Beth Moore Message Review | Our Lives Should be Supernatural?

I see across the earth, across every different country, from all different backgrounds, all different ages, that we would, for two days, come together and ignore our feeds, ignore all the noise, ignore the chaos inside of us, and listen to the word of God taught.

My whole aim is that somehow our appreciation of this treasure that he has put within us would so skyrocket that we would respond in such a way to yield to what the Holy Spirit wants to do.

If 2020, we are going to focus completely, entirely, solely on the person of Jesus.

About being connected and about being aware, I believe that we were chosen for this generation because of this time period on the globe. So it would be ridiculous not to act like we know what's going on in the world, but at the same time, we're overwhelmed by it.

And our minds, I mean, we're just like turning on ourselves and our very, very compulsive kinds of thoughts. And I was always given to it, always given to it. That is it.

Every message that you hear, every song that we sing, like this is our hope. And we need hope. The world is spinning out like crazy, and so are the insides of us. And we need the thing that's gonna steady us.

You will receive power. I wanna say something to you. This is supernatural power. The word of God tells us in a number of different places that we have a power that is beyond us, that is dwelling in us.

Because we're gonna preach the name of Jesus. We're gonna preach the name of Jesus. It's the only name we care about. It's the only name that changes lives, the only hope we have to give.

After he'd been seen for a period of 40 days, and he had ascended to the Father, I believe that he probably had the welcome of all welcome.

And whether you've known Jesus for a long time, or you're just checking him out, we're not gonna water him down here. We're going to Romans 8.

I don't know that there's a deeper theological piece.

Of work in the Bible, so we're going here. And what you will leave with, I believe, is more of Jesus.

Are you in Christ?

Then the very spirit of Christ is in you, with a capability. You're not even capable, nor am I, of fulfilling our own callings, because they must be done in the spirit.

What you've been called to do,.

You do not have the capacity to do.

Because we believe there's gonna be people that meet Jesus for the very first time. We believe there's gonna be people that have been far away from God and the church, and they're gonna come back. We believe there are people that love Jesus, but they don't know what it means to live for him, and we're gonna talk about all of that.

So Perla and Evangeline are just staring at me, and they won't leave. And I looked at them, I said, well, are y 'all gonna stay or are you gonna leave? Because I said, I'm gonna tell you something. If you're gonna stay, you're gonna praise dance.

You're not gonna stand here and watch us. And they said, well, we'll stay.

My dream, guys, I don't dream small. I only dream big. And my dream is to disciple a whole generation, and that takes all of us working together. We give you the tools. You all take them and use them in your places.

We cannot wait to see what God's going to do. Do not miss. If 2020 will be the best one yet.

So we'll just live all of our lives. If we don't get this, we're just like struggle through, and I mean, we'll get to our deathbed and go, you know, he said he had a calling for me, and he just never kept his word.

He's like, you know what? You tried to do it by yourself. I was trying to do it through you, and you just kept trying to do it yourself.

And what you will leave with, I believe, is more of Jesus.

Why Rightly Interpreting Scripture Matters

Andrew, why is rightly interpreting the Bible so important? Some people might say, oh, just who cares? Just read it. Whatever it means to you is what God wants to say to you. And people who worry about interpretation are just scholars and sticklers, and some people will call you a Pharisee if you're really into what the Bible means.

Why is rightly interpreting the word so vital?

First of all, because it's God's word. Like, he is speaking to us, and God does everything on purpose. He knows what and why he does in every aspect of this world, and when it comes to how he communicates to us regularly, it's through a book.

He's chosen to give us a book, and so it's to be read and understood as a book. And that means it's so important to hear his words in the context that he has given them to us. It's so important that we would take time to think about what is being said in it.

He is a God of purpose and intention, and so everything he says in this book has been given with purpose and intention. So I don't want to impose my own thinking, my own idea. I want to hear what God says, and that means I need to listen carefully.

And Bible study, that's really all it is. It's just listening carefully to the word of God.

That's so helpful.

The Purpose of Thoroughly Equipped and the Sufficiency of Scripture

Welcome to the Thoroughly Equipped podcast, where we compare the teachings from popular women's ministry, books, conferences, Bible studies, et cetera, to scripture. Our focus is 2 Timothy 3, 16 to 17, that all scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness so the man or woman of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

I'm your host, Melba Toast. May this episode bless you and bring glory to God. Hey ladies, welcome back to another episode of Thoroughly Equipped. So glad you have chosen to listen to this podcast or watch this YouTube channel.

This podcast is a resource for you guys to help you with discernment, especially the teaching and the teachers that are within the very popular evangelical women's ministry. And we have been doing just that, looking at a very popular women's ministry, the If Gathering.

And in discerning this very popular women's ministry, I have taken the time to look at the If Gathering's 2020 conference. And if you're just tuning in, I suggest you go back to the beginning of the series.

And the first episode of this series, I presented to you, first of all, the goal and purpose that Jenny Allen has set for this ministry. And then we started looking at the speakers that presented at the If 2020 conference.

In this portion, like I said, of the series, we're looking at the way these teachers handle scripture. And the 2020 conference is laid out perfectly for us to do just that, as Jenny Allen set up the conference to be centered on Romans chapter eight, dividing the chapters into sections to which the speakers were to quote, unquote, focus completely and entirely on the person of Jesus.

Even though chapter eight is all about the role and work of the Holy Spirit in the life of those who are the children of God, in all truthfulness, drawing out the person and work of Jesus Christ, and even proclaiming the good news is very easy to do.

Christ and his work is proclaimed clearly in the first couple of verses of Romans chapter eight. So that's what we want to discern. Did these speakers handle the text rightly and actually give us and teach us about Jesus as promised?

Or did they just give lip service to Jesus and instead chose to teach us what they want, their experiences, what they felt was highly important, you know, their life lessons and opinions on the work of Jesus and the Holy Spirit, et cetera.

The last two episodes, we examined two messages given on Romans eight versus one to eight. One of the reasons I love doing this podcast is the opportunity to look at scripture and really shine a light on how wonderful it really is.

And even in critiquing books or messages, I see this as an opportunity to proclaim the beautiful good news of Christ and his work. And in the last couple of episodes, looking at Romans eight one to eight was a perfect opportunity to do just that.

Jenny Allen was right in this regard, that Romans eight is just so theologically rich. Really, all of Romans is incredibly filling. In fact, Luther stated in his preface to his commentary on the epistle, this, this letter is truly the most important piece in the New Testament.

That's from Luther's preface to the Romans. Unfortunately, what was given in these messages, because they did not draw out from the text, it's rich theology, ended up being jello instead of meat. And meat is so satiating and filling, believe me.

I did like three months of the carnivore diet and never has any diet kept me so full for so long that I was eating only two meals a day. I even eventually towards the end there got down to one major meal a day.

So yeah, meat is extremely filling. And it's the same with real good, deep theology. That type of teaching keeps you full through life, through trials and tribulations. For scripture even says, "'Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.'".

Deuteronomy eight three and Matthew four four. The message we will look at today is given by Beth Moore, who was to teach about Romans eight, nine to 11. But before we get into her message, let's talk a bit about her ministry.

Beth Moore is now an American Anglican Evangelist. I keep saying. Beth Moore is now an American Anglican Evangelist. I did that several takes.

I did that several takes.

Cause that's a tongue twister. American Anglican Evangelist. Anyway, she's also a very popular author and a Bible teacher. She's president of Living Proof Ministry, a Christian organization based in Houston, Texas that she founded back in 1994, focused on teaching women.

Moore, who is arguably the most prominent white evangelical woman in America, according to Wikipedia, speaks at arena events and has sold millions of books. While Living Proof Ministry no longer works in conjunction with Lifeway, Moore continues to teach through live events and a podcast radio show called Living Proof with Beth Moore as well as on her YouTube channel of the same name.

Now, there has been no slight drama revolving around Beth Moore and her ministry. Most of it is centered about how often she preaches to men at our church. She has a very weak stance on homosexuality to where she publicly apologized for claiming that same sex sin was particularly satanic, fearing that these words kept her readers from God's words, claiming what she said would become a stumbling block for them.

And there's a lot we can discuss regarding the concerns I have with her public statement, but that would be a whole other episode. A small group of women bloggers wrote to her asking her to make her stance on the sin of homosexuality more clear and to be firm and strong in it.

Needless to say, she has not. Eventually, she left the Baptist Convention and became Anglican in 2021, a year after giving her message at the 2020 If Gathering Conference. So let's dive into this message.

But first, let's read the text she's supposed to teach about. Moore's text is Romans 8, 9 to 11. But like always, let's look at it in context. Paul, throughout the first seven chapters, basically presented the truth that all men are under condemnation and are born children of wrath due to their sinful nature, that men are born slaves to sin.

Yet those who have been united with Christ are no longer slaves to sin, but to righteousness. And because we have been buried with Christ and raised with him to newness of life, we are not under law, but grace.

Because we are under grace, we present our bodies in obedience to God, slaves to righteousness, leading to our sanctification. In chapter seven, Paul describes the battle between the flesh and the spirit within the man who wishes to obey the law of God, which is spiritual and good, yet is living in a body of flesh.

It is here that Paul proclaims the good news to those who wrestle with this inner battle, that there is no condemnation for those in Christ because Christ did what we could not do, taking on human flesh, condemning sin in the flesh so that the righteous requirement of the law would be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit.

And this is where we'll get into the text. We will read Romans 8, five to 13. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the spirit set their minds on the things of the spirit.

Or to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law, indeed it cannot.

Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. Now here's Miss Moore's passage. You, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if in fact the spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness. If the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you.

Now I'm gonna read verses 12 and 13 because these two verses will be missing from the whole context of the conference. Both Beth Moore will not touch upon these verses and neither will the next speaker, Joe Saxton, touch upon these verses as Joe Saxton will be teaching about Romans chapter eight, verses 14 to 17.

So let's read these two verses to keep them all in context. So then brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh, you will die. But if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

So this text is all about the work of the spirit of Christ in the life of a believer. Paul has been constantly contrasting the flesh with the spirit. And he makes it very clear in verse eight that the flesh cannot please God.

Why? Well one, those who are in the flesh do not have faith as Paul describes how people suppress the truth in unrighteousness, Romans 1, 18 to 25. They don't hold to the truth and live in it but in rebellion actually suppress it.

And without faith, it is impossible to please God, Hebrews 11, six. And two, those who do not have faith in Christ and his work do not have the spirit of Christ and therefore do not belong to Christ. But those who have faith in Christ were buried and raised with Christ and are indwelt with the spirit who now are empowered to put to death the deeds of the flesh and live.

That same power that raised Jesus from the dead is given to us to walk in righteousness, to desire to obey the law. And in that desire, obey the best we can. That is what this text is saying. That is the wonderful work of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

Now, is this what Beth Moore will talk about? So let's get into our message. Beth Moore starts out praising the Neof Gathering as a work of God because of Jenny's lack of knowledge in what she was getting into and its radical explosion over the years.

Knew the spirit of God was on that young woman and that God had sown something in her that was going to produce a harvest.

I actually want to address this a bit because in Jenny Allen's introduction of Beth Moore, Jenny claims that before she set out to start the Neof Gathering, Beth told her she had to accomplish this vision, that she knew it was of God because Jenny had no idea how to fulfill God's calling.

The day that I committed to the Lord to obey and to do this thing was an hour after I'd spent lunch with her. And she grabbed me by the shoulders and she looked me in the eyes and she said, baby, you got to do this.

This is of God. And the reason I know that is because you have no earthly idea what you're doing.

I want to make a note of this because this is actually going to be connected with Beth's message as she will go on to teach about the role the spirit plays in our life. But can we know that something is a work of God because of the weakness of someone's ability or the growth in attendance and involvement?

Now, I hope to address this type of thinking as it's often point out in the IF ministry throughout the years. Christine Kane even described it as a revival at the 2021 conference. There is this prevailing teacher within the purpose-driven and charismatic theology that you can know God has called you to something by assessing how unlikely or impossible it seems to be to be able to accomplish it.

Why is this the main way to determine if something is a move or idea from God? Because the more impossible the goal, the more supernatural intervention is needed.

Well, I need you to understand how this goes all the way around because it is overwhelming to me because I'm going to tell you something, this particular event and the size of it, no human being can do it.

This can only be God. You can't grow something like this that has this kind of gospel impact and think somebody made it up and I knew that it was so on her, it had to be God.

If you watched last week's episode, we got a little taste of this teaching from Jenny Allen herself when she alluded to the role of the spirit as giving us possibility and capacity to accomplish great things.

The spirit of God. We have possibility and capacity beyond anything we can imagine.

Keep this in mind because this is where Beth will go with her message. So I want us to think about what is the evidence of a work of the spirit of God according to Romans chapter eight. She then begins to talk about her love for the word of God, how it saved her soul and mind.

I was 27 years old when a fire was so lit up in my bones for the word of God that I almost could not bear it. And I'm going to tell you how it happened. I saw someone with it. It was my Bible doctrine teacher.

She gives a testimony of a Bible teacher of hers who proclaimed the word of God with such passion that she decided that she wanted that same passion, to love the word of God more than she loved her next meal.

And like her, she relays that there may be ladies listening in the audience that may see that passion and hunger in someone and cry out for that type of passion. Now let's listen in because this is her setup for talking about the work of the Holy Spirit.

I'm telling you, I got in my car. I shut that car door after that class that night. Totally riveted. I was speechless. I couldn't even take a note down. And I said, Lord, I don't know what that was, but I want it.

And I've said so many times the Lord took that. It was like he took a match to a stone and struck it and set a torch in my heart. And I tell you this because this weekend, I don't know who it will be.

It will be different people for different ones because you have different learning styles. But you're going to see somebody, you're going to know that the Spirit of God is on them and I don't even know how to define it.

But Lord, I want that. I want to hunger and thirst after you like that. I want to love your word like that. I want to have a fire in my bones that I would go anywhere in the world you've sent me. I want it like that.

One of the things that he's taught me over and over again is what do you lack in the Spirit that I would give to anyone? What is it I've prioritized? You then pray for it. I constantly ask him, give me a love for your word.

Give me a love for your son. Give me a love for people because when we pray in the will of God, we will have what we ask. You ask him to delight you in his word and he will. He will answer that request.

There are several things here that I could agree with. Yes, let us have that passion to love God's word, his son and our neighbor. And yes, when we have that desire, God will answer our prayers because in loving God, we will ask an agreement to his will.

In fact, Romans 8 in a way touches on this. Paul indirectly talks about this, that the Spirit not only gives us the desire to see God's will accomplished, but the power to accomplish it. In this portion of scripture, the will of God is obedience to the law and more specifically his will for us to believe in Jesus Christ who fulfilled the law.

She talks about getting passionate for God's word and being willing to do anything and go anywhere he sends us. And while I like the encouragement, will Beth talk about how this passage is about the desire to do God's will through obeying the law?

Is this where Beth Moore will go? She then lays out the format of the conference, noting how Jenny planned that each speaker should address a portion of Romans 8 to be expounded upon and cohesively come together in the end.

For her, she was portioned out Romans 8, 9 to 11, but there are two verses that she says she wants to focus on.

What Jenny has done for the conference is that we are concentrating on Romans chapter eight and all of us have been given different segments of it to teach you. And I just love that we were given our assignments.

When I saw my verses, I knew I wanted them. So I want you to stand please, I wanna go before the throne of grace with you in prayer and then we're gonna get into these two verses of Romans that are gonna take us a whole lot of places.

Now let's stop here for a bit. We have already read the text and context. And if you listened to the last episode, I want to remind you of a couple things at this point. One, that I was acknowledged in the introduction that there are likely unbelievers listening to these sessions.

Two, that Jada had opportunity to present the gospel, the life and death of Jesus Christ presented to us as a gift to be received by faith for the forgiveness of our sins and salvation from the wrath to come.

Romans eight clearly lays this out for us in the opening passages. And yet it was not given. The gospel was watered down to God pursuing us. So at this point, the unbeliever has been told that we are a mess.

God took care of their greatest need, not expounding upon that, but that God fixed our mess by pursuing us. So far, we got Jenny's take on setting the mind on the flesh versus setting the mind on the spirit, by which she interprets setting the mind on the flesh as focusing on worldly pursuits, such as a job, marriage, children, or social media, et cetera.

While to set the mind on the spirit is interpreted as thinking positively to pursue peace, kindness, joy, love, confidence, et cetera, and that we must engage in the battle for our minds, that the enemy attacks us with negative thoughts that keeps us from pursuing the spirit.

No talk of how one who walks in the flesh is a slave to sin, while one setting their mind on the spirit is to set the mind on Christ, and in love obey the law or Christ's commands by putting to death the deeds of the flesh.

It is this dichotomy that Paul presents to the reader so that they may ascertain whether they truly have the spirit of Christ. And that is where these verses are going to go. But for one who hasn't been presented with this dichotomy, nor the gospel, they may come to the text thinking they have been given the spirit because they do not pursue success or material things and work their best at defeating negative thoughts.

So now Beth goes to pray, then read the passage. And she's going to present to us her goal for the message she's about to give.

Romans chapter eight. My verses are nine and 10, and they say this. You, however, are not in the flesh but in the spirit, if indeed the spirit of God lives in you. If anyone does not have the spirit of Christ, he does not belong to him.

I wanna read that again. If anyone does not have the spirit of Christ, he does not belong to him. Now if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit gives life because of righteousness.

I'll go back to that one point again. If anyone does not have the spirit of Christ, he does not belong to him. I want you to know my one goal for this message. Just one, just one. And that is that it would be used of God, overtaken by God, in such a way that every single one of us would far more greatly value that which is in us.

My whole aim is that somehow our appreciation of this treasure that he has put within us would so skyrocket that we would respond in such a way to yield to what the Holy Spirit wants to do.

Okay, so she reads the text, repeats a couple of times, anyone who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him, and proceeds to give her goal for the message, saying that she wishes for God to use the message to cause every single one of us to greatly value that which is in us so that this treasure that was put within us would so skyrocket that we would respond in such a way to yield to what the Holy Spirit wants to do.

Okay, let's look at these two verses again. You, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if in fact the spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him, but if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness.

If the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. So then, brothers, we are debtors not to the flesh to live according to the flesh, for if you live according to the flesh, you will die, but if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

This is the text she has been given to teach on, and she wants to only focus on the first two verses, and through these verses, her goal is to encourage us to value the spirit that lives with us in such a way that we yield to what he wants us to do.

Okay, my question is, does the Holy Spirit through Paul in writing this message have the same goal? Is that what he intended in writing these verses? Paul definitely wants to encourage believers, yes.

He wants to encourage them by directing them to observe their walk and assure that if they are in Christ, they have his spirit which empowers them to walk like Christ. So when Beth Moore says that she wants us to treasure the Holy Spirit so much so that we yield to what he wants of us, does she mean to live by faith in Christ Jesus and submitting to God's law?

What is it that the spirit wants us to do? Does she believe it is arrived at subjectively? Let's find out. She uses how women value the life of an unborn child in the womb as an example of valuing the spirit within us.

Found out that you were carrying a child. There's a very strong sense of valuing what is in you.

And makes a claim that if this passage was an Instagram story, it would be at this point that all sorts of emojis would be placed for it is this passage that reveals whose spirit has been at work all along.

If we were looking at the scriptures in such a way that it were an Instagram story and it was embedded in our stories and at this point we would see all men are on Instagram, all sorts of emoji, all sorts of fireworks, there would be all manner of thing going on in that story when we got to this point in the scriptures because something huge takes place here doctrinally.

Something you need to know, something I need to know and be aware of every single day of our lives because the entire premise of this part of Romans chapter eight is this, a very, very simple kind of equation.

The spirit of God equals the spirit of Christ. Wanna say that again. That may sound like, you know what, that's not very exciting. Oh no, this is so exciting. The spirit of God that had been taught all the way through the Old Testament, seen the activity of the spirit from the very beginning of Genesis that we find out through the inspiration of God, through the pen of the apostle Paul, that that spirit of God all along has been the spirit of Christ.

Yes, this is a wondrous and glorious thing. Paul is saying that the Holy Spirit is God's spirit and Christ's spirit. That same spirit that worked with God in creation worked in Christ a perfect righteousness and raised him from the dead.

And Paul is reminding us that the same spirit worked in us to raise us to life, to be led by him, verse 14, to walk in him and give life to our mortal bodies. At this time, she leaves the text and gives the listeners a bunch of verses that talk about God's spirit being Christ's spirit.

She lists and reads 1 Peter 1, 10 and 11, Galatians 4, 6, John 14, verses 15 to 20 and verses 25 and 26 and Acts 1, 8. With each one read, she points to how the spirit written about in these verses is Christ's spirit.

Now what she's doing here is called proof texting. That's where one takes a bunch of verses out of context to build a theology and proof texting done correctly is good. But if the verses are taken out of context to be given a different meaning than what they mean in the context, then that's a no-no.

Beth Moore at this point isn't quite mishandling the verses given. She's using them to explain how God's spirit was Christ's spirit from the beginning and to inform us that those who believe in Jesus have been sealed with the Holy Spirit.

How different would our lives be if we really understood, wait a second, because I have trusted Christ. In the moment that I did, his very spirit took up residency in me and that the Holy Scriptures say at that point, I was completely sealed, you were completely sealed until the day of our redemption.

That is when we are in his presence. Nothing can get in because the Holy Spirit lives in us. We cannot be possessed by any other spirit, but the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit also is not going to leave nor forsake us.

And I'm really glad she mentions this, though I'm saddened that unbelievers have not really been taught on what they should believe about themselves and what Christ did, but I digress. What she will do is leave out some extremely important details, especially in the John passages that actually are important to what it means that the spirit is our helper.

Important truths that are exactly in line with what Paul is teaching in Romans 8. Let's look at what she says and examines how she handles this text.

These are huge principles in the word of God. And I want you to see in John chapter 14, I wanna read verses 15 through 20, and then 25 through 26, 15 through 20. This is Jesus speaking. This is the last evening he will be, later this evening, he will be arrested and he will be crucified and will die on the cross within the next day.

So it says, if you love me, you will keep my commands. And I will ask the Father and he will give you another counselor to be with you forever. He is the spirit of truth. Now he's talking about himself.