- Jun 25, 2018
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Well, most people already made up their mind about the doctrine they hold already, so I don't see any point in rebutting.
My objective is more to understand how people form their doctrine.
I'm a Calvinist... but not a cessationalist..
I guess I mainly base that on my own experiences, as well as hearing things coming out of the mission field, first hand accounts of missionary Pastors and the miraculous things that they experienced.
It doesn't seem to be the same level perhaps as demonstrated by the Apostles, but it does indeed still appear to occur. People speak of missionaries knowing to meet a certain person by revelation, or a newly saved individual feeling led to go to a town they've never been in before to meet with a person, without knowing why only to find a missionary.
Others have their lives saved by taking a certain direction over another in an area of high persecution, or being led to stay in an area only to find it's the only safe place for them to stay.
I think great caution needs to be used when considering accounts, as certainly I believe there is also a counterfeit spirit also based on real world accounts and testimony...
But in most areas these days there isn't the need of the powerful moving of the Spirit, as because of the Spirit of God many areas are quite safe, so we won't see nor experience the same types of things.
I don't believe God does things needlessly, i.e. He doesn't demonstrate His power just to prove Himself powerful (He's God and has nothing to prove) there's always a reason and that reason is to lead people to Himself... so the little things that seem so powerful and miraculous in one area, might not be seen in other areas of the world..
But God absolutely still moves in great power among His people.
I also think we need to consider what the Spirit of prophecy is, and what it is not, as well as what tongues are, verses what it is not...
Tongues biblically isn't mumbo jumbo it's actual languages that real people can actually understand, as seen in Acts.. Mumbo jumbo is false, while an Indian walking into an American church and hearing the gospel in his own language is speaking in tongues, biblically.
The Spirit of Prophecy is a teaching spirit, and people like Charles Stanley, Paul Washer, Wayne Grudem among others have that gift even if they never demonstrate the ability to foretell the future...
So on and so forth...
Our world is so much different in some ways than it was 2000 years ago, and in others much the same.
I do think so many people hyperfocus on the miraculous and things God does in power, and overlook the relationship between them and God, which is what all of it's about in the first place.
Ted Cruizes father gave an account in 2015 leading up to the primary elections in which he spoke of Cruizes family and pastor and some elders all praying together for God's will in Ted Cruize's presidential run.
He spoke of God telling them in that prayer session they needed to seek God's face, and not His hand.
They errantly extrapolated their desires on what that meant, and decided it meant that Cruize was going to be the next president.
When I heard this account, the second I heard it I knew Cruize wasn't going to be the republican nominee... because anyone with Biblical knowledge knows that when your seeking God's hand your seeking a manifestation of God's power, and if your seeking God's face your seeking the relationship.
So when God told Ted Cruize he needed not to seek the power of God for presidency, but rather foster a deeper relationship with Him, Mr. CRUIZE ignored God's call to him completely...
Which is, sadly, a problem with many Christians today. God is saying to them to deepen their relationship with Him and they seek nothing more than God's power to achieve their own ends, regardless of what those ends are, healing, powerful ministries that rake in the dough, powerful job positions, it's all about God's power and if they don't get what they want they walk away - because they don't want the relationship.
It's why Jesus said that for those who seek signs none will be given them but the sign of Jonah.
We are definitely in that generation, more so than the first generation that was marked first by the relationship that led to them being willing to die for their faith.
When the relationship exists in its fullest potential, I do think very real signs are still a mark... if and when God desires it so.
When I was saved it was as if all of heaven opened up and poured down on me... but it didn't stop me using my mind, and the gift God gave me to develop a greater understanding of His Word, and that did prevent me from attendance at a charismatic church, even though I'm not a cessationist. Doctrine is what was everything to the Apostles, not expressions of God's power...
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