MAKE YOU WONDER
By Rod Rowland
“And these signs shall follow them that believe... And they went forth, and preached every where, the Lord working with them, and confirming the word with signs
following. Amen.” Mark 16:17 & 20
After almost three and a half decades in and around
the Pentecostal, and Charismatic movements I have seen and been a participant
in events which some might call “bizarre”.
Some of which I have repented my involvement, while
others, to this day, I still praise the Lord that I was privileged to witness
His power and His might at work in His Church!
In and of itself, a bizarre event or behaviour is not
necessarily something to be shunned as the workings of the devil, for the word
simply means “strange or unusual”. (Oxford Dict. It is left to the synonyms to
take us further into the extreme meanings).
For example, to throw an iron axe-head into water and
expect it to float may seem bizarre to some, but Scripture describes this very
act, does it not? What is more bizarre than to have an ass speaking to and
warning a human being of God’s impending wrath?
The twofold hallmark of the Christian Church has stood
unchanged for almost two millennia. Firstly Christ commanded that we in His
Church “love one another as He Loved us” (John 13:34) and secondly, He
commissioned His Church to go forth and preach His Gospel “with signs
following”! So it was, that for almost four hundred years the
followers of Christ enjoyed the communion of the Holy Spirit as He confirmed
the Gospel of Christ with manifold signs and wonders in their midst.
With the advent of the Emperor Constantine and his
admixture church, apostasy, manipulation, and downright heresy poisoned the
waters of the Church throughout the Dark Ages, so much so that the ministry of
the Holy Spirit was completely absent from the visible Church. History itself
teaches us that this was the very reason for naming those years the “Dark Ages”
- the light of the Gospel had been dimmed almost to the point of extinction!
Seen only in very small pockets of faithful believers
who had withstood the pogroms of the Caesars, in and out of Rome, the signs and
wonders of the Church were reduced to a mere shadow of that which had been in
the early Church.
So it remained, until after the Reformation and to the
great Revivals of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Strangely, even in the midst of those wonderful Holy
Ghost revivals we find a line of separation drawn by those who supported signs
and wonders in the Church and those who considered the miraculous as something
akin to the works of the devil!
The Church at large owes our Lord a heartfelt apology
for her unbelief and her quenching of the Holy Spirit. However, by the same
token I believe great sections of the visible ‘church’ today need to repent of
its mad obsession with its false signs and false wonders!
When Jesus commissioned His Church to go into all the
world and preach the Gospel He laid down a strict criteria, by which the Holy
Spirit would confirm the preaching with “signs following”.
Very simply, our Lord instructed His followers to “...preach
the gospel to every creature...” Some might conjecture here... “Are
you serious? Surely it can’t be that simple, can it?”
It may sound silly to press this issue, but beloved,
if what is being preached is not true
Gospel, then no-one
has any right to expect the Holy Spirit to confirm the “preaching” with signs
following!
It is at this point that desperate and cunning minds
seek to “conjure up” their own “miracles and magic tricks” to justify their
ministry and control their followers! Oh, and of course, in the manner of
Simon, of Acts 8, to make money from God’s people.
That said, what then are we make of those ministries
which claim “miracles” and “signs and wonders” when it is obvious that the
gospel being preached is NOT the gospel of Jesus Christ?
The world has a quaint and somewhat simplistic method
of judging something or someone as to its authenticity... “If it looks like a
duck, if it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck - then in all
probability it is a duck!” That may be good and fine when it comes to ducks,
but when applied to the workings of the Holy Spirit it is a sure recipe for
disaster!
To apply this “duck theory” to the Holy Spirit and His
workings is naivety at its worst and leaves the vulnerable in the Church open
to deception of the worst kind.
Many of us in the Church, myself included, believe
that we are in the “last days” of the Church Era and delight in the expectation
of our Lord’s immanent return for His people.
Sadly many of these same people, whilst believing the
Good News of our Lord’s return, willingly ignore His warnings about the “lying
signs and wonders” and the deception that would abound prior to His return.
Often these folk are the first to condemn God’s Watchmen when they sound clear
warnings about these false revivals and lying signs and wonders! “Critical” and “unloving” are two words of
abuse which spring to mind when our courageous brethren stand firm in exposing
these charlatans and their “miracles”, and “Touch not God’s anointed” and
“Beware lest you be found to blaspheme the Holy Spirit” are two scriptures
readily heaped upon those who dare to discern.
It is not possible to enumerate the endless list of
questionable signs and wonders which are being held up as true miracles of God
here, but suffice to say again... if it is not the true Gospel of Jesus Christ
being preached, then it cannot be a true sign or wonder that is being claimed.
If it is not in the scriptures... don’t do it!
Jesus issued a very sober warning in His denunciation
of false prophets and false miracle workers in Matthew 7:21-23...
“Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the
kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy
name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful
works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you:
depart from me, ye that work iniquity.”
At risk of repeating myself, (from our last issue) I
want to state again John Wesley’s grim commentary on the passage: “I never knew you”. Wesley states:” - In saying
“There never was a time that I (Christ) approved of you,” he believes our Lord is warning
that whilst many souls had been saved under the ministry of these apostates,
they themselves were never saved from their sins.”
What then are we to make of the possibility of someone
receiving a healing under the preaching of a false gospel or a false preacher?
Using the gist of Wesley’s commentary to deal with
this occurrence, we must allow a Sovereign God to act according to his will and
purpose in the lives of all who love His Son.
God will always hear the cries of the heart of His
faithful children and Wesley noted that the preacher, though deliberately and
willingly breaking the laws of God, may still preach the Gospel perfectly, thus
bringing souls to salvation or healing.
However, any preacher knowingly and rebelliously
preaching a false gospel is quite another thing - but here again our merciful
God may work His own will and purposes in the life of His son or daughter, not
glorifying the sinful preacher but revealing Himself to the individual.
The apostle Paul, in dealing with the “perversion” of
the Gospel in the midst of the Galatians, spoke thus: “O foolish
Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth… Are ye so
foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh? ...He therefore that ministereth to you the
Spirit, and worketh miracles among you, doeth he it by the works of the law, or
by the hearing of faith?”
Paul makes the point that any
miracles done in their midst was done by those who ministered the Spirit of
Truth, not by those who offered the works of the Law. Why should we have
any illusion that these end-time deceivers in our midst work their “miracles”
by anything other than the works of illusion or trickery!
It makes no sense to believe that a ministry, a
church, or any religious movement which preaches another Jesus, or another
gospel, will have the blessing or sanction of the Spirit of God - it is just
not possible.
I urge our readers to study the account of Simon the
Sorcerer in Acts 8:9-24.
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