This is the continuation of thoughts about spiritual abuse based upon Becca Anderson’s and Jennifer Redcay’s book, Pushing Back the Darkness.
The third point the authors make is as follows:
| Test those who say they speak for God. In 1 John 4:1, the Bible says, “Do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world.” You approach a salesperson with a degree of skepticism, expecting to hear things that might not be as good as they are described. It is even more vital to maintain healthy caution with regard to people who try to “sell” you ideas that sound biblical but may not be. If what is being said is true, it will stand up to scrutiny, and over time. |
Anyone may make the claim to speak for God. We see it all around us today, from televangelists seeking your money to the small church where the pastor has complete control of the people. In Jennifer’s circumstance, it was a very small group that didn’t meet in a church and was operated by one man who claimed to speak for God. He was a liar and a fraud. We find the same in unhealthy churches, large and small. Some man or woman claims they speak for God and people follow. How can one determine if a person truly speaks for God? Obtaining a ministerial license or going to a seminary does not mean one has been called of God to operate a church or even preach.
So what are some ways that a person can know if the minister’s claim is true? First, what they teach will agree with the scriptures. If a pastor says God told him to sleep with you, for whatever reason, that is not God. In contrast, the scriptures certainly do not condone sexual relations with the spouse of another person.
If the minister tells you it is permissible to lie about something in order to defraud someone outside the group or to lure someone into the group, what can you find in the Bible that speaks about lying? If the pastor proclaims that you must tithe in order to be saved, what will the scriptures show if you study tithing? Any minister that teaches things contrary to the scriptures has not been speaking for God.
Don’t blindly accept what a minister teaches, even if in the past you have found something they taught lined up with scripture. Some ministers start out good and then stumble into false doctrine or an unhealthy group. You have a Bible, and if you don’t they are available online for free. We really have no excuse for not checking what is taught before accepting and believing it. If you choose not to, down the road you may find yourself caught up in a very unhealthy situation.
I want to share an article written around 1979 by former United Pentecostal Church minister Dan Lewis when he worked as a teacher at their endorsed Jackson College of Ministries. It appeared in the college’s newspaper, The Agape. It addressed questioning and it being okay to not always have answers. It created a firestorm for him at the time it was written. This is from his book The Journey Out of the United Pentecostal Church.
FAITH WITH A QUESTION MARK
To some people questions are disturbing! For them life is a logically consistent, systematic closed activity which can be defined in precise propositions. Questions are unnerving. Worse, questions without immediate answers are unthinkable and to be avoided at all costs. What cannot be rationally treated with finality is to be brushed off or ignored. Probing is regarded with suspicion. Options are nonexistent. Anything less than blind assent is labeled as dissent or even rebellion. Yet, is not such an approach to life, especially Christian life, somewhat naive and overly simplistic? Does not such an attitude portray insecurity rather than strength? Ultimately, does not this position describe uncertainty rather than faith? The man who is afraid of questions is usually a man who is fearful of his position!
It is my conviction that genuine faith must be a questioning faith! It must be an attitude toward God of seeking for truth and a contentedness in spite of unanswered questions. Faith cannot be founded only on empirical evidence, for what can be conclusively proven does not require faith. For this reason, God Himself must be approached on the level of faith. As the transcendent God, He must be pursued. He reveals himself, true, but He always remains far enough beyond our comprehension to beckon us onward in our quest for Him.
Some of the greatest luminaries in God’s assembly of saints were questioners. Job, David, Habakkuk, and others asked discerning and pointed questions, not only of their peers, but of God. Does God enjoy my suffering? If a man dies, will he again live? Is God righteous? How can YHWH use a people less righteous than Israel to judge his own people? In the case of Job, it was the trio with the ready answers who found error, while the sufferer with the unanswered questions found truth. One of the finest ways of discerning the depth of Jesus’ teaching is to observe the questions which he asked, answered, or in some cases left unanswered. Jesus never avoided sincere questions that were motivated by truth-seeking. Questions were not an embarrassment to Him.
In the New Testament, one confronts both “faith” and “the faith.” “Faith” is what is believed because of genuine encounter with God. “The faith” is what is received because of traditional and doctrinal correctness. Both are important! However, we live in a generation which feels comfortable in accepting “the faith” without necessarily having “faith.” A doctrinal heritage can be adopted and defended without a genuine encounter with Christ. “The faith” without “faith” is worth little. One of the prime reasons for such a bland form of Christianity is a reluctance or fear of asking questions. “The faith” can be blindly followed without questions. But real “faith” comes as God reveals Himself, and He reveals Himself to the searcher.
Occasionally, one’s approach to the Bible takes the following naive, omniscient form, as related by Bernard Ramm. “Dear Friends, I have read no man’s book. I have consulted no man-made commentaries. I have gone right to the Bible to see what it had to say for itself.” Yet, as Ramm further points out, although this may sound very spiritual, it is in reality a veiled egotism.
Faith presumes a transcendent God. He is not wholly transcendent, or we could never know him. On the other hand, he is not wholly within our grasp, else he would cease to be God for us. Faith is the first prerequisite for coming to God, yet it also leaves us with unanswered areas, for “faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.” In this life, “We see but a poor reflection” (NIV, 2 Co. 13:12). “We have this treasure in a fragile vase of clay….” (Weymouth, 2 Co. 4:7). We are constantly aware of our finitude and of God’s all-sufficiency. We are called to trust Him in the unanswered questions of life and eternity. If our faith is healthy and properly focused, unanswered questions are not an embarrassment but an incentive to continue our pursuit of Christ! As we struggle with a sensitive conscience in making ethical decisions, as we look inwardly in godly self-examination, as we view the needs of the world in light of the gospel, we have faith with a question mark! In the words of Jim Bishop, “I had wanted proof, something for my eyes or ears or hands. He wanted me to believe without it. Faith was what He required of me. And He never rested till I found it.”
The Darkness of Spiritual Abuse Part 1
The Darkness of Spiritual Abuse Part 3
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