Excuses for fakes

[Sojourner]

Oh, I forgot about that one. 'Let's change the subject to something else' is another response.

On a message board there is a 'New thread' option for other subjects.

We can discuss fake Christians and excuses people make for them all day, but to what end? What is accomplished? Fakes and charlatans will continue to present a facade, and genuine saints will continue to be faithful and true. God knows the difference, and in the end, only His opinion matters. A day of  judgment is coming in which we will all stand before Him and the truth will be laid bare. 

"For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. So it is no surprise if his servants, also, disguise themselves as servants of righteousness. Their end will correspond to their deeds." (2 Cor 11:13-15)

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness." (Matthew 7:21-23)

[tango]

Oh, I forgot about that one. 'Let's change the subject to something else' is another response.

On a message board there is a 'New thread' option for other subjects.

It's not really a "let's change the subject" response, it's a question about your assertion. Your assertion was that signs and wonders are fakes. I don't think anyone disputes that some signs and wonders are fakes. It's not unreasonable to explore whether some signs and wonders being fakes implies that all signs and wonders are fakes.

Part of the issue with genuine signs and wonders is that they tend to affect a small number of people, simply because they are observed by a small number of people and, as word spreads and people become ever-more removed from the situation, the impact lessens and the potential for fraud and fabrication increases.

Let's go back to the paraplegic friend I mentioned earlier. If I met him and he was walking around without his wheelchair I'd know something very strange had happened. He'd know something very strange had happened. Anyone who knows him would know something very strange had happened. In the course of general conversations and word spreading more people would hear about it who didn't know the guy affected (I'll call him Mike, for the same of a name). So they don't know Mike but they do know me, and they trust that I can tell that a paraplegic walking isn't an everyday occurrence so something very strange has probably happened. The issue comes down to whether they believe my account of the story and, if they know me, they know it's not the sort of thing I'm likely to fabricate.

As word spreads a bit further so the impact drops, until eventually word makes it onto a board like this where all you have to go on is that some guy who goes by the handle of tango knows a guy called Mike who was paraplegic and now isn't. It's a pretty wild claim. You don't know Mike, so you don't know if he really is walking and you don't know if he ever was paraplegic. You don't know me so you don't know if I'm likely to make up something good to support a wild claim. So you have no way of knowing whether the story is true, or partly true, or totally false. So past a certain point there's really no purpose in repeating this wild claim that happened to someone else, somewhere else. If you went to see Mike speak about his miraculous healing you'd see him walking about on stage but you'd have no way of knowing whether or not he ever was paraplegic so even then you'd have no way of verifying the claim.

Of course if Mike was your friend you'd be on the other side of that, and you'd have no doubt that something very unusual had happened.

[Slug1]

I wonder how many people presenting the notion that signs and wonders are fakes have simply grown weary of the Bethel-style "miracles" of gold dust and feathers, and an ongoing insistence that anything less than unwavering belief that they are divine in origin represents a lack of faith.

Hooah. God's work, changes lives. satan's work, indoctrinates lives (all in the name of God).

By overwhelming the world and even, "body" of Christ with fake signs/wonders, has placed many into an indoctrinated position when it comes to signs/wonders. Word of faith IS a position of indoctrination and thus, a powerful belief can be produced. Those in this bondage see only miraculous moves of God, it is impossible for those in such bondage to discern the truth. I will submit that such bondage is compounded by blind faith, which is living undiscerningly (is that a real word?).

Point being, satan is causing people, even those of faith, to deny "all" signs and wonders OR, to believe ALL signs/wonders. Furthermore, some of the faith stop believing that God does continue to work and can move in supernatural miraculous ways, as He wills. We're warned to always test the spirit but when overwhelmed, its far easier to deny than discern.

Add this element, those indoctrinated will persecute those who question/discern and accuse us of having a lack of faith (as you mention). This has usually two effects, 1) hurt, or 2) hardening of the heart. Either can further push people away from God. Some will even fall away from God as 1) they choose to stop following God or 2) they follow a Bethel-style indoctrinated position (all in the name of God) and thus we can understand more about those whom we read about in Matthew 7, saying "Lord, Lord, we DID this in your name." Any Bethal-style indoctrination is what/who Matthew 7 is all about.

Oh, I forgot about that one. 'Let's change the subject to something else' is another response.

On a message board there is a 'New thread' option for other subjects.

God is reaching out all over the world and if "power" is a means He chooses to utilize, satan is doing all he can to thwart and your OP is a prime example of thwarting in an attempt to push people away from God.

At the end of the day, we have to ask ourselves, when satan does his work, such as through this megachurch where people were raped... are we going to allow satan to succeed in pushing us away from faith in God???

[Athanasius]

Oh, I forgot about that one. 'Let's change the subject to something else' is another response.

On a message board there is a 'New thread' option for other subjects.

Apologies, your majesty, but this is a natural progression of the discussion.

[DavidGYoung]

What is a Christian supposed to do in such a church, or when a representative of it comes to their church as a guest speaker?

[RabbiKnife]

1.  Walk out.
2.  Meet with the elders and ask them to public condemn false prophets and to teach the congregation sound doctrine.
3.  If they don’t, find another church

[tango]

What is a Christian supposed to do in such a church, or when a representative of it comes to their church as a guest speaker?

I've walked out of a church because things were happening that I couldn't reconcile with Scripture.

If a representative of a church I consider to be theologically toxic were invited to my church I'd urge the invitation to be withdrawn. If I had commitments during the service I'd make it clear to leadership that I couldn't honor them because the chances were very high I'd be walking out during the visitor's time. If I attended at all my primary purpose would be to take notes on what they were teaching so any contradictions to Scripture could be highlighted based on what they said right there and then, such that the "he didn't say that" line wouldn't be an option.

[DavidGYoung]

What is your take on a Christian who says the following?

"If you are a Christian, you are never in your life required to treat 'the Lord has told me' as an authoritative statement. You are never required to treat your dreams, images in your mind's eye, voices in your head or unusual coincidences you see in life as divine messages either."

How would you feel about the most senior person in your church saying it in sermons on a regular basis?

[RabbiKnife]

I do say that on a regular basis.
So does “the most senior” leader in our church

This is the norm, or should be.

Man is both physical and metaphysical…. Both meatsuit and spirit inhabiting the meat suit.  God would be a cosmic idiot if the instructions to the meat suit were different than the instructions to the spirit in the suit.

[tango]

What is your take on a Christian who says the following?

"If you are a Christian, you are never in your life required to treat 'the Lord has told me' as an authoritative statement. You are never required to treat your dreams, images in your mind's eye, voices in your head or unusual coincidences you see in life as divine messages either."

How would you feel about the most senior person in your church saying it in sermons on a regular basis?

It's not only a perfectly fair thing to say but I'd be worried if anyone in our church, senior or not, disputed it.

If I believe the Lord told me something it's up to me whether to obey the call or not. You have precisely zero obligation to follow it, whatever I might like to say. The so-called "prophets" of some movements today like to think they carry the authority of an Old Testament prophet but curiously don't seem to want to pay the price of getting it wrong.

If I have a dream it might be God telling me something. It might be my mind processing something that happened during the day. It might be down to eating too much cheese before bed. I can interpret it however I see fit, and decide whether to act on it however I choose. As with "the Lord told me", if I present my dream to you then you are absolutely free to regard it as a message for you, an interesting piece of trivia, or evidence I need to lay off the cheese before bed.

The great thing about God calling someone is that God is quite capable of sending the message in a way that gets it through to the intended recipient. You list yourself as a non-Christian so I'll pick on the good Rabbi, simply because his post comes right before mine. If I say to the Rabbi something like "hey Mr Rabbi, I think God might be calling you to be a missionary to Outer Elbonia" then the Rabbi is free to do anything from immediately putting his house on the market and booking tickets to Elbonia, to falling over laughing at the absurdity of my suggestion. The thing is, if God was truly calling him to be a missionary to Elbonia then the chances are my comment would be one of several coming from different people at different times, probably after things were starting to happen that led him to believe that maybe God might be calling to something like that.

Anyone who tells you "God says you must do this" and expects you to obey without question is someone it's best to ignore. They may claim the title of prophet but if they behave like that I'd say they aren't a prophet. If they aren't willing to accept 100% responsibility for the consequences if they are wrong they definitely aren't a prophet.

The person who says something more like "I think God might be calling you to..." and encourages you to prayerfully consider what they are saying, acceping without question that you make the final decision, is worth at least hearing out.

[RabbiKnife]

Is that Left Elbonia or Right Elbonia?

And if I go, do I get the cool hats and the beard?

[Athanasius]

What is your take on a Christian who says the following?

"If you are a Christian, you are never in your life required to treat 'the Lord has told me' as an authoritative statement. You are never required to treat your dreams, images in your mind's eye, voices in your head or unusual coincidences you see in life as divine messages either."

How would you feel about the most senior person in your church saying it in sermons on a regular basis?

Obviously.

[Slug1]

What is your take on a Christian who says the following?

"If you are a Christian, you are never in your life required to treat 'the Lord has told me' as an authoritative statement. You are never required to treat your dreams, images in your mind's eye, voices in your head or unusual coincidences you see in life as divine messages either."

How would you feel about the most senior person in your church saying it in sermons on a regular basis?

I'd give the senior member a, Hooah!

We're required to "test" all spirits:

1 John 4: 1 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world. (NKJV)

1 John 4: 1 Dear friends, do not believe everyone who claims to speak by the Spirit. You must test them to see if the spirit they have comes from God. For there are many false prophets in the world. (NLT)

I lost count of the number of "The Lord told me, the Lord showed me, or I dreamt that, etc" that I put on a hanger.

[Sojourner]

If what a messenger delivers is from God, He will generally prepare the recipient(s) to receive it. Scriptural examples include the Jews whose hearts were pierced at Peter's message (Acts 2:37), and the case of Peter and Cornelius (Acts 10). God's work will never lack God's provision.

[tango]

Is that Left Elbonia or Right Elbonia?

And if I go, do I get the cool hats and the beard?

Are you feeling called? I hear they have a secret recipe for making mud.