such thing. The apostles did not conduct healing meetings. They didn’t call out psychic healings. They didn’t shake and laugh hysterically and stagger around like drunks and flop around on the floor. We believe in divine healing for today, but we don’t believe in Pentecostal showmen (see “I Believe in Miracles” http://www.wayoflife.org/fbns/ibelievein-miracles.html). Furthermore, when the apostles healed, they really healed!

The devil is just as much in the business of religion today as God, and the only way we can discern the difference is by comparing all teaching and practice to the Bible.

Bentley says of the “spiritual drunkenness” and other phenomena, “Don’t try to figure it out with your head” (“Florida Outpouring of Drunkenness,” http://christianresearchnetwork.com/?p=5075).

This has been one of the theme songs of the Pentecostal movement from its inception, but the Bible warns of deceiving spirits and instructs God’s people to carefully prove all things. The Bereans were called “noble” because they tested everything by Scripture (Acts 17:11). Any type of Christianity that draws back from testing everything carefully by Scripture is ignoble and wrong. “Prove all things; hold fast that which is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21).

Bentley was promoted by the discredited “prophets” Bob Jones and Paul Cain, who were associated with Mike Bickle and John Wimber in the 1980s.

Jones was disciplined in 1991 for using his “prophetic” office to cause young women to disrobe before him (J. Lee Grady, What Happened to the Fire, p. 103).

Cain was exposed in 2004 for homosexuality and drunkenness, but the “restored” Cain appeared with Bentley in Lakeland in May 2008 at the baseball stadium and declared that Bentley was a “new breed” and the “spirit of Elijah.” In spite of their incredible claims about healing, Cain suffered a stroke soon thereafter and was hospitalized (“Paul Cain,” Wikipedia).

Bentley claims to have seen many angels. Not surprisingly, some of them were “financial angels” who spread prosperity to him and to those who attend his meetings.

“So when I need a financial breakthrough I don’t just pray and ask God for my financial breakthrough. I go into intercession and become a partner with the angels by petitioning the Father for the angels that are assigned to getting me money: ‘Father, give me the angels in heaven right now that are assigned to get me money and wealth. And let those angels be released on my behalf. Let them go into the four corners of the earth and gather me money’” (Bentley, “Angelic Hosts,” 2003, http://www.etpv.org/2003/angho.html).

One of Bentley’s angels is named Emma. Bentley says:

“I was in a service in Beulah, North Dakota. In the middle of the service I was in conversation with Ivan and another person when in walks Emma. As I stared at the angel with open eyes, the Lord said, ‘Here's Emma.’ I’m not kidding. She floated a couple of inches off the floor. It was almost like Kathryn Kuhlman in those old videos when she wore a white dress and looked like she was gliding across the platform. Emma appeared beautiful and young--about 22 years old--but she was old at the same time. She seemed to carry the wisdom, virtue and grace of Proverbs 31 on her life. She glided into the room, emitting brilliant light and colors. Emma carried these bags and began pulling gold out of them. Then, as she walked up and down the aisles of the church, she began putting gold dust on people. ‘God, what is happening?’ I asked. The Lord answered: ‘She is releasing the gold, which is both the revelation and the financial breakthrough that I am bringing into this church.’ ... Within three weeks of that visitation, the church had given me the biggest offering I had ever received to that point in my ministry. Thousands of dollars!” (Bentley, “Angelic Hosts”).

In Scripture there are no female angels, no angels that sprinkle gold dust, and none that float two inches off the floor.

It appears that the Lakeland Outpouring is finished, but it was unscriptural from the start.

My friends, God is not dead, but He is not a puppet on a Pentecostal healer’s string. He has given us clear instructions in Scripture about healing. Those that are sick are to call the elders of the church and he is to confess any sins and they are to anoint him with oil and pray over him (James 5:13-16). This assumes, first, that the individual is born again through faith in Jesus Christ. It assumes, second, that he or she is a member of a Bible-believing church. James 5 does not describe a raucous “healing crusade.”

As we said earlier, we believe in divine healing for today, but we don’t believe in Pentecostal showmen.

See “I Believe in Miracles” http://www.wayoflife.org/fbns/ibelievein-miracles.html.

For a more extensive study of this subject see The Pentecostal-Charismatic Movements: The History and Error, which is available from Way of Life Literature. See the online catalog.

[Distributed by Way of Life Literature's Fundamental Baptist Information Service, an e-mail listing for Fundamental Baptists and other fundamentalist, Bible-believing Christians. OUR GOAL IN THIS PARTICULAR ASPECT OF OUR MINISTRY IS NOT DEVOTIONAL BUT IS TO PROVIDE INFORMATION TO ASSIST PREACHERS IN THE PROTECTION OF THE CHURCHES IN THIS APOSTATE HOUR. This material is sent only to those who personally subscribe to the list. If somehow you have subscribed unintentionally, following are the instructions for removal. The Fundamental Baptist Information Service mailing list is automated. To SUBSCRIBE or to UNSUBSCRIBE or to CHANGE ADDRESSES or to RE-SUBSCRIBE UNDER A NEW ADDRESS, go to http://www.wayoflife.org/fbis/subscribe.html. If you have any trouble with this, please let us know. And please be patient with us. We do not ignore any unsubscribe request, but we cannot always get to your request immediately as each person involved with maintaining the Way of Life web site does this only on a very part time basis and is busy with many other major activities, such as pastoring and missionary work. We take up a quarterly offering to fund this ministry, and those who use the materials are expected to participate (Galatians 6:6) if they can. Some of the articles are from O Timothy magazine, which is in its 25th year of publication. Way of Life publishes many helpful books. The catalog is located at the web site: http://wayoflife.org/catalog/catalog.htm Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061. 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org. We do not solicit funds from those who do not agree with our preaching and who are not helped by these publications, but from those who are. OFFERINGS can be made at http://www.wayoflife.org/fbns/offering.html. PAYPAL offerings can be made to https://www.paypal.com/xclick/business=dcloud%40wayoflife.org]

The Fresh Oil & New Wine Conference for 2007 features radical charismatic speakers such as John Kilpatrick, who led the “Brownsville Outpouring” in the 1990s as the pastor of the Brownsville Assembly of God in Pensacola, Florida. When the “outpouring” began in June 1995 Kilpatrick fell to the floor and lay there almost four hours. He said, “When I hit that floor, it felt like I weighed 10,000 pounds. I knew something supernatural was happening” (Charisma, June 1996). Supernatural, yes; Holy Spirit, no!!! Kilpatrick got so “drunk in the spirit” at times that men in the church had to haul him out of the church auditorium in a wheelchair, carry him home, and help inside the house. He told of trying to drive in this drunken condition and running into garbage cans and backing into another automobile. On one occasion Kilpatrick fell onto the platform and a woman from the “worship team” fell into his arms and they lay on the platform in a drunken stupor together. He laughingly tells this story on an audio cassette that I have. It is definitely not the Holy Spirit who causes that kind of moral temptation and confusion. “Spiritual jerking” was also a feature of the “Brownsville Outpouring.”

Gary Folds is pastor of the First Baptist Church in Belle Glade, Florida. He has written a book promoting the Toronto “Blessing” entitled “Bull in a China Shop: A Baptist Pastor Runs into God at Toronto.” He describes being “slain” in the Spirit and other such things. Following is how he described the meetings he attended: “Some people would simply lay on the floor as though they were sleeping … Others would writhe in what appeared to be anguish, pain, or possibly agony. Some would twitch, while others shook, and some would even have convulsive-type jerking. Many would cry, while an even greater number would laugh … Many of them would laugh for an hour or longer. One night I saw people laugh for almost two and a half hours.”

James Robison is another example of SBC charismatics. The once fiery evangelist used to lift his voice against sin and apostasy, but those days are over. In 1979, he had some sort of charismatic experience. That same year he spoke at an Assembly of God church. By 1981, he had completely gone over to the ecumenical charismatic-Roman Catholic line. That was the year he first invited a Roman Catholic to speak at his Bible conference. Robison was so comfortable with the ecumenical program by 1987 that he joined hands with 20,000 Roman Catholics, including hundreds of priests and nuns, at New Orleans ‘87. At this meeting, Robison made the following amazing statement: “I tell you what, one of the finest representatives of morality in this earth right now is the Pope. People who know it really believe he is a born again man.” I was at this meeting with press credentials and personally recorded the message from which this excerpt is taken. Robison remains affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention and has influenced many Southern Baptists in the charismatic direction.

Another example is the Missouri-based evangelist Bill Sharples. He resigned a Southern Baptist pastorate after accepting the tongues-speaking movement, but 25% of his meetings are in SBC churches. He claims that 15 to 20 percent of Southern Baptists that he meets are open to the Charismatic movement.

Billy Graham is another Southern Baptist who has recommended tongues and charismatic signs and wonders. In his 1978 book, The Holy Spirit, he “endorsed laying on of hands, divine healing and tongues.” He said: “As we approach the end of the age I believe we will see a dramatic recurrence of signs and wonders, which will demonstrate the power of God to a skeptical world.” Graham even promoted the false charismatic prophet Oral Roberts. Graham spoke at the dedication ceremony of Oral Roberts University in 1962. Later that year Graham joined Oral Roberts as a speaker at the July 1962 convention of the Full Gospel Business Men’s Fellowship International in Seattle, Washington. Graham invited Roberts to the World Congress on Evangelism in 1966 and recommended him to influential Evangelical leaders.

Pat Robertson is another example. In the late 1950s he became involved in the Pentecostal movement and began “speaking in tongues.” He established the Christian Broadcasting Network in 1960, and that same year was ordained by the Freemason Street Baptist Church in Norfolk, Virginia, a Southern Baptist congregation. A few years later he formed the “700 Club,” which spread ecumenical and charismatic doctrine far and wide. He still claims to be affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention. Speaking at Celebration 2000 in St. Louis, Missouri, Robertson testified that though he is a Baptist, he sees the need for Roman Catholic charismatics to visit Baptist churches in order to teach the Baptists how to dance and worship God.

Another charismatic Southern Baptist is Pastor Wallace Henley, Crossroads Baptist Church, Houston, Texas. His church practices tongues speaking, and he supports the “revival” at the Brownsville Assembly of God in Pensacola, Florida, where the pastor gets so “drunk in the spirit” that he cannot lead the congregation. Henley claims that those who are opposed to the charismatic movement are “pharisaical” and “mean-spirited.”

Another charismatic Southern Baptist church is Riverside Church of Shreveport, Louisiana. Pastor Lee Jenkins received a Pentecostal experience in 1998 and led the church into full blown Pentecostalism, losing a large percentage of the congregation in the process. The church dropped the name “Baptist” but remained a part of the SBC. In 2000 the church supported Rodney Howard-Browne’s Good News Shreveport-Bossier conference (“Southern Baptist Pastor in Louisiana Opens Door for Charismatic Renewal,” Charisma, July 2000).

In November 2005 the Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board voted to forbid missionaries to speak in tongues, but Jerry Rankin, the head of the board, says that he has spoken in a “private prayer language” for 30 years!

Speaking at a chapel service on August 29, 2006, Dwight McKissic, a trustee of the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, told the students that he speaks in tongues in his “private prayer life” (“Southwestern Trustee’s Sermon on Tongues Prompts Response,” Baptist Press, Aug. 30, 2006). McKissic, who is the pastor of Cornerstone Baptist Church, an SBC congregation in Arlington, Texas, said he has prayed in tongues since 1981. The first time, he says, was when he was a seminary student. He recalls, “Strange sounds begin to come out of my mouth” (“Southern Baptists Debate Tongues,” cbs11tv.com, October 07, 2006).

In support of the doctrine of a “private prayer language” McKissic sited the teaching of New Testament professor Siegfried Schatzmann of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (“Texas Pastor Calls for BF&M Statement on Tongues,” Baptist Press, Sept. 19, 2006).

Missionary David Rogers, son of the late Adrian Rogers, SAID HE WORKS WITH MANY MISSIONARIES WHO PRACTICE PRIVATE TONGUES (“Baptists Are Caught up in Controversy Again,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, March 11, 2006).

Charles Carroll, SBC missionary to Singapore who was dismissed by the Southern Baptist International Mission Board in 1995 because of his charismatic activities, testified that many
Southern Baptists living overseas are charismatic, but most remain “in the closet” for fear of being fired (“Baptist Missionaries in the Closet,” Charisma, March 1999, p. 72).

A 2007 study by LifeWay Research indicates that half of Southern Baptist pastors believe that the Holy Spirit gives some people a “special prayer language” today. More than 400 Southern Baptist pastors were contacted by phone and asked, “Do you believe that the Holy Spirit gives some people the gift of a special language to pray to God privately? Some people refer to this as a Private Prayer Language or the ‘private use of tongues.’” The replies were 50% “Yes”; 43% “No”; and 7% “Don’t know” (“LifeWay Released Prayer Language Study,” Baptist Press, June 1, 2007).

Thus, it appears that this is not a small issue or one that will go away any time soon. Rankin and those supporting his position are trying to distinguish between public tongues and private, saying that while they are opposed to public tongues they believe there is a private form of tongues that one can use to edify oneself. In fact, biblical tongues are biblical tongues. The tongues of Acts are the tongues of 1 Corinthians 14. They were real languages that a believer could speak supernaturally. They were a sign to the nation Israel that God was going to send the gospel to every nation and create a new spiritual body composed of both Jews and Gentiles (1 Cor. 14:20-22, quoted Isaiah 28:11-13). Each time tongues were spoken in Acts (Acts 2, 8, 10, 19) Jews were present. As the prophet Isaiah foretold, the Jews rejected the sign and were judged. Its purpose ceased even before the events recorded in the book of Acts were completed. The last mention of tongues is in Acts 19. The sign, having been fulfilled, ceased. When John Chrysostom wrote in the 4th century about the sign gifts of 1 Corinthians 12-14, he said: “This whole place is very obscure: but the obscurity is produced by our ignorance of the facts referred to, and BY THEIR CESSATION, being such as then used to occur but now no longer take place” (“Homilies on 1 Corinthians,” Vol. XII, The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Hom. 29:2). There is no “private prayer language” in the New Testament. It is the recent invention of Pentecostals and Charismatics who, having realized that they cannot speak in real tongues that can be interpreted (one of the absolute biblical requirements), were forced either to renounce their experience or to create some sort of cockeyed defense for it. There is not one example of a prayer in the Bible that is uttered in unintelligible mutterings that “bypass the intellect.” Jesus Christ did not pray that way and neither did the apostles. I have heard Charismatics speak in their “private prayer language” in churches and conferences in many parts of the world. Larry Lea’s “private prayer language” at Indianapolis ’90 went something like this: “Bubblyida bubblyida hallelujah bubblyida hallabubbly shallabubblyida kolabubblyida glooooory hallelujah bubblyida.” I wrote that down as he was saying it and later checked it against the tape. Nancy Kellar, a Roman Catholic nun who was on the executive committee of St. Louis 2000, spoke in “tongues” that went like this: “Shananaa leea, shananaa higha, shananaa nanaa, shananaa leea…” repeated over and over.

Friends, this is not any sort of biblical prayer; it is childish nonsense, but it is neither innocent nor lacking in spiritual danger. The Bible warns repeatedly and forcefully about the danger of spiritual deception, and those who empty their minds through the practice of a “private prayer language” are in danger of the devil filling them.

The Southern Baptist Convention would do well to cleanse itself of all charismatic practices, but this does not appear to be in the cards. How ridiculous is it to forbid missionaries to do something that the head of their agency does!

The 2008 Southern Baptist Hymnal contains many songs written by charismatics and published by charismatic music companies such as Integrity, Maranatha, and Hillsong. For example, songs by David Ruis, Paul Baloche, and Darlene Zschech are included. These popular worship leaders are extreme charismatic ecumenists and contemporary Christian rockers.

Ruis is one of the worship leaders at the Toronto Airport Church where people roll on the floor, bark like dogs, roar like lions, laugh hysterically, and get “drunk in the spirit” during their “revivals.” Ruis’s song “Break Dividing Walls” calls for ecumenical unity between all denominations.

Baloche is worship leader at the charismatic Community Christian Fellowship of Lindale, Texas. Their 2002 Leadership Summit featured Ricky Paris of Vision Ministries International, who calls himself an apostle and is said to give “apostolic covering” to Vision Church of Austin, Texas. Baloche’s Offering of Worship album was recorded at Regent University in Virginia Beach, which was founded by the radical charismatic ecumenist Pat Robertson. As far back as 1985, Robertson said that he “worked for harmony and reconciliation between Protestants and Catholics” (Christian News, July 22, 1985). Some of the Regent professors are Roman Catholic and Regent’s Center for Law and Justice has a Roman Catholic executive director. According to Frontline magazine, May-June 2000, a Catholic mass is held on Regent’s campus every week.

Zschech and her Hillsong worship band recently performed for the Catholic Youth Day in Sydney, with the Pope present. The lyrics to Zschech’s “Holy Spirit Rain Down” (which is included in the new Baptist Hymnal) begin: “Holy Spirit, rain down, rain down/ Oh, Comforter and Friend/ How we need Your touch again/ Holy Spirit, rain down, rain down.” Where in Scripture are we instructed to pray to the Holy Spirit? To the contrary, the Lord Jesus Christ taught us to pray to the Father (Mat. 6:9). The charismatic movement is not in submission to the Word of God and does not care one way or the other that there is no Scriptural support for this type of prayer, but shame on Baptists who follow in these presumptuous and disobedient footsteps.

Zschech’s song “I Believe the Presence” from her Shout to the Lord album preaches false Pentecostal latter rain theology. The lyrics say: “I believe the promise about the visions and the dreams/ That the Holy Spirit will be poured out/ And His power will be seen/ Well the time is now/ The place is here/ And His people have come in faith/ There’s a mighty sound/ And a touch of fire/ When we’ve gathered in one place” (“I Believe the Presence” from Shout to the Lord).

Shame on Lifeway for giving charismatics a powerful forum to influence Baptist churches, and shame on the Southern Baptist Convention for allowing Lifeway to do these things.

Because the SBC refuses to deal with charismatic error consistently, the leaven will doubtless spread.

The Bible warns that “a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump.” This is true for sin (1 Cor. 5:6) as well as for false doctrine (Gal. 5:9).

For more about the charismatic movement see The Pentecostal-Charismatic Movements: History and Doctrine, which is available from Way of Life Literature.

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