A love for titles
Certainly, Scripture encourages us to desire spiritual gifts for the edification of the Church. Yet nowhere in the Bible does it tell us that these spiritual gifts make us superior to other believers. Neither are we told to boast about those gifts nor to look down on those with different gifts. This bad mindset has corrupted many of the brethren who (without any biblical qualification) now seek to give themselves titles in the name of ‘Apostle’, ‘Prophet’, ‘Overseer’ – to mention just these – with the hopes that these titles mean that they are closer to God somehow, therefore more superior than other believers. We all of course that their end goal is to get honour from men through these titles. Such a sad state of affairs.
But where are the miracles?
We all love it when we come across a story in the Bible where the Lord manifested His mighty power through signs and wonders. I for one, am thrilled by the fact that we serve a miracle-working God who does more than we can ask or think. This was partly the reason why many of us welcomed charismatic prophets because they claimed to possess mighty power to change our lives. However, after reading the Bible where miracles are real and powerful; as Jesus put it in Luke 7:22, “the blind were seeing, the dead raised, the deaf and the crippled all getting their instant healing” – I don’t see the same miracles happening among those who claim to do miracles today. Think again, except for staged miracles, did you ever see anyone raised from the dead the same way Lazarus was? We can say the same about the blind and the crippled. There are people who are blind and crippled right now, most of which have been to these faith healers, yet they returned home the same – even after leaving large sums of seed money in the offering basket. Certainly, you never heard me say God no longer does miracles – I didn’t say that! My point is: these charismatic prophets who boast to have mighty power to do signs and wonders are actually not doing those signs and wonders. They lie. Evidence on the ground proves my point. They cannot even heal something as flue-like as Covid19. If anything, they are the ones who secretly go to private doctors when they get sick. It’s true.
The silence
To admit a problem is an admirable thing, however, what help is it if no one is willing to confront that problem. I direct this mostly to the true ministers that know within themselves that they represent the truth of the Christian faith; why the silence to speak about false prophets who are dishonoring the name of Christ every day? Why the lack of concern to rescue innocent souls that blindly follow after these deceivers? Why the unwillingness to educate Christians under our leadership about the real truth of the Gospel as opposed to lies? Why the uncaring attitude about warning believers about false doctrines that have become popular around us? As the old saying goes, “Silence in the face of evil is evil itself.” It is evil on your part when you are not speaking out against that which is harmful to the cause of Christ and the wellbeing of innocent souls.
The root problem
We can all scream against false prophets until the kingdom comes but it would be helpful if we began by examining the source of error; where everything went wrong in the first place. It might be a surprise (even a denial) by many well-meaning Brethren if I suggested that the root problem was simply a departure from Scripture. The sufficiency of Scripture. When we say Scripture (the Bible) is sufficient, we mean that only Scripture is enough to tell us about everything we need for life, godly living and the glory of God.
Hence we do not need foreigners that come to add on top of the Scriptures in the form of revelatory visions, dreams and a whole lot of foolishness we hear from the prophetic clowns of our day. You may disagree at your time but the fact is Christianity is a lot safer with the Bible as the only rule for our faith and life. Think of it this way; if we all put our Bibles aside and start to live by our weird personal spiritual experiences in the form of dreams and visions, then there is no truth. It is means everything goes; every alien doctrine from any planet is welcomed because everyone’s dream is true in his own eyes and who is to say they are wrong? That is the perfect definition of the word ‘confusion’. This is exactly what is happening in the Christian faith today. Everyone is confused as to what the real truth is because we have allowed these strange voices from our weird experiences to dominate the Church – to the neglect of the tried and tested Truth in the form of the Holy Scriptures. If we are all to return to that ancient Book, and its same old doctrines of the Faith, we will get rid of all this drama that came with the prophetic movement and save ourselves time and souls.
The solution
Okay, we have heard the problem, what then is the way forward from here? First, let’s acknowledge that false preachers must be there to fulfill Scripture that predicted that these individuals will be there among us – all the more now as we edge towards the end of days. Our first duty is to be wary of being false prophets ourselves through a regular examination of our hearts and doctrine – fixing our eyes focused on Christ Himself. The second solution is to know the true Gospel ourselves; you must be grounded in truth to discern false teachers. Resting upon this is the point that you need to diligently guard your Bible study times. Be a friend of Scripture! Have a desire to grow in your walk of faith. Develop a love for the truth and even search the internet for strong Bible teachers who will teach you the whole truth of the Bible without fear or favour. This is critical in your walk of faith because those who neglect sound doctrine as taught in Scripture are the easy meat and the first choice candidates for being deceivers. Finally, we must go out to the world proclaiming that true Gospel to the lost – in Word and conduct. All this on top of the regular meeting with other believers in the house of the Lord as you all grow in faith together. May the Lord help His people.
Sinothi Ncube
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