For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were
before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace
of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our
Lord Jesus Christ. Jude 4. The word lasciviousness is aselgiea in the original
text and means unbridled lust, excess, outrageousness, shamelessness, insolence.
The entertainment format going on in Charismatic churches fits Jude's description
of the apostates perfectly. The sacrilege being displayed on modern church
stages as anointed ministries is not Pentecostal. Pentecostals do not host
worldly celebrities in their pulpits. Everything from karate to body builders,
soap opera stars and athletes, are brought out onto the stages of Charismatic
churches. Charismatic night clubs featuring rock music and dancing, mercenary
athletes who draw the unregenerate crowds in desecration of the Sabbath
for pleasure and then applauded as being great Christians (Isaiah 58:13).
Jude is right again! This kind of "Christianity" is outrageous lasciviousness!
One large church in the Dallas/Ft Worth put on a play at their youth conference
showing a bedroom scene with a girl getting out of the bed (unmarried young
people) saying, "You just can't get enough of me, can you John?" Jude is
right again. Shameless insolence! Pentecostals don't dramatize sin on the
church platforms. Pentecost is when the pulpit is aflame but is not consumed
by the fire! Where there is not this flame then let that people not claim
to be Pentecostal.
Charismatic churches exploit the the human body
(personality) in both the way their people dress and the shows they schedule
on their church platforms. Body builders, karate experts (rooted in oriental
religions), "Christian" TV sex symbols and sport stars appear on their
programs (and often with a fee required by their agents). People actually
applaud these performances and "testimonies." To believe that displaying
the prowess of the physical body is even the least bit relative to a gospel
ministry or Biblical Pentecost is an effront to God. Jude is right again
- unbridled lust! Many Charismatic pastors would rather have a TV actress
in their pulpit who plays the part of a promiscuous slut in the soapies
than to have a man of God or a prophet preach truth to his people. This
contrast between Charismatic church programs and Pentecostal meetings makes
clear the big difference between Pentecostals and Charismatics.
Some Pentecostal pastors will say, I would never
allow those excesses in my church . . . but there are some Charismatic
ways that I think are good which we can learn from. How many pastors have
said this in the beginning of their compromise and ended up being carried
away in the currents of extreme Charismaticism? Many! Once you start wading
in the waters of the Charismatic philosophies, you get deeper and deeper
until you are helplessly being carried away in the rip tides of the Ladicean
"revival." You ultimately end up in extremes that will bring you into judgment
before God. The best advice to Pentecostal pastors is to remain loyal to
the orthodox Biblical precedents set forth in Scripture by the apostle's
and not depart from them. Those men used of God in compiling the Scriptures
through the ages were God's spokesmen. We must not trifle with that revelation.
Hebrew dancing got its start in the churches because
the Charismatics said, "its in the Bible." There are many things "in the
Bible" that do not belong in the church! Study dancing carefully in the
Bible and you will note it was never done in the temple, inside the church,
as a part of church worship. The people rejoiced in the victories gained
in the field of battle, and the triumphs of God over their enemies in a
spontaneous and public display of jubilee - but never was there dancing
carried on as a form of worship in the house of God. David danced before
the ark as it returned to Jersulaem, in the streets, but this urge to dance
before the Lord was not an orchestrated musical production. The Hebrew
dancing going on in Charismatic churches today is not even similar to the
dancing recorded in the Old Testament. If Hebrew dancing was to be in the
church you would read all about it in the book of Acts and, or, it would
be mentioned in the New Testament by the apostle's in their writings. Hebrew
dancing is just another idea that was picked up on because it resembled
something mentioned in the Bible but certainly not taught as it is being
practiced by Charismatic churches.
To know we are pleasing God we simply stay within
the Biblical boundaries of revelation. We must keep things in the Biblical
setting and study them carefully. That's why God gave us His Word! Keep
the practices of worship you allow in the setting of Biblical precedent
and you will never start something that will ultimately get out of control
and become a dangerous slide into excesses that violate the real work of
the Holy Spirit. We, as minister's of the gospel must not allow the taste
of carnal people in the church to dictate to us the program of the church.
Ministers often tolerate compromise thinking they will gain people, and
you will while at the same time experience a moral and spiritual decline.
You may begin by thinking you can save them and end up with a lot of people
but with a spiritual decline. Go by the Word! Live by it! Die by it! The
raptures of heavenly visions and the manifestations of God were with our
Pentecostal Daddies who taught that holy life. Scripture is the final authority
and the only authority to govern the church by.
The beginning not as the ending.
In the months following the crucifixion there was a transition
from Judaism to Christianity. It was a time of much uncertainty, new direction,
and dramatic reforms for God's people. God sent a strong Spirit of revelation
to the church to carry it through this foundational period. It was a critical
time in the church's history. The beginning had to be right! The kingdom
of God on earth was passing from one system to another, from the old covenant
to the new. But the church today as it nears the end of its history is
not in a time of transition between two systems. The crisis of the end
time church, according to the prophetic Word is moral decline. The little
cliche' that God wants to do a new thing is deceptive and misleading. To
the contrary, when we have lost original Pentecost we don't charge forward
with emotional methods and programs forcing excitement on the people and
then shout "revival!" So long as there is prayerlessness, pride and sin
in the camp there will be no revival that comes from above.
Thinking that revival will come through our creativity
and cleverness, through charisma, and business psychology, having a winning
and winsome way with people, special movements such as the Promise Keepers,
are all indications that in liberalism the Holy Spirit and all divine provisions
are insufficient in themselves, that we need special new revelations and
programs. Pentecostals don't believe that professionalism, full color graphics
and masses of people who sacrifice the truth of pure doctrine under a banner
of "unity" is even relevant to moving God. God's provisions of secret prayer,
humility, confession of sin are the things that move God and rend the heavens.
Why do we need these others "things?" If a Christian is praying and in
communion with God and living the holy life, he has the all-sufficiency
of Christ. These add-ons indicate only one thing about the modern Christian,
that he or she is not in an intimate and personal relationship with Jesus
Christ, and that we are suffering from deficiencies which these teachers
and doctrines (we think) supplement our spiritual needs because of the
world we are living in. The all sufficiency of Jesus certainly does not
mean that Christians today need something more than the Christians of the
first century who were being fed to lions!
If Christians today lack something, it is certainly
not programs by professionals trained in secular colleges and universities.
The answer to better homes and mates, to rebellion in our kids and the
corruption reigning in high places is in the closet of groaning prayer,
waiting there in brokenness and praise, waiting on the Lord in supplication
and intercession; until the heart is pure and surrendered, until the renewed
man of the Spirit renounces his bond with all the things of this depraved
world and comes forth morally transformed and sensitive to what is sacred.
What Charismatics are devising are substitutes for the power of pure Pentecost,
they are broken cisterns that will not hold water with God. Show me a prophet
or an apostle with a program. Jesus came with power to purify man, not
3 point or a seven point program. He came teaching against adultery and
fornication never speaking of worshiping God with the phallus. The use
of this word in speaking to men provokes wrong imagery and leaves a wrong
impression about sexual behavior in the marriage. Jesus taught that adultery
and fornication were sins unto death to be abstained from. But Scripture
teaches no such thing as sexuality being related in any way to the worship
of God!
It is not by our human resources, our intellect,
our skills, our gifts in life that will bring God from the heavens with
a new Pentecostal visitation, but going back to where we started losing
the real Pentecost and at that point begin again and walk once again in
the apostles footsteps. Then there will be no more need for special programs
to restore us. Programs are like comets, they come and go with ooohs and
aaaahs. But authentic Pentecost is really all we need and it is perpetual.
The answer is found in the Word of God: For the church to go forward in
God we must go back to the old paths and go back far enough that we have
returned to where we lost our senses, our sense of divine direction, and
get on that old path again. That is the path clearly laid out in the writings
of the apostle's. Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and
ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye
shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein.
Jeremiah 6:16; 2 Thessalonians 3:6.
Biblical Pentecost is not (supposed to be) "relative."
But Charismatics say the church must be relative to win the world to Christ.
It has been this obsession with relativism that makes Charismatics to resent
the Scripture's literal ultimatum to the church to separate from the world
(2 Corinthians 6:14-7:1). This has led to a new morality among Charismatics
that tolerates divorce and remarriage, wealth and materialism, entertainment,
television, externalism, professional sports and public beaches. Charismatic
morality ignores Biblical instruction against these things and accuses
anyone who does regard this Biblical moral as spiritual Scrooges bound
in legalism and tradition.
Original Pentecost teaches non-conformity and a
non-affinity with the world. Biblical Pentecost follows Biblical standards
in all matters of behavior and conduct They like to sing about Old Time
Religion but then sarcastically villainize the very people who wrote the
song by doing so. They sing their songs and venerate the old timers but
reject the message these godly men and women taught and lived. The Word
of God has never been relative to the preferences of depraved flesh! New
birth is to makes the Word of God relative to me but there is no way to
make the Word of relative to degenerate man until he is regenerate. To
even think of making Christianity relative to pagans is irresponsible theology.
Pentecostals know that the message of the cross
is foolishness to those who perish but to us who are saved it is the power
of God. (1 Corinthians 1:18) It is not pleasing people that saves them
but disturbing them that saves them. Pentecostals are not concerned about
being relative to sinners, we are just being sure that we relate properly
to God and His revealed Word. Relativism is the philosophy of Kierkegaard
and relates very little to our common objective with Christ to destroy
the works of the devil!
It is not appealing to the preferences of the sinner
that wins him, but making him know the love of God and the pronounced consequences
of sin. This is what peter did on the day of Pentecost in the first sermon
preached in the New Covenant dispensation. That is not exactly being relative,
and certainly not what they wanted to hear, but what they must hear to
escape the wrath of God.
When Peter finished his Pentecost message the people
didn't say, Oh my, wasn't that a wonderful message, it was so relevant."
No! They said, "What shall we do?" and Peter answered, "repent!" This is
still the Pentecostal message! The Charismatic philosophy of looking and
acting and talking like the world to be relative is contrary to all that
is taught in the New Testament. There is no message of relativity in Scripture
unless you twist it and mutate it, and ignore the apparent message of repentance
and transformation that runs through the Scriptures, through the lips of
every prophet, the apostles in their writings, and the Savior Himself.
The Charismatics say, Pentecostal orthodoxy is antiquated
and not relative to the twenty first century Christian, And, It just doesn't
work any more. The Charismatic visionaries are like politicians; before
they can put over their own doctrine they first attempt to make the opponent
look bad. Once they make the righteous look bad they can better persuade
the same people that they are right. These are the devices of those who
deceive men with flattery. Being relative is vital to success in business
but not to being Pentecostal. It is the wisdom of this world which God
condemns in 1 Corinthians 1:19.
Prayer
Has Become Praise:
