Why bother with this anyway?

With all the present confusion among Christianity, we must learn to recognize between the Charismatic Movement and the Conservative Church.

By charismatic we don’t mean the Catholic segment. We mean Christian Evangelical churches or groups of people whose theology consists in all or some of these:

-          All spiritual gifts are still valid (tongues, healings)

-          Apostles and prophets must be restored

-          God wants us to be prospered and healthy

-          New and direct revelation from God must take place nowadays

-          Word of faith

-          Baptism of the Holy Spirit as a second blessing

-          Ecstatic experiences

Even though these kinds of teachings have taken many different ramifications, all of them are considered part of what has been called through the years as Charismatic Movement. Other labels, like “liberal churches” have been used. However, no matter how has been called, all these churches differ from the conservative churches in the fact that they acknowledge spiritual authority outside the Bible.

But why is this important? Here are some specific reasons:

 

1)     Because some of these new teachings have been embedded in the Church’s body of doctrines for so many years now, that people can be lead to believe (especially new Christians) that they have existed for 2000 years and based on the Scriptures, when in fact they have emerged just 100 to 150 years ago from secular and doubtful sources.

2)     Because as a product of this Post-modernism and pragmatic society we live in, we as Christians are led to put experience and feelings in the first place, serving as validations of these new doctrines and putting the Scriptures as secondary authority, many times disregarding them if they contradict the experiences.

3)     Because it is of utmost importance to restore the Scriptures as the only source of authority and to go back to the principle of “Sola Scriptura”, lest the Church fall in apostasy and deception of big proportions, just the way it was before the Reformation, where the principle of Sola Scriptura was key to subvert all strange doctrines present in that time.

This is a relevant issue not only in the US, but also in countries like Honduras and all Latin American countries, where deviated doctrines are spreading uncontrollably.

Therefore, this blog will help you to recognize whether you consider yourself a charismatic or a conservative person through a simple questionnaire, and it will provide basic information about biblical issues that have been distorted (experience as valid test of truth, new revelations, health and wealth, etc.).

Finally, a word of warning: I am not saying that charismatic believers are not Christians, nor I am trying to color all charismatic the same. In words of John Macarthur, I recognize “there are many extremes within the movement and many hues of charismatic doctrine, ranging from evangelical orthodoxy to rank heresy”. However, we must acknowledge that there is no better ground for the Enemy to put his seeds of doctrinal errors than those churches that neglect the sound biblical doctrine and give hear to any new teachings and new revelation, giving more importance to what they feel rather than what God says in His word.

I hope this website can serve as an encouragement for you to dig in your Bible and be more like the noble Bereans, who "examined the Scriptures to see if these things are true" (Acts. 17:11).


Huri Cañas

WARNING TO CONSIDER

All material here is discussed from a doctrinal point of view; that means that it has to do basically with what has been said and taught by some of the most popular preachers, not about trivialities like “evil” hand signs, special symbols or other subjectivities.

What is the problem with believing in positive confession?

If I believe that the word I confess in faith with my mouth has power, what’s wrong with it?

First of all, positive confession does not stick necessarily with Christianity, since other cults and religions consider positive confessions as an important area in their doctrinal statements.

But more important than that, this error, just like any other error found in church, becomes a danger when is taken beyond its limits. If I start fooling around saying that I am a doctor, probably only my reputation will suffer; but if I start giving medical advice to people unaware that I am not a real doctor, then it becomes a serious issue.

That is exactly what has happened! There are countless cases where people, taught to believe in their own faith and confessing health with their mouths, stop taking their medicines, refuse to go the doctor or choose to disregard any bad diagnostic, resulting in disastrous consequences.

Hank Hanegraaff tells the case of Larry and Lucky Parker:

“Their tragic tale was courageously published in 1980 by Harvest House. Their book “We Let Our Son Die¹” recounts the tragic details of a misguided trip of faith. In painful and painstaking detail, Larry and his wife paint the picture of how they withheld insulin from their diabetic son. Predictably, Wesley lapsed into a diabetic coma. The Parkers, warned about the impropriety of making a “negative confession”, continued to “positively confess” Wesley’s healing until the time of his death. Even after Wesley’s demise, the Parkers, undaunted in their “faith” conducted a resurrection service rather than a funeral. In fact, for more than a year following his death, they refused to abandon their firmly held faith that Wesley, like Jesus, would rise from the dead. Eventually, both Larry and Lucky were tried and convicted of manslaughter and child abuse”²

And this is not an isolated case, and certainly it does not encircle health issues; the same can be said of relationships, debts, bad purchases, etc. But it is evident that exercising this dangerous practice can be fatal when it comes to sickness. Well known is the case of Hobart Freeman, a pastor from Claypool, Indiana who believed that medicine was the extension of ancient witchcraft and black magic, therefore, at least ninety members of his church died as result of ailments that would have been easily treatable; or the case of Ruth Carter Stapleton (Jimmy Carter’s sister) who died because she refused cancer treatment in 1983³. 

However, this is just one side of the coin; the other side, no less important than the first one, has to do with the image of God. If the Word of Faith really works, then we command God through our faith, making a puppet out of Him; we just need to know the words and there…! God has to do what we ask because of our faith.

But this is not the God we find in the Scriptures. Certainly this is the god Copeland preaches about when he says that “God cannot do anything for you apart or separate from faith”, because “faith is God’s source of power”⁴. Even worse, the god Myles Munroe preaches about is one who needs our permission to work on earth⁵.

I encourage you to go to the link “Questions for Charismatics” where you will find more information about this in form of questions and with biblical evidence.

Huri Cañas

¹ http://www.amazon.com/We-let-our-son-die/dp/0890812195

² “Christianity in Crisis” Hank Hanegraaff, pg. 62

³ “Charismatic Chaos”, John Macarthur, pg. 237-239

⁴ “Christianity in Crisis” Hank Hanegraaff, pg. 65

⁵ http://charismaticorconservative.blogspot.com/p/outrageous-videos.html (video 5)