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Source: (consider it) Thread: Prayer as a 'force'; where did this come from?
quetzalcoatl
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Some excellent comments above.

Being a channel of God - oh wow, hubris or what.

No, try being emptied out of all things. Now, where is the channel?

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Komensky
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Wow. Thanks EE.

K.

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South Coast Kevin
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I was thinking about this 'controlling God' criticism earlier today, as I really don't think I'm suggesting anything of the sort. Instead, I see it as something like a runner waiting on the start line or a hunter waiting for the bird to take flight. The start gun doesn't make the runner set off, neither does the pheasant make the hunter shoot; the gun and the bird are simply the prompt for action.

Likewise, my view is that God has chosen to (most of the time) act in accordance with the faithfulness and holiness of his people. We don't control God by our righteous living, we merely co-operate with his way of working.

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Komensky
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But Kevin, I just don't see it. Someone recently put it nicely: 'we pray in hope'. I'm afraid that's it. God does not rely on human faith for his actions. God is God is God. There is no secret recipe. We are called to pray quietly (nota bene!) and in hope.

There is no 'but sometimes' or 'most of the time'. He just *is* are you are stuck with it. The Todd Bently and Bill Johnson (just to name two notorious examples) circus acts are, sadly, the logical conclusions of this sort of erroneous thinking.

K.

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Gamaliel
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Kevin, the Church (however defined) is AN agent of the Kingdom, but it is not the ONLY agent of the Kingdom.

It ain't all about us. It ain't all about li'l' ol' you and me.

Nice and laid-back though the Vineyard is, I think it too has been susceptible to what I might call the 'commodification' of grace ie. you can go to a special place (The Toronto Vineyard) or wherever God is apparently 'moving' in a particular way and somehow 'catch' the anointing (as if it is a kind of spiritual infection) and carry it back with you to wherever you happen to come from.

I don't see it working like that.

Ok, there are some intriguing and unanswered questions - I've long been struck by how Elisha and the other Israelites didn't appear to disabuse Naaman the Leper of the apparent belief that God's power was 'located' in the very soil of Israel when he asked to take two mule-loads of earth back with him to assist in his worship of the One True God.

See 2 Kings 5:17-19

It's interesting, isn't it, that Naaman is asked to dip himself in the Jordan (rather than any other river including the 'superior' rivers of his native Syria which he considered 'Pharpar' better ...) [Biased]

You could argue that this incident is reinforcing the idea that God's grace and power is found in particular places rather than being generally available, as it were. Equally, one could argue that the Lord was meeting Naaman where he was at ...

Whatever the case, if we accept sacraments (or ordinances) as some kind of means of grace I don't see why we should baulk at the idea of people somehow acting as conduits of that same grace and power - 'if anyone gives you a cup of cold water in my name ...'

But that's not to suggest that we act as some kind of spiritual lightning conductors or as laser-beams directing God's grace and power to particular locations or situations. We often talk as if that's the case - I've done so myself - but I think we need to recognise what we are actually doing and saying if we make those kind of claims.

That's a lot of slipshod and lazy thinking about in charismaticdom and I think the impression that you somehow stretch out your hand and some kind of force-field or power-beam emanates ... bzzzztttt ... like something in Star Wars or science fiction is part and parcel of all that.

Similar things happen in RC and Orthodox circles, of course, Mediterranean peasants crossing themselves to ward off the Evil Eye and so on.

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beatmenace
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Interesting - this is another good discussion. I do love the Ship.

I do think that while God is 'everywhere' there seems to be times when he is more 'somewhere' than others. The are both biblical (Plagues of Egypt, Mount Carmel, Day of Pentecost etc ) and extra-biblical (Historic Shrines, Toronto Airport (for the sake of argument), some of my more Celtic inclined folk talk of Iona and Lindesfarne in these terms).

My own view is that the Kingdom goes with us, and where we are gathered we should expect signs and wonders on occasions. In most cases that will be in church meetings but certainly doesnt have to be.

There are things we dont need to think too much about, in that we are told to do them. Healing is one, Preaching the Good News. Check. , Making disciples. Check. Setting Captives free. Check. Feed the Poor. Check. Not so keen on the snakes and deadly poison, though, give those a miss.

There is indeed a temptation to exalt yourself. Thats where the risk comes - but i think thats a temptation common to all types of church leadership not just the Charismatics....

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Gamaliel
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Sure, beatmenace, and plenty of sacramentally inclined Christians would see Christ as being especially present or 'realised' if you like, in the Eucharist.

We all 'sacralise' things and I would suggest that the tendency among charismatics is to sacralise things like the worship time or the preaching of the word or 'ministry times' and so on and so forth because this tendency is innate within all of us.

If I wanted to be snarky from a more fully sacramental viewpoint, I could suggest that it's precisely because they've denigrated the 'proper' sacraments to a certain extent that they've had to develop sacraments of their own - in a 'nature abhors a vacuum' kind of way.

But that would be equally as reductionist as the sort of things charismatics get up to ...

[Razz]

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quetzalcoatl
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A kind of leakage effect, I suppose. Block up the 'channels' in one area, and new 'channels' open up in another. But lo and behold, it turns out I'm the channel!

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Stejjie
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I do feel torn about this. On the one hand, I do think we're called to pray and to ask God for things. Jesus' point about God knowing what we already need wasn't made, ISTM, to discourage prayer but to encourage trusting, simple prayer (as opposed to untrusting, loud, attention-seeking prayer).

Furthermore, I think there are instances in the Bible when God & Christ do seem to change their minds about things because of human petition. I'm thinking of Abraham negotiating with God over Sodom and Gomorrah; or Moses persuading God not to wipe out the whole of the Israelites after the Golden Calf; or the Syro-Phoenician woman talking Jesus into healing her daughter when he'd (seemingly) refused on ethnic grounds. The picture of God that Scripture portrays doesn't seem to be one of someone who puts His fingers in His ears to our prayers and ignores them, but who listens and answers.

On the other hand, I do have huge problems with the view of prayer as a 'force' in the sense that's been described here. That seems to be the opposite of the trusting faith in God that, IMHO, Scripture suggests should be our motivation for prayer - it's putting faith in ourselves and in our level of faith that will make miracles work (if that makes any sense at all). It does seem to treat certain words and phrases almost as "magic words" , that if we say them will make wondrous things happen. That, ISTM, isn't the faith that the Bible calls us to.

On the Acts question, I do take the point that a lot of the miracles that happen there do come from the apostles saying "be healed!" rather than "God, please heal them!" or something similar. But the question in my mind is: how much are the events in Acts supposed to be normative for the church now and how much are they a description of something new that was breaking out then? Is Acts simply a template for us to copy, or a description of how the nascent church operated which may not translate easily into our current experience? If the latter, then praying and doing things in the same way as those in Acts may not be appropriate.

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Komensky
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quote:
Originally posted by beatmenace:
Interesting - this is another good discussion. I do love the Ship.

[snip]
There are things we dont need to think too much about, in that we are told to do them. Healing is one, Preaching the Good News. Check. , Making disciples. Check. Setting Captives free. Check. Feed the Poor. Check. Not so keen on the snakes and deadly poison, though, give those a miss.
[snip]

There you go already with selective readings. Firstly, why on earth are these things we 'don't need to think about'? Also, I'm guessing from your language that by 'healing' you mean of the 'be healed in the name of jay-sus!' type of healing. If you are reading magic into some of these, why not others? Why does the healing have to be supernatural but not the snake handling? Or, could it be, that idiom needs to be considered in all cases?

K.

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South Coast Kevin
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quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
We all 'sacralise' things and I would suggest that the tendency among charismatics is to sacralise things like the worship time or the preaching of the word or 'ministry times' and so on and so forth because this tendency is innate within all of us.

I think you're largely bang on the money here, Gamaliel. I see this tendency in some of the talk about big conferences like New Wine, and at the local level in the way some people want a lengthy section of sung worship as the focus of church services.

I guess I'm 'sacralising' people rather than activities or places. Reflecting on that, I think it's legitimate; or at least it's consistent with what I've been saying in this thread about God (mainly) working through people who are devotedly, humbly following him.
quote:
Originally posted by Stejjie:
But the question in my mind is: how much are the events in Acts supposed to be normative for the church now and how much are they a description of something new that was breaking out then? Is Acts simply a template for us to copy, or a description of how the nascent church operated which may not translate easily into our current experience?

Such a key question, IMO! Tentatively, I'd say we should take practices we see in the NT as normative unless we can give a reasonable explanation as to why we shouldn't. Perhaps a trivial example: 'Greet one another with a holy kiss'. Kissing was used as a greeting in Jesus' and Paul's time and culture far more than in mine, so I won't take this as a direct command to me. Instead I'll adapt it to my own context and greet my Christian brethren warmly in a way that fits my culture.

With the 'be healed' prayer thing, I guess I simply don't see why we should pray in a different way to Jesus' early followers. Any thoughts, Stejjie or others...?

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Komensky
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Kevin,

I don't think that we should pray in a way different from Jesus's early followers (by which I assume you mean the book of Acts, rather than Jesus's early followers, that is, the people who made up the early church and established the Bible, Creeds and so on).

Also, I don't see that 'be healed' is more or less than a prayer in hope of God's healing. Sometimes he does this, sometimes not; and getting back to the OP, that's what we have no power over.


K.

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beatmenace
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quote:
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by beatmenace:
Interesting - this is another good discussion. I do love the Ship.

[snip]
There are things we dont need to think too much about, in that we are told to do them. Healing is one, Preaching the Good News. Check. , Making disciples. Check. Setting Captives free. Check. Feed the Poor. Check. Not so keen on the snakes and deadly poison, though, give those a miss.
[snip]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There you go already with selective readings. Firstly, why on earth are these things we 'don't need to think about'? Also, I'm guessing from your language that by 'healing' you mean of the 'be healed in the name of jay-sus!' type of healing. If you are reading magic into some of these, why not others? Why does the healing have to be supernatural but not the snake handling? Or, could it be, that idiom needs to be considered in all cases?


I wouldn't have thought that any of these could be argued against as being things that Jesus did and taught his disciples to do. I would argue these are all things that Christians should be about. If you have an issue with that i think its another discussion waiting!

Another one that springs to mind is that 'the greatest among you is the one who serves'. Which is quite pertinent to the above discussion i think.

While we have probably done healing to death in other threads - i believe that healing in Jesus's name is supported by both Scripture, Tradition and Practice and have known those physically healed (and also those who have died who were not healed physically) after prayer.

Its not a wacky modern transatlantic add-on but something which has always been taught and practiced.

In that sense you could include the snakes and poison. And perhaps you should.

I dont think you should necessarily go out of your way to to find snakes and poison (sorry snake-handlers) because Mark 16 is more Jesus predicting the kind of signs that would go along with doing the preaching of the good news, but as you say healing is in that segment).

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Gamaliel
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@Stejjie - 'God and Christ' ? - being pedantic, don't you mean 'God the Father and Christ' ie. Christ as God the Son, the Second Person of the Holy and Undivided Trinity.

@South Coast Kevin - well, if you want to go around saying to people 'Be healed!' and so forth, that's up to you. The onus is on you though, to demonstrate that you've got the power/right/authority or whatever-it-is to do so. I could go round declaring 'be healed!' to people until I'm blue in the face but that doesn't mean that any of them would necessarily be healed.

I s'pose it's a bit of a circular argument - you don't know until you've tried. I used to go laying hands on people and praying for healing every now and then when I was a good-little-charismatic - sometimes even with 'unbelievers' in the street. I can remember doing that on two occasions and feeling quite uncomfortable about the whole thing but doing it nevertheless - they were both occasions when people asked me to do so.

Nothing happened. Neither were healed through my prayers as far as I can tell.

As Mousethief says, if you can do that ... well, then that shows something. But if you can't, you can't. I can't. So I don't.

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Raptor Eye
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quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:

@South Coast Kevin - well, if you want to go around saying to people 'Be healed!' and so forth, that's up to you. The onus is on you though, to demonstrate that you've got the power/right/authority or whatever-it-is to do so. I could go round declaring 'be healed!' to people until I'm blue in the face but that doesn't mean that any of them would necessarily be healed.

I s'pose it's a bit of a circular argument - you don't know until you've tried. I used to go laying hands on people and praying for healing every now and then when I was a good-little-charismatic - sometimes even with 'unbelievers' in the street. I can remember doing that on two occasions and feeling quite uncomfortable about the whole thing but doing it nevertheless - they were both occasions when people asked me to do so.

Nothing happened. Neither were healed through my prayers as far as I can tell.

As Mousethief says, if you can do that ... well, then that shows something. But if you can't, you can't. I can't. So I don't.

I think it harmful to try to do so, unless convinced by the Holy Spirit that we must - not only by other human beings. Harmful that is to yourself, as you're compromising your relationship with God, harmful to Christianity as it gives people to believe that its followers are on another planet/giving false hope/thinking we have powers etc; and harmful to the reputation of God's holy name as it appears that God is not there. Similarly with those who try to evangelise out of kilter with God's will.

I believe that God still gives people gifts, some of healing, some of tongues, some of prophecy, etc and God calls some to be evangelists, some to be nurturers, etc. Unless we're offered the gift from God and we accept, knowing the responsibility it carries, we should tread with extreme caution, and even then we must remain very close to God in consciousness at all times.

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the long ranger
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quote:
Originally posted by beatmenace:
I wouldn't have thought that any of these could be argued against as being things that Jesus did and taught his disciples to do. I would argue these are all things that Christians should be about. If you have an issue with that i think its another discussion waiting!

Care to unpack that? Surely it is down to you to show a) the activities you describe as being 'things that Jesus did and taught his disciples to do' are actually in the New Testament in the way that you enact them and b) some kind of rationale behind why you in the 21 Century should behave in the same way as the first apostles, given we all know that there are things recorded by the early apostles that you/we do not do.

quote:
Another one that springs to mind is that 'the greatest among you is the one who serves'. Which is quite pertinent to the above discussion i think.

While we have probably done healing to death in other threads - i believe that healing in Jesus's name is supported by both Scripture, Tradition and Practice and have known those physically healed (and also those who have died who were not healed physically) after prayer.

I don't think it is necessarily consistent with scripture to assume that the actions of the apostles with regard to healing continued beyond their lives. And this is part of the problem discussed in this thread.

quote:
Its not a wacky modern transatlantic add-on but something which has always been taught and practiced.
Nope, it is a (current) transatlantic add-on. In the past, periodic groups of people claimed charismatic gifts of healing at different times, but by far the majority saw this as a very rare miraculous occurrence, if it happened at all.

quote:
In that sense you could include the snakes and poison. And perhaps you should.

I dont think you should necessarily go out of your way to to find snakes and poison (sorry snake-handlers) because Mark 16 is more Jesus predicting the kind of signs that would go along with doing the preaching of the good news, but as you say healing is in that segment).

I'd submit that it'd be rather stupid to make a point of the snake-and-poison verse given it is not present in the earliest and most reliable sources and was added much later.

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beatmenace
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Ouch - some of this will take a bit of time but to start with :


quote:
I don't think it is necessarily consistent with scripture to assume that the actions of the apostles with regard to healing continued beyond their lives. And this is part of the problem discussed in this thread.


quote:

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Its not a wacky modern transatlantic add-on but something which has always been taught and practiced.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nope, it is a (current) transatlantic add-on. In the past, periodic groups of people claimed charismatic gifts of healing at different times, but by far the majority saw this as a very rare miraculous occurrence, if it happened at all.

Assuming you dont really mean that the apostles kept doing the miraculous after their deaths, which wouldnt be too likely, and you really mean - did the church continue to practice this stuff?

The 'Next Generation' would be the Church Fathers. Did they practice signs etc....

Some Quotes - more time with Google would surely find others - this is just my work lunchtime!

'Daily some are becoming disciples in the name of Christ.....who are also receiving gifts, each as he is worth. These are illuminated through the name of this Christ. For one receives the Spirit of understanding, another of counsel, another of strength, another of healing. justin martyr (c160, e)1.214'


'For numberless demoniacs throughout the whole world, and in your city, many of our Christian men. exorcising them in the name of Jesus Christ, who was crucified under Pontius Pilot, have healed and do heal, rendering helpless and driving the possessing devils out of the men, though they could not be cured by all the other exorcists, and those who used incantations and drugs. Justin Martyr 2nd apology, chapter 6, addressed to the Roman senate, Ad 165'


'Those who are truly his disciples, receive grace from him,....perform works in his name, in order to promote the welfare of others, according to the gift that each one has received from Him. Some truly and certinally cast out devils. The result is that those who have been cleansed from evil spirits frequently both believe and join themselves to the church...still others heal the sick by laying their hands upon them, and the sick are made whole. What is more, as I have said, even the dead have been raised up and remained among us for years. What more can I say? it is not possible to name the number of gifts which the church throughout the whole world has received from God, in the name of Jesus Christ. irenaeus (c180, e/w) 1.409, Irenaues against heresies, book 1, chapter 32, section 4, Ad 200'


'And some give evidence of their having received through this faith a marvellous power by the cures which they perform, revoking no other name over those who need their help than that of the God of all things, and of Jesus, along with a mention of His history. For by these means we too have seen many persons freed from grievous calamities, and from distractions of mind,and madness, and countless other ills, which could be cured neither by men nor devils. Origen against Celsus, book 3, chapter 24, Ad 250'


'Clement ordered those to approach who were distressed with disease, and thus many approached having come together through the experiences of those having been healed yesterday, and he having laid hands upon them and prayed and immediatly healed them Clement, homily 9, chapter 23, 3rd century '


this list could go on and on, not only was healing a part of ministry work in the new testament, but it was also within the church after the new testament.


quote:

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Its not a wacky modern transatlantic add-on but something which has always been taught and practiced.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nope, it is a (current) transatlantic add-on. In the past, periodic groups of people claimed charismatic gifts of healing at different times, but by far the majority saw this as a very rare miraculous occurrence, if it happened at all.

These were the most prominent Christian figures of their day - not just members of fringe groups, so i suggest it was more normal than you think.

I dont doubt there are Medieaeval saints with similar stories (Francis of Assisi springs to mind) , but i hope i dont need to exhaustively document these too, to make the point.

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Gamaliel
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@Raptor Eye - yes, indeed.

@thelongranger - you'll appreciate, of course, that it is taken as axiomatic in charismatic/evangelical circles that we are meant to be doing the same things as we read about Jesus and the disciples doing - although the mileage varies as to the extent that this expectation works out in terms of frequency etc.

I'm increasingly coming to the conclusion that contemporary evangelical charismatics (or charismatic evangelicals) are reading their own experiences (or apparent experiences) back into the pages of the NT - rather than the other way round.

As for the apparent continuation of these things beyond the lives of the original apostles, well, there are certain Patristic voices that imply that these things continued to some extent and others which suggest that the frequency of their occurrence diminished over time.

Certainly the expectation that these things should be the almost natural, habitual experience of the believer is a very recent one - dating from the Pentecostal movement in the early 20th century.

I'm reminded of Bishop Butler's remonstration with John Wesley, 'Sir, the pretending to revelations and gifts of the Holy Spirit is an horrid thing, a very horrid thing!'

For all the good Bishop's Enlightenment rectitude, I sometimes think he had his head screwed on ...

I'm certainly no cessationist but I'm increasingly finding the notion that we can all go around doing the spectacular stuff if only we were faithful enough, holy enough, committed enough, bold enough ... add-whatever-you-please enough - to be less than tenable.

It's just not borne out by observation. There's loads and loads of talk but very little evidence on the ground.

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Gamaliel
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Whoops - I cross posted with beatmenace.

These are well-known quotes. I've come across most of them before. There are others which suggest that miraculous healings and so on diminished in frequency.

That said, I don't think these things completely disappeared. We could cite examples from medieval Catholicism and also from Eastern Orthodoxy - I'm thinking of Saints like Saint Seraphim of Sarov and others.

But what you don't get in either medieval Roman Catholicism nor Orthodoxy is the idea that these things are easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy occurrences that would be happening every five minutes if only we were bold enough or holy enough.

I've always found that the claims for healings and prophecies and so on in contemporary charismatic circles are out of all proportion to their actual occurrence. That these things can and do happen in contemporary charismatic circles I don't doubt. Whether they are happening week by week on a regular basis I doubt most assuredly.

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the long ranger
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Yeah. Well, I've been to a modern charismatic church (actually, lots of times) and I know the current frequency with which healings and the miraculous are supposed to occur. Even taking into account the Church Fathers - who, incidentally, had some pretty wild ideas compared to the standard charismatic evangelical line on things. It surprises to hear people quote Justin Martyr, Iranaeus in the context of orthopraxy given that a lot of what they taught is flatly denied by those same churches... but never mind.

Those guys are not talking about the same thing as current Charismatics. Not at all.

But y'know, there is a feature of many churches to claim precedence of activity based on the early Christians, without any real foundation. Save perhaps the Orthodox, we don't have any traditions that go back that far. Par for the course, they can't all be right.

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Stejjie
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quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
@Stejjie - 'God and Christ' ? - being pedantic, don't you mean 'God the Father and Christ' ie. Christ as God the Son, the Second Person of the Holy and Undivided Trinity.

Yes, you're entirely right about that - didn't mean to come across all heretical there! [Hot and Hormonal]

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Gamaliel
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You've hit on something else there, the lone ranger ...

Charismatic evangelicals are highly selective. They'll pick on the bits they like from the Fathers (such as healings and so on) and dismiss/reject those aspects that they find less appealing - such as a more sacramental theology or a high view of the Virgin Mary and so on.

We are all guilty of such things, though, but I tend to find a particular kind of charismatic evangelical to be more prone to this sort of thing. Heck, I ought to know, I've done it myself ...

They don't just do it with the Fathers, they do the same thing with the Reformers and with John Wesley and Jonathan Edwards and the 18th century revivalists - as well as 19th century figures such as Spurgeon, Moody, Hudson Taylor etc.

It took me a while to realise this and only when I began to read some of the source documents did I realise that:

- Neither Wesley nor Edwards were the kind of 'enthusiasts' they claimed them to be - at least, not all of the time and their views modified over time.

- Quotes from Spurgeon, Moody or whoever else were often taken out of context.

- They were applying the same isolated proof-texting approach to this material as they do to the scriptures.

Of course, charismatic evangelicals aren't the only ones who are guilty of this kind of thing, but I submit that if beatmenace subjected the quotes he's found to rather more scrutiny and submitted them to some contextual analysis and understanding he wouldn't be so quick to bring this stuff on board as justification for what his own church gets up to ...

I was involved with a full-on charismatic church for 18 years, then a mildly charismatic one for six and the one I've been involved with for the last five years is trying to become more charismatic.

I can cite a few examples of what may have been divine healings/healings in responses to prayer - but not many. No more than three or four if I'm brutally honest.

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the long ranger
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Oh absolutely, I agree we all pick and choose. The point is not that the charismatics are worse at it than anyone else - just that they claim to be being authentic and not picking and chosing when they blatantly are. All the time.

I suspect this is largely a feature of all churches without a well defined (and usually pretty old) written set of of beliefs. For example, I do not accept the Westminster Confession of 1646 as authoritative, but at least if someone appeals to it as an authority, you know where they get their ideas from (of course, it is a fun exercise to pick holes in the reasoning of those that wrote the confession as well). I think you can say the same thing for almost any church which has this kind of doctrinal document. You might not agree with it, but it is at least there.

As far as I am concerned, charismatic churches of all denominations lack any kind of written document that has the benefit of age - largely because they've rejected these kinds of documents in favour of their 'clear and obvious' reading of the New Testament, which as far as I am concerned is anything but clear and obvious. And where these congregations exist within longer established traditions, they tend to behave more similarly to each other (and share similar beliefs) than to other parts of the denomination to which they supposedly belong.

I believe this is largely because the charismatic expression has been sporadic and has very little continuity throughout the ages.

[ 20. September 2012, 14:59: Message edited by: the long ranger ]

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Gamaliel
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Indeed. 'A spirituality in search of a theology' as it has often been described.

Personally, I don't have a problem with a soupcon of the charismatic dimension to add some spice to the total mix - and I'd argue that it's possible to encounter the vatic and the numinous in all Christian traditions, not just the more demonstrative ones.

I s'pose my main issue with it all is that it veers towards dualism and can become quite Gnostic at the fringes - particularly when it gets into 'word-of-faith' style territory - or even with the idea of special revelations per se.

That and the fact that the rhetoric clearly belies the reality.

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the long ranger
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quote:
Originally posted by beatmenace:


The 'Next Generation' would be the Church Fathers. Did they practice signs etc....

Some Quotes - more time with Google would surely find others - this is just my work lunchtime!

'Daily some are becoming disciples in the name of Christ.....who are also receiving gifts, each as he is worth. These are illuminated through the name of this Christ. For one receives the Spirit of understanding, another of counsel, another of strength, another of healing. justin martyr (c160, e)1.214'

etc


I'd genuinely be interested to know if you've actually read any of the sources you've quoted here or whether they're all found on a blogpost or some kind of proof from a charismatic organisation.

Charismatics I've known seem very focused on the New Testament era and the present and have little knowledge/interest of the intervening 2000 years.

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"..If some have no teeth, then teeth will be provided.”

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beatmenace
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Well yes and no actually.

This lot, as i said is a quick lunchtime google. Although a few (probably more than a few now) I spent some time some time trying to fathom a more or less chronological church history in my head.

So I did read some of the early writings (mostly out of a book modestly called 'Part III', which collected together highlights of Christian writing from the Fathers on) including stuff like 'the teaching of the 12 apostles', 'the shepherd of hermeas' and the 'letter of Clement' which is pretty early. All the standard Fathers such as Oriegen, Justin etc are there (I was particularly impressed by Justin i remember).

At one stage i could remember details of all the early heresies, Monatism, Arianism, Marcionism etc but i reckon i would now have to look them up to make sure i didnt mix them up!

Also read some later stuff - Bernard of Clairvaux (forget the title) , Dark Night of the Soul (treatise) - not that overwhelmed by the original poem - but St John was in jail so i can forgive that, and Augustine's Confessions (never read City of God). Gave up on Thomas a Kempis.

Got a bit bogged down in mediaeval history - really ..3 Popes at the same time (my brain hurts) and those Borgias....... Not bothered with Luther and Calvin much as i think i would likely want to punch them every so often.

Wesley's Journal makes interesting reading as there are a number of accounts of signs and wonders along side the preaching, which was always the main focus - and yes, to a previous poster , i did read all i had of it - although is suspect its abridged a bit ( i believe the original covered a very long time period)

As i said in other threads - i have not read some docs, well known in Orthodoxy and the Gnostic Gospels , not at all. So there are plenty of gaps.

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South Coast Kevin
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quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
@South Coast Kevin - well, if you want to go around saying to people 'Be healed!' and so forth, that's up to you. The onus is on you though, to demonstrate that you've got the power/right/authority or whatever-it-is to do so. I could go round declaring 'be healed!' to people until I'm blue in the face but that doesn't mean that any of them would necessarily be healed.

Thing is, I think the power/right/authority comes from Jesus' words in the NT - he taught his followers to do many things, one of which was to proclaim healing. For sure, most of the time when I or others do it nowadays nothing happens, but I can't escape what I see as Jesus' clear teaching to carry on doing it.
quote:
Originally posted by the long ranger:
But y'know, there is a feature of many churches to claim precedence of activity based on the early Christians, without any real foundation. Save perhaps the Orthodox, we don't have any traditions that go back that far. Par for the course, they can't all be right.

Why must we have an unbroken line of tradition, though? I think this misunderstands the appeal to radicalism (going back to the root) that is at the heart of much charismatic theology and practice.

Just as Luther, Calvin and the other Reformers broke with tradition because they thought something had been lost (or maybe I should say they thought many extraneous things had been added).

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Gamaliel
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@beatmenace, if it helps at all, you've probably read a similar amount of Patristic stuff as me and rather a lot more medieval RC material than I have ... so I'm certainly not claiming to be Mr-Source-Document or be any better appraised of these things than your average reasonably well-read charismatic.

I've read Wesley's journals though and whilst there are 'signs and wonders' I think his position on them, like that of other 18th century contemporaries, was rather ambivalent - or at least, more ambivalent than is popularly portrayed. As indeed my position (and that of many of us) is today, so that's no real surprise.

@South Coast Kevin - sure, I can see where you're coming from. Jesus commanded his disciples to do this stuff, I'm a disciple so therefore off I go in obedience to his command - whether it 'works' or not ...

That's the view I'd have taken at one point. I'm not sure whether I'm older, wiser, more cynical or what - but there's only so long you can keep doing the same thing over and over and over again without any apparent 'results' without becoming disillusioned or rethinking things somewhat.

Who was it who said that folly is doing the same things repeatedly and expecting a different result?

If one believes in a 'gift of healing' as it were, then it would quickly become apparent whether one had that gift or not.

As for praying for people in general - sure, we can all do that. I'm quite happy to pray for people's well-being, healing etc in the privacy of my own house if I've been made aware that they are ill or something. I'm not sure I'd go round and lay hands on them and pray for their healing there and then or 'command' them to be healed.

One of the dafter things, I think, that Wimber bequeathed the charismatic scene was this idea that you somehow built up from smaller miracles to bigger ones - as if you could learn and improve on your performance and 'strike-rate' as it were.

I s'pose one could argue that the more you go around praying for healing the more likely it is to occur eventually - but I'm not sure it works like that.

I really don't know how this sort of thing 'works'. All I do know is that I have no desire to be part of anything that builds up a sense of false expectation only for these expectations to be cruelly dashed. I've seen too many instances of people who thought they'd been healed and where the apparent healing didn't 'stick' or materialise.

Sure, all healing is temporary, even Lazarus died at some point - but common-sense, observation and even the scriptures ('Trophimus I left sick at Miletus') seem to suggest that we can't turn this stuff on at will like a tap.

The reason the signs and wonders in Acts and so on were recorded were because that's what they were - signs and wonders - not everyday occurrences.

If you're going to go around laying hands on people and praying for them to be healed and nothing ever (or rarely) happens as a result then sooner or later someone's going to get hurt. I think the chances of someone suffering psychological damage or trauma or becoming disillusioned and losing their faith entirely is a far more likely result of you and your pals' little faith adventures than miracles of healing to be brutally frank.

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the long ranger
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I've been around churches that believed in healing all my life. And have known charismatics of various kinds (and attended various sorts of charismatic churches for much of that time).

I can think of quite a few people within those congregations who have died of serious illness. Of those, I can recall quite a few where the churches made a considerable effort to pray (nights of prayer and so on). I can remember several instances of oil being poured over the sick person and special declarations of healing.

Of those, I can only remember a very small number who actually were healed. And of those, I can't think of any where there was no other explanation - all were being cared for by the NHS system.

To my mind there is no evidence that those who get specially prayed for are any more likely to survive than the general population. Most of the time the prayer clearly makes no difference as the person gets sicker and dies.

On the whole, the charismatics make claims about healing which cannot be justified. They make extravagant claims about things which might just be the way of things, they ignore all the people who are clearly not healed, they claim the miraculous in ordinary things - such as someone getting a job, someone traveling somewhere without getting ill, someone else selling a house and so on.

The troubling thing for me is not that these are evidence of blessing from a benevolent deity, but they are a special blessing for this special group of people as a result of special pleading by specially holy or Spirit-filled people. And as I said before, the clear teaching of Jesus seems to be that these things are not the sorts of blessing Christians should be seeking!

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"..If some have no teeth, then teeth will be provided.”

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beatmenace
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quote:
On the whole, the charismatics make claims about healing which cannot be justified. They make extravagant claims about things which might just be the way of things, they ignore all the people who are clearly not healed, they claim the miraculous in ordinary things - such as someone getting a job, someone traveling somewhere without getting ill, someone else selling a house and so on.

While i can see where your coming from , i feel you are starting to batter a Scarecrow here.

Anyone who has ever prayed for healing on any kind of regular basis will know that some folk are not healed. Does that mean we should never pray for anyone to be healed? I dont think so.
But to say this issue is ignored is simply untrue.

quote:

The troubling thing for me is not that these are evidence of blessing from a benevolent deity, but they are a special blessing for this special group of people as a result of special pleading by specially holy or Spirit-filled people. And as I said before, the clear teaching of Jesus seems to be that these things are not the sorts of blessing Christians should be seeking!

Most Charismatic Christians will argue that any believer can potentially demonstrate signs and wonders and would never claim to be in anyway 'more special' than anyone else. There MUST be some exceptions but i wouldn't think they are the norm.

What you describe sounds more like a Gnostic varient - with all the 'specials' in it - i guess some may veer in this direction!

Lastly, the timing of perfectly natural things can also be an answer to prayer. I dont know the specifics of your cases so i can't speculate if it is or not.
In todays economic climate finding a job or selling a house may well need divine intervention! I live in the North.

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the long ranger
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quote:
Originally posted by beatmenace:
While i can see where your coming from , i feel you are starting to batter a Scarecrow here.

Anyone who has ever prayed for healing on any kind of regular basis will know that some folk are not healed. Does that mean we should never pray for anyone to be healed? I dont think so.
But to say this issue is ignored is simply untrue.

Personally, I'd say yes. But even if you do believe in the 'power of prayer', surely the fact that it doesn't work should give rise to some hestitancy to make the extravagant claims made by some, as seen further up this thread.

quote:

Most Charismatic Christians will argue that any believer can potentially demonstrate signs and wonders and would never claim to be in anyway 'more special' than anyone else. There MUST be some exceptions but i wouldn't think they are the norm.

Again, see further up this thread where claims about the holiness of the life was cited as potential reasons for this kind of spiritual gift.

The very fact of being a charismatic Christian is to imply that you're more special - specifically shown by terms like the 'baptism of the spirit'.

quote:
What you describe sounds more like a Gnostic varient - with all the 'specials' in it - i guess some may veer in this direction!
I think a good argument can be made that many charismatic forms of Christianity are actually a form of gnosticism. If you are claiming to have a special relationship with God and that he gives you special miraculous powers as a result, that isn't far from claiming special mysterious knowledge of the divine.

quote:
Lastly, the timing of perfectly natural things can also be an answer to prayer. I dont know the specifics of your cases so i can't speculate if it is or not.
In todays economic climate finding a job or selling a house may well need divine intervention! I live in the North.

I don't think prayer works like that, more specially I teaching from Jesus seems to suggest that those kinds of things are not even the sorts of blessings we should desire.

As I waffled before, repeatedly talking about Blessings, and then associating these with health, wealth and success are closely related to the Prosperity Gospel.

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"..into the outer darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth,” “But Rabbi, how can this happen for those who have no teeth?”
"..If some have no teeth, then teeth will be provided.”

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Gamaliel
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I think that much popular charismaticism is actually a lot more Gnostic than its proponents would like to accept ... but on the whole I think it tends to fall short of full-on Gnosticism, the long ranger.

There is an inherent dualism within it, though, but arguably that's true of evangelicalism per se.

One of the things that strikes me is that would one surely expect there to be a lot more healings and a lot more of the miraculous given the number of charismatics that there are around.

I would hazard a guess that there are around 100 people in my small town of 12,000 people who would makes some kind of claim to charismatic experience. I don't see that making any kind of difference to the level of supernatural healings and what have you that take place around here - can't say that I'm aware of any ...

In a US time of the same size, depending on its location, I could imagine there being many times that number of charismatic Christians. I wonder whether the incidences of supernatural healings would be commensurately increased?

I very much doubt it.

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http://philthebard.blogspot.com

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