Have you ever wondered what the word "hypocrisy" really means? According to Webster it means, "the practice of claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one's own behavior does not conform; pretense." Did you catch that? "Claiming to have moral ..." It is easy to see the faults in other people's efforts. This is especially easy if the one seeing the faults has not stepped out to attempt anything for the Kingdom of God. The Bible is chock full of nuts that constantly were trying to thwart the Kingdom work because of their inability to either "lead, follow, or get out of the way".
One of my favorite people on the planet is Dr. Scott Thompson. He is the Vice-President of Fruitland Baptist Bible College in Hendersonville. If ever there were a more intelligent man on the planet, I never met them. Dr. Thompson has a way of giving you the Bible in ways that you can understand it. He said when someone does something that we deem inappropriate Biblically, instead of attacking them, examine ourselves. In my study Bible, one of the statements made in the daily reading was "If we see someone do something great, emulate it. If we see someone do something wrong, examine yourself". I wonder if the guy that annotated that Bible knows Dr. Thompson?
If someone does not "bash" another ministry along with you, that does not mean that they agree with the unbiblical things taught. About 15 years ago, I was the king of bashing other ministries. Indeed, I understood everything there was to know about the Bible and all of those heretical preachers were going straight to hell for leading God's people astray. At the zenith of my "Bible Study" evenings, there were maybe 6 or 7 people that would show up on a weekly basis. I remember just as plain as day one evening after my bashing at least 20 of these ministries that God asked me about my ministry. It stung. I then began to "examine" the way I viewed things and realized that the only difference between their heretical teaching and mine was that they had more numbers to lead astray then I did. I was leading astray the 6 or 7 that would come to "my" Bible study. All throughout the scriptures, as the disciples would get cocky, Jesus would bring them back down to earth; gently.
It is easy to bash a ministry. It is even easier to bash a minister. But here is the thing. Do we take God's sovereignty away by bashing said ministries or ministers? Throughout scripture, when you see someone go after another, it was God ordained. God is sovereign. We have wanted to either be God, or control Him since the beginning of time. Ask Lucifer about this. We feel as though we need to help God. After all, He is old and needs our help. The Pharisees were the most learned people on the planet at the time of Christ and yet they had it wrong. From the woman who they wanted to stone, to the crucifixion of God Himself, they got it wrong. Maybe we get it wrong sometimes. Maybe we are right on the money about a ministry or minister. Either way, if God does not specifically tell you to intervene, don't. This may be a foreign idea to some, but pray for them. What? Yes, pray for them. Maybe they are off base in their Bible prowess or maybe they are the devil incarnate. Either way, pray for them and do not take it on without God's blessing.
I had a response to the article "Why do we eat our own" which led me to write Part 2 here. A gentleman commented in length on an article bashing Stephen Furtick with a long diatribe of insults toward him, his ministry, and any one who would dare stick up for him. While this may seem harmless to the casual viewer, it is not harmless to put ourselves in any position without first self-examining. I appreciate this gentleman's fire for the Lord. I am sure the Lord appreciates his fire. Pointing out the faults in others is easy to do. Of course, seeing past that beam in your eye can be sort of difficult at times. All I did was paste the link to the article on the feed and the following was this gentleman's response to Bible Pass's article, "Why Do We Eat Our Own".
"Did you write this? This is total tripe. This isn't even an honest effort. You misquoted, misinterpreted, and eisegeted the text of Matthew 15 and Romans 12. This is not rightly dividing the word of truth. This is completely unfaithful to the Scriptures and shameful, actually. This shows a serious level of biblical illiteracy and complete lack of hermeneutical and exegetical ability. It's time to unplug the keyboard and put a pause on the Bible blogger dream for while and pick up your Bible and actually read it. This lack of understand of biblical truth and knowledge and total disregard for being true to the text and faithful study to rightly divide it are what's wrong with the church and the evangelical community. Not this diatribe that you concocted in this article. Personally, I would delete it. Seriously. I wouldn't leave that kind of grievous error out there accessible on the internet, much less on my "Bible blog" website. I'm just being honest with you. I'm sort of embarrassed for you and definitely hurting for you. This is painful. I can't believe you hopped on here and posted the link to this. You literally used the text in Matthew 15 for almost the opposite of what it actually means and what Jesus was saying to the disciples. He was saying to let them alone and don't worry about them being offended by His teaching. Nowhere in the whole 39 verses of Matthew 15 is there anything eluding to judge. Romans 12, Paul is saying don't get vengeance on those who wrong you because God will repay. Again, literally nothing about judging whatsoever. This whole article is asinine and doesn't even flow together. Plus, you're judging people's intentions all throughout it. You name specific names and call all those false teachers and prophets you name lowlifes. And yes, I would burn every book, tract, cd, dvd, and any other piece of propaganda from any of the people you name in there and burn it yesterday. These far too prevalent and fallacious ideas that we're supposed to have this emasculated Christian faith and lock arms and sing koombayah are absolutely nonsensical and not biblical. 26 out of 27 New Testament books warn against false teachers and prophets, wolves in sheep's clothing, tares planted amongst the wheat, sheep and goats, false conversions, ravenous wolves, and other people that would come up in the church and be the enemy within the church, not of God or His kingdom. We are to mark and avoid false teachers. Test all things and hold fast to what is true, even test ourselves and see if we're in the faith. Judge rightly and righteously and not cast our pearls before swine. Look for fruits of repentance to see if people are truly of the church or just deceivers. Those false teachers and anyone who would preach different gospel, even an angel, are to be anathema, literally cursed. We are called to rightly divide truth from error, real from false, and beware of those that are leading people astray. The commands of faithful judging, discerning, gaining wisdom from faithful study and suggests rightly dividing the weird of truth are all through the Scriptures. We're called to forsake everything for Christ, literally everything, and be his slave, obeying Him with reckless abandonment to him over everything. Better are the wounds of friend than the kisses of an enemy. We're called to faithfulness to Christ wherever he leads, trusting Him to sustain us. We're not called to start our own empires, ministries, websites, and blogs. If He leads some to that and equips them for it, then that is well. That's obviously not the case here. We don't set ourselves where we want to do what we want, nor will He bless that or equip everyone for what they decide they want to do and how they want to serve our what ministry they decide they want to create. Faithfulness is following and serving God where and how he wants us to serve and as his slave. Not deciding we're bloggers or saving the world through our own little ministries. Get out your Bible and read it and start being faithful in your study, learn it, and start learning to interpret it and apply it faithfully, dividing it rightly. Pray for wisdom and discernment and the Spirit's illumination of the Bible and do that for good looking while. Then, see where God wants you to serve Him, and he'll equip you for that. Start being faithful and forget everything else. Stop butchering God's word because that's not alright."
I am pointing this out because examining one's self in light of scripture might just take this fellow down another path. For the record, I pray over every article, paper, video, and commentary that goes out. I appreciate his comments. Why? Because it lets me know that there is still work to do.
In summary, when someone is bashing a ministry and you do NOT join in, this does NOT mean you are complicit. It does not mean you agree or disagree with what they are ranting about. It does mean that you have fear of the Lord and that when God tells you to strike, you strike; not until.
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