Dealing with Cessationists

Palmfever

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There are arguments on both sides. My attitude toward miracles/gifts is thus:

I’ve witness some being ‘slain in the spirit’ and to be honest I was skeptical.

I heard ‘speaking in tongues and it produced the same response.

That being said, I tend to believe that modern day Christians have stopped believing in them and are lukewarm when compared with the early church. They’ve bought the lie because they haven’t the faith. If we were to go into church’s today and speak against the hypocrisy and sin we would be arrested or thrown out. Many are as was Thomas, I won’t believe it until I see it. But what did Christ say in Matthew? ‘Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.’

Here in Mark.

‘And he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith.’

Someone who does not believe in miracles has little chance of seeing one. Yet, what is prayer for if we don’t believe.

I’ve had answer to prayer on many occasions. Faith is an interesting phenomenon, You can’t fake it. You can’t drum it up if you don’t have it, but when it happens it opens a fresh perspective in our reality.
 
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NBB

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...or to avoid pressing the issue until a certain level of maturity is evident.

I don't know if you need to be mature at all, you just need to believe, and be with the correct people who is telling you to be filled, like the disciples: "have you received the Holy spirit when you believed, we did not even heard of the HS they said"
 
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ARBITER01

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The Baptism of the Holy Spirit, like i, is counterintuitive.
We won't consider either until we are developed to a certain point.

I would disagree.

I received my infilling of The Spirit in under a year after being born again. What matters here is each persons dependency on GOD. If I only relied upon what others said and the books I read, and I was concerned about my social circle of friends and what would happen in my church if I did receive,... then I would probably do like a good percentage of folks do, not pursue it.

I reached up to GOD and asked Him to help me receive this if this was something that He wanted me to have,... and after 2 1/2 days of fasting, The Lord filled me mightily.

Our dependency on GOD matters, and there is always something new with Him.
 
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The point is that the miracles that happened through Peter and Paul in the book of Acts were clear-cut and witnessed by multitudes of unsaved pagans, which resulted in whole communities of pagans turning to Christ. They didn't have to demand proof that the miracles were real. The miracles themselves proved it and they saw that the power of Christ was greater than that of their pagan gods.

In our modern times, the same has happened when the Gospel has been preached and miracles have happened associated with it, and whole communities of unsaved unbelievers have turned to Christ. In the same way, it were the miracles themselves that provided the proof that Jesus Christ is alive today.

It is interesting to me that when a modern miracle of instant healing of a serious medical condition has occurred, and the community of unbelievers have turned to Christ because of what they witnessed, the professing Christians argue about the authenticity of it and demand more conclusive proof that the miracle has actually taken place. It seems to me that unconverted unbelievers tend to believe and accept the miracles more readily than professing Christians! What does that tell you?
 
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NBB

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The point is that the miracles that happened through Peter and Paul in the book of Acts were clear-cut and witnessed by multitudes of unsaved pagans, which resulted in whole communities of pagans turning to Christ. They didn't have to demand proof that the miracles were real. The miracles themselves proved it and they saw that the power of Christ was greater than that of their pagan gods.

In our modern times, the same has happened when the Gospel has been preached and miracles have happened associated with it, and whole communities of unsaved unbelievers have turned to Christ. In the same way, it were the miracles themselves that provided the proof that Jesus Christ is alive today.

It is interesting to me that when a modern miracle of instant healing of a serious medical condition has occurred, and the community of unbelievers have turned to Christ because of what they witnessed, the professing Christians argue about the authenticity of it and demand more conclusive proof that the miracle has actually taken place. It seems to me that unconverted unbelievers tend to believe and accept the miracles more readily than professing Christians! What does that tell you?

The wife (RIP now, i miss her) of a pastor i know, when she was young had to be taken literally everywhere by her husband the pastor, because she was so gravely ill with cancer she could barely move, the doctors said nothing could be done with the cancer, she was healed to live until she was old.

Her husband the pastor married her when ill, he was labeled a nut for doing so by their family and friends. Epic story, she was from Chile and came to Uruguay to die, and also a guerrilla soldier and passed time in prison for that in the dictatorship in Chile before meeting God.
 
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lismore

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If you are trying to prove something you need evidence . You will need to find someone who was healed by a miracle and collect evidence from that person. Shouldn't be difficult.

Agreed! In every church/ Christian family there will be evidence. God Bless :)
 
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lismore

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It is interesting to me that when a modern miracle of instant healing of a serious medical condition has occurred, and the community of unbelievers have turned to Christ because of what they witnessed, the professing Christians argue about the authenticity of it and demand more conclusive proof that the miracle has actually taken place. It seems to me that unconverted unbelievers tend to believe and accept the miracles more readily than professing Christians! What does that tell you?

Hello Oscarr. It might tell you that they've been bitten in the past and don't want to be so again (in some cases).

Sadly although there are genuine healings today there are also wolves in the sheep-pen. The bible warns us to expect that (Matthew 7:15). However I think the issue in our day is that the wolves, once revealed, in some cases are still allowed free access to the sheep. God Bless :)
 
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Hello Oscarr. It might tell you that they've been bitten in the past and don't want to be so again (in some cases).

Sadly although there are genuine healings today there are also wolves in the sheep-pen. The bible warns us to expect that (Matthew 7:15). However I think the issue in our day is that the wolves, once revealed, in some cases are still allowed free access to the sheep. God Bless :)
As I have been reading these threads on miracles and cessationism, I am also reading John Calvin's commentary on Acts. These jumped out of the page this morning:

Acts 19:12: "For [miracles] were proofs of God's extraordinary power, but he records that Paul's apostleship was distingished by these signs, in order that the authority of his teaching might be more certain."

Also, concerning Acts 19:13, commenting on the event where the demon overpowered the sons of Sceva:
"So that it might be seen more clearly that Paul's apostleship was confirmed by these miracles, which have just been mentioned, Luke now shows that when certain men made false pretense to the name of Christ, such an abuse was severely punished. We learn from this that such powers were put out through the agency of Paul for no other purpose except that evidence might be given to all that he was faithfully preaching Christ as the power of God, since the Lord not only did not allow them to be separated from the pure teaching of the Gospel, but also punished so severely those who were irregularly appropriating them for their own exorcisms. Again we gather from that, that all miracles obscuring the Name of Christ are deceptions of the devil, and that those, who lay claim to genuine miracles of God for any other purpose than confirming the pure religion, are deceivers."

So, it is clear that Calvin believed that the miracles were to support the preaching of the Gospel and to confirm thr truth of the Gospel when preached to the unsaved. Calvin says that any claim to miracles that are separate from the preaching of the Gospel in the Name of Christ, are false, and those who claim such miracles are deceivers.

This quote, made in the late 16th Century by John Calvin, perfectly describes the false Prosperity and Guaranteed preachers who are claiming miracles and healing as part of their ministries. This is because these Prosperity preachers are not preaching the Gospel of Christ, but are claiming God's power for themselves - to bolster their own ministries and persons thereby obscuring Christ.

Calvin says that the true miracles of Paul were "to prove himself a true apostle of Christ, to win men's confidence in the Gospel, and to confirm his ministry". He says that "the false appearance of miracles is a horrible charm for deluding unbelievers, so that they are plunged into deeper darkness because they rejected the light of God."

I find it remarkable that Calvin, so many hundreds of years ago, is clearly describing many of the aspects of the Prosperity, Guaranteed, Word-Faith claims of miracles and healing, when their ministries are almost exclusively directed at professing Christians in their conferences, rather than preaching the true Gospel to the unsaved.
 
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Sabertooth

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I reached up to GOD and asked Him to help me receive this if this was something that He wanted me to have,... and after 2 1/2 days of fasting, The Lord filled me mightily.

Our dependency on GOD matters, and there is always something new with Him.
That is/takes a measure of maturity that some do not pursue.
 
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chad kincham

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How do you deal with Cessationists?

How do you approach Christians who disregard all modern miracle accounts as hearsay unless hard indisputable evidence is provided, in the form of peer-reviewed publications in medical journals, undeniable footage of a miracle, etc.?

Do you just share your testimony and hope for the best?

Do you engage in scriptural debates and go over controversial passages that Cessationists typically cite to make their case?

I’ve got a pretty fair amount of documented healings, where a doctor involved in the case, and/or medical imaging, says it was a miracle.

There are thousands of testimonies by Christians who’ve been healed after prayer, but I collected the medically documented ones - like the fetus that was documented to be dead in the womb for two weeks, that came to life, and their ob/gyn Doctor calls it a miracle, and a cardiologist who raised a dead man to life after he died in the ER.

Just click on “watch it on YouTube” to watch the first one.



 
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There are arguments on both sides. My attitude toward miracles/gifts is thus:

I’ve witness some being ‘slain in the spirit’ and to be honest I was skeptical.

I heard ‘speaking in tongues and it produced the same response.

That being said, I tend to believe that modern day Christians have stopped believing in them and are lukewarm when compared with the early church. They’ve bought the lie because they haven’t the faith. If we were to go into church’s today and speak against the hypocrisy and sin we would be arrested or thrown out. Many are as was Thomas, I won’t believe it until I see it. But what did Christ say in Matthew? ‘Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.’

Here in Mark.

‘And he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith.’

Someone who does not believe in miracles has little chance of seeing one. Yet, what is prayer for if we don’t believe.

I’ve had answer to prayer on many occasions. Faith is an interesting phenomenon, You can’t fake it. You can’t drum it up if you don’t have it, but when it happens it opens a fresh perspective in our reality.
The problem is that many Charismatic and Pentecostal churches have turned themselves into "bless me" clubs instead of being what they are here for: to present the Gospel of Christ to the unsaved community around them. If people are looking for miracles to "bless me", then they are going to be disappointed, because the miracles won't happen, no matter how many prayers are offered and how much effort is put into "believing for it".

All the manifestations that are being seen in Charismatic churches are no evidence of God's power at all. It is just all fleshly froth and bubble. The real power of God is in the preaching of the Gospel to the unsaved. That's what we see in the ministries of Peter and Paul in the book of Acts. Paul saw that the Corinthian church was becoming a "bless me" club and getting away from its true purpose through self-indulgence. The whole of 1 Corinthians is Paul's teaching to turn a church away from self-indulgence and getting it back to its true purpose - to use its gifting to get the Gospel out to the pagan community around it. Paul told them where the real power of God is: "I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, because it is the power of God leading to salvation to those who believe."
 
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Presbyterian Continuist

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The gifts are the children's bread, not the worlds. If GOD desires to operate in mercy to them, He will, but it is grace to us.
We need to be careful not to reapply what Jesus said about His ministry being exclusively for the Jews, rather than for the Gentiles at the time. There are no verses in the New Testament that say that the gifts of the Spirit are "the children's bread". The gifts of the Spirit are for the strengthening and building up of the body of Christ to make it into the powerful witness to the Gospel of Christ that it should be. They are not designed for the self-indulgence of Christian believers. The purpose of God is to have a visible church to show through the power of the Holy Spirit that Jesus Christ is truly resurrected and is alive today, and to show this as a witness for Christ to the unsaved community around it.

The church was never designed to be a "bless me" club that had their meetings with the doors shut and the members all ministered to themselves; unfortunately, many churches have become just that. This is why we don't see many exhibitions of God's power, and most of the claims of it are without substance.
 
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ARBITER01

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We need to be careful not to reapply what Jesus said about His ministry being exclusively for the Jews, rather than for the Gentiles at the time. There are no verses in the New Testament that say that the gifts of the Spirit are "the children's bread". The gifts of the Spirit are for the strengthening and building up of the body of Christ to make it into the powerful witness to the Gospel of Christ that it should be. They are not designed for the self-indulgence of Christian believers. The purpose of God is to have a visible church to show through the power of the Holy Spirit that Jesus Christ is truly resurrected and is alive today, and to show this as a witness for Christ to the unsaved community around it.

The church was never designed to be a "bless me" club that had their meetings with the doors shut and the members all ministered to themselves; unfortunately, many churches have become just that. This is why we don't see many exhibitions of God's power, and most of the claims of it are without substance.


I agree with your last part Oscarr.

GOD operates with the body of Christ in grace, unmerited favor because of what was accomplished by Jesus. The world has to receive mercy, and that's obviously by GOD's choosing.

Where would we expect GOD to manifest His gifts more? Around where His body members are.
 
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That's what I meant, the body of Christ.

The gifts are to edify the body, if GOD chooses to use them to those outside of the elect, He can, but it is not a given. He's not going to have one of us who operates in them to head over to a hospital and heal everyone, they are not His.
The point is not to charge off to a hospital and try to heal everyone. The purpose of the gifts is to build up the body of Christ to form it into a entity that will boldly and powerfully preach the Gospel to the neo-pagan community that surrounds us. The signs and wonders accompany the preaching of the Gospel are not the gifts of the Spirit. The gifts of the Spirit are for Christians who already know that Jesus is alive today. They don't need them as proof of that. The healing miracles that occur out among the unconverted are confirmation that the Gospel is true and that unconverted people should repent and have confidence in the Gospel of Christ.
 
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I agree with your last part Oscarr.

GOD operates with the body of Christ in grace, unmerited favor because of what was accomplished by Jesus. The world has to receive mercy, and that's obviously by GOD's choosing.

Where would we expect GOD to manifest His gifts more? Around where His body members are.
The post I have just written explains the distinction between the gifts of the Spirit for the body of Christ, and the healing miracles that confirm the Gospel of Christ to the unconverted.
 
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ARBITER01

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The point is not to charge off to a hospital and try to heal everyone. The purpose of the gifts is to build up the body of Christ to form it into a entity that will boldly and powerfully preach the Gospel to the neo-pagan community that surrounds us. The signs and wonders accompany the preaching of the Gospel are not the gifts of the Spirit. The gifts of the Spirit are for Christians who already know that Jesus is alive today. They don't need them as proof of that. The healing miracles that occur out among the unconverted are confirmation that the Gospel is true and that unconverted people should repent and have confidence in the Gospel of Christ.

We're getting of the thread subject Oscarr. I'll just have to entertain your post in another thread.
 
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How do you deal with Cessationists?

How do you approach Christians who disregard all modern miracle accounts as hearsay unless hard indisputable evidence is provided, in the form of peer-reviewed publications in medical journals, undeniable footage of a miracle, etc.?

Do you just share your testimony and hope for the best?

Do you engage in scriptural debates and go over controversial passages that Cessationists typically cite to make their case?

To be honest Truth, I don't really waste a lot of time on them if I don't have to.

They are more than likely born again, sealed with The Spirit, but after that, when The Holy Spirit was leading them towards the next step of the infilling, they got talked out of it somehow. Once they really set themselves against having the filling of The Holy Spirit and His gifts, GOD helped them believe the lie even further, just like scripture says.

You gotta remember, Jesus dealt with these sorts of people in His day, the ones that refused to believe and went about arguing with Him at every point to try and make Him look bad somehow. It's not much different nowadays in many respects. GOD could restore a whole leg to someone in front of them and they would still be trying to argue against it.

There are always greener pastures to go to, and our livelihood and strength is with Him, not amongst them.
 
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