Defecting From Bethel: Part 2 (Exclusive)

all right welcome back ladies and gentlemen to part two this culture is exclusive defecting from Bethlem once here once again with pastor Jeff Durbin myself and we are here with Jerry yes I'm Jerry hey someone's new to this yes yeah like I said I'm miny I noticed Jeremiah but once everyone gets to know me I just become Jerry it's just how I am so but we are here with Lindsay Davis we appreciate you coming on and if you guys haven't checked out the first episode definitely checked it out because this is part two of this interview so Lindsay if you can let's just recap the very last part of why you went public in the way that you did so I'm gonna just go ahead and hand it back to you listed let's do this take it from there yeah well at the end of the last episode I was just sharing that I mean almost 50% of Bethel school of supernatural ministry are people that have come from all over the world but what I was trying to explain is the reason that I had to go public in the rebukes and the correction of the false teachings and the demonic or you know psychosomatic called New Age practices maybe all of the above the reason I had to go public was because there's 1,500 people in first year 1,500 people in second year and I mean I think a thousand people in third year nine thousand people in Bethel and millions of people all around the world follow Bethel's teachings and so you know I had to say something because you know even if it's just for one person who you know God sovereignly reveals the truth and empowers the gospel for them to hear then it's for the one person and all of heaven rejoices over that so you know I had to say something because obviously I love these people and I love them enough to tell them the truth so ya know that's that's very good so I'd like to hear we on the past episode if you haven't heard episode one you go hear that episode to get the full story but now we're in the part of the story where you now have watched this film American gospel you've seen the failure of the the evangelical gospel in the West and the thing that's commonly propagated this false the fictitious version of the gospel and you've been challenged you're now seeing your own sin and and and now you see wait a minute what's happening around me isn't from God this isn't true and so bring us into that now you're realizing like I want to see people rescued from this like I am yeah but what does that look like for you now you're in the midst of this entire community and just just give everyone a picture of what the Bethel community is like and I don't mean just Bethel the church but I mean the community surrounding that church nine thousand people there all these students there well what's the town like well Bethel people I mean they're very nice people very kind but things get a little crazy when you disagree with them or you speak out against something that they hold very dear in their theology or in their behaviors and their practices but really be a system and Bethel has taken over the town of Redding and the town is very divided so so much of the town is actually associated with Bethel so take you know half of reading but then the other half of reading does not like Bethel at all there's really no middle ground in reading and everyone knows it and I mean everyone in Redding has had an encounter with someone from Bethel because you know these students go out to the grocery stores and they ask you know can I pray for your bodily ailment you know hey anyway heads up right now this is a joke this is real guys so everyone has had an encounter with students or people from Bethel Church just because of Bethel's you know activity in the town evangelistically and I use that term very loosely because evangelism isn't just going out and praying for someone's back pain to go away it's preaching the gospel which they rarely do at all but theologically the gospel they preach isn't really the gospel that we find in Scripture at all right and not only that I mean you have which you mentioned these these students that are going in and out you got 1500 first year second year third year so people obviously hear about Bethel they know about Bethel and then now we get to go to Redding California to enact this supernatural ministry but then it's like the people who are opposed to Bethel now it's like every single year you've got a brand new 1,500 students who are now going out getting ready to do the stuff that they're now experiencing but for people who are opposed to Bethel it's like oh boy here comes some new people trying to you know heal me or do or do these certain things so I can understand how there would be this this divide and then that's there's been a lot to cultish movements there's one specifically right now in Wells Texas when the same things happen where they're buying a property and there's this huge divide that's definitely a sociological structure without question in the history of coldest movements in the United States and abroad and one of the the main tactics of cults broadly is they get you in in terms of the love-bombing and we describe some of that stuff but if you begin to question the authority of the leadership or the teachings coming from that particular cult then you start to experience being ostracized being separated and disconnected and now we disconnect the love the affection maybe even disconnect from them altogether in terms of I can't speak to you can you describe what that was like now you're starting to question this what was it like in terms of the environment and the community when you start challenging some of these teachings what was it like it is really hard to go to school everyday because I walked around and it felt like I was like a leper and obviously we know in the Bible that like when lepers had to walk through the town they had to shout out you know unclean unclean yeah but in my experience you know everyone already knew I was unclean in the eyes of Bethel because of what I was doing and speaking out against everything that they held so dear so it literally you know felt like I was this leper walking around because I was being labeled with a religious spirit again I was being labeled as a Pharisee I was being told by people you know you have to watch out because you're on the borderline of blaspheming the Holy Spirit and obviously we know that's the unpardonable sin because you're questioning the practices right within Bethel right men of Bethel and so now you're being threatened with committing the unforgivable sin yeah yeah and if I'm being just honest and vulnerable like we know like coming out of coats there's a lot of confusion and like just trying to sift through everything I thought you know what if I'm wrong again you know what if I'm wrong again but every single night for the past four months I've literally stayed up till maybe five or six o'clock in the morning every night seeking out the truth in God's Word literally sometimes to the point of Tears and frustration and just like wanting to scream because I have to unlearn everything that I learned in Bethel and come to true knowledge of what scripture says all over again and it can be very frustrating because you this is sort of what it feels like it feels like you know one night I stay up till five o'clock in the morning and I build my house on the solid rock and then the next day I'm hit with this doubt again the cycle lot the psychological effects of coming out of a place that you know could be cultish considered cultish and i have to rebuild the house again and again and again yeah and it's a common experience from people come out of the Colts and I've seen that a countless times people come out of saying Mormonism and six months after things they're going doing well they're joyful and delighting in God and and then we'll have a conversation and they'll mention something and I'll say well actually that's that's now that the Bible teaches and they're like oh where'd that come from I'm gonna shake that loose too and I thought that that was a biblical teaching and it's it's a it's a common experience I'll just say for the record we don't get you some sleep yeah yeah I'm sure you'll probably catch up and that once you get back to Ohio yeah once I get back to Ohio for sure but anyways so yeah things got really really hard I was actually taken off of they have a private Facebook page for the school and for all of the students to be on to sort of mingle and whatnot and I was actually taken off of the Facebook page and blocked because I was posting things contrary to what Bethel teaches so I remember in one instance I posted a paul Washer sermon and it was just like this beautiful presentation of the gospel and the caption you know just said this presentation of the gospel is so beautiful you guys should listen to it this will really help us you know in our evangelism and I remember a lot of people got on this post and they said you're posting someone who dis honors our leaders and therefore you're dishonouring you should really think about your actions and I just thought you know they don't even talking about Bethel in this video like they're just presenting the gospel and so it was always very Coulter Shafter I spoke out they say that you know we want to cultivate a culture of freedom and we don't want to control you but that freedom only goes so far because when you disagree or you speak out about anything that freedom is taken away and your censored and in my experience excommunicated and we challenge when you're challenging the authority structure of the group yeah yeah and there's code wars that are given to cloak it in virtue and ethics so a word and again this is might be part of like your deprogramming we're now to even like theological you here like certain turns and like you read for the book of Acts now and you learn about you know what's happening at Pentecost and those sort of things and it's like okay hold on I got it I got to rethink this there might be this like and I've talked with that Daniel who came out of Mormonism like he's still like sometimes we'll read the book of Romans and just knowing that he was in a works based salvation for so long sometimes there's that mindset where I still want to think like a poultice with like thinking I have to work my way to salvation yeah but um specifically though you mentioned about being dishonorable they the honor is like one of these sort of words that is used yeah to basically say honor and dishonorable just in regards to giving unprecedented authority to bill and Chris yeah well in the ESSM handbook it says that they want to you know cultivate this culture of freedom and they're but they're more concerned about you breaking a value than a rule and they don't give you clear rules and they say the reason that this well they're I'll tell you the reason but they say that their rules are buried underneath their values but they don't tell you what the rules are they tell you what the values are and so when I was being kicked out I was told that I dishonored the teachings and I dishonored the leaders and one of their values is having a culture of Honor but it's very vague it's not specific it doesn't tell you what you can or cannot do what you can or cannot say and that seems really good on the surface but the reason that they say that their rules are buried underneath their values is so that they can make up any rules they want arbitrarily when they see fit and when they think someone is an imminent danger to their agenda well it's interesting because if you read well I mean throughout the Bible you can find these kinds of instances but if you read in Galatians when Paul is dealing with the perversion of the gospel not long after the resurrection of Jesus in the century of Jesus he is alarmed about how quickly they are deserting him who called them by the grace of Christ to another gospel which is moving on another he says but there's some who were troubling you want to pervert the gospel of so then he goes on to declare the anatomy which is a very big deal we should always be cautious about doing that yeah but he declares an anathema the curse of God and eternal death upon anybody preaching this gospel even if an angel comes from heaven even if you get this amazing manifestation of seeing your angel yeah and preaching this gospel to you let him be anathema am i trying to please men or God if I was still seeking to please men I would not be the servant of Christ but he goes on to describe an experience he had where you have the Apostle Paul and the Apostle Peter in a conflict with each other before the church and that's where Peter is actually engaging not in theological error in terms of saying something that's not in step with the gospel he just simply had behavior that could be viewed as a denial of the biblical gospel and justification through faith apart from works he was just doing something in his behavior that could have been interpreted as denying the biblical view of justification and it Paul says in Galatians just reading guys first three chapters he says that when he saw it he confronted Peter to his faith face in front of everybody and why because a core essential truth about how a person is made right with God was being denied just by perception of what Peter was doing and hanging out with Gentiles no problem this time but when these are the people coming from Jerusalem he's hanging out with them and affording the Gentiles and he's essentially saying like that is going to destroy the gospel Peter and he's in his face in front of everybody so in terms of this idea of like honor your leaders honor your leaders the answer is well yeah the Bible teaches that like honor those who Shepherd you care for you yeah submit to those who are in authority over you yes but that's not to an ultimate degree and that's shown even in our greatest examples with the Apostle Peter and Paul is Paul's willing to in front of everybody dishonor Peter to take down his honor for a second to say stop you're not an ultimate here and your behavior is going to confuse people with the gospel so stop yeah and so you do have a right when you have a core essential truths being denied to actually confront that and to quote-unquote dishonor somebody yeah when do you not see that in Scripture you don't see the Apostles you don't see the Apostles doing that kind of very aggressive in your face behavior over minor issues yeah minor disagreements secondary issues you just don't see it you do see it when you see somebody who's not walking in step with the gospel or they're denying fundamentally who Jesus is yeah that's where you see the Apostles tearing their beards out and freaking out so yeah and so and I definitely agree with that so just talking about when you started meeting with the leadership I want to just sum it up you can expand upon this is that you had meetings with them the meetings weren't necessarily you had some Syrians about this is what I'm seeing in Scripture this is what the gospel is you talked about there is a moment when you went out with everyone else to do this ministry yeah and you're preaching the actual gospel and you had classmates come up to you or saying what what's this what's you're talking about they were they were is something that they hadn't heard before yeah and so and you were asking questions a sincerity it was there an attempt to open up the word of God and answer your questions or was it more just to see if we can let's see if we can get Lindsey to calm down and conform back to the way we want her to be like okay which way which way which one was it well when I went into the meeting it was just me and then three people so sort of like this three against one and I really came in with a heart too all right if I am under misunderstanding something I want to be receptive to them explaining what I miss understanding through using the Word of God as their source but from what I've done the past four months I think that at this point I can biblically judge righteously because I know what scripture says yeah so when I came into this meeting I thought that you know they would ask me questions they would want to know what I find to be false or heretic Oh but it wasn't like that at all there was a lot of dominance from their side in the conversation just telling me that I'm dishonouring that they don't understand why I have to publicly speak out there was a lot of stress on that and I was trying to voice my concerns and we reached a point in the conversation where the overseer of the SSM said to me Lindsay you're not even explaining to me what you think is heretical and I said well do you want me to explain what I think is heretical and she goes yeah I think so no not really and I said I just was sitting there like but you just said that I'm not explaining myself so trying to make me look like I'm not saying anything but then when I want to bring my concerns to the table it's shut down really quick and also in that first meeting an interest for the records I know they're in terms of biblical standards here and so this isn't just your word yeah there is a confirmation yes as to this conversation we'll leave it at that yeah there's it's not this is not just your word right now we can attest to it yeah yeah so towards the end of this conversation she reaches over and touches my arm and she says honey I'm like I'm genuinely worried that you're going to come after my family or something and I said what and because I was posting these things online she's apparently worried that I'm going to come after her family and then my revival group pastor who was part of the meeting said that students have been coming to him with concerns and they are scared and you know they have fear because of what I'm saying online when all I was perpetuating online was you know this is the truth this is not you know believe the gospel and trust in Christ alone yeah so yeah that's sort of how the first meeting was like and at the end of that meeting they said well because we didn't have time to talk about you know the full range of your concerns today we would like you to type up a document of what your concerns are so I mean I had a lot of concerns a lot you know false christs false gospel demonic behaviors and practices so I went home that night and I took the weekend I probably worked on it for 48 hours straight a thirty one page document explaining all of my concerns with their theology and their behaviors and their practices and when I sent it to them they sent me to someone higher they sent me to an overseer of third year of be SSM who is apparently getting his master's and Bible and theology and so when I went and I had the second meeting I think the thing that stood out to me the most is that in this meeting he said you know Lindsey we value the gospel here but it just doesn't always get airtime and I thought well I heard time do you imagine Jesus is bloody and battered body and think I mean we think you're important but we're just not going to give you air time yeah air time this is what Christianity is about the gospel and that's what that meeting was like but I made it very clear that you know I'm not backing down I'm standing firm and nothing that you're going to say unless you can show me in Scripture nothing that you're going to say is going to make me waver from the ultimate source of authority which is the gospel of Jesus Christ the bible scripture and so in the last meeting it was only about two minutes long much shorter than all of the other meetings and they just called me in and they said you know Lindsey we just feel like we wouldn't be geniuses keeping you around when you just totally oppose our leaders and you publicly speak against us and they said you know I think it's best if you go back to Ohio and so they asked me to leave and I had to you know shake the dust off my feet and move on but I'm not moving on from truth and trying to help people in 15 minutes later you got a message from me on facebook messenger and here we are talking about yet though this is funny is interesting to see how this has come full circle so I think it's important to lay a foundation here now because your this is very unique and compelling story yeah and it's an experience you've had a dramatic experience that is conch and testimony again we're kind of using the language we've had when we've had conversations with our LDS friends and neighbors but there are people right now who are in ESSM who also are sincere and and have a testimony and and and and I appreciate their Pat me out I've gone through the comments on your facebook thread and and I can understand I and I can appreciate the fact that they're passionate for what they believe but just because you're sincere and passionate doesn't mean you're right and by their own admission they would believe that given by what they're saying of you that you know you're young you're passionate you're going for the truth but ultimately we have there's tests news experiences that are in contrast to it with one another yeah we can't differentiate between the two you believe you had an experience with the Holy Spirit yeah when you saw American gospel there are others right now who believe that they are experiencing the miraculous and the manifestations when they're talking with with Bill and Kris but ultimately I want to jump back to the foundation that we laid what what Jesus said is thy Word is truth that we need to look at the Word of God and address how do we can which experience conforms to the Word of God yeah and ultimately we can't use our experiences Authority and we're not going to do that so what I want to do now is let's let's have a conversation just about the theological foundation because again there's there's videos for example that are out there that you shared and about what I would say is definitively a possibility of demonic manifestations I don't think you can look at the video of the guy shaking uncontrollably and falling off stage [Applause] and again I I'm the I'm king of skeptics I try to rationalize it like maybe this is some sort of psychosis or whatever it is but I just don't see that at school right yeah so we yeah so we need to look at what does the Bible say about what these practices that they're doing is it biblical so that lets lay the foundation of that so you've got a couple books over there as props there's the kind and again so what you have there is you have one of your manuals when you were a bethel student um you've got that you've got a book if you want to hold up the power of communion you've got that one you can see there this is a recent book you just you just we're gonna go over a couple quotes from that in fact and this is this is basic fundamental teachings you can go you bought these books you probably still have the receiving your car very fundamental teachings but give an example just off the get-go what are some distinctives that they're very clear core doctrines and then we'll just bring it up we're just gonna talk about what the Word of God says about it and how your conversation about that what's wrong yeah well in order to understand I think the the basis of everything is you know if you're truly Christian if you're truly in the faith you have to get two things right the gospel and who Jesus Christ actually is if you don't have those two things right you have a Jesus that cannot save and you're the gospel that cannot save so a popular teaching from Bill Johnson is that Jesus Christ he says in his book when heaven invades earth he says and I believe it's chapter 10 I could be wrong but it's in this book and he perpetuates it and his sermons if you just look it up but that Jesus completely laid aside his divinity and that he ceased to be God on earth that he was only a man in right relationship with God and obviously that isn't the Jesus of scripture we know that Jesus is the same yesterday today and forever in that the fullness of God dwells in him Bardo and so we know that that is not true and we know that the Jesus Christ that bill Johnson is perpetuating is not the Jesus Christ of Scripture if you look at Bethel's gospel bill johnson teaches that any gospel that is taught by you know teachers or preachers or whoever that is absent of signs and wonders that is an absent of an encounter it's a powerless gospel and so if it's a powerless gospel we know that in Romans is it Romans 1:16 it's a God unto salvation yeah so they believe really that it's not the gospel that's the power of God into salvation but it's an encounter it's an experience it's a sign or a wonder that is the power of God unto salvation and that is a different gospel so yeah that's one part of there may I ask you this in terms of the experience and I don't want to put this on the experience as the acid test here but I just want you to I want you to tell me sort of the cultural part of that do you see in in an experience at Bethel and the students and the church itself an emphasis on when you're having an opportunity to preach crisis somebody or to given the gospel and emphasis upon the holiness of God the sinfulness of humanity and the need to repent and believe in Christ and what he's accomplished is there an emphasis on that when when we talk about the gospel like I'm going out to preach the gospel for a bethel student looks like no yeah well first of all I'll tell you sort of what their evangelism is like and then but first like in church because obviously their church has even more congregants than students but the gospel is thrown on at the end of a message like an accessory it's no longer the centerpiece it's no longer the foundation and which we build upon but it's really just thrown on at the end of the message just to say you know we shared the gospel but even the gospel that they share isn't God is holy we have fallen into sin we have become wretched and without hope our heart has become hardened towards God there's no one that seeks him there's no fear of God before our eyes and our own righteousness is as filthy rags compared to God and only Jesus Christ has the power to save you because of the finished work on the cross there's none of that there's no explanation of who Christ is what the gospel is why Jesus Christ had to die for you on the cross there's none of that the gospel really looks like at Bethel God just wants to have a relationship with you and he just loves you so much and he just wants to come into your heart and he wants to just have your life no you need Jesus's life you need Jesus it becomes this thing where God needs you mmm when you're the one who needs God and how do you even know how to enact repentance like you talk about terminology if sin is really never discussed yeah whose aspect their explanation of repentance is how the Greek defines it which is you know a changing of mind but what they explain a changing of mind like is taking on heavens perspective and that sounds like that sounds beautiful right I'm gonna just take on heavens perspective without realizing that you're a wretched sinner without hope that you need to repent of your sin and trust in Christ alone because he is holy and if he is going to enact perfect justice he's going to send you to hell there's no fear of God they really and I'm just going to be blunt in saying this they show the true meaning of what Romans 3 is all about where it says there's no fear of God before our eyes there's no sensitivity to sin there's no there's no grief over our wickedness or you know anything so God just wants to have a relationship with you so you wouldn't here and all those are common pithy slogans of modern evangelicalism that have now just become the norm like let Jesus into your heart sort of a thing it's like we'll find that in the um you won't I promise and don't go to Revelation because that's not what that's talking about but you wouldn't hear coming across the pulpit and Bethel words like come die no I've never heard one message about dying to yourself I hate hate father mother sister brother wife even your own life and you come and die yeah count the cost of what it means to come and turn to Christ and his salvation and lordship nothing like that no I mean there are so many people you won't hear that at all no no wrath of God you'll hear sin mentioned but there's such a insensitivity to sin that like sin just doesn't even mean anything anymore there's I've never heard the word wickedness I've never heard the phrase wrath of God no explanation of any of that so without any explanation of that there's no understanding of the gospel our condition right our position before God God and His Holiness the the need to to repent and believe exactly in in trust in what Christ baby becomes more of this you're you're you're really proclaiming and then people are pursuing a a relationship with Jesus and and and what comes as the selling it sounds like this and tell me if I'm wrong like tell me if i if I'm not accurately portraying this is it the the selling point for all of this is not so much you get Jesus and forgiveness and salvation is it look at all of this experience and the signs and the wonders and these feelings you can have all that with this Jesus yeah is that what we tell it describe what that's like what what is the main thing what are people hearing and and and and believing absolutely yeah it's definitely experience based it's power based if you come to Jesus he's going to give you power over everything they believe that right now that we have dominion over all of heaven and over all of Earth we do yes we we do and that all Authority has been given to us and obviously we know from first Corinthians 15 that we will not rule with Christ on this earth until he returns until every put under his feet and so and specifically when they say the US the US is the people that are in the Bethel movement specifically because we have a I've saw comments where people even talking about well we have we don't have what they have so therefore we have a powerless gospel yes right oh I've been told I have a powerless gospel more times than I can count and I haven't told them that I don't believe in spiritual gifts or that God heals or any of that I believe in God's providence I believe that God can heal I've seen God heal people many times and provide Providence that's important to hang there for what's up yeah so for those who are watching this right now that that's a very important thing to highlight in this moment of this discussion is act as to what's wrong is this is right this is not a debate right now in terms of what's wrong at Bethel and Bethel school of ministry it's not a debate over cessationism versus continuation ISM whether the spiritual gifts are active and available today that's not even what this is about no not as this is about a distortion of what the gifts are a distortion of what the gifts are coinciding with a really powerless gospel and a very at least at minimum an ill-defined gospel in terms of what am i coming to Jesus for yeah I mean the point of the Cross exactly I mean everyone wants the Jesus that will heal their body everyone wants the Jesus that will give them their inheritance which is a really big thing at Bethel too and when I was studying Scripture the other day I just realized you know the only person that demanded their inheritance from God and well if you look at the prodigal son that's where I'm going with this he demanded his inheritance from his father he was given it he went out and he basically turned into a pig squandered it yeah and you know he was welcome back to his father's house but he repented and people don't even know what it means to repent so the reason that we're talking about this is because we want people to know it like if you want to repent you can and this is what it means to repent if you want to trust in Christ God willing this is the gospel right this is who Jesus Christ is No and I pray that God sovereignly opens your eyes and softens your heart to the truth of the gospel well you know this is I think when the important things this this is hopefully a highlight thing and hopefully a blessing to you in the midst of you working through these things with Scripture the way that you're describing where you're at now and what you saw was wrong and how you know something is off there oddly this is what's so peculiar about it is oftentimes these movements when they have such an emphasis on these experiences and the spiritual gifts and the power and always everything's they go now back to Pentecost back to Pentecost go read the book of Acts look at the signs look at the wonders and I would say well yeah that was fulfillment of prophecy God said that essentially at the turning over of the old and new covenant there was gonna be the signs and wonders that a competent company did it but again this is not the discussion about whether those gifts are present now and all those things it's a question of this if you want so much to go back to the book of Acts and to Pentecost and what was happening in the time of the Apostles then I challenge you to actually read the book of Acts outside of the influence read the book of Acts and look at what the Apostles and early Christians are preaching yes like if you want the book of Acts Christianity I'm on board like yeah yes high five hundred percent like that's what I want say high five good let's aim for that yeah but in order to get that Acts first century Christianity we got to get our noses in that book and say what were they saying yeah because what they were saying wasn't isn't what your you are saying you're hearing at Bethel yeah would you see the Apostles proclaiming and how they're engaging the culture with the gospel listen mmm oftentimes the people are liking to the spiritual gifts and like let me fix the length of your leg and you know and and you know laughs and and oh like you know all these different things are happening it's like you know okay okay but let me ask you like when when you experience a a preaching of the gospel and your culture are you having to be lowered out of windows mmm because people want you dead yeah are you having are you going into places and the whole city is going into an uproar and are they taking you into jail and fogging you are you going into a place where people are actually taking oaths to not eat anything until you're dead like you know because that's how the up hostels are preaching the gospel and the gospel their preaching is leading people to Jesus that church is being built up the church is multiplying it's growing but some people also wanted Paul dead Acts chapter 9 yes and so my question is is if if if the gospel that we're preaching really isn't getting us into any trouble in terms of like offending the natural dead state spiritual state of a person if it's really not getting into us into in trouble we need to re-examine our gospel because when Jesus preached his gospel they wanted him dead when the Apostles preach their gospel lo and behold they wanted him dead so if we're going out and preaching this fuzzy sort of like Jesus is a friend of mine and he wants to be your buddy and he wants you to have this amazing experience and just let him into your heart bro and like that kind of a thing like that's not gonna get me in a lot of trouble yeah with people like Jesus wants to be your buddy yeah but gee you're an enemy of Jesus right now he's the king of the world with all authority you're a dead in your sin and you're gonna perish without him if you don't turn to him in a hurry and trust in his work alone you're gonna die in your sin yes you're an enemy of God like that's a very different gospel exactly people say hey that gospel is going to anger people it's going to turn people away you mean like when Jesus was preaching to thousands of people and then when he preached to them they whittled down to 12 again hmm yep so yeah and I'm gonna let you jump back quickly I want to comment is we're talking about the controversy and the in the apostolic tradition what the with the Apostles did yeah and I'll let you what I want to just comment and transition into is its imperative to you that we define our terms that's because cult is a very misunderstood word and we're just talking about coldish characteristic I wanted before we actually label anything it's just at least to find the term of what it is and the term that we adhere to is basically a group or organization or group of persons centered around any particular person's interpretation of the Bible because and they always will use Christian terminology they'll use our language but ultimately they'll fund they'll deny the fundamental elements of the faith and I think there is a point a dividing line not just the warm and fuzzy God loves you and so bad because that and again that topic was one of those things where initially when we are inundated with messages about Bethel we were thinking okay this is might be more in the Justin Peters like discernment ministries which is a good thing I don't know if it's necessarily in our field dealing with a different paranormal the occult and the otic holds and the alcohols like fringe aspects so one of the things that I want to really communicate to anyone who's listening or watching this is if you look in the book of Acts that when people came to Christ they didn't see any of the new age or occultic books or secret hidden mystic knowledge as something to redeem they made bonfires out of it they burned them what I found extraordinary a lot again for people who don't know what you're referencing they're my people new to this because they need to hear what you just said that's that's important can you could you just give 30 seconds on what what are you talking about an acts where people made a bonfire of occultic books and they didn't redeem what do you mean yeah well I mean I believe it's sin when they went to it was what was going on in Ephesus when the riot broke out so people were were coming to Christ and and there's there's different instances and in fact one of my favorite passages in the book of Acts is dimitra's the silversmith I love it because it's it's from the vantage point of an unbeliever who understood what the gospel was and he wasn't saying like and these Christians are coming around here and they're just they're just seeking miracles they hear him hearing their healing people is wonderful he gathers all these people together to say we're making we were making a huge profit margin off of these idols and people are now turning away from those idols that worship the Living God and my my biggest fear is that Demetrius and the temple Demetrius and in the world well no no not Artemis is going to be not known throughout the entire earth so you see as a kingdom of God's expanding in the first century you see the abolishment of idols and says their hearts were filled with rage and they said greatest Artemis of the Ephesians and so not only that then you see people who are taking these mystic books whether it was like the witchcraft or whatever it is to consult with mediums and Finland your spirits and they burn those there's no there's certain things that have no redeeming value whether it's a Ouija boy reishi board or tarot cards or whatnot so what I found extraordinary alarming is that and that this may come from their view of their Dominion aside of ideology as they believe that and you can correct me if I'm wrong that they believe there's aspects of where New Age practices can be redeemed if we basically just take that practice and we just replace it with Christian terminology can you just expand on that because I mean I have a quote here actually if you could hold up the one book yeah and because you just purchased this this is the basic this is basic teaching the physics of heaven yeah I want to just read one quote and then you can expand on this and because we just had an episode with Stephen bankers talking about the New Age we talked about the concerns of it infiltrating the church and again this is not we're not since eight I don't want to sensationalize anything this is a book you can buy right now through Beth about whatever they're publishing houses at Bethel publications or daniil damaging house is called think it's called destiny image oh yes yeah is that just the name of that sounds like new agey yeah this is a quote something that you highlight sounds like a hair salon yeah in Washington DC so again you see the mixture of had a bunch one of the someone that was part of the great of wait one of the original Great Awakenings I'm just gonna call this just directly from that book the physics of heaven and it says Jonathan Edwards the legendary 18th century minister once said a work of God without stumbling blocks is never to be expected I believe that a great work of God is in praat is in process as he restores knowledge and insights that have been lost to Christians but are now hidden in the teachings and practices of quantum mysticism hmm let me see that look at it Jonathan Edwards would be rolling over in his grave right now Jeff I mean just Jeff can I ask an L transparency if I got up in front of church mm-hmm did you like we here we have announcements today if I got up and said that what would you what would you say would you would you I would say everyone let's stop and pray for Jerry fast and I would say all the elders and we're gonna go outside and talk to Jerry for a minute so then you're gonna come back in and and repent it what you just said yeah but this is this is the bait that they're not this is out in the open and people that I had no idea about this yabin till you you sharing this stuff with me go ahead and expand on some as some aspects of that because this is where we can make sense of the distinctive possibility of these video footage being demonic manifestations not just because we want sensationalize anything but from a biblical standpoint is that God calls these practices and again you're talking about no being no fear of God before their eyes yeah God in his law says that these practices of divination and sorcery and mediumship is an abomination towards God and anyone who practices those things should be put to death okay one part of this it's right above that first of all don't do that to Jonathan Edwards yeah we're hearing more and more teachings about Christians taking back truths from the New Age that really belong to the kingdom of God that's terrifying that is frightening is so so in that that pushes now this is where the divide comes if we just look at the definition of cult that we use this is a fundamental using the language Christian lingo and Christian language but then distorting distorting and altering it um there's nothing redeemable about pagan practices and what God says in his word is that and this is this is true and people who have come out of the New Age has testified to this is that when you just don't listen to God it's the same thing like Russia like flying over a no-fly zone regardless of what your intentions are you are in enemy territory in you're subject to being shot down because you've crossed that line and God says when you try and access hidden knowledge to these particular practices you open up dimensions that ultimately have power but that power is satanic and that's we're just biblically not trying to sensationalize anything looking again you guys can listen to our previous episodes on the new wage this is a serious issue because this is when you see these practices being done with that soul nd I want everyone's where that's at just so you don't have to do the details now but let's get people to it go read Deuteronomy chapter 18 yeah read that these practices are forbidden by God they are abominations and you are commanded by God not to participate in any of this kind of pursuit of secret knowledge or communication with the other side it is an abomination it is dangerous spiritually dangerous and I'll just say this very very honestly as a pastor than a ministry for a long long time and I have seen this kind of practice cause wreak significant spiritual havoc upon people I've seen its consequences and it is terrifying and I mean that sincerely like in terms of my whole body my hair standing up in my body when I've come into contact with somebody who tried to cross this gap in this incidence of this realm I've seen the devastating effects of this kind of dangerous spiritual activity in on the island that we have planted a church apology a kawaii' they effects of this kind of practice is absolutely terrifying in a spiritual perspective so just gonna go ahead and well a few examples of this obviously you can read about it in their book the physics of heaven I wouldn't recommend reading it I I wouldn't really recommend ever reading a book just for the sake of you know reading it if there's not truth in it but you can look up certain things to which I'm going to explain if you go on google and you look up am i more religious than jesus and next to jesus just put Bethel on their own website there is an article from ABS sm student that wrote about an experience that he had at a psychic there when he and other students went to a psychic fair and they set up their own tent and they didn't they decided not to use the words father son or Holy Spirit instead they basically led people into encounters by using the term spirit of creation and so they're leading people into you know alleged encounters in these tents where people are you know encountering God through physical manifestations or whatever and they're saying that people are coming to Christ through this but how do you bring someone to Christ through something called the spirit of creation when it's the Holy Spirit who softens hearts it's not the you know spirit of creation what does that mean Hindus use that that's just fine right yeah yeah spirit of the universe commercial exactly so there was that and basically the article is talking about from this student's perspective you know I realized at the end of this that I'm more religious than Jesus was when Jesus would have you know outright condemned this practice he would have not you know condoned this practice so there's that they believe that we have the power to speak things into existence and in the New Age phenomenon and that could be known you know as the law of attraction and you know declaring things into existence and they'll manifest whatever you speak out into the universe is what's going to come back at you it can almost be in a negative sense to like karma and so if you speak they say that you can speak things into existence essentially because God spoke the universe into existence and because he's given us all authority we have the ability to speak anything into existence because all things have been given to us and there's a quote from Bill Johnson where he says just like God spoke the universe into creation speak to that hip and declare life and healing into that hip I don't think I've ever had this word of knowledge like this before but I know there's at least two if not three people in the room that that something happened in a traumatic way relationally and you carried the burden of it even though you've not been in bittered you've carried the weight of it and it's affected your body and specifically that hip so we just declare as you pray or praying over them commend now the spirit of affliction loose that hip in Jesus name command it gone just just speak health into that hip some actually need a creative miracle there's degenerative condition in the joint so the worlds were made when God spoke them into being so speak to that new hip so in some way they're you know saying that essentially we have the same authority and power as God and also Chris Powhatan has talked about the fact that we're little gods little G he says we're little gods and the October uses that exact same language and yeah the third Jesus and he's a prominent New Age teacher completely denies every aspect of Christ's right with of course using paying homage and giving every essential yeah well if you even look at the you know the crazy manifestations and all of that - you'll find a lot of that originating in the occult and Hinduism and and Hinduism specifically when a guru does what's called I guess a shock teapot where they touch them on the forehead and they fall over and they can you know manifest physically violently shaking breaking out into laughter feeling like they're on fire screaming it can manifest in many different ways but if you look at a video of that and then you look at a video of a you know a manifestation at Bethel Church or you know the school they look dangerously similar exactly yeah yeah exactly we were talking about that similarity - especially if you guys look online and see we might and even share some of these videos - there is a striking and disturbing similarity and again we're not we're dealing it we're addressing it from a biblical standpoint of what these Eastern religions do and how they revoke with satanic power if you look at the documentary wild wild country and again I just want to say some people are asking us it's a Netflix documentary there are points where you do not want to watch with your kids there is mature content in it but as a whole it's very intriguing if something very significant historical event Walter Martin spoke extensively on the movement with the rajneeshees but a lot in it yeah yeah he's actually featured in the documentary I'm at one point I was like yeah well I like jumping up and cheering and Sofia is fun but there are these moments where the Rajneesh II and they would like dress in all red and they had this unique cult identity but they would do these just look up Rajneesh occult and you will look at the these practices where they are like dancing and well they would start just shaking and manifesting when they would do their their Kundalini spirit and again it's this that you look at what's the this definitive Eastern cult practice was doing and in many ways you would say what was demonic and demonic manifestations my I just saw the striking similarity with the girl there's there I think the footage of a young girl that was shared that I saw where she was convulsing and shaking and yelling out I'm a millionaire hmm and it's almost sort of like talk about that law that was disturbing to me because Allah that law of attraction comes from Eastern thought and this young girl is like shaking uncontrollably it's like she's standing still in her right hand is I think it's like going back and forth and she's yelling that out and he saw I think there's another one where someone puts their hand on a girl and the way that she was convulsing it was almost if we did a split screen of what was happening like with the Rossi she's are these other movements or even even holy hell number when he put his please you'd lay hands on them and they shake uncontrollably the exact same thing so and that's and I think what's also important is that best-case scenario is that I believe there are people at Bethel who are Christians and they're sincere absolutely you need to look at some of this and I'm really hoping this is going to create there needs to be a conversation about this there's something definitively wrong when people are acting out in certain ways that is virtually identical to the two different cults and occultic movements that are based in the New Age there's that and yeah there's that we need to take a look at the stuff and we need to have that especially when you have chat when you have chapters in I mean we have several books in front of here with titles the chapters I mean that could be if I read this people think I'm reading out of a new age book yeah I'll just read one last little paragraph from the the physics of heaven and I'll let you jump in here pastor Jeff it says it can the coming new sound isn't just something that you can pick up with your ears it's greater than anything you can understand it can change DNA so we are genetically growing up we are becoming like instrument being tuned in where our genetics are getting aligned with a father genetics in harmony with him does that sound anything remotely in a Christian worldview if I was talking like that no no no I understand even the context what what in terms of like what what are you saying what what does it mean to have us in tune with the father's genetics what what does that mean from a Christian perspective all of this is just it is exactly what God warns us against in Scripture over and over and over again it's the it's the it's the opposition that God has to syncretism and that's taking pagan practices occultic practices and adopting them now into our relation Japan our walk with the Holy One of Israel yeah exactly what the Israelites did with the Golden Calf every time the Israelites engaged in syncretism with the pagans and the pagan practices God judged them for that and what we need to consider is just really how very serious that is if you have people who identify as the Bride of Christ who are using the name of God the name of the Lord Jesus Christ who were essentially adopting our terminology and pouring entirely different meanings into it if they were as if they were essentially adopting all these pagan New Age of cultic practices in we need to consider the cycle that God has shown us in Scripture is that he actually judges yeah and he is not a he is he is he is a God to be considered very seriously and he is a holy God and so if we're gonna adopt these kinds of dangerous spiritual practices into what we call Christian worship and practice there's going to be a day of reckoning now we all know there's a day of reckoning at the end of time and if you're in Christ that is not a day to be feared because you are righteous in him through faith it's a gift of God but there are moments in history where God acts and he judges and I would I would not want to be anywhere near this kind of movement where you've taken pagan practices sorcery divination all of these practices you've pulled them together into Christian worship and you're using the name of Jesus over it to deceive it's a dangerous thing and a very very serious well when the Israelites did that God told them you know for those of you have repented go out and whoever does not repent kill them and 3,000 people were killed after they were worshiping the golden calf in the name of Yahweh mm-hmm you know judgment oh yeah judgment all right so I think it's good it's over an hour I think we've done on this we don't want yes take a break and come back for maybe a little bit shorter one yes yeah well we'll wrap things up here so again we definitely Lindsay this has been fantastic yeah and again for those of you regardless of where you stand on these issues we appreciate the may thus far and you're taking the time to listen to you and we're doing this not this is an hour go out and get anyone just for the sake of getting them we have purpose and intent behind that and like I said regardless of whether we we're willing to be misunderstood for the sake of what God said into his words so we're gonna do one little last segment here in just a little bit so thank you for listening to part two of defending from Bethel we'll talk to you guys next and go I'm by the way go to apology of studios.com apol OG IA studios.com to get more from cultish yes absolutely talk to you guys in a last part of part three

Channel: Apologia Studios

Views: 361,290

Keywords: jeff durbin, apologia studios, defecting from bethel, lindsay davis, jeremiah roberts, cultish, bethel, bethel music, bethel tv, bethel kids, bethel exposed, bill johnson sermons, bill johnson teaching, bill johnson 2019, bill johnson healing, bill johnson holy spirit, gold dust, bethel miracles

Id: GF2t_VRorXQ

Length: 59min 27sec (3567 seconds)

Published: Fri May 10 2019