Category — heterodoxy

Satire at its best. Gotta love Kirk Cameron for bringing that truth with humor.

Too many of today’s pastors are being pressured (by the god of false success) to build churches with false converts. Such churches look great on the outside and appeal to “lights, action and camera” folks but there must be concern that souls are truly converted to Christ, not just become church members.

The Lawman Chronicles blog lists 10 marks of a false convert (feel free to add on):

1. You believe that you are inherently a good person, thus denying the doctrine of Original Sin.

2. You commit idolatry of the mind and blaspheme the very character of God by denying essential doctrines such as judgment, hell, regeneration, and justification by faith alone; and you replace the truth with lies such as sinless perfection and open theism.

3. You think that only the red-lettered words in your Bible are the words of Jesus and, therefore, the rest of the Bible can be interpreted and applied to your liking.

4. You believe that a person can be a Christian while wantonly engaging in habitual sin; such as homosexuality, fornication, adultery in mind or body, the support in any way whatsoever of the murder of the unborn, or any other sin.

5. You believe that because a person has prayed a prayer and asked Jesus into their heart, then they are saved.

6. You believe a person can be a Christian, even if they bear no fruit after making a profession of faith in Christ. You treat the grace of God as a license to sin. You like the word “backslider.”

7. You struggle with the thought of missing a meal; but going days, weeks, even months without reading your Bible doesn’t faze you.

8. You pray when you want something from God; but beyond that you have very little time for conversation with Him.

9. You believe that Darwinian, macro-evolution is a scientific fact and compatible with belief in the God of the Bible.

10. You see evangelism as a gift other people have; and you have no real concern about the fact that 150,000 people die every day, with the vast majority of them bound for hell. You soothe your conscience by convincing yourself that “friendship evangelism,” as it is most commonly practiced among American Christians, is actually in the Bible. You think that if you “let your little light shine,” you don’t have to verbally proclaim the gospel

For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 1 Tim 4:3 NIV

[An elder] must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught, so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it. Titus 1:9 NIV

You must teach that which is in accord (in harmony with) sound doctrine. Titus 2:1

There is no way we can accurately ascertain the scope of God’s will and then live out the will of God without an balanced and consistent understanding of his word. That balanced and consistent understanding is given to us primarily through the teaching of sound doctrine. Sound doctrine accomplishes two things: (1) it guards against deception, and (2)it guides others into spiritually healthy men and women of God (Ephesians 4:14-15).

Paul instructed both Titus and Timothy to be careful not to change what he had taught them and to anticipate that some in the church would depart from the faith and pay attention to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils. And consequently, reject sound doctrine.

The word “sound” comes from the Greek word hugiaino translated as “hygiene” or “health.” This obviously has a medical aspect to it. So in short sound doctrine is healthy doctrine. The opposite of healthy its unhealthy. Thus, we can conclude that not everything which sounds good to the ear or feels good to the body, is healthy for the soul.

What we need today if we are to be effective and remain steadfast in the work of the Lord is a radical return to God’s word and the foundations that produce good, healthy fruit.

Doctrine has gotten a bad rap in the contemporary church. Its been compared to heartless dogma and legalism which restricts and controls people unnecessarily. The truth is that doctrine is simply a body of principles presented for acceptance or belief. But not all doctrine is good doctrine.

How do we convey sound doctrine?
The primary tool of conveying sound doctrine to others is through teaching because teaching is about the how and the why. Its instruction that must be given carefully and received with diligence. Thus, the best way for you to show me properly is to teach. Remember the old saying “If you give a man a fish, he’ll eat for a day. But if you teach a man to fish, he’ll eat for a lifetime.” Its the same with sound doctrine. If you really want me to become a healthy, fruit-bearing follower of Christ, you will teach me sound principles. If you want to keep me locked into a unhealthy co-dependency on you do the opposite. And that’s exactly what false teachers do.

The word “teach” occurs twenty times in Matthew alone, and Jesus is called Teacher there about ten times. If we look at the whole NT, the two nouns for teaching or doctrine occur over fifty times, while the verb to teach occurs over ninety times. The word teacher appears at least fifty-eight times. Half a dozen other related words appear on another twenty occasions.

When Paul urges Titus to “refute” (this is what I consider polemics) those who oppose sound doctrine, we must take it seriously and do it. One tactic used by those who oppose balanced healthy teaching is the “mystery” approach. In essence, they claim no one can really know the truth, so we are responsible for finding and living our own truth. Judges 21:25 gives us insight on such a teaching: In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did that which was right in his own eyes.
Dr. Bob Wright of Denver says this is a mockery of Christian maturity:

We do not need answers; we need to grow up and learn to accept the paradoxes of life! True Christian maturity is said to be measured by our commitment in the face of final paradox rather than by any kind of knowledge. People who want answers are just immature, that’s all.
Our faith is recognized by specialists in comparative religion as being by far the most intellectual religion of all; that the New Testament puts a heavy priority on the regeneration of the intellect that the Bible in both the Old Testament and the New makes it perfectly plain that the term heart means the seat of the intellect, or the mind as our capacity to reason; therefore all the problems we face are to be solved first by allowing the Bible to change our minds about the truth, and then by learning what God’s answer is to our problem, as God defines and explains both problem and answer.
The results are predestined to be successful and to infallibly meet the needs of the believer sooner or later. The Bible itself calls this process “making disciples,” and the primary method is said to be by something called teaching.

Sound doctrine and homosexuality
The teachings of homosexual affirming theology stands against much of the cornerstone tenets of our faith.

• Teaching that same gender sexual expression is normal opposes the creative nature of God (Col 1:16, Romans 1:25)
• Teaching that homosexuality is acceptable by God opposes the biblical definition and penalty of sin (Dan 9:5, 1 John 3:4)
• The teaching that Christ was ignorant of contemporary homosexual relationships, thus silent opposes the divinity of Jesus Christ specifically his omniscience. (John 8:58, Ps 33:13-15) (
• Teaching that homosexual have no need to repent opposes the authority and applicability of the Word of God. (Mt 4:4)

Homosexual affirming doctrine isn’t different from other unhealthy teachings, it is unhealthy teaching.

Just happened on this series of audio teachings courtesy of  The Master’s Seminary.

The instructors provide excellent insight and indepth teaching on these various aspects of homosexuality from a biblical worldview.  The Master’s Seminary opened its doors in Fall 1986 under the leadership and vision of Dr. John MacArthur, known worldwide as a master Bible expositor, church leader, and author.

Does the headline seem exaggerated to you? Well, its not. From Charisma Magazine:

A few weeks ago the Barna Group released a report on the spiritual shift that’s occurred among Hispanic Americans in the last 15 years. This week the focus turned to African-Americans, who remain the most faith-oriented ethnic group in the United States.

In response to nine statements regarding various faith fundamentals, blacks scored the highest among the four predominant groups in all but one—which was also the lone question for which they answered similarly to the national average. A whopping 85 percent—22 percent higher than white respondents—stated that the single most important purpose in life is to “love God with all your heart, mind, strength and soul.”

African-Americans were the leading group to believe in the Bible’s inerrancy, with 66 percent agreeing that it is completely accurate in all its teaching (20 percent higher than whites). Despite this, however, blacks also led the way in claiming that Jesus sinned while on earth (54 percent) and that Satan is merely a symbol of evil (46 percent).

When compared to the three other ethnic groups—whites, Hispanics and Asians—blacks proved to be the most likely to engage in church-related activities during the week, including praying and reading the Bible. And according to the Barna study, they are even more spiritually minded today than they were 15 years ago, with most of the spiritual measures the research group uses having increased significantly.

“While the beliefs and behaviors of America’s white population have changed little since the early 1990s, the new research underscored that the faith of African-Americans is dynamic, generally moving in a direction that is more aligned with conservative biblical teachings,” the report stated.

Serious problems

1. This is a stunning contradiction of positions. First, the report says that AA’s are the leading ethnic group to believe in the inerrancy of the Bible, yet 54% of those believe Jesus sinned on earth and satan is just a “symbol of evil”? How is that reconciled in any biblical manner?  That’s rank confusion but perhaps  explains why the so-called black church is a sinking into a quagmire of sin and ignorance. Both issues are cornerstone fundamentals of our faith.

2. Jesus never sinned. If he had, the totality of our faith is completely bogus. Of course,we know that not to be true based on Mt 27:4 (Judas), Mt 27:19 (Pilate’s wife), Mt 27:54 (theif on the cross), 2 Cor 5:21, 1 John 3:5, Heb 4:15 and in many more places. This reveals a serious deficiency in teaching and training  in doctrine and faith which produces mature disciples. You cant learn that running after prosperity teachings, emergent church mess and gay theology! In fact, we need to go back and re-incorporate catechism training in the church. We’ve mastered all the tongue talking, shouting, dancing and dressing to the nines, but this report exposes a deep ignorance in the black church. And such leads to destruction (Hosea 4:6).

3. Satan is not just a symbol of evil. Actually, this is one of the strategies of satan is to cause people to believe something about himself that is not true. I wont go into here, but we have completely exposed satan by revealing his birth certificate and origins, tactics and judgment. Read here and here.

Its difficult to believe that these people in the Barna survey are true Christians harboring erronerous beliefs like this.  Barna has exposed the real problem and from it stems all others.

Link to the Barna survey.

Via I am the bread of Life blog, an excellent commentary on recognizing false prophets/teachers by Dr. David Reagan. Some additional notes by GCM Watch in brackets. After reading this, you should be able to identify these people floating around the church now. Some of them have big names, draw large crowds and cannot “preach” unless they are paid large sums of money. Others are operating for sidebar religious junkets like the gay christian and emergent church movements.

Keep in mind false prophets dont always dress weird and live in communes in the desert.

False prophets are all over the landscape today, and they are a sign of the times pointing to the soon return of Jesus. Jesus Himself warned of false prophets in the end times. His most detailed discourse on end time signs is recorded in Matthew 24. In that passage the very first sign He mentions is false prophets (Matthew 24:4-5), and it is the only sign He repeats (Matthew 24:11,24). His warning was blunt and plain spoken: “Many false prophets will arise, and will mislead many.”

The Old Testament test of a prophet is spelled out in Deuteronomy 18:22 — “When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not come about or come true, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously…”
This, of course, is an obvious test. But what if the prophecy is fulfilled? Does that guarantee that the prophet is speaking for God? Not necessarily. The reason is that a prophetic utterance might be fulfilled by coincidence or because of supernatural insight given to the prophet by Satan. So there must be other tests.

Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 1 Jn 4:1

Additional questions for determining whether a person is speaking authentically for God.

(1) Does the prophet speak in the name of a god other than the true God revealed in Scripture?
If a prophet speaks in the name of Allah or Baal or Vishnu [or any human], you can be assured that he is a false prophet. “If a prophet… rises among you and gives you a sign or wonder, and the sign or wonder comes true, concerning which he spoke to you, saying, ‘Let us go after other gods (whom you have not known), and let us serve them,’ you shall not listen to the words of the prophet…for the Lord your God is testing you.” (Deuteronomy 13:1-3)

(2) Does the prophet’s message pass the test of Scripture?
If a prophet tells you that you can be saved by putting your faith in Mary, the mother of Jesus, you can be certain he is not a spokesman for God. [be careful to note also now many are using science as a god of authority against the word particularly on issues of sexuality. If science conflicts with the truth of scripture, it is to be rejected.] “But even though we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to that which we have preached, let him be accursed.” (Galatians 1:8)

(3) Does the prophet’s life manifest or demonstrate a commitment to holiness?
If a prophet lives a sinful life, his prophecies are to be doubted. “Among the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen a horrible thing; the committing of adultery and walking in falsehood… Therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts concerning the prophets, ‘Behold, I am going to feed them wormwood and make them drink poisonous water.’” (Jeremiah 23:14-15)

(4) Does the prophet’s teaching produce the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23)?
If the prophet’s followers are motivated to worldly living, the prophet does not speak for God.“Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits… a good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit.” (Matthew 7:15-16,18)

(5) Does the prophet emphasize vain visions?
If the prophet focuses on personal visions with sensational insights (visits to Heaven or Hell, for example), his words are to be distrusted. “Let no one keep defrauding you of your prize by… taking his stand on visions he has seen, inflated without cause by his fleshly mind.” (Colossians 2:18)

6) Does the prophet deliver only “positive” messages?
If the prophet never issues a call for repentance, he is to be suspect. “Thus says the Lord of hosts, ‘Do not listen to the words of the prophets who are prophesying to you. They are leading you into futility; they speak a vision of their own imagination, not from the mouth of the Lord. They keep saying to those who despise Me, ‘The Lord has said, ‘You will have peace…” They say, ‘Calamity will not come upon you.’”(Jeremiah 23:16-17)

(7) Does the prophet appear to be greedy for monetary gain?
If the prophet operates in a manner that makes it appear that his greatest interest is money, he is to be avoided. “From the least even to the greatest, everyone is greedy for gain; from the prophet even to the priest, everyone practices deceit. And they heal the brokenness of the daughter of My people superficially, saying, “Peace, peace.” But there is no peace.” (Jeremiah 8:10-11)

(8) Does the prophet focus on the exaltation of Jesus?
If a prophet tries to bring attention to himself or focuses on the Antichrist or the sensational, he is to be questioned.“The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.”(Revelation 19:10) Over and over, the Word of God commands us to test all messages lest we be deceived and led astray. Paul urged the people of Berea to test everything he taught them, and they did so by “examining the Scriptures daily” to see whether what he was teaching was scriptural (Acts 17:10-11). Paul was an apostle! How much more so should we test everything we hear taught by the standard of the Word of God. The tragedy is that most professing Christians today are incapable of testing anything because they are biblically ignorant. There is a famine of the Word in most churches today (Amos 8:11) as people are fed a diet of pop psychology and positive thinking. What about you? Are you in the Word on a daily basis? Are you capable of testing doctrine by Scripture? If not, then you are a sitting duck for deception. “Examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21).

For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; but his heart is not with thee. (Prov 23:7)

In my opinion, Proverbs 23:7 is almost always taken out of context to serve our own self interests or perhaps to explain something about someone else that may or may not necessarily be true. If the statement is to be contextually understood, the latter portion of it must be included as there is no period after “he” but a colon. This simply means what follows the first part proves and explains it. In this case, the point is more about hypocrisy than destiny or character. Taken out of context, the meaning can travel to Jupiter and back.

My point? Getting an understanding of things is very important if we are to rightly divide the word of truth not only for the edification of each other but to an unbelieving world we are called to witness to. Notwithstanding the Spirit of God giving what to say “on the spot”, we should avail ourselves to further study. The false prophets of our day are smart and glib of tongue. That’s a potent factor in deception.

The power of words, the meaning of words

There’s a growing lexicon of terms related to understanding or explaining religious concepts out there. This can be attributed to in part to the conflict over truth. Some terms describe false concepts which are popping up in churches everywhere. Others describe biblical perspectives which are embedded essentials of our faith. Then too, some may help to explain some of the perspectives that are espoused on this blog from time to time by non-believers who object to our biblical conclusions about homosexual conduct.

I decided to make a post highlighting the most prominent of them. Most  have the “ism” and “ology” subtext. Hopefully, as you hear these terms being dropped here and there in your studies you will have a working man’s knowledge of what they mean and its applicability. While I believe etymology is important in most cases, we have to be careful that etymology doesn’t eclipse other factors associated with a particular word because there are many. Primarily, their placement in scripture (or their inference in scripture) along with the Holy Spirit’s “illumination” is important. But even that has a check and balance. No meaning claimed to be derived from the Holy Spirit’s leading can conflict with other scripture particularly when the meaning is clear. The Word of God is one complete and harmonious system of doctrine. Thus, etymology is not an end all, but rather an appropriate starting point.

I’ve also linked scripture references for your consideration. If you know of any additional ones, please drop it in the comment section (with a working man’s definition) and I’ll add it.

antinominanism – taken from Greek: anti nomos “against the law”. In this case it is against God’s laws regarding sexual conduct, the promotion of lawlessness in the church. A belief which manifests in several different forms but mainly exalts one’s personal experience or ” the spirit” over scripture. Psalms 19:7-9
Determinism – a philosophical doctrine which holds that every state of affairs, including every human event, act, and decision is the inevitable consequence of a previous event or series of events. Philippians 2:13
heterodoxy – any doctrine at variance with an official or orthodox position. Not to be used as a weapon against credible revelation, but as a deterrent against false teachings which have no root in established biblical doctrines.
perfectionism – the idea that once one has been saved, it is impossible or inadmissable to commit sin or sins. 1 John 1:6-10
existentialism – A philosophy that emphasizes the uniqueness of individual human experience in hostile or indifferent environments. It regards human existence as unexplainable and thus allows for one to claim human sovreignty; the “little god” teaching.  Eccl 12:12-14
epistemology – the study of how we know what we know
justification – the legal act where God declares the sinner to be innocent of his or her sins. Its not that the sinner is actually sinless, but that he is “declared” sinless. Justification is granted by God alone and only by faith. Romans 5:1
fallibilism – a philosophical doctrine that all claims of knowledge could, in principle, be mistaken. Colossians 2:2-3
fatalism - a philosophical doctrine holding that all events are predetermined in advance for all time and human beings are powerless to change them 2 Kings 20:1-6
Nihilism – a radical doctrine that advocates destruction of the social system for its own good; annihilate Psalms 24:1
probability – part philosophical, part theoretical teaching that a random sampling process will result in all outcomes equally likely to happen solely based on chance. Romans 8:28-30
solipsism- a philosophical teaching that the self is all that you know to exist  Jeremiah 17:7-9;  Colossians 2:8
apologetics – defense of the Christian faith or its biblical doctrines from external enemies 1 Peter 3:15
polemics – defense of the Christian faith or its biblical doctrines from internal enemies. 2 Cor 11:13-15; Jude 3
theology – the study of the nature of God
christology – the study of and proper understanding of Jesus Christ as revealed in scripture 2 Pet 3:18
monergism – the doctrine that the Holy Spirit is the only efficient agent in an individual’s “new birth”. Monergism (Gkmono ergon “the work of one”) holds that the human will possesses no desire to holiness until it is born again, thus there is no pre-existing cooperation in regeneration.”
fundamentalism – a belief that every word in the Bible should be interpreted as literal truth. 2 Timothy 3:16-17
monogenes – a belief which suggests derivation, creation, origination of Christ. Rev 1:8
diaprax – the belief that Christian unity should and can be achieved without doctrinal consensus. Amos 3:3-7; 1 John 5:7-8
orthodoxy – can be applied across the spectrum of beliefs. In terms of Christian faith, it is adherence to a right set of beliefs as outlined in scripture.
orthopraxy – places emphasis on right conduct, both ethical and spiritual but not necessarily in opposition to faith and grace.
eschatology – The study of end times. A doctrine concerning the ultimate or final destiny of humanity and the earth including Christ’s second advent and God’s final judgment. 2 Peter 3:7-10