Searching For Answers

It has been several months since I have posted something new.  When I think of things to write, I realize that most of what I want to say has been said in previous posts, and I don't want to exhaust you with criticism.  It's kind of like going to church on Sunday morning and wondering after the hour-long exhortation if the pastor couldn't have made his point in fifteen minutes.  Brevity is often lost on those who think they have important things to say.

Despite there being fewer comments than I was hoping for there is substantial traffic on this blog each week so I hope that you are finding some of the ramblings interesting.  For those that are first time visitors, I would suggest reading the "Blog's Purpose" link and start at the beginning.

Please feel free to leave comments so all of us can learn from your insight!

-Chilled Zealot

Quotes I Like

"I dislike those who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." – Susan B. Anthony

“Humility is often a false front we employ to gain power over others.”

– François de la Rochefoucauld

"The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good."

– Samuel Johnson

“I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.” – Galileo Galilei

“We are more often frightened than hurt; and we suffer more from imagination than from reality.”

– Seneca

“Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers.” – Voltaire

“However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results.” – Winston Churchill

“Go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for it is now that God favors what you do.” – Ecclesiastes 9:7

I've Been Healed!

I know I have been a little skeptical about faith-healing.  I can't completely nail down my belief in this area.  I do believe God heals people.  He created an amazing process where our bodies self-correct.  The last time my son scraped his knee, it miraculously got better.  Every once in a while, I think He supernaturally intervenes.  I don't believe he often uses a group of frenetic college students standing around you to do it.  I don't think your sin or your non-submission to authority has anything to do with it.

I ran across the "testimony page" on ACC's website.  It brought back bad memories of my experiences there.  Here's one of the testimonies.  Anything wrong with this picture?


Tracy had not been to Antioch in about two years, and she was excited to come and visit and to see her friend get baptized.  She has breast cancer, and we gathered around her to pray.  Interestingly, when I laid my hand on Tracy, the left side of my lower back started hurting.  We prayed for God to heal the cancer, and then I asked Tracy if she also had back pain, and she said yes.  I asked her if it was in her lower back on her left side, and she said yes.  She said that she had a cracked vertebrae, the second vertebrae from the bottom, and that she had severe pain.  I told her that since my back had started to hurt when I laid hands on her, I believed that the Lord wanted to heal her back.  She was eager to receive prayer.  We prayed for her back for several minutes and asked how she was doing, and she said that she was still in pain and that nothing had changed. 


I confirmed that she had given her whole heart to Jesus. She earnestly said that she had.  We prayed more, and I felt God speak that we needed to repent as a group for not submitting to authority.  If we are insisting that demons submit to the authority of Jesus, then we need to be submitted to Him as well.  I repented on behalf of all of these women (and myself!) for a lack of submission to God, to husbands, to pastors, and other men in authority.  We all knelt down together.  Something broke.  Tracy started crying and smiling, and she said the pain was completely gone. 


I clarified to see if it was "mostly gone" to see if we needed to pray more, and she said, "No- it is COMPLETELY gone!"  I asked her, "What is something that you couldn't do before because of the pain?" and she replied, "Reach down and touch my toes."  We encouraged her to get up and do it, and she did, with a very giddy look on her face.  She immediately wanted to testify- she was so excited.  She went up to the stage and was able to share on the microphone. It was awesome! Christi 2/25/07


If you peruse the page of testimonies, this is one of the more dramatic.  I guess it is because they did all of that repenting.  I find it curious that all of the testimonies are related to back pain, knee pain, ear pain, finger pain, and basically things that can't be diagnosed by a physician and then tested later by a physician.  But hey, I guess Jesus wants her to touch her toes -- no word yet on the breast cancer...


The thing that makes me angry about it is that it distorts the character of God.  It says, "this affliction is in your life because there is hidden or unrepentant sin in your life."  Give me a break! There is tragedy in this world.  Let it drive you closer to Jesus.  Let Him embrace you, comfort you, and comfort your family.  Don't let an over zealous weekend warrior suggest that it is because you forgot to repent for yelling at your husband last week!  Bad theology, uh, I mean methodology.

Comments Welcome

There have been some good comments on the blog so far.  I hope everyone reading it will contribute to the conversation.  I wanted to respond to a few comments.  One stating that they haven't heard the teachings that I have posted on the blog (Watchman Nee, John Wimber, Rick Joyner, etc.) taught at Antioch.  I would agree that apart from Nee's Spiritual Authority, the others are not overtly preached from the front.  (Although Mike Bickle spoke at World Mandate in 1998 and Rick Joyner did a video series at Highland in 1996 upon an invitation from Jimmy.) However, the teachings I outline have contributed significantly to influencing the teachings at Antioch.  It was pointed out that a few of the books are sold in the book stores.  I know that the training school was more influential in presenting some of these teachings.  I also want to say that even though I was involved in the college group, I was very involved with other ministries as well.  When I talk about senior leadership, I am specifically talking about Jimmy, Jeff, Danny, Kevin, etc.  Jimmy is not a cheerleader for any specific authors or teachers that are out there.  He just gets excited about anyone that has a really sensational story, especially if it involves signs and wonders and revival.  Revival is the most important thing.  The other stuff about intimacy with Jesus, prayer, fasting, etc. is really just means to an end.  Revival.  Building Christ's Kingdom for Him!

I don't know if it is still shown, but in the late 1990s, Jimmy was particularly excited about some videos that he had seen on vacation.  David Hogan was the new guru.  He had Power!  Jimmy had his entire staff watch the videos during staff meetings and started showing them in the training school!  He even got a haircut like him.  You have to question the teachings of a church that get its teachings from people such as these...

Google some of his videos if you want to truly be amazed.

More on David Hogan Here:
http://www.pfo.org/exploits.htm

• He raises people from the dead;

• He is thrown supernaturally across rooms into walls;

• He multiplies food;

• He drives his vehicle underwater;

• Angels are assigned to him and have to go where he goes;

• He is miraculously transported from place to place without the aid of planes, trains or automobiles;

• He is invigorated when new demons are unleashed on him;

• A demon has tried to tear out the innards of his child;

• He has a little son who has a hanky that is so anointed he can make people fly just by shaking it at them;

• He has seen limbs grow on limbless people;

• He has seen the creation of new brains in a brainless baby;

• Jesus talks to his dog and horse;

• He has seen people fly around the room under the anointing of God.

Foundations: Revival Theology - Weighed and Found Wanting

I ran across this publication when I was looking at some of the teachings that have influenced Antioch's leadership.  The focus on growth, revival, and "intimacy with Jesus" are not new.  I have come across several Internet articles regarding the Latter Rain Movement.  It appears that this movement founded in the 1940s and 1950s heavily influenced many of the teachings that formed ACC's "theology."  The Toronto Blessing (attended by ACC leadership), Mike Bickle, Rick Joyner, John Wimber, and many more ascribe to these teachings that the works of man are central to Christ's return.  If you have the time, this is worth looking through.  I will paste a few interesting sections below.  Antioch is steeped in these teachings.  The training schools used to teach this and I assume to some extent still do.  While not all of these people are on the reading lists, the ideas are so ingrained by now that no one really remembers where they came from.  If you do some research on the names and organizations below, you can see how some of these very strange teachings lay at the foundation of Antioch's worldview.

http://www.apologeticsindex.org/docs/WeighedAndFoundWanting.pdf

• We are supposedly the ones who are to evolve into a “great end times army that will put God’s enemies under our feet,” we are supposedly the ones to whom God said, “Ask of me and I will give you the heathen for your inheritance.” In short, the church either replaces Christ or “is THE Christ.” Whether the movement calls itself the Latter Rain Movement, the Manifested Sons, Kingdom Now, Dominion Theology, Restorationism, The Faith Movement, or the Third Wave, all have either come to or been based on this erroneous conclusion. The Latter Rain believes that the work of restoration is not over yet. 
• They hold that Davidic worship, teaching, ministry, evangelists, and prophets and even apostles in all of their authority are currently being restored. According to a commonly held misunderstanding of Acts 3:21, they teach that Jesus can’t come back even though He wants to because WE haven’t fully “restored all things.”

• Thus, the “Latter Rain” Revival centered around the following themes: Restoration of fivefold ministry (Eph 4) (especially apostles and prophets.) This teaching is crucial because it is this ministry that is supposedly going to unite the church, and perfect the Body of Christ; the restoration of personal prophecy, the impartation of spiritual gifts through laying on of hands; deliverance, healing and baptism of the Spirit through laying on of hands, and the complete unity of the Body of Christ. Denominationalism was seen as “Babylonian Captivity” and subsequently a host of churches affected by the “Latter Rain” broke away from their denominations and became independent churches, many being “set into the body” by the newly discovered apostles. This “revival” which started in Canada, was primarily about Christians “coming into their own fullness,” and not necessarily the conversion of sinners.

• The evolution concept of the church fosters pride and arrogance. Both Rick Joyner and Mike Bickle have said, in effect, that the apostles of the Book of Acts will want to wait in line to interview the superapostles of our day.

• In another more extensive (224 pages) prophecy, Rick Joyner can see the day coming when, "The feet of the body of Christ will carry the credentials for all of those who have gone before them. They will be joined to each other like no other body of people have ever been joined, but they will be also joined to the true believers of all ages who lived and prophesied of this day. As Jesus promised, the things that He did and even greater things will be done in His name, because He went to the Father. His faithful will soon walk in unprecedented power and authority. In the near future, the church will not be looking back at the first century 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 days in all of history have now come upon us. You who have dreamed of one day being able to talk to Peter, John and Paul are going to be surprised to find that they have been waiting to talk to you!"  Do you notice the emphasis on greatness? But who, according to this scenario, is going to be great in those days? Not necessarily Jesus.

Awaken Trip

Reader, thanks for the question.

I'm a baylor freshman and have been going to antioch since about this past september. I started out as just going to my lifegroup but now also attend the wednesday service frequently. I actually just got back from the training day for the awaken trip...that's why I'm commenting. I wanted to know what your experience has been with the trip. 

You can tell from my posts that I am not the biggest fan of ACC-style missions. I think you will go, have a good time, meet fun people, and see a little bit of Mexico. I don't think you will make a lasting impact on the community in terms of church growth or economic development. If it is like past Juarez trips, I think a lot of the conversions and healings have more to do with miscommunication due to language barriers, and I think ACC spends little time on work projects.

Here is a scenario for why I think the fruit of these types of trips are overhyped: There are a bunch of poor people hanging around the neighborhood on a lazy Sunday afternoon. A group of energetic college kids who are dressed really well show up to play soccer and put on some skits. They have nothing else to do so a crowd gathers. They see that people that respond to the message are getting a lot of attention from these young, attractive Baylor students. More and more people respond. They are told that Jesus is all powerful and can fix their life. If they believe hard enough and let these nice college girls pray for them, then their life will be better. They think, "why not?, got nothing else to do today."

There is a very natural group excitement that I think has little to do with the power of the Holy Spirit. I do think God works through it because the Word of God is powerful. However, I think a lot of what happens can be explained as natural rather than supernatural. But since you were told all morning long during the 3 hour worship and teaching session to see everything through eyes of faith, then you as the messenger see it all through a supernatural prism.  You are not there long enough to know these peoples prior stories or what happens to them next week.  God knows - sure - and hopefully they seek him. I am just saying that the returning stories from these trips don't reflect reality because you don't know the reality.

I am not sure short-term missions aren't worth the cost. (I made that last post as something to think about.) I know several missionaries that I respect that were introduced to missions on short-term trips. I do however think it is good to know that when you go on a short-term trip, it is really about you. It is about introducing people to missions or a specific country or people group. There is little lasting impact, especially given the cost. I don't know a good solution to that problem. I think going somewhere and spending a significant amount of time building something or serving an existing ministry like an orphanage or clinic is more worthwhile.

Antioch uses these trips to hype signs and wonders, easy conversions, and push commitments from college students to become cogs in a machine as church planters. There is little reality to what it takes to make a lasting impact as a missionary.

Study Questions Whether Short-Term Missions Make a Difference

Study Questions Whether Short-Term Missions Make a Difference

Interesting article.   I always found that mission trips focused more on the team than on doing anything lasting in the location.  I remember in Juarez attending worship/exhortation sessions for 3 hours and going to a work site for 45 minutes, where in the end, most of the team goofed around.  That was contrasted to the Mexican believers who labored to make our meals and coordinated our visit who worked all-out for the entire week.