When the contemplatives found Alcoholics Anonymous a fertile garden

I am still sort of shell shocked about The Bible Project Tim Mackie’s unquestioning endorsement of contemplative guru Thomas Keating. You can read about that here. This is not my first rodeo with Thomas Keating. Fifteen years ago Keating and Richard Rohr zeroed in on those in 12 Step programs like Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous.

As I wrote back then:

Much like farmers kneeling in rich, fertile soil, Richard Rohr, Thomas Keating, and other contemplatives are tending a meditative garden that has already produced much fruit. There are now 12 Step groups for everything from overeating to sexual addiction. Literally millions of people have already experienced meditation as part of their 12 Step program. … continue reading article

Unclean spirits and Alcoholics Anonymous co-founder Bill Wilson

A.A.’s history is often misrepresented or downplayed to portray A.A. co-founder Bill Wilson as Christian. In reality, Bill Wilson swam in an ocean of unholy, occult experiences before and during his time in A.A.

According to Wilson:

“The ouija board began moving in earnest. What followed was the fairly usual experience-it was a strange melange of Aristotle, St. Francis, diverse archangels with odd names, deceased friends–some in purgatory and others doing nicely, thank you! There were malign and mischievious ones of all descriptions telling of vices quite beyond my ken, even as former alcoholics. Then, the seemingly virtuous entities would elbow them out with messages of comfort, information, advice—and sometimes just sheer nonsense.” (PASS IT ON, Wilson’s official A.A. biography, pg. 278) (emphasis mine)

The fairly usual experience?

“There shall not be found among you…a medium or a spiritist or one who calls up the dead. For whoever does these things is detestable to the Lord.” (Deuteronomy 18:10, 11, 12)

Related: The 12 Steps and Christ

Post New Apostolic Reformation Reflections

What is it like for those who have broken free from NAR influence?

“Post New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) you can expect a shift (excuse the pun) in your understanding of scripture, and consequently of God and self. In this article I share various stages, or moments of awakening to certain truths that many experience after their exit from the NAR,” writes Rick Becker of Famine in the Land.

Click here to read article.

The Passion Translation author’s heretical views about Christ’s return

An appalling and horrible thing has happened in the land: The prophets prophesy falsely, And the priests rule on their own authority; And my people love it so! But what will you do at the end of it? (Jeremiah 5:30)

Brian Simmons, author of The Passion Translation, is teaching heresy about the return of Christ. Simmons says the Bible uses “clouds” as a term for men eight times. Simmons states the Bible says Jesus comes within clouds, so therefore it means Christ is coming from within us.

Here is what Simmons said to Patricia King:

The Book of Revelation is “not primarily a manual of coming events. A sneak preview of what’s coming. Rather it is the coming one. It’s the unveiling of who is coming. And His coming is within us. We experience that unveiling in our lives.” (5 minutes 9 seconds in video)

Here again is Simmons to Patricia King:

Brian Simmons– What about the clouds? Jesus is coming, Greek is meta nephele, He’s coming, meta nephele, within clouds. He’s coming within clouds. Not on clouds. Within clouds. Eight times in the Bible, CLOUDS ARE PEOPLE. (11 minutes 14 seconds in video)

P.K.– Right. Wow.

Brian Simmons– So, maybe the Second Coming isn’t what we think.

P.K.– Wow.

Brian Simmons– Maybe we don’t have it all figured out.

Here is Brian Simmons at the Glory of the Last Days Conference:

Something about clouds. God really likes clouds. He rides, His name is cloud rider. I put that in Psalms, the translation of the Psalms. Thou shalt get the Book of Psalms on your way out too. But His name is Yah, cloud rider, ha ha ha ha. He rides upon the clouds. Okay, you’re the cloud. Eight times in the Bible. Uno, dos, tres, quatro, eight times. Men are clouds. Cloud of witnesses. Jude speaks of false teachers that are clouds with no rain.

Throw up Isaiah 60 verse 8. Put up Isaiah 60 verse 8, if you dare to read this. The Passion Translation: Who are these that soar like clouds, like doves flying into their portals. Jesus is coming in the clouds! I’m here to announce to you, ladies and gentlemen. Everybody missed His first coming. Everyone missed the first coming. Only people who got revelation understood the first coming.

Even though they had the Bible, they knew it’d be Bethlehem, but yet He was from Nazareth so they, He purposely let them get offended over being in Nazareth, but He wasn’t, He was from Bethlehem, but they called Him from Nazareth. He didn’t set the record straight. He let them be deceived.

But those with spirit revelation would understand. He was from Bethlehem. Micah 5:2. So if everyone missed the first coming except by divine revelation, how is it you got all the Second Coming figured out? There’s so much more to the unveiling. I want to unveil, I want to lift some of that veil as we go into Revelation 1. After lunch I want to show you some secrets about the coming of the Lord. (10 minutes 54 seconds in video)

We’re the seed of Christ, the 42nd generation, we complete the genealogy of Jesus. Christ is no longer a man, He’s a people. YOU AND I CARRY LIKE MARY. WE WILL BRING FORTH THE CHRIST. THE SECOND COMING IS THE BECOMING OF THE LORD. The Father loves the Son so much, he is going to fill the earth with people just like Him. (4 minutes 31 seconds in video)

Please note that Simmons proclaims, “Christ is no longer a man, He’s a people” and “The Second Coming is the Becoming of the Lord.” It appears that Simmons, beneath his New Apostolic Reformation exterior, is promoting a New Age, corporate manifestation of Christ.

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God of Isaiah vs. the “higher power”

“I, even I, am the one who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake,
And I will not remember your sins. (Isaiah 43:25)

In 1941, Jack Alexander of the Saturday Evening Post wrote the article that provided A.A. its first national publicity. Describing A.A.’s “higher power,” Alexander noted the following:

[The alcoholic] “may choose to think of his Inner Self, the miracle of growth, a tree, man’s wonderment at the physical universe, the structure of the atom, or mere mathematical infinity. Whatever form is visualized, the neophyte is taught that he must rely on it and, in his own way, to pray to the Power for strength.” [1]

Please note that Alexander’s article, with this A.A. definition of “god,” is distributed as official Alcoholics Anonymous literature.

We can warn against the New Apostolic Reformation, contemplative prayer, The Shack, the Enneagram, Bill Johnson’s Bethel Redding, etc., and that is fine and good. And necessary.

But it is Alcoholics Anonymous that has infiltrated and watered down the visible church for 80 years. Many Christians attend A.A., and A.A. meetings are held in many churches. The sacred has been mixed with the profane.

A.A. has given us the confusion of recovery passing for sanctification, and twelve-step theology has many Christians in A.A. believing it is perfectly fine to encourage alcoholics to go ahead and make up a “god.” To help justify attendance in this non-biblical spirituality, the myth has been promulgated that most alcoholics with custom-designed higher powers will eventually come to Christ. This is simply not so. It is relatively rare but is presented as a common occurrence. This claim is one of the primary ways Christians justify A.A.

In Alcoholics Anonymous, most Christians will experience a transference of faith. The twelve-step experience often becomes an idol. It is not uncommon to speak with Christians who are more concerned with “recovery” than sanctification and who demonstrate a preference for A.A. rather than fellowship with the saints.

Immersion in “higher power” theology has Christians believing it is fine to join spiritually with non-believers in prayer to the “higher power.” (2 Cor 6:14-17)

I have been to numerous A.A. meeting. Alcoholics never hear that A.A. co-founder Bill Wilson came to understand A.A. simply does not work for many motivated alcoholics, and that he actually began seeking alternatives.

When will we as God’s people begin to examine A.A. according to the Scriptures? Maybe…never.

Yet the Lord is faithful. He has rescued myriads of us from drugs and alcohol, myself included. Lost and hurting addicts cannot be blamed for turning to A.A. What do you expect? This has been society’s answer for decades. But if you are a Christian who has been encouraging people to join A.A., would you at least seek the Scriptures?

So, here from Isaiah 45 is the God who saves. He will do much more than grant you sobriety. No one designed Him. We didn’t make Him; He made us:

¹⁸For thus says the Lord, who created the heavens (He is the God who formed the earth and made it, He established it and did not create it a waste place, but formed it to be inhabited), “I am the Lord, and there is none else.

¹⁹“I have not spoken in secret,
In some dark land;
I did not say to the offspring of Jacob,
‘Seek Me in a waste place’;
I, the Lord, speak righteousness,
Declaring things that are upright.

²⁰“Gather yourselves and come;
Draw near together, you fugitives of the nations;
They have no knowledge,
Who carry about their wooden idol
And pray to a god who cannot save.
²¹“Declare and set forth your case;
Indeed, let them consult together.
Who has announced this from of old?
Who has long since declared it?
Is it not I, the Lord?
And there is no other God besides Me,
A righteous God and a Savior;
There is none except Me.
²²“Turn to Me and be saved, all the ends of the earth;
For I am God, and there is no other.
²³“I have sworn by Myself,
The word has gone forth from My mouth in righteousness
And will not turn back,
That to Me every knee will bow, every tongue will swear allegiance.
²⁴“They will say of Me, ‘Only in the Lord are righteousness and strength.’
Men will come to Him,
And all who were angry at Him will be put to shame.
²⁵“In the Lord all the offspring of Israel
Will be justified and will glory.”

Source Notes:

1. Jack Alexander, “Alcoholics Anonymous: Freed Slaves of Drink, Now They Free Others” (Saturday Evening Post, March 1, 1941). https://www.aa.org/assets/en_US/p-12_theJackAlexArticle pdf

When the New Age View of the Trinity Enters the Church

[The Body of Christ is being attacked with a total revision of the Atonement and the Trinity. Leading this assault on the biblical God are, of course, the author of The Shack and his ally, C. Baxter Kruger.]

In his article A New Age View of the Trinity Enters the Church, Mike Oppenheimer, author of The Trinity: The Triune Nature of God, writes:

Today, the word Trinity, or Trinitarian theology, is taking on a whole new meaning, one of which most Christians are unaware but one that is working its way into the church through the highly popular book, The Shack. Let me explain. Many people have defended their admiration for The Shack, saying it is “just a novel.” But Shack author William Paul Young admits that The Shack is more than a novel; he considers it a theological book:

Please don’t misunderstand me; The Shack is theology. But it is theology wrapped in story.1

Young said these words in a book written by C. Baxter Kruger titled The Shack Revisited where Young wrote the foreword. He also stated in the foreword:

If you want to understand better the perspectives and theology that frame The Shack, this book [Kruger’s] is for you. Baxter has taken on the incredible task of exploring the nature and character of the God who met me in my own shack.2

Reading through The Shack Revisited, it becomes clear that Baxter’s main theme is what he calls “the trinitarian life.”

[Jesus] became what we are, entered into our world of confusion. . . . He found his way into our darkness, into the scary places inside our souls. And there he pitched his tent forever—and he brought his Papa [the Father] and the Holy Spirit with him. . . . inside of us all, because of Jesus, is nothing short of the very trinitarian life of God. . . . “I am good” because Jesus and his Father and the Holy Spirit have found me and live in me.3

Contrary to what I have described about the Trinity in my book, Baxter’s (and Young’s) view of the Trinity is not just about the shared deity of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Rather it encompasses all of humanity and all of creation:

From all eternity, God is not alone and solitary, but lives as Father, Son, and Spirit in a rich and glorious fellowship of utter oneness. . . . The trinitarian life is a great dance of unchained communion and intimacy . . . This life is unique, and it is good and right. . . . And this love, giving rise to such togetherness and fellowship and oneness, is the womb of the universe and of humanity within it.4

In presenting this view of the Trinity that there is “oneness” and “togetherness” throughout the universe and all humanity, Kruger introduces the idea that there is no separation between God and His creation: Continue reading article…

US, Canadian Conferences of Catholic Bishops ‘Consecrate’ Nations To Mary, Ask Her To Intercede Amid Pandemic

Happy now, Francis Chan? How about you, Mike Bickle? Or you, Todd White? Your efforts to bring the Catholic Church into the Body of Christ means exposure to this sort of unholy doctrine. The Catholic Church is not a Christian denomination.

These precious Catholic people need to hear the true gospel message. But you guys don’t believe that, and you guys don’t do that. You could do so much good by explaining to young Catholics and Christians why this is wrong.

Click here to continue reading.

High profile Christians and contemplative prayer (Beth Moore, Priscilla Shirer)

“The question may arise–how can credible Christian organizations justify and condone meditative practices that clearly resemble Eastern meditation? … Christian terminology surrounds theses practices,” states Ray Yungen. “It only takes a few popular Christian leaders with national profiles to embrace a teaching that sounds Christian to bring about big changes in the church. ” [1]

Big changes indeed. These high profile people include Rick Warren, Bill and Beni Johnson, Mike Bickle, James Goll, Tim Keller, and Heidi Baker (she calls it “soaking”).

Why does contemplative prayer continue to spread despite numerous warnings? What is going on with these influential, high profile people? There is a bondage to this deception. There is also pride. Celebrity Christians, like many of us, do not take correction well–which is to say, not at all.

And all the while, the visible church inches (catapults) closer and closer to New Age practices and a New Age Christ.

Some years ago a Christian magazine described Beth Moore as a contemplative advocate. [2] And that brings us to Beth Moore and Priscilla Shirer, and their foray into these murky waters. Click to read…

Source Notes:

1. Ray Yungen, A Time of Departing, pg. 184

2. Halee Gray Scott, “First Came the Bible” (Christianity Today, August 2010, Vol. 54, No. 8, Pg 27, http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2010/august/19.27.html).

Catholic/Protestant unity? IHOP worship leader’s false “The Lord says” prophecy (video below)

[The video is at the end of this very long article.]

Can two walk together, except they be agreed? (Amos 3:3)

‘

The elements of the false church are slowly streaming together–including, I believe, the Catholic Church, the New Apostolic Reformation, and contemplative prayer. International House of Prayer founder Mike Bickle has given Catholics a number of opportunities to merge with Protestants. This is not biblical. (2 Cor 6:14-17, Gal 1:6-9) Such ecumenism was the case at IHOP’s Onething gathering in 2015. This is when the first Catholic Ecumenical Track at Onething took place.

In 2016, the Catholics brought their beliefs and practices including Lectio Divina (with IHOP worship leader Nathan Panke), contemplative prayer (pg.1), and Taize Chants (pg.3). Click for Schedule

‘

The Catholic contingent was present at Onething in 2017 and 2018 as well.

Back to 2015 Onething: This was a significant conference in as much as Francis Chan became even more identified with Mike Bickle and IHOP. Chan, speaking for the second time at Onething, once again served as a public relations agent for Bickle and IHOP theology. Chan seemed to encourage Catholic/Protestant unity as well.

Perhaps Bickle or the Catholic participants influenced him concerning Catholicism during his three speaking engagements at Onething. Or, perhaps Chan has been going in this direction for some time. But now, in 2020, it seems Chan himself may well be on his way to becoming a Catholic. Time will tell.

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Why are so many high profile Christians seemingly incapable of distinguishing between Catholic doctrine and the biblical understanding of Salvation? Beware the celebrity Christians who would carry us into a syncretistic Samaria. (2 Kings 17:24) For there are many: Todd White, Lou Engle, Mike Bickle, Rick Warren, and more.

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will for themselves accumulate teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. (2 Timothy 4:3-4)

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Aren’t there some people who are saved in the Catholic Church? Yes. The Lord is merciful above all else. But these people are saved in spite of Catholic teaching, not because of it. And I always wonder, if this is the case, why doesn’t the Holy Spirit lead them out?

There are many articles on this blog about false teachers, incorrect doctrine etc. The hardest thing to write about is Catholicism. I know many will be hurt, and will not understand. I went to a Catholic high school and know full well (as do you) that Catholics are great neighbors and friends. Unfortunately for the Catholics, the visible church is far more interested in following the leading of a Bickle or a Chan rather than supporting the ministries of those trying to reach Catholics with the true gospel.

As previously noted, this hunger for Catholic/Protestant Oneness has been going on at IHOP for a long time. It was going on long before the 2015 Onething in the heart of Mike Bickle, and it is going on now. Remember, deceptive contemplative practices are foundational to IHOP. False visions and prophecies are part and parcel of the IHOP spirituality. During the 2015 Worship Leader Q&A Panel a false prophecy–“The Lord says”–about Catholic/Protestant unity was given. The following is my second letter to this worship leader about this. I never received a reply. The video showing this false prophecy is at the end of this letter.

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Subject: For Nathan Panke: False Catholic/Protestant Oneness prophecy

Hi Nathan,

I wrote you at IHOP-KC after watching your prophecy at the Onething IHOP and Catholic worship leader Q and A (with Matt and Audrey). Unfortunately, my letter was returned.

On the stage, you said, “And I just feel this right now, The Lord says, there’s no us and them. There’s us. There is no us and them. There’s us. There is no us and them….”

Brother, I know you have spent your life trying to serve the Lord. I don’t question your heart. But that is a false prophecy.

Catholicism is inclusivist. According to the official Vatican document, Lumen Gentium:

But the plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator. In the first place amongst these are the Muslims, who, professing to hold the faith of Abraham, along with us adore the one and merciful God, who on the last day will judge mankind. (emphasis mine)

Catholic teaching offers another way to salvation!

Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me.” John 14:6

Galatians 1:8-9. Please, Nathan, this has to stop. You IHOP people are serving as a catalyst for a false unity.

I also sent you Holly Pivec’s article two years ago, Roman Catholic View of Salvation. Read

I would very much appreciate hearing from you.

In Him,

John

Nathan Panke begins at 53:47 in video. At 58:15 another IHOP worship leader prays, “Father I want to repent on behalf of myself and other Protestants for ignorant assumptions related to the Catholic Church and Catholic believers.”

The Jerusalem Council and Roman Catholic Eucharist

From Rational Christian Discernment:

If the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation was taught in the church from its inception, then how come the issue was not discussed at the Jerusalem Council where the consumption of blood was frowned upon (Acts 15:20; 29; 21:25)? If the leadership who convened had actually believed in this teaching, then would they not have clarified that the blood of Christ was of a different nature in order to prevent confusion? Click here…