Slain in the Spirit

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.

A Fast Intro and the Show’s Irreverent Tone

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a Was a fast intro, Pastor Steve. Thank you. Thank you. You have no glasses.

Elvis Costello. He�s got glasses. Yeah, you know, I just got rid of them. All right. I got healed.

Well, you know, in the old days, we always thought that was funny. You�d watch the false teachers, the word-faith healers on TV. I�m not talking about dog healers, but regular healers, and then they have glasses and they were bald.

How does that work?

You know, obviously, the Spirit doesn�t heal everything, right?

Oh, well, maybe they didn�t have enough faith in that area. Mm-hmm. Yep. Okay. Well, you can always write us, info at nocompromiseradio .com.

Faithless follicles, you know.

I still have the special going on. If you buy �Sexual Fidelity we send you things that go bump in the church for free. Just order online. Several people have taken me up on that offer. Have they? Uh-huh.

You know, if you ever have a second edition of �Sexual Fidelity I�d like to write, you know, an endorsement for it.

Well, you know what? I�d like to do that because I think although there is plenty of gospel in it, it could have been even more gospel-saturated. Right? You know, the one chapter I think was like, you know, �Can you wear white on your wedding day kind of thing.

�Can you be forgiven And so, I know there are some, but that was several years ago that I wrote that. You want to revise and revamp? I do, but I don�t have time to do all that. It�s like the old J .I. Packer, right?

I mean, you have to quote. Well, that was the old Avendroth. This is a funny story, Steve, in light of that. Fridays on NoCo are the reruns, and somebody just wrote to me and said, �It must have been a really old rerun because you actually were speaking well of Richard Baxter.

And I said, �Well, I can�t go back and edit all the shows.

I thought they were going to say because the outline for your sermon was �Three Ways to Be a Better Neighbor. I know. I know.

It�s so bad. Evangelicalism is crazy these days. Is there anything in the news on evangelicalism that you want to speak to?

Anything in the news on evangelicalism? Well, I mean, nothing I really want to talk about. I saw where somebody who famously has almost worshipped Trump now is saying, �Well, he should just concede and let Biden be the president.

I thought that was interesting.

How can you have 14 ,000 people be at your church? How does that work?

I don�t know. It sounds like a football game to me, so I don�t know.

I don�t know if there�s anything in evangelicalism that I want to talk about either, except we should probably get to the topic today. I handed you earlier not much notice, I know, but at least it was a little bit notice a Wikipedia article on slain in the spirit.

I thought we were going to talk about Wikipedia today. Can you trust Wikipedia?

What “Slain in the Spirit” Claims to Be

So the other day I was thinking about being slain in the spirit, because not that I needed to get slain in the spirit, but I watch people and, you know, I think it was the Benny Hinn thing that for the daylight savings time, you spring ahead and fall back, and then somebody put a big picture of Benny Hinn in his coat.

Yeah, it�s Benny Hinn day. I thought about getting slain in the spirit. And so let�s talk about this a little bit, Steve. I think that when people get slain in the spirit, it might actually come from and several people a good motive and a right motive.

They�re just ignorant in terms of what the Bible teaches on progressive sanctification, and they think, you know what, they�ve got sin in their life and they�d like to be a better to quote you neighbor or husband or wife, and they realize it�s difficult, and so they think, you know what, maybe if I can just get zapped, I�d be better.

There are probably some people like that, don�t you think?

Well, doesn�t the Bible say, �Be filled with the spirit It does.

Does it not say, �Do not quench the spirit Exactly.

Uh-huh. Now, it�s interesting. It says those things. It doesn�t say, �Be slain in the spirit.

Yes. But when I was looking at this article briefly, on page three, there are claimed biblical examples of getting slain in the spirit. And Grudem would say, you know, you don�t see the words slain in the spirit in Scripture, but there are some places in the Bible where people like fall back, where they get, you know, onto the ground they go, and the presence of God is so powerful that it just knocks them down.

It�s kind of like Muhammad Ali and George, you know, Joe Frasier. Remember Joe Frasier? Down goes Frasier! That was pretty good. So let�s talk about some of these biblical examples. I mean, to me, it sounds like these people are trying to find verses to match what�s going on.

Right? I have bad theology. Let me see if I can find some. And there�s a lot of verses in the Bible. Hunt and peck. Okay. How about before we look at these verses, could you just generally describe what slain in the spirit, I mean, what happens?

Well, I mean, I�ve seen, you know, slain in the spirit. I mean, and I think most, well, actually, I find a lot of people haven�t watched TBN, and blessed are you if you haven�t. You know, it�s the concept, and where people literally fall, they are allegedly knocked down by the spirit.

Sometimes it�s Benny Hinn waving his coat. Sometimes it�s someone just raising their arm, or it�s tapping you in the forehead, you know, all these different things. I�ve actually been, I may have talked about this before, at a service, big service in Pasadena, Mott Auditorium, with one of the Kansas City so-called prophets, where there was a bunch of shenanigans going on.

I don�t even know what to, you know, call it. I mean, it wasn�t preaching. They call it prophesying. There were a lot of things going on. And then, you know, Bickle, Mike Bickle, Mike Bickle was up there, and he said, he goes, �It�s okay.

Now it�s carpet time. And it was like a game show, because they opened up these curtains that were behind the stage, and they asked for catchers. Oh, yeah. You�ve got to have a spotter, so yeah. Sure.

And so then, you know, people were going forward to catch, and then other people were being slain in the spirit, and, you know, they would fall over. And sometimes they would just lay there. Sometimes they would laugh.

Sometimes they would roar. Sometimes they would bark. There was all, you know, manner of cacophony going on. But you know, what we would not see is, you know, some verses come to mind like, you know, I mean, is God a God of order, or is he a God of chaos?

Kind of 1 Corinthians 14, or Galatians 5 with the fruit of the Spirit, self-control. Yes.

And so, you see these things going on, and you go, okay, now is the Holy Spirit, does he give self-control? Does he want things done in an orderly way? Or would he come in such a way as to make absolute and utter chaos of a church meeting?

I, you know, and what does the Holy Spirit do? The Holy Spirit points us to Christ. That's what he does. So, why would he just knock people down or make them, you know, roar like a lion, bark like a dog, you know, rip it like a frog, whatever, you know?

Steve, I'm sorry to interrupt you. Yes, go ahead. There are a lot of biblical bases for getting slain in the Spirit on this Wikipedia article, but I have my own, right? It's not on this list. Are you ready?

When Ananias heard these words, he fell down and breathed his last, and great fear came upon all who heard of it. The young men rose and wrapped him up and carried him out and buried him. And why was that?

Because they lied to the Spirit. He was slain in the Spirit. They lied to the Spirit, right?

Why have you lied to God? Well, you know, they say that theology is found in the prepositions, and so either slain in the Spirit or that particular case. Slain by the Spirit. Why do you think this so-called slain in the Spirit happens with, like, groups or healing crusades or large auditoriums or sanctuaries?

Why doesn't it happen, like, when I'm alone, you know, just in my prayer closet or something?

Well, because people are in a crowd, they're more suggestible, right? They're more easily manipulated. If the expectation is, excuse me, if the expectation is that you're going to fall down, bark like a lion, bark like a dog, howl like a jackal, whatever it is, then when the appropriate time comes, it's almost like it's very similar to being hypnotized.

You know, you're in an altered state of consciousness where you're just so prone to suggestion, you just do what they say. The music, everything that they do in these so-called services is designed to elicit the desired response.

They're going to get you to do what they want you to do. Okay. Pastor Mike here.

Pastor Steve here. No Compromise Radio. We're talking about being slain in the spirit. The biblical basis, according to some of these people like Michael Brown and Wayne Grudem, Ezekiel 128, Ezekiel saw the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord and fell face down.

Wrong. Very wrong. Well, you know what? When you do, when a person actually sees the glory of God, there's going to be a response, certainly. And there's no way you can equate the glory of God that Ezekiel saw to, you know, I'm hearing about the glory of God in some sermon at a prayer crusade, healing crusade.

It's not the same thing. If the Shekinah glory did actually come down, then I'd see people falling over.

Well, even, you know, having not studied Ezekiel 128 or Ezekiel 323.

Did you know Ezekiel saw the wheel way up in the middle there?

Having not studied those recently, I would just say this, that in all likelihood, you know, this is the pre-incarnate Christ, right? So the idea that this is an example of being slain in the spirit. How about this is just being in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ and being overwhelmed.

I am a mortal. I'm a sinful man. I am in contact with the Holy. What do I do? I don't know what I do, but I'm afraid and I'm hitting the ground, baby.

Peter. Is that not Peter, James, and John, the Mount of Transfiguration? It's not slain by the spirit. It is slain by the effulgent glory of the second person of the Trinity who is glory incarnate, right?

Pete Yeah. And you just shot down their third example. Oh, okay.

They were overwhelmed at the Mount of Transfiguration.

So that's two of their examples up in flames, Ernie.

Ernie And Steve, when we read about the glory of God in the Bible, a good response is awe. Pete Yes. Ernie Right? A good response is wonder. A good response is I can't believe I'm not disintegrated like Isaiah.

Remember Isaiah? He is on his face in Isaiah six before the pre-incarnate glory of the Lord Jesus, according to John chapter 12. That is the right response. But we're not trying to make these prescriptive things because in these theaters, like in Pasadena, the glory, literal glory of God was not unveiled.

Pete Trust me, I was there.

Ernie. Trust me. Pete. And I did not see anything remotely resembling, you know, the transfiguration. There was nothing. What I saw was a bunch of bizarre behavior. And I'm not saying, you know, I can't ascribe motives.

I don't, you know, I don't know what the people who do these things, who flop around on the floor, I don't know what they're thinking. I have no idea. What I do know is I watch it and I'm just like, I get the whole, you know, first Corinthians 14 thing.

It certainly seems like chaos.

Ernie Steve, you know, you can't make some of this stuff up. According to this wiki article, it says historian Grant Wacker concluded that the.

Well, you know, you know who Grant Wacker is, right? Do you know who he is? No, but Wacker, Grant Wacker was the football coach at Baylor.

Oh, he's the historian now about Pentecostal religious ecstasy.

Yeah. He gave up coaching football. He's a Wacker.

Well, he's the historian about this. I don't know if he's actually whacking people. Wait a minute.

There's no H in there. It's just W-A-C-K-E-R. He's just. That's correct.

Yeah. Steve, was it not in the 90s? Correct me if I'm wrong. And my memory sometimes. Of course I will. Isn't that good. But Benny Hinn was sued by someone, a family of the lady that got slain in the spirit.

They didn't catch her and she broke her hip. And then I think if memory serves, that happened. How would that be the Holy Spirit's work? I don't recall.

You know, I lost track of all Benny Hinn's lawsuits. I mean, he's like the L. Ron Hubbard of so-called Christianity.

Biblical Examples Claimed for Slain in the Spirit

Any other verses here that talk about slain in the spirit before we talk about anything on the positive side of sanctification?

I mean, every one of these descriptions are just, you know, they don't describe the, they don't describe being slain in the spirit. Oh, I don't think it's on here.

But what about the whole thing with Malchus? He gets his ear cut off by Peter. And remember when Jesus, you know, who's Jesus and all that stuff. And then Jesus says something, they all fall down. Yeah.

What about that? Well, again, you know, having preached through that, I think, you know, because there are various explanations given, you know, that maybe they stumbled. I mean, literally, you know, I'm reading through the commentaries and they say, well, you know, it's possible that they were just caught off guard because Jesus is coming out of Gethsemane, the Garden of Gethsemane, which really wasn't exactly a garden.

But anyway, he's coming out there and, you know, it's late at night. And even though they've got these torches and they were professional soldiers, maybe they were so caught off guard by his boldness.

But I tend to think, no, this was just, you know, Jesus for a moment kind of stretching his God muscles, you know, as it were, and just kind of going, boom, here's a little something.

I'm glad you said as it were, because I would have then had to correct you. John 18, whom do you seek? They answered, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus said to them, I am he. Judas, who betrayed him, was standing with them.

When Jesus said to them, I am he, they drew back and fell to the ground.

It's so, I am he. Well, I mean, there's no accident there, right? This is another kind of I am statement, ego e me. He's proclaiming his divinity and they all fall down. Now, again, I don't think that's a stumble.

Pete Steve, do you think it's fair to say that when we read in the Bible an encounter with the glory of the triune God, in these particular cases, the second person of the Trinity, that response of falling to the ground, that's biblical, logical, rational.

We understand that? Pete. Absolutely. Pete. Then what's the difference then between that and what people do now besides Benny Hinn's coat?

Pete. Well, I mean, we have no reason, other than what they say, we have no reason to accept the fact that it's the presence of of the third person of the Trinity that is knocking these people down, right?

I mean, we are, and you know, here's the bizarre thing. I mean, there are a lot of bizarre things, but the idea that somehow Benny Hinn, and we're picking on Benny, but any of these people can kind of fling the Holy Spirit around like he is a force, right?

Like they're throwing them around the room like a Muppet. It's blasphemous, ultimately. But again, we would have no prescription, and we would have really no description in scripture for the way that they are doing this.

This is all suggestion and not anything biblical. I mean, even these claimed examples here, we don't see any person manipulating or using the Holy Spirit as some kind of, I don't know, force field or something.

I mean, it's just all erroneous theology anyway.

And don't you think, Steve, that if this person, the third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, could be either used, controlled, activated in some kind of quasi-service that 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, or Titus might teach us on how to do that?

Absolutely.

Pastoral epistles. Paul says, here's how you run a church, and he didn't give any directions about using your jacket or, you know, whatever. Getting people ready for carpet time. Make sure you have catchers available.

None of these things. And you know, again, we alluded to it earlier, but 1 Corinthians 14 verse 33, for God is not a God of confusion, but of peace. And when you walk into these sort of so-called services, you are not going to be at peace.

You are going to be completely confused and just thinking this is wacky because it is.

Order, Self-Control, and the Holy Spirit’s Work

Steve, I know this is not a real, it just doesn't have a great foundation to it, but I like to go to worship services where I know kind of what's going to happen. Right? You invite people and you say, well, today we're going to sing some songs about Jesus.

We're going to read some scripture. We're going to have a sermon. There might be a baptism of the Lord's Supper. And then we do that same thing next week. This is just what we do. Versus, you know, I remember when I used to go to church on the way on Sherman Oaks, in Sherman Oaks, probably, on Sherman Way, I used to have to say, well, you know what?

Most of the time, you know, it's above board, but once in a while they get kind of crazy.

Our church is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're going to get. Well, I remember, you know, Stephanie Kierkegian, when, because she used to work for me. And one day, you know, instead of being grouchy at work, I was super happy.

And she goes, what happened to you? And I go, I think I got saved. And she says, what do you mean? And I go, I'm a Christian. And she looks at me and she goes, not one of those born again Christians. And because her understanding at that time, not being saved, of what it meant to be born again, was flopping around on the ground like this.

That's all she'd ever seen.

I have not seen, speaking of seen, I've not seen the 1967 film, Holy Ghost People, about Appalachian Pentecostal churches that were having a lot of slain spirits. Have you?

I think it contains a special scene with the The Holy Ghost Machine Gun, where Holy Ghost People.

That reminds me of the story. There was a family that lived in our neighborhood and still does here in New England. And they didn't really go to church, but they wanted their kid to go to Owanna. And so we brought their daughter and then later her son to Owanna, at least my wife and kids did all the time.

And so then those people were going to come to our house once. And then the little daughter said, are we going over to the Jesus People's house? And we were the Jesus People. Which, you know what? I took that as a commendation.

Yeah, there are worse things to be called, right? I mean, how would you like to be known as, are we going over to the family that flops around on the ground?

What do we do when people say, yeah, but there's a lot of crazy things during revivals, even maybe, you know, Edwards and Whitfield, they say, or Wesley might write something that might be close to this.

What do we then say?

Uh, experience is no substitute for scripture.

Oh, that's good. That's good. We have a more short word.

Yeah. I mean, you know, yeah, we get right into the writings of Peter and what did he say? He said, listen, I was on the Mount of Transfiguration. This is my own interpretation. I was on the Mount of Transfiguration.

That was a wonderful experience, the best experience anybody ever had. And here's something better for you, scripture.

Mm-hmm. What do we do. When we read the Bible, we don't see any of the slain in the spirit stuff. And then we realize, according to Wiki, that the words slain in the spirit weren't even used until 1920 by American healing evangelist, Maria Woodworth Eder.

Danger. Danger Will Robinson. Danger. Well, I mean, you know, and I know you agree with me. When we hear about something new, run, right? New is not good. God doesn't change. And so, the idea that he waited, you know, maybe 1900 years to reveal through Mary, bad.

Experience Is No Substitute for Scripture

Steve, you know, our church likes to do something odd, but people love it. The kids especially love it. There's a more formal Christmas party, but we have the little Christmas outing at the skating rink, right up in Lemonster.

And they play, I don't know, K-Love songs and, you know, non-COVID time. We have Pete and... Gary Glitter.

Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun.

Yeah, uh-huh, uh-huh. And Uma Paloma Blanca, stuff like that. Yeah, great stuff. Uh-huh. And we just rent the entire place out. Would that be an example of holy rollers?

Ba-dum-bum. Huge, huge setup for that one, folks. Pastor Mike will be in the lounge all week. Try the veal.

I remember one year I was at that thing, and I always get my skates and stuff and skate a little bit with the kids, and they're all happy, you know, whole pastor skating. And I couldn't get the skate to work, right?

They were new skates and they were locked up. And I thought, I have to unlock these. And then I thought, oh, it's a key you need. So I said to the person sitting next to me, you know, and they were putting their skates on and off.

And I said, I think I need a key. I'll go up to the little booth there. And the person next to me said, I have a key in my pocket. Somebody from BBC. Whoa. Who carries a roller skate key in their pocket.

Some people are really prepared.

I know. I got a brand new pair of roller skates. You got a brand new key. That's what went through my mind.

I know. Yeah. Well, if I went roller skating, all the kids would think it was great too, till I wiped a bunch of them out, you know. Pastor Steve!

That one time I tripped and fell, and out of my top flannel pocket, flannel shirt pocket, fell all my herbal supplements for my prostate stuff. And it was just like, there's all pastor's pills just flying everywhere.

Kids, don't touch that. You'll have to be hospitalized.

We would encourage you to study Galatians 5 and the Holy Spirit, Pauline Epistles and the Holy Spirit. And it's wonderful that Jesus gave us the Holy Spirit so we wouldn't be alone, but not to do all these crazy things.

I mean, if you just study the Bible, you would never come to the conclusions that, you know, these people do on television. And they're out for the spectacular, not the biblical. Amen.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth 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 bbcchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.