PREFACE
We frequently encounter Christian fantasy
especially in the Full-Gospel Movement. Hos. 4:6, My
people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. We perish
because of our ignorance. II Tim. 2:15, Study to shew
thyself approved unto God. You must study by yourself;
you can not depend on others to teach you everything.
II Tim. 3:16, All scripture is given by inspiration of
God. Many times you get little scripture in a message
and a lot of man's words. The Bible from cover to
cover must be read repeatedly and meditated upon.
James 1:22, But be ye doers of the word. It does no
good just to read or hear the Word of God; you must
put it into practice. Head knowledge will get you to
Hell; heart knowledge will get you to Heaven. As you
can see from these scriptures, you must study the
whole Bible and put it into practice. We are not just
New Testament Christians ignoring the Old Testament.
We are children of God following the whole Word of
God.
After Byron died, I
decided to quit playing church and start following God
as my Lord, Master and Savior; before then He was only
my Christ. I was concerned because I had not gone to
the seminary or Bible school. God told me just to
accept the Bible in simple childlike faith, put it
into practice and watch it work. That fit in well with
my practical engineering background. Since that time,
I have followed those instructions; signs, wonders and
miracles have followed the teaching of the Word.
DEFINITIONS
Fantasy: hallucination, fanciful,
imagination, caprice, unrealistic, improbable,
daydream. Fable: story, fictitious, legend, falsehood,
lie. Cliche: stereotype, trite, overly familiar. Myth:
parable, allegory, tradition, unfounded, false,
imaginary, unverifiable.
TRUTH
Deut. 32:4, A God of truth. Isa. 65:16, The
God of truth. Our God is the one and only God; He is
the God of Truth. I Kings 17:24, Now by this I know
that thou art a man of God. If you are of God, then
truth will flow thru your mouth. Jer. 4:2, The Lord
liveth, in truth, in judgement, and in righteousness.
Many Christians fall into Satan's trap that God is
love only and not judgement also. John 4:23, Worship
the Father in spirit and in truth. Some are not true
worshipers but are hypocrites that are putting on a
religious show that stinks in God's nostrils. John
14:6, I am the way, the truth, and the life. Unless we
accept JESUS CHRIST on His terms, we will never come
to the Father. I John 1:8, We deceive ourselves. There
was only one perfect person on earth - JESUS CHRIST,
the Son of God. All others sin. To be perfect, you
must completely follow the whole Word of God every
moment of your life. Gal. 4:16, Am I therefore become
your enemy? Do you get mad at Earline and me because
we tell you about the hard sayings in the Bible, and
do not pet you in your sins and weaknesses? We call
this practice petting demons.
LIES
Num. 23:19, God is not a man that He should
lie. God doesn't lie but man does. I Sam. 15:29, Will
not lie nor repent. God doesn't have to repent for
lying but man should. Job 11:3, Should thy lies make
men hold their peace? Eze. 13:10, Peace; and there is
no peace. The ministry cries peace, peace when America
and the world are deteriorating into sin and
degradation. Prov. 6:19, A false witness that speaketh
lies. There are a lot of pat phrases in the Christian
world that are not true when put to the test. This is
false witness and deceives others. Prov. 19:9, He that
speaketh lies shall perish. It is dangerous to follow
false teachings of any kind and you will perish in
some manner. You will pay for any area of the Bible
that you are ignorant of. As Earline says, you burn
while you learn. Isa. 9:15, The prophet that teacheth
lies, he is the tail. Instead of being a head of
Christianity, he will be the tail. Isa. 28:15, Under
falsehood have we hid ourselves. Are Christian fables
your refuge? Isa. 63:8, Children that will not lie.
God's people do not lie. Jer. 14:14, The prophets
prophesy lies in my name. People prophesy in the name
of God but the prophesy comes from their soul. It is a
soulish prophesy that frequently ends with "thus saith
the Lord". Jer. 23:14, They commit adultery and walk
in lies. How many preachers and teachers have you seen
committing adultery and teaching lies? Jer. 23:25,
Saying, I have dreamed, I have dreamed. These are
false prophets with false dreams. Jer. 23:32, Cause my
people to err by their lies, and by their lightness.
False prophesy will cause the people to err. Taking
Christianity lightly is error. Eze. 13:19, To slay the
souls that should not die. This is talking about false
prophetesses. Acts 5:4, Thou hast not lied unto men,
but unto God. Some lies are unto God. If you say your
soulish prophesy is from God, then you are lying about
God. I Tim. 4:2, Speaking lies in hypocrisy.
Hypocrites who depart from the faith continue to teach
lies. Rom. 1:25, Who changed the truth of God into a
lie. God will give Christians over to vile affections
who want to believe lies. Heb. 6:18, It was impossible
for God to lie. It is comforting to know that God does
not lie and we can completely rely on His Word. We can
trust our lives in the hands of God.
CHRISTIAN
FABLES AND CLICHES
There are many fables and cliches (Glen
Miller calls them tradition) that are passed off as
the Gospel. Generally, these are sayings that make you
feel good. They take many different forms. If repeated
often enough, the Christian world believes they are
true. Some of these follow; the list could go on and
on.
"God will do
everything for you; you don't have to do anything
yourself." God will always do His part of the
covenant; we must do our part also. "God will take
care of your family if you take care of God's
business." We have no right to neglect our families.
"All of God's promises are ours." The promises are
ours only if we meet the conditions. For every promise
there is a condition.
DELIVERANCE
MYTHS
There is much ignorance and many myths about
DELIVERANCE. DELIVERANCE is the most misunderstood
part of the Christian life. Most traditional
Christians know little or nothing about Satan and his
army. They do not believe they have a personal Devil,
Satan. Most Full-Gospel Christians do not believe that
a Christian can have a demon in the body or soul.
Satan is eating their lunch and they think it is just
the flesh. Many DELIVERANCE workers and ministers do
not realize how demonized they and the Christian body
still are. Sometimes they fall by the wayside because
they do not continue to purge their bodies of demons.
DELIVERANCE is the
most controversial and unpopular part of the Christian
life. Unless the Church gets involved on a regular
basis with DELIVERANCE, many Christians will continue
to be defeated by Satan. The Devil will use their
ignorance to plague the Church.
When the Christian
finally accepts that he can have a demon, the response
is that he can only have a few demons. Actually,
Christians have many demons. When the young Christian
starts to cast out demons, he will make statements
like, "You are completely free of demons." JESUS never
told anyone in the Bible that they were completely
free of demons. He spent days casting out demons from
the multitudes.
PROPHECY
MYTHS
Prophecies can be a blessing or a curse.
Personal prophecy has caused some Christians to try to
make it come true with disastrous results. The most
danger for abuse lies in personal prophecy.
Charismatic witches use personal prophecy to control
others. Some Christians think that they have to have a
word from the Lord or there is something wrong with
them.
The true prophet
does not make any mistakes. All of his prophecies come
true. In the Old Testament, if the prophet missed God,
he was stoned (Deut. 13:1-5, 18:20). I wonder what
would happen if we killed the false prophets today.
Many prophecies are
soulish prophecies which are made up in the mind of
man or woman. Frequently they do not line up with the
Bible. Sometimes people prophecy just to be noticed.
You have a
responsibility to check out everything you see, hear
or read by the Word of God, by the Holy Spirit within
you, and by your intelligence. Otherwise, you will
follow every wind of false doctrine.
Some prophecy is
divination. Divination is the false gift of prophecy.
It has destroyed churches and ministries across the
land. The prophecies are right on but the purpose is
to control. The diviners want to take over the pastor,
then the church, and finally the property.
Satan has a
counterfeit for everything that God has created. Just
because it is spiritual and happens in the church,
does not mean that it is from God. The demons go to
church with the Christians and non-Christians to
hinder or destroy the church. Don't underestimate the
power of Satan and his forces; he is the second-most
powerful spiritual being in the universe, only second
to JESUS CHRIST who defeated him. We have power over
Satan only because of JESUS CHRIST.
BATTLE MYTHS
There are many myths about Christian warfare.
Most Christians don't know that we are in a battle.
Actually, we are in a life and death battle with Satan
and his host of demons. We have to fight to take the
Kingdom of God by force from the enemy. Satan is a
good Devil, a worthy Adversary, at what he does; he
works twenty-four hours a day to destroy us. He will
probably take 98% of the world population and 75% of
the church population to Hell with him. His army
consists of billions of demons and hundreds of
millions of fallen angels. He has multiplied demons
for every person on earth, now about four billion
people.
You will be tempted
until you die. God will not stop the temptation but
will make a way for you to escape. You need to learn
to war in the spirit world to protect yourself and
your family. The best defense against Satan is a good
offense which is all-out spiritual warfare. God didn't
provide any armor for our backs as cowards running
from the enemy.
GENERAL
MYTHS
The following are negative statements or
myths: "There is a single answer to my problems and
living the Christian life. My problems in life can be
worked out overnight. We can pick and choose what
parts of the Bible to follow. It is not necessary to
discipline our soul or body. We can let our mind be
blank and God will fill it. We do not have to take
care of our body; God will heal us when we get sick.
We can let others feed us spiritually; we don't need
to do it ourselves. We don't need to go to church; all
we have to do is watch television evangelism. If we
don't like DELIVERANCE, we can ignore it. God will
supply everything we desire. If we can just find an
anointed man or woman of God, they will pray for us
and everything will be fine. We can live with one foot
in the world and one foot in the Kingdom of God. If
you do God's work, you can ignore your
responsibilities. I can be a passive Christian and
watch others do the work of God. The pastor and
leaders do the work, not me. I am not in a war, God
will fight all of my battles. All I have to do is to
follow my pastor; he will hear from God for me. We can
live a sinful life and receive all of God's blessings.
I can sin, get forgiven and my family will not suffer.
All we need to have in the church is token
DELIVERANCE. Rejection is not a demon. I have a right
to my unforgiveness because of the way I have been
treated. Sex is love. Bad emotions are not demonic. I
do not have to examine every area of my life. I can
keep my cursed objects without causing any harm.
We can get all of
our demons cast our in one grand event. I can be
ashamed of my DELIVERANCE; God won't mind. When
someone makes me mad, I can react however I feel. I
can be ignorant of Satan's wiles; what I don't know
can't hurt me. God is love; He won't send me to Hell.
I can do anything I want to; God will protect me. God
is pie-in-the-sky by-and-by. We can be gluttons as
long as we are not drunkards. I do not need to get my
demons cast out; all I need is to get prayer for me to
be healed. It is all right to take mind control drugs.
I need to go to a psychiatrist; God is not interested
in my mind. The sins of my ancestors will not cause me
any problems. I can do things my way; God will
approve."
TRADITION
NOT COVERED
There are other areas that were not covered
in this lesson. Some of these areas are holidays,
puppetry, origin of evil, false strength of
Christians, divine order, separation of healing and
DELIVERANCE, taking care of the body and soul, what
you sow - that you reap, Christians are not cursed,
and parlor games won't hurt you. When this lesson was
taught at Lake Hamilton Bible Camp, Glen Miller
commented on these subjects. Tommy Cook also reviewed
the topic of Prophecy Myths.
PRAYER
Before DELIVERANCE from demon bondage, pray
about being controlled by charismatic witchcraft or
trying to control other's wills which is also
witchcraft. Repent, take authority over these forces,
break soul ties, and break curses placed upon you.
Then cast out the demons.