JOEL 2 GENERATION

I first posted this back in 2008. It came up in a word search I was doing on the blog. I realized it is as relevant today as it was back then. There is a whole new effort in recent years to try and discredit many (if not most?) of the charismatic ministries today. The new witchhunt as I've blogged about before is going after the so-called "NAR" (New Apostolic Reformation). The most ardent critics ironically are the non-Charismatic ones. The ones who have no miracles. The ones who aren't seeing people healed. I wonder again in 2023 what Jesus would say to ministries that look very unlike His ministry? What would Paul say to churches today that don't demonstrate Kingdom power? Paul said his preaching came "with a demonstration of the Spirit's power". Does our preaching? Do our ministries? Let us all stand corrected! Challenged! The original blog post  Which ministries should we be evaluating? The ones that demonstrate NO POWER! Today in 2023 (as was th...

Note : I define a "severe critic" as someone who, because of their presuppositions, is unwilling to listen to any evidence that challenges those preconceived ideas/beliefs about a particular topic. To use Jesus' description, they are those who have "no ears to hear." In recent years, a doctrinal "witch hunt" has been underway against Charismatic Christianity by a growing number of "severe critics" (spearheaded by some Christian apologists) who are attacking a movement they call 'NAR' (standing for the New Apostolic Reformation).  This new 'crusade' against the "so-called" NAR really began back in 2014 with the publication of a book entitled  A New Apostolic Reformation? A Biblical Response to a Worldwide Movement by Douglas Geivett and Holly Pivec. The irony is that the actual modern movement referred to as the New Apostolic Reformation began more than 20 years earlier. The NAR term was  coined by the late C. Peter W...

To summarize the notion that "Christmas is a Pagan Holiday": “We are told, by popular cultural and academic tradition of recent centuries, that there’s no way Jesus was born on December 25. In fact, the only reason we celebrate Christmas Day on December 25 is because the early Christians adapted a pagan holiday to hide their faith in a still-hostile culture” It is argued that Emperor Constantine (early 300s) tried to Christianize a pagan holiday to make his new faith more acceptable to pagan Romans. He chose Dec. 25th, the date of Sol Invictus .   The Roman Festival of Saturnalia took place between December 17th and 23rd and honored the Roman god Saturn. The Romans also thought that the Solstice took place on December 25th. It's also thought that in 274 the Roman emperor Aurelian created 'Dies Natalis Solis Invicti' (meaning 'birthday of the unconquered sun') also called 'Sol Invictus' and it was held on December 25th. The myth is that AFTER the p...

Much has been written about "Prosperity" - many, especially in my tribe, the Charismatic wing of the Church. Much has been written to defend the so-called "Prosperity Gospel" and much has been written to challenge it as a distorted message. The Apostle Paul himself in one passage of 1 Corinthians should be enough to debunk the absolute claims of the proponents. I'll get to that passage in a moment. I must first say that one of the main problems with those who advocate some form of the "Prosperity Gospel" is that it misuses the Old Testament and in particular the Sinai Covenant that God made with Israel. The basic conditions were that if Israel obeyed God they would be blessed (Deuteronomy 28:1-14) with all the material blessings promised in the Covenant. Of course, the curses listed in Deuteronomy 28 (v. 15-68) were also promised for disobedience (the prosperity teachers don't ever "claim" these promises!) The Sinai Covenant DOES NOT appl...

Megan Basham's recent Daily Wire article is a MUST-READ - "How Church Leaders Aligned With Fauci To Discredit Experts Opposed To COVID Mandates" (https://www.dailywire.com/news/how-church-leaders-aligned-with-fauci-to-discredit-experts-opposed-to-covid-mandates) So far, the article remains behind a paywall for subscribers only. I have yet to read it in its entirety but have listened to a detailed summary by Jon Harris in his Conversations That Matter podcast.  To summarize some of her points, Basham has Tweeted this: “Love your neighbor” has become a catchall cudgel for pushing any number of progressive policies in the church. Covid lockdowns/mandates, open borders, environmental regulation. What gets forgotten is that ppl suffer on the other side of the coin for every one of these issues." "People starved and were pushed into poverty by Covid policies. Blue-collar people see their wages depressed, drug and sex traffickers flood the country due to open borders. ...

  Psalm 81 (Septuagint/LXX) = Psalm 82 in Masoretic Text/MT.  The "gods" are angelic beings and this Psalm describes their fall; their judgment. It refers to those "sons of God" who were put over the nations (Deut 32:8) but who abused their assignments.  Let us pray verse 8 for the hour that we are now in across this nation and all over the Earth. And for God ( YAHWEH ) to judge and to "vindicate" (v. 3). These fallen entities (also called in the Old Testament either the "sons of God" and/or "Watchers") have been manipulating things by controlling the Luciferian Globalist Deep State (to cite their modern manifestation and dominant strategy over the past few hundred years). Psalm 81 has an ongoing application. Recently when looked at the Book of Joel we saw this same ongoing dynamic. In short, there are many "days of the Lord" throughout salvation history before THE final Day of the Lord. There was a "day of the Lord"...