Toronto Blessing, Pensacola Outpouring - Where are the renewal and revival movements leading the church?

The Way of Cain - Page 6

New teachings in the Christian Church- Where are They Leading Us?

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The Latter Rain Gospel

They use biblical words and quote from the Bible, but the Latter Rain gospel was not drawn from the Bible. It was received ''prophetically'' - that is, by men in direct communication with the spirit realm. They then use symbolism and allegory to draw far-fetched support of their doctrines out of random words or fragments of Bible verses. Following is an overview of the events the Latter Rain gospel says will happen in the ''end-times,'' the end times being right now.

The 'office of prophet' and 'apostle' or 'five-fold ministries' will be restored, which are said to have been necessary for the 'perfecting' of the church but lost to it since New Testament times. (This idea implies that God is helplessly unable to control what happens to His church.)
Under the rule of these prophets and apostles, the church will be ''perfected'':
1. it must become fully unified, as one global organization without denominational division, and
2. it must ''purge itself of all 'rebellion' against God'' (a new Inquisition)
Through this perfecting, the church will become powerful and glorious, and great supernatural miracles will begin taking place so that -
1. The church will become so desireable that everyone will want to be in it. In a huge ''end-time revival'' (or ''harvest'') all the people and nations of the world are going to come into the ''church.'' The entire world will be ''saved'' - -
  
  ''...we are going to be a people, one new man in the earth, that are going to exhibit and showcase the Kingdom of God in such a degree that the nations, kings are going to come to our feet and ask of us the things of God''
  
  (Larry Randolph, 11/18/94)
  
  ''all the sick are gonna be healed, the dead are gonna be raised and nations are gonna turn to God in a day.''
  
  (Bob Jones & Paul Cain, ''Selections from the Kansas City Prophets'')
  
  They believe it is important to set doctrine and theology aside and make the church attractive to the world to encourage these to start happening.
2. The church will take the position of literal dominion over the world system, extending its absolute rule and ''purging of rebellion'' to that realm. They look forward to a transfer of power, authority, and wealth from secular government to a global church organization, which they describe as the church becoming ''the head and not the tail.''
  
  In the new promised land Christians will be ''the head and not the tail, the lender, not the borrower. Christians will dominate the socio-political systems of the day.'' (6)
  
  (John Arnott)
  
  Through the revival and the church's rule, a ''Christian world'' will be brought about and enforced governmentally.
A new kind of people- a spiritual elite - will be brought forth by the ''perfected'' church. These people will actually be physically and spiritually different than the rest of us; they will attain to a higher spiritual level than anyone before in history. They describe this as Christ being ''birthed in,'' or ''fully manifested in'' these people; they will ''possess the Spirit of God without measure.'' They will be militant, powerful and dangerous; a physical and spiritual super-race.
They will attain to the level of godhood and they - not God - will defeat death, achieve immortality, and enforce ''the Kingdom of God'' on earth.
These people are called ''the Manifest Sons,'' ''the Overcomers,'' ''the manchild,'' ''Joel's Army,'' and some just boldly call them what they are: ''gods.''

''God intends us to be like gods, he intends us to be like the Son of God. ... God has conceived in His heart of a plan to make a race of men that would live like gods on the Earth. He has conceived in His heart to have Sons that would live like His Son, the Lord Jesus lived... That we were to be on earth the extension and manifestation of God's life in heaven.''

(Mike Bickle)

''Those who submit to Him in truth... will be the most dangerous and powerful people on earth...''

(Rick Joyner)

(Did Jesus really call us to be a 'dangerous and powerful' people?)

''There will be a manifestation of the sons of God. And it won't be this baloney that we've heard of in the past ...I'm talking about a true manifested son of God; if anyone walks through this wall, over here, they're not going to tell you about it, I mean, they're just going to do it. And sons of God don't tell you they're sons of God, they'll just show you! Amen!''

(Paul Cain, ''The New Breed'')

''In the near future we will not be looking back at the early church with envy because of the great exploits of those days, but all will be saying that He certainly did save His best wine for last. The most glorious times in all of history have not come upon us. You, who have dreamed of one day being able to talk with Peter, John and Paul, are going to be surprised to find that they have all been waiting to talk to you.'' (

Rick Joyner, The Harvest,1990)

''No prophet or apostle who ever lived equaled the power of these individuals in this great army of the Lord in these last days. No one ever had it, not even Elijah, or Peter, or Paul, or anyone else enjoyed the power that is going to rest upon this great army.''

(Paul Cain, ''Selections from the Kansas City Prophets'')

[The end time prophets and apostles] ''will do greater works than the apostles, than Jesus, or any other Old Testament prophets.''

(Jack Deere, ''Intimacy With God and the End Time Church'')

As the church becomes more and more powerful, more people in it will receive this 'complete manifestation of Christ' in themselves, while more and more of those who will not accept the new theology will be ''purged.''

The movement sometimes calls this ''manifestation of Christ'' in the people of His church ''the rapture'' though it is obviously not the ''catching away'' spoken of in 1 Thess 4:17, where Christ descends to catch His bride away from the earth: in this rapture, it is the church that catches Christ away from heaven!

''Jesus Christ as the first fruit of the kingdom began the work of conquering death on an individual basis, but we, as His church will be the one to complete the task... Death will not be conquered by Jesus returning to the earth. It will be conquered when the church stands up boldly and says, ''We have dominion over the earth!'' How else will God be able to show Satan a people for whom death holds no fear, over whom death no longer has any power?... Is it possible that there will be a people who so possess the authority of Almighty God, as Elijah did, that they, as a group, will say to death, hell, and the spirit of Satan, 'We will NOT die. We will stay here and be changed, and we will call Jesus Christ to return to this earth as King of Kings and Lords of Lords'? Yes, that is what I believe the church must do!''

(Earl Paulk, ''The Proper Function of the Church'')

This thing they call the ''incarnation of Christ in His church'' goes far beyond Jesus' presence with us and the Holy Spirit's indwelling of us at present. ''Something's going to come so strong to you that you won't even know that there be any baptism of the Holy Ghost compared to the enormous baptism you're about to receive,'' says Paul Cain.

They describe this by saying ''God must come to His church before He comes for His church.'' So, rather than watching for Christ's imminent, literal, bodily return, they are watching for this ''manifestation of Christ'' within the people of the church.

Some believe the Lord may return bodily - to receive the world as a gift from the church after it has become triumphant and achieved perfection -

''This many-membered corporate body will take dominion over the Earth for ultimate presentation to Christ at his second coming.'' (Mike Bickle) (7)

- but the central teaching of this theology seems to be that He 'returns' only symbolically, through the ''manifestation of Himself in His church,'' the corporate Christ. The church becomes Christ, and it rules over the nations ''with a rod of iron.''

''The idea that we have to wait until we get to heaven to get our crown is a whole lot of garbage. We will receive our crowns here on earth. How can we be kings on this earth without our crowns? ...We are meant to rule and to reign here on the earth...''

(Kim Clement)

Earl Paulk goes so far as to teach that Jesus is no longer Jesus, seated at the right hand of God, but He became the Holy Spirit after the resurrection- ''He [Jesus] entered a higher realm of restoration and love by becoming an indwelling Spirit.'' (8) In this way, Jesus can be said to have ''returned'' through indwelling His church. The focus of this theology has turned away from Jesus and to the Holy Spirit.

They speak of an ''evolution'' of the church through these stages. Words like ''evolving,'' ''maturing,'' ''birthing,'' or ''growing'' are used quite a bit.

They explain that the closer the church comes to achieving these things, the more the ''glory of God,'' or the ''Shekina Glory,'' will appear ''visibly upon it'' ...

''Prior to Jesus Christ's physical return, His living presence will companion the church in ever-increasing power. During this time the visible glory of the Lord will rise and appear upon God's people.''

(Francis Frangipane)

''I want to see that, don't you? I want to see the whole Body of Christ flowing in the anointing so powerfully that the whole earth is filled with God's glory. I believe with all my heart, we're the generation who will see that! But before we do, we must lay aside the things that block that anointing. We must rid ourselves of religious traditions... ''

(Ken Copeland)

The movement proclaims, ''We are entering to possess a New Promised Land!'' meaning they believe the attaining of dominion over the earth is now at hand. (Note that we must ''lay aside'' anything that interferes.)

They believe God is now holding out to the church the chance to ''possess the land'' that Israel 'failed' at. There is a sense of urgency lest the opportunity pass before the church can 'get its act together.' It is all up to the church to make these things happen. They believe success hinges on:

having enough faith to 'believe' it into happening, and
. thoroughness in carrying out the unifying and purging- since people in the church who disagree with this theology will prevent the spiritual power (the corporate level of faith) needed to make it happen, they must be eliminated. Ask yourself, where do you think a doctrine like this will lead? Violence and murder have already been set forth by the prophets as acceptable ways to achieve this. (More on that later.)

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