What Respected Christian Leaders Have To Say!

Many Christian leaders are in agreement that the teachings of the Faith Movement are not biblical and are harmful to the church. If you are involved in the Faith Movement, it is very important that you undertake a personal re-evaluation of your spiritual committment.

Just before his death, the late cult authority Walter Martin warned, "The situation is extremely serious" because the faith teachers "have forged a virtually unbroken chain of serious doctrinal deviation." He further observed, "the study of the Kingdom of the Cults has taught me many profitable lessons, and this is one of them -- error begets error; heresy begets heresy and always in the name of truth, always in the name of the gospel."

Noted theologian J.I. Packer author of Knowing God and God's Words, argues that calling "some televangelists to account for their heretical teaching, their spiritual unreality, their shameless personality-cult, and the spurious dramatics of the fund-raising is unpleasant but necessary, for pastoral reasons."

Dr. Donald K. Campbell comments that the Faith Movement "is grevious and threatens to engulf the Church and sweep many professed believers into dangerous currents of false and destuctive doctrine."

Church historian Dr. Harold Lindsell, author of The Battle for the Bible and The Bible in the Balance, warns, "Historic orthodoxy is being diminished by heretical departures from the true faith...Along with some biblical truths a poisionous stream of error is to be found."

Theologian R.C. Sproule, founder of Ligonier Ministries and author of The Holiness of God and In Search of Dignity observes, "Very little evidence of any significant knowledge of either Church history or theology is displayed by Copeland, Hagin, Tilton, Crouch, and others. These men are not scholars. There is nothing wrong with that...What is alarming, however, is the attitude with which these 'teachers' assert their novelties, claiming divine authority for charting a new course...There is such a thing as heresy. The tragedy is that it pervades the electronic church."

Noted Christian counselor Dr. Jay Adams believes that for too long the Faith teachers "have been spreading falsehood unchallenged."

Dr. Dave Breese, a popular speaker and author of Know the Marks of a Cult and Satan's Ten Most Believable Lies, laments that "much on television that passes for Christianity is a new Gnosticism, a revived pantheism."

In his analysis of the Faith Movement, distinguished professor of the New Testament Dr. Henry Krabbendam comments that, "The doctrinal positions will often prove to be confused, confusing, errant, and at times, even heretical; the interpretive procedures are arbitrary, ill-advised, deficient, and at times, even damaging."

Professor of Theology and Apologetics Dr. Rod Rosenbladt observes, "...many popular media evangelists are preaching what amounts to blasphemy in their references to Christ's Person and work...In almost every point of Christology, these televangelists have deviated from orthodoxy and have promoted their own fantasy saviour..."

Michael Horton comments in the following manner: "...the obnoxiousness of offering salvation for money is itself heretical, indeed, pagan. Nevertheless, the gospel heralded by some of the television preachers is even more perverted than that...It is not only crass and ugly; it is overtly blasphemous and anti-Christian...they are preaching another Word, another God, and another Christ."

Even the Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements representing 65 contributors from a large variety of different denominations, many of them Pentecostal and Charismatic, comments that the Faith teachings are based on a distortion of Scripture and a distortion of the biblical concept of faith, and that, for example, their concept that believers are "little gods" presents "the greatest danger."

(from The Facts on the Faith Movement by John Ankerberg & John Weldon)