WWUTT 1265 Q&A Is Todd White a Christian, Did Benni Hinn Repent, Why Someone Does Not Believe?

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Has Todd White become a Christian? What else should we expect to see in Todd's life to show that he's genuine?

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And how is his repentance not like what Benny Hinn did last year? The answers to these questions and others, when we understand the text.

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This is When We Understand The Text, celebrating five years of podcasting. As seven days a week, we study the word of Christ, that we may be made into His image.

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Tell your friends about our website, www .utt .com. Here's what's good, it's Pastor Gabe.

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Thank you, Becky. You're welcome. Five years. Five years. Five years of podcasting.

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Podcasting. Broadcasting. It's not five years of broadcasting. I've been doing broadcasting for almost 30 years.

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Yeah. It's been that long. It's been. Okay. So when I finished radio, it was 22 years.

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And then I was out of broadcasting for a little while. And now I'm doing the podcast. So it's another five years.

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So it's been 27 years. My dad told me that podcasting counts, like the way that the national religious broadcasters are calculating a person's years in broadcasting.

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Podcasting counts now. That's cool. So. Because it's the new radio, I guess. That's right.

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So even though I've been out of radio, I'm still accumulating years of broadcasting by doing a podcast.

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So now for me, it's been 27 years. Yay. 27 years of broadcasting, but five years of podcasting.

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Yes. And here is we're celebrating five years, which technically it's August 1st, because that was when we did the first program.

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But as we're celebrating five years, we're actually transferring all of our websites. So www .utt

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.com is going to be hosted by the Majesties Men. We really like the

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Majesties Men and what they are doing. And this is also to protect the ministry.

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Right. Because in case we say or do something that makes Google go, no, sorry, can't have your videos here, can't have your blog here anymore, or Podbean decides, you know, we don't want this kind of material out there on our podcast hosting site.

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Any of these secular entities that refuse to carry this kind of material, we're moving it over to the Majesties Men and everything is protected here.

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Some point, at some point, the podcast is going to move as well. But right now, it is just the main website, www .utt

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.com, and my blog, PastorGabe .com. So those are both going to the

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Majesties Men. And since August 1st is kind of the official launch day of those sites, sometime this next week

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I'll get another blog up. I'm only writing like one or two blogs a month right now. But I'm going to get...

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You've been kind of busy. That's right. There's a lot going on. Being on this new platform, I actually have to put a new blog out on the

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Majesties Men. So that's going to be next week. Well, there's enough to blog about.

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There's plenty going on. I mean, just pick your hour. Yes. No kidding. All the craziness that's going on in the world.

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It's 2020. Who knows what's going to happen next? You never know. I mean, Todd White could get saved or something.

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Something. I'm not sure about that. Yeah. In fact, the first email that we have here from Chris says,

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Good morning, Pastor Gabe. You have probably been blown up on this particular topic by now. But just in case,

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I saw this on Kosti Hinn's Facebook page and checked it out. Todd White nailed the gospel with some minor issues demonstrating some of the baggage that he's carrying over from the new apostolic reformation.

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All of that still kind of lingers. He says, I listened to it on my commute to work this morning.

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I initially was skeptical, but as he continued, he kept hitting the law and grace as expertly as Paul Washer.

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Whoa. That's quite a comparison. Yeah. Very complimentary there. I haven't tracked his entire ministry, quote unquote ministry, but I know that he has been steeped in the new apostolic reformation.

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He counts Kenneth Copeland as his mentor, and he goes around lengthening legs while telling people that they are awesome.

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I do not know if he has repented of these things, but if what he is saying in this video is any indicator, it appears that he is transitioning in a major way.

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I would be curious about your take. This doesn't sound like the kind of repent, but not really Benny Hinn stunt.

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I would hope that as he grows, he stops preaching for a while and even get some sound understanding and accountability before going back behind the pulpit in Christ.

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Chris, thank you for your email. Chris. Yes, I had seen this and it was thanks to Kosti that it came to my attention because he shared it on his

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Facebook page and also on Twitter. Right. Now, I would like to do a little bit of a comparison here.

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I want to listen to a couple of clips from this sermon that Todd White did. Okay. And then I'm going to show you how what

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Benny Hinn did last year is not the same message that Todd White is preaching.

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Right. Because a few people even on the What Facebook page, when I posted the sermon of Todd White, I was that impressed with it.

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I posted Todd White's sermon on the What Facebook page. When I shared it there, there were a few comments of people saying, well, this was just like what

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Benny Hinn did last year. Right. I'm going to show you how they're not the same. But first of all, let's just listen to what

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Todd White says here. Very unfortunately, as I was pulling out clips from this sermon, I erased one of my favorite ones.

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I didn't keep it. Aw. But it's a portion where he's just in tears over how much he hates his sin and how he sees his sin as God sees it now and knows that he offended

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God. He didn't just hurt the people around him that he hurt, but the worst part was that he offended

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God. Right. Now, that by itself, that was like it 10 minutes into the sermon or something like that.

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That's way different than Todd was teaching before. Because previously, and I've cited this and we've cited it on the

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What page before, he's said it in print, even on his own Facebook page, that he doesn't sin.

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And he'll talk about like, I've gone weeks without sinning and all that. Right. I remember hearing that. Yeah. So what he was saying in this sermon was totally different than stuff that he said before.

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Here is a clip where he realizes now he's never truly been sharing the gospel before.

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The Bible says that all are under condemnation that don't believe in Jesus. Are you with me?

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The Bible also says that everyone has the law written in their hearts. It's already there. So if I ask a good person if lying is wrong, they will tell me yes.

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If I ask a bad person if lying is wrong, they will tell me yes. So lying, thieving, adultery is cheating on your wife.

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But adultery, Jesus says, is committing it with your eyes and your heart. So like that makes the best of people, lying, adulterous thieves.

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That's crazy. And that doesn't sound like, wait a minute, you're condemning. No, I'm not. You're already condemned.

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All people are condemned, it says, by the law. It says in the Psalms, in Proverbs, it says the law converts the soul.

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The soul is converted from the law. That doesn't mean that we preach it as legalists. That just means that if people don't know that they're sinners, they won't see their need for a savior.

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This is hard for people, huh? It's hard for me. It's hard for me.

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Because I feel like I haven't preached the whole gospel. And I repent.

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I repent. You have no idea. I will not be responsible.

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I believe that when I preach that the blood of people is on my hands. I believe that when I walk by a person and don't share a witness,

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I believe that their soul is in my power. Not my power,

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I can't save them, but it's my power with my words that I can say something that can. I'm convicted.

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I'm convicted. It says to he who knows to do good and doesn't, it is. That's James 4 .17.

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Whoever knows the right thing to do and does not do it for him, it is sin. The things, even in that short little clip there, what

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Todd White was saying, it was unlike anything he's ever preached before. Yeah. There was. Complete new man.

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Yeah. There was audio. I wish I had this somewhere and I probably do, but I would not know where in my library to go back and find this.

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But there was audio from just, it was either last year or the year before with Todd White saying that he does have the power to save people.

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Like he is the one who brings about their salvation. He declares them saved and they are saved. Yeah. And there in that clip he was saying,

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I don't have the power to save them. So you see already like transformation that's happening with him saying,

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I repent. He was in tears the whole sermon. It was hard to keep my eyes dry. Was it that quiet the whole sermon?

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Yes. And it was, well, sometimes the audience would cheer. Sometimes they would clap. Well, of course.

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Because they're used to doing that for Todd's sermons. That music's playing the entire time.

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And that's kind of obnoxious. Yeah. Yeah. It's a 45 minute sermon.

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Oh. And that whole like synthesizer thing is playing the whole time. Yeah. Okay. So that was going on all the while.

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That's a little distracting. Yeah. But what he was saying, he's quoting from Spurgeon. He's quoting from Whitfield.

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He was quoting from Ray Comfort, read like a whole section of Ray Comfort from Way of the Master. And the stuff that Todd White was walking through when he was talking about being convicted by the law and resolving that with the gospel, and then even walking in righteousness.

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He talks about if you get saved and you act like you're a Christian on Sunday, but then you live like the world the rest of the week, the world is looking at you and they're going, you've got nothing for me.

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You're acting just like I do. So what difference does it make? I mean, all of this stuff that he was saying was one of the best evangelical sermons

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I've ever heard. And definitely the best one I've heard in 2020. Yeah. And when

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Kosti and I were talking about this on Twitter, I said, this is like the weirdest thing I've seen in the year 2020.

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Right. But the best. It's incredible. Yeah. So is this for real?

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Is Todd White really saved? Well, time will tell. Most definitely. But like we said, there's already some things here that are very clearly contrary to stuff that he has said before.

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Let me give you another example of this. So this is earlier in the sermon, this clip that I'm going to play here.

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And something that he says here is exactly a critique

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I made of him six years ago. Okay. So listen to Todd White here.

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When you come into the gospel, because you came in for a better life, you've come in for the wrong gospel. When you come to Jesus, because he's going to give you this and give you this, you really didn't surrender.

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See, what you're saying is that I've come to get this. What you've done is a taste test to see if it's true.

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It's the same thing as getting a buzz. Well, I'll try this Jesus thing. Maybe there's a buzz in it.

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That's not Jesus. It's full. Your goal as a Christian is to be conformed to his image, is to be transformed into his image, into his likeness, and to actually walk like Christ walked.

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Jesus didn't despise sinners, but he hated sin and he addressed it all the time. And he said words like sinners to people that were in sin.

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Okay. A critique that I've regularly made of Todd White, and I made it six years ago, is that he does not talk about sin and he does not call anybody to repentance.

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And so there he was clearly talking about sin and throughout the sermon calls to repentance, living as Christ and not just pretending, you know, plain

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Christian or something like that. And he also makes that statement in there about like, you're just, you're just looking for a new buzz, right?

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So here's the statement that I made about Todd White. This was in a blog that I wrote in September of 2014.

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And it was the review of the Wanderlust film. That's unfortunately the name of the production company,

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Wanderlust, but it was, it was their movie called The Holy Ghost. And at one section of this particular documentary film, they're, they're following Todd White and Brian Head Welch at a

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Korn concert, Korn, the, the block band, K -Korn, right.

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So they're going to people out front of the concert hall, you know, the arena or whatever.

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And they're, Todd White's doing his thing where he lengthens people's legs out. You know, that trick that he does, he sits down, he tries to pull the leg, your back is hurting because your legs are uneven.

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So right now I'm going to pray in the name of Jesus, I'm going to lengthen your leg out. Those who are familiar with Todd White knows that he does this gag.

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It's like the, the thing that is mentioned about him in the American Gospel documentary as well, that he does this gimmick.

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So anyway, they're doing that in the documentary. And that was, that was when

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I was first introduced to it that I think I'd watched a couple of videos of him doing it on YouTube before the documentary, but that was really like seeing him in action, you know, at this

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Korn concert. So here's what I wrote about Todd White there. I said, Todd White, a motivational speaker in Dreadlocks who claims to have been an atheist and a drug addict for 22 years until Christ set him free, but he doesn't actually know what that means, teams up with Brian Head Welch and Fieldy of the band

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Korn. They go out to the lobby area of an arena where scores of people are waiting to get into a

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Korn concert. Both Welch and Fieldy claim to be born again Christians, but that has to be called into question.

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First of all, their testimonies basically sound like they substituted the Holy Spirit for their former drug addictions.

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The Spirit is just their new drug trip. They talk about how God's word is amazing, but they don't quote any of it or what it has revealed to them about their sin.

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Secondly, they've not actually repented of anything. They're still in the band Korn.

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Are you familiar with Korn's lyrics? It's filthy stuff. Lead singer Jonathan Davis has a custom, a custom made

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HR Geiger microphone stand so lewd I cannot post a picture of it. That's what

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I wrote six years ago about this ministry, quote unquote ministry that Todd White was doing with Brian Welch and Fieldy.

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And here what Todd White was preaching was exactly contrary to everything that he was doing in that in that first examination that I gave of Todd White from the film

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Holy Ghost six years ago. So we're seeing something obviously change with this message.

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Now, if he continues to preach like this. So right now,

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I mean, you had people saying amen, you know, his own audience is applauding and stuff like this. Right. But if he continues to talk like this, here's one of two possibilities.

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Either praise the Lord. If this is the if this is the first scenario, people within the new apostolic reformation are going to start to see what he's saying.

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And they're also going to realize we haven't been preaching the gospel either. That would be amazing.

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And they start repenting of the false teaching that they've been doing, the false miracles that they've been doing.

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And and there's a whole revival that takes place in the new apostolic reformation, which of course would have to be renounced because there is no new new apostleship.

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Right. But but all of that would be transformed because Todd White is the first.

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The Holy Spirit through him brings about this whole revival in the NAR movement. That would be incredible.

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That would. So that's one possibility. If we want to be really, really optimistic, pray for that.

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Yes. That we could see that kind of. Just pray for that. Yes. Just pray for that. Be that hopeful and pray that what's going on in Todd White's life is genuine.

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And then he likewise is able to bring many others in that circle of influence that he's in to an understanding of the true gospel law and gospel conviction of sin, repentance, worship of Christ, renouncing these underhanded, sneaky things that they've been doing to entice people and draw them in.

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That's the Apostle Paul to the Corinthians. We have renounced underhanded ways and preach the truth of the gospel.

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So pray that that would be Todd White and the rest of this movement that he's been a part of for the past decade or so, however long this has been around, a little bit longer than that.

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That's one possibility. Second possibility. Second scenario. And this is the more likely scenario. He's going to continue in this route of preaching the same things that he just preached in this sermon.

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And people are going to start leaving him. Because they are following Todd White for the gifts that he gives.

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Itching ears. Yes. Because, right. They've been storing up for themselves teachers to scratch their itching ears.

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They want the miracle things that Todd White has been doing. They want that. They want the feel -good message that he's been preaching the entire time.

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Jesus loves you no matter what. That's what they want. So he's changing that now. And he's convicting.

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And he's in tears through the whole sermon. And he just keeps repeating over and over again,

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I'm convicted. This is convicting me. I can't preach anything else but this now. Right. Because God has been convicting me.

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And so as he's doing that, and other people start to get convicted. Like there's at one point in the sermon where he talks about,

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I'm hurt. This hurts me. And he says that God is speaking to him, you know, not really.

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I would still say that there were some that pointed that out to me. Well, Todd White says he's still having a conversation with God.

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Yeah, but what God is saying back to him is way more biblical than what Beth Moore says that God says back to her.

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Because he's talking about being pruned. And Jesus exactly talks about that in the scriptures. So that's at least what he was saying was definitely biblical.

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But he's having this conversation with God in which he says, God, this hurts. And God replies to him, well, if it didn't hurt, you'd be dead.

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Right. So it's because I'm growing you. Yeah. And I'm shaping you. I mean, that's true. Right. And that's true.

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That's exactly what we have in scripture. So there's still that, you know, those NAR tendencies, just like Chris said in his email that Todd White still has.

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And of course, we have to take what we're hearing and measure that against the gospel. This is the true gospel that he's been preaching.

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Like I said, best evangelical sermon. I was not even ashamed to put it on the what website.

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Everybody knows how critical I've been of Todd White over the years. So my question is, was that the first sermon?

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Because I mean, it sounds like he's been reading like reading

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Spurgeon and Whitefield. And for a while. For at least a little while.

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Not not a long while, but a little while. And he's he's been convicted.

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Is he just now convicted? And this is his first sermon that he's saying all this, or is this like second or third?

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This is the first sermon. Okay. I was just curious. I've not done any background.

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But somewhere in there, he mentioned that it wasn't in the clips that we played, but he mentioned that he had been on vacation and he couldn't enjoy himself over vacation because the

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Lord had been convicting him. So my guess is this was the first sermon that he preached coming out of that vacation.

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And he preached that if if I have this right, he preached that this past Sunday. So while I think so, while John MacArthur was preaching this knock them dead sermon at Grace Community Church, see, this is where our

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Lord is good. Yes. Amen. Just have faith. And John MacArthur said in that sermon, he said,

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I believe this is this is the finest hour for the church right now. Oh, yeah. The Lord is working through his church, even in the face of these tyrannical threats that are coming from our government to shut down churches.

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You got the mayor in New York City, de Blasio, who was saying, if churches and synagogues continue to meet, we're going to shut their buildings down permanently.

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Who is man against our God? That's right. I mean, you know what

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I mean? What's that saying? What's the verse? If God is for us, who can be against us? Yes. And there's there's more, though.

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There's more than just that one. Well, the one that I quoted Sunday was Psalm 118, verse six, where it says, the

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Lord is on my side. What can man do to me? That's the one I was. That's the one you're thinking of. That's what

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I said in my sermon on Sunday. So I preached the same thing, a very similar message, because we've been getting it from our governor here in the state of Kansas.

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And for the sake of my my own church body, knowing that I'm not leading them into something that was illegal, are we breaking the law with what we're doing?

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Right. I felt compelled to preach what I did on Sunday. And you can listen to that sermon.

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I had uploaded it to the podcast. But to understand, too, and also to fill the church with a boldness in Christ, that we understand our strength, our perseverance is because of our love for Christ.

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We're not trying to defy a government. Our objective is not defying the government.

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If that was our objective, our hope would be in this world. Right. That's a good point. Very good point.

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So our desire is simply to please Christ. And if the government tells us you can't worship, then our response should be the same as the apostles.

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We must obey God rather than man. As they replied in Acts four and Acts five.

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So so anyway, back to Todd White here. What was I saying? I'm sorry. So we're seeing something that's obviously changing here in his rhetoric and the things that he says, especially when

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I've followed him as closely as I have over about the last six or seven years. Now there are some that are some expressed to me that they were upset that I shared that video on the website because we don't yet know where Todd White's heart is.

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And I will admit to you that that's true. And I hope to see something a little bit more for from him.

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But consider these words from the apostle Paul in Philippians chapter one, where he says in verse twelve,

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I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel.

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Paul is talking about his persecution. So as we endure persecution in this world, we need to hold fast to the gospel.

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We need to continue to honor Christ and that be our our main objective as Christians, because then other people are going to see that not that we were trying to defy a government, but because we are trying to honor our

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Lord. Right. And that will be the testimony to unbelievers, what they see us doing.

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So that verse 13, so that it has become known throughout the whole Imperial Guard and to the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ.

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And most of the brothers, having become confident in the Lord by my imprisonment, are much more bold to speak the word without fear.

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Some indeed preach Christ from envy and rivalry, but others from goodwill.

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The latter do it out of love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel. The former proclaimed

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Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, but thinking to inflict me sorry, thinking to afflict me in my imprisonment.

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What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth,

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Christ is proclaimed. And in that, I rejoice. So Todd White most definitely proclaimed

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Christ in that sermon. Yes. And for anybody to listen to that, I was not ashamed because it was such a great convicting message that pointed straight to Christ.

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And as far as I could tell from that sermon, that was Todd White's desire, was not to draw attention to himself, but to instead point to Christ.

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And for the people that were in his congregation, a church? Church. Yeah.

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It is a church. If it's the church I'm thinking of, it's the one that he has down in the Dallas area. Okay. Well, the people attending that day to hear the gospel,

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I mean, that's amazing. Right. Some of them probably were hearing that for the very first time. The very first time.

25:41

Yeah. That is worth rejoicing. Amen. Amen. Especially since he admits there that he hasn't ever preached this before.

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And if those people are there because of Todd White, then that's all they'd ever heard is the

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Todd White stuff he's been preaching the last six or seven years. They haven't heard this message. Well, at one point in the sermon, he says, it's taking me 16 years to get this.

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So he's been ministering for 16 years and has never preached on sin and repentance. And I...

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Yeah, obviously. Yeah. I can testify at least to the last six or seven years that he hasn't been preaching

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Christ. But here he does. And so, if it's not genuine,

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I at least rejoice in that the gospel was preached at his church on Sunday, which had not been done yet, and that there were people there who heard it.

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In this, I rejoice. Pray for this man that the conviction that he has experienced is indeed genuine.

26:37

Now, Cynthia, in a follow -up question to exactly this scenario, has asked us, is there a biblical mandate outlined in scripture for restoration for Todd White?

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There would seem to be a logical process to follow, but is there anything like flat out outlined?

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I was just chatting with a friend a few minutes ago when she sent it to me, and 1 Timothy came to mind, but I didn't quite see it.

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Of course, it's two in the morning when she was writing this, good night. And she said, I mean, quoting

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Comfort and even uttering the names of Spurgeon and Whitefield, please Lord, let this be real.

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Yes. That would be awesome. And I am praying for that. And I think that we all should too. Skepticism is fine, especially considering what he's been preaching in the name of Christ for more than a dozen years.

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It's okay to be skeptical, but don't let it be to the point of that you're skeptical of God's power to change this man.

27:38

Don't let your skepticism go that far. Because if it is... It's still possible, but it could be,

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I mean, it could be like a... A flash in the pan. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.

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It could be something momentary. I mean, we know that Todd White has preached feel good emotional sermons for years.

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So if this is just his latest emotional kick, what's going to happen when it starts to get really hard?

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Right. Is he going to stick with it or will he abandon it? And that's really going to be the test.

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When people start turning away from it and he starts getting persecuted by his own circles for what he's preaching now, that's going to be the true test to see, is he willing to endure that for Christ?

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Is he willing to suffer the loss of all things? Now, as Cynthia is asking here, is there some sort of restoration process that needs to happen?

28:33

No, there's nothing that's outlined in scripture like that. One of the things that I would be greatly concerned about is elevating him or platforming him too quickly.

28:41

That's what I was thinking too. I think that we did that with Kanye West. And I had real problems with that.

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I still do. You've done that with a lot of people though. Yes. So, I mean, even, you know,

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Kanye was preaching or had a preacher come who was a graduate of master's and all this.

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So a lot of reform folks were even getting behind that going, hey, he's got a master's guy that's preaching at his concerts.

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Right. But it just there wasn't enough there for me to be convinced that this was genuine.

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And so far, I'm still not convinced with Kanye West. There's a lot of narcissism there, a lot, a lot of narcissism.

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Yeah. So anyway, but that's another subject. The important thing is not to jump on this too quickly for his sake, for Todd's sake.

29:27

Right. I was thinking, would it be the kind of thing where he should like do what

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Saul did? Right. And that was what I was going to say in response to Cynthia. So when

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Paul was saved. Saul became Paul. Saul became Paul. Yeah. He was always

29:45

Paul. And he was still always Saul. But that's why I said Saul. But yeah, right. The name changed because he became an apostle to the

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Gentiles. And so he had to use his Greek name, which was Paul. Check. So that the Hebrew name

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Saul would not be the turnoff to the Gentiles. Got it. So anyway, as Paul first began preaching after his conversion, he was there in Damascus, same city where he was saved.

30:10

And he's preaching now about how the Christ is Jesus. And the people are going, wait, what?

30:18

We thought you were here to round up Christians. What's going on? Yeah. And so according to Paul's testimony in Galatians, what happened after that is he left and he went into Sinai to be with the

30:32

Lord for three years before he came back and began his apostolic ministry. So we did see at the beginning of his ministry, right after his conversion, there was confession of the

30:44

Christ is Jesus. Galatians chapter one, verse 11, for I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man's gospel, for I did not receive it from any man, nor was

30:57

I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. For you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how

31:04

I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it. And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people.

31:14

But when he who had set me apart before I was born and who called me by his grace was pleased to reveal his son to me in order that I might preach him among the

31:23

Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with anyone, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me, but I went away into Arabia and returned again to Damascus.

31:34

So that was kind of the period of Paul who went away for a while.

31:40

So verse 18, then after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him 15 days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James, the

31:47

Lord's brother. So going on from there. So I would hope that something like that would happen with Todd White.

31:53

And I know that Costi has said that he's reached out to those people who are part of his circle that are connected with him.

32:00

Of course, Costi came out of this. Todd knows who Costi is. And so I hope they're able to connect.

32:07

Costi's able to coach him through this stuff. He's able to talk with somebody sound. And Costi's a person that he didn't jump right away into pastoral ministry.

32:18

He was under Anthony Woods teaching for a little while at that church and was learning how to be patient, was learning how to calm down.

32:29

In that interview that we had with Costi, he talked about how he would, like he was just awakened to, oh my goodness,

32:36

I was a false teacher for so many years. And Anthony's like, yes, you were. And so Costi's like, well, we got to explode about this.

32:44

What do I got to do? So he could have written the book right then. He could have signed the big book deal.

32:49

I'm going to blow open the whole Benny Hinn empire. But instead, he was taught to calm down, to learn self -control, to learn temperance, and to learn humility, knowing that this is about Christ.

33:04

It's not about making a name for Costi Hinn. It's about exalting Christ. And so there has to be that period of humility, which

33:12

I hope would be the case for Todd. And I would encourage, I mean, the Christian body, whatever influence I've got through this broadcast, don't rush to elevate him too quickly on this.

33:22

I think it's good for us to be sharing these clips of this sermon and see that there is a transformation that is happening and pray that this continues on.

33:31

That's what I was going to say, pray for him. Right. But don't start like pulling him into our conferences and lifting him up on platforms that, oh, we got to book him in this church and this church and this church.

33:41

Because now, suddenly, he's moved from the influence and the money that he was making within that circle of influence now to another circle and still able to have that kind of popularity and that money when there needs to be greater fruit of repentance that's taking place there, bearing a fruit of repentance.

34:00

It's just replacing it with another addiction, if you will. Just like he talked about there. Right. So we can't let him replace this ministry with a new ministry without some realizing what it is that he had done.

34:11

All the lies that he had been committing under the tent of the new apostolic reformation that he was preaching in.

34:20

Right. I mean, the leg lengthening thing, I hope he sees how much of a lie that was.

34:26

I don't know what kind of money Todd White made, but I hope there's like some sort of Zacchaeus kind of repentance that happens there.

34:33

There's still some more things that need to take place here, things that we need to be praying about. He was a lying, manipulative charlatan.

34:40

And now if he knows the true gospel and he's been convicted in his heart over the sin that he had done before, that has to include the way that he preached before.

34:48

So we're hoping for that. We need to continue to pray for that. So on that note, here's how

34:54

Todd White's sermon that he preached on Sunday was not like. Yes, I forgot about this.

35:01

Yes. So this is not like what Benny Hinn did last year. How is it not like Benny Hinn?

35:07

So when Benny Hinn made those headlines, what was this back in September? I can't remember. Hang on. I've actually got my blog up here.

35:15

It was, yeah, September 4th. So this video broke on September the 3rd of him repenting from the prosperity gospel.

35:24

Yeah. It seems like it was just yesterday or last week or something. Yes. I wrote my blog on September the 4th, the next day, saying

35:34

Benny Hinn has not repented. Even though he said it, he had not done it.

35:40

Yeah. Justin Peters was the same way. I mean, he did a video. He didn't repent either? Yeah.

35:47

I'm just kidding, guys. I'm just kidding. No. He was saying the same thing. He was saying, no, Benny Hinn has not repented.

35:53

And Brandon Kimber with American Gospel was also posting that on his Facebook page. Yeah. No, Benny Hinn has not repented.

35:59

Yeah. So here is the clip of Benny Hinn's, quote unquote, repentance.

36:05

Yeah. And see if you can notice the difference here. And I will tell you now something that is going to shock you.

36:12

I think it's an offense to the Lord. It's an offense to say, give $1 ,000. I think it's an offense to the

36:19

Holy Spirit to place a price on the gospel. I'm done with it.

36:29

I will never again ask you to give $1 ,000 or whatever amounts because I think the

36:35

Holy Ghost is just fed up with it. Are you, did you hear me?

36:42

I think that hurts the gospel. So I'm making this statement for the first time in my life.

36:49

And frankly, I don't care what people think about me anymore. So I had a guy, well,

36:59

I'll tell you who, it was Dan Willis. I love Dan with all my heart. I said, don't you dare preach that message again.

37:06

When they invite me to telethons, I think they will not like me anymore. Because if you look at the word of God, I don't want to get into it now.

37:19

Am I shocking you? Good. Let's have a high five on this one. If I hear one more time, break the back of debt with $1 ,000,

37:31

I'm going to rebuke them. I mean, he's just doing this for applause and he's like, hey, let's have a high five.

37:38

He's making it all about him. Yeah. It's totally about him. He even threw a friend of his under the bus.

37:45

Completely under the bus. So it's not, there's no repentance in tears. I'm not going to name names. Let me just tell you, it's this guy.

37:52

Oh my goodness. Yeah, that was totally. And then as Brandon Kimber pointed out also on his

37:59

American Gospel page, that he just turned around a couple of days later and was on TV saying, you know,

38:07

Psalm 146 says this, so send $146. But it wasn't $1 ,000. It wasn't $1 ,000.

38:13

That's true. It wasn't $1 ,000. Because he's just so sick of that. The Holy Spirit was sick of that.

38:20

Yeah. There was no conviction there. No mourning, nothing. Whereas Todd White's crying all the way through his sermon.

38:26

He's saying things that are exactly contrary to what he said before. And so we're just waiting to see.

38:33

We're waiting to see that this is a genuine move of the Holy Spirit in his life. And I pray that it is. And Todd seemed to be more geared towards,

38:40

I mean, like putting your eyes on Christ rather than himself. Whereas Benny Hinn was still, give me attention, give me attention.

38:48

Yeah. You know, he was even stopping for applause and things like that. Right. Turning around and high -fiving people. Yeah. That was really, when

38:54

I, somebody told me about it and I went and found the video. And it was at that point when he turns around, he's high -fiving people.

39:00

I'm sitting there going, this isn't repentance. Are you kidding me? No joke. Give me a break.

39:08

And then, I can't remember if this was Brandon that pointed this out. I said it in my blog.

39:14

But I mean, this goes back to the 80s, probably the late 70s. Benny Hinn has been repenting of the prosperity gospel for a generation.

39:25

I thought, was it Brandon that said that or was it Kosti? It could have been me.

39:30

I don't know. Or you? It could have been on my blog. I don't remember. It could have been any of you. Yeah. I wrote about it even in my 2019 year in review book when

39:39

I covered this. So yeah, I mean, Benny Hinn has been repenting since the late 70s.

39:44

He's been renouncing the prosperity movement. Whenever it's expedient for him to do so, when it benefits him, he'll do it.

39:52

But then he'll turn right back around and do something else. Different audience. That audience didn't hear him repent, and they don't know the difference.

40:00

They're just storing up teachers to scratch their itching ears. Yeah. And he also grew up in the era where there wasn't recordings that were well -

40:09

Yeah. It wasn't a YouTube era. Yeah. There we go. When he made his fame and fortune. Honestly, I don't think it matters.

40:16

Probably not. These people who do these false miracles and stuff like that and con people with them, it wouldn't matter if that was on YouTube or not.

40:25

True. All this stuff is right out there. And Mormonism, the internet should be destroying

40:31

Mormonism. Like all you - That is very true. All you have to do is just one little bit of a search on the kind of stuff that Mormonism believes, and in five minutes, you're like, oh, this is such a fraud.

40:42

Mm -hmm. But yet, Mormonism still has 15 million adherents in the world, so in the

40:50

United States included. Let's see. Well, it's Friday. I didn't mention that the email address.

40:56

If you want to submit a question to When We Understand the Text, send it right there, whenweunderstandthetextatgmail .com.

41:04

And we got that question from Chris. We got the follow -up from Cynthia, who sent us that message.

41:12

And this next one here, this is from Sienna, and she says, hi,

41:17

Pastor Gabe. I'm hoping that you can help me out. A friend of mine is a bishop. He believes that we don't go to hell, only our sins do.

41:25

He's a big supporter of the LGBTQ community, believes in evolution, and claims that while the Bible is inspired by God, it isn't the word of God.

41:34

I guess every view that he has is shaped by the fact that he doesn't believe the Bible is God's word.

41:40

So it would be impossible for me to refute him on those topics if he would not submit to Scripture.

41:46

So apart from 2 Timothy 3 .16, are there any verses that I can use to help him to understand that the

41:52

Bible is the word of God? Well, first of all, we know that 2 Timothy 3 .16 says that all

41:58

Scripture is breathed out by God. And that, of course, is the most obvious passage where we have a statement made about the

42:08

Bible being God's word. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

42:22

Consider these words that Jesus said in John chapter 8. He said to them,

42:29

John 8 verse 42. There is no truth in him.

42:59

When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

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But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me. Which one of you convicts me of sin?

43:10

If I tell the truth, why do you not believe me? Whoever is of God hears the words of God.

43:17

The reason why you do not hear them is because you are not of God. That's the problem with your bishop friend.

43:24

It's not that he needs to understand that Second Timothy 3 .16 is speaking of all

43:30

Scripture being the word of God. It's that he hates the word of God because he loves his sin.

43:36

That's really the problem there. So I would recommend sharing him that passage from John chapter 8 and say, why is it that you don't see that the

43:43

Bible is the word of God? Because you know that it speaks against these things that you're clinging to and loving, which the

43:49

Bible says are sin. And you don't believe the truth because there is no truth in you.

43:55

You are of your father, the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires, to do

44:01

Satan's desires. So that's where I would go with that. Not necessarily building a robust theology on understanding how the

44:09

Bible is the word of God. Certainly don't sheathe your sword. So as we have, you know,

44:15

Ephesians chapter six says that the word of God is the sword of the spirit. Don't put it away.

44:22

You just are going to need to use a different section of Scripture to convict him of this sin that he loves so much.

44:28

Yeah. Treat him as an unbeliever. Yes. Because he obviously is.

44:33

Yeah. He's not a believer. If he doesn't believe that the word of, I mean, if the Bible isn't the word of God, then

44:40

I mean, that's number one. Right. And even more than an unbeliever, he's a wolf in sheep's clothing.

44:46

Oh yeah. Because he's a bishop. He's a bishop. True. Very true. So you're talking about a false teacher, a false prophet.

44:52

That's the way that he needs to be regarded. And maybe going to second Peter chapter two, read that section where it says that false teachers will arise among you.

45:02

Just as there were false prophets that arose among the people, referring back to those false shepherds that led

45:07

Israel astray. That's what he's doing to the church, to those who believe that they are serving

45:12

God, but they're not. They're serving the father of lies, Satan. So pray about that.

45:20

Meditate on the word. Read what Jesus says in his exchange with the Jews there in John chapter eight.

45:25

That's one section of scripture I would encourage you to focus on. But of course, we also have in a second

45:32

Peter chapter one verses 20 through 21. Know this first of all, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation.

45:41

For no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will. But men moved by the

45:46

Holy Spirit spoke from God. So it's interesting that your bishop friend says that he's not convinced that the

45:53

Bible is the word of God. It's it's not God breathed, but it's inspired by God.

45:59

Well, what's I mean, what do you what's the difference? Good question. This we're talking about the inspiration of the

46:06

Holy Spirit here that wrote the scriptures. Every word that has been written down for our benefit came from the

46:12

Holy Spirit of God through the inspiration of the of the Holy Spirit. Still God breathed, but also

46:18

God inspired. So what's the distinction you're making there between God breathed and inspiration?

46:23

More excuses. Yeah, just more excuses, right? Like I said, go back to John eight, read that and convict your bishop friends heart through through the words of Christ, what he says there.

46:37

This next email. This is from Cliff and Sarah. Hi. Hey, Pastor Gabe, Cliff from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada here.

46:46

Thank you for doing this Q &A each week. I often listen with my wife on car drives. Yay. It's fun, fun for me and my bride to discuss the issues with you and your bride.

46:57

Oh, yay. I appreciate your graciousness response or your gracious responses.

47:03

But I'm especially thankful for your stern older brother responses like the

47:08

Hawk Nelson stuff. We were doing a few couple of months ago. It reminds me that we're in an era where most professing

47:15

Christians are like Jeremiah in the quotation of Jeremiah 20 verse nine, but never progressed to the rest of the verse.

47:23

If I say I will not remember him or speak anymore in his name, then in my heart it becomes like a burning fire shut up in my bones and I am weary of holding it in and I cannot endure it.

47:35

It's Jeremiah 20 verse nine. Most are in agreement with Jeremiah's initial thought experiment by thinking and many even saying

47:41

I will not remember him or speak anymore in his name. So thank you for not holding it in for not being weary of speaking in Christ's name.

47:50

Yeah. And that particular section in Jeremiah chapter 20, Jeremiah was being persecuted and it was the chief priest of the temple that beat him for the things that he was saying in the name of God, the words that were given to him by God.

48:05

And so Jeremiah was frustrated with speaking God's word and yet was being persecuted for it.

48:12

But he said, if I try to shut this up, if I try to not speak in the name of God anymore,

48:18

I will be weary of holding it in and I cannot endure it. So Jeremiah could not help but to speak in the name of God.

48:26

Hey, persecution's tough. Jeremiah was known as the weeping prophet. And so to be persecuted,

48:32

I have a thicker skin than most and I know that to be persecuted is really hard even to endure name calling and to have yourself smeared on social media and stuff like that.

48:45

You know, the old adage sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me. We know that's a lie.

48:51

Words can be even more hurting than the sticks and stones can be sometimes.

48:58

Even David lamented his enemies in the Psalms and how they used words to persecute him.

49:05

Don't let anybody tell you that true persecution is getting beaten with, you know, rods and threatened with guns.

49:12

That is a form of persecution. But the words and the slander that gets spread about us is persecution also.

49:19

And Paul said that for Christ's sake in 2 Corinthians 12, for his sake then,

49:26

I endure these persecutions, hardships, calamities, even the bad things people will say about him.

49:34

Even the negative comments, he lumps that in with persecution. So don't just think that persecution is a thing that people do with weapons.

49:43

Words are weapons. And if you cannot stand the persecution that comes when people say things about you, if you can't handle that, you're not going to handle it when somebody comes at you with a gun either.

49:57

Yeah, no. Definitely not. As I said in the sermon on Sunday, we need to have a boldness for Christ.

50:03

And our strength comes from Christ and the Spirit of God that is within us to stand even in the midst of these times.

50:09

And unfortunately, very unfortunately, it's not just the leftists and the state that are attempting to discourage us.

50:18

There are even our own brothers and sisters in the Lord, those whom we would call our brothers and sisters in the Lord.

50:24

Jeremiah was being persecuted by the chief of the temple. We're seeing pastors that are stepping out and saying, why are you having church?

50:31

Why aren't you wearing a mask? You don't love your neighbor. And we have this division that's happening among the brethren.

50:40

So I understand. I understand Jeremiah's lament there. I sympathize with that, even though my skin can tend to be thicker than most.

50:49

But we must find our boldness is in Christ. It's not in our own ability to endure these things.

50:54

We must turn to and cling to Christ. Most definitely. So Cliff goes on, my wife and I are wondering if you can give us tips about learning and teaching friends how to biblically discern whether a news source article or report is factual or merely gossip.

51:11

How can we better discern whether a random blog post or YouTube video about insert conspiracy theory or scary sounding hypothesis is legitimate or not?

51:20

And how can we even begin to fact check or verify such things? I remember you previously mentioned several news sources you regularly check out.

51:29

Could you list those again, please? Many thanks from America's hat, Canada.

51:35

Right now it's a red hat, but that means the liberal leftist party is in power. We're backwards from you guys and that our conservative party is blue and the liberal party is red.

51:45

In Christ, Cliff and Sarah. Well, thank you so much for your email. I think most of our stuff is from Canada this week.

51:52

Oh, yeah. Seems like most of our emails have come from Canada because Cynthia was from Canada, right? Yeah. Cynthia's from Canada.

51:58

All right. All right. So news sources. Here are the sources that I gave last time and they're under the what website www .utt

52:07

.com. Click on links, scroll down, and there's a section that says news from a

52:13

Christian worldview. Albert Mueller is back on the briefing on Monday. So the briefing is one that I recommend is as August is ramping back up again, he's going to be back on the briefing.

52:26

Discern, which is Adam Ford's baby, Adam Ford Comics, the guy that created the

52:31

Babylon Bee. He's got a news site called Discern, D -I -S -R -N is how you spell that.

52:38

So Cliff, as you're talking about, how can I be discerning about news? Check out Discern.

52:43

Yeah. And I really think that as far as like an online news source goes, you get quick facts, brief stories, you get them quickly.

52:53

Discern is top of the list. They're doing great. And even some of those other news sites out there are starting to grab

53:00

Discern articles and share them. Fox News, Drudge Report, they're all grabbing

53:06

Discern articles and sharing those articles. That's awesome. Yeah. Very quickly, Adam Ford has built himself up as a credible news agency that you can rely on getting good news sources from a

53:17

Christian worldview perspective. Wonderful. I still recommend World Magazine and you can listen also to their podcast,

53:24

The World and Everything In It, which is about a half an hour long. That's what I've been listening to while I haven't had

53:30

Albert Moeller every day. Ah, yes. And James White. So I was in the kitchen one day fixing lunch and Becky comes walking through the kitchen and she goes, she goes, hey babe, hey

53:42

James. I did. True story.

53:47

Because, yeah. I'm like, oh, he's back. He's visiting again. He's in our kitchen talking.

53:52

It's James White. And Alpha and Omega has been doing the dividing line a lot more frequently since COVID.

54:00

James isn't going anywhere. Dr. White's got to stay home, you know, so he's, there was one week he had,

54:06

I think, seven episodes. Every day of the week. Might've been six, but you know, six days in the week he had a new episode.

54:13

There's a lot going on. I told you. You can just pick your hour. Yeah. Tons of stuff there.

54:19

So anyway, World Magazine, I mentioned World Magazine. Oh, the World Wide News, World.

54:26

Oh, World News in Three? Yeah, that. Yeah. So that's a very quick, and that's a video that you can use.

54:31

On YouTube. Yeah. And I don't have that one linked. It's about three, four minutes long.

54:37

It's called World News in Three, but sometimes it runs four minutes. Sometimes they'll even say it's a special report, so this is going to be a little bit longer today.

54:44

Right. But check that one out. So you're getting - But that's through the World Magazine.

54:50

That is also through World Magazine. Now I will say this, and very carefully, I'll say this very carefully.

54:56

There are some people at World Magazine that are obviously getting influenced by the woke stuff that's going out.

55:02

But there are also people at World Magazine that are very clearly not. So you actually have the balance of both there.

55:11

Don't read World thinking that they're all against the woke stuff, because that isn't necessarily the case.

55:17

There are some that are being influenced by woke, but others that are not. Pray for that ministry, because what

55:24

World Magazine does is great. They have been a faithful Christian world news organization for decades now.

55:30

Yeah. And if you sign up for World's The Sift, that was the thing that I mentioned last time we were talking about this.

55:37

So you get The Sift delivered to your inbox on email. S -I -F -T? Yeah, S -I -F -T.

55:43

But you're gonna go to World Magazine's website to get that. Okay. And submit your email address, and you get

55:48

The Sift every day. So it's very quick news stories that are just kind of catching you up on major events that were happening while you were sleeping.

55:56

Oh, cool. And then the other one that I mentioned there that's on our website too is Christian Headlines from the

56:02

Salem Web Network. And that one goes either way. Sometimes they're just reporting facts.

56:08

They're not even trying to give an angle on it, which is the good part of Christian Headlines. But they do lean a little bit more toward the progressive side of Christianity, I think.

56:20

I think they're fair in their reporting, but they're probably leaning more.

56:27

I won't say too much there. I think they try to be factual.

56:32

I think that's the case with Christian News Headlines. And then there's Baptist Press as well.

56:38

Most of that's gonna be Baptist News, but they do a pretty decent job updating you on some of the events that are going on around the world.

56:45

As far as how to be discerning with how you read your news, I can't tell you because we're out of time.

56:52

So thank you for... Check out those news sources for now. I may come back to this question again next week.

56:58

Okay. But thank you so much for listening, and don't forget that you can submit your questions to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com.

57:05

Let us pray. Yes, let's. Heavenly Father, we thank you again for this time. We want to lift up Todd White to you, and we pray that this thing that's happened in his heart is genuine and it is real, because there are a lot of people that are influenced by him and some of those other ministers in the

57:22

New Apostolic Reformation, including Francis Chan, who's been sucked into that. So maybe we have lost

57:28

Francis but gained Todd. Hopefully we see the Spirit move through their hearts and convict them further and lead them to a truth and a knowledge of your word and the true gospel that comes from Christ as testified by your

57:42

Holy Spirit. We pray for many Christians in the U .S. and Canada and around the world who are being persecuted for their faith, that we would stand strong in the midst of these difficult days, that even during a disease that is causing the crisis that it has with COVID -19, that we're making wise decisions there.

58:03

We want to honor each other. We want to be careful of one another's conscience, but most of all, we want to honor

58:11

Christ and help us to love our neighbor as Christ has said to love our neighbor, not the way that the world says that we love our neighbor, but in those ways that are honoring to the

58:20

Lord and for the benefit of the body of Christ. Bring us together. May we gather in our churches again and sing the mighty praises of God, our

58:29

King. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. This is

59:37

When We Understand the Text, celebrating five years of podcasting. We're not broadcasting?

59:44

No, it's podcasting now. It's podcasting now, after five years. After five years.