The following message was delivered at Grace Community Church in Panorama
City, California, By John MacArthur Jr. It was transcribed from the tape,
GC
90-63, titled "Charismatic Chaos" Part 12. A copy of the tape can be
obtained
by writing, Word of Grace, P.O. Box 4000, Panorama City, CA 91412.

I have made
every effort to ensure that an accurate transcription of the
original tape was
made. Please note that at times sentence structure may
appear to vary from
accepted English conventions. This is due primarily to
the techniques
involved in preaching and the obvious choices I had to make in
placing the
correct punctuation in the article.

It is my intent and prayer that the Holy
Spirit will use this transcription
of the sermon, "Charismatic Chaos" Part 12,
to strengthen and encourage the
true Church of Jesus Christ.



Charismatic Chaos - Part 12

"Does
God Promise Health and Wealth?"
(Part 2)
by
John
MacArthur


The subject tonight in our study of the Charismatic Chaos is the
Health,
Wealth, and Prosperity gospel. We can title this message with a
question,
"Does God Promise Health and Wealth?"

When I was in the Soviet
Union a couple of weeks ago they said to me, "We
want you to preach on the
'Health and Wealth' gospel." I was talking to
hundreds of pastors, and Pastor
DuChanchenko (sp.) who heads up the Church
there in the Ukraine said, "I want
you to preach on the 'Health-Wealth'
gospel." I said, "You're not telling me
that that's a problem here?" How
could anybody go to the Soviet Union and
promise people wealth? A whole
nation in poverty! He said, "It's here." He
said,

Recently, outside of Kiev, a man came from America and he
called
the people in the city together, and he said [that] he
represented
Jesus Christ, and he was going to preach. And a great crowd
of
non-Christian people came to hear him, and he promised them that
God wanted them healthy and wealthy! And he said that if they
came
back the next night the power of God would fall and they
would all be
healed! And so they came. A large crowd came and
nobody got healed--
and they spit on the man! They spit on the
man!

The kind of foolish
promises that are being made that cannot be fulfilled
bring a terrible
reproach to the name of Christ.

One of the most unusual legacies of World
War II has been what are known as
the "Cargo Cults of the South Pacific."
Anybody who lives in Australia or
New Zealand knows about them. Many
Aboriginal Island people ranging from
northern Australia to Indonesia were
first exposed to modern civilization
through the allied armed forces during
World War II. The American military,
in particular, often used these remote
islands in the South Pacific as sites
for temporary landing strips and supply
depots. And those of you who
remember the scenario of World War II--
personally I have absolutely no memory
of any of it because I was so small,
but I have read and I know what
occurred--some of you will even remember, and
some of you will remember your
history books and be reminded of the fact that
we were all over the South
Pacific on remote little islands with our landing
strips and our supply
depots so that we could keep our men in the air
particularly. And so when
Americans and other allies came to these little
islands and met these
Aboriginal island people they came bringing cargo. They
flew in there,
created these airstrips so they could fly larger equipment in
there. And
then they brought in huge warehouses full of cargo and they left
as quickly
as they came when the war ended. The tribal people had absolutely
no
opportunity to learn the ways of civilization, but for a brief moment
they
saw high technology up close. Cargo planes would swoop in from the sky,
they
would land, they would unload their payload and then takeoff.

Natives
that lived in the bush all of a sudden saw cigarette lighters that
produced
fire instantly and they believed it to be miraculous. They saw
large machines
come in and push trees down. They went all the way from not
even having a
wheel or a cart to seeing a Jeep, modern weaponry,
refrigerators, radios
(talking boxes), power tools, and many varieties of
food in all kinds of cans
and jars. They were fascinated by all of that and
many of those tribal people
concluded that the white men were gods. When the
war was over and the troops
were gone tribesmen built shrines to the "cargo
gods." Their tabernacles were
perfect replicas of cargo planes, control
towers and airplane hangers. They
made them out of bamboo and woven
material. These structures look remarkably
like the control towers and the
plane hangers and the planes themselves, but
they were really nonfunctional;
all they were was shrines or temples to the
cargo gods.

On some of those remote islands today the cargo cults still
thrive. Some
have personified all Americans in one deity and they call that
deity "Tom
Navy." They pray for holy cargo from every airplane that flies
over. They
venerate religious relics like Zippo lighters, cameras,
eyeglasses, ballpoint
pens, nuts and bolts, and so on. As civilization has
begun to penetrate some
of these cultures their fascination for cargo has not
diminished. In fact,
missionaries that have been sent to these areas where
cargo cults have
flourished receive a warm reception at first because the
cargo cultist view
their arrival as the "Second Coming" of the cargo god. But
they are looking
for cargo--not gospel. And missionaries say they find it
very difficult to
penetrate the materialism that is the essence of the cargo
cults.

In recent years the Charismatic movement has spawned its own variety
of cargo
cult. It is called the "Word-Faith Movement"; known otherwise as the
"Faith
Movement," known as the "Faith Formula," known as the "Word of
Faith,"
"Hyperfaith," "Positive Confession," "Name It and Claim It," "Health,
Wealth,
and Prosperity Teaching," all of those titles. This subdivision of
the
Charismatic movement, listen, is easily as superstitious and materialistic
as
the "Cargo Cults" of the South Pacific. The Leaders of this Word-Faith movement, including Kenneth Hagin, Kenneth and Gloria Copeland, Robert
Tilton,
Fred Price, and Charles Capps (sp.), promise each believer financial
prosperity and perfect health; anything less, they argue, is not God's will! And there are many people who "chime" in with this; in fact, if I understand, last week there was a great, great convocation at the church of Fred Price, which espouses this, attended by many, not only Charismatics and Pentecostals but even a leading Presbyterian pastor in our area. They were all there.

The tentacles of this kind of theology has reached out far and wide. They
have sought mainstream acceptance and they have managed to build
relationships
with people, who because of those relationships will not speak
the truth
against them, and so the thing flourishes like a wildfire. And of
course it
appeals to people because it demands nothing but faith; it doesn't
demand
holiness, it doesn't demand devotion or dedication, it only demands
faith and
it promises that if you have enough you'll get rich and
healthy--that's a
popular message.

I suppose that we could say that virtually every false
religion ever spawned
by man worships a god whose function it is to deliver
some kind of "cargo."
That is, human religion invariably invents gods for
utilitarian reasons.
They invent gods that give them what they want. They
invent deities to serve
them rather than the other way around. The Word-Faith
theology has turned
Christianity into a system that is no different from the
lowest human
religions. It is a form of voodoo where God can be coerced,
cajoled,
manipulated, controlled, and exploited for the Christian's own ends.
I received a mailing sent out by one rather extreme Word-Faith teacher named David Eppley (sp.). A brochure was included with a bar of prayer-blessed
soap, quote,

We are going to wash away all bad luck, sickness,
misfortunes,
and evil! Yes, even that evil person you want out of
your
life. Jesus helped a man wash blindness from his eyes; I want
to help you concerning hexes, vexes, home problems, love,
happiness, and joy. (the brochure said).

Inside the brochure were
testimonies from people who had been blessed by that
ministry. "Door opens to
new job!" said one. "An $80,000 dream comes true!"
said another. "Couldn't
use my hand for twelve years!" said another. Also
inside was a personal
letter from the pastor closing with a full page of
instructions on how to use
the soap. If you used it right it would bring you
healing and money,

Now, after you wash the poverty from your hands, take out the
largest bill or check you have. That $100, $50, or $20 bill,
hold
it in your clean hands and say, "In Jesus' name I dedicate
this gift to
God's work and expect a miracle return of money."

And of course, your
largest bill or check must be sent to David Eppley (sp.).
The last paragraph
said,

Through this gift of discernment, I see someone sending a $25
offering and God is showing me a large check coming to them in
the
next short while I mean "large;" it looks like over $1,000!
I know this
sounds strange but you know me well enough to know
that I have to obey
God when He speaks. I'll be here waiting
for your answer.

Frankly,
that sounds more like Black Magic. Certainly a more outrageous
example than
most, but still it reflects a style that is typical of nearly
all Word-Faith
ministries. If it was just plain hucksterism that would be
bad enough. I
guess I could tell you honestly, I could take Reverend Ike. I
could take
Reverend Ike because . . . (I don't know if you know who he is, but
if you
don't, don't worry about him)--but, I can take Reverend Ike because
he uses
the same gimmick, but he doesn't make it Christian! What corrupts so devastatingly is to tie this kind of con game into Christ!

Word-Faith teachers
have corrupted the heart of New Testament Christianity.
They have moved the
believers' focus off sound doctrine, worship, service,
sacrifice, and
ministry; and they have shifted it instead to promised
physical, financial,
and material blessings. Those blessings are the cargo
that God is supposed to
deliver to those who know and follow the Word-Faith
formula.

Word-Faith
writings . . . and there are myriad of these things, you can't even
keep up
with them. I got a new one this week that somebody sent me to try to
help me
to see the truth. It's a thick book and it is all about all of these
Word-
Faith teachers. It has all their pictures on the front. There is
almost no
end to the proliferation of literature (many trees are dying in
this operation
to be used for pulp and paper). Word-Faith articles carry
titles like, "How
to Write Your Own Ticket with God," "Godliness is
Profitable," "The Laws of
Prosperity," "God's Creative Power Will Work for
You," "Releasing the Ability
of God Through Prayer," "God's Formula for
Success and Prosperity," "God's
Master Key to Prosperity," "Living in Divine
Prosperity," and so it goes.

In
Word-Faith religion the believer uses God, whereas, the truth of Biblical Christianity is--God uses the believer! Word-Faith theology sees the Holy Spirit as a Power to be put to use for whatever the believer wants. The
Bible
teaches, however, that the Holy Spirit is a person who enables the
believer to
do whatever God wants. It is absolutely the opposite of
Scripture. Many
Word-Faith teachers claim that Jesus was "Born Again" so
that we might become
"little gods." Scripture, however, teaches that Jesus
is God and it is we who
must be born again.

Frankly, I have little or no tolerance for these
deceptions, these corruptions
of Scriptures and false claims of the Word faith
movement. I have absolutely
no constraints on me to speak to this issue
because I believe that I am
literally bound by my obligation as one called to
minister the truth of God
to so speak, because this defies everything I
understand to be true about
Scripture.

The movement [Word-Faith] closely
resembles some of the destructive greed
sects that ravaged the early church.
Paul and other apostles were not
accommodating to or conciliatory with the
false teachers who propagated ideas
like that in their day. They identified
them as dangerous false teachers and
urged Christians to avoid them. Paul
warned Timothy, for example, about "Men
of depraved mind and deprived of the
truth, who suppose that godliness is a
means of gain." This isn't anything
new. Paul was dealing with those who
thought godliness was a ticket for
money. Paul further said to Timothy,

But those who want to get rich
fall into temptation and a snare
and many foolish and harmful desires
which plunge men into ruin
and destruction. For the love of money is a
root of all sorts
of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away
from the
faith, and pierced themselves with many a pang. But flee
from
these things. [1 Tim 6:9-11, NASB].

These cults are generated,
know this, out of a love for money! They develop
a religion to accommodate
their lusts. Jude wrote of the greed mongers of
his day,

Woe to them!
For they have gone the way of Cain, and for pay
they have rushed
headlong into the error of Balaam, and perished
in the rebellion of
Korah. These men are those who are hidden
reefs in your love-feasts
when they feast with you without fear,
caring for themselves; clouds
without water, carried along by
winds; autumn trees without fruit,
doubly dead, uprooted; wild
waves of the sea, casting up their own shame
like foam;
wandering stars, for whom the black darkness has been
reserved
forever . . . They are grumblers, finding fault, following
after
their own lusts; they speak arrogantly, flattering people for
the sake of gaining an advantage. [Jude 11-13, 16 NASB].

There is nothing
that I could say that would be as strong as that, and that
is out of God's
Word. Peter wrote,

But false prophets also arose among the people,
just as there
will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly
introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who
bought
them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. And
many will follow
their sensuality, and because of them the way
of the truth will be
maligned; and in their greed they will
exploit you with false words. [2
Pet 2:1-3, NASB].

Peter went on to say,

Their judgment from long ago
is not idle, and their destruction
is not asleep . . . For speaking out
arrogant words of vanity
they entice by fleshly desires, by sensuality,
[that is, they
entice you by the things you lust for], and they entice
those
who barely escape from the ones who live in error, promising
them freedom while they themselves are slaves of corruption; for
by
what a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved. [2 Pet 2:3,
18-19,
NASB].

You show me a person who preaches the "Money Gospel," the "Money
Message,"
the "Wealth Message," I'll show you a person who has been corrupted
by the
love of money; that's what Peter is saying. Paul said covetousness
is
idolatry and Paul forbade the Ephesians to be partakers with anyone who
brought either a message of immorality or a message of covetousness (Eph. 5:5-7).

Now the question is, "How closely do modern Word-Faith teachers
resemble the
greedy false teachers that the apostles described? Is it fair to
write the
movement off as heretical? As sub-Christian?" Well, I want us to
look at
that, and let's find out. In some ways I hesitate to label the Word-
Faith
movement as a cult only because its boundaries are, as yet, somewhat
hazy.
Many sincere Christians hover around the periphery of the Word-Faith
teaching. It isn't a sort of a bordered, identifiable cult. It is somewhat amorphous and it floats in an almost undefined way and bumps in and out of
all
kinds of groups of Christians. And so while on the one hand we can't say
that
everybody that it touches is cultic, all of the elements within it are
cultic:

It has a distorted Christology that is a warped view of
Christ.

It has a distorted view of man, an exulted view of man.

It has a theology built on human works.

It has a process of
sanctification that justifies greed.

It has a belief that new
revelation from within the group is unlocking
secrets that have been
hidden from the Church for years.

It believes that extrabiblical human
writings are inspired and
authoritative.

It has an exclusivity
that compels its adherents to shun any and every
criticism of the
movement. In fact, as you know, Benny Hinn said if
anybody criticizes
him he wants, "to get a Holy Ghost machine gun and
blow their head
off!"

Without some exacting corrections in the movement's doctrinal
foundations it
will become a clearly identifiable cult, if it is not already
so. It
certainly is the closest thing on earth to the greed cults of the
New
Testament era which the apostles bluntly labeled heresy. Now, I know that
is
a serious verdict, but I think there is ample evidence to bear it out.
At
almost every turn the Word-Faith movement has tainted, twisted, garbled, misunderstood, corrupted, or obliterated the crucial doctrines of Christian faith. Let me help you with that by looking at some of them.

First of all,
The Word-Faith movement has the wrong god! It has the wrong
god. I believe
that it is fair to say that the god of the Word-Faith
movement is not the God
of the Bible. Word-Faith teaching, in effect, listen
to this, sets the
individual believer (are you ready for this?) above God,
and turns God into
Santa Claus, or a genie, or a valet who is there to do
whatever the Christian
tells Him. See, these Word-Faith teachers are their
own supreme authority.
Kenneth Hagin, who is patriarchal in this movement,
wrote this booklet
called, "How To Write Your Own Ticket With God." He tells
about seeing a
vision of Jesus and he says to Him,

Dear Lord, I have two sermons I
preach concerning the woman who
touched your clothes and was healed when
you were on earth. I
received both of these sermons by inspiration.

I am quoting him. Later on he quotes what Jesus told him in reply, Jesus
said,

You are correct, My Spirit, the Holy Spirit, endeavored to get
another sermon into your spirit but you failed to pick it up.
While I am here I will do what you ask, I will give you that
sermon
outline. Now, get your pencil and paper and write it
down.

That's what
Jesus said to him, he says. Hagin claims to have received
numerous visions as
well as eight personal visitations from Jesus. Hagin has
written, "The Lord
Himself taught me about prosperity. I never read about it
in a book; I got it
directly from heaven." That claim is a lie: outright,
I'll show you why a
little later. You see they believe or they want every
body else to believe
that God is giving this information to them. Do you
understand beloved that
if you do not have a closed Canon, and if Scripture
did not end with the Book
of Revelation, if you believe that God is still
giving revelation--there is no
way to stop the flood.

Everybody is claiming God speaks to them.
Fortunately, for the Word-Faith
people, God is telling them exactly what they
want Him to say. They have
created God in the image that they want Him to be.
For example, they have no
concept of God as sovereign. Scripture says in
Psalm 103:19, "The Lord has
established His throne in the heavens; and His
sovereignty rules over all."
What that simply means is, God's in charge of
everybody and everything. God
is the blest and only sovereign, the King of
Kings and Lord of Lords (1 Tim
6:15), yet in the volumes of Word-Faith
material that I have read, I have
not found one reference to the sovereignty
of God--not one! The reason is
clear: they don't believe He is sovereign.

Jesus, according to Word-Faith teaching, has no authority on earth: it is all delegated to the Church. Kenneth Hagin says this in his book entitled, "The Authority of the Believer," which, by the way, has long sections which were taken verbatim from other books written by other people: and he says that he got them from God; it is just not true. But he says that Jesus has no authority, He delegated it all to the Church; we are in charge of God and we are in charge of Jesus.

Furthermore, Word-Faith theology teaches that God is
bound by spiritual laws
that govern health and prosperity. God is bound by
some laws; by some
principles. If we say the right words, or if we have the
right faith, God is
forced to respond however we determine. Robert Tilton
claims that God has
already committed to take His part in a covenant
relationship with us. We
can make whatever commitment or promise to Him we
want, quote, says Tilton,

Then we can tell God, on the authority of His
Word, what we
would like Him to do. That's right, you can actually tell
God
what you would like His part in the covenant to be.

In the Word-
Faith system God is not Lord of all: He can't work unless we
release Him to
work; He is dependent on human instruments; He is dependent on
human faith;
and above all, He has to act in response to human words to get
His work done.
Charles Capps (sp.) has written, "It is in your power to
release the ability
of God." In other words, "God is Stuck--until we speak
His orders!" On the
other hand, according to Charles Capps (sp.) "Fear
activates the devil." If
you succumb to fear, even doubting a little, he
says,

You've moved God
out of it. You have stopped God's ability
immediately. Maybe it was
just about to come into
manifestation, but now you have established
Satan's word in the
earth, "That it is not getting any better, it is
getting worse."
You have established his word.

What he is saying is,
"If you have fear, you release the devil to work; if
you have faith, you
release God to work. So if you are afraid of Satan, you
have bottled God and
set Satan loose," (My, you are a powerful person!).
According to Charles
Capps, in his book, "The Tongue--A Creative Force," God
has turned over His
sovereignty, including (listen to this) His creative
authority, to people.
Capps has written,

In August of 1973 the Word of the Lord came unto me
saying,
[Just that is frightening. This is the Lord speaking to
Charles
Capps] "If men would believe me, long prayers are not
necessary.
Just speaking the Word will bring you what you desire. My
creative power is given to man in word form. I have ceased, for
a
time, from My work and have given man the book of My creative
power.
For it to be effective man must speak it in faith Jesus
spoke it when
He was on earth and as it worked then, so it shall
work now, but it must
be spoken by the body. Man must rise up
and have dominion over the
power of evil by My words. It is my
greatest desire that My people
create a better life by the
spoken word, for My word has not lost its
power just because it
has been spoken once. It is still equally as
powerful today as
when I said, 'Let there be light,' but for My word to
be
effective, man must speak it; and that creative power will come
forth performing that which is spoken in faith."

Simply saying, in other
words what he is stating is this, "You have the
ability (if you have enough
faith) to create with your words. You want
money? Create it with your faith
filled words. You want healings? Create
it with your faith filled words."
It escapes my how one of these popular
Word-Faith teachers could possibly be
5 Million dollars in debt; can't he
just speak it into existence? And then on
the other hand, why pray at all if
your words have so much creative force?
Why pray? What's there to ask for?
You really come up with a denial that
you need to seek anything from God;
after all, God has given the sovereignty
to you, He's yielded up His creative
power to you; it's not His word anymore,
it was His word the first time, it
is your word now. Speak it into existence,
you don't need Him--you're
sovereign.

Another of their teachers, Norval Hayes
(sp.), says it is better to talk to
your checkbook, talk to your disease, or
talk to whatever predicament you're
in than to turn to God in prayer! I'm
quoting,

You aren't supposed to talk to Jesus about it; you're
supposed
to talk directly to the mountain in Jesus' Name (whatever the
mountain is in your life). Stop talking to Jesus about it; stop
talking to anybody else about it; speak to the mountain itself
in
Jesus' Name. Don't say, "Oh God, help me. Remove this
sickness from
me," say, "Flu, I'm not going to let you come into
my body! Go from me
in the name of Jesus! Nose, I tell you,
stop running! Cough, I tell
you to leave in Jesus' name!" Say,
"Cancer, you can't kill me, I will
never die of cancer in Jesus'
name!" [I'm quoting him further] Do you
have a financial
mountain in your life? Start talking to your money.
Tell your
checkbook to line up with God's word. Talk to your
business.
Command customers to come into your business and spend
their
money there. Talk to the mountain.

You laugh at this,
and I understand that, but there are a lot of people who
don't laugh at this--
they are believing this. Norval Hayes (sp.) has several
publications and one
of them titled "Putting Your Angels To Work" which
indicates that you are not
only sovereign over this world but you are
sovereign over the angelic world as
well. Hayes also teaches that believers
can exercise dominion over the
angels, quote,

Since angels are ministering spirits sent to minister to
and for
Christians [he reasons], we can learn how to put them into
action on our behalf. We believers ought to be keeping those
angelic creatures busy! We ought to have them working for us
all
of the time.

And so I think it is fair to say that Word-Faith theology denies
the
sovereignty of God, removes the need to pray to God for any relief from
burdens or needs and gives the Christian himself both dominion and creative power. In my judgment it is human pride at its ugliest. Worse, it is
idolatry and the new idol is self, and God is dethroned. To follow this wrong-God concept a little further, the Word-Faith movement teaches that when you become a Christian you become part of a race of little gods. Kenneth Copeland has explicitly stated what many Word-Faith teachers more subtly
imply. This is what Kenneth Copeland writes,

He imparted in you, when
you were born again . . .Peter said it
just as plain, he said, "We are
partakers of the divine nature."
That nature is life eternal in absolute
perfection, and that was
imparted, injected into your spirit-man and you
have that
imparted into you by God just the same as you imparted into
your
child the nature of humanity. That child wasn't born a whale,
he was born a human--isn't that true? Well now, you don't have
a
human do you? You are one. And you don't have a god in
you--you are
one!

Copeland teaches that Adam was created in the god-class; that is, Adam
was a
reproduction of God! Listen to what he says,

He was not
subordinate to God--Adam was walking as a god! What
he said "went,"
what he did "counted"; and when he bowed his
knee to Satan and put Satan
up above him then there wasn't
anything God could do about it because a
"god" had placed Satan
there. Adam, remember, was created in the god-
class, but when
he committed high treason he fell below the god-class.

"On the cross," according to Copeland, "Jesus won the right for believers to
be born again back into the god-class. Adam was created, not subordinate to God, but as a god; he lost it, and in Christ we are taken back to the god- class." In saying that, Copeland believes that Jesus, quote,

Won
healing, He won deliverance, He won financial prosperity,
mental
prosperity, physical prosperity, family prosperity. He
said He would
meet my needs according to His riches in glory by
Christ Jesus, and I am
walking around and saying, "Yes, my needs
are met according to His
riches in glory by Christ Jesus."
Glory to God, I am coveting to the
"need meter"; I am coveting
to the I AM; Hallelujah! And I say this
with all respect so
that it don't upset you too bad, but I say it
anyway; when I read
in the Bible where He says "I AM" I just smile and
say "Yes, I
AM too!"

That is so blasphemous that it ought to make every
true child of God cringe,
yet it is typical of Word-Faith teaching. For any
human being to call
himself the "I AM," "YAHWEH" the eternal saving, sovereign
God, is blasphemy.
In the face of criticism for some of his statements about
the deity of the
believer, Copeland appeared with Paul and Jan Crouch on
Trinity Broadcasting
Network's program "Praise the Lord!" and he was there to
defend his teaching,
and this is the following conversation that ensued,

Paul Crouch said: God doesn't even draw a distinction between
Himself and us.

Kenneth Copeland said: Never, never, you never
can do that in a
covenant relationship.

Paul Crouch: Do you know
what else that has settled then
tonight? This hue and cry and
controversy that has been spawned
by the devil to try and bring
dissension within the Body of
Christ that we are gods--I am a little
god!

Kenneth Copeland: Yes, yes!

Jan Crouch: Absolutely, He gave
us His name.

Kenneth Copeland: The reason we are . . .

Paul
Crouch: I have His name! I am one with Him! I'm in
covenant relations.
I am a little god! Critics be gone!

Kenneth Copeland: You are anything
that He is.

Paul Crouch: Yes!

Paul Crouch, head and "On Air" host of
Trinity Broadcasting Network and
therefore one of the most powerful
influential people in religious
broadcasting today, has reaffirmed repeatedly
his commitment to the "little
gods" doctrine of Word-Faith, quoting him,

That new creation that comes in the new birth, is created in
His
image. It is joined then with Jesus Christ. Is that
correct? And so
in that sense (I saw this many years ago)
whatever that union is that
unites Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
He says, "Father, I want them to be
one with Me, even as You and
I are one in Us," so apparently [that's]
what He does: He opens
up that union of the very Godhead and brings us
into it.

We become part of the Trinity in that view. Other Word-Faith
teachers have
reiterated the heresy. Charles Capps (sp.) writes,

I
have heard people say, "Those who confess God's Word and say
the
promises of God over and over are just trying to act like
God." Yes!
That's exactly what we are trying to do, act as God
would in a similar
situation. What did He do? He spoke the
thing desired.

Or O'Palk
(sp.), another of them, wrote, "Until we comprehend that we are
little gods
and we begin to act like little gods, we cannot manifest the
Kingdom of God."
Robert Tilton also calls the believer, "A god kind of
creature designed to be
as a god in this world. Designed and created by God
to be the god of this
world." Other of their popular preachers, Maurice
Serullo (sp.) had this
televised conversation with Dwight Thompson, you see
him on Channel 40
frequently,

Maurice Serullo (sp.): See when God created us in His image
He
didn't put any strings on us--did He? He didn't make us
puppets.

Dwight Thompson: No, not at all!

Maurice
Serullo: He didn't say, 'Maurice, raise your hand,
raise your, you know,
and then here we are. We have no
absolute, no control over us.

Dwight Thompson: No, no, no!

Maurice Serullo: He made Dwight
Thompson, he made Maurice
Serullo a small miniature god. Of course!
The Bible says that
we are created in the image of God, His likeness.
Where is that
god-likeness? He gave us power. He gave us authority.
He gave
us dominion. He didn't tell us to act like a man, He told us
to
act like a god.

Benny Hinn adds,

The new creation is
created after God in righteousness and true
holiness. The new man is
after God, like God, godlike, complete
in Jesus Christ. The new
creation is just like God. May I say
it like this, "You are a little
god on earth running around."

And then Hinn responded to criticism of such
teaching this way, he said,

Now are you ready for some real revelation
knowledge? Ok, now
watch this! He laid aside His divine form so one
day I would be
clothed on earth with the divine form. Kenneth Hagin has
a
teaching; a lot of people have problems with it, yet it is
absolute truth. Kenneth Copeland has a teaching, many
Christians
have put holes in it, but it is divine truth. Hagin
and Copeland say,
"You are god, you are gods." "Oh, I can't be
God!" Hold it! Let's
bring balance to this teaching. The
balance is being taught by Hagin;
it is those who repeat him
that mess it up. The balance is being taught
by Copeland, who
is my dear friend, but it is those who repeat what he
says that
are messing it up. You see there brother, when Jesus was on
earth, the Bible says that He first disrobed Himself of the
divine
form. He, the limitless God, became a man that we men
may become as He
is.

You'll notice in this that they land on the verses that indicate that we
enter in and participate in some of the things that are true about God. But they take it to the extreme where we become God. We do participate in the
love of God, don't we? And in the righteousness of God, and enjoy the grace
of God, but are not God. Hagin says,

If we ever wake up and realize
who we are we will start doing
the work that we are supposed to do,
because the Church hasn't
realized yet that they are Christs, that's who
they are. They
are Christs.

Now, we are not only God--we are Christ!
Thus, have the Word-Faith teachers
agreed to dispose God and to put us in His
place. From that basic error flow
all the fallacies. Why do they teach that
health and prosperity are every
Christian's divine right? Because, we're
God--we deserve it! Right? If I
am God I deserve prosperity. Why do they
teach that a believer's words have
creative and determinative force? Because
in their system we're God, and God
could speak things into creation, and we're
God so we can speak them into
creation. They have bought Satan's original
lie. The serpent said to the
woman, "You surely shall not die, for God knows
that in the day you eat from
this fruit, your eyes will be opened and you will
be like God." That was a
lie. Man will never be like God. We will be a
glorified man--not God. The
idea that man can be like God, is and always has
been the satanic lie. It
was the very lie . . . listen to this, [that]
brought the devil himself down.
He said, "I will be like God."

Two proof
texts are often used by the Word-Faith teachers to support their
teaching. In
Psalm (you need to listen to this, this is their case here), in
Psalm 82:6 God
says to the rulers of earth, "You are gods; and all of you are
sons of the
Most High." They quote that all of the time, Psalm 82:6, you
might want to
turn to it. And we will close with just a look at the two
texts they use, and
we are going to take it up next week. Psalm 82:6, God
says to the rulers of
earth, "You are 'gods'; and all of you are sons of the
Most High." And so
they say, "See, God says we are gods!"

A simple reading of the Psalm
however, says something very, very, different
than that. If you look at the
Psalm it will reveal to you that those words
were spoken to ungodly rulers who
were on the brink of judgment: ungodly
rulers on the brink of judgment. Look
at verse 7, (they never want to read
verse 7), "Nevertheless, you will die
like men; and fall like any one of the
princes. Arise, O God, judge the
earth." What is this? There is a note of
irony. God looks at these rulers
and they have been rendering unjust
judgments. Back in verse 2 they have been
judging unjustly; they have been
showing partiality to the wicked. They have
been, rather, doing injustice
than justice and He says, "Look, in your own
eyes you think you are gods, but
you are going to die like . . ." what?
"Men." How could you ever rip that
6th verse out of that context and make it
an affirmation that a Christian has
become a god? Far from confirming their
godhood, God is condemning them for
thinking they were gods!

Word-Faith
teachers will immediately turn to their other favorite proof text,
John
10:33-34. Guess what? This is where Jesus quotes Psalm 82:6, so if you understand Psalm 82:6 you don't have a problem understanding John 10. "The Jews answered Him, 'For a good work we do not stone you, but for blasphemy because you being a man make yourself out to be God.'" And then Jesus
answered them, "Has it not been written in your law, 'I said you are gods.'" Don't fail to notice Jesus' purpose for choosing that verse. It would have been a very familiar one to the Scribes and Pharisees. They would have understood that that verse was an condemnation of wicked rulers, and Jesus is simply echoing the irony of the original Psalm. Walter Martin wrote an excellent comment on this, He said, "Jesus mocks the people as if to say,
'You
all think you are gods yourselves. What's one more god among you?'"
Oh, the
irony. You are going to stone me for claiming to be God, you all are
claiming
the same thing. What's one more god? The sarcasm.

Walter Martin says,
"Irony is used to provoke us, not to inform us. It is
not a basis for
building a theology." Further he says, "It is also pertinent
to an
understanding of John 10 that we remember that Satan is called the
"ruler of
this world" by no less an authority than Jesus Christ, and Paul
reinforces
this by calling him the "god of this age." We can make a god out
of anything:
money, power, status, position, sex, patriotism, family, or as
in Lucifer's
case--an angel. We can be our own god; but to call something
deity or to
worship it, or to treat it as divine is quite another thing.
Then it is being
by nature and in essence deity. Jesus is not calling them
"God" in the true
sense; He is saying that you have made a god out of
yourselves just like the
people in Psalm 82 who felt the blast of God's
judgment. God said to the
rebellious Israelites in Isaiah 29:16, "You turn
things around! Shall the
potter be considered equal with the clay" (Isaiah
29:16). Does the clay think
it is equal to the potter?" According to the
Word-Faith movement, what's the
answer? "Yes, if not superior." They have
the wrong god.

Well, they have
some other things that are wrong and I'll tell you what they
are next Sunday
night, and we will start with the fact that they have the
wrong Jesus.

Father, even as we talk about these things we are thrown almost into
disbelief, not because we are not used to error but we are not used to error being received by people who say they belong to the truth. We are shocked
that so many Christians who would affirm their belief in the truth will identify with the terrible heresies of this movement. We feel like
evangelical Christianity has become absolutely undefinable, it is so
amorphous
that it has no boundaries. It is inexplicable. We almost feel
like we have
to pull out of the whole thing and start all over again. Lord,
so many are
confused, so many led astray. We just pray that somehow Your
truth will reach
them and that they will worship you as the sovereign God and
not turn You into
their valet, but fall on their face in your presence and
plead for the
privilege to suffer if need be for your sake, sickness, poverty,
or death, if
You so will. That like the Apostle Paul they would rejoice to
suffer, they
would be thankful for persecutions, distresses, deprivations, if
it is your
will because you are sovereign.

Father, help us to know that we are at best
men and no more. Men who have
been touched with the transforming grace of
Christ. Men in whom the Holy
Spirit live, but we are men and no more,
redeemed men and as men we must be
humbled before God. We grieve Father, that
You have been so dishonored, so
humiliated that such a terrible reproach has
come on your Holy Name from
those who teach and believe such foolish things.
And we ask that You would
be exalted and bring a halt to this degrading
teaching for the Savior's sake
we ask. Amen.

Transcribed by Tony Capoccia
of

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