What is SPEAKING IN TONGUES?

Just ran across this news report on a study of what happens in the brains of Christians while they are "speaking in tongues."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZbQBajYnEc

I've posted a link in the margin to the "Strange Fire Conference" which was held a few years ago to examine the claims of the charismatic movement in the Church that they are practicing the "gifts of the Spirit" described in the New Testament, speaking in tongues being one of them.  The conference convinced me that the phenomena being called the Gifts of the Spirit today are not the New Testament gifts.

I myself received the "gift of tongues" when I was a member of a charismatic church back in the 90s,  Whatt they are describing in the news report is what I also experienced:  we have no control over this, it just comes out.  I was praying out loud when these other sounds just started coming out instead of my English words.  I could repeat them at will but I could not control what sounds came out.  I could start and stop them but I couldn't control what was being "said."

People in the charismatic movement claim they are speaking by the Holy Spirit, that it is a prayer language, that the Holy Spirit is praying through them.  They claim to experience spiritual feelings as they exercise the gift.

My own experience did not feel spiritual or worshipful at all and that bothered me a great deal.  I would let the sounds continue as I went about my chores during the day.  They had a definite pattern to them, a pattern that would repeat itself, maybe about the length of a sentence.  The SAME sounds kept repeating in other words and I was not controlling them at all.  But nothing about it felt like prayer as so many charismatics claim it is.  None of it evoked God in my mind or heart in any way.  After some time I began singing the sounds, and when I recognized that the tunes were anything but spiritual I simply had to conclude that this has nothing to do with God.  The tunes that came out were "Three Blind Mice" and "Reuben Reuben."  There is nothing spiritual or prayerful or worshipful about those tunes, just as there was nothing spiritual or worshipful or prayerful as far as my own feelings went in connection with the "words" that I was speaking.

It took a while to convince myself to completely give it up though.  The pressure is strong in charismatic circles to embrace the "gifts of the Spirit."  I read studies that aimed to debunk the whole charismatic movement but couldn't be completely convinced of those arguments.  I remained in suspension about these things until the Strange Fire Conference which finally made the case I'd been needing to hear.

So what ARE these phenomena?  Certainly what the scientist in the news report says is true:  the people are not doing this on purpose, it just "happens" to them.  I experienced this personally.  It is in SOME sense "supernatural" therefore.

The most convincing explanation I've run across comes from Watchman Nee who wrote on the subject of "Soul Power."  These are capacities he understands to have been abilities God gave to Adam and Eve that were lost at the Fall, such as psychic abilities, the ability to read minds and other capacities.  These things are often discovered through various religious practices, particularly Hindu practices.  Sometimes they are intentionally cultivated, but what seem to be the higher forms of these religions discourage them as distractions.  In general they may be more or less akin to "siddhis" which include psychic powers.

Nee particularly identified spontaneous laughter of the sort that overtook a charismatic congregation in Toronto in the 90s and then spread to other charismatic congregations.  It occurred in some Chinese churches in Nee's time and he identified it as related to this "soul power" and something that should be discouraged rather than encouraged.  In Toronto it was strongly encouraged and became known as the Laughing Revival.

He said he himself had the power to read minds and thought it was a gift of the Holy Spirit until he realized it was not that and exerted himself to suppress it.

The Strange Fire Conference to my mind definitively proved that whatever these phenomena are they are not the Gifts of the Spirit that were given by God to the early Church:  the "healings" are nothing like those in the New Testament, the "prophecies" are more like fortune telling than the prophecies people gave in the New Testament, and the "tongues" that are spoken are not real languages as they were at Pentecost.  We may well wonder what they really are, if they have any qualities of language at all, and that I don't know.  The excuse that they are an angelic prayer language has to be doubted because none of the other "gifts" are those of the New Testament.

Watchman Nee's interpretation that they are a version of "soul power" seems the best to my mind, and in any case they should not be cultivated but abandoned.  God will restore to us whatever powers He gave Adam and Eve when His kingdom has fully come, but until then they are not to be practiced and it is even possible that they are subject to demonic manipulation in this still-fallen world.

Strange Fire: Sorting Out the Issues, Part 5: In Spirit and in Truth: Disagreeing with John MacArthur

Much as I applaud the Strange Fire Conference and hope its influence will grow, I do want to clarify some points where I still differ with them.  I'll say up front that I'm open to being corrected on these points as well, if it should work out that way.

Although the speakers were very careful to affirm that the Holy Spirit is at work today in the Church and our individual lives, I've always believed and still do that there are authentic experiences of God that Cessationists don't recognize, often wrongly calling them "mystical" (in the sense they use that word that I don't think is always appropriate).   

When John MacArthur says "praying in the spirit" is simply praying with all our human faculties, I have to wonder why, if that is so, Paul made the distinction between that and praying with the mind, or "the understanding" as the KJV has it:

1 Cor 14:15, in KJV "with the spirit and with the understanding also"

--which certainly implies that the spirit is something separate from the mind and not understandable or graspable with the mind.

And why would John the Apostle, the author of Revelation, bother to say he was "in the Spirit on the Lord's Day" if the involvement of all our human faculties is all it means to be "in the Spirit."  

"Spirit" is capitalized in the KJV here, and also in Ephesians 6:18  where we are commanded to pray "in the Spirit" ourselves, so it's not some special mental state that only John was expected to experience.

The Greek word for "spirit" AND for "Spirit" -- the distinction was decided on by the KJV translators -- is the same word:  "pneuma" which literally means "breath."

"Mind" and "understanding" are translated from the Greek word "nous." 

The Greek word the KJV translated "soul" is "psyche," which we recognize as the root of "psychology." "Soul" or "psyche" includes both the emotions and the mind according to an online dictionary, but "nous" is just "mind."  

But "spirit" is something else.  "Spirit" and "soul" are clearly not the same word, and the fact that they are not treated as synonymous in scripture certainly implies that they refer to distinctly different human faculties.

MacArthur has the same idea of worshiping "in spirit and in truth," as he said in Part 2 of the Challies interview:

True worship takes place in spirit and truth (John 4:24), meaning it involves both the emotions and the mind.

Again he treats "spirit" as synonymous with "soul" or "psyche," but this isn't correct:  it is "psyche" and not "pneuma" which is the seat of emotions and mind.

I'm aware that John Owen, the great Puritan, also ignored the difference between "soul" and "spirit," and spoke of "body and soul" as the totality of human nature.  I don't know if a defense of this has ever been given.  Like Owen, MacArthur also insists on the understanding of human nature as made up of body and soul, against the views of some teachers that we are tripartite:  body, soul and spirit -- at least those who have been born again are tripartite, the spirit that was previously dormant or "dead" in the fallen nature having been quickened. 

There is scripture for this: 1 Thessalonians 5:23 distinguishes the three parts, and Hebrews 4:12 emphasizes the difference between soul and spirit by speaking of "dividing" them "asunder:" 

1 Thess 5:23 

And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.''

Heb 4:12  For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart

At the Blue Letter Bible site, Jamieson, Fausset and Brown's Commentary on this verse acknowledges this tripartite human nature:

All three, spirit, soul, and body, each in its due place, constitute man "entire."  The "spirit" links man with the higher intelligences of heaven, and is that highest part of man which is receptive of the quickening Holy Spirit ( 1Cr 15:47 ). In the unspiritual, the spirit is so sunk under the lower animal soul (which it ought to keep under) that such are termed "animal" (English Version. "sensual," having merely the body of organized matter, and the soul the immaterial animating essence), having not the Spirit. The unbeliever shall rise with an animal (soul-animated) body, but not like the believer with a spiritual (spirit-endued) body like Christ's (Rom. 8:11

This is in keeping with Penn-Lewis and Nee's understanding and both of them develop the idea at great length.
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Matthew Henry's Commentary quotes the passage but only as a description of the "whole man," and doesn't go into detail.

While Charismatics and Pentecostals are likely to agree with the interpretation of the tripartite human nature, there is no necessary connection with the "gifts of the Spirit," and it also has to be acknowledged that it's possible for anything of the "spirit" to be counterfeited just as the gifts are counterfeited.  The great danger is ALWAYS the failure of Biblical discernment. 

Those who share this interpretation are likely also to believe in a special separate "Baptism in the Holy Spirit."  I've never had a clear idea of this concept except that those who hold it must have had some kind of special experience they are describing, whether they are understanding it rightly or not.

Obviously there is much more to discuss about this.

Strange Fire: Sorting Out the Issues, Part 3: The Source of the Charismatic "GIfts"

Having said that I think it's important to characterize the Charismatics' beliefs in their own terms, as the Holy Spirit's speaking through the human spirit, if the Strange Fire Conference is right that is not at all what is going on.  However, I'm still not sure it's right to characterize the actuality as promoting extrabiblical revelations, seeking subjective impressions and ecstatic experiences as John MacArthur put it. 

I think this glosses over the fact that these things are usually experienced as just happening to the person without being asked for, and because that is the way they occur and because the recipient believes he or she is a saved Christian the question of their source just doesn't come up.  Or if it does it is immediately squelched by the constant refrain that it is dangerous to doubt the Holy Spirit.  That this attitude amounts to a mental bondage as tyrannical as that of any cult or dictatorship also doesn't occur.

In any case, if you insist on characterizing these phenomena in terms of subjective mental states you are going to miss the whole point, and miss an opportunity to make Charismatics aware of the problem you want to get across to them.

THE PROSPERITY GOSPEL IS A HUGE OFFSHOOT BUT IT'S NOT THE ROOT

I'm glad to see the Pentecostal pastor I quoted in the previous post agreeing with John MacArthur about the Prosperity Gospel, and that's a big start, but he remains a Continuationist nevertheless, in opposition to MacArthur, while the Strange Fire Conference ultimately aims at the root of the whole thing, at the very idea that the miraculous gifts of the Spirit continue today.

And that gets us into the fundamental Pentecostal and Charismatic claims of miraculous healings from God, of genuine visions from God, of genuine prophecies from God, of a genuine gift of tongues from God. of a Baptism in the Holy Spirit that is separate from being born again, and so on. 

[Just heard on Pilgrim Radio an interview with Phil Johnson of the Conference, and tomorrow at the same time there will be an interview with Michael Brown for the Charismatic side, on the program His People. The program airs in Pacific Standard Time at 2:30 AM, 12:30 PM and 9:30 PM and can be heard online.]

MIRACULOUS GIFTS OR "LEARNED BEHAVIOR" OR "INTUITIONS"

On the radio show I just mentioned, Phil Johnson just described the phenomena claimed by Charismatics to be from the Holy Spirit to be in fact "learned behavior," and I've got to disagree with that quite sharply. 

I don't know if possibly some of it is, but I can guarantee you I never "learned" to "speak in tongues," it just happened to me one day while I was praying out loud during the few years I was in a charismatic church and a charismatic organization as well.  A whole stream of unfamiliar sounds came out of my mouth absolutely unbidden.  I don't remember what I was praying about but I wasn't even thinking about the gift of tongues, let alone asking for it, though I think I had asked for it from time to time before that.  At first I was elated -- Wow, it's true and I got the gift.  It turned out to be easy to just walk around letting my mouth produce those foreign sounds.  There was a definite pattern to them with repeating "words."  Sometimes they seemed to come out with an unidentifiable foreign accent too, even more oddly many different accents.  I even sang them.  It began to hit me as very odd that the tunes I was singing them to were nursery rhymes like Hickory Dickory Dock and Three Blind Mice and the tune Reuben Reuben.  This did bother me, I didn't know what to make of it, but I wasn't producing those sounds myself in any sense, they were being automatically produced as I simply opened my mouth and allowed them to come out.   I couldn't have imitated them consciously if I'd tried, though by now I can imitate many of them.  Years later I read that at least one other person quit the charismatic movement when he found his own "gift of tongues" coming out to the tune of a nursery rhyme.   Smart man.  I dragged on with mine for a few more years, very ambivalent about it but unable to get rid of it; and occasionally I discover it's still there though I try to suppress it.

So to MacArthur and Johnson and Company I have to say No No No, you are not going to get anywhere characterizing these productions of the mind and mouth that Charismatics experience as mere learned behavior or intuitions of any ordinary sort.   I'm not going to say there aren't any frauds but I know for a fact that these things can be produced apart from any normal mental process.   Michael Brown said on one of his shows that he "prays in tongues."  Well, from my experience it's quite possible to carry on for a long time producing these alien sounds and I suppose someone, taking his cue from a misread Bible verse or two, could assume they are "prayer."  My supposition is that they are about as far from prayer or worship as you can get, but the automatic nature of them may be enough to persuade a Charismatic believer otherwise. 

And if Cessationists don't recognize this they aren't going to persuade any Charismatics.

SOUL POWER OR DEMONIC?
 
For this sort of phenomenon those are really the only two options.  Eventually I want to do a more thorough discussion of "soul power,"  which comes from a Continuationist corner of the Church although today's Charismatics haven't given it any thought that I know of.  The Strange Fire people are not likely to accept much of it either, although in many ways it supports their criticisms of the Charismatic movement.  

The idea is that there are "miraculous" powers that were given to Adam but lost at the fall, or at least "buried in the flesh" as Watchman Nee puts it, that can be revived under certain circumstances (such as repetitive singing of choruses).  He thinks they are probably discovered by people through promptings by the evil spirits.  They include such "parapsychological" or "paranormal" phenomena as psychic powers, clairvoyance, telepathy, telekinesis and that sort of thing.  Psychic powers can imitate prophecy.  Nee says healings of a certain sort are even possible through these powers, a sort of mind-over-matter thing such as Christian Science preaches and some Hindus and others practice.

This kind of thing would explain the kind of phenomena that are being exercised in the Charismatic movement, the "prophecies" and the "healings" and probably also the tongues speaking.  Some at Strange Fire did mention "psychic" phenomena as a possible explanation.  Nee also discussed the so-called "holy laughter" that was a major element in the supposed "revival" called the Toronto Blessing, that he'd witnessed in China before 1933 when he wrote the book describing these things.  How this automatic laughter relates to soul power isn't clear but Nee recognized it as a counterfeit phenomenon that did not come from God.   Nee, and Jessie Penn Lewis whose work he built on, accepted the continuation of the gifts of the Spirit but he also recognized a very large number of counterfeits of those gifts that were being expressed at the same time, something we don't hear recognized by today's charismatics who seem uncritically to accept anything that calls itself prophetic or miraculous. 

In his interview about his critics, John MacArthur goes on to such subjects as visions and tongues, which also need to be discussed as something other than ordinary human phenomena. That will be the next post.

Getting Free of the Deceptions of Charismatica

After watching and rewatching the Strange Fire Conference it's been growing on me how amazing and deplorable it is that so many Christians can't discern the falseness of Charismatic phenomena, and I'm certainly including myself in that judgment.   After much prayer I had come to reject most of the phenomena I'd encountered in my Charismatic phase, and left the whole movement after a couple of years of involvement, but I still had some doubts and reservations I shouldn't have had. 

When John MacArthur at the Conference simply flatly denounced the movement as insulting to God and the Holy Spirit and in essence apologized to the Lord for anyone's ever mistaking the bizarre phenomena as coming from Him, it hit me how right he was and how we should ALL recognize that.  And why don't we?  Are we deceived Christians or are we Christians at all?  Even that is often not clear.  How many of us may even be demon-oppressed (or possessed) because of our involvement?

I had felt hopeless about ever settling the questions I had for years, a couple of decades really, having given up on being able to determine for sure whether there was anything of God in the movement or not. 

Some of us originally got involved in the movement because of personal experiences of our own that we attributed to God.  And some of the experiences may truly HAVE been of God.  Having had such experiences we are drawn to the movement because it majors on personal experience.  I know of people who feel they found the "truth" in a charismatic church, found a real relationship with God.  They love the enthusiasm, the emotion, whereas their previous experience of church had been "dead" and boring.

My very first experience of a church service, being taken there by a friend after coming to belief through reading, was in a Foursquare charismatic church.  I actually didn't like many things about it because my reading had led me to a reverence and adoration of God rather than the emotional enthusiasms I saw in the church, but I had no reliable way of judging at that time, being a new Christian and then for some period being around only charismatics.  I'd also become involved in occultic practices during my reading period, and that was no doubt exerting a strong influence on me too despite efforts to reject it.  Later, in another town, the first church I attended by my own choice was a Presbyterian church, and it took me a while to realize that it was a "liberal" church, that is, it wasn't true to the Bible.  So I left there and went to another Foursquare church.  Then I joined a charismatic "parachurch" organization.  All that lasted for a couple of years until I finally made my way to a Reformed church which was new in town at that time.  The preaching there was excellent, but I still had my reservations about the charismatic phenomena.  And even now, despite the effect of the Strange Fire Conference, I may still be deceived in some ways I have yet to discover.

I am writing all this with a view to getting across something about the hold these things have on people.  I have no doubt any more that the movement is satanic in its essence, yet I met many there I consider to be true Christians, and now I'm pondering how hard it is to get free of it.  It must be somewhat similar to a Catholic's bondage to the RCC, or a Mormon's bondage to their "church."

TORONTO "BLESSING" OR CURSE?
I was still involved in the Charismatic movement when the "Toronto Blessing" broke out and my first take on it was that it had to be a counterfeit.  Nevertheless, being surrounded by charismatics who were constantly warning against imputing satanic influence to a work of God I was kept in a state of suspended judgment about it.  That constant refrain about attributing God's work to Satan has a powerful effect, it's one of the devil's most effective strategies.  Few of us have enough of a grasp of the Bible to cut through that worry with certainty, and even praying for light as I did (and receiving a great deal of light in answer) didn't fully release me from my doubts.

Until the Strange Fire Conference I hadn't thought about the Toronto Blessing for years, but in the last few days I decided to learn something about it.  All I remembered was that it was known as the "laughing revival."  I watched a film about it at You Tube that presents it in a very positive light.  Very little of the more controversial phenomena the revival is known for was shown, very little of the laughter, very little of the jerking.  Instead it focused mostly on people's claims to have been emotionally healed of past "hurts," to have had bad marriages repaired, and a few claimed physical healings as well.   Much of this "healing" went on during the periods when they were out cold on the floor.

How difficult it is to find fault with such nice normal people as were interviewed for this film, nice people who had such nice experiences, who testify to having had their lives changed by this "revival," and to "loving Jesus more" as well as loving people more.

After I saw it I had to sit and think and pray for a while to get my head straight about it.  The main thing that became evident to me was that all the focus was on psychological or fleshly results, people "getting their lives back," now having happy marriages or happier lives; and they were all thanking God for this.  But this is a far cry from the teachings of Jesus, who tells us to LOSE our lives, not gain them, who tells us to take up our cross (consider ourselves dead to this world), die to ourselves daily and so on.    None of that was in evidence, nor a single word about sin and how we are sinners in need of salvation, nor anything of the gospel itself of salvation through Christ's death in our place,  In short there was nothing Christian about this "revival" at all from what was shown in that film.

"HOLY" LAUGHTER?
 This topic takes me back to the idea of "soul power" which I've posted on a few times.  I've always liked the "holiness" writers like Watchman Nee, which is probably one major reason I haven't been able to completely free myself from the spell of charismatica, since he and others in the Holiness camp accept the charismatic idea of the continuation of the spiritual gifts.  Now that I believe he was deceived about that it helps.

However, since he does accept the gifts for today you might think more charismatics would refer to his writings for support, but I haven't found that to be the case.  If they did they'd have to notice that he denounced "holy laughter" all the way back in 1933 when it was occurring in churches in China.  Unlike other supernatural phenomena he considered to be possibly authentic, requiring discernment to tell the authentic from the counterfeit, "holy laughter" he considered to be nothing but counterfeit [pp. 71-4, Latent Power of the Soul], so if charismatics had taken him seriously during the Toronto Blessing they'd have to have rejected that particular manifestation for sure.

And really, again it seems to me that we all ought to see such laughter as counterfeit, just the tone of it is a violation of the Biblical revelation of the character of God, so again I'm amazed at us that we hesitate on such a point as this.  The devil's manipulations are powerful, the fear of offending God by rejecting such phenomena for instance, when in reality we offend Him by accepting such things.

Nee also writes, in Latent Power of the Soul, that the devil can counterfeit all kinds of things that we'd never suspect to be counterfeits, such as "false repentance, false salvation, false regeneration, false revival, false joy ..." [p. 41]

We need all the help we can get from something like the Strange Fire Conference, to set us free from these things.

Here's a link to a page of articles exposing the errors of the Toronto Blessing:
Testimonies and Analyses of the Toronto Blessing

Interesting: I've read quite a few of those articles by now and what's particularly interesting to me is that while many of them identify the revival as the work of evil spirits they don't give up their belief in the charismatic gifts for today. This is a pretty common position these days, to see such things as merely excesses or deviations, but it seems to me now that they are the natural logical extension of belief in the gifts, or any false belief in supernatural occurrences, which gives ground to evil spirits.

Some of the Evidence for the Cessation of the Gifts of the Spirit, and the Devilish Nature of Today's Counterfeits of the Gifts

The Strange Fire Conference definitely did convince me that the supernatural gifts of the Spirit that were so evident in the early church stopped completely after the apostolic era.  I had read arguments along these lines before but none of it was convincing to me as is the evidence that was given at the Conference. 

THE BIBLICAL EVIDENCE:
The main evidence given for this was Biblical, and most of it was given at the Conference by pastor Tom Pennington: [A Case For Cessationism]    the Biblical fact is that ALL the miracle-working powers possessed by individuals throughout the Old Testament were clearly given by God to authenticate either His messenger or the message brought by him.  There were only two periods in Old Testament history when miracles were common, and each was only 65 years in duration:  the period of Moses and the period of Elijah and Elisha.  There were isolated instances in between but those two periods were when miracles were most prolific, and in between there were very long periods when no miracles were done at all.  There were over 700 years from the last Old Testament miracle in Hezekiah's time until Christ, during which no miracles were reported.

The third and last period of miraculous working was during the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ and the spread of the gospel.  There are various clues in the text that the miracles were given as God's authentication of His messenger, authenticating Christ as Messiah and the gospel message as God's.   Somehow we manage to overlook the implication of such clues as the fact that Jesus told John that if he doubted Him, at least he should believe the works He did, the works being His credentials from God [John 10:37, 38]; and He told Philip the same thing [14:11].  We also fail to grasp the implication of the fact that the Lord Jesus gave His disciples miraculous powers when He sent them out to preach the gospel, but the gospel WAS the message they were to preach:  He did not tell them to preach that miraculous powers are available to all believers as today's Charismatics teach.  Clearly He gave them those powers to authenticate the message they were to preach.  

R. C. Sproul answered the typical Charismatic claim that the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, in the form originally given at Pentecost where they all spoke in tongues, is an experience all believers in all times should expect to receive, showing that the instances of separate Spirit baptism in the New Testament occurred at the entry of specific groups of believers into the Church:  the Jews, the Gentiles, the Samaritans, and the "God fearers."  I'd have to listen again to the talk to be able to argue this case myself, but I found it convincing:  each separate group represented a specific extension of the gospel into the world and God gave a special authentication at the entry of each into the Church in the repetition of the events of Pentecost, Pentecost being THE sign of the inauguration of the gospel.  That initiation was never to be repeated except in those special instances, but those special instances were in reality the gospel being given to other parts of the Foundation of the Church and not representative of all believers since then.  Once the Foundation was established and ratified, believers since then are not to expect to receive the sign of Pentecost.

OTHER EVIDENCE:
There is secondary evidence as well, including the fact that apparently the miraculous powers were waning by the time Paul's ministry was drawing to a close, and that after the apostolic age they had ceased.  Charismatics try to rationalize this away on the basis of an assumed spiritual deadness in the post-apostolic churches, but that is nothing but assumption.  In fact it's just circular reasoning:  the "deadness" is proved by the cessation of the gifts.  Some of the early Church fathers as well as other Christian leaders down the centuries, declared the cessation of the gifts.  Pennington in his earlier talk quoted Calvin on that subject.

The fact that the "gifts" as practiced today are really nothing like the gifts practiced in the Apostolic era, is another piece of secondary evidence.  Today's "prophecy" is not required to be 100% accurate as biblical prophecy was required to be, although they claim it's based on the New Testament, and besides that a great many of the "prophecies" are either useless or just plain silly (I wrote about Jill Austin's "prophecies" here some time ago).   As for the gift of healing the evidence is just about nil for the thousands of claims, although in principle there is no reason God can't heal miraculously today and no doubt does from time to time;  and I'll get to the "gift of tongues" next:

TONGUES:
Tongues speaking ought to be discredited by the mere fact that Mormons and some practitioners of pagan religions may speak in tongues, plus the fact that they are not known languages but are used entirely differently than they were used in the early church.  By the way, I supposedly HAVE the gift of tongues.  I received it while praying out loud in my bedroom during the period I was involved in the Charismatic movement.  But from the very beginning it didn't FEEL right to me, and over the years I've struggled with understanding it, have prayed the Lord would take it away but I still have it and sometimes just blurt it out.  It may be what Nee calls "soul power" in which case simply working to deny it and suppress it may be the best I can do.

What was the original gift of tongues FOR?  To demonstrate God's plan to spread the gospel to all people groups of the world, that the Messiah was not simply the Messiah of the Jews but the Savior of the entire world understood to have been promised as far back as Adam and Eve.  Again, once God's new work was authenticated there was no further need of the authenticating signs.  To continue to expect them is to completely miss the point of what God was doing.

The conclusion from all this and more is that miracles were never in themselves to be part of the gospel message but were given to establish the gospel message as coming from God.   All the emphasis on miracles is a distraction from the gospel.  Not that God doesn't sometimes still give miracles for specific purposes, but that they were never intended to be normative in the life of the Church.

SOUL POWER:
There is probably more than the above evidence that I'm forgetting but I'd like to add what I wrote about in the previous post from Watchman Nee's warnings about "soul power" being mistaken for the work of the Holy Spirit. 

This isn't evidence but I find it a compelling way of understanding some of the Charismatic phenomena that is clearly not just human imagination but has a supernatural element to it, without always having to invoke demons as their author (although probably demons are behind the expression of these things in one way or another anyway.)  It's the fact that the Charismatic phenomena occur through unusual channels and are NOT something normal human abilities could produce that misleads people into thinking they are from God, figuring that Well, we're Christians so where else could such things come from?  Cessationists who think only in terms of ordinary human powers or some sort of trickery completely miss the point that the phenomena just "happen" to people and can be quite astonishing.

Nee took most of his thinking on this subject from Jessie Penn-Lewis who was involved in the Welsh revival of the early twentieth century, specifically her book, Soul and Spirit.  The writings of both of them are rather quaint as they make much of the early twentieth century "scientific" studies of parapsychology in their discussion.

And they both affirm the continuation of the supernatural gifts of the Spirit.  After the Strange Fire Conference I'm now convinced that both of them were deceived about that.  They are at great pains to distinguish genuine manifestations of the God-given gifts from the counterfeits that both were acutely aware of.  Whatever miraculous events were genuinely given from God that either of them witnessed would have been done through God's sovereign will and not as a continuation of the gifts, but unfortunately many of those may also have been counterfeits. 

Penn-Lewis wrote extensively about the activity of evil spirits in connection with the revival.  It is most likely that the confusion of God's gifts with counterfeits gave place to the devil to do his work, and there is every reason to think that the devil is working among Charismatics today who have fallen into the same mistake.

Lord, set us free from the devil's deceptions.

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October 30:
Now they're saying, well, Michael Brown is, that the Biblical arguments for the cessation of the spiritual gifts prove nothing. 

He also dismissed the fact that Kundalini yoga brings about the same jerkings that were so evident on videos of the Brownsville "revival."  He said if they're the result of preaching Jesus then it means nothing.  However, ALL we see on the videos is that sort of phenomena, we do not see Jesus being preached.  It is clear that those who made the video think the strange body movements are of major importance and the preaching of Jesus not so important. 

And Michael Brown doesn't seem to know that he can't just SAY Brownsville was all about preaching Jesus if there is no evidence for it, which there isn't.  But there IS evidence for all those jerkings and falling down.  Also the whole atmosphere of the "revival" on those videos is giddy rather than appropriate to a true Christian revival.

Soul Power Counterfeits the Holy Spirit: Predicting the Future

It was while listening to Friday's radio show by Dr. Michael Brown, Dr. Brown Answers Your E-Questions that I decided to post again on the subject of Soul Power, even perhaps at some length, because I believe it may explain a great deal of what is experienced in Charismatic circles as the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, although in reality it may be nothing but heightened natural human powers.

On that radio show Dr. Brown goes into some detail about the Charismatic claim that New Testament prophecy is different from Old Testament prophecy in that the prophet is not required to be 100% accurate.  He also tries to answer the accusation that it is new extrabiblical revelation, and I have to say I agree with him about that:  that is, most of the "prophecy" in question is focused on strictly personal individual concerns, which is an entirely different thing from the Old Testament prophecies which were given to God's People for revelation of the ways of God, which are instructions for the edification of all of us in all times and places.

But this amounts to a denial that anything like biblical prophecy is being exercised at all.  As someone at the Strange Fire Conference quipped, this denial, along with the denial that healings on the level of the New Testament are occurring today, and the denial that today's "gift of tongues" is  the same as the New Testament gift of tongues, makes closet Cessationists of Charismatics. 

There is truth in that observation.  The claimed gifts are really not like the supernatural gifts that were exercised by the Apostles and many believers in that era.

Brown gave two examples of what he means by "New Testament" style prophecy that is not like Old Testament prophecy: 

When he was teaching part time but had been privately told he would soon replace a full-time teacher on the staff, someone in his class received this knowledge in his mind and spoke it out loud.  It was true, Brown knew it was true, and he considered it to be a prophetic speaking.

Another example was given of a woman missionary to China who was told by a Charismatic prophet that he "saw" her working in Palestine although such an idea had never occurred to her.  Over some time other similar words of "prophecy" were brought to her and finally it was also confirmed in her own understanding as God's will for her, and she did eventually go as a missionary to Palestine.

If we just accept these as true reports, and I have no reason to doubt them, the question I'd have is whether either of them describes prophecy in the biblical sense at all.  And I'd answer, No.

Consider something about these two examples:  Don't they strike you as peculiarly empty and useless?  Even if true what good is there in either case of such a prediction being given?  Did either Brown or the missionary need to know about it, did it serve any purpose in their lives?  Wouldn't Brown have taken over the other teacher's job in any case, and the missionary have gone to Palestine in any case, and what good purpose did it serve for either of them to have it revealed in advance?  Isn't it obvious the answer is None?

Well, what is it then?   Is it demonic?  Not necessarily.

My guess is that it's what Watchman Nee identified as "soul power."  There can be demonic influence involved but it's nevertheless a human power, which he explains as built into human nature at the Creation but suppressed as a result of the Fall.  Although such powers are suppressed in us, it is possible to release them to expression through various disciplines such as are practiced in many of the world's religions, including Buddhism, Hinduism and Taoism.  Nee discusses the ability to foretell the future as one of these "supernatural" but fallen human powers on pages 22 and 24 of his little book, The Latent Power of the Soul. 

He also mentions healings as one of the powers, and sees Christian Science as the practice of controlling the mind in order to bring about certain kinds of healings.  He regards such phenomena as often successful, which may or may not be borne out in reality, but his idea of how it works is interesting and compelling it seems to me.  It explains for one things the strenuous disciplines, the ascetic practices, the breathings and meditations, that many go through in Eastern religions to acquire the ability to control the mind and body.  Books written by many practitioners of Hinduism, such as Paramahansa Yogananda, often describe strange phenomena and powers that its adepts are capable of, from telepathy to telekinesis to clairvoyance and so on.  I've tended to think of these abilities as demonically inspired, but now I think this explanation is better. 

The simple repetition of a mantra or even a prayer such as the Jesus Prayer practiced by Russian mystics, can release such abilities in a person.  But such practices and disciplines aren't the only means of releasing the latent soul powers, as many Christians today have come to experience some of them from a sort of contagion, especially in a highly emotionally charged atmosphere as can occur in some "revivals."   The jerkings and shakings and falling down may include demonic involvement, or they could merely be the effect on the human frame of a heightened "religious" frame of mind that can trigger the release of the powers in question.  Again I'd recommend watching the video presentation by Andrew Strom about false spirits in the Church, which I've posted at the upper right of this blog.  It is abundantly clear that the same jerkings that occurred in the Brownsville "revival" are part of Hindu Kundalini practices as well.  How gullible we are, and so eager to embrace anything out of the ordinary that seems supernatural.

Could genuinely born-again Christians experience these things and mistake them for the Holy Spirit?  Contrary to John MacArthur who seems to believe that being born again should protect us from all such counterfeits, I don't know for sure but I'd hesitate to say they couldn't.  In any case these are NOT the biblical Gifts of the Spirit, they ARE counterfeit.  And Nee (who himself had a psychic power he at first attributed to God but then learned to renounce as contrary to Christian life) teaches that rather than allowing their expression we should die to them and deny them expression because as powers of the human soul they interfere with the genuine workings of God through the Holy Spirit.

"My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge" can apply to this subject.  If we don't know we are being deceived by a counterfeit we can fall into all kinds of error and miss the Holy Spirit altogether.

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Just want to add here that Nee sees human nature as made up of three parts, body, soul and spirit, which is found in one place in the Bible, though others such as John MacArthur believe in only two parts, body and soul.

Spiritual Deception: Soul Power 3

Probably the most common way going off track into signs-and-wonders "Christianity" doesn't get recognized:

These are phenomena that just come over a person. They are involuntary, they come out of nowhere, it seems supernatural. You were praying to God (you thought), you were worshipping God (you thought), you have dedicated your life to God, all you want to do is serve God, therefore it must be from God. Speaking in tongues comes this way, visions and dreams come this way, jerking and flailing and falling down "under the power" come this way, the "holy laughter" comes this way. Out of the blue, out of nowhere, unbidden.

Since scripture isn't crystal clear about these things a person can just go on assuming it's from God. You can argue all you like that the supernatural gifts stopped when the canon was closed, but you won't be persuasive with people who have experienced these things. You can't tell them there is no more prophecy because they've experienced prophecy -- and healings, and tongues and so on. And where could such things come from except God? Can't be Satan "because we're Christians." Can't have human origin because, well, because we don't think of human powers as ever reaching a level we'd call miraculous or supernatural -- Nee's teaching on the latent Adamic powers is not well known or accepted.

Calling it all "mysticism" may help categorize it at least but the way that term is used as a blanket pejorative has always bothered me. On this point maybe I'm the one who needs to change my mind, that's not clear yet, but the reason I've not wanted to think of mysticism as always a bad thing is that some very good Christians have both experienced something they call mysticism and defended it. A W Tozer defended it and even put out a book of quotes from various "mystics." This is because some of those called "mystics" seem to have a much more powerful appreciation of the character of God than the average Christian does, love of God, fear of God, an all-around deeper sold-out Christian life of genuine dying to self and service to others.

I remember reading of a striking vision Jonathan Edwards had, and a description of his wife's actually levitating. That struck me as very odd and as often happens I don't remember where I saw it, but would we accuse THEM of practicing mysticism? While the Catholic mystics are to be shunned, for good doctrinal reasons, nevertheless Teresa of Avila seemed when I first read her to be describing unusual phenomena that simply happened to her as a result of normal if protracted periods of prayer -- to God, not Mary -- not something she was seeking but something that just happened, and most of it seemed to come through passionate love of God and it had the effect of inspiring love of God in me the reader.

Also, those mystics were always advising their students not to take supernatural or unusual spiritual phenomena seriously, that most of it did not come from God, and that even if some of it was from God you shouldn't focus on God's gifts but on God Himself. Sounds like words of wisdom to me. John of the Cross wrote quite sternly against one nun who got carried away about how God had "spoken" to her. Yet John of the Cross's methods reminded me of what I'd read of Buddhist methods -- despite the fact that his famous poem about the Dark Night of the Soul* was all about yearning in love after God, panting after God as the psalm says, while Buddhists aren't seeking God and love would seem to be an emotion foreign to their practice. I read the Catholic mystics on my way to becoming a Christian and I did put them aside at that point with no intention of returning to them, but some of the phenomena they described I also found described among some good Protestants and it always seemed to be something that just came to a person, wasn't sought, but was given by God to those seeking Him for Himself and not for His gifts.

HOWEVER, Watchman Nee's Latent Power of the Soul does suggest another way of thinking about these things. It's not at all a familiar idea that the human soul possesses any powers that could reach expressions describable as supernatural or miraculous, so at first it's hard to entertain what Nee is saying even as a possibility, but it's coming to make more sense to me. Jessie Penn-Lewis also writes about the phenomena of the soul as opposed to the spirit and specifically attributes the powers of the coming Antichrist to soul power. The Biblical term in the Greek is "psyche," so these can be called "psychic" powers, though "soulish" is often the preferred English rendering. Both Nee and Penn Lewis wrote in the early part of the 20th century when it had become fashionable for "scientists" to study paranormal and psychic phenomena, so some of their descriptions sound out of date, but the same phenomena persist now of course, sometimes with terms from Eastern religions attached. Much of it is what now gets called "mysticism."

Nee's descriptions reminded me of the Russian Startsy or holy men who were (are?) known for their various "supernatural" powers. Seems to be rather a striking example of just what Nee is talking about, practicing methods that release not the spirit but the soul powers.

Many of them have a reputation amidst believers of being able to know the secrets of a person's heart without having ever previously met the visitor, and having the ability to discern God's plan for a person's life. This, as all of the elder's gifts, is believed to come from the Holy Spirit acting through the elder.

Nee himself said he had experienced knowing "the secrets of a person's heart" but had to learn that this was soul power that did NOT come from the Holy Spirit, that he must put this power under the cross or deny it so that the spirit, that is the dwelling place of God's own life, could operate in him instead. It is the spirit that gives life, the flesh profits nothing. A popular book about the life of a Starets is Way of a Pilgrim in which the method prescribed for the holy life is the practice of the Jesus Prayer, which is used the way a mantra is, simply endlessly repeated, the very sort of thing that releases soul power according to Nee, and in the case of the "pilgrim" of the book that's exactly what happened, as he came to have heightened powers of various kinds.

Just another way of missing God completely. Spectacularly.

It is very likely that many or all of the "charismatic" gifts including speaking in tongues, are based on soul power. Also the phenomena of "revival" such as the "holy laughter" and the spasmodic bodily movements and the like. There is nothing of God in those environments but the odd manifestations are what deceive people into thinking God is present. Those of us who have experienced these things know they are real, know we aren't bringing them about intentionally, know that they aren't an illusion produced by the mind, and yet sometimes they don't feel like they have anything to do with God at all. My own "gift of tongues" has always felt wrong and I haven't had any way of epxlaining it. It also doesn't go away when I pray God will take it away. I try to suppress it but sometimes it's just "there" anyway. It came just as I describe above, out of the blue, not as something I produced myself in any way at all, just all these "words" came tumbling out of my mouth as I was praying out loud in my room one day. Sure does seem supernatural or miraculous. But it has NEVER felt like worship, always felt wrong, though I never knew how to deal with it. Now it seems to me that I should probably regard it as a soul power that I inadvertently facilitated by my participation in charismatic groups, so then I can practice denying it as Nee denied his ability to know what was in people's minds.

In this way Nee's book is very helpful, and it seems to me it could be more helpful in getting a handle on this sort of phenomena than the usual arguments are, even possibly persuading some people out of them who have been caught up in them.

Here's an example of a typical charismatic type "prophecy" or "word from the Lord" given by Jill Austin, who used to be well known among the Kansas City Prophets -- she died a few years ago. She says to a woman that she "saw" her apparently dead husband "dancing on the sapphire sea" with the Lord. You'd think this sort of thing would be so patently obviously nuts it couldn't be entertained at all just because it's so obviously unbiblical -- dead people don't return to talk to people in this life -- but again, it just "comes out of the blue" and is taken to come from God because supposedly where ELSE could it come from? This could be either soul power or just garden-variety witchcraft or mediumship in which demons impart enough knowledge about other people to seduce them.

It's not just the usual charismatic phenomena we have to account for these days either. There is now a growing movement of people who have become dangerously enamored of what is called "contemplative prayer" which makes of prayer a "practice" or a "meditation" or a sort of repetitive mantra along the lines of some Hindu practices. Just another way of releasing soul power or even inviting demonic power.

Another hindrance to recognizing and being able to deal effectively with the "supernatural" counterfeits of the Christian life may be the belief in much of the Church that there is no distinction between soul and spirit as Nee and Penn-Lewis teach there is, even saying that to teach such a distinction is heretical. Maybe I need to try to get more into this concept here.

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*Dark Night of the Soul: In John of the Cross's poem, the "dark night" is a state of the soul in prayer, in which all the faculities and powers of the soul and body, the senses for instance, mind and emotions as well, have become "quieted" or "dark" so that the spirit can go forth unimpeded, in love and yearning and adoration to God. It's not meant to describe just any kind of suffering, as most people misinterpret it who don't know anything about the poem but its title, but the suffering of being deprived of the usual faculties we depend on, dealing with impediments to the spiritual life and learning to deny self. I'm not advocating anything about his methods. Clearly they are a minefield of dangers and potential delusions, especially to anyone today who casually and naively decides to try "contemplative prayer." But of course the main problem with ANYTHING Catholic is that they preach a false gospel of salvation by works.

Spiritual Deception: Soul Power. Dangers of seeking experiences or "gifts" in the wrong way

On his June 12th radio program Brannon Howse directed listeners to google "manifestations at Rick Joyner's Morningstar Ministries" which takes you to You Tube for a "church service" that is quite a spectacle of bizarre charismatic "worship." It has the flavor of some kind of pagan ceremony, or tribal celebration, with heavy drumbeat, people jumping up and down and at least one woman apparently emotionally unstrung up on the stage giving an incoherent "testimony" of some sort. Here's one and here's another video of Rick Joyner's "church."

I also watched part of an interview Sid Roth (It's Supernatural) did with Joyner at the beginning of 2011 about a dream he had had about America under God's judgment. In the interview he sounds like a sincere Christian who sees judgment coming to America, though you might wonder why a dream would be necessary to inform us that the nation is under judgment. He comes off as sincere in the other videos too -- it's the raucous carryings-on around him that he apparently accepts and promotes as the right way to "do church," as valid worship, that make it clear there's something deeply amiss spiritually. This is beyond anything I ever saw in charismania, into heavy spiritual darkness. But Rick Joyner stands up there talking in a pastorly sort of way, albeit in charismospeak, as if it's all quite normal.

Brannon Howse surprised me by referring to Watchman Nee's Latent Power of the Soul as a source of insight into such phenomena. I think he was quoting Jerry Vines. I was surprised because it's a book that I've found is often treated as beyond the pale of orthodoxy.

So I got out my copy and reread it. It's all about the powers of the soul that Adam supposedly possessed originally, that were lost -- or hidden rather than lost, according to Nee, buried in the flesh as it were -- at the Fall. The only way this could be known, or inferred, is from exhibitions of such powers now. There is no Biblical clue to them that I know of. Nee says they can be released now, and that's what many of the practices of the fallen religions are aimed at, and sometimes they occur spontaneously in Christian settings as well under certain conditions.

Hindus describe many powers that their practices are aimed to develop, practices such as meditations to control the mind, breath control exercises, postural exercises and so on. Walking on burning coals and lying on a bed of nails without pain are a couple of the Hindu versions of soul power. Not just Hinduism but Buddhism and Jainism as well promote such practices and powers. Look up "siddhis" for lists and discussions of various powers. I always thought of these things as demonically produced but according to Nee they are normally latent human powers that can be cultivated or released, though they are usually instigated demonically. Sometimes powers can be manifested that approach the miraculous, including healing of the body.

There are also involuntary movements of the body that are released in some of the practices, called "kriyas." Some of these things happen spontaneously even in Christian settings. I did a post about the Brownsville "revival" a while back in which at least two people were manifesting odd bodily movements that they couldn't control, jerking movements or flailing and thrashing movements -- and attributing them to being under the power of God. I posted the videos there or you can find them at You Tube.

In Christian settings what may bring them about is SEEKING manifestations of one sort or another, mistaking these things for gifts of the Holy Spirit or expressions of God's power. Anything that stirs up and concentrates emotions can also bring them about, such as repetitious singing.

What Christians need to know that most don't know is that these things have nothing whatever to do with God but come from the human soul usually under instigation by demon spirits. Intense emotion can release them. They are unusual, often involuntary and sometimes "miraculous" and that's why people assume they are from God. (To compound the problem, sometimes SOME manifestations MAY be from God, but let's not get hung up on this point yet).

"My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge" says scripture. It would seem to apply here, because in churches where the "gifts of the Spirit" are avidly sought and supposedly practiced it is very easy for people to be exercising a power of their own soul or even a demonically imparted power and not something that comes from God and not know the difference. Clairvoyance is a power of the soul that can be mistaken for a gift of the spirit. Nee says he himself had the ability to know what was in other people's minds and at first he thought this was a good thing that served God until he came to realize that it was something God didn't want him to use and learned to deny it. (Deny yourself, take up your cross and follow Me).

There are soul powers that can mimic prophecy. These "prophets" in the charismatic movement are most likely experiencing this power of the soul and missing God completely.

According to Nee the soul powers can produce even a false salvation, a false repentance, a false regeneration, false revivals --such as Toronto and Brownsville -- but this book was written in 1933!) ...and "false joy."

False joy: Again, this book was written in 1933 and he talks about the "holy laugh." The "Toronto Blessing" of the 90s was all about Holy Laughter and at the time I had no idea there were ever such manifestations in churches before that. Nee describes a meeting -- this would have been in China in the 20s or 30s -- at which

...it was announced that everybody should seek for this holy laugh. All began to beat tables or chairs, jumping and leaping all around until not long afterwards this so-called holy laughing came...

Can this possibly be the fullness of the Holy Spirit? Can this be His work? No, this is plainily one of the works of the soul. [p. 71]

SEEKING it and doing things to work up an artificial state of mind or emotion seem to be the prerequisites.

How do people get this laugh? What procedure do they follow?or what condition must they fulfill? It is nothing but simply the asking to laugh... Are they seeking to be filled with the Holy Spirit? Their lips may indeed utter such words as 'O God, fill me with Your Spirit.' Nevertheless, that is merely a procedure; the aim of asking to be filled with the Spirit is something else than to be so filled...their heart desire is elsewhere.

God must be the object of our seeking if we are not to be deceived, and there must be a willingness to do without any sort of experience if He so wills. If you seek an experience you may get it but it won't be from Him.

Nee reports [p. 74] that one young man

pleaded fervently with God, and vowed that he would npt get up from prayer that evening if God did not give [the holy laughter] to him.

Eventually he did get the laughter. Did he get God or anything from God or of God? That's the question, and the answer is Probably not.

As a side note, I've read of people who have made this vow not to get up until God grants this or that, and it's always struck me as questionable that God would honor such an attitude. Isn't this tempting God? Isn't it trying to force God to accede to YOUR will instead of submitting to His will? Charles Finney did this and it began his career as a very powerful evangelist in the middle 19th century. Is it possible he was operating on soul power instead of spiritual power? During and following that period a great many of today's cults got started. Christian Science, for instance, is completely a matter of cultivating and practicing soul power. Could there be a connection?

Seems to me today's churches are in need of knowledge about these things. There are many deceived into thinking they are following God when they are following only their own heightened powers and they are deceiving others who treat them as prophets and seers. This is dangerous, obviously. They may be listening to demons at times too, that can impart some kinds of knowledge, just as they do to mediums and witches, as well as dreams and visions.

There is a remedy, there is a preventative. What did Jesus preach? Taking up your cross, dying to self. Think of it as dying to soul power, dying to your own abilities -- any abilities, natural abilities, natural talents, asking God to keep you from depending on your natural abilities so that you can depend completely on Him instead. If you truly want God your attitude needs to be bearing the cross, crucifying or mortifying the flesh and the self.

"My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge."

The knowledge that is lacked is knowledge of God, according to the context and at least one commentary I consulted (JF&B). This applies here as the knowledge pursued in seeking experiences and gifts is not knowledge of God. And in context, also, the lack of knowledge is sin, not mere helpless ignorance. True knowledge is not sought.

Hsa 4:6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.

So maybe they won't listen. But shouldn't these things be taught in the churches these days? It's a very serious and dangerous mistake to stir up soul powers and mistake them for the Holy Spirit. It's not necessarily easy to learn these things but sincerely wanting to is a first step.