The Multiplication of Error

Since the early 1970s, the same people who today espouse the "little gods" teaching have forged a virtually unbroken chain of serious doctrinal deviation.  We were first told that the church had forgotten the "proper" concept of authority, so it was necessary for us all to have "shepherds" to disciple us.  Thus, the "shepherding movement" spread and divided many churches across North America.  When this failed, the so-called "faith teaching" or "positive confession" was resurrected from the writings of Kenyon.  The Christian church was then informed (and still is) that God can be "commanded" to respond to our prayers of faith and that we can create with our tongue both good and evil, prosperity or poverty, health or sickness.  Such a position presupposed, in effect, that our faith (not God's sovereignty) was seated on the throne of heaven.

With great speed, these teachings expanded to the dictum that Christians are "little gods."  As the faith movement is embraced by leaders within the Christian Reconstruction movement, the "little gods" are given a "dominion theology."  One key reconstructionist leader, Gary North, boasts, "It has already begun:  bringing together the post millennial Christian reconstructionists and the 'positive confession' charismatics. . . . A new fundamentalism is appearing."  Dominion theology, as it is called, states that until we do indeed subdue the creation, the return of the Lord Himself will be delayed.

The multiplication of erroneous doctrine is now complete.  Unlimited faith, unlimited health, unlimited wealth, unlimited power, unlimited divinity, and now unlimited dominion.

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.  Those who propagate these erroneous views (the "little gods," the "born again Jesus," and so on) have sadly crossed over into the kingdom of the cults and stand in need of genuine repentance, lest they come under the inevitability of divine judgment. [The unrepentant will be going to hell.]

It is dangerous, in the presence of God, to affirm oneself as a deity -- even with a small "g."  It is blasphemous to speak in the name of God and utter false prophesies.  It is the height of theological folly to reduce God the Son, second Person of the holy Trinity, to a lost sinner with the nature of Satan and then send Him to hell with the requirement of regeneration before He can complete the work of redemption.

The words of the apostle ring true, "From such turn away" (2 Timothy 3:5, KJV).  "Keep away from them.  For such people are not serving our Lord Christ, but their own appetites.  By smooth talk and flattery [what could be more flattering than being told you are a god?] they deceive the minds of naive people" (Romans 16:17-18).

Don't Take the Bait!

One of the great paradoxes of Holy Scripture is Satan's desire to be "like the Most High" (Isaiah 14:14).  He was hurled from the pinnacle of glory to eternal judgment as a result.  When God created man in His own image, jealous Lucifer tempted Adam and Eve with the luscious bait, "You shall be as gods."  Even after they had fallen, humanity was promised a Redeemer.  Through faith in Him, believers could have the relationship with God that Lucifer so desperately craved.  It is no wonder Satan hates the church, the bride of Christ, the building of God, because within it God has been pleased to dwell (I Corinthians 3:16).  Remarkably, He has described that relationship as "the body of Christ" built upon an unshakable, enduring foundation (Ephesians 2:20).

We are then, as believers, in a union of fellowship with the Trinity.  We are joint-heirs with Christ (John 17:11-26; Romans 8:17), eternally subject as He is Himself to the Father of spirits (I Corinthians 15:28) in love and by choice.  The church is not her own; she has been purchased by the sacrifice of Calvary. [not by Paul Mcullough]  Our identity is greater than any human concept of "godhood."  We are the heirs of eternity, recipients of an indescribable gift.

Let us not cheapen that inheritance or dilute it with perverted theology.  The cost is far too great.

-- by Walter Martin

Ezekiel 28:2 -- In the pride of your heart you say "I am a god; I sit on the 

throne of a god in the heart of the seas."  But you are man and not a god,

 though you think you are as wise as a god.

Also see Genesis 3:4-5 and Isaiah 2:6, 11

More Misapplied Texts

2 Peter 1:4

Another passage often seized upon by "little god" proponents, 2 Peter 1:4, reads:

Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises:  that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust (KJV).

The first word, "partaker," is interpreted by faith teachers to mean that man actually takes the divine nature for himself, that he actually participates in the divine nature or essence.  It could be pointed out that on my last birthday, I partook of my birthday cake but I did not become part of the cake.  Similarly, Peter is certainly not teaching, in violation of all divine revelation, that man -- a finite being -- actually becomes one with the substance of deity.  Let us find out what he was saying.

Hebrews 1:3 in the original Greek reminds us that Jesus Christ is the incarnate "character" of God, and herein lies the answer.  Because of Christ's death in our place, we have figuratively "died" to sin (Romans 6:2) and are to live in the glory and power of His resurrection (Romans 6:5).  We are to seek those things that are above where Christ dwells at the right hand of God, since we are "seated. . . in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus" (Ephesians. 2:6).  We, like Jesus before us, are to reflect the character of God in our lives.  We have been redeemed.  God has recorded to our account the righteousness of His Son and has charged His Son with our guilt (Romans 4:4-8).  The Christian, therefore, is justified by faith in Jesus Christ because he has become a partaker of the divine nature and character of God.

The image of God in man, which was shattered, marred, and defaced by sin, due to the first Adam, is restored in the last Adam, the Lord from heaven.  We have become recipients of a new set of attributes patterned after the last Adam, motives and affections that are constantly at war with our fallen nature (Rom. 7; Gal. 5:17).

We partake of the divine nature in the sense that we imitate, not duplicate, His character in our own lives.  We were "predestined to be conformed to the likeness of [God's] Son" (Rom.8:29).  As we were partakers of the fallen, Adamic nature, so now we are partakers of the resurrected Christ's character -- not partakers of His divinity but of His sanctifying grace.  We are being conformed to Christ's moral image (likeness), not to His essential deity.  We are called to resemble Him in our lifestyle, but we cannot become Him (deity) in any way, shape, or form.

John 1:12-13

"Yet to all who received Him" says the gospel, "to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God -- children not born of natural descent nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God."

This text is usually offered, along with other passages referring to man as "begotten" by God, to erroneously prove that the believer, through a direct creative act of the Holy Spirit, becomes a god-bearing person, as Christ Himself was. (This is known in church history as the Apollinarian heresy.)  But do such texts really teach that, as "born again" children of God we ourselves share God's divinity?

In the same text cited by the faith teachers (John 1:12-13), John is urging for the uniqueness of Christ's relationship to the Trinity as "the only begotten Son of God."  As believers, we are adopted children (Romans 8:15, 23; 2 Corinthians 5:20; Ephesians 1:5).  When, for instance, Kenneth Copeland states "God begets gods,"  He is ignoring the meaning of the term begotten and therefore falsely concludes, "You are all little gods."

Jesus Christ is the unique, one-of-a-kind, incarnate Son of God and is, therefore, different from believers.  "In the beginning was the Word," says John.  "And the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (John 1:1).  John the Baptist, our Lord's elder in age, nevertheless said of Christ, "He who comes after me has surpassed me because He was before me." (v. 15).  The Baptist recognized that Jesus' origin was eternal. "No-one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side has made him known" (v. 18).  We are adopted in time; Jesus is God's eternally-begotten Son, whose origin and deity never began but have always been.

Kenneth Hagin, therefore, is gravely mistaken when he asserts that the Christian "is as much an incarnation [of God] as is Jesus of Nazareth."  And Kenneth Copeland is wrong when he insists "Jesus is no longer the only begotten Son of God."  When the Word became flesh, God the Son remained what He always was -- the second Person of the Trinity.  Man is not an incarnation.  He is never spoken of as such in scripture -- limited as he is to finite humanity.

None of these texts in any way suggest that redeemed men are or ever will be gods.  As we have noted, Scripture forbids this as idolatry and blasphemy, in both testaments.  We can see, then, that from their very language those who maintain the "little gods" doctrine are affirming a type of pagan polytheism over against classic monotheism.  This constitutes, by any measurement, heretical doctrine.


For more information on Victory Churches and the Faith Movement, go to the Reference Library.  Click on any book title to get a brief overview of the book.  All books on the list are available through www.amazon.com. 

Misapplied Texts and Terms

John 10:34-35, With Psalm 82:6

Those who embrace the "little gods" doctrine almost universally cite these verses, wrested from their contexts.  In Mark 12:28, Christ was asked the question, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?"  To which Jesus replied, "Here, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One."  And yet, Jesus claimed deity, union with the Godhead, on numerous occasions. Nevertheless, the faith teachers appeal to Christ's remark in John 12:48-50:  "Is is not written in your Law, 'I have said you are gods'?. . . and the Scripture cannot be broken" (John 10:34-35).

In the beginning of this story in John 10, Jesus states, "I and the Father are one" (v. 30).  Furious, the Jews picked up stones.  Jesus asked them, "For which of these [good works] do you stone me?"  To which the Jews responded, "We are not stoning you for any of these . . . but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God" (v. 32-33).  His citation of the eighty-second Psalm perplexed them.  "Is is not written in your law, 'I have said you are gods'?. . . and the Scripture cannot be broken" -- why on earth did He quote  that one? they wondered.  Was Christ, in fact, teaching that man was a god?  And if so, how can this be reconciled with the extreme monotheism (one-God-ism) of Judaism, which He both believed and taught as a rabbi.

There can be no doubt from the history and theology of the Old Testament that the judges of Israel and rulers of the people were representatives, or mouthpieces, for God. Such individuals were accorded great respect and assumed in the eyes of the people the outward appearance of  "mighty ones" (in Hebrew, Elohim, "gods").

This should not come as a surprise to us when we remember Exodus 7:1, where God, speaking to Moses, says, "I have made thee a god to Pharaoh" (KJV).  Now, there can be no doubt that Moses was no more than a mortal man -- in no sense divine, by nature or in essence.  Nevertheless, since Pharaoh was a pagan and God was addressing him in that context, He was, in effect, saying, "When I finish with Pharaoh, through the power that will be revealed in you, Moses, My representative, he (Pharaoh) will think you are a god."  The plagues of Egypt were evidence to Pharaoh and to the occultic priests who surrounded him that this was indeed the "finger of God" (Exodus 8:19).

Moses did not lay claim to being a deity.  Instead, he manifested the power of  deity as a gift from the only Deity -- God the Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost.  Similarly, the judges of Israel fulfilled the same role and so appeared to be gods.  But in reality, they were sinful men who abused their office, and as a result God mocked them, saying, "I have said, Ye are gods. . . . Ye shall die like men" (Psalm 82:6-7).  Here were men who were supposed to emulate God's own character but who had become corrupt rulers.  They were supposed to be defenders of "the poor and fatherless . . . the afflicted and needy" (v3, KJV), but instead they were proud men, who -- though they looked like gods in the eyes of the people -- would nevertheless demonstrate their frail mortality in the judgment of death.

In Genesis 3:5, we can clearly see the teaching that man is a "god" or can become "like God" in relation to the divine essence originates not with God, but with Satan, who brought about the fall of man by deceiving Eve and then Adam into believing they would be like "gods."

Bible scholars have pointed out that Christ's statement, then, in John 10, is in the form of irony.  God, they say, was stating something that would be recognized by anyone as an absurdity.  Paul did the same with the Corinthians, mockingly referring to them as "kings," when both he and they knew they had not become kings at all.  Instead, they were abusing their spiritual gifts.  Similarly, in John 10, Jesus mocked the people as if to say, "You all think you're gods yourselves.  What's one more god among you?"  Irony is used to provoke us, not to inform us.  It is not a basis for building a theology.  

It is also pertinent to an understanding of John 10 that we remember that Satan is called "the ruler of this world" by no less an authority than the Lord Jesus Christ (John 14:30, NASB).  And Paul reinforces this by calling him "the god of this age" (II Corinthians 4:4).  We can make a "god" out of anything -- money, power,  status, position, sex, patriotism, family, or, as in Lucifer's case, an angel.  We can be our own "god."  But to call something deity or to worship it or treat it as divine is quite another thing than its being by nature and in essence deity.

The Bible insists that there is but one Creator:  "Besides Me there is no god" (Isaiah 45:5, NASB).  We need only compare Deuteromony 32:21, where God charged the Israelites with provoking Him to anger by the worship of  "what is not God" (NASB), with Galations 4:8, where Paul reminds the church that they served pagan deities before their conversion to Christ and "were slaves to those which by nature are no gods" (v. 8, NASB; italics added).

There is, therefore, only one God by nature, one God who is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, one God who possess characteristics and attributes that may be imitated but never duplicated in finite creations.  When it is said, then, that man is or can be a "god," we must remember that Christ is stating (John 10, with Psalm 82) that only He, the incarnate Word, has the right to the title of deity among men, since He alone is designated "the only begotten God" (John 1:18, Greek text).  What we worship then may become "a god" to us, but it is not deity, as it is written, "'You are my witnesses,' declares the Lord, 'and my servant who I have chosen, so that you may know and believe Me and understand that I am He.  Before Me no god was formed, nor will there be one after Me.'" (Isaiah 43:10).

If this were not enough, such passages as Isaiah 44:6, 45:22, and Deuteronomy 6:4 would close the issue forever.


For more information on Victory Churches and the Faith Movement, go to the Reference Library.  Click on any book title to get a brief overview of the book.  All books on the list are available through www.amazon.com. 

Consequences of the Faith Movement

Faith Movement Teachings Hinder Personal Sanctification

The Faith teachers claim their methods will lead the believer into a higher level of spirituality. But unfortunately, the Faith Movement actually works against the spiritual growth of a Christian. It does this in many ways, directly and indirectly.

1. By experientialism -- First, it teaches Christians that spiritual experiences are the primary emphasis of the Christian life and more important than biblical study. This undermines biblical authority.
2. By new revelation -- Second, the Faith Movement undermines Christian growth through an appeal to newer, allegedly better revelations. But all these new revelations have accomplished is to confuse believers with false teachings.
3. By spiritual malnourishment -- If only "faith" is preached (and a distorted faith at that), can this provide spiritual nourishment? If people are never told the content of the Bible, of what value is their "faith" when there is precious little that is biblical for such faith to act upon? Even Kenneth Hagin, Jr. confesses that "a portion of the Word of God preached without the whole counsel of the Word of God is as dangerous as a baby playing with dynamite. And that is the problem in Charismatic Christianity today..."
4. By spiritual pride -- The Faith Movement can also foster spiritual pride, and nothing is more deadly to spiritual growth. The Bible teaches that God hates pride and that pride destroys people spiritually (Proverbs 8:13; 11:2; 16:18). Unfortunately, pride in spiritual leaders tends to beget pride in their followers. People who think that God speaks to them audibly on a regular basis, who believe that they are "little gods" and have the powers of Jesus, who claim to perform miracles, who have vast multi-million dollar ministries with international satellite communication networks, who think they can literally command angels and manipulate creation, speaking into existence things which do not exist -- these are things which may generate spiritual pride.
5. By distortion of priorities -- When the Faith teachers claim that Jesus was not poor, and that we can have whatever we say and that nothing is impossible to us in the realm of making money or being successful, they are tragically reducing the glory of what it is to be a Christian. They have emaciated the Christian life to a trivial focus, that of meeting only surface needs (cf. Hebrews 11:25-26).

Other Tragedies Associated with the Faith Movement

People who first join the Faith Movement are initially enamoured with the prospects of abundance and prosperity and all the excitement they see around them. But sooner or later, the bubble bursts. Thousands of former Faith members have learned the hard way: by ruined finances, poor health, the inability to trust -- and even personal tragedy.

If Christians imitate the cults and their practices, should anyone be surprised they may suffer the same results as those cults? Thousands of people have been injured or actually have died from believing the teachings of Christian Science, Jehovah Witnesses, Mind Science, and Armstrongism that faith will cure terminal illness and/or that using modern medicine in part or whole is sinful and wrong. Not surprisingly then, besides the spiritual tragedies due to the Faith teachings, there are also physical tragedies. As a result of Faith teachings, hundreds of churches today believe either that it is wrong and sinful to use modern medical science or that any Christian who truly wants God's "best" will not seek its help. More than once this has led to fatalities. For example, the "Faith Assembly" Movement of Hobart Freeman has caused well over 100 unnecessary deaths (including Freeman's), and the "End Timers" cult in North Central Florida has also allowed several dozen children and adults to die prematurely.

The irony of a teaching claiming success and healing actually leading to misery and death is not lost upon those who have suffered the personal consequences of losing loved ones, as revealed in books such as Larry Parker's, We Let Our Son Die.

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