You don’t have to stay true to your orthodox convictions. Just blend in and appear cool…with a swagger.No body will notice.

How many Evangelical churches and ministries have orthodox statements of faith on their websites but their preaching is everything but orthodox and authentic Christianity?

I am still trying to figure it out.

What Biblical Tongues Were:

• The manifestation was supernatural (Acts 2:1-4).
• The manifestation involved speaking. (We read in Acts 2:4, “and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they began to speak in different tongues, just as the Spirit was giving them to declare” [emphases added]. In fact, we must notice that this activity of speaking in tongues began before any of the listeners heard the speakers. The stress is on what the believers say, not on what the listeners hear. They spoke in other languages. Also, in v. 6 we read, “each one was continually hearing them speaking in his own dialect”; and again, in v. 11, “we hear them speaking in our own tongues the mighty deeds of God” [emphases added]. There is a reason it is referred to as the gift of “tongues,” not “ears.”)
• The manifestation involved languages that were intelligible. (Cf. Acts 2:9-11; 1 Corinthians 14:19), known (Greek glossa means language; cf. also Corinthians 12:10, 28; 14:21, 22), and not naturally learned (Acts 2:7).
• Tongues were unsought (Acts 2; 1 Corinthians 12:11, 18).
• Tongues were of low priority (1 Corinthians 12:28, etc.).
• Tongues were designed to be temporary (1 Corinthians 13:8-10).
• Tongues were a sign for specific unbelievers (1 Corinthians 14:21, 22).
• Tongues were subject both to self-regulation and to external regulation (cf. 1 Corinthians 14:26-27). (The suggestion that all claims to speaking in tongues must be accepted, and cannot be prohibited, has no basis in Scripture.)

What Biblical Tongues Were (and Are) Not:

• Not ecstatic (i.e. gibberish, or “exalted non-language”; Greek glossa never once means gibberish, which the dictionary defines as “rapid and incoherent talk; unintelligible chatter”; it consistently has the well-attested and common meaning of language. Gibberish is not a language.)
• Not intended for self-edification (1 Corinthians 14:4; cf. 1 Corinthians 10:24; 12:7; 1 Thessalonians 5:11).
• Not a “prayer-language.” (There is no positive statement that this is tongues’ design, it does not fit the stated design, and the passages cited do not teach that this is tongues’ purpose.)
• Not a merit badge signifying superior spiritual maturity or status. (Simply ask yourself: which assembly is the only church in the New Testament that was said to feature tongue-speaking on a regular basis? It was the church in Corinth. Then ask further: what was characteristic of the spirituality of that church? They were as men of flesh, infants in Christ [1 Corinthians 3:1]; it was a church featuring schisms, outrageous heresy, stunning immorality, and petulant stubbornness. None of this consitutes a glowing testimony as to the tongue-speaking Corinthians’ superior spirituality.)
• Not contemporary. (Whatever is happening today, it is not Biblical tongues. The modern phenomena simply do not measure up to Biblical standards. While studies of thousands of modern “tongue-speakers” have been performed, not one instance fitting the Biblical criteria has been documented. Unbelievers rightly find the modern practice absurd and laughable — which contrasts rather starkly with Acts 2:6-12. On the day of Pentecost, no serious observer, saved or unsaved, doubted the supernatural nature of the occurrence. Today, by contrast, no impartial observer believes the genuineness of “tongues” as unlearned foreign languages!)
• Not a large-group activity (1 Corinthians 14:27). (If five hundred people are speaking in tongues in church assembly, at least four hundred and ninety-seven are sinning against God’s declared will.)
• Not to be altogether forbidden (1 Corinthians 13:39b). (However, note well: Paul does not say “do not forbid gibberish, do not forbid babbling, do not forbid so-called ‘tongues’ even if they bear no similarity to genuine tongues.” No pastor has had occasion to “forbid” speaking in tongues for the last 1900 years, because no documented case of Biblical tongue-speaking has occurred.)

Excerpt from Sound doctrine regarding the Holy Spirit: His person,  work and gifts by Daniel J. Phillips

ATCT [A Twisted Crown of Thorns ®] : Sorry you are masked from your audience today. What is a typical week in your life like?

CHRISTIAN: A typical week in my life is anything but typical. We run a small farm and home school two boys, so most days are busy, between lessons and farm chores. Spring is busy with the arrival of baby animals, summer and fall are spent in the garden, or in the kitchen preserving the harvest and winter is a bit slower, but it is also the time we are well into schooling. I am also a youth group leader on Wednesday nights year round, and a Sunday school teacher for a teen class, both of which require preparation time in advance. I am regularly active in other church activities as well, like singing services, dinners, and fun activities for the children. We are busy, but blessed.

ATCT: Did you have any Christian  influence in your youth or childhood?

CHRISTIAN: Not really. I grew up more a cultural Christian than an actual Christian. There were godly people in my life, but not in my everyday life. Spirituality was considered a good thing, but my family was not regular in church attendance.

ATCT: What is the gospel in one sentence?

CHRISTIAN: We, who were lost, eternally separate from God by our own sin, with no way to repair the gulf, have been granted the gift of eternal life and reconciliation to and by God through His Own action on our behalf — paying the price we owed but could not pay, whereby we receive the reward we do not deserve — Grace.

ATCT: If you woke up this morning and found your self transported back in time, which preacher in the last 500 years would you like to listen to? Why?

CHRISTIAN: Charles H. Spurgeon. The Prince of the Preachers. His sermons, more than 150 years old now, still speak to me every time I read one of them. I would have loved to hear his oratory, speaking to thousands without aid of a microphone. I can only imagine what it would have been like to hear him in person, and watch God work through him.

ATCT: How would you like to be remembered by your HUSBAND and closest family?

CHRISTIAN: I would like my husband, children, and family to remember me as a person who loved the Lord, and who strove to do His will, even so imperfectly. I would love for them to know that I was a sinner saved by His grace and not my own actions, knowing that even when I failed, I did my best.

ATCT: How easy (do you think) is parenting?

CHRISTIAN: Parenting is the singular most difficult, and most rewarding, job I have ever undertaken in my life. We came late to parenting, adopting our children when we were more than 40 years old. I have had to learn how to be a parent during a time when most of my friends are toying with the idea of grand-parenting. It is maddening, frustrating, difficult, and at the same time, wonderful, watching your children grow and learn, often making the same mistakes you did. It has often made me praise God knowing what an Awesome Father He is to me, even knowing how many times I have lived my life in a way that I am sure has grieved Him far more than my own children have ever frustrated me.

ATCT: Your teenage daughter comes weeping to you and tells you she is pregnant. She doesn’t know who the dad is. (Yup, it’s that bad). She feels she has let you down and feels disillusioned about her walk with God. She got a phone number from a friend who can arrange to “sort out” this inconvenient unplanned pregnancy. It’s all a big shock to you. What do you do?

A)    Pretend you didn’t hear her and continue reading your news paper.

B)     Tell her to dial the number REAL QUICK!

C)    Let her know in no uncertain terms she has brought shame to you and your testimony. And she has therefore left you with no option but to disown her.

D)    OTHER:

CHRISTIAN: Wow. Well, the first thing I would do is to tell her I love her. I would remind her that she is not the only person in this world who has made poor choices, or has found herself in a situation she did not know how to handle. And then I would remind her that each life given on this planet is a gift from God. I would tell her that there is no sin that cannot be forgiven, and that even in this God has a purpose. Some of the most difficult times in our lives give rise to the biggest changes IN our lives. It is these times when God molds us into the person He wants us to be. We can choose wisely and prayerfully seek God’s guidance in these times, or we can let them knock us off track. I would promise to stand with her during the months and years ahead, and then we would make an appointment to begin getting her some prenatal care planning for the birth of the child into our family.

ATCT: We are sending you to a desert island. You can only take one book aside from the Bible. Which book would you take and why?

CHRISTIAN: LOL oh! I thought it said one book OF the bible lol. That is not nearly so difficult J Is John Gill’s commentary of the whole Bible one book? No, actually, all I need of God I can find in scripture. The word is complete. Therefore I would probably take along some survival related book — since I would be stranded on a desert island

ATCT: What attribute of God do you struggle to understand?

CHRISTIAN: His Sovereign Grace. Not that I question his Sovereignty; I don’t. The question is not whether He IS — there is no doubt that He orders the entire world, makes nations rise and fall, and all things according to His purpose. I have no problem with *any* of that. My questions are more the whys associated with it. Why He would choose one person over another. The election of Grace. And I know that my questions are simply because I cannot see what He can see. The answers will never come this side of Heaven. And I rest in His Faithfulness, knowing that even when I don’t understand all that happens, that nothing takes Him by surprise.

ATCT: What are the words of your favourite Hymn?

CHRISTIAN: When peace like a river, attendeth my way. When sorrows like sea billows roll. Whatever my lot, thou has taught me to say, it is well, it is well with my soul. It is well (it is well) With my soul (with my soul) It is well, it is well, with my soul!

Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come,
Let this blest assurance control, That Christ has regarded my helpless estate, And hath shed His own blood for my soul.. It is well (it is well) With my soul (with my soul), It is well, it is well, with my soul!

My sin, oh the joy, of this glorious thought. My sin, not in part, but the whole. Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, Oh my soul. It is well (it is well) With my soul (with my soul) It is well, it is well, with my soul!

For me, be it Christ, be it Christ hence to live:
If Jordan above me shall roll, No pang shall be mine, for in death as in life Thou wilt whisper Thy peace to my soul. It is well (it is well) with my soul (with my soul), It i swell, it is well, with my soul!

But, Lord, ’tis for Thee, for Thy coming we wait,
The sky, not the grave, is our goal; Oh, trump of the angel! Oh, voice of the Lord! Blessed hope, blessed rest of my soul! (It is well (it is well), with my soul (with my soul). It is well, it is well, with my soul!

And Lord, haste the day, when my faith shall be sight. The clouds be rolled back as a scroll. The trump shall resounds, and the Lord shall descend! Even so, it is well, with my soul. It is well (it is well) With my soul (with my soul) It is well, it is well, with my soul.

Thank you very much for sparing a few minutes of your precious time. I hope it is well with your children as it will be with your soul. [More anonymised interviews here]

Soli deo gloria!

• Baptist explanation: There must be sin in your life. Everyone else opened it fine.
• Presbyterian explanation: It’s not God’s will for you to open this link.
• Word of Faith explanation: You lack the faith to open this link. Your negative words have prevented you from realizing this link’s fulfillment.
• Charismatic explanation: Thou art loosed! Be commanded to OPEN!
• Unitarian explanation: All links are equal, so if this link doesn’t work for you, feel free to experiment with other links that might bring you joy and fulfillment.
• Buddhist explanation: …………………….
• Episcopalian explanation: Are you saying you have something against homosexuals?
• Christian Science explanation: There really is no link.
• Atheist explanation: The only reason you think this link exists is because you needed to invent it.
• Church counselor’s explanation: And what did you feel when the link would not open?

HTTP 404 – File not found – Internet Explorer

ATCT [A Twisted Crown of Thorns ®] : Sorry you are masked from your audience today. What is a typical week in your life like?

CHRISTIAN: Basically, I study, work with the clubs at my school, go to the gym, church, and spend time with my fiancee. If there’s anytime left, Disneyland works its way in.

ATCT: Did you have any Christian  influence in your youth or childhood?

 CHRISTIAN: I did. There was a man in my Southern Baptist Church who I looked up to greatly. To this day we keep in touch. I was friends with his daughter growing up. He shaped a lot of my thinking and values.

ATCT: What is the gospel in one sentence?

 CHRISTIAN: You are a sinner who is guilty before God, but He sent His son to be the substitute for all believers 2,000 years ago, to die and rise from the dead, so you can have eternal life and not suffer His wrath to come.

ATCT: If you woke up this morning and found your self transported back in time, which preacher in the last 500 years would you like to listen to? Why?

 CHRISTIAN: Spurgeon. He had a way of getting right to the heart of any matter, but he also did it with approachability, gentleness, and meekness while still remaining firm.

ATCT: How would you like to be remembered by your wife and closest family?

 CHRISTIAN: Faithful and honest.

ATCT: How easy (do you think) is parenting?

I have no idea, but my parents can tell you I was a handful!

ATCT: Your teenage daughter comes weeping to you and tells you she is pregnant. She doesn’t know who the dad is. (Yup, it’s that bad). She feels she has let you down and feels disillusioned about her walk with God. She got a phone number from a friend who can arrange to “sort out” this inconvenient unplanned pregnancy. It’s all a big shock to you. What do you do?

A)    Pretend you didn’t hear her and continue reading your news paper.

B)     Tell her to dial the number REAL QUICK!

C)    Let her know in no uncertain terms she has brought shame to you and your testimony. And she has therefore left you with no option but to disown her.

D)    OTHER:

CHRISTIAN: D) Other. Try to explain to her that she has done wrong and help her seek true repentance and grace from God. At that point, under no circumstances would abortion ever be an issue considered. We would discuss the plans for the child. Finally, I would remind her how much I love her.

ATCT: What major theological shifts have happened in your life as a Christian?

 CHRISTIAN: I started out my first 20 years as a nominal pious Southern Baptist. In my early 20′s, I got a little wild then I started being drawn back in by the Spirit in my mid twenties. I had a melting pot of theology, though, and would probably have ended up Pelagian if it weren’t for God’s grace. I would say that’s the biggest shift for me was going from a nominal Southern Baptist to a 5 point Calvinist. The process did take a while, though.

ATCT: We are sending you to a desert island. You can only take one book aside from the Bible. Which book would you take and why?

CHRISTIAN: “The Giving Tree” by Shel Silverstein because my Mom used to read it to me as a child.

ATCT: What are the words of your favourite Hymn?

 CHRISTIAN:  “You Ask Me How I Know He Lives, He Lives Within My Heart” Just kidding. (That’s the old Southern Baptist alter call memories coming into play.) “Love Constraining to Obedience” by Cowper.

To see the law by Christ fulfilled

And hear His pardoning voice,

Changes a slave into a child,

And duty into choice.

No strength of nature can suffice

To serve the Lord aright:

And what she has she misapplies,

For want of clearer light.

How long beneath the law I lay

In bondage and distress;

I toll’d the precept to obey,

But toil’d without success.

Then, to abstain from outward sin

Was more than I could do;

Now, if I feel its power within,

I feel I hate it too.

Then all my servile works were done

A righteousness to raise;

Now, freely chosen in the Son,

I freely choose His ways.

“What shall I do,” was then the word,

“That I may worthier grow?”

“What shall I render to the Lord?”

Is my inquiry now.

I know you have time constraints so I will allow you to trudge on to see your fiancee. Hope I get an invite to the big day. Thank you indeed for your insightful thoughts.

Court dismissed! [More Anonymised Interviews here]

Sunday, [ 22nd January 2012] after conducting morning worship services, Derek Staples, pastor of Jacksonville First Baptist Church, will drive to Birmingham to be with a member of his congregation who is scheduled for a kidney transplant.
Staples won’t just be at the bedside, however. He’s the one donating a kidney. The woman whose life he may be saving is Jennifer Borders, who turned 40 in December.

“It’s special to me that anyone would be willing to do this,” said Borders. “And I think Derek’s as excited about it as I am.”

“It’s an honor for me,” said the 51-year-old Staples, who doctors say has the kidneys of a 20-year-old. “I feel like this is the role that God has chosen for me to play in the lives of this family. I’m proud to be able to do it.”

Three days before Christmas, Jennifer Borders [recounts how after being put back on the national register she] learned that she had found her third kidney transplant match.

“The church has wrapped its arms around my whole family,” she said.

Staples has always understood that his role as pastor is to guide the spiritual lives of his congregation. By donating a kidney, he hopes to exemplify a deeper commitment.

Jesus said, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”

“I’ve preached on that text many, many times,” Staples said. “But how often I’ve asked myself if I ever really could do that — love my neighbor as I love myself?

T.D. Jakes is the leader of The Potter’s House, a 30,000 member congregation located in southern Dallas, Texas. I had never heard a T.D. Jakes sermon before, though I knew of his reputation. I was curious to see – if only via an Internet video stream – the man that Elevation Church reminded us was named ‘America’s Best Preacher’ by Time Magazine. Would I be able to uncover the secret of his mystique? And would he preach the Biblical Gospel?

Jakes [after a long introduction gets to the pulpit amidst cheers] changes tempo – he’s back in control. He has everyone stand for the reading of God’s word. Jakes reads from the King James Version – he is reassuringly and self-deprecatingly old school.

We begin with the eighth chapter of the Gospel of Luke, verse forty-six:

                       “   And Jesus said, Somebody hath touched me: for I perceive that virtue is gone out of me.“

He elaborates a little on the text, then moves quickly to Hebrews 4:15–16. He wants to ‘play with these two texts and see whether we can get them to cohabitate [sic] together.’

Jakes jokes with the crowd as he waits for them to find the book of Hebrews. They laugh adoringly with him.

Jakes begins to read:

                          “ For we have not an high priest which cannot be…

He pauses for a fraction of a second.

He enunciates the next word – ‘touched’ – with explosive emphasis.

He continues his recitation:

                      “…with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come [‘How?’, Jakes interjects] boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.

Jakes reads with passion and feeling. You could listen to him read Scripture all day and still be eager for more.

He explains that he read all of that to get one word: ‘Touched, touched’.

                              “ Touch is the theme of tonight’s sermon.

Jakes changes pace. The crowd needs their release, a moment to reflect upon the word ‘touched’. The background music, which had stopped unnoticed minutes before, now resumes as Jakes prays, beseeching the Holy Spirit for His glory. Jakes’ humility is again on display:

                        “ There really is no preacher but You. There is no glory but Yours. There is no word but that word which proceedeth out of Your mouth. And we come before You like sparrows with our mouths open, waiting for, for bread to fall into our mouths. Feed us O God, until we want no more.

As Jakes finishes his prayer, he builds up to another carefully crafted crescendo – higher than the last, but nevertheless merely anticipatory of those yet to come. He truly is lord of the rhetorical arts and master of his own voice, consciously aware of the effect of his intonation’s every nuance.

Jakes begins his sermon proper. He talks at length about the importance and power of human touch. Words are insufficient – some meaning can be conveyed only through touch.

His discussion moves back to the book of Hebrews. He outlines with an infectious enthusiasm his understanding of the book: it is a comparative analysis of the Old and New covenants, ‘so that we might understand that what we have in our contemporary society – through the blood of Jesus Christ – is a better thing.’

This is the evening’s second mention of the blood of Christ. Surely, we must be hearing Gospel?

Jakes holds forth on why the New Covenant is better than the Old:

                        “[God] always takes you to something better, never lesser. God is always in the business of taking you forwards, never backwards. He’s not in the business of diminishing you, he’s in the business of increasing you. He doesn’t want to divide you, he wants to multiply you. He doesn’t want to subtact from you, he wants to add on to you. And wherever God is, He will take you from faith to faith, and from glory to glory.

The crowd laps up the rhetoric. This is what they have yearned to hear. Jakes waits for the applause to quiet.

A niggling doubt begins to surface.

Is this the Gospel? That God is in the business of ‘increasing us’? Is that why the blood of Christ was shed?

What of John the Baptist, who said ‘He must increase, but I must decrease’ (John 3:30)? Has not the Lord ‘made all things for himself’, ‘even the wicked for the day of doom’ (Prov. 16:4)? Are not all things made for His benefit and His glory? Paul said – did he not? – ‘For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen.’ (Rom. 11:36)

But perhaps Jakes is speaking of a spiritual increase, whereby, in the language of Luther’s Small Catechism, our old nature is drowned by daily sorrow and repentance, put to death, ‘that the new man should come forth daily and rise up, cleansed and righteous, to live forever in God’s presence’. For twice already Jakes has invoked the blood of Christ – surely he will bring us the Gospel.

Jakes tests his sway over his audience. He tells them, ‘Look at someone and say it’s getting better’.

They obey.

He has them utterly in thrall…

The review in it’s entirety (check here) is quite good and will help you learn to always search your bible to see which word a preacher is “cherry picking” to support his pre-conceived self esteem booster or motivational pep talk.