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Mary Bateman. Maybe you never heard of her, but you are intimately acquainted with the charismatic theology that drove her. Charismatic chickens?
Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.
In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.
Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry.
My name is Mike Abendroth. I don�t seem loud enough in my headphones. If you listen to this show, which you are now, I�m wondering if you would listen on Spotify. My son, Luke, said, �Hey, Dad, you should be on Spotify.
Who knows how much it costs a month, but I guess if more people would listen, then we might give it a shot. You can write me, Mike, at NoCompromiseRadio .com. I have a variety of things for this episode.
The first thing I have is to discuss a little bit about a person named Mary. When I say Mary, what do you think of? Well, you might think of the Virgin Mary, or you think about Medjugorje, Mary, Medjugorje.
Those are hard words to say. I�m talking about, of course, the most famous, infamous Mary, Mary Bateman. Mary Bateman. You know, when you think about Mary Bateman, if you did like a little word association, what might come to your mind?
And the Mary Bateman I�m talking about is from England, and she was born in 1768. And most people, when they think of Mary Bateman, they think of poison. They think of con artists. And I just want to talk about her a little bit today.
She did die in prison, around 40 or 41 years old, by hanging Mary Bateman. Now I�m not laughing that she was a fraud, and she got hung, or anything like that. But I�m laughing because it�s interesting.
I don�t know why I�m laughing. It�s probably inappropriate. I�m laughing. I�m ceasing to laugh. I�m interested in this because there�s a charismatic element. There�s a theological element to this. Mary Bateman, she was called the Yorkshire Witch.
Hmm. Interesting. And she, this English lady, worked as a dressmaker. There�s a little burglary here, there. However, the internet says, �During these early years of her marriage to John Bateman, she also undertook several robberies and was caught several times escaping prison by bribing those who witnessed her activities.
Okay. According to Summer Stevens, she worked as an abortionist also, so there�s nothing to laugh about there, of course. But here�s the part that I want to talk about today on the radio. She joined some prophetesses, specifically Joanna Southcott, and thought this would be a peripetoir, I guess.
Looking back, if you�re a scam artist, there�s another way to scam people, right? We watch people on TV, Christian TV, and watching them scam folks. I�m not talking about conservative charismatics or real charismatics who are Christians.
I�m talking about the scam artist ones. And she started this hoax. And the hoax was, there�s a chicken, and I mean, I can�t make this up, there was a chicken. And these chickens, one in particular, would lay an egg.
And when the egg would come out, it would say, written in English, �Christ is coming� on the eggshell. She was known as the prophet hen of Leeds, Christ is coming. Now it�s true that Christ is coming, that�s true.
And it�s true that the eggs came out of the chicken. But it was discovered later that those eggs already came out. She used some acid to etch �Christ is coming� on the egg. And now here�s the weird part, I�ll just read right from the internet.
And she, quote, �reinserted them into the hen�s oviduct end quote. Well, some people approached her. They said they had chest pains. She said, Bateman said, that they had been put under a spell and then began giving them pudding with poison.
She was caught, they found her guilty. She said that she was 22 weeks pregnant and therefore couldn�t be hung. And they asked some people to assess that to see if that was true or not. And the internet says 12 married women were sworn into the jury, conducted a physical examination of Bateman, concluded she was not pregnant and thus able to be executed.
Well, hung alongside two men, March 20th, 1809. Now it gets stranger. Could it be stranger? According to the internet, after she was killed by hanging, they sent her body to the Leeds General Infirmary and they displayed her body and the public could come and watch and you would charge them three pence to come look at the body.
They dissected the body over three days and gave medical students the opportunity for money to watch and to see what was going on. And then on the third day, they let women buy some tickets to go watch.
Could it get any weirder? Yes. According to this particular article that I�m reading, strips of her skin were tanned into leather and sold as magic charms to ward off evil spirits. The tip of her tongue was collected by the governor in Ripon Prison and two books from the library at Mecksboro House were covered in her skin.
The books were named Hurt of Sedition, How Grievous It Is to a Common Wealth by Sir John Cheek and also Arcadian Princess by Richard Banwath. We've since lost the books. They wrote a book about her that wasn't covered in her skin called The Extraordinary Life and Character of Mary Bateman, twelve editions later, and they did do a BBC, British Broadcasting Company show about Mary Bateman.
What does this have to do with anything, a no-compromise radio? Well, A, not much, in all seriousness. The question really here is, when I talk to my friends who are continuationists, who don't believe in cessationism, and when someone says to me, �Are you a cessationist
The answer is yes, because I think the sign gifts that authenticated both the messenger of God and the message from God, we don't need those anymore because if you'd like to have authentication, you just compare to what people say with what's in the Bible.
Therefore, I don't need it. Anybody that would say, �Show me a Bible verse that there's cessationism. Well, I don't argue with biblicists in that fashion. Show me a Bible verse is not adequate enough.
Sometimes there are Bible verses for things to help us, but that's just a kind of a biblicistic way, a solo scriptural way to try to make some argument. Show me a verse where they still exist, or show me some people that do actual New Testament signs today, raising people from the dead.
The healing in the New Testament was organic, it was instantaneous, except for one occasion that Jesus delayed the healing because he did it for a theological reason, a practical reason. Therefore, we don't see these organic, instantaneous healings today that were done in front of people who were unbelievers, but they didn't deny it, they attributed the works of Jesus to Satan, of course.
The issue here is Christ is coming. Why? Why do I need an egg to say that? Most every morning I get up, well, every day I get up, but most mornings I get up and I go have some coffee and then a couple eggs, maybe a little bit of butter in there, maybe a little bit of cheese.
Now that my nuclear stress test for my heart came back good, now I can start having cheese galore. So the question is not, well, it was a false thing that was said, but the way she did it, of course, it's obvious that it was wrong, and I don't need that.
Second Peter chapter 3, there's a promise of Jesus coming back, Mark 13, lots of New Testament, Titus 2, eagerly awaiting, right? We are looking forward to the Lord's return, the book of Revelation, Revelation 19, we see him coming back.
I just don't need a chicken. Who comes up with that? Let's see, how could I convince people? The prophet Hen of Leeds. We have the word, and when Peter says in second Peter chapter 1, I, Peter, have seen the transfigured Lord Jesus, and I have heard the words of the Father, commending the Son.
This is a preview of the Lord's return. He's going to come back, and this is how great he is, and that's basically why second Peter 1, the transfiguration account, was there, because the false teachers kept saying, Jesus is going to come back.
Oh yeah? Yes, he is going to come back. His timeframe is different, his timetable is different, he doesn't see time the way we do, and in addition, he always keeps his word. Just to give you a little preview of coming attractions, here's the transfiguration.
He's coming back with full glory. I don't need a prophet Hen to tell me Jesus is coming back, jamming eggs back. How do you put an egg back in the oviduct? I don't know. I mean, there's some acid-etched egg thing there, but I don't know, I've never actually seen the actual thing, right?
I've seen babies being born, I've seen animals born, and by the way, this is just a side note here, of course, the curse with women bearing children with pain. When I watch animals bearing their offspring, I usually don't see them in a lot of pain.
Maybe they're experiencing pain, I just can't, you know, how does a horse grimace, I don't know, but it doesn't look like they're in a lot of pain, and I wonder if there's a theological issue there. But that's another day.
Mary Bateman, do you need someone to give you a sign, something extraordinary, a wonderful sign or wonder or a spectacular thing happening for you to believe the Bible? And of course, Jesus in Luke 16, if somebody's even raised from the dead, they still won't believe, right?
This is not a matter of some kind of rationalistic thing, it's a sin issue. The fool has said in his heart, there is no God. It's not a moral, excuse me, it's not an intellectual problem, it's a moral problem.
Therefore, it's very difficult for us to try to convince anybody of the gospel, because 1 Corinthians 1 says what? It's foolish, and has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe.
For Jews demand signs, and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles. But to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God, for the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
Excuse me. So, therefore, when it comes to, hey, I want a sign, I need a sign, I need a sign, I don't need any more signs. Jews, they wanted signs, and what did Paul say? I'm going to give you a stumbling block, Jesus crucified, here's your Messiah on a cross.
It's not that he didn't believe in the resurrection, he waits until chapter 15, and a whole chapter on resurrection of the body, which we know is true, because Jesus was resurrected earlier in the first few verses, verse 4, I think, in particular.
How do we know there's a resurrection of our bodies, verse 12 of 1 Corinthians 15? Because Jesus was resurrected, and the first fruits, et cetera. Anyway, Mary Bateman is an interesting case, I just want to make sure you realize, as I just talked about her, which I found interesting, not my talk about her, but she, the person, the character, what went on there with all her addiction, as it were, to crime.
We don't need anybody to tell us that Jesus is coming back with clouds formed with English letters for evangelists to come and tell us, you know, he's coming back real soon. We already know that. The imminent return of the Lord Jesus.
He keeps his promises. So my name's Mike Ebendroth, this is No Compromise Radio Ministry. What else do I have here in front of me? I have the christianbook .com, 1 -800-CHRISTIAN, Everything Christian for Less, Christian Book Distributor.
In the old days, we would meet here once a quarter, we would meet here at the church building at 4 .30 in the morning, usually, drive up to Peabody Mass, stop off at the Dunkin's, Dunky's, and get a sandwich, a breakfast sandwich, a coffee, and then stand in line for an hour outside of the Peabody warehouse for Christian Book Distributor, CBD.
And of course, they made a big new one and a nice one. They would sell the books, you know, 10 of original cost if they were damaged or extras or whatever, incomplete sets. So we used to go there a lot, and many people here at the church have better libraries than some pastors that I know, just because it was really cheap.
We'd spend thousands of dollars, come before the church, and then put it back in the library or put them at the book table and just, you know, have no upcharge. It really was fun. Well, what do you do now when it comes to digital and when it comes to Amazon?
Are they going to even make it, especially with that big warehouse? But they continue to put out some catalogs. And one of the things about the digital book, I'm not really fans of, except if I do travel and I have my computer with Logos Bible programs, I can bring thousands of commentaries wherever I go or access them on my phone.
If you're a missionary, you don't want to bring books in a crate. I get all that. But even with, let's say, BibleWorks, BibleWorks is gone. They couldn't sustain themselves financially. And it was on my computer until the recent iOS update, and then I can't access it anymore.
It's just gone. And the same thing could easily happen with Logos over time. Whether it's banned by the government, whether they decide to fold, it's just one switch away between, you know what, I can't access this anymore.
So I still like my regular books, because maybe one day there's no books online that we can get that are Christian at all. Beside the fact that Logos, I think, does the black theology stuff, and they are promoting Roman Catholicism as a, in my mind, they're doing it as a viable option.
If they say, well, there are Roman Catholic resources that can benefit us, which they can, that's fine, but it's more than that. In my mind, it's money-driven. So if you want to call yourself for-profit, fine.
You're able to do that. If you want to call yourself a ministry, then ministries minister to people. They don't give them theological strychnine, pulling a kind of a Mary Bateman on someone, the prophet-hen of Logos.
No, just kidding. Just kidding. I don't order too many things from them anymore, but I do occasionally. And to their credit, we get the free book of the month, too. So I get that. The other day, I needed to get some biblical theology book.
I wanted to type a bunch of quotes to put into my sermon, and the secretary who usually types those quotes for me wasn't around, so I clicked and bought the book for 30 bucks or whatever, and then I could just cut and paste.
So there are benefits, obviously. There are books here on the Christian Book Distributor, and lots of times, the cover tells me what's going on in evangelicalism. And so the number one book there is Seen Beautiful Again by Lisa Turkost, Finding God's Goodness in the Chapters of Your Story You Didn't Choose, Didn't Expect, and Don't Know How to Get Past, Helps You Adopt Healthier Ways to Process Pain, Empower the Lie that Your Feelings are the Full Story, and Spend Guided Time with the Lord.
That's kind of what they sell. They sell other things, obviously, commentaries, but it's usually this how-to, and most of the time, how-to books are very pietistic and spiritual disciplines-driven, and they're far away from Reformed biblical sanctification.
There's an ESV MacArthur Study Bible. It says second edition. I don't know what the second edition is. It says it's redesigned and fully updated. What does that mean? I have no idea. Tony Evans, Kingdom Men Rising, in the old days, Dallas Seminary grad Tony Evans, used to teach the Bible kind of in his own way.
I think of the equivalent of Chuck Swindoll, something like that. But these days, it's just crazy. It's crazy, and from what I remember, a bunch of critical race stuff, and when I hear him teach, it's just wacky.
I just can't recommend him in any way, shape, or form. Life Application Study Bible, third edition, world communion cups with bread juice sets. I see why they're doing that. You can get gluten-free wafers as well.
How much do these cost, by the way? A thousand communion chalice cups, they call them, is $349. So what's that? That's 34 cents each, is that it? A box of 50 is 30 bucks, yeah, so 30-some cents each.
The Case for Easter by Lee Strobel, I think he had to redo his book, did he not, that had a bunch of Ravi Zacharias stuff in it? Was that right? And then, of course, you have Jesus Calling for Easter, Sarah Young.
Could there be a more awful concept than marketing Jesus Calling in every way, shape, or form? Talk about Mary Bateman. I mean, this is Jesus Calling for Easter, prophet hens of Leeds. I mean, we could just put the whole thing as an amalgamation, and it would be awful.
The Case for Easter by Strobel, he's not my favorite, but it's probably a decent book in terms of trying to help you think through the issues. Was the tomb really empty, etc.? So anyway, it does say, page three, you get $5 books like Max Lucado.
Maybe that's when he was saying homosexual sin is really sin, but now they've got to get rid of this. Second page, there are books like Tim Keller, Hope in Times of Fear, One Minute Inspirations for Women by Elizabeth George, Jim George, One Minute Insights for Men, that's a buck each, buck 25, and then Five Love Language.
Remember when that was big, love languages? Hey, I did not know there were so many people that sold a bunch of crazy stuff. Sarah Young, Jesus Calling for Graduates, Jesus Calling Enjoying Peace in His Presence, Jesus Calling Large Print, Jesus Calling for First Responders Exclusive Edition.
You can't make this up. Beth Moore Chasing Vines, Does Your Field of Your Life Feel Like Rocky Soil? Beloved Bible Teacher explores, Beth Moore explores what it means to abide in the vine of Christ and bear abundant fruit loaded with just for you extras.
This special edition features insightful discussion questions and life application takeaways so you can dig deeper into God's plan for human flourishing. You've got to be kidding me. Who would waste $16 .99 for that?
Don't do that. Priscilla Schreier, I think that may be Tony Evans' daughter, Discerning the Voice of God, When you hear that still small voice, you are certain it's the Holy Spirit speaking, are you certain?
Featuring personal insights from her dad, Tony Evans, Priscilla Schreier leads you through scripture in this freshly updated seven-session study to heighten your spiritual senses so you can distinguish the prophet-hen of Leeds, sorry, you can distinguish God's voice from imposter's chatter.
Now, just, I'll wrap it up with this. We have an external revelation, both general revelations external and specific revelation, the Bible is external. Why do we need that? Because if it goes through us, if it's our voice, if it's our thoughts, if it's coming from us, we forget that we are depraved, right, and even as we're Christians and new creatures in Christ, we still have the flesh and we have a sin hangover that's affected, see Romans 7.
Therefore, I don't want to trust anything coming from me, coming from inside of me. That's Quaker, that's inner light, that's denying depravity. Therefore, I don't want to say, well, I listen to myself, is it God or not?
Whatever you think, that's not a Bible verse, isn't from God. You might have a hunch, you might have some insight, you might say, I better go for this, and later you can say, I see how God was leading me in certain directions.
But looking forward, in a forward fashion, you're not going to get any more revelation from God. He has spoken, and he has spoken clearly, he's spoken with a lot of words, and it's our responsibility to study this prophetic word made more sure.
Made more sure than what, 2 Peter 1? More sure than our own experiences. So my name's Mike Abenroth, this is No Compromise Radio. I would stick to Calvin, I would stick to Luther, I would stick to Jerry Bridges, old standbys that are faithful, and we don't need to do all this other stuff and nonsense and personal revelation.
No Compromise Radio, with Pastor Mike Abenroth, is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church, firmly committed to unleashing the life-transforming power of God's Word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.
Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.