Prosperity, Persecution and the Sovereignty of God

Recent days have seen the explosion of discussion on the nature of the spiritual gifts, most notably, whether they are for today or not. It is not my intention to wade into that discussion in this post. My intention is rather to address the abuses of prosperity theology with a view to highlight how wrong it is first from Scripture, second in experience, and finally how damaging it is to the Church’s mission of making much of Jesus.

Scripture and Prosperity Theology

One of the crucial things that came out of the recent Strange Fire conference was the highlighting of how prosperity theology erodes sound doctrine. When I think of prosperity theology preachers I think of the vast majority of TV preachers who emphasize that you can be wealthy, healthy, and successful if only you will tithe to their ministry. I have a friend who regularly gets newsletters from them even though this friend doesn’t want them. They promise to send prayer cloths and other gimmicks if you will just “sow” into their ministry.  Moreover, they even offer to pray for you to be healed although the method and results of those healing ministries are questionable at best. Now there is nothing wrong with praying for someone and even praying for them to be healed. God may or may not answer that prayer. No one wants to limit the sovereign power of our God here. Yet such healing wasn’t even normative during Jesus ministry or even the Apostles so how can we expect it to happen in our own day?   Continue at Dave Jenkins

New Course on Calvinism from John Piper

The Bible gives us a glorious vision of God’s sovereignty in saving sinners. “Calvinism” is a kind of nickname for this Christian body of doctrine on salvation that so appropriately humbles humanity and so magnificently exalts divine grace.

In a new eight-hour course on Calvinism, or “the doctrines of grace,” John Piper walks through the historical “five points,” digging into text after text of Scripture and responding to many of the most common questions.

“The doctrines of grace,” Piper explains, “give the lowest view of the saved person as utterly depraved and hopeless in himself, and the highest view of the saved person as individually chosen and loved and purchased at infinite cost.”

These truths expose our desperate neediness, such that the subtlest form of boasting in ourselves becomes ridiculous. And at the same time, they highlight the grace of God such that we marvel with the apostle Paul, “To him be glory forever” (Romans 11:36).

Stream or download the entire seminar in six parts:   Continue at John Piper

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How Great Evil Confirms the Biblical Teaching about Demons

I can mourn with and pray for the families in Connecticut who lost their children (and in a few cases their spouses) in the school shooting. I certainly cannot offer any definitive explanation. I am dedicating this week’s three blogs to perspectives that may be helpful to some. Keep in mind that we are treating only a few aspects of the problem of evil, and therefore much will remain unaddressed. For a larger perspective, see my books on this issue, in particular If God is Good.

Acts of extreme evil, though routinely used as arguments against God, are actually arguments for supernaturalism.

I spent hours walking through Cambodia’s Killing Fields. Vek and Samoeun Taing, a gentle Cambodian couple who had survived there with a young child for two years, escorted our small group. Feeling numb, I saw the skulls piled up and stood by the mud pits where killers threw hundreds of bodies. A human jawbone lay at my feet. I picked it up, held it in my hand, and wept.

The darkness felt overwhelming. Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge murdered nearly one-third of the country’s population. Yet the three million slaughtered in Cambodia amount to less than one-fiftieth of the murders by twentieth century tyrants, who killed mostly their own people. Hitler, Stalin, and Mao accounted for most of the carnage, but the ongoing state-sponsored killing in Sudan, including the Darfur region, follows the same script. (And this figure ignores the staggering number of preborn children aborted throughout the world.)   Continue at Randy Alcorn

How to Call for a Gospel Response Like a Calvinist

"Think like a Calvinist. Preach like an Arminian."

That is how one preaching professor taught his students to call people to faith in a sermon. He couldn't reconcile a theological system that embraces God's sovereignty in salvation with a plea for sinful people to change. Ultimately, this 

prof thought Calvinism makes sense biblically and logically, but not practically.

Perhaps you have struggled with this, too. I know I have.

There was a season of my ministry where I didn't call people to believe the gospel. I preached the gospel, of course, but only with the hope that the Spirit would use his word to regenerate spiritually dead teenagers against their will. I merely implied that they must believe the gospel.

But I have turned from this mindset. This is not because my pendulum has swung to a more balanced position between Calvinism and Arminianism---I don't believe there is such a thing. It's because I've grown to understand what Calvinism is and, perhaps more importantly, what it isn't.

It is Calvinistic to call people to respond with faith in the gospel.

Eschewing theological labels for a moment, it is biblical and Christian to call people to believe in the gospel. This is, after all, how Jesus began his ministry: "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel" (Mark 1:14-15). You don't have to know Greek to recognize the imperatives.

But we Calvinists love to quote Ephesians 2:8. "Faith is a gift from God!" we exclaim. "It doesn't originate in the person!"   Keep Reading...

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