Debunking The Blessed Life by Robert Morris - Part 1

Debunking Robert Morris’ Principle of Multiplication

We're going to be doing a series of segments called Debunking Robert Morris' Principle of Multiplication. This topic has been covered before at Fighting for the Faith. We're covering it again because, well, Robert Morris seems to have grown in popularity and his book, The Blessed Life, has all of a sudden had new life breathe into it, and he continues to make the round at some of the most prominent seeker-driven churches out there, basically pitching his money principles.

The problem is that they're not based on a right reading or proper handling of God's Word. To demonstrate that, today's segment, we're going to be listening to his first sermon from Elevation Church, and we're going to be listening to The Power of Multiplication.

This is Robert Morris teaching through Luke 9, where Jesus feeds the 5 ,000. As you listen to this, the thing that you need to be paying very close attention to is this, is that Robert Morris is sticking into this text all kinds of details that are not there.

By the time you become comfortable with him basically retelling the story with all of these details that are not there, by the time you get yourself comfortable with all of that, the trap has been set.

When he springs the trap, you're completely unaware of when and where it happened. I'll point it out to you, but this is no way for anybody who calls themselves a pastor or a teacher in God's church, Christ's church, to be handling God's Word.

I mean, seriously, it's as if he's reading a completely different document than the biblical gospel. So if you have your Bible, go ahead and open up to Luke 9, and I'll go ahead and get started. Here is Robert Morris, The Power of Multiplication, and well, here we go.

Adding Details That Are Not in Luke 9

Luke 9, here's what I want to share with you, but I want to share with you a message in your series, Banner Years, that is a principle that when we understand this principle, it causes us, in my opinion, to have a banner year every year.

When we join in on what God's doing and understand, and this is a principle that I call the principles of multiplication, and it's from Luke chapter 9 with the feeding of the 5 ,000. Notice this, Luke 9, look at verse 12.

It says, when the day began to wear away, the 12 came and said to him, send the multitude away that they may go into the surrounding towns and country and lodge and get provisions, for we are in a deserted place here.

But he said to them, you give them something to eat. And they said, we have no more than five loaves and two fish, unless we go and buy food for all these people, for there were about 5 ,000 men. You probably noticed this before, Pastor Stevens probably shared this with you.

Okay, now notice something.

He just read verse 12 and 13, okay? He just read two verses. That's what, and so far, so good. This is like the heresy two-step though, because he lays down the biblical text and no sooner does he lay it down, then he's going to begin to back off of it.

In this particular case, what he's going to be doing is filling this text up with artificial and foreign concepts. Think of it this way, okay? I understand that the hostess is going bankrupt and that the fate of the Twinkie franchise is now hanging in the balance, okay?

But think of it this way, okay, we're all familiar with Twinkies, right? You've seen a Twinkie before. I mean, yes, they're tasty, they're sweet, but right in the middle of that sponge cake, in the center of the Twinkie, you've got this cream filling, okay?

We all love Twinkies in part because of that, okay? But see, here's the deal, okay? Think of it this way, is that what Robert Morris has done here is he's laid down the biblical text. Think of that as the healthy portion of this meal.

But he's decided to, while you're not looking, inject into the middle of this healthy food that you've just tasted an artificial, toxic, poisonous substance that is not actually part of this biblical text.

He's going to basically inflate this story with artificial teaching, with stuff that isn't there, and he's going to deliver it in such a way it's so funny and that nobody is suspecting that what they're being fed is literally toxic waste, okay?

So you got to think of it that way. We got healthy food that he's just put down, and now he's going to literally take a syringe, stick it right in the heart of that thing, and fill it with green, literally radioactive, toxic teaching, stuff, details that are just not in this text.

And all of this is to get you comfortable with it so that he can spring a trap on you. And once he springs the trap, you're not going to detect it unless you've been paying attention all along. But watch what he does here.

So he's read two verses, and so now he's going to start engaging in some, aw, shucks, Texas kind of storytelling.

In Jewish culture at that time, the way they counted crowds is they counted men. They were counting families. So when it says there were 5 ,000 men, it means there were 5 ,000 families. And according to the culture of that time, and you think about how many children each family would have, easily, they could have had 15 or 20 or maybe even 25 ,000 people there that day.

Matthew says it this way, Matthew 14, 21, those who had eaten were about 5 ,000 men besides women and children. Many theologians believe this is the largest crowd Jesus ever spoke with. So it's a huge crowd.

So when we say the feeding of the 5 ,000, just don't let that be a misnomer for you to think it was 5 ,000 people. It was 5 ,000 families. True. That he fed. Now let's keep going. Verse 14, for there were about 5 ,000 men and he said to his disciples, make them sit down in groups of 50.

And they did so and made them all sit down and then he took the five loaves of the two fish and looking up to heaven, he blessed and broke them and gave them to the disciples to set before the multitude.

So they all ate and were filled and 12 baskets of the leftover fragments were taken up by them. Now I'm kind of a numbers guy. Okay. Now let's see there.

That's the whole story. There it is. Without any artificial flavors, fillers, toxic waste, Bible twisting. There it is. Wow. I mean, you think what a Bible teacher and watch what's coming.

Numbers jump out at me and when I saw that 12 baskets were left over, I remember thinking now why would there be 12 baskets left over? And then it dawned on me. I think that Jesus wanted each disciple to have a doggy bag.

I mean, it's just, it's just my personal opinion. Now that's the first thing he says. That's his personal opinion.

It's a little laugh line, right? Okay. But see, now he's going to start giving us a litany of his personal opinions, stuff that isn't in the text. This is not what pastors are supposed to do, by the way.

Okay.

But here's what I like to do with the Bible. I like to put myself in the story. There's a problem. So he's now going to put himself.

So here we go. It sounds so pious, doesn't it? But see, the thing is, is neither you nor me nor Robert Morris were there. So how exactly do you put yourself into the story? And watch what he's doing. Since he's going to put himself into the story, he's going to just start making up all kinds of details that aren't in the story.

But I mean, after all, he can do that because he just inserts himself into the story. And by doing so, he's able to see all of the stuff that isn't there that Luke didn't write down, but he's able to figure out himself.

Watch what he does.

I don't know if you've ever done this, but it's a blast. I like to imagine how would I have responded had I been there that day.

Imagine. Okay, so now we're going to slip into the realm of imagination. Yeah, no pastor is supposed to be preaching from his imagination. This is a dangerous place to be preaching from.

And so that's what I want us to do today. I want you to just imagine, use your holy imagination. I want you to imagine that you're one of the disciples. You are on what we would call the Messiah search committee.

You've got a great candidate. You have a guy who's healing the sick and raising the dead and walking on water, which is like a bonus messianic prophecy, you know. And so you've got this great guy and he's teaching the Word and he's a really good teacher.

And so you decide to have a high attendance weekend. And you do a mass email and you tweet about it and the biggest crowd that you've ever had shows up and you have great worship like we did today at all the locations.

And then the guest speaker gets up to speak and, you know, 1230, he's still going. One o 'clock, still going. Two o 'clock, I mean, you've already missed the first game. Three o 'clock, four o 'clock, five o 'clock.

I'm not exaggerating. Look, look at verse 12. Verse 12 says, when the day began to wear away, you know what that means in the Greek and the Greek? That means when the day began to wear away, it's getting late.

And so here's what I think personally, I think the disciples, they just formed a little committee over here and they said, like, man, what are we going to do? I mean, this guy's just going all day.

I mean, he's good, but nobody's just good. I mean, notice that this part, where does it come from? It comes from Robert Morris's, not from the biblical text. It's coming from his imagination. This is how you inject artificial substances into the biblical teaching at this point.

What are we going to do?

And I'll tell you what, if I don't get something to eat soon, I'm going to die. I'm going to die right here. And I think one of them said, that's it. And he said, well, let's see it. Let's tell Jesus that the people are getting hungry.

He seems to care a lot about the people.

Notice everyone's laughing here, but what they don't realize is just how much danger they really are in. And the reason I say that is because Robert Morris can tell stories. He's got good skills when it comes to delivering a speech or a masleration.

But what he's doing here is not what Christian pastors do. Christian pastors don't preach from their imagination. And as funny as these details are, and as, you know, as shucks the story is, there's something really wrong here.

Because he's getting them used to this idea that we don't have to pay attention to what the text says. We can just recast the story and retell the story, not from the details and the grammar given in the biblical text, but we can do that using our dangerous, dangerous.

Let's continue.

He doesn't seem to care much about us, but he seems to care a lot about the people. And so now let's imagine that you get elected as a spokesperson, okay? So see this in your mind. Jesus is up there speaking.

He had a podium very similar to that one, a lot of people, you know, and you walk up to Jesus while he's speaking. This is the inference from scripture, okay? That they interrupted him while he's speaking, okay?

So see this, Jesus is right there. And so you say, Lord, Lord, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me. Boy, this has been good today, I'll tell you, this has really been good. This series of messages that you're bringing all in one day.

But we feel like, Lord, that.

Notice by using his imagination now, we're making Jesus kind of look stupid. Yeah, I mean, who preaches all day long while people are hungry? Come on, get a clue, Jesus.

That the people are getting hungry. Now, we could go all night. I'll tell you, it's been that good, boy. But we feel like that the people are getting hungry and it's getting late.

So in your, well, you have the disciples basically lying to Jesus. Oh, yeah, we could go all night. This is great stuff, Jesus. We could go on. They're basically lying and condescending. Got it, okay.

The restaurants are about to close. And so we voted and we feel like that you ought to just wrap it up. And Jesus says, you're concerned about the people. Yes, Lord, it's all about the people. It's all about the people.

And then, look, he says something. Maybe you've never seen this. Verse 13, so he said to them, then you give them something to eat. Excuse me? Yeah, you and your little group over there, you're concerned about the people.

Why don't you all give them something to eat? It didn't go like you planned, did it? And now you got to report back to the committee. That's the hard part. So you go back over, you know, and they say, well, did you tell them the people are hungry?

I did. I told them exact. I said those exact words. I said the people are hungry. Well, is he going to dismiss the service? Well, what'd he say? He said for us to give them something to eat. What? What did he say?

He said for us to give them something to eat. What? There's 20 ,000 people here. Oh, man. And then there's some little kid that snuck back into town during one of these messages, and he's walking by with a long John Silver sack.

And so they grabbed the sack, you know, and they opened it up. He got the two-piece meal with extra rolls. And, of course, Peter probably just gone, and they said, stop it, Peter. Stop it. That's all we have.

That's all we have. And one of them said, that's it. And they said, what's it? Let's tell Jesus this is all we have, and he'll dismiss the service. Now, I want you to think just for a moment. If you had never heard this Bible story, and you had been there, and that was all you had, don't you think he would dismiss the service?

Wouldn't you think that also? Sure. Makes sense.

So, again, you're the spokesperson. Jesus is up there speaking. So, at this point, I mean, you're the victim, and you've been made very comfortable now with all of these extra biblical details that are not in the text.

You won't find them in Luke. You won't find them in Matthew's account. You won't find them in Mark's account. This, by the way, this story occurs in all three of those Gospels, okay? You won't find it in any of these details there.

But now you've become, because he's used humor to do this, you've become very comfortable with all of this extra biblical imaginative stuff, and so it makes it very easy now for Robert Morris to introduce you to stuff that is a complete twisting and mangling of this text, and you won't detect it at all because how are you supposed to detect it with all of the, seriously, with just the sheer quantity of imaginative information that's being inserted into this story?

Lord, excuse me.

Just one more, just one thing, Lord. Excuse me. You know, we were talking about, I was telling you how good this series is, and you said for, you know, us to, you know, get the people something to eat, and we've been working on that, but, Lord, all we have, this is all we have, we have two fish, and we have almost five rolls.

Peter ate some, Lord, and so we're thinking, since that's all we have, that's all we have, and again, it's late, we're thinking that you ought to just, you know, go with the original plan and just wrap it up.

And the Lord said, okay, you have two fish and almost five rolls. I know how Peter is. That's all you have, right? Yes, that's all we have. Yep, yep, that'd be great. Have them sit down in groups of 50.

Excuse me. We don't have a lot of these snack packs, Lord. There was a kid walking, Peter took it from him. I didn't take it from him, Lord. Yeah, that'd be great, have them sit in groups of 50. Now, have you ever thought about that?

Have you ever thought about getting thousands of people to sit down in groups of 50? I don't know about you, but have you ever worked with people? I mean, people are hard to work with, aren't they? So, you know, you get them all sat down, and then I think during this process, I think one of the disciples thought, hey, I think I know what's going to happen.

And I'll bet he told... Notice, again, he says, I think one of the disciples thought. Well, how did you think that thought? There's no text that says that. It's not revealed in God's Word. Where are you getting this?

Oh, yeah, I know, from his... Yeah, you don't want to trust somebody who's preaching from their imagination. We continue, though.

The other guy says, hey, guys, I think we're okay. Do you remember that story in the Bible where Elisha fed 100 men with 12 loaves of bread? Well, we have someone greater than Elisha here. I'll bet you that when he prays over it, it's going to just multiply right in front of our eyes.

And by the way, that's what a lot of people think happened. But that's actually not what happened.

Okay, now, point this out here. See, this is so sneaky, so sneaky. Where did he get this information about where the disciple thought that this was going to result in these loaves just multiplying in front of them?

Not from the biblical text. It's not what the biblical text says at all. He told you. He said he thought one of them thunk this. So, in other words, so he set up the dichotomy. Okay, well, this guy thunk this, but he doesn't know that he actually thunk it, but he got it from his imagination.

And then turns around and says, but he got it wrong. Huh. But see, nowhere in Luke chapter 9 does it say that the disciple thought that this was going to happen. So now, let's just put it this way. You've been set up.

You are literally inside of the trap, okay? He's lured you in and he's going to spring it. And he's lured you in by making it look like he's teaching God's word, but he's not. He's teaching what's in his imagination.

Over and again, my opinion, I think, I thought, all of this is his imagination. And now we've even got some poor guy who's thinking wrongly about what's going to happen so that, well, don't worry, even though he thought wrong, Robert Morris is going to clear it up and he's going to tell us the truth.

But he hasn't told us the truth at all.

We continue. If you look at verse 16, just part of it, it says, he blessed and broke them and gave them to the disciples to set before the multitude. He blessed and broke them and gave them to the disciples to set before the multitude.

So here's what might have happened. This is just, again, I'm using my holy imagination. He's using his what?

In other words, this isn't what the biblical text says. This is just what he imagines went down.

Peter, probably, you know, because he was so bold, he probably said, here, here, give me, and he took a piece of bread and he ran over and he said, here, pray over mine, first Lord, here, pray over mine, pray over mine.

Watch, watch, watch what happens when he prays over it. Peter didn't do that. None of the texts say it. And Jesus takes this piece of bread, lifts it up to heaven and says, Father, bless it. And then he breaks it and gives half of it back to Peter.

Are you through praying? Okay, where in the text does this appear? It doesn't. This is Robert Morris's imagination that he's preaching, not the biblical text. This account of Peter is not in there at all.

Yes, Peter, it's blessed. Now, go give it away.

That dialogue doesn't occur in any of the gospel accounts of the feeding of the 5 ,000. You want to pray some more? That response appears nowhere in any of the accounts of the feeding of the 5 ,000.

No, Peter, and you need to catch this, it's blessed.

That reiteration by Jesus nowhere occurs in any of the accounts in the gospels regarding the feeding of the 5 ,000. It's blessed.

Now you give it and you watch what happens.

And nowhere does Jesus say, now you give it and watch what happens. It occurs in not one account of the feeding of the 5 ,000. This account literally only exists in Robert Morris's.

We continue. But personally, I think Peter walked up to the first person and said something like this.

Now, catch what he said. Personally, I think, wow, where is he getting this from? Oh, yeah. We continue.

Take just a little piece. What would you have said? Take little piece, little piece, little piece. I said little piece, you pig. Take little piece. He gets down to the end of the row. There is a crumb left.

Okay, where in the biblical text does it say that people were taking little pieces and then there was only a crumb left? It doesn't say it in any of these texts at all.

In his hand, sweat pouring down his face.

No account of sweat pouring down Peter's face at all.

Right before the guy reaches to take it, Peter looks down and this little crumb starts growing.

Nowhere in any account of the feeding of the 5 ,000 does it say that the crumb grew.

In his hands. And Peter said, you have some more. You have to catch this. The miracle did not happen in the master's hands. It happened in the disciples' hands.

Wrong. That's absolutely patently false and a lie. And I'll prove it to you from the biblical text. Now there is a simple principle in hermeneutics and here's the idea that scripture interprets scripture.

Scripture interprets scripture. And so the idea is this, is that if you're not sure how to rightly handle a particular biblical text, look at how the same concepts, teaching, or doctrine is handled in other biblical texts that deal with that same topic.

Okay. Clear passages then govern unclear. Let me read again the story here for you in Luke chapter nine, we'll pay attention then to the details, but I'm going to use a cross reference to disprove what he's saying.

Because number one, I've already pointed out, there is no account of the miracle growing loaf at all, or of Peter sweating, or of Peter saying, take only a little bit, or of the miracle occurring in the disciples' hands.

It doesn't say that in the biblical text at all. In fact, the biblical texts make it clear in whose hands the miracle did take place. And it was not in the disciples' hands. Let me read again. Okay. Luke chapter nine, verse 12.

Now the day began to wear away and the 12 came and said to him, send the crowd away to go to the surrounding villages in the countryside to find lodging and get provisions for we are here in a desolate place.

But he said to them, you give them something to eat. They said, we have no more than five loaves and two fish unless we are to go and buy food for all of these people. For there were about 5 ,000 men and he said to his disciples, have them sit down in groups of about 50 each.

And they did so and had them all sit down. And taking the five loaves and the two fish, he, that's Jesus, looked up to heaven and said a blessing over them. Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples to set before the crowd.

Let me read it again. He looked up to heaven and said a blessing over them. Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples to set before the crowd. Who broke the bread? God. Jesus did. Where did the miracle take place?

The miracle took place with Jesus breaking each of the loaves. By breaking them, he was the one performing the miracle. The miracle is happening in his hands. And here's verse 17, and they all ate and were satisfied.

And what was left over was picked up 12 baskets of broken pieces. Now notice no mention of any multiplication taking place in the hands of the disciples. No mention of growing loaves or anything like that.

Instead, the natural reading of the text is this, where the multiplication took place was in Jesus' breaking, repeated breaking of the bread itself. And this, by the way, using that principle that I told you about, scripture interprets scripture, is where we now know for sure that this did not take place in the hands of the disciples.

Let me give you a cross-reference, Mark 8, verse 14, I'll read you the story. Here's what it says. Now, they had forgotten to bring bread, and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. They were getting in the boat, and they only had one loaf with them.

And Jesus cautioned them, saying, Watch out and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod. And they began discussing with one another the fact that they had no bread. And Jesus, aware of this, said to them, Why are you discussing the fact that you have no bread?

Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear, and do you not remember? When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?

Did you catch it? Jesus here, in Mark 8, verse 19, is referencing the feeding of the five thousand. And in Jesus' telling of the story, in whose hands did the miracle take place? According to Jesus, the miracle took place in His own hands.

Listen again. When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up? They said to Him, Twelve. And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?

They said to Him, Seven. And He said to them, Do you not yet understand? Scripture interprets Scripture. So here's the idea. Mark 8, verse 19. Jesus makes it clear that the miracle took place in His hands when He broke the five loaves, and He makes a point of pointing out that the disciples picked up twelve baskets full of broken pieces.

Nowhere in any account of the feeding of the five thousand or the four thousand does it say anything about loaves growing in the hands of the disciples. This teaching comes directly out of Robert Morris's, but when we apply simple biblical hermeneutics, Scripture interpreting Scripture, paying attention to the details as they are recorded and not using our, then we're able to understand where the miracle took place.

The miracle took place in the hands of Jesus as He broke the loaves. They picked up broken pieces. The multiplication took place in the Master's hands, not in the disciples' hands. What Robert Morris is saying here is a flat out lie, but he needs this story to go this way so that it, because this becomes the foundation for the rest of his heretical teaching regarding his so-called principle of multiplication.

Let me back it up just a little bit so that you can hear again what the crime that he's committed here. That's the trap. It's been set. You were in it, and then he sprung it right there when he said that the miracle took place in the disciples' hands.

By that time, you had become so comfortable with all of this extra detail of the story that is not recorded there that you were seeing it magically, but it's not there in the text when you go back to re-examine.

Listen again. Peter looks down, and this little crumb starts growing in his hands. And Peter says, you can have some more. You have to catch this. The miracle did not happen in the Master's hands. That is a lie.

It happened in the disciples' hands. Flat out lie. Okay, so there are two principles of multiplication from this story, okay? I want to give them to you, and if you're taking notes, I want you to write these down, all right?

If you're not taking notes, write these down, okay? Here's number one. It has to be blessed before it can multiply.

See, this becomes the principle. At this point, if you've fallen for all of this, you are already on the hook, and there ain't no way you're going to get out of it. You have literally had this wolf sink his teeth into you.

Good luck escaping.

It has to be. It must be. You could say it either way. It has to be blessed before it can multiply. Now, just think with me for a moment.

Okay, now I'm going to just stop right there. But see, here's the deal. This is not what Scripture says. Everything else that he builds off of this is built off of a false foundation. This is built off of, well, a Twinkie that has toxic waste as its filling.

You get what I'm saying here? That's the idea. What he said is absolutely patently false, and the way he was able to do it was basically lull his listeners into a false sense of security that they were being fed God's Word, when all the time he made it very clear he was not preaching God's Word.

He was preaching what was in his imagination. And that's where the thing goes off the rails to the point where it makes it possible for him to literally insert details that are not there and smuggle, smuggle, I mean literally smuggle the glory that is due Jesus for the miracle that he performed and give it then to the disciples.

That's some serious Bible twisting there. And that's section one now, or part one of a series of sections that we're going to do in examining Robert Morris' teaching regarding the principle of multiplication.

All right, we're up on our second break. If you'd like to email me regarding anything you've heard on this edition or any previous editions of Fighting for the Faith, you can do so. My email address is talkbackatfightingforthefaith .com, or you can subscribe on Facebook, facebook .com forward slash piratechristian.

Click on the subscribe button or follow me on Twitter, my name there, at piratechristian. When we get back, we're going to be listening to a miserable handling of the story of Gideon from up in Canada.

You don't want to miss it. We'll be right back.