VOL. XIX  NO. 8      NEWS & VIEWS, NOTES & QUOTES, TO WARN & INFORM      May 2002

CARLTON PEARSON’S ‘INCLUSION THEOLOGY’—Carlton Pearson is founder of a multiracial, charismatic megachurch in Tulsa. He claims he lost the recent mayoral primary due to his belief in inclusion theology, which also questions the existence of a literal hell (5/02 Charisma). His gospel of inclusion states that everyone is saved—they just don’t know it. Pearson said he first started thinking about the inclusive doctrine after reading E.W. Kenyon’s writings over 25 years ago and has been preaching it for three years. Per Dave Hunt, Kenyon is the real founder of today’s Positive Confession movement which has also influenced Hagin, Cho, and others. Pearson spoke at NRB’98. 

COMMERCIAL CONTEMPORARY MUSIC—Modern praise concerts where there is a ticket price have moved from worship of God, to the entertainment of the people. You don’t pay to worship God! The cost of a praise service can be covered by a freewill offering but when tickets are sold, as in a recent Gaither concert in Toronto, the emphasis is on entertainment rather than the worship of God (2/02 Canadian Revivalist). Toronto Free Presby. pastor Dr. Frank McClelland said according to advertised ticket prices, if the Air Canada Centre was full that would bring in $1.5 million.

CCM LEADS TO NEW EVANGELICALISM—Music is a powerful force for change. Rev. John Ashbrook writes in the 4/02 OBF Visitor: Wherever Christian contemporary music is welcomed by a fundamental church or school that fundamental entity will become new evangelical. Worship music is one of the great battles in Bible-believing churches today. We must teach students to thrill to the worship music which upholds the Savior. Be warned, be wise, beware!

CATHOLIC PRIEST’S UNSCRIPTURAL THEOLOGY—Influential Catholic priest Michael Manning gave the following answers to Larry King’s questions (12/1 show): King asked: Now Father, if you don’t believe in Christ when you die, are you going to hell? Manning replied: No, not at all. It’s the Catholic belief that Jesus is the source of salvation, Jesus is God; we believe that. But what [do] we say to the millions and billions of people who don’t even know about Jesus, are they just thrown into hell? Or what about a Rabbi who really follows the Lord as best he can? As a Catholic, I’m very comfortable that he attains salvation by doing this. King: So he achieves it without believing in Christ? Manning: Correct. [He added that it’s not the goal of Christ to try to throw people into hell.] King: … [H]ow do you view Mohammed? Manning: As a very wise man. I see the beauty of Islam in a very strong way. A simple approach to God….I’m very touched by Ramadan, by the fasting; the beautiful presence of God and the power of God. And as a Catholic, I need to learn from that. (Foundation)

U.N. WORKERS TRADE AID FOR SEX—The United Nations has publicly accused its own aid workers and peacekeepers of rampant sexual abuse in West Africa (3/30 World). According to testimony of refugees, male UN staff members traded wheat and other food items, tarpaulins, and medicine for sex with girls under 18. UN workers feel free to abuse the people they are supposed to help and protect. 

FORCED TO PAY FOR SOMEONE ELSE’S ABORTION?—Last month, California became the first state to force insurers to cover so-called morning-after pills. Gov. Gray Davis ordered California HMOs to pay for the drugs, claiming that a woman’s right to choose must never be held up by red tape. (4/13 World) But, what about the right not to pay for someone else’s abortion? In 1999, Davis signed a bill requiring HMOs to cover federally approved contraceptives. 

BONO SEEKS AID FOR AIDS IN AFRICA—U2 rock singer Bono visited Washington last month to drum up political support for aid to Africa (for AIDS programs, and Third World debt forgiveness). Evangelicals were impressed by his profession of faith in Christ (but see 4/02 CC), and reporters were in awe as he tagged along with Pres. Bush for a day (4/22 Chr. Today, 3/30 World). Aid funds usually go to corrupt dictatorships and seldom reach the needy people. 

HALF OF RC PRIESTS MAY BE HOMOSEXUALS—Roman Catholic seminary president Donald Cozzens says that at least half of the priests and seminarians in the U.S. may be homosexuals and that the priesthood is becoming a gay culture (4/8 C. News). RC officials have covered up for them. 

COURT KILLS BAN ON VIRTUAL CHILD PORN—The U.S. Supreme Court last month shocked Christians over the country with a decision that legalizes child pornography when the pictures are generated by computers, etc. The ruling struck down a congressional ban on virtual child pornography, saying the First Amendment protects pornography or other sexual images that only appear to depict real children engaged in sex. *** And a federal judge has ruled against a bid by the Justice Department to overturn an Oregon law that allows doctor-assisted suicide. Attorney General John Ashcroft had sought to override that law, saying helping people to die was not a "legitimate medical practice." 

VICTIM AWARDED $80,000 FOR INJURY AT SERVICE—A woman who broke her arm after being slain in the spirit during a charismatic worship service won $80,000 from the Long Island church where she was injured (2/21 Ala. Baptist). The minister placed his hand on her forehead causing her to fall backwards. She argued the church should have had someone in place to catch her. Or better yet, why not heal her?

CAMPING SAYS GOD’S USE OF CHURCHES IS ENDED—Family Radio founder Harold Camping claimed in his 1994? book that Christ would return in 1994. Foolish date setting is unwise. He now writes in the new Family Radio News: It is the time when the work of the corporate external church has been finished. It is no longer used of God to do the work that had been assigned it to do as its principal endeavor. That work is to evangelize the world. Thus we have learned that the time has now come when we must leave our churches and congregations even though we are to continue to gather in fellowship with other believers (Heb. 10:25). This means that God’s usage of the churches…has come to an end. (4/8 C. News). So does Camping think Jesus was wrong when He said the gates of hell would not prevail against the church? 

BWA LEADER WITH POPE AT ASSISI—Baptist World Alliance Gen. Sec’y Denton Lotz participated in Pope John Paul’s interfaith prayer gathering for world peace at Assisi, Jan. 24 (Foundation). Lotz said: I went to Assisi to affirm as Baptist Christians that we are people of peace and that we will join the other Christians to pray for peace. His other Christians included Catholics, Muslims, Hindus, etc. (2/15 CC), He has reached out ecumenically to Catholics before (see 2/1 CC). The testimony of conservative So. Baptists is tainted by its membership and support of the apostate BWA. 

OBF’S ‘EXPECTATIONS’ FOR CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS—John Ashbrook in the 4/02 Ohio Bible Fellowship Visitor writes: We expect the schools to which we entrust our young people to take the separatist position of Christian service which holds that believers must only be yoked in ministry with spiritual equals. We expect our schools to teach our students that they cannot unite in service with modernism, new evangelicalism, ecumenical evangelism, or the charismatic movement. Rev. Ashbrook lists other expectations from schools (relating to morality, etc.), and said in church history it has usually been the schools which changed denominations from Bible-believing to apostate. He said we have watched such institutions as Moody, Biola and Wheaton change from fundamentalist to new evangelical and must be diligent lest the same pattern be followed by fundamentalist schools we now support. Music, Bible texts, and other current issues are mentioned in this 4-page article. Order it from: OBF, 3165 N. High St., Columbus, OH 43214, 10 copies for $3.50.

OBF ON BIBLE TEXT ISSUE—Rev. John Ashbrook (OBF Visitor writes: The Bible text issue has become a divisive force in fundamentalism. He adds: We in the Ohio Bible Fellowship are grieved at the way this issue has divided fundamentalism. Every school which trains pastors must deal with this issue. In its teaching it must express its own conviction on the biblical text. However, we hope that our schools will beware of an emphasis which divides and makes it impossible for true, but differing, brethren to work together. 

USE ONLY ‘ORIGINAL SOURCES’ IN QUOTING?—A Michigan PhD in an e-mail last month suggested this. (On the surface, it sounds more ethical and fair and, indeed, can and should be done at times.) But we replied: How many deceivers would give a truthful answer if it meant their deception would be exposed thereby? If one is devious enough to be a deceiver, he would have no qualms in lying to cover it up. I John 4:1 commands us to try or test false prophets, etc., and we do this by comparing their teachings to the Word of God (Isa. 8:20, Acts 17:11, Matt. 7:15-16). A wolf comes in the attire of a sheep, so wouldn’t it be naïve to ask him (primary source) if he’s a wolf? Great care must be taken in exposing compromising brethren who call themselves fundamentalists but are linked in ministries with new-evangelical compromisers. These we are to note and admonish, but not to count as enemies (II Thes. 3:14-15). 

Do not use our old Sparkman Drive address for Calvary Contender mail. Use 104 Cotton Row, Huntsville, AL 35806. See 2/15 CC note. 

BILL BRIGHT’S ‘BEYOND ALL LIMITS’ CONFERENCE, ‘GLOBAL PASTORS NETWORK’, ‘SYNERGISTIC CHURCH’—Dennis Costella has a good firsthand report of the Beyond All Limits pastor’s conference which convened in Orlando, Jan. 17-19 (Foundation). Campus Crusade’s Bill Bright had the vision for this. The purpose was twofold: first, to minister to the 5,000 pastors assembled at First Baptist Church and second, to launch a new Internet program for training pastors for the new millennium, the Global Pastors Network. The ambitious plan to network (join together in common fellowship, ministry and purpose) and instruct virtually every Christian worker in the world by way of the Internet and satellite technology in the decade ahead was impressive. The proposed global synergistic church model, an ecumenically-styled network of churches and ministries where doctrinal issues are set aside and all who say they love Jesus will join together to reach the world for Christ. Many messages were helpful and Biblically-based. Speakers included Drs. Falwell, Stowell, Smalley, Warren, Trask, and Merritt. Charismatics were well represented by Hayford, and PK’s Bill McCartney who stressed the need for no divisions to exist between all Christians. The above speakers and the following other ministries are part of 200 already committed to the GPN. Kay Arthur, Henry Blackaby, Bill Bright, Chuck Colson, Jim Cymbala, James Dobson, John Hagee, David Jeremiah, John Kilpatrick, Erwin Lutzer, Chuck Swindoll, and Bruce Wilkinson. A conference leader said: In the future, those [pastors] who are not networking will not be working. 

REVISIONIST EVANGELICALS OFFER STALE LIBERALISM—The struggle to define evangelical boundaries has existed since the formation of the movement in the 1940s. Young evangelicals in the 1970s stretched the movement leftward. The evangelical left now resists any meaningful boundaries at all (4/6 World). A group of theologians recently released a new manifesto for revisionist evangelicalism. The Word Made Fresh calls for evangelicals to resist attempts to propagate rigid definitions of evangelicalism that result in unnecessary alienation and exclusion. Without doctrinal boundaries, New Evangelicalism has long been adrift, moving leftward. The middle of the road is a dangerous parking place. 

THE EXTREME MIDDLE—We have heard about the extreme right and the extreme left, but it is the extreme middle we need to expose as being extremely deceptive, extremely disobedient, and extremely dangerous. (Rev. Hayes Minnick). Dr. W. B. Riley in bygone years said: The middle-of-the-road man is the theological menace of the twentieth century. In the battle between truth and error, (good and evil) neutrality (moderation) is no virtue.

SCHULLER COZIES WITH MUSLIMS—Islam rejects the Jesus of the Bible. Yet Robert Schuller’s compromises with Islam are notorious. From personally preaching in the mosque of the Grand Mufti in Damascus, to allowing the Islamic leader’s cleric son to preach from his own pulpit, these things are nothing new for someone who sponsors Christians and Muslims for Peace at his Crystal Cathedral. He stated to an official of the Muslim American Society that if he [Schuller] came back in 100 years and found his descendants Muslims, it wouldn’t bother him…. (3/02 Berean Call) He was also a keynote speaker for the Unity School of Christianity’s (New Age) conference ridiculing evangelical Christianity; at Unification Church (Moonies) functions with Sun Myung Moon, and at Mormon Tabernacle where he addressed an interfaith event and saluted the Mormon Church (Vantage Point). 

CHARISMATICS GO BEYOND PENTECOSTALISM—In promoting a book by O. Talmadge Spence in 1989, Dr. Bob Jones, Jr. wrote: The Charismatic movement goes far beyond the traditional Pentecostal practices of healing and speaking in tongues. It is not a matter of what many of us regard as a misinterpretation and misunderstanding of Scripture. It is a denial of Scriptural authority and infallibility…. 

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