I offer my apologies to those who those who have been following my articles of late, for my delay in providing fresh feed for the flock. I will adjust.
I’m afraid my walk and calling are not the Pentecostal norm. However, for that, I make no apologies. For those who like milk, I’m not the writer to follow. Sorry, but since my restoration over 5 years ago, I have gone through hell on earth in my personal walk with God and the office of ministry God has called me to. I’ve been thrust into the flames of trial and testing and endured peril of false brethren and even peril of false ministries within a oneness Pentecostal organization that does not yet understand that they are fast approaching the judgment of God on their heresies, attitudes and lack of justice and judgment for anyone in the body of Christ that does not fall inside their clique of licensed ministers.
Sorry, but I am no Apostolic apologist, and I’m getting ready to handle it as roughly as I have to do so in order to get the job done. For those, my friends, my fellow laborers in Christ and fellow ministers in Apostolic truth and doctrine, please bear with me. I have no axe to grind, but I’ve delved into areas within an organization and cut into some issues that have festered in the Spirit to a point that it is time to lance the infection and let the poison out of a movement that has gone astray, or admit that a large Pentecostal organization, no matter how vastly renown and affluent, can and will be brought down to the ground if they fail to hear the voice of God and what the Spirit is saying to the church in this hour.
Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. Rev. 3:20
I’ve long thought about the cry of the Holy Ghost in the book of Revelation, when after speaking to the angels of the seven churches and pleading with the angels of those churches to hear what the Spirit is saying to the church, that Jesus Christ himself just stepped back and said, Okay, if I can’t get the angels of the churches to hear me, then just let me find one man! IF ANY MAN WILL HEAR MY VOICE…How can a church age get so deaf to the cries of the Spirit of God that he would step past organizational hierarchies and governances and even the ears that should be hearing the voice of the Spirit and cry “IF ANY MAN WILL HEAR MY VOICE?” If I can just find one man that will listen to me, I can turn this thing around!
After 10 years of wandering as the walking wounded and 5 years of restoration by fire, I’ve learned exactly how men learn not to hear the Spirit’s cry. I’m sorry, I won’t name names. Be content if you know me well, to know the organization I have walked in for 30 years. Two months ago I determined after many political battles and soul searching to seek licensing with another Oneness Apostolic organization, even while still sitting in the very churches of an organization where God placed me to root out, pull down, destroy, throw down, build and plant. If you have questions about that statement, see Jeremiah 1:10 for the answer to that job assessment. Thank God he doesn’t look at pedigree when he chooses to call us to work in his kingdom.
Recently I spoke with a very well-known UPCI minister I know about the calling of God on ministry. When I told him that I knew about the calling God placed on my life at an early age. He made what to me was the most stupid comment I’ve ever heard come out of the mouth of a licensed minister. “That’s a scary thought. You know what calling God called you to! That terrifies me.” His personal attempt to interrogate me at that point met a road-block and I lit into him from the Word about the programs and politics of modern Pentecost.
Knowing what he knew of the storms I had gone through for 5 years, he said he was amazed it that I would think it was the will of God for God to place me in a position or office to correct a man of God who had stepped off into sin, heresy and pastoral abuse.
Now he was right…in one way. It wasn’t the will of God for all those things to happen.
The will of God would have been for one minister to NOT be stealing from his church building fund and for God to NOT have had to slap the same man out of the pulpit for attacking me over the pulpit for revealing his sin.
The will of God would have been for another minister to NOT listen to lies from a backslidden sinner against saints in his congregation and NOT be abusive to his saints in the counseling office.
The will of God would have been for a yet another minister to NOT be teaching a heresy that Apostolic Gentile believers had to keep the Law of Moses in violation of Acts 15.
The will of God would be that yet another minister NOT stop preaching holiness.
And finally, the will of God would be that his ministers, presbyters, elders and leaders keep justice and judgment and NOT sit back on their laurels and refuse to correct sin in their congregations and districts.
He was right in one way…but it is all a matter of perspective.
And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Son of man, say unto her, Thou art the land that is not cleansed, nor rained upon in the day of indignation. There is a conspiracy of her prophets in the midst thereof, like a roaring lion ravening the prey; they have devoured souls; they have taken the treasure and precious things; they have made her many widows in the midst thereof. Her priests have violated my law, and have profaned mine holy things: they have put no difference between the holy and profane, neither have they shewed difference between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from my sabbaths, and I am profaned among them. Her princes in the midst thereof are like wolves ravening the prey, to shed blood, and to destroy souls, to get dishonest gain. And her prophets have daubed them with untempered morter, seeing vanity, and divining lies unto them, saying, Thus saith the Lord GOD, when the LORD hath not spoken. The people of the land have used oppression, and exercised robbery, and have vexed the poor and needy: yea, they have oppressed the stranger wrongfully. And I sought for a man among them, that should make up the hedge, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it: but I found none. Therefore have I poured out mine indignation upon them; I have consumed them with the fire of my wrath: their own way have I recompensed upon their heads, saith the Lord GOD. Ezekiel 22:23-31
Ultimately I sat that afternoon, looking at a man who now at a pinnacle of success in his life and ministry, is wandering lost, not hearing the voice of God, or at least not hearing the things God is wanting him to hear. What terrifies me most is that we have a whole new generation of Pentecostal ministers who seem to be able to hear the voice of God to get a message to preach to you or me, but who can’t hear the voice of the Spirit calling them to a place of repentance, righteousness and godliness in order to correct things in their lives. I sense he was seeking hard to find a program to bring his church revival, new life and growth, but the things God is calling to him to do…fast, pray, travail in intercession and weep between the porch and the altar for souls…he will not do!
Gird yourselves, and lament, ye priests: howl, ye ministers of the altar: come, lie all night in sackcloth, ye ministers of my God: for the meat offering and the drink offering is withholden from the house of your God. Sanctify ye a fast, call a solemn assembly, gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the LORD your God, and cry unto the LORD, Alas for the day! for the day of the LORD is at hand, and as a destruction from the Almighty shall it come. Joel 1:13-15
Let’s face it brethren, it’s not about finding a message to preach to “the sheep” when we are resisting God in listening to his voice about removing sin, or stumbling blocks or hindrances in our own life, walk and ministry! It’s not about finding a “camp meeting message” or a “conference message” to preach and wow our peers. If we start dabbling in pet sin or worse, wading in carnality we are in serious trouble. I’ve seen men attempt to silence the gifts of the Spirit in our congregations so that their sins did not get revealed before their congregations. It doesn’t work…even if we use the excuse that some of our saints are getting “out of hand” with the gifts so we have to rebuke them and silence or “bind” them to calm them down. Trust me… in 30 years around the apostolic movement; you hear a lot of really stupid excuses about why the gifts are silenced in a church. That one topped my charts.
Ministry is not even about finding something to preach to our people or listening enough to God to hear him for a message when we won’t name sin in our churches and call it out from the pulpit with a harsh rebuke, naming the sin! Now we live in an age where we have ministers hiding behind their man-made versions of apostolic leadership and self-appointed authority, who will neither give nor take correction from the word of God!
Who do you take your correction from, preacher? I pray it isn’t some other preacher 1,400 miles away who barely remembers teaching you in Bible college! Every man, every minister, needs to be under subjection to someone. Preferably it would be more than one other minister, and they should be close enough to actually see the way we live and conduct ourselves on a reasonably constant basis.
The word “autonomous” has been thrown up in my face by more than one regional bishop or district superintendent to defend their refusal to correct ministers of gross sin against the body of Christ. Like the high priests, Levites, Pharisees and Sadducees of Jesus’ time, we’ve become so intoxicated on our callings and offices of ministry that we have entire organizations of ministers who think they are untouchable. They even teach a form of this as a doctrine over their pulpits, making their selves the President and CEOs of their local assemblies in violation of the word of God and the doctrine of the Apostles in the early church. They fail to realize that we as ministers are not the Head of the Body of Christ. Jesus Christ is the Head of the church, not the ministry. We are the servants of the Body. Come on Pentecost, it’s time to get real! I’m getting ready to rock so many boats of Pentecostal tradition that we’re all going to get sea-sick.
For the pastors are become brutish, and have not sought the LORD: therefore they shall not prosper, and all their flocks shall be scattered. Jeremiah 10:21
Is it so easy to sit back and try to teach in the flesh when God won’t anoint us with a message to preach anymore? Worse yet, it’s now easier for us to call in 5-10 different evangelists, special guest speakers and “Holy Ghost Crusaders,” because we are trying to avoid preaching something God told us to preach! We’ll use any venue we can from skits to guest speakers to cover for us while we drift aimlessly; trying to find a new program for the local church to follow while we avoid a message of judgment God gave us for the church! Is it that we have long since stopped listening to the voice of the Spirit, because He won’t say anything to us that we want to hear?
Worse yet, has God stopped talking to us entirely! How far have we drifted from God as a movement when men attempt to quash the voices of correction and direction God sends to them from venues not of their own choosing… or think that prophetic ministry cannot see what is going on in our churches when they visit. Has the prophetic voice of God backed away from us? Many of our churches have not had a prophecy, a tongues and interpretation or miracles in years. We can’t live forever spiritually on the testimonies from the one church in our district doing something for God. We need a Holy Ghost firestorm in every one of our churches!
For among my people are found wicked men: they lay wait, as he that setteth snares; they set a trap, they catch men. As a cage is full of birds, so are their houses full of deceit: therefore they are become great, and waxen rich. They are waxen fat, they shine: yea, they overpass the deeds of the wicked: they judge not the cause, the cause of the fatherless, yet they prosper; and the right of the needy do they not judge. Shall I not visit for these things? saith the LORD: shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this? A wonderful and horrible thing is committed in the land; The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means; and my people love to have it so: and what will ye do in the end thereof? Jeremiah 5:26-31
When God gives a minister a message to preach and he refuses and spends 3 months “teaching” the saints something he’s drawn up as a Bible or training lesson to excuse his refusal to preach what God gave him, and the Holy Ghost has to break in on him and yank him off his lesson and force him to preach something he did not want to preach and didn’t have the words for, there is something wrong spiritually in that ministry and in that assembly! Maybe you are in a church or pastoring a church that is on fire, friend. If that is so, then more power to you, but I’ve seen and heard things the last five years over the pulpits of Pentecost that have shaken me to the core of my being.
What causes ministers of God not to see the things of the Spirit? What causes spiritual deafness? Every guess would be a shot in the dark unless we look into the Word.
I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth. Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked: I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent. Rev. 3:15-19
How does a man of God get to where he cannot hear from God or to where God cannot relate to him in a relationship? He’s neither hot nor cold. Not on fire. Not to a point to where he is completely backslidden. He’s dwelling in the land of mediocrity and carnality, to where he’s hit a happy balance and can be phased by either end of the spectrum.
The city of Laodicea according to one theologian was situated where two rivers joined, one a hot mineral spring that could bring healing and rejuvenation, and the other an icy cold river that quenched and refreshed. The mixing of the waters at this point produced a tepid, mediocrity could neither rejuvenate nor refresh, and because of this, Jesus said, he will spew us out of his mouth.
Let me pause a moment brethren and state for the Apostolic record, Jesus Christ was not addressing some pagan, mainstream, neo-Christian mainline denomination here. He was speaking to the church of the Living God, a church that has been baptized in Jesus name, filled with his Spirit, and teaching the entire Apostles doctrine, not just a group of people camped out on one verse out of the entire New Testament. So often when we listen to these verses, the tendency is to look outwardly to those men, ministries and denominations that have so far strayed from the light of the True Gospel as to be easily recognized by the naked natural eye.
No. He was not speaking of them. He gave them no acknowledgment. They were not even a blip on his radar. Jesus Christ only recognizes one church, and so should we. There are no organizational walls that keep the Body of Christ bound. No ministerial fellowship, no card-carrying group can solely espouse being his bride. To claim otherwise is heresy. He recognizes no “member” in His bride who has not repented, been baptized in His name and been filled with his Spirit. That is the only key to seeing the Bride, the Kingdom…and the only key to entering. Without this key you can’t even see this Kingdom.
Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. John 3:3-5
Jesus was not speaking to some church that has long espoused some ancient Nicean heresy or taken on some dogma creed of some apostate pseudo apostolic father or apologist. He was speaking to his bride, a blood-bought, water-baptized, Spirit-filled body of Christ that had grown so lethargic in their wealth, increased with the goods of this life and in need of nothing. They are a group of blood-bought men and women who have become affluent in this movement, set in their ways and programs to where the leading and guiding of the Holy Ghost no longer stirs them…We can do it with our own blessed talents, charisma, oratory, preaching, programs, concepts, ideas, literature and flesh, Pentecost! Nor will Jesus Christ accept a church that refuses his correction.
As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent. Rev. 3:19
Now we even call in special “Holy Ghost Crusaders” while we pack the church with visitors and call them all to the front to a specially organized area of the altar with tissues, altar counselors and an evangelist telling them exactly how to receive the Holy Ghost while a choir pumps up the music to excite and set the mood. It’s our modern method of Cath-ecostalism. Give us a generation and we’ll be shoving communion wafers down their throat with a sip of wine and telling them they have received the Spirit. Did God honor their coming? Yes. Did they receive the Holy Ghost? The Bible says if you repent, God forgives. If you ask, you receive. I believe they did…most assuredly, but have we cheapened their experience with God to make it just a “thing” and not an experience?
I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom; Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables. 2 Timothy 4:1-4
Yet, here still, is the dilemma…Someone who has not been preached under conviction for their sins by the power of the gospel has just come and repented of sins (many of whom have no clue that drugs, shacking up, drunkenness are the works of the flesh) they have no idea they have committed, because no one has preached them the unadulterated Word of God. Many do not even know what they are repenting of, but because God accepted them at their word, they then walk out and many never darken the door of the church again.
Did they have a biblical experience? Yes. Did something get birthed in them? They just sat under a 15 minute sermonette by an evangelist who only preached Acts 2:38 to them. The remaining first 37 verses of the chapter where Peter calls them a bunch of murderers and how their sins caused the Lord of Glory to be crucified remains un-preached. This leaves them to either immediately fall by the wayside if a church does not stay contact with them, or to try and reform them by teaching them in various classes.
God did not call the foolishness of teaching to save men. God chose the foolishness of preaching. In many cases they go through all these classes without any change of their conduct, outlook, appearance or lifestyles and I’ve even seen some made “covenant members” with the local church and authorized to hold positions in the church that never changed from the day they had their “Crusade” experience!
I’ve seen some cases where entire assemblies enter their sanctuaries totally devoid of prayer, minus a 2 minute formality amidst the functions of a service, never truly seeking the face of the Spirit to cleanse our thoughts, align our lives, walks and ministries to His will. Nationwide, our music has become entertainment to a large group of SMOs (Sunday-morning-only) who don’t know God as more than a distant second cousin, and mid-week Pentecostal midshipmen who have never truly taken the full measure of decision it takes to see if they really want to get with the message or just sit and park on a pew the next 20 years. Let me pause to say it as cold, calculating and burdened as I can…saint, sinner or minister, sir, there is a difference between just “being saved” and being totally and completely delivered, just as there is a great difference between attending a church and being a part of the church! We are fast becoming just a denomination and NOT Apostolic!
I currently attend a fairly large Pentecostal church that does not even have a prayer room. Despite having been blessed with a multi-million dollar church edifice, gymnasium and outbuildings, they attempt to pray in the hallway on one side of the building while saints, sinners and ministers alike enter and exit while congregating to chat, greet and meet, all the while showing absolutely no regard to those weeping and praying a short distance away…lukewarm, tepid. Our prayer rooms remain empty or worse yet, filled but silent of the voice of travailing intercessory prayer.
Blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly: Gather the people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders, gather the children, and those that suck the breasts: let the bridegroom go forth of his chamber, and the bride out of her closet. Let the priests, the ministers of the LORD, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, Spare thy people, O LORD, and give not thine heritage to reproach, that the heathen should rule over them: wherefore should they say among the people, Where is their God? Then will the LORD be jealous for his land, and pity his people. Joel 2:15-18
God pity the misfortunate sinners who should chance to wander into the altar in one large south-eastern Pentecostal church I was blessed to attend awhile back. While the minister did his best to perform one of his 2-hour filibusters of a sermon in front of his congregation and show off his great oratory skills that he would be unleashing on an annual minister’s conference in the deep south the following week, he accidently gave what some poor sinners must have thought was a 2-second altar call. As the sinners heeded his two second call to repentance, they were trampled in the aisles as the blessed saints were dismissed for lunch before they ever reached the altar area. God forgive us of such blatant ignorance!
Now in this generation we seek for something new, something different, a new ministry, a new song, a new sound, a new outreach methodology, a new program or training method in the church that will make us “cutting edge” and “current.” Our church attendance is not to be a blessing and a testimony of what God has done for us during the week. No, we come together to let the music ministry pump us up emotionally so we can jig and dance and turn the church into a nightclub scene for the same people who will never get near the altar if the preacher preaches them under conviction.
Some only wait for a new guest preacher to turn up a new hot topic for us to get inspired for a week and try something new…all the while letting church turn into a great “bless me club” for spoon-fed Pentecostal lapdogs in our plush, velvet-lined ruts.
I’m sorry, Pentecost. If I offend you, just do as those in my organization have done for years, look at me as an outsider and a trouble-maker, and one that won’t conform to their man-made, so called, “ethics,” not rooted or grounded in the Word of God. I’m sorry, but I don’t see anywhere in the Holy Writ where just because God called me to preach that I am now and elite and privileged-class of Pentecostal ministry that is above correction! For that matter, half the Pentecostal movement only has a “three-fold” ministry, because they’ve done killed off every apostle and prophet God sent them! Don’t believe it possible? Better read Matthew 23:29-36
How is it that we can draw up a set of by-laws that we don’t even follow and don’t align with the Word of God? How is it that we can pass ordinances that will not allow any of our preachers to correct one another or root out things which the Holy Ghost has chosen not to accept in our affluent boy’s club of misguided “ministerial organizations?”
While we crave and cry for gift ministry, power gifts, miracles signs and wonders in our ministries…has God grown silent to our search, because the one thing we still have dangling in our dying grasp from the few remaining shreds of any semblance of Apostolic leadership from bygone generations is the exercising of justice and judgment in leadership. The one thing we have in our power to exercise, we refuse to utilize, or worse yet, wield with absolute disdain and prejudice out of respect of persons, ministerial or organizations inclusion or exclusion, or worse yet, in regards to organizational bylaws and man-made ordinances and not in accordance with the word of God!
If that is too big of a verbal chunk for you to chew on without swallowing, let me explain in layman’s terms. How is it, brethren, when a minister brings a fault or accusation against another minister in our movement before the ministry and leadership…how is it that if he is not a member of our specific organization we will not hear his plea? Or worse, if he is a friend of ours that we respect, we will not hear a cry for judgment for some sin he has committed against another brother, be they saint or minister? Or worse yet, if the aggrieved person is not of our own particular organization’s “licensed” ministerial staff, we will not hear it? Understand when we do this, God is judging us, judging our ministries, judging our churches and in many cases, divesting us of revivals we have longed for simply because we will not exercise just judgment.
That no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter: because that the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also have forewarned you and testified. 1 Thes. 4:6
Recently I watched a presbyter in one state (somewhere between the north and the south) refuse to judge a matter of absolute biblical heresy being perpetrated by one of his local ministers, even when half the ministers in the district knew of the wayward minister’s doctrinal heresy. After all, he’d only been preaching it for five years. Yet another short three years later another one of his ministers violated their own by-laws and stopped preaching the full Apostolic doctrine. When it was brought to that very same presbyter’s attention, he again refused correction.
I might have been frustrated if not for scriptures that show that when something like this happens, God revealed to me that judgment is actually taking place. God is currently judging his ministers to see if they will keep justice and judgment according to his Word. Will we take a stand for what is right? Or are we just an organizational hireling? Will we slip into the ranks of the false prophets of ages past who refused to correct, or worse refused to speak what thus says the Lord and fall into the ranks of the priesthood that will try and silence any voice of change, call for repentance, correction or direction that does not flow from our own throats? Or will we step to the forefront and cry aloud and spare not and speak what the Spirit is saying to the church age despite the unpopularity and infamy it will bring to our ministry from our own peers?
If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at the matter: for he that is higher than the highest regardeth; and there be higher than they. Song of Solomon 5:8
Like the vision of the angel with the ink horn, I believe God is sending his angels among the church of this hour seeking men and women of God who are sighing and crying for the sins of this nation, the sins of the church, the sins of the ministry. This nation is coming to its knees, not because of the nation’s sins and refusal to repent, but because the saints and ministers of the Most High will not humble ourselves and repent and cry aloud for the sins of this nation.
I believe God is currently putting his mark on a group of Apostolic men and women who are going to usher in a new era in the church age right before the Great Tribulation and the Rapture of the church. He is going to start with his ministry. We are headed for a war and not a war that will be fought by lackadaisical, lukewarm, cold-hearted, cold-spirited, Pentecostals in velvet-lined ruts of ease with their nice cars and Armani suits. God isn’t coming back for a wounded, whipped, half-backslidden, liberal, sissified, compromising, effeminate, carnal-minded, worldly, laid-back body of believers who don’t know what they believe and don’t know how to fight spiritual warfare.
While some ministers look at the mess I’ve seen and endured the past 5 years and some have even try to cast aspersions that there must be something wrong in my life and ministry for God to have placed me into such Euroclydon-class messes involving ministries and churches, I stand on the vow I renewed to God 5 years ago, when I told him I would go where he wanted me to go, do what he wanted me to do, and say what he wanted me to say. You’d better mean that when you say something like that, because it will cost you. It has cost me dearly.
That being said, let me draw the staff of the Word and get ready to smite the rock of Pentecostal traditions. Sit back, buckle your seatbelt and grab the hand rails. I’m getting ready to delve into areas of man-made doctrines that Pentecostals have given holy cow and Arc of the Covenant status to for the past 30 years or so. There is no way to be overly kind and sensitive when dealing with these issues, as they have become so steeped in Pentecostal tradition that they are taken as being directly from the Word of God. Sorry…they are not!
And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy, and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD unto the shepherds; Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves! should not the shepherds feed the flocks? Ye eat the fat, and ye clothe you with the wool, ye kill them that are fed: but ye feed not the flock. The diseased have ye not strengthened, neither have ye healed that which was sick, neither have ye bound up that which was broken, neither have ye brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that which was lost; but with force and with cruelty have ye ruled them. And they were scattered, because there is no shepherd: and they became meat to all the beasts of the field, when they were scattered. My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and upon every high hill: yea, my flock was scattered upon all the face of the earth, and none did search or seek after them. Therefore, ye shepherds, hear the word of the LORD; As I live, saith the Lord GOD, surely because my flock became a prey, and my flock became meat to every beast of the field, because there was no shepherd, neither did my shepherds search for my flock, but the shepherds fed themselves, and fed not my flock; Therefore, O ye shepherds, hear the word of the LORD; Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against the shepherds; and I will require my flock at their hand, and cause them to cease from feeding the flock; neither shall the shepherds feed themselves any more; for I will deliver my flock from their mouth, that they may not be meat for them. For thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I, even I, will both search my sheep, and seek them out. As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered; so will I seek out my sheep, and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.
Ezekiel 34:1-12
I realize that Ezekiel 34 is probably the most un-preached chapter by the Pentecostal movement as a whole, but it is in there for a purpose, so it is time to hear about it. Pastor was used as a word only once in the New Testament in Ephesians when Paul was telling about the five-fold ministry. A pastor from the meaning of the Old Testament references in Ezekiel 34 and Jeremiah 2, 3, 10, 12, 17, 22 and 23, was simply a shepherd. Often he did not even own the sheep he was shepherding, but was hired to protect them and lead them in and out to water, food and shelter.
If you know anything about sheep at all, they are truly dumb animals. Personally, I think some pastors prey on that fact in this day and age, and have for the last 50 years in Pentecost. However, sheep cannot be driven. They must be led, but not led as is the style of Gentile princes and leaders, or even as the misguided pastorates of modern Pentecostalism. They must be led by a walking example, not a dominant, commanding leader, but someone they have learned is fair, friendly, just and nurturing.
I once asked a shepherd about sheep and what they will do if they are beaten by the shepherd. He looked at me and said, “Brother, they will run every time they see you coming.” Yet when I asked about those he has nurtured over the years, he told me they came running when they heard him walking or smelled him or saw him.
If you walk straight at a herd of sheep, even as a shepherd, you will see something common to their nature. They will scatter and then fall in behind the shepherd that they are used to. They will follow him. He’s built a relationship with them of loving, caring and nurturing. Tell me this is the example of the modern day Apostolic church in practice and principle instead of theory and I’ll question your integrity.
The elders which are among you I exhort, who am also an elder, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed: Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly; not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind; Neither as being lords over God's heritage, but being ensamples to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away. 1 Peter 5:1-4
Peter’s words here echoed the commandment of Christ to Apostolic ministry. It is not something that can be argued with. Instead most will choose to merely ignore it or ascribe a different meaning to the words. There was no power, privilege, glory or monetary value to being a minister in the early Apostolic church. My how we’ve changed! Preaching is big money and big business for some in this day and age. Sorry, but if that is your model of ministry, you aren’t Apostolic!
Before you get upset with me…that was the POLITE version. You have no idea how much editing I had to do to get most of this to sound polite. That’s the problem with truth. Sometimes it doesn’t just hurt. It doesn’t taste good either! It goes down bitter, but it will be sweet in your belly if you let it get into your soul, Pentecostal.
Peter told the ministry to take the oversight, not the control or ownership of the flock. Overseers review how things are going and ensure that those who are in charge are doing right. He told them to take the job willingly and not be forced into it. Why? …Because there is no power or affluence in the position. If you think I’m nuts, Acts 6 reiterates this when church elected deacons to be over the affairs of the church. If you are worried about a loss of power or control, you might want to start questioning your motives and repenting. For the honest ministers out there, they realize there was an Acts 3 before there was ever an Acts 6. By then, there was a great fear and respect for the power of the Holy Ghost on the entire church. You don’t have to be in control as long as the Holy Ghost is, friend. That’s where our major problem is, we’ve become a pastor-led and not a Spirit-led church!
Now I’ll tell you why Peter told them to take their calling with a ready mind…and this will rock some of you so much you will stop reading. Here it is…New Testament ministers are NOT Levitical priests! There was no tithe assigned to them. They were there completely at the mercy of the Body of Christ. Yes…I know I just crossed theological swords with the entire UPCI…and half the rest of Pentecost as well, but that’s okay. Do me like your television set and turn me off. I’ll keep preaching anyway, because it is the truth. I learned from the best of you. Don’t worry. I’ll save the rest of the tithe and offering jazz for the end of this little message. Read on!
Peter also told them to take their ministerial oversight with a ready mind, not for filthy lucre. We get that all backwards in this day and age. Now many of our ministers get paid so well they come willingly to the task alright. The task was so thankless in Peter’s day that they had to pay them a salary. We put the emphasis on the filthy lucre Peter mentioned, but Peter’s emphasis was on the ready mind. They didn’t get tithes in those days of the Apostolic church. Let me tell you why. The tithes still went to the Levites by Jewish law. God didn’t take the New Testament priesthood out of the Levites. Read your Bible!
Peter said this because he wanted any type of pastoral ministry to be voluntary, willing and above all with the best interest of the flock of God in mind. There is a danger to taking the job for any other reason, or who do not care about the sheep.
Woe be unto the pastors that destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! saith the LORD. Therefore thus saith the LORD God of Israel against the pastors that feed my people; Ye have scattered my flock, and driven them away, and have not visited them: behold, I will visit upon you the evil of your doings, saith the LORD. And I will gather the remnant of my flock out of all countries whither I have driven them, and will bring them again to their folds; and they shall be fruitful and increase. And I will set up shepherds over them which shall feed them: and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, neither shall they be lacking, saith the LORD. Jeremiah 23:1-4
We have men who have lost the heart of the servant among us and have taken on their leadership as lords over God’s heritage and ruling as the princes of the Gentiles by exercising lordship over their congregations. I’m sorry, but Pentecost, this debate was settled in the Word of God in Acts chapter 6, as I mentioned earlier. The Apostles had the CHURCH pick out deacons to rule the affairs of the church. They did not do it for them. They had the saints pick out the deacons. My how that has changed! They knew Jesus had said in Matthew 20 that they would not rule his people like the princes of the Gentiles did their people. They followed up with this in the book of Acts by having the people appoint their leading elders and deacons. I’m sorry if this upsets your apple cart and gives certain ministers in certain Pentecostal organizations a heart attack, but you will just have to get with God’s Apostolic mode of leadership, brethren. Bear with me, it is a lengthy read:
Then came to him the mother of Zebedee's children with her sons, worshipping him, and desiring a certain thing of him. And he said unto her, What wilt thou? She saith unto him, Grant that these my two sons may sit, the one on thy right hand, and the other on the left, in thy kingdom. But Jesus answered and said, Ye know not what ye ask. Are ye able to drink of the cup that I shall drink of, and to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with? They say unto him, We are able. And he saith unto them, Ye shall drink indeed of my cup, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with: but to sit on my right hand, and on my left, is not mine to give, but it shall be given to them for whom it is prepared of my Father. And when the ten heard it, they were moved with indignation against the two brethren. But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant: Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many. Matthew 20:20-28
Now we One God Pentecostals are notorious for taking every denominational person we meet into the Bible to Matthew 28:19 and showing them Jesus’ commandment to baptize in the Name, not in titles, then rushing them to Acts 2 to show them where the Apostles fulfilled that commandment. We’ve rubbed their faces in it for years, so now it is our turn Pentecostals. Let’s go from Matthew 20 to Acts 6 and see how the Apostolic ministry fulfilled Jesus’ commandment not to be in dominance and control over his saints. I hope you are enjoying the analogy!
And in those days, when the number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews, because their widows were neglected in the daily ministration. Then the twelve called the multitude of the disciples unto them, and said, It is not reason that we should leave the word of God, and serve tables. Wherefore, brethren, look ye out among you seven men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business. But we will give ourselves continually to prayer, and to the ministry of the word. And the saying pleased the whole multitude: and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost, and Philip, and Prochorus, and Nicanor, and Timon, and Parmenas, and Nicolas a proselyte of Antioch: Whom they set before the apostles: and when they had prayed, they laid their hands on them. And the word of God increased; and the number of the disciples multiplied in Jerusalem greatly; and a great company of the priests were obedient to the faith. And Stephen, full of faith and power, did great wonders and miracles among the people. Acts 6:1-8
In these verses, we see the true governing function of the Apostolic church being set up, not ruled, regulated and led by preachers and ministry, because Jesus told them it would not be so among the Apostles. The early Apostolic church was ruled by elders and deacons…not preachers and not pastors. What was the “business” the Apostles were talking about? Running the church!
I’m letting that soak in before many of you start declaring I just committed the unpardonable sin of Pentecost and did something worse than blaspheming the Holy Ghost, by killing someone’s holy cow and questioning the model of modern Pentecostal governance and leadership, brethren. I’m know some preachers who would have already organized a lynch-mob and furnished them a rope with my name on it, but if I’m in the Word, I’m in the Word. Maybe you think this isn’t a salvation issue, but it does fall in the rank and file of obedience to the word of God, Pentecostal. I believe obedience is a salvation issue, don’t you?
The Apostlic ministry of the FIRST CHURCH gave their selves completely to prayer and ministering the word of God, not trying to govern a rapidly growing, even exploding assembly of saints! How dissimilar we are! No wonder we have so much preacher burn-out and men leaving the ministry. We try to run everything from the business meetings, church finances, nursing home visits, church appointments, and every aspect of the local and some district assemblies and we wonder why our brain is fried and we don’t have time to pray and don’t have the adequate time to study! We’re nuts to try and do something even Moses’ father-in-law said he could not do…run things by ourselves!
No, in 2009 we don’t give ourselves to prayer and the Word…we give ourselves to building a church that can support our retirement, developing our game of golf, vacationing in Barbados, developing our side businesses, retirement funds and money market accounts and deciding whether to preach at or just attend the next few conferences and district functions.
Let me drop in here some church history, pre-Pentecost, from the holy-writ:
Then saith one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, which should betray him, Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor? This he said, not that he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and had the bag, and bare what was put therein. John 12:4-6
Sorry, but after Judas’ death you won’t see a reference to anyone of the disciples or Apostles keeping the bag among the eleven. They passed the purse off to the deacons as quickly as possible. Experience had revealed that Apostolic ministry and money don’t go together. When decisions were made in the early Apostolic church, nothing was done without the approval of the saints, elders and ministry. Look at Acts 15. You won’t find many in Pentecost today that would be content to allow that kind of liberty and freedom in the church. It dictates that we lose our nasty control over people, namely the “saints.” It’s too “Baptist” for out taste. (I say that as a former Baptist.) To do so would mean placing trust in the elders, deacons and saints.
Maybe that last verse I mentioned in Acts 6 shows where the modern distrust of laity falls in our ministry. After laying on of hands by the Apostles, the Bible says that Stephen , “full of faith and power, did great wonders and miracles among the people.” Maybe therein lies the modern Pentecostal fear of non-pastoral leadership of the churches. Flesh hates for someone to steal its thunder or eclipse our self-imposed importance and control.
I’m firmly set that any ministry that is not fully relying on the Holy Ghost is a fleshly, carnal ministry. Yet we wonder why there are church splits and divisions among us. We’ve never learned to rely completely and totally on God. No minister of God needs ever fear being usurped from his position of ministry if he trusts in the Lord. It is when we trust in the arm of flesh and our own methods of governance and self-control that we gain a curse from God and loose the umbrella of his protection over our ministries. It is time as a nation that our Apostolic ministers fall on our faces in repentance and fasting and prayer and restore the works of the early Apostolic church in fasting, prayer and seeking God’s face for this land, for His people and for our cities. Then and only then will we see the full restoration of Apostolic power and demonstration in our land.
Just think with me for a moment what it would be like if every minister in the Pentecostal movement had the ability to just let the elders and deacons run the business affairs of the church and we could all give ourselves to continuous prayer, fasting and study and ministry of the Word. Think of the anointing that would be birthed in us. Think of the power that would flood our messages. You say, “but I’d lose control of my church.” Get honest once before you die! Look at Peter in Acts 3...do you think a deacon or saint will run over that kind of Apostolic ministry? Well? Not willing to risk it are you? Not feeling that Apostolic after all, huh?
Sorry, it's not your church or my church, it is God’s…and if we get Apostolic governance and leadership back into accordance and alignment with the word of God we will see a change in the Apostolic movement. Obedience to the commandments of Christ will bring the blessings of God. Secondly it will get elders and deacons in the body of Christ involved in the work of the church. Third, it will restore Apostolic Leadership and with it the miracles, signs and wonders that we have been seeking for so long.
Finally, restoration of the Apostolic Model of Governance and Leadership will allow the ministries to give their selves totally and completely to prayer and the Word so they can cry out to God for the sins of a nation. With this will come the power, protection and provision of the early Apostolic church.
Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and shew my people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins. Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and forsook not the ordinance of their God: they ask of me the ordinances of justice; they take delight in approaching to God. Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours. Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high. Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his soul? is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the LORD? Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh? Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the LORD shall be thy rereward. Isaiah 58:1-8
Now as a final side note, let me delve back into the realm of tithing and financial support as I mentioned I would. For all the UPCI cat’s that think that they still can mandate their saints pay tithes, and have formulated a doctrine about it, the Gentiles were never under the Law of Moses and no new commandment was given to them upon their conversion. In fact, Acts 15, the very same chapter God showed me to combat the mandatory dietary laws heresy I faced down 4 years ago, is the very same chapter that supports this fact also. The Gentiles were only given four mandatory things from the Law that the early Apostolic church mandated that the Gentiles keep:
But there rose up certain of the sect of the Pharisees which believed, saying, That it was needful to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses. And the apostles and elders came together for to consider of this matter. And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up, and said unto them, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us, that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel, and believe. And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us; And put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they. Acts 15:5-11 (Peter)
And after they had held their peace, James answered, saying, Men and brethren, hearken unto me: Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name. And to this agree the words of the prophets; as it is written, After this I will return, and will build again the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up: That the residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things. Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world. Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them, which from among the Gentiles are turned to God: But that we write unto them, that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood. Acts 15:13-20 (James)
It seemed good unto us, being assembled with one accord, to send chosen men unto you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, Men that have hazarded their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. We have sent therefore Judas and Silas, who shall also tell you the same things by mouth. For it seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things; That ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication: from which if ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well. Fare ye well. Acts 15:25-29 (Paul, Barnabas, Judas, Silas, and the entire assembly of Apostles and elders of the Apostolic church)
I’m having a really hard time trying to find the passage here where the Apostles ordained that the Gentiles pay tithes to either the Levitical priesthood or the ministry. Can someone please find me the tables of stone from where God came down and furnished the Gentiles their own Apostolic Gentile addition of the new and improved Mosaic Law? I know some of you are ranging in color from livid right now but I’m sorry, you simply won’t find it. You will find verses in the Old Testament under the OLD covenant where God told the Jews that the tithe was his. That was under the Law of Moses.
One of the worst and best things a Pentecostal minister ever did for me was to teach me a class on hermeneutics, and how to rightly divide the word and interpret scripture. It was the worst thing he ever did because I used it to totally destroy his philosophy on mandatory tithing. It was odd to say the least to watch a man who knew I still paid tithes get red with anger when I used the class he taught me to tear up his own mandatory tithing doctrine...so much for brotherly love.
And before you get so bent out of shape at me that you are calling the Gambino family to try and finance a hit on me, let me explain that I also know that Abraham paid voluntary tithes to Melchisedec, King of Salem after returning from the slaughter of the kings. He gave a tenth of all the spoils…not a tenth of his possessions, not a tenth of his income…a tenth of his spoil. However, we also see that Jacob vowed at the rock that if God would bless him he would give a tenth of all that God gave him and blessed him. Abraham was the father of the faithful and that even Levi paid tithes as yet unbegotten in the loins of Abraham.
We also know that the scripture says the things that were written before were written as an ensample for us that followed. Now if you want to make a doctrine of mandatory tithing out of that, then more power to you…heretic. In truth, the Law of Love, Mercy and Grace far outweighs the Law or carnal ordinances, which by the way, was done away at Calvary if you read Ephesians 2:
But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby: And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh. For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; Eph. 2:13-20
If you want to know my outlook on tithing, it is a simple one. How can I give less under Grace than someone who was under the Law? If Abraham was the father of the faithful, he was an example for us in giving voluntarily. Don’t try to throw a stumbling block or occasion to fall in front of your saints by dragging them back under Mosaic Law. Sorry, I just wouldn’t look good in a robe and sandals. Where do I stand on “tithing?”…I think Paul said it best to the Corinthian saints.
For as touching the ministering to the saints, it is superfluous for me to write to you: For I know the forwardness of your mind, for which I boast of you to them of Macedonia, that Achaia was ready a year ago; and your zeal hath provoked very many. Yet have I sent the brethren, lest our boasting of you should be in vain in this behalf; that, as I said, ye may be ready: Lest haply if they of Macedonia come with me, and find you unprepared, we (that we say not, ye) should be ashamed in this same confident boasting. Therefore I thought it necessary to exhort the brethren, that they would go before unto you, and make up beforehand your bounty, whereof ye had notice before, that the same might be ready, as a matter of bounty, and not as of covetousness. But this I say, He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully.
Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver. 2 Cor. 9:1-7
