My Open Challenge to Bill Johnson, Kris Vallotton and Bethel Church
Bethel Church, led by Bill Johnson and Kris Vallotton, is known for an emphasis on signs and wonders, including angel feathers appearing out of thin air in their services. They made this claim just recently, in February of 2024. Kris Vallotton has said he has seen angel feathers appear “on at least a couple hundred occasions.” If that is true, I have an open challenge to Bill Johnson, Kris Vallotton, and Bethel Church. If they can meet this challenge, I w
Transcript
If Bill Johnson and Chris Vallotton meet my open challenge and prove me wrong,
I will immediately and permanently shut down my ministry.
Welcome to the program, ladies and gentlemen.
My name is Justin Peters.
I hope that this finds you and your family doing well today.
Want to thank you so much for joining me for this program.
Bethel Church in Redding, California, pastored by Bill Johnson and Chris Vallotton,
world famous.
They have the Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry and they attract young people from
literally all over the world.
Young people will uproot their lives and move to Redding, California to
be trained in the Bethel School of Supernatural Ministries and people from all over the United States, indeed all over the
world, even if they don't go to school, they will pick up their lives and move to Redding, California to be
members of Bethel Church.
This is a famous church.
It is Word Faith.
It is New Apostolic Reformation and they claim to have signs and wonders
regularly occurring in their church services.
Now, some of the more famous quote unquote miracles and signs and wonders that take
place, they claim that they will heal the sick, raise the dead, no
proof of that, of course, but they also say that they have gold dust that will appear
various times and will manifest in their Bibles or on people's clothing or on the hands of face and
the hair.
So they have gold dust.
This is gold dust from heaven and also angel feathers.
Angel feathers will just magically appear in their church services and just fall out of the sky
and I haven't heard much about the angel feathers at Bethel Church because I figure they,
once they made those claims, they were pretty mocked and I figured they didn't want to
revisit that, but they have.
They have revisited it.
Believe it or not, I just happened to be watching a service that was found on YouTube.
It was being live streamed this past Wednesday night, February
21st, 2024.
Okay, as of this recording just two days ago and I'm just kind of not even seriously watching
it, just casually watching it and Heather and Ben Armstrong walk up onto the
platform and the first things out of their mouth are talking about
angel feathers.
Now, watch this.
Hey, how is everyone?
It's here, the angel feathers are already falling.
Oh, come on.
Here we go.
Are you ready?
Thank you, Jesus.
That's just like Jesus.
Come on, on Sunday night we had quite a few feathers falling in Sunday night service as well.
How many of you were here Sunday night?
Come on.
Oh, a bunch of you came early.
Oh, oh, we have to say hi to the online guests.
Yes, why don't you?
Hi, online guests.
Everybody turn around.
Wave to our online guests.
Wave to the camera here.
We love you.
We're so happy you're here.
Oh, and also to our overflow.
Well, Mrs. Armstrong, I'm not so sure that you're gonna be too happy that I was there watching
because I have an open challenge for you.
Now, you just heard Ben and Heather Armstrong, staff members at Bethel Church, get up
and the first thing out of her mouth, first words out of her mouth, oh, angel feathers, or we see
angel feathers.
They're falling already.
And Ben Armstrong says, yes, last Sunday night, last Sunday night would have been February
18th, 2024.
So Sunday evening service, they have quite a number of angel
feathers falling out of the sky.
And it happened again this past Wednesday night, February 21st,
2024.
So if you had angel feathers materializing in your services,
I am quite confident that you kept said angel feathers.
There's no way that you would have thrown these away, right?
I mean, you don't, if angel feathers show up in your services, you don't throw these
away with the trash, you know, with used paper plates and Dixie cups, right?
I mean, these are angel feathers after all.
This is from the heavenly realm.
So I am quite sure you have some of these angel feathers.
Now, angel feathers are apparently pretty common at Bethel because I've stumbled
across this article that Chris Vallotton wrote back in 2016.
And he was addressing some of the controversy that was going on about Bethel's claims of
raising dead people back to life and gold dust appearing.
And of course, angel feathers.
This is what Chris Vallotton wrote about the angel feathers in 2016.
Vallotton writes, I don't think we have taken more ridicule for anything than gold dust and feathers.
It all began one day while someone was preaching and these tiny white feathers started falling from the ceiling in the sanctuary.
It wasn't raining feathers or anything like that.
People tell tales.
Truer words never spoken, Chris Vallotton.
But they were very obviously there and easily seen.
At first, no one said anything.
We all thought there were birds in the AC ducts or something.
Then other leaders began to report the same phenomena happening in their churches.
Our maintenance staff investigated the bird theory.
No birds, feathers, or nests were discovered anywhere in the duct work or the ceiling.
It also started to happen in people's homes.
It always happens when we are talking about the things of God.
The phenomena tends to come and go.
No one at Bethel has ever preached on feathers that I know of except for
Bill Johnson and preaching on feathers here.
And it would be about 15 or maybe 14 years ago, somewhere in that area, 14 years ago probably, the
feathers started disappearing and falling in meetings.
And then they started falling in our homes and in restaurants and things like that, just unusual
things.
There are signs that make you wonder.
People say, where's that in the Bible?
Well, he said he'd cover you with his feathers.
But I digress.
But at times it is nearly impossible not to mention them when we are teaching because several of them are falling right
in front of the pulpit all at once.
Now, wait just a minute.
It's hard not to mention them because several of them are falling right in front of the pulpit all at once.
Your service, every single one of your services are
videoed at high quality, high def, expensive cameras.
I mean, y 'all got state -of -the -art stuff here.
And I watched a lot of your services.
I've never seen a single video of any angel feathers falling in front of the
pulpit.
Where are those videos, Chris Vallotton and Bill Johnson?
I mean, you make the claim right here.
They start falling in front of the pulpit all at once while you are
teaching.
Show the video.
Show the video.
Where is it?
Vallotton continues, I have witnessed this myself a couple hundred times in several
different buildings.
Okay, a couple hundred times in several different buildings, a couple
hundred times.
And let's just say, I mean, you say several or multiple angel feathers fall on
each occasion.
So a couple hundred times, let's just, let's be generous here.
Let's err on the conservative side.
Let's just say, let's say just three angel feathers at each occurrence fell.
I mean, that's the most conservative that we can get because you've said multiple and so three.
That's 600 angel feathers just that you've seen.
And we had them apparently this past Sunday night, February 18th.
And again, this past Wednesday night as of this recording, February 21st, 2024.
You should have hundreds upon hundreds.
And I would imagine more than three at each service, right?
I mean, cause three, you know, it could, that could, those could be overlooked.
So you've got hundreds upon hundreds, quite probably thousands of
angel feathers.
Where are they?
Okay, where are they?
Here's my challenge.
Take one or more of these angel feathers and have them tested to see if they come from a
bird or to see if they are from some unknown origin.
And there are several ways you can do this.
There are websites that will identify feathers for you.
Now, if these are, if these are truly angel feathers, they will not be bird feathers
because angels are not ducks.
They're not magpies.
They're not crows.
They're not red -tailed hawks.
You know, they're not ostriches.
So if they're truly angel feathers, they will not match any bird.
Angels are not birds, okay?
So take one or more of these angel feathers and see if you can identify them just
on a website or here's better.
Take them to a facility to have them tested.
Take them to the United States Fish and Wildlife Service.
Take them to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.
I am quite confident they will look at those angel feathers and tell you whether or not they
have an avian origin.
Any local college or university, I'm sure will be happy to test them for you.
Take them to the science department of any local college or university.
And California is absolutely swimming in colleges and universities with
very prestigious science departments.
So Chris Vallotton, Bill Johnson, take a couple of those angel
feathers that you undoubtedly have.
And if you say you didn't keep them, I'm going to publicly accuse you of lying
because there is no way that you would throw angel feathers away in the trash.
So if you have seen them on hundreds of different occasions, you must have many, many of
these feathers.
So take them to the US Fish and Wildlife Service, take them to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife
or to any local college or university, to the science department.
Have them tested.
I will pay for all of your expenses.
I will pay for your meals.
However much, however, whatever expenses you go to, I tell you what, I'll pay for all of your
expenses and triple the expenses that you have.
I'll triple that to make it worth your while.
And if these tests come back and the experts, the people
who would know, say that there is no bird, no known bird anywhere on the
planet that these feathers can be traced to, and these feathers are of
unknown origin, if that is their findings, then I will
immediately and permanently shut down my ministry.
This will be a public relations bonanza for you.
I am one of your most vocal and strident critics
because I believe you are all a bunch of false teachers.
You lie to people.
You give false prophecies.
You put words in God's mouth that he did not say.
You are deceiving your followers.
You are bringing untold reproach upon the name of Christ.
And quite frankly, you don't even know how to preach the gospel as evidenced by your baptisms.
So here, which are a complete and total joke.
So there's my challenge.
This would be a huge win for you, huge win.
You would shut me down permanently.
You would prove that I am wrong.
As a cessationist, I am wrong.
I will immediately and publicly apologize to you and shut down my ministry.
It will be a bonanza for Bethel, church
and the Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry.
So you have these feathers?
Post pictures of them for us to see.
And this has actually been done before.
Sid Roth had a guy named David Jones as his special guest.
And David Jones brought his collection of angel feathers, very pretty angel feathers, white
feathers, blue feathers, yellow feathers, even has them in this nice little frame.
So this has been done before.
So surely you can do it too.
I mean, easy, right?
I mean, everybody has a smartphone.
So post pictures of these feathers and go have them tested.
And if they come back of unknown origin, I will immediately and permanently shut down my
ministry.
This will be a huge windfall for you, massive,
massive.
To Bethel church members, I'm sure some of you will come across this video.
I don't hate you at all.
I don't even hate Bill Johnson and Chris Violet and I hate what they're doing because they're false teachers.
They are hirelings.
They are deceiving you.
So to Bethel church members, to students at Bethel School of Supernatural Ministries,
this isn't hard.
Your leaders have routinely said, angel feathers appear in their services.
If they don't have proof of it, then they're lying.
They are intentionally lying to you over and over and over.
This is not a one -off.
So if that is the case, why are you there?
Why are you there?
Why would you want to trust someone to be your spiritual shepherd who is
looking you in the eye, directly in the eye and lying to you?
And for the students at BSSM, members of Bethel church, people
thinking about attending there, visiting there, please don't, don't, don't do it.
This is a false church.
But I do want to close with the gospel because Bethel doesn't preach the gospel.
Here's the gospel.
You are a sinner.
You have broken God's laws.
You have lied.
You have stolen things.
You have taken things that do not belong to you.
You have taken God's name in vain.
So you're a blasphemer.
You're an adulterer at heart at least because you have looked with lust upon other people.
If you've ever done that, you're an adulterer.
Go through the 10 commandments, God's moral law.
All of us have broken God's laws thousands of times.
And just like when we break laws on earth, there's a penalty to be paid, how much more so when
we break the laws of God.
But because we have sinned against God who is eternal, the punishment of that sin is also
eternal.
And if you die in your sin, you will very rightly and very justly go to a very real place that the Bible calls
hell.
The worm will not die.
The fire will not be quenched.
There will be wailing, weeping, gnashing of teeth.
The full undiluted fury of God's wrath that burns against sin will be poured out on you for
all of eternity.
There will be no mercy.
There will be no end.
That is what your sins have earned you.
And you cannot save yourself.
There's no amount of good works that you can do to earn God's favor or to earn his forgiveness.
God sent his son, Jesus Christ, to this earth to make a way for you to escape his wrath.
Jesus came to this earth, one person, two distinct natures, truly God,
truly man.
He never laid aside his deity, by the way, as Bill Johnson and Chris Vallotton teach and others at
Bethel.
He never laid aside his deity.
He never laid aside any of his divine attributes.
Truly God, truly man, one person, two distinct natures.
The God -man lived a perfect life to the perfect pleasure of God the Father.
And then God the Son willingly laid down his life on the cross.
His life was not taken, he gave it.
And on the cross, this perfect person offered his perfect life as a perfect sacrifice
to perfectly satisfy the perfect wrath of God.
Died on the cross three days later, bodily raised from the dead, proving himself to be who he said he was,
God in human flesh.
And if you will repent of sin, turn from sin, and place your trust in the completed
atoning work that Christ accomplished on the cross, you will be saved.
You will pass from death to life.
The righteousness of Christ will be imputed to you, counted to you, even though you are not righteous,
even though you have no righteousness on your own.
The righteousness of Christ will be counted to you.
And I want to say something about repentance, because repentance is something that Bill Johnson does not
understand.
Chris Vallotton does not understand.
Dan Farrelly, none of those guys at Bethel Church understand repentance because I've watched them teach on it.
True repentance is in and of itself granted by God.
God grants repentance.
You may have heard that the word repent is in the Greek metanoia, it means to change your mind.
And that is what the Greek word means, to change your mind.
But when God grants repentance, not only is your mind changed, everything about you is changed.
Your desires are changed, your affections are changed.
You begin to love what God loves, and you hate what God hates.
The Bible speaks of two different kinds of sorrow over sin.
That's a worldly sorrow and a godly sorrow.
Second Corinthians chapter seven, the Apostle Paul says a worldly sorrow leads to death, but a godly sorrow leads
to repentance unto salvation.
What is a worldly sorrow?
A worldly sorrow is nothing more than a guilty conscience.
A worldly sorrow is that kind of sorrow that says, what would happen to me if my sin were exposed?
What would be the consequences to me?
And so we try to cover up our sin, not because we grieve over it, but because we don't want the
consequences of it.
A worldly sorrow is the kind of sorrow that Bill Johnson and Chris Vallotton have when they try to cover up
their lies, cover up their fake signs and wonders, because they don't want to
endure the consequences of being exposed for the liars that they are.
That's a worldly sorrow.
A godly sorrow, however, over sin is that sorrow which is vertically oriented.
A godly sorrow comes when we grieve over our sin because we understand that our sin grieves God,
and we do not want to grieve Him.
We do not want to grieve His person.
He has been so good, so kind, so patient, so faithful, so
merciful to us, that when we sin against Him, it grieves us that we sin,
because our sin grieves Him.
Does your sin grieve you?
Just as much as we should want a Savior from hell, we should want a Savior from our
sin.
The person who wants a Savior from hell, but not a Savior from sin, has a
Savior from neither.
If you will come to Jesus empty -handed, grieving over your sin, He
will save you.
You will pass from death to life.
Old things passed away.
Behold, all things will be made new.
You will have new desires, new affections.
You will have a love for the truth.
You will have a love for God's Word, and you will grow in discernment, and you will not fall
for the cheap parlor tricks and lies of Bill Johnson and Chris Vallotton and
everyone else there at Bethel.
They are deceiving you.
They are deceiving you.
So members there, people thinking of visiting there, students there,
please, I implore you, leave.
Find a good church that's based upon Scripture and expository preaching that's led
by a plurality of biblically qualified men, and join yourself to that church.
All right, dear ones, Bill Johnson, Chris Vallotton, prove me wrong.
Shut me down.
Prove me wrong.
Let's see the pictures of those feathers, and let's see the results, where they come from.
Until our next time together, may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of His Holy Spirit
be with you all.