December 28, 2017 Show with Justin Peters on “The Latest Dangerous Names Teaching the Word of Faith Heresy”

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Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

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Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,

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Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

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Proverbs 27 verse 17 tells us, iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

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Matthew Henry said that in this passage, quote, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

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Now here's our host, Chris Arntzen. Good afternoon,

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

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This is Chris Arntzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Thursday on this 28th day of December 2017.

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I'm so delighted to have back as a returning guest one of my very favorite guests,

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Justin Peters, who is committed to expositional preaching and equipping believers to biblically engage false doctrine.

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He also received his MDiv and THM from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and he's an evangelist and a teacher having preached in 42 states and 23 countries, and he's an author, radio host, and founder of Justin Peters Ministries.

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He's also one of the speakers on the very long and very impressive roster at the

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G3 Conference coming up January 17th through the 20th in Atlanta, Georgia, and we'll be talking more about that exciting conference.

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And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Justin Peters.

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Hey Chris, it's a joy to be back with you, brother. I really enjoyed our last times together, and so was thrilled to have this opportunity today.

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So thank you for the invitation. Amen. And if you could, even though you've already done this, it seems that we are having new people added to the

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Iron Sharpens Iron Radio audience by God's grace every day, at least pretty much every day, sometimes four or five times a week, but it seems that every day we hear from somebody that has just discovered the program and lets us know how much they are blessed by it.

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But if you could, for those of our listeners especially who have not yet heard about you or your organization, tell us about Justin Peters Ministries.

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Okay, Chris, sure. My wife Kathy and I live in northern Idaho, and I am an evangelist,

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I suppose. I kind of hesitate to use that term because when most people hear evangelist, they think about the very people that I actually critique in my ministry, the televangelists, the health and wealth prosperity preachers,

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Joel Osteen, Joyce Meyer, Kenneth Copeland, Benny Hinn, Joseph Prince, Creflo Dollar, Kenneth Copeland, those people.

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One of the things for which I'm most well known is my work that is a biblical critique of that movement.

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I have a seminar entitled Clouds Without Water, which is a reference in the book of Jude, verse 12, to false teachers and these people that I just named and others who teach their theology, this health and wealth prosperity gospel,

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Bill Johnson, Rick Joyner, Heidi Baker, IHOP. These are all false teachers, and I have a seminar that is what

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I hope is a comprehensive biblical critique of this movement. And so that's kind of what

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I'm most known for. It's not my only interest. I've kind of got typecast, I suppose, is the term they use in Hollywood.

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It's what I'm most known for, but it's not by any means my only interest. My first commitment is to exposition, teaching

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God's Word verse by verse, but this seminar is what keeps me busy the most.

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Long story short, I was introduced to this movement by, as a teenager,

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I was born with cerebral palsy and still have it, of course. If you're born with it, you don't ever get over it.

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But I walk on crutches, and when I was a teenager, I went to see some faith healers in hopes of being healed.

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I was told by a neighbor of mine that God had spoken to him. He said, Justin, God has spoken to me.

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He has told me that you're going to be healed as long as you have enough faith. And so at age 16,

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I didn't know the difference between Romans and Revelation, didn't know anything, so I got sucked up into this movement for a while.

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So that was my introduction to the movement, but it wasn't until years later in seminary that I began to study it at a more academic level, and I came to realize how heretical this movement actually is.

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It's not just about health and wealth and Rolex watches and private jets and healing. It's actually a different gospel.

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They have a different God, they have a different Christ, they have a different atonement, they have a different gospel, and health and wealth is just some of the bad, low -hanging theological fruit that comes off of that bad tree, a tree that's rotten at its core.

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So anyway, that's kind of me in a nutshell. I travel across the United States and internationally.

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Usually every year I have three to five overseas trips where I go and preach and teach in various places, far -flung places around the world, and so there you go.

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And if anybody wants to get more information about the Word of Faith movement that may include things we don't have time to cover today, if you go to ironsharpensironradio .com,

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ironsharpensironradio .com, if you type in these names, you will get some audio links for past programs that I have participated in on this program, on this broadcast, and the first would be, of course, our guest.

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If you type in Justin Peters, you will get previous interviews I have conducted with Justin.

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If you type in H -I -N -N, just like Benny Hinn, you will be able to hear interviews with Kosti Hinn, who is a mutual friend of my guest,

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Justin Peters. Kosti Hinn is the nephew of Benny Hinn, and not only did he by God's grace get delivered out of the

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Word of Faith heresy movement, but he also is a very vociferous and outspoken opponent of his uncle's theology, and he does not mince any words, and of course he speaks with as much of a level of respect and love and grace and charity as he can, since Benny Hinn is indeed his uncle.

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He still does not allow that to have him candy coat the very, very serious and deadly and damning things that are coming out of his uncle's ministry and those similar to that.

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You could also type into the search engine of my archive John Sampson, that's

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S -A -M -S -O -N, there's no S -A -M -S -O -N. John Sampson is the pastor of King's Church in Peoria, Arizona, and I would love to introduce

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Justin Peters to John Sampson. He's a dear friend of mine, he's a Reformed Baptist pastor in Peoria, Arizona, and he at one time was not only a believer in the

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Word of Faith heresies, but he was also a pastor of a church teaching those things, and not only that, he was a talk show host locally for the

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TBN affiliate there in the Peoria area. So, he was quite a, or is a, quite a remarkable example of God's grace and mercy upon even people who are teaching some of the worst heresies, because God has delivered him and totally transformed him and his way of thinking and has given him a heart for the

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Reformed faith, which he is very passionate about, and has even written published works on this subject of the doctrines of sovereign grace.

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But it probably would be a good idea for you to give an abbreviated list of things that are universal or very common amongst

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Word of Faith heretics, because of the fact that we want people to really understand what the danger is when you start going into some brief descriptions of the more recent names that have been added to the list of those teaching and proclaiming these heresies.

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Obviously, we don't want you to go too far with that, because we've already covered some of the, or many of the doctrinal aberrancies, and we want to stick to our topic today as much as possible about the new developments.

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But if you could, give us a summary of the Word of Faith movement. Sure, Chris.

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Well, I tell people that Word of Faith is not necessarily a denomination like Presbyterian or Baptist, something like that.

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It's more of a theological system, and there's not 100 % uniformity, but basically

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Word of Faith doctrine can be boiled down to a few set of core doctrines to which they would all adhere.

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Now, you would hear some of them articulate these doctrines more clearly than others.

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For example, Joel Osteen, well, you really won't hear him articulate any kind of doctrine one way or the other, but you can kind of tell by some of the things he says that he holds to Word of Faith.

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But basically, it's this. It is the belief that when

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God created Adam, He created Adam to be a perfect, exact duplicate of Himself, a carbon copy of Himself.

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Now, of course, Adam was sinless before he fell, we all understand that, but Word of Faith holds that Adam was a reproduction of God and could stand, to use

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S. W. Kenyon's language in this, could stand toe -to -toe with God without any consciousness of inferiority whatsoever.

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So he was another Yahweh. Well, Adam was sinless, but he was not

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Yahweh. So that's where the error really begins, and it stems from there. And as Scripture teaches, error always begets more error.

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It spreads like gangrene, as Paul says. So once you start with error, it always leads to other errors.

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So that's really where the error starts. And Word of Faith holds that when Adam fell, he lost his deity, transferred it to Satan.

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Then Satan becomes the legal God of planet Earth. And God, the real

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Yahweh God, is kicked out of planet Earth. And even to this day, according to classic

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Word of Faith theology, the real Yahweh God has no access to planet Earth or His creation unless we grant

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Him permission. Wow. You know, you're telling me some elements of this that I have not heard, even though I've done a number of programs on this.

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I have never heard that. Let me put it this way. If any of my guests said that, it somehow escaped my attention.

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But that's pretty grotesque to think that God could be kicked out of anywhere or anything.

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Oh, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. In fact, I don't have it in front of me, but I've said it so many times in my teaching,

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I've just about got it memorized. Kenneth Copeland sent out an email that I received, and nobody tell him

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I'm on his email list. It came in,

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I think it was 2015, so just a couple years ago. Maybe last year, actually, now that I think about it.

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But anyway, he says, he has this long diatribe. He talks about what I just said, that Adam was God, and when he sinned,

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Satan became the legal God of planet Earth. And then he says, he says in his email, he says, now

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God is on the outside looking in, and he can't do anything down there, referring to the earth.

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He can't do anything down there. And then he says, people wonder why God lets those wars go on.

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And then Kenneth Copeland says, he doesn't. There's not anything he can do about it. Wow.

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Yeah, I mean, there's nothing he can do. That's a direct quote. This is not an isolated thing.

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I mean, this is standard teaching from Kenneth Copeland, and has been for decades. But God is literally kicked out of planet

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Earth. We are gods. This is the other wrinkle to it. When Satan became the legal

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God of planet Earth, God was kicked out. God lost his legal right to planet Earth. And then supposedly, when a person gets saved, quote unquote, and I say quote unquote because they have a very different gospel than the gospel of the

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Bible, but when a person gets saved, then they regain the deity that Adam supposedly lost when he fell in the garden.

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So a Christian literally becomes a little god on planet

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Earth, and they teach what's called the little gods doctrine, that if you are a Christian, you are in fact a little god.

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And you can, as a little god, and as a Christian, according to them, as a

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Christian, you are just, and here's another direct quote, just as much an incarnation as was

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Jesus of Nazareth. Wow. Yeah, so I mean, let that sink in for just a little bit.

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So we are just as much an incarnation as was Jesus of Nazareth. And so therefore, we have all the rights and privileges.

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We can speak things into existence. That's their little, that's their doctrine called positive confession.

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We can speak things into existence. And you've probably heard this on television. I'm sure our listeners have.

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You come across one of these people, whether it's T .D. Jakes or Joyce Meyer, Joel Osteen, even

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Beth Moore is starting to sound Word of Faith because she's hanging around Word of Faith people. But speak it.

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Speak it into existence. You've got to speak your own reality. You create your own reality by your words.

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And that's the doctrine of positive confession. So if you need money, you speak it into existence. If you need healing, you speak it into existence.

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If you have pain in your body somewhere, you've got something, you talk to it. You just talk to your body.

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You command it to leave. The doctrine of positive confession. So you create your own reality.

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You can literally create things just like God did. And that's not hyperbole.

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This is what they teach. In fact, Creflo Dollar, who is undoubtedly the most appropriately named of the prosperity preachers,

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Creflo Dollar, he said in a tweet, and I had this in my seminar, but he said, quote, as spiritual beings, we have the ability to speak things into existence just like God did.

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Wow. Yeah. So, I mean, and therefore, if you need money, you need healing, you speak it into existence.

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You talk to it. Our words, we can literally create things out of nothing, ex nihilo, just like God did.

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Because we are gods. We are little gods. And so this emphasis on health and wealth, that's why

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I say that's just some of the bad low -hanging fruit from a rotten theological tree. It's far more serious than what you see on television with, you know, these fancy preachers wearing

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Rolex watches and flying in private jets. That is part of it, but that's just, like I say, the bad fruit from a rotten theological tree.

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It is rotten at its core. It has a different God, has a different Christ, has a different atonement.

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They believe that Jesus did not pay for our sins on the cross, at least not fully. They believe that he paid for our sins in hell.

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When he died on the cross, they teach that the atonement had just begun, not completed, just begun.

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He then went to hell, suffered, was tortured, tormented by demons, died a spiritual death, ceased to be

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God, and had to be reborn. They actually teach that Jesus had to get saved.

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Yes, I heard Kenneth Copeland say that out of his own lips, where he said God, or Jesus Christ, is the first -born -again man.

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That's right. Which happened in hell. That's right, that's right, happened in hell.

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Yeah, that's where the atonement took place, in hell. Yeah, I went to a, I'm not going to mention the name of the theater because they may have repented of this, they may be under new management, but there is a

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Broadway -level theater company run by Christians, and I have heard that many of their biblical stage performances are spectacular and very biblically faithful.

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And I went to one on the resurrection years ago with my late wife, and much of the performance was, in fact, biblically faithful, it was beautiful, the stage settings were just as amazing as the most highly acclaimed

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Broadway play, as far as the settings and costumes and so on. But they had one element in this play that I had a gut feeling must be traced to the

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Word of Faith movement, because after the crucifixion of Christ, Jesus is tied and blindfolded, tied to a chair and blindfolded, and Satan, and I have no idea why they chose to do this, because everybody else was in realistic costumes,

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Satan looked like John Candy in a very cheap, comical devil costume.

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They obviously did that on purpose, why? I have no idea why they wanted to make the devil look ridiculously humorous with the red horns and the pitchfork and the cape, even looking very cheap, and it had to be intentional because everything else was realistic.

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But the devil is laughing in hell as demons dance around Jesus tied to the chair and blindfolded, and they're whipping him.

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Obviously that must have some kind of root in the Word of Faith movement, would you agree? I wouldn't be surprised at all,

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Chris, because that sounds, yeah, exactly like what Word of Faith theology holds about the Atonement, and it really is grotesque.

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Just hearing you describe this just, I mean, just sends shivers down my spine, the very notion that Jesus was somehow helpless.

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But that's what they teach, that's what they teach, that demons were dancing on him. In fact, to quote

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Frederick K .C. Price, another Word of Faith preacher, very well -known a couple decades ago, not as well -known now, his son has kind of taken over his range, but anyway,

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Frederick K .C. Price says, of Jesus in hell, says this, that the demons quote, went on a three -day drunk on Jesus.

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Wow. Which just, I can't even put into words how that offends me, and would offend anyone who is truly indwelled by the real, by the

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Holy Spirit of God. Jesus never has been, is not now, nor will he ever be a victim.

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The very notion of Jesus tied to a chair and blindfolded, I mean, that just, that offends me on every level.

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Jesus is the ultimate victor. He was not held there against his will.

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It was his own predetermined plan to go to the cross and die, to atone for our sins on the cross, not in hell.

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So that offends me and should offend any person who is indwelled by the

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Holy Spirit of God, and I, yeah, I'm going to have to get my emotions settled down for that.

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That offends me greatly, but yeah, I would not be at all surprised, Chris. Amen. Now, backtracking a little bit, when you mentioned earlier that the

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Word of Faith movement teaches that we are little gods, I'm assuming a part of their rhetoric must include

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Psalm 82 .6, which reads, I said you are gods and all of you are sons of the

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Most High. I'm assuming that has something to do with it. I know that, ironically, even

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Jehovah's Witnesses will use that verse to diminish the identifying of Jesus as God.

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They will basically, in a paraphrased way, say, well that's no big deal because look at what

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Psalm 82 .6 says. You know, they diminish the deity of Christ to that level of being a god because Jesus was no more of a god than Jehovah's faithful children are.

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But, if you could, explain that verse for us. Yeah, sure.

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You're exactly right. Psalm 82 .6, that verse that you just quoted, but then it goes on in verse 7, it says, but you will die like men and fall like any one of the princes.

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This is the passage that Jesus quotes in John chapter 10 when the Pharisees were getting ready to stone him because he proclaimed himself to be

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God, made himself out to be God in their view, and of course he was affirming his deity. And so they were getting ready to stone him.

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And so Jesus quoted this verse to them and said, you know, why do you stone me?

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This is Scripture. Well, the word faith people teach that as support for their little

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God's doctrine that we are little gods. But that is to really misunderstand the text, and it's to misunderstand

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Jesus' use of that text. Jesus was using some irony here, some hyperbole, and I think also some irony.

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Basically what Jesus, the context of Psalm 82 is talking about judges, and those judges had been put in places in which they were making decisions, life and death decisions, typically only made by God, but they were put in these positions making very important decisions, like life and death matters.

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And so in a sense, they were functioning in a very small capacity in some way.

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They were making decisions that typically only God made, but it does not mean that they were gods.

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In verse 7, the very next verse makes that abundantly clear, but you will die like men.

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Okay, so I mean, God doesn't cease to exist. You will die like men and fall like long princes.

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In other words, you're just men. That's all you are, you're just men. And Jesus quotes that verse to them, and I think what

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Jesus was doing was using some hyperbole but also using some irony. Basically what Jesus was saying is this to the

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Pharisees, what these judges were in theory, in function, in capacity to a small degree,

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I am in reality. And so this was going back against the

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Pharisees, and it inflamed them. So Jesus was not at all affirming that we as Christians are gods, not at all.

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And such a doctrine, the little God's doctrine, honestly Chris, has far more in common with Mormonism than it does with Christian.

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Yeah, well it seems that there is some kind of a connection, not that I'm claiming that it is an intentional connection by them, but the fact that they believe that even

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God the Father has a body of flesh, bone, and blood we're not talking about the incarnation of Jesus Christ, we're talking about the

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Father being very quote -quote coincidentally pretty much the same physical stature of Kenneth Copeland himself.

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Yeah, yeah that's right, and Kenneth Copeland actually teaches this.

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I have this in my seminar, he says that God is a being, and I just have this memorized, he says he stands around 6 '2", 6 '3", weighs a couple of hundred pounds, maybe a little better, and so he says that God has a body, and God the

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Father has a body, which is heresy. I mean that's completely heresy. God is spirit.

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John chapter 4, God is spirit, must be worshiped in spirit and truth. God the Father does not have a physical body.

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And ironically Jimmy Swaggart, who was opposed to the Word of Faith movement, he didn't believe that as well, he believed that God the

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Father had a physical body. Yeah, yeah, he did. And may still do because he's still alive, so I'm not sure if he repented of that or not, but he is still alive.

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Yeah, he is still alive and has his own television channel now actually, Sun Life Broadcasting I believe it is, but so yeah

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I don't know where Jimmy Swaggart stands on that. Jimmy Swaggart's one of those guys, he's kind of had one foot in, one foot out of the

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Word of Faith movement for decades. He has written some stuff that's actually really critical of Word of Faith, but then he'll come around and he'll teach some other things that Word of Faith holds, and so he's one of these guys, one foot in, one foot out, but anyway

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Jimmy Swaggart, of course he's not even qualified to be a preacher, you know what happened back in the 80s, but that's another story.

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Well we're going to go to a break, and when we return, unless you have something to add to your summary of the

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Word of Faith teaching, when we return we will get an update on Benny Hinn and his ministry.

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Benny Hinn is not a new name in the Word of Faith movement, but there may be things going on in his ministry that are new, or new to at least me and many of our listeners, and we will continue discussing related topics like the melding of more classical

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Word of Faith teachers like Benny Hinn, Kenneth Copeland with NAR, the

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New Apostolic Reformation with Bill Johnson and Rick Joyner, and other essential topics that come under the umbrella of updates on the

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Word of Faith movement. If you'd like to join us on the air, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

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c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com. Please give us your first name, at least your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA, and please only remain anonymous if you live outside of the USA.

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I'm sorry, only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

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I can readily understand if you are involved in a church that is somehow connected or identified with the

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Word of Faith movement, or perhaps you're just in a beginning stage of doubting and wondering what you are hearing from the pulpit of your own church.

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Perhaps you're a pastor, just like the aforementioned John Sampson was in the

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Word of Faith movement who is starting to realize, wait a minute, these things are unbiblical, they're heretical, they're dangerous, and they're damning, and he finally left there as quickly as he could possibly run from that movement.

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In addition to Kosti Hinn, who actually had to risk losing a family over his departure from this heretical movement.

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Perhaps you're one of these people. I understand if you prefer to remain anonymous and I will grant that request, but otherwise please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA. Don't go away, God willing we'll be right back with more of Justin Peters and updates on the

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Please, please, please remember, if you are ordering anything from cvbbs .com

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or any of our advertisers, if you are patronizing them and using their services or visiting the church or the parachurch ministry or whatever it is that we're advertising, if you respond to their ads, please mention

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That would mean the world to me if you would please do that. We are now back with our guest today,

36:54

Justin Peters. Justin Peters, who is the founder of Justin Peters Ministries, and we are discussing the latest dangerous names, teaching the word of faith heresy.

37:04

Justin is also on the roster of the G3 conference coming up in January, January 17th through the 20th.

37:13

Justin, I don't know if you know already, but if you do, can you tell us about what your specific topic of discussion will be at the

37:21

G3 conference? Sure Chris, it will be, surprise, surprise, the word of faith movement.

37:32

Anything specifically? Anything specifically? No, my challenge at the

37:38

G3 conference is going to be to try to condense my entire seminar, which is about eight hours, into one hour.

37:47

That's my challenge. So that's a modern -day miracle there. Yeah, it really is.

37:53

I've done that before, but it is a challenge because there's so much to it, so much more to it than what most people realize, and so trying to put all those little pieces together and just give kind of a cliff note version is a challenge to be sure, but I'm very much looking forward to it.

38:10

This will be my first time at the G3 conference, and I've heard about it for years, but I've never been to it, so I'm looking forward to that, meeting some new people, and honestly, that's one of my favorite parts.

38:24

I love going, whether I'm speaking at a conference or attending a conference or preaching in a church, whatever,

38:30

I just love meeting people. I love talking to them and hearing their stories, hearing their testimonies, how the

38:37

Lord has worked in their lives, how so, so many people, Chris, come up to me just all the time, and I get emails daily from people who have told me that God has delivered them out of this deception, and it just thrills my soul to hear those testimonies, whether it's word of faith or some other theological deception.

38:59

I get those emails all the time, and you know, since I brought that up, that is the real working of the

39:07

Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not about dropping angel feathers out of the sky or gold dust, as Bethel Church, Bill Johnson's church in Redding, California, that's kind of what they're known for, and other churches like to have these stupid, ridiculous, so -called miracles, angel feathers falling out of the sky, gold dust, gold teeth, people's tooth fillings turning into gold, which is just ridiculous.

39:37

That's pennies sticking to walls. That was a phase of Bata here a few years ago from out of Bethel Church.

39:46

The Holy Spirit was, for some reason, sticking pennies to the walls. Yeah, I mean,

39:53

I kid you not, you can't make this stuff up. I mean, you really cannot. You wonder why it was pennies, why not silver dollars, at least, for crying out loud.

40:01

Yeah, really, yeah, no kidding, exactly, stick some Benjamins on the wall.

40:10

Yeah, forget the pennies. So that's not the work of the

40:17

Holy Spirit. The real work of the Holy Spirit is when He regenerates people,

40:23

He seals people, and He delivers them out of deception, Chris, and this is the thing, this is what is so important for people to understand.

40:33

Sometimes I'm asked, well, can a genuine Christian be in this movement? And I give that a qualified, a qualified yes, and I say that for this reason.

40:43

What I mean by that is this, someone can be saved, get saved, even in a

40:49

Word of Faith church or a New Apostolic Reformation or something like that. I have no doubt that there have been people converted hearing

40:57

Benny Hinn preach. Benny Hinn's a false teacher, he's a false prophet. If he's not one, then the term really has no meaning.

41:05

He meets every biblical criterion, but I have heard him on occasion give enough of the gospel that one of God's sheep could hear that gospel presentation and go to the shepherd and be converted, but here's the deal, that doesn't legitimize

41:23

Benny Hinn, he's still a false teacher. And number two, if someone does get saved in a church like this, they're not going to stay there,

41:31

Chris. They are not going to stay there. The Holy Spirit, once He saves someone,

41:39

He illumines our minds to the Word of God, He illumines the Word of God to our hearts, to our minds.

41:46

He empowers us to obey God's Word, and once we are indwelt by the

41:52

Holy Spirit, He creates in us a desire to read and study God's Word. We understand God's Word, He empowers us to obey

41:59

God's Word, and as that process continues, then one of the fruits of that will be discernment.

42:07

It will be discernment. Hebrews 5, you cannot be a mature

42:12

Christian and lack discernment at the same time, so as you read and study God's Word, discernment grows, as it will.

42:21

That new creature in Christ, that new believer is going to leave there. It's not going to stay in a church like this.

42:27

It's not going to stay and listen to these kind of false prophecies and this kind of heresy coming out of the pulpits.

42:34

It's not going to stay and be content with the gospel that says God wants you to be healthy and wants you to be rich.

42:42

It's not going to stay there. They're going to crave the pure milk of the Word, and they're going to seek it out.

42:48

They're going to leave those churches. They're not going to stay there, so any Christians who are in, whether it's

42:54

Word of Faith, New Absolute Reformation, and I would include with that Roman Catholicism, you cannot be a genuine born -again

43:03

Christian and stay in a false system.

43:08

You will leave. You know, I was going to wait till later to bring Roman Catholicism up, but I might as well bring it up now since you've just mentioned it.

43:18

There seems, even though the average person, especially perhaps the average Catholic, knowing how stoic and reserved and quiet a typical

43:32

Roman Catholic worship service will be, and of course I know that they're not all cookie cutters of one another in different regions and different countries, it might be very different, but I think that that's pretty much the mainstream or the most dominant experience that a

43:49

Catholic will have going to a worship service, as I did for the first 25 years or so of my life.

43:59

I was raised Roman Catholic, and although I must admit that the last 10 years of my connection to Catholicism before I was saved by the grace of God, I was rarely ever going to church.

44:14

I really pretty much wandered away from it when I was 14 and 15 years old, only going on holidays and things, but they will not readily see the real strong connection that there is between Romanism and the

44:33

Word of Faith movement. There are many startling connections, whether they were intentionally designed that way by Word of Faith movement heretics or not, the focus on the miraculous, which is something that even though your typical

44:52

Roman Catholic worship service will not have that occur, although there may be some charismatic congregations that do, the fact that I can even remember my mother having a vial of water from Lourdes, France, our

45:09

Lady of Lourdes, the allegedly miraculous water there, she had a vial of it in her medicine cabinet, and thanks be to God my mother was delivered from the superstitions and heresies of Rome six weeks before she passed away.

45:28

She clearly trusted in the true gospel and renounced prayer to Mary and the saints and idols and so on.

45:38

But there is a strong, and even the modern version of Pentecostal indulgences, they don't call them that, but they're very similar.

45:51

Don't you see a lot of similarities? Oh yeah, without a doubt, without a doubt,

45:56

Chris, and I bring this out in my teaching when I have time to more fully develop it, but yes, there's an awful lot of commonality between Word of Faith, AR, and Roman Catholicism.

46:10

And Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormonism too, but in a little bit different way, but in some of the same ways.

46:16

But anyway, specifically between Word of Faith and Roman Catholicism, you have both of these groups rely on extra -biblical sources for their authority.

46:29

That's right. Now, with Word of Faith and AR and that kind of thing, it is divine revelation knowledge.

46:38

Well, God told me such and such. God spoke to me, God told me this, God told me that. I mean, you can't watch

46:44

TVN or Daystar or one of these networks for more than about five minutes before you'll hear someone on there say,

46:50

Lord spoke to me and he said da -da -da -da -da. Well, theoretically, if God is still speaking to these people in a direct, quotable sense outside of Scripture, then whatever he's telling these folks should be just as authoritative as any verse in the

47:06

Bible, because whatever God says, he cannot speak less authoritatively on one occasion than he does on another.

47:14

God is speaking, God is speaking. Just one example would be, Benny Hinn infamously said that the

47:22

Holy Spirit told him that there are nine members of the Trinity, that each member of the

47:27

Trinity is a trinity within himself, and so there's actually nine members of Godhead. Well, God supposedly told him that, so that's his source of authority.

47:37

And then later he said he was joking, because he knew he was cornered. Right, yeah, he later said he was joking, but I actually have the recording of him saying this.

47:46

I have the video. And I heard it repeated on the Bible Answer Man years ago.

47:52

Yeah, yeah, so he was not joking at all. But that, I mean, that's just one example.

47:57

I mean, whether it's Joyce Meyer or Hinn or Kenneth Copeland or Jesse Platt of Scriptural Dollar, Joseph Prince is another one,

48:05

I can't remember if I've mentioned him yet or not, but they all claim that God speaks to them, and they get revelation knowledge,

48:12

God speaks to them. So their source of authority, yeah, they'll say, yeah, we believe the Bible, but God also speaks outside the

48:18

Bible, and so if you can't find what I'm teaching you in the Scriptures, don't worry about it, it's okay,

48:24

I got it from Jesus. Jesus told me these things. With Roman Catholicism, their extra -biblical source of authority is the

48:34

Apocrypha, is church tradition, is the

48:39

Magisterium of papal bulls, whenever the pope speaks ex -cathedra, then whatever he says is infallible, it carries the same way as Scripture.

48:52

And they also have, as you've already mentioned, this emphasis on signs and wonders, a little bit different, usually, from the signs and wonders that you see in the

49:01

Word of Faith, and they are, but they have their own signs and wonders as well. You've already mentioned lords, there's the

49:08

Lady of Shrines and statues that they say weep, cry, and bleed, and they find

49:17

Jesus burned in their toast, and you know, stuff like this. And indulgences,

49:24

Roman Catholicism has these indulgences, you give the Roman Catholic Church money, you can get time out of purgatory, or time out of purgatory for your loved one, and Word of Faith has their form of indulgences.

49:38

Seed faith, you sow a seed, in other words, you give money to a particular preacher or a church, you sow your seed so you can reap a harvest.

49:47

They really have reduced God to a cosmic slot machine.

49:53

I mean, you put your money in, and you pull the lever, and God'll give you results.

50:01

A cosmic genie, you rub the lamp with your faith, with your money, and God becomes your cosmic bellhop, and he will do whatever you tell him, not ask him, but tell him to do.

50:15

So there is a lot of overlap. And Word of Faith and Roman Catholicism have always been very cordial to one another.

50:23

Just in the last couple years, Pope Francis had a meeting, in -person meeting, with Kenneth Copeland and some of the other prominent

50:33

Word of Faith preachers. Very cordial to one another. Kenneth Copeland just slathers praise all over Pope Francis, and so very cordial, very friendly.

50:45

You'll never, ever, ever hear a Word of Faith preacher criticize

50:51

Roman Catholicism. They're always friendly to it. Then again, it's very friendly to Roman Catholicism because there is so much commonality there.

50:58

It's interesting because in my own journey of faith,

51:05

I can recall in the 1980s when I started to visit churches, when

51:14

I knew that the Catholic Church was not where I would remain, and I started bouncing around and visiting all different kinds of churches.

51:23

Most of them were charismatic or Pentecostal churches. And the 1980s is not that long ago.

51:30

And typically, back then, in the 1980s, and I'm talking here about mainstream

51:36

Pentecostal charismatic congregations, they would typically be vehemently opposed to Roman Catholicism and speak against it from their pulpits.

51:49

Now, it says, now it seems that in the 21st century, and of course

51:54

I'm trying not to broad brush because I'm sure there are differences with different congregations and denominations that are charismatic or Pentecostal, but it seems that nowadays it's not only the

52:06

Word of Faith movement or adherents of that movement that are cozied up to the

52:13

Church of Rome and the Pope. It seems that even mainstream Pentecostals are a lot more tolerant and accepting of Roman Catholicism than they used to be.

52:22

And as I said, 1980s is not all that long ago. Right. Right.

52:28

And that kind of comes full circle to what I said in the early part of this interview, that error always begets more error.

52:35

And you're right. Back in the 80s, there was more of a clear line of demarcation, but as time has gone on, error begets more error, and there's this, we're seeing this melding of Pentecostalism, charismatic

52:49

Word of Faith with Roman Catholicism, and now, I mean, you would just, you would honestly be hard -pressed to find a charismatic preacher anywhere who would draw a firm hard line against the

53:05

Roman Catholic Church, which I hesitate to even call it the Church. Right. Well, we have to go to our midway break right now, and when we return, we'll really launch right into the new developments and more recent things.

53:19

If you'd like to join us, again, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

53:26

Please give us your first name, your city, and your state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA, and only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter. Don't go away. God willing, we'll be right back with Justin Peters and more on updates on the

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Word of Faith heresy movement. One sure way all

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Rich Pierce, the president of Dr. James R. White's ministry, Alpha and Omega Ministries, but the one you heard prior to that, who is supposed to be

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Charles Haddon Spurgeon, is one of these former Word of Faith preachers that I mentioned earlier, my friend

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And now I just want to make a brief announcement regarding the G3 Conference. Our guest today,

01:06:13

Justin Peters, is on the roster for this exciting conference coming up January 17th through the 20th in Atlanta, Georgia.

01:06:21

G3 stands for Grace, Gospel, and Glory, in case you're wondering. And this January's theme is

01:06:27

Knowing God, a Biblical Understanding of Discipleship. In addition to Justin Peters, this roster includes

01:06:33

Stephen Lawson, Vody Baucom, Phil Johnson, Keith Getty, H .B. Charles Jr., Tim Challies, Josh Bice, James White, Tom Askell, Anthony Methenia, Michael Kruger, David Miller, Paul Tripp, Todd Friel, Derek Thomas, who is our guest tomorrow on Iron Sharpens Iron, Martha Peace, and Stephen Nichols, the president of Reformation Bible College, the college founded by the late

01:06:58

Dr. R .C. Sproul. If you want to register for this conference, go to g3conference .com,

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And you can also register for an exhibitor's booth, just like the one I will be manning there, God willing.

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So if you have a business, a ministry, a church, a parachurch organization, whatever it is that you would like the attenders of the

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G3 Conference to know about, you can register for your own exhibitor's booth by going to g3conference .com.

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And now I just have to do very briefly that thing that I hate to do, but that's beg you for money.

01:07:39

One of the reasons I hate doing it is because the very heretics we are describing today in our interview with Justin Peters, Word of Faith Movement heretics and others, other charlatans, have really made it more difficult for ministries and other

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Christian organizations to ask for money because we are very often broad -brushed with those charlatans who misuse money, who have false pretenses and promises in their fundraising, all kinds of nonsensical and heretical and blasphemous things that go on.

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And I hate to be among the number of many asking for money that unfortunately includes heretics like this, but I'm sure that if you've listened to Iron Sharpens Iron long enough, you know that the kind of programming that we air, the kind of interviews that I conduct, the kind of guests that I have on this program, the topics we address are nothing like these heretical broadcasts.

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If you are not a member of a local Bible -believing church, a solid Bible -believing church, you must be a member of one if you want to live in obedience to God.

01:09:19

So please prayerfully seek one out and join it. And please never siphon money out of your giving to that church just because you want to help

01:09:26

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. Also, never take food off of your family's dinner table if you're struggling to make ends meet. But if you are blessed financially, above and beyond your ability to give to your church and provide for your home, because those are two commands of God.

01:09:43

And providing for Iron Sharpens Iron Radio is not a command of God. But if you are able to, while still obeying those two commands, please donate as much and as often as you can to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

01:09:55

I thank all of you who are already doing that. Some of you, every week now, are sending in checks, which is quite amazing.

01:10:03

And I thank the Lord for you in ways that I cannot describe. If you want to advertise with us, just send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com,

01:10:12

chrisarnson at gmail .com, and put advertising in the subject line. And as long as whatever it is you're advertising is compatible with the theology we express on this program, we would love to launch an ad campaign with you.

01:10:24

You don't have to believe identically with me. You just have to be compatible with what I believe in what you are advertising.

01:10:32

And, of course, some things are theologically neutral, if you own a shoe store or something like that.

01:10:38

But if it has anything to do with religion, you have to be at least compatible with what

01:10:43

I believe here. And now we are back with Justin Peters, our guest today, and we are discussing the latest dangerous names teaching the

01:10:50

Word of Faith heresy. If you have a question for Justin, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com,

01:10:56

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Before we go to any of our listener questions, because we already do have quite a number of them,

01:11:04

I want to make sure that we at least begin the topic of the new updates, the latest updates, about the

01:11:13

Word of Faith heresy. And Benny Hinn, although he is not, surely not a new name, he is involved in things that are new, at least new to you and I and many of our listeners, if you could let us know, give us an update on Benny Hinn.

01:11:33

Sure, Chris. As you said, Benny Hinn has been around for a long, long time. I started ministry decades ago, back in the 80s, and started the crusade that he's really famous for in the neighborhood of the early 90s, right around 1990 or thereabouts.

01:11:48

But he is not nearly as popular now as he used to be. I wrote my master's thesis on Benny Hinn, and I would say he probably hit his zenith of popularity right around the year 2000, 2001, 2002, and has had a fairly precipitous decline in popularity since then, which is a good thing.

01:12:14

But that's domestically. Even though he's not used to, when

01:12:19

I would go see Benny Hinn at a crusade, he would be renting out the American Airlines Center.

01:12:25

He would be renting out Coliseums. Now he's renting out hotel ballrooms. So he doesn't have the following domestically that he used to, but his following overseas, internationally, is still enormous.

01:12:41

And so he is still very popular internationally, though not quite as popular as he used to be here in the

01:12:49

States. But he's continuing to do the same thing. He continues to do his crusades.

01:12:55

He continues to parade in front of people on television, on his television program, false healings, and Kosti Hinn, who, as you said, has become a really, really good friend of mine.

01:13:09

Kosti would attest to this, I'm sure already has, on your program. But continues to parade these false healings, false claims of miracles, still claims that God speaks to him when he doesn't, still teaches seed faith theology, sow a seed, give me money,

01:13:25

God will bless you. He still does that. He still has his television program. I watch it from time to time. Same old, same old.

01:13:33

But what we're seeing now is that you're seeing a melding of the more classic word -faith guys like Benny Hinn, like Kenneth Copeland, Creflo Dollar.

01:13:45

You're seeing that meld with the New Apostolic Reformation and they are guys like Bill Johnson and Rick Joyner and Todd White, who is another individual that we should probably mention.

01:13:59

Todd White is a member of Gateway Church in Southlake, Texas, in the

01:14:06

Dallas -Fort Worth area, pastored by a guy named Robert Morris. Now, if you watch

01:14:11

Robert Morris, his program is called The Blessed Life, and he comes across as, honestly, pretty normal.

01:14:18

I mean, he's not, he doesn't have, he doesn't really dress in the fancy clothes, flashy stuff.

01:14:26

He's fairly low -key in his appearance. But his theology is absolutely word -faith.

01:14:32

Todd White is a member of his church. Todd White is this guy, if our listeners have seen him, maybe, maybe not, but he has dreadlocks.

01:14:41

White guy, white guy with dreadlocks. And he goes around, he has this ministry, it's called Lifestyle Christianity.

01:14:48

Which provides a pretty cushy lifestyle for Todd White. But he goes around. He's famous for doing these on -the -street healings.

01:14:56

He'll take a camera with him, and he'll go up to people randomly on the street, and he will ask them if they have any pain in their body.

01:15:04

And most people, most of us have some pain somewhere, something in our body doesn't work right. And he'll say, well, can

01:15:11

I pray for you right now? And most people will say yes. And so he lays his hands on whatever part of the body is hurting or whatever, and he'll command healing to come.

01:15:22

And he'll say, now, you're feeling something, right? And say this person has a problem in the shoulder. Put his hands on their shoulder.

01:15:29

Lord Jesus, I just command your healing power to go into the shoulder right now. Shoulder, we command you to get back into, he actually talks to the body parts.

01:15:37

Shoulder, we command you to get back into alignment. And he does this, and he's a very engaging kind of personality.

01:15:45

And almost without exception, practically 100 % of the time, the person that he prays for says he feels better, says that whatever pain was there is gone.

01:15:58

He's famous for having people sit down, and he'll have a person sit down, and he'll take each of their feet and put each foot in one of his hands, and the camera will be zooming in, and he'll say, see, one of your legs is a little bit shorter than the other one.

01:16:17

And sure enough, when you look, it appears as though, say the left leg is a half an inch or so shorter than the right leg.

01:16:23

And he says, I command this leg to grow. Leg, I command you to grow right now. And as he's saying that, you're looking at this on the camera, being videoed, and the leg appears to grow right there on camera.

01:16:37

The person's leg just links right there on camera, and it's a ooh and a ah, and people are just mesmerized by this guy.

01:16:46

Well, the old leg lengthening trick has been around for decades. Charlatans have been using it for decades.

01:16:52

It's not real. It's sleight of hand. He's not commanding anybody's, or not with any success anyway, commanding anybody's leg to grow.

01:17:01

Nobody's leg is growing. It's an old trick. You can watch a video on YouTube entitled

01:17:07

Miracles for Sale by a guy named Darren Brown, D -E -R -R -E -N

01:17:12

Brown. And Darren Brown is a skeptic at large, and he takes this guy who auditions for a part and takes this guy off the street.

01:17:23

This particular guy is a scuba diving instructor, trains him for a period of weeks in the lingo and the tactics of faith healers to prove that what faith healers do is not real.

01:17:33

So he takes this guy who's not even a believer, trains him in the tactics and the lingo, and after a few weeks of this training, he takes him out on the streets, and he does the exact same thing that Todd White does and gets the exact same results.

01:17:54

And the guy's not even a Christian, but he gets the exact same, with practically 100...

01:18:00

In fact, in this documentary, they got 100 % success in the people they go up to randomly on the streets.

01:18:07

He asks them if they have pain. They say, yeah, I've got pain here or there. Prays, commands the pain to go away, commands the body to be healed.

01:18:14

And 100 % of the time, the person feels, claims to feel real relief.

01:18:20

And it's not a put -on. I mean, they really do feel that, but it's all psychosomatic,

01:18:26

Chris. None of this is real. These are mind tricks, not unlike, you know, these are not the droids you're looking for.

01:18:35

Not unlike that. You know, it's mind tricks, group dynamics.

01:18:42

That's all it is. Here's my challenge to Todd White, and if somebody is listening can get this to Todd White, send him a link or whatever.

01:18:51

Here's my challenge to you, Todd White. If you can command a leg to grow, Todd White, then

01:18:56

I will pay all of your expenses. I will get you a first -class plane ticket to the nearest

01:19:04

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, and I will pay for your hotel room.

01:19:10

I don't have a lot of money, but I can scrounge it up. I will pay for a first -class airplane ticket to the nearest

01:19:18

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. I'll put you in a hotel. I'll pay for your meals. You go in there, and you command those cancer cells to die.

01:19:28

You can command a leg to grow. Surely you can command cancer cells to die in those kids, and you heal those sick kids, many of them dying of cancer.

01:19:39

You go, and you clear that place out, Todd White. If you can go up to a person randomly on the street and command a leg to grow, then the first place he ought to be is

01:19:49

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. You go, and you heal those kids who are sick and dying of cancer, and if he can't do it, and he can't, he is a fraud.

01:19:59

He is a fraud. He is a charlatan. He is a wolf. He is a false teacher, and anyone who promotes him, anyone who gives him cover, and I'm looking at you,

01:20:09

Dr. Michael Brown, anyone who would partner with him, as Dr. Michael Brown is about to in this upcoming conference, then he should be ashamed.

01:20:20

To give these people cover for what they are doing to people, for how they are twisting the name of Christ, twisting the gospel, exploiting the poor and the sick and the desperate for personal financial gain, they should be ashamed.

01:20:32

These are wolves, charlatans, and I feel much better now. Well, I'm glad that you had the opportunity to vent in a good way.

01:20:46

Now, a couple of things just to go over. I know that Todd White, unlike some other charismatic pastors,

01:20:54

I can recall before I was saved and became a member of a

01:21:00

Reformed Baptist church, I can remember once in a while hearing Pentecostal and charismatic pastors when

01:21:08

I would visit those churches. They would give the excuse about that very thing that you challenged

01:21:16

Todd White on. Well, people in the

01:21:21

Scriptures came to Jesus to be healed, and their faith had to be strong enough, etc.

01:21:28

But Todd White is different, because as you said, he's wandering around in the streets walking up to people he doesn't even know doing this, right?

01:21:37

Yeah, yeah, he goes up to people. Claiming to do it, that is. Yeah, claims to do it.

01:21:43

And I've watched a lot of video from Todd White, and it is extremely rare that he gives anything resembling the gospel to any of these people that he goes up to.

01:21:56

And if he does, it is always just a bare bones, just wishy -washy, watered down, kumbaya kind of, you know, just trust

01:22:06

Jesus, you know, kind of thing. I mean, you never hear him genuinely call people to repent and place their trust in the finished work of Christ on the cross, nothing like that.

01:22:17

Yeah, he's a complete and total charlatan. And, you know, as far as faith, yeah.

01:22:24

See, if you begin with a premise that it is always God's will to be healed, if that's your premise, if it's always

01:22:30

God's will to be healed, and a person prays for healing for days, weeks, months, years, decades, some people, and the healing never does come, then the question must be asked, whose fault is it?

01:22:44

And by definition, it cannot be God's fault, because he's perfect. So guess who's left?

01:22:50

It's the sick person's fault. If you're not healed, according to Word, Faith, Theology, make no mistake about it, it is your fault, it is your lack of faith, it is your secret sin, it is your fault that you're sick.

01:23:04

And you can wordsmith it all day long, you can try to, you know, squirm around in any way you want to, but you can't.

01:23:12

That is the only conclusion to which you can logically come. If it's always God's will to be healed, and you're sick, it's your fault that you're sick.

01:23:21

This is what they teach. It is horrible, it is heresy, it is a distortion of the gospel, and, you know, and Chris, just so people know, who may not be familiar with me,

01:23:34

I believe that God not only can, but does, on occasion, heal people.

01:23:40

I have no problem with that. What I do reject is anyone who claims to have the gift of healing.

01:23:47

That person does not exist. When God heals, and it's rare, it happens, but it's not an everyday thing.

01:23:56

But when He does heal, He does it simply because it is His sovereign will and good pleasure to do so, and sometimes

01:24:05

He does, but more often than not, He doesn't. But if someone is listening to me, and maybe you're struggling, maybe you have cancer, or whatever disease, or a loved one who does,

01:24:16

I have no problem. I would encourage you. Pray that the Lord would bring healing, if that is

01:24:22

His will. But if it is not, pray that God's grace would be sufficient.

01:24:29

Pray for strength to serve the Lord faithfully through the sickness, through the disease, through the affliction.

01:24:38

And it's like what David said in Psalm 71. He said, It is good that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.

01:24:48

It is oftentimes an affliction, and sickness, and disease, and persecution that we are drawn most closely to the

01:24:57

Lord. Charles Spurgeon said, He said, Trials are not enjoyable.

01:25:11

The Bible does not command us to enjoy trials. James says, Count it all joy.

01:25:18

It doesn't say enjoy the trials. It says count it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials.

01:25:24

On the other side of trials, God is faithful. He will give us the strength to endure the trial.

01:25:30

He'll give us strength to serve Him and carry His name with honor and point people to Him, glorify

01:25:38

Him through the trial. And you can count it all joy. You can take it to the bank. It's an accounting term.

01:25:45

Count it all joy, my brethren, that there will be joy on the other end of that trial.

01:25:51

There will be joy. Whether you find relief from that trial this side of heaven or the other side, there will be joy.

01:25:59

So I take real umbrage with people who not only teach this, but also with people who give them cover because it is such a tremendous travesty and a tremendous injustice to the

01:26:12

Word of God. Amen. And just because someone performs a miracle does not mean they are a true messenger of God or does not mean that they are truly

01:26:26

His children. In Matthew 7, there is that classic text starting in verse 22,

01:26:33

Many will say to Me, meaning Jesus, on that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name and in Your name cast out demons and in Your name perform many miracles?

01:26:47

And then I will declare to them, I never knew you. Depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.

01:26:56

The thing that's interesting, fascinating to me about that text is that Jesus does not say,

01:27:01

No, you didn't. You didn't do that. He never denied the miracles and the exorcisms that they claim to perform.

01:27:10

What do you think about that? How do you exegete that? Yeah, I agree with you, Chris. Clearly, the

01:27:16

Bible gives testimony that there is, there are lying signs and wonders. There are false miracles.

01:27:23

Satan and his minions do have power. Now, their power is limited and they only have the power that God allows them to have.

01:27:32

But they're real. They do have power. And there will be people. I think the most natural way of reading that text, and it is one of the more sobering passages in all of Scripture, to read that, and there will be people.

01:27:45

And you see their address, Lord, Lord, that term, kurios, Lord, Lord, is repeated twice.

01:27:51

The sense is that these people are actually surprised. They are surprised to find themselves in the situation in which they find themselves.

01:28:01

Lord, Lord. Did we not prophesy? Did we not cast out demons? Did we not perform any miracles in your name?

01:28:08

These people, I think, are surprised. And he says, depart from me, I never knew you, you workers of iniquity.

01:28:17

That is a sobering passage of Scripture, Chris. And when I read that, and when I think about that text,

01:28:24

I'm asking myself, who are these people? If they are not the very people that we see paraded on Christian television and speaking at these big conferences and teaching this heresy, who are they?

01:28:41

I mean, this seems like it is tailor -made for a Benny Hinn, or a

01:28:47

Kenneth Copeland, or a Todd White, or one of these others. I mean, it seems to perfectly describe these people who claim to be

01:28:55

Christians and perform some kind of signs and wonders, not of God, obviously.

01:29:03

But if that's not talking about these charismatic faith healers, who's it talking about?

01:29:10

Who is Jesus talking about? I mean, he's not talking about Buddhists. He's not talking about Hare Krishnas.

01:29:17

He's not talking about Muslims. He's talking about people who claim the name of Christ.

01:29:23

So, if it's not these kind of folks, who is it? And I would submit to you that it is exactly these kind of people that we've been talking about that are in view in that passage.

01:29:36

Amen. And before we go to the break, I don't know if you misspoke or if this is something that Todd White said.

01:29:45

I have heard Kenneth Hagen, who is now deceased, say, in fact,

01:29:52

I heard him say this before I was a born -again believer. I was starting to listen to Christian radio, quote, quote,

01:30:00

Christian radio, because I was searching and exploring, and I believe it was because, obviously,

01:30:07

I was being drawn by God, and I was starting to investigate different Christian denominations and so on.

01:30:14

And I remember hearing Kenneth Hagen, and even as an unbeliever, I recoiled with shock and horror hearing

01:30:22

Kenneth Hagen say, I'm so sick and tired of you wimpy

01:30:28

Christians begging God to answer your prayers. You storm the throne of grace and you demand what's rightfully yours.

01:30:37

I can still remember him saying something very close to that, that even as an unbeliever made me listen in shock with my jaw hanging open.

01:30:46

And I knew instinctively, by God's grace, that is, that this was false, that this was a horrific thing to tell people to do.

01:30:55

But just moments ago you said Todd White was commanding

01:31:00

Jesus to heal. Did you misspeak, or is that something he actually says? No, no, no, no, no,

01:31:07

I didn't misspeak at all. I mean, yeah, you hear that from him regularly. Now, he will say, like,

01:31:12

I command you, leg to grow, I command you to grow right now. So, yeah, he says that quite frequently.

01:31:19

But that's common amongst these word -faith so -called healers. No, what

01:31:24

I meant was, did he command Jesus to do it? That's what I meant. Oh, command, no, if I insinuated that, no,

01:31:33

I've not heard him say, I command you, Jesus, those direct words, no.

01:31:39

He will command body parts to be healed. He'll command legs to grow or this and that to heal.

01:31:46

He'll speak to body parts, I'll command healing, I speak healing. That kind of verbiage comes from him regularly.

01:31:54

Okay, we're going to go to our final break. It's going to be very brief. And if you want to get in line and have your question asked and answered by Justin Peters, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

01:32:05

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Please give us your first name, city and state, and country of residence if you live outside of the

01:32:11

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01:35:47

Justin Peters for our interview on the word of faith heresy, updates involving this movement, new figures whose names you should be aware of so that you stay clear of them and warn others about them.

01:36:01

And we will now ask some questions from our listeners. We have

01:36:06

Kofi in Medford, Oregon, originally from the

01:36:12

United Kingdom. Kofi asks, Brother Justin proved incredibly helpful to me in my transition out of the word of faith -ism as a teenager.

01:36:24

Wow. My question relates to those mainstream evangelicals who give credence to the word of faith guys.

01:36:32

How do we deal with them when people cite them as a reason to listen to those guys?

01:36:39

Yes, that's obviously a very common thing where you will have people, very well -intended people.

01:36:47

Sometimes these people, I think, are unconsciously desiring that we are more polite and kind and gracious than the

01:36:54

Apostle Paul was when it came to the Judaizers. He was pretty clear that they are to be accursed.

01:37:01

And sometimes you would think that these evangelicals today, who are more on the side of a mushy -gushy

01:37:09

Mr. Rogers version of Christianity, would want us to be merely just loving and kind and gracious to these folks.

01:37:18

And, of course, it is an act of love to call them to repentance. That is not an act of hatred. But if you could comment on Kofi's comment and question.

01:37:27

Yeah, absolutely. Kofi, thank you. Thank you, brother. I'm honored to be use of the Lord in some way, to be a part of your growth in the

01:37:37

Lord. So thank you for that encouragement. Yeah, one of the things that distresses me so much is

01:37:42

I will see non -word -of -faith NAR people, some evangelicals who may not teach this kind of heresy, but yet they won't call it out either.

01:37:56

And sometimes not only do they not call it out, they will actually partner with some of these false teachers.

01:38:02

And that is very, very distressing to me. I've said before, it makes it really hard for us to warn people about the bad guys when the supposed good guys are having fellowship with the bad guys.

01:38:18

And so it makes it really, really difficult when you see big -name evangelicals that supposedly have pretty good doctrines associated with or covering for some of these wolves.

01:38:34

And I've seen that, unfortunately, a lot. But the most loving thing we can do for people is to tell them the truth.

01:38:44

The worst act of hatred that we could do for someone is to know the truth and not tell them.

01:38:52

I tell people, if you really want to hate somebody, if you really want to show a person hatred, know the truth, don't tell them.

01:39:00

See that they are in spiritual danger, know the truth, don't tell them. That is the most hateful thing we could possibly do.

01:39:08

The most loving thing we can do is to tell people the truth. The truth is love. And I tell folks that it is not up to us how that truth is received.

01:39:19

We're not accountable for how people receive the truth. We are accountable for giving it to them.

01:39:25

And the truth is offensive. The truth can be offensive to people. But here's something that I really want people to keep in mind and understand.

01:39:34

There is a way to speak the truth. And Paul tells us in Ephesians 4 .15 that we are to speak the truth in love.

01:39:42

We are to speak the truth in love. Now that doesn't mean we speak the truth watered down.

01:39:47

We speak it in love. And that in love part is just as inspired and authoritative as the speak the truth part.

01:39:58

And I've said before publicly, if you can't speak the truth in love, then do God a favor and don't speak it until you can figure out how to do it.

01:40:06

But if we really want to love people, we should love them enough to tell them the truth. Amen.

01:40:12

Thank you so much, Kofi. Continue to spread the word about Iron Trip and Zion Radio in Oregon and beyond.

01:40:19

Or Oregon or however they pronounce it there. I'm sure you don't even know since you're in the

01:40:24

U .K. Or from the U .K., I should say. Let's see.

01:40:30

We have Joe in Slovenia. Dear brothers Chris and Justin, I'm so very thankful that you are addressing this vital topic.

01:40:38

The disastrous effects of the worst of Word of Faith heterodoxy and heresies are rampant on the mission fields around the world.

01:40:48

Please address the question of whether or not a consistent Word of Faith preaching teacher or church at the same time embrace and consistently apply the five solos of the

01:41:00

Protestant Reformation. If not, please also give specific examples of how and why these theological systems are incompatible.

01:41:10

Thank you both for your passion for the true gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Excellent question.

01:41:16

And, of course, you can claim something and have a different dictionary for the words you're using.

01:41:22

But clearly, I'm sure you agree, brother, that especially solo scriptura is being violated by the

01:41:31

Word of Faith teachers. But if you could be more detailed in your answer to Joe in Slovenia.

01:41:38

Yes. Joe, is that his name? Joe? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Joe, thank you for that question.

01:41:45

And always encouraging to hear feedback from our brothers and sisters in other parts of the world.

01:41:50

And to that point, unfortunately, Word of Faith, the face of Christianity today around the world, is one of two things.

01:41:58

It's either Word of Faith or Roman Catholicism or a mixture blending of those two. And so it truly is tragic.

01:42:05

It's not just an American problem. We export, we created it, and unfortunately we've exported it to the rest of the world.

01:42:11

But specifically to his question, Chris, I agree with you. No, it's not compatible.

01:42:17

I don't know how in the world you could have a church or a preacher that teaches Word of Faith theology and also hold to the five solas of the

01:42:26

Reformation. They're just so incompatible with one another. And my go -to sola would be just what you said, solo scriptura.

01:42:35

You cannot hold to the sufficiency of Scripture and hold to Word of Faith, NAR, even

01:42:46

Charismatic theology at the same time. They're diametrically opposed, they're mutually exclusive.

01:42:54

And to flesh that out, all of these teachers, without exception, 100 % of them, all claim that God speaks to them directly, in a direct global sense, outside of Scripture.

01:43:04

Well, if God is doing that, then you cannot say that the Bible is sufficient.

01:43:10

Because if the Bible is sufficient, then there would be no need for God to speak in a direct, quotable sense outside of Scripture.

01:43:16

And if God is doing that, then whatever He is saying to people, as I said earlier, should be just as authoritative, just as inspired as John 3 .16

01:43:25

or any other verse in the Bible. So they are mutually exclusive. You can't, on the one hand, say,

01:43:32

I believe in the sufficiency of Scripture, and on the other hand say, well, God speaks to me and He told me, da -da -da -da -da.

01:43:38

You just can't do it. Apples and oranges, oil and water, they just don't mix.

01:43:44

They're mutually exclusive. But one thing that you'll notice, 99 .9

01:43:51

% of Word of Faith churches, NAR, this theological system, 99 .99999

01:43:58

% of them would be very, very Arminian in their soteriology. It would be a very rare thing to find a church that leans

01:44:07

Word of Faith to any degree that would hold to a more Calvinistic, Reformed view of salvation.

01:44:14

Now, what can you say about the Kansas City Prophets? Yeah, Kansas City Prophets and IHOP are closely related to one another.

01:44:30

The latter rose out of the former. IHOP, you would have guys like Mike Bickle and some of those folks.

01:44:38

They are, it's basically, there's a little bit of a distinction without a great deal of difference is what

01:44:45

I tell folks. You'll find minute differences in a few areas of doctrine amongst like IHOP or Kansas City Prophets or Word of Faith, minor differences.

01:45:03

But they're, I mean, minor distinctions, but a distinction without a great deal of difference.

01:45:08

They have far, far, far more in common than they would have in difference with one another.

01:45:17

Far more in common. And you would never hear one openly critique, one from one camp openly critique another one from, you know.

01:45:26

In other words, you won't hear Mike Bickle call out Benny Hinn as a false teacher.

01:45:32

Mike Bickle, IHOP, Benny Hinn, you know, more classic Word of Faith or Bill Johnson or anything.

01:45:39

You'll never see that between them. They're very simpatico. Well, the thing that is bizarre about that is that,

01:45:48

I don't know if he's still connected with the Kansas City Prophets, but a brilliant Calvinist, C.

01:45:54

Samuel Storms, perhaps you've heard of him. He was a part of that movement. And for the life of me,

01:46:00

I cannot figure that. In fact, I remember years ago, I was trying to arrange an interview with Dr.

01:46:09

Storms on a book that he had written opposing, denouncing the excesses in Pentecostalism in the charismatic movement.

01:46:20

And Dr. Storms said to me in a phone conversation, I don't think you want me on your interview anymore because I've come to renounce a lot of what

01:46:29

I wrote in that book. So I was taken aback by that because he's not your typical zany, crazy person, at least when he's writing on theology, he's not.

01:46:41

Do you have any explanation for that at all? If I understand right, you say he has come to renounce some of what he wrote in critique of that?

01:46:50

Yes, exactly. And I'm talking about when I was trying to arrange an interview with him back in the 1990s on a program, a talk show that was airing on the station that I worked for,

01:47:02

WMCA 570 AM in New York. I worked for them and the talk show host,

01:47:07

Andy Anderson, would frequently ask me to book guests for him. And Dr. Storm wrote a book that was actually being sold in a reformed book distributor, a solidly reformed book distributor.

01:47:20

And when I called him to get an interview arranged on his book denouncing the excesses of some charismatics and Pentecostals, he said that he denounced much of what he wrote in his denouncing of these groups.

01:47:37

Wow, that's actually kind of disappointing to hear. Yeah, you're right. Sam Storms is one of the rare individuals who would hold to a more

01:47:47

Calvinistic, to use that term, view of soteriology, doctrines of grace. But he is a continuous, and by that I mean he believes in the continuance of the apostolic gifts, tongues, interpretation of tongues, miracles, physical healing, divine knowledge, revelation knowledge.

01:48:08

He would believe that those gifts continue today. I honestly don't know exactly where he is now, but I have seen

01:48:17

Sam Storms, to his credit, seen him denounce some of the excesses in this movement, and he even compared some of the excesses like being slain in the spirit and whatnot to Hindu Kundalini, and rightly so.

01:48:32

And this is recent, you've seen this? I'm sorry? Is this recent from Dr.

01:48:38

Storms? Ah, recent. I would say, gosh Chris, if I had to guess, I'd probably say it's been five or so years ago.

01:48:46

Well, that's pretty recent then. Yeah, it's pretty recent. I don't know exactly where he is now, but one of the things

01:48:55

I tell people, to be a continuous, which means you believe that all the apostolic gifts continue today.

01:49:00

I don't believe that, okay? I don't. I believe those apostolic gifts passed away and faded out of operation with the closing of the canon of Scripture.

01:49:11

I mean, that's a whole other program, I suppose. But in and of itself, believing that those apostolic gifts continue in and of itself is not heretical.

01:49:21

Okay, I don't want people to misunderstand me in that. I'm not saying if you believe that tongues are for today that you're a heretic or you're not a

01:49:27

Christian. So it's not heretical, but I do believe it's an important issue because the ramifications of that position are widespread.

01:49:37

There's a lot of ripple effects that go from that. And I think if you have a right understanding of the gift of tongues, the gift of languages, then you have to jettison the sufficiency of Scripture as well.

01:49:53

I'd have to have some time to develop that argument. But in and of itself, it's not heretical.

01:49:58

But I do tell people, know what you believe and why you believe it, and don't base your theology just off of an experience.

01:50:06

Well, I believe tongues are for today because I've experienced tongues. Well, Hindus have experienced tongues too, and they speak in tongues in the exact same way that Charismatics do.

01:50:17

So don't base your theology off of your experiences. Don't interpret the Bible by what you experience.

01:50:23

Interpret your experiences by the Bible. Amen. In fact, there was an individual that you may—I don't remember his name, but you may recall his name or who he is.

01:50:33

He claimed to have been, for at least a handful of years, the lead singer for the heavy metal rock group

01:50:43

Black Sabbath after Ozzy Osbourne left the group. And I saw, years ago, him on the 700

01:50:51

Club, talking about how he was in the starring role of at least one stage performance of Jesus Christ Superstar.

01:51:01

And even though he was a Charismatic, he says that while he was on the stage hanging from the cross, that he began to speak in demonic tongues before he was a

01:51:14

Christian. So even a Charismatic is admitting that he believes that tongues can be demonic. Yeah.

01:51:21

Yeah, it can be. It can be. And I've heard testimonies from people that are very similar to that as well.

01:51:28

Tongues can be demonic. Most—99 % of the time, what you see from tongues is emotionalism.

01:51:35

It's a learned behavior. I mean, you can teach a canary how to speak in tongues. You can just learn it. But on occasion, there are spiritual forces at work, but they're not of God, and they absolutely can't be demonic.

01:51:51

And the Corinthians—I don't want to chase a rabbit too much here, but the Corinthians, before they heard the gospel, before Paul came to Corinth and preached the gospel to them and church was born, before—in their pagan days, before they came to Christ, they were in these

01:52:05

Apollinarian -Dionysian cults, and part of their pagan worship was speaking in unintelligible, ecstatic gibberish.

01:52:13

The exact same things that we see in this movement that we've been talking about— unintelligible, ecstatic gibberish.

01:52:20

That's not of God. That's pagan. That's pagan. So, anyway.

01:52:26

Where does—in fact, this is a listener question right now. We have

01:52:31

CJ from Lyndonhurst, Long Island, New York, who says, Where does James Robeson fit into the mix?

01:52:38

I thought that he, at one time, was a fundamentalist Baptist and then later became charismatic.

01:52:44

Is that true? And, in fact, yeah, Mike Huckabee actually was on the staff for James Robeson.

01:52:51

Mike Huckabee, the former presidential candidate who's now a talk show host, and he credited

01:52:58

James Robeson for the birth of the moral majority that Jerry Falwell later turned into a larger movement.

01:53:06

But if you could, where is James Robeson on this spectrum? Yeah, that's a great question. James Robeson is—you're right, he began as a

01:53:15

Southern Baptist, non -charismatic, then he claims to have gotten the second blessing, and he became charismatic, and now he is actually a member, an apostle, actually, of the same church that Todd White goes to.

01:53:27

Wow. Yeah. Todd White and James Robeson are members of the same church, and James Robeson, one of their quote -unquote apostles, which there are no more apostles today, but at any rate.

01:53:37

So he goes to Robert Morris' church, and he is one of these guys that kind of slips in under the radar a little bit more readily than does someone like Benny Hinn.

01:53:48

And a lot of people can look at Benny Hinn and immediately tell, something's not right with this guy. Not so much with guys like Robert Morris or James Robeson.

01:53:57

Beth Moore has, up until recently, was a regular guest on James Robeson's program every

01:54:05

Wednesday. They called it Wednesdays with Beth. She was on his program every single Wednesday for years.

01:54:11

And so, yeah, he is one of these who comes across as a bit more even -keeled, but don't be deceived.

01:54:20

He teaches the same thing that these others teach, as evidenced by the fact of where he goes to church and calling himself an apostle and all this.

01:54:29

So he is definitely one to be avoided. By the way,

01:54:34

I also want to mention, if anybody wants to find out more about the New Apostolic Reformation, I did an interview recently with Doug Guyvet and Holly Pivick, who are the authors of A New Apostolic Reformation?

01:54:51

A Biblical Response to a Worldwide Movement. And it was a pretty fascinating interview. I don't know if you've heard of that book, but the interview was very good.

01:55:00

I have heard of that book. I actually got a copy of it recently, and I haven't read it yet, but I will.

01:55:05

And speaking of books, a little plug for Kosti Hinn and his pastor,

01:55:11

Anthony Wood. They are coming out with a book entitled Defining Deception, and they are going to—maybe he's already talked about this with you on his program, but their book will be coming out,

01:55:22

I believe, in February, in just a couple months here or less. And I'm really excited about the book.

01:55:28

I've got the manuscript. I'm reading through it now. It's going to be really, really good. Yeah, I already have Kosti scheduled for an interview sometime next month, and I'm looking forward to that.

01:55:38

And I know that you have a book that is on a different topic, that we have already participated in an interview discussing that book.

01:55:47

If you could just quickly plug that before we close with more relevant topics in regard to our discussion today.

01:55:55

Sure. Thank you, Chris. Yes, I do have a book entitled Do Not Hinder Them? A Biblical Examination of Childhood Conversion.

01:56:03

And in this book, I deal with some of the precautions that we need to take, must take, with our children before we baptize them.

01:56:15

Simply because a child has made intellectual ascent to some basic gospel facts does not mean that that child has been converted.

01:56:25

I take the nature of children, and I contrast the nature of children with the nature of salvation, all from Scripture.

01:56:32

And the contrast is striking. Children are easily tossed to and fro,

01:56:38

Ephesians 4. Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child, Book of Proverbs. Paul in 1

01:56:44

Corinthians 13 talks about, he says, When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child.

01:56:49

But now that I've become a man, I've done away with childish things. You take the nature of children, that they're easily tossed to and fro, and you contrast that with the nature of salvation,

01:56:59

New Testament. Nature of salvation in the New Testament uses very adult -sounding language.

01:57:05

And children are very malleable. What a child professes, or what captures a child's attention one week may be completely disinteresting to them the next week.

01:57:15

So I encourage people, teach your children the gospel. But wait, don't rush them off to the baptistry when they're 6, 7, 8 years old.

01:57:26

They're too young. They cannot possibly understand what real repentance, godly sorrow, taking up the cross, denial of self, really looks like.

01:57:37

And so that's basically what the book deals with, how to teach your children the gospel, but also some things to look for to see if conversion has really taken place.

01:57:49

And what does salvation look like? What are some things to look for? And you won't be able to tell that.

01:57:57

You just won't see these things in a 6, 7, 8 -year -old child. It's not going to be until they're older that these things will really begin to manifest in their life if God has truly saved them.

01:58:07

So thank you for that. That's it in a nutshell. And if anybody wants to find out more about Justin Peters' ministry, go to justinpeters .org,

01:58:17

justinpeters .org. Before we go, do you have any final words to those who are in the

01:58:23

Word of Faith movement or perhaps just dabbling in it or just being seduced by it initially?

01:58:30

What would you have to say? Yes, Chris, just come out. Come out. Start reading the

01:58:36

Bible, studying the way it needs to be read and studied. Listen to good, solid men, John MacArthur, Steve Lawson, some of these people that will be at the

01:58:44

G3 conference, some solid expositors, and learn good hermeneutics.

01:58:50

But if you're going to a Word of Faith church or church that is in any way dabbling with this stuff, leave it. Leave it.

01:58:56

Don't try to reform it. You're not going to change it. Get out of there and seek a good, doctrinally sound church that does exposition of God's Word.

01:59:06

That's where you'll grow. So, yeah, and be encouraged. Speak the truth and love to your family members and implore them to come out.

01:59:15

Amen. And once again, if you want to attend the G3 conference, go to g3conference .com, g3conference .com,

01:59:22

and the Justin Peters website is justinpeters .org, justinpeters .org. I thank you so much,

01:59:29

Justin, for being on the program. If you could hold on so I can say a proper goodbye to you off the air. I want to thank everybody who listened, especially those who wrote in questions.

01:59:38

I apologize to anybody who wrote in a question whose question we could not ask on air. And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater