How New Age & Word of Faith Misunderstand the Bible (Mike Winger and Melissa Dougherty)

I was recently interviewed by Melissa Doherty on the topic of new-age teaching and how it's actually infiltrating Christian churches like never before it's been on my heart for awhile to deal with this topic and so I'm thankful for Melissa for partnering with me cuz she could help bring the New Age understanding but not only do I want to help hopefully churches and people in churches that are feeling the the sense that something's wrong something's wrong that's going on but I also want to help people who are involved in these movements who aren't Christians at all but they think that the New Age is a Christian movement or that it's supported by the Bible and they have all these Bible verses that they think support these New Age or New Thought teachings that in fact really the Bible's saying something totally different than what they think it is and so this interview what it is is MIA Melissa talking going through 15 different sections of Scripture one at a time to break down how it doesn't actually teach new age or new thought things and then explaining not only that but explaining the meaning the biblical meaning the right understanding of those challenging passages so if you're a new age or new thought influence during a church that is then this video could potentially change your life and I hope you'll pay attention and really think it through with us and we're really just trying to help and if you aren't if you're not influenced by those things then maybe you want to watch this video for training because you probably know someone who is and maybe in this discussion as Melissa represents the New Age view and I represent the biblical Christian view as you see this discussion it can be a model for how you can have a discussion with someone else to talk to them about these wrong ideas and so I'm gonna present this to you if you're interested in Melissa Dougherty's channel I put a link in the description for that as well the interview was done on her channel originally so you can actually watch it there if you like as well and she does a lot of New Age stuff she's former New Age New Thought person I think she categorizes herself as more new thought anyhow I hope this is a huge blessing to you god bless you hi everybody I am really excited for today's video I have one of my favorites apologists pastors on YouTube and hopefully one of your students who mike winger this is his mug by the way and not to plug it I just really like tea it's a nice mug it's a nice mug and made but you can order this by the way if you want to we're gonna do a video together today I asked Mike to do this a few months ago after I did my law of attraction video it was a very good video it was well done I was on fire when I did it but one of the main questions that I keep getting almost every day I get this question very frequently is what versus specifically are used in the law of attraction that are taken out of context not just a law of attraction but where to face teachings as well people don't recognize where two faiths teachings because they think that it's in the Bible they think oh they're using scripture oh but they're backing it up backing it up with scripture what I asked Mike to do is because I really respect his views on things and how he kind of has a really balanced view of Scripture I asked him to kind of define these scriptures I took maybe about 15 of them there's hundreds guys that they take but I took about 15 asked him to look it over I'm going to read them off and kind of just hand it to Mike and you know see how he can define them which by the way Mike thank you for being here it is my privilege and pleasure thanks so much for having me and this is here's what I love about what we're doing right now is like this is going to meet people right where they need it if they've been exposed to a lot of Attraction or New Age teachings and stuff like that or those same teachings infiltrating into churches and they hear it they go I don't know about that but they don't they need help working through it and and we know this that like Satan quotes scripture yes Satan uses Scripture when he comes to tempt Jesus he uses Scripture so we can't just see them using Scripture we have to discern and evaluate and think it through and hopefully this will help people do that yeah I have to say one of the things that is gonna bother me even reading one verse is not reading the 10 before in the 10 after because context is a paramount to that switche I'm pretty sure you'll get into whenever you get into the scriptures but oh yeah so without further ado um these are in no particular order I just took the scriptures that I know that me I personally I took years to unlearn some of these personally I had to reread it and reread it and redefine it ask questions and then I took that others you know might hear a lot from the pulpit of a war to face church or read in a law of atraction book or from a new thought teacher things like that but the first one I'm gonna start with is John 10:10 John 10:10 we hear a lot from word of faith preachings more than anything I would say basically I have come that they might have life and have it abundantly is John 10:10 and this is basically used to express how Jesus came to give us a prosperous life we're supposed to live in abundance we're supposed to have prosperity we're supposed to have blessings from God and we're supposed to have abundant experience and encounter of the Holy Spirit Mike can you define that well yeah in a sense I want to say I totally agree but obviously Jesus he wants us to have an abundant life and he came to give us that abundant life implying that without him you don't get it right like I came to give it to you like and if you don't have me you're not gonna get this abundant life but how they're defining abundant life like this is this is to me what really comes down so let me give you an analogy to help people understand this this concept it's pretty simple I have a friend who gave me these earbuds for like my birthday I think it was and they were these off-brand earbuds they look like the Apple earbuds that like work in your phone or your ears that you know Bluetooth and all this but they never worked right they didn't sing cry only one worked at a time and then the sound was really low-quality because they were a cheap imitation and he didn't realize that he just knew that they were on sale they were really really cheap so he got them and they ended up not being real and so I was like gracious but but I'm hoping he doesn't watch this video because I don't I don't want to make him feel bad but this is this is what we're getting the the version of abundant life that the that the word Faith Movement talks about prosperity preachers talk about and New Age stuff talks about is a cheap imitation of what Jesus is talking about in John 10 so in John 10 in context but before he says like you know I've come to give you a bundle life he talks about how he's the Good Shepherd and he's come to lay his life down for the Sheep this describes Jesus as someone who's unpowered core week and who dies for others a premature painful death and that's how he shows us his love and in in this he says look at me now I'm gonna give you the abundant life but the abundant life you see it's not about prosperity it's in this in this life immediately it's not about your less life right now your best life forever that's the idea so let me give you some examples in Luke 12:15 Jesus says take care and be on guard against all covetousness for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions this is really key Wow because he's saying that like your life they think abundant life is about possessions right hmm well he says your life doesn't consist in the abundance of your possessions so when Jesus talks about abundance abundant life he's not speaking of that in fact he warns against covetousness or looking around at all the things you want what what and the Bible calls that a type of idolatry mm-hmm so this is actually a cheap imitation it's it's a it's not a good thing so those things aren't the thing um in Luke 12 he also goes on to say I tell you do not be anxious about your life what you will eat nor about your body what you will put on so food and clothes you guys don't worry about that and explains why because life is more than food and the body is more than clothing life is so in this in this scriptures Jesus is saying that life is a whole lot more then you know the type of thing prosperity preachers are talking about what is life than to Jesus if it's not about drawing near to me you know naming and claiming a better job better business you know bigger family bigger more and more more stuff and things and people in my life in John 14:6 Jesus explains what he means by life he says I am the way and the truth and the life and no one comes to the Father except through me he's the only way to get to the Father to have a real relationship with God it's through Jesus life in John 17:3 he really narrows it down more and says this is eternal life that they know you the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent so abundant life is a relationship with God abundant life is an eternal relationship with God where the things of this world that prosperity preachers and new-age things focus on that those things seem cheap compared to the glory of knowing Christ this this should seem like a cheap imitation if I think Jesus came to be my cosmic vending machine right that he's gonna like give me more stuff or I need a better car oh thank you Jesus I need better physical health and my life is hanging on things and health and all that I'm missing out I have the cheap imitation I don't have like the abundant life God has given to me so the life Jesus talks about better than sort of the new age or prosperity gospel life in a couple ways one is this thing that we have now is better than physical things because it's a relationship with God a treasure beyond any suffering it is to know Christ and also the second way it's better is it's eternal not temporary all the things prosperity preachers talk about are things that are just gonna burn right they're all gonna burn they're all gonna be gone one day and this should get to us I remember playing Monopoly when I was a kid I was playing a game Monopoly yeah and I was really good like I always beat my family and then they didn't want to play me game before in my life I was a good little capitalist or anyway I would conquer the game and I win them at the end of the game I'd have all this money all these $500 bills you know and then I would put them all away and I would be exactly the same as before I played the game I had no money and this is this is the sad mentality of thinking that my life you know my abundant life is based on the things I possess in this world all this stuff is the Monopoly game that we put away one day and all that will matter is my relationship with God the people I know in Christ and the glories that are to come and I want to be storing up the treasures for for heaven for that eternal thing and not for just this temporary momentary pleasures that tend to be based very much on self and not on God so this is if I can give you some more scripture on this Philippians 3 Paul talks about both these aspects like the eternal goodness outweighing the temporal stuff you know and also the relationship with God being better than all of the things all of the things that we might think of in our in our law of attraction mentality yeah so in Philippians 3:7 he says whatever gain I had I counted as loss for the sake of Christ indeed I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord for his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish he's like they're nothing all the things I lost whether it be friends whether it be finances whether it be physical health whether it be approval in society all that nothing it's nothing he says in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law but that which comes through faith in Christ the righteousness from God that depends on faith that I may know him that I may know him that is a relationship right the abundant life is to know Christ that I may know him in the power of his resurrection it may share his sufferings becoming like him in his death that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead so we get this that the Apostles were not wealthy Jesus was not wealthy they suffered martyrdom and all sorts of hardships and none of it mattered compared to the glory of what is coming and to know Christ right now the confusion is is they have a cheap imitation of abundant life yeah thinking that it it consists of things you even if you get them you can't keep them and what a sad imitation that's actually a really good breakdown because the point of bringing it Paul in prison is that if you're gonna take that scripture about living an abundant life just look at the apostles like you look no farther than the apostles who walked and talked with Jesus an abundant life into the Christian is Jesus it's all about Jesus it's about our relationship with him and I think that's you mentioned health before I think that's a hard concept for people that have health issues too and I always say is Jesus enough if he never got the healing if you never got you know financial blessing would he be enough you know and I think that that is really what that's about the abundance of the Christian life is Jesus and Jesus alone alright next one on the list this can kind of be tied in with a few other scriptures so I think these ones were gonna kind of put together acts 20:35 that is the first one it is more blessed to give than to receive one little sentence and acts and then paired together with mark 11:24 and Matthew 21:22 which are parallel scriptures if this is a big one if you believe with if you believe you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer so it's more blessed to give than to receive and if you believe you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer basically this embodies the Golden Rule to a New Ager and everybody that's been a new-age knows exactly how I'm gonna explain this I'm sure whatever you give you get back because whatever everything is a mirror a cosmic mirror so however you treat somebody you will get that treatment back and whatever you ask the universe whatever you ask God if that's the vibrational setting that you're putting out there to the universe or to God to source however you wanted to define him back then you had to get it back it's basically a law of attraction scripture people like Wayne Dyer Eckhart Tolle Rhonda Byrne Esther Hicks they will use scriptures like this to kind of back up what they believe it's also why a lot of them seem so happy all the time is because if they're thinking that they're putting off negative energy they'll get that negative energy back break it down Mike what does it mean what is the Christian definition scriptural definition of this okay well I'm you know I'm trying to wrap my head around this stuff because you know because I started with Scripture and then heard these things later it was like wait what are they getting at here and so you know maybe it could take cause someone to take pause that when you just start with only the Bible you really don't come to these things you need gurus you need these gurus for these teachings yes vibrations like I don't read about this anywhere in the Bible this is like the use of things like quantum physics and dark energy I know at least enough about quantum physics and dark energy to know that has nothing to do with you know their usages but more importantly the biblical passages don't have anything to do with those usages let's take the acts 20 example it's more blessed to give than to receive okay it's more blessed to give than to receive the biblical view of this is that it's not about giving to get which it seems to be that that's the the New Age perspective I'm giving an order to get and that's what makes it more blessed which is their way of saying it's more blessed to get by giving let me just give the biblical view is that we're not giving to receive we're giving to give and that's the blessing and that's it that's all there is to it it reverses the idea of giving to receive it the law of attraction becomes a a trigger for covetousness and selfishness that undoes that undoes the goodness of my giving effectively like Jesus says you know like hey you know beware the hypocrites he talks about these Pharisees and they have ulterior motives for doing good things and that's ends up being a real problem so it's not about tapping into universal powers of love whatever whatever that is seen to be right it's it's about actually loving people like Jesus did and delighting in them and enjoying giving for the sake of them being blessed . that's it right so it doesn't say you you get more if you give more so give more that's not a biblical view i don't think at all and it's not really the act of love and and so in marriage we have a good illustrations this right like if you do something for your spouse you know why you did it based on whether when they when they're uh not grateful when you give them something or do something for them and they have no gratitude and you're all mad at him for it mm-hmm you did it for you i did it to get them to respond to me i did it to get them to be nice to me I was using a kindness to manipulate but if I do that something for them and find out they they're not grateful in and I go oh oh I guess that didn't really bless them but my point was to bless them so I'm not upset I'm just learning about my spouse you know and it shows us what our real motives are we have a hard time finding our real motives but sometimes things like that can reveal them so there's some biblical principles about giving and getting I want to mention real quick um we know that God provides and God takes care of us but we're not giving so he will give us more in return rather it's just like this Lord I know you'll give me enough to survive and so I can be free in my giving to others because you'll provide my needs - SATs and it liberates me to give to others it doesn't mean that if I have a million dollars and I give a million dollars away I'll get two million mm-hmm like if you give a million dollars away you will have zero dollars that's the law of math yet if you're doing such a thing you know in service of Christ in wisdom and in kindness and love I can trust that God will provide my needs yes I won't probably ever have another million dollars but it's more blessed to give than to receive anyways so it frees me to give that's the idea it liberates me from the idea that reception receiving has anything to do with my giving provision does God provides for me but I don't worry about what I get back nice 4/7 e65 talks about this it says that there are people who are thinking that godliness is a way of gaining profit things and that this is actually a depraved idea it's pretty let me read this text to you it's a really strong refutation it says people who are depraved in mind and deprived of the truth imagining that godliness is a means of gain whoa yeah it's it really rails hard against the idea that I'm gonna get stuff by giving and then verse six the next verse he says but godliness with contentment is great gain and that biblical word contentment means you're just okay with whatever you've already got like how Paul was content in any situation he was in exactly exactly so so giving and godliness and all this it's never a it's not a law of attraction it it turns love into selfishness law of attraction the whole concept it seems to turn love into selfishness for people that are watching this is what happens when you take one scripture and you make a whole doctrine or belief out of it and you will hear me and Dorine say all the time that context like never read a Bible verse Greg Koch Allah says that never read a Bible verse and this is why is that what what Mike just quoted first Timothy if you were to read scripture in context as a whole you would read a scripture like Acts thirty-five and know instinctively that means something different because you're taking the rest of Scripture there's truth and everything but not everything is true so whenever you come at it like like how Mike started off the whole thing by saying if you were to read the Bible alone you would never come up with these beliefs you would never get Mormonism you would never get jehovah's witness in jehovah's witnesses you would never get catholicism you wouldn't get a lot of these religions by just reading the Bible you would you would get those religions by taking a few scriptures here and there and kind of piecing it together and making your own worldview so I just kind of want to throw that out there right now while I remember to mention that that this this is what happens so you you have to read the whole paragraph read the whole chapter the whole book compare translations you don't understand the translation translation you're reading get a few of them and read them side by side from the new-age perspective they really believe in the power of words right oh yes and that's yeah and there's an element of truth to that I think it's taken out of context but there's an element of truth side and if I can take advantage of that in the mind of anybody was watching who's part of word faith or New Age movement and it's like words are powerful right they're very important and here we have in the Bible the words of God and those words are really important and they are really powerful and taking them out of context is really dangerous we should let God say what he says right if God certainly would care if you took his words and twisted them to your own purposes instead of his definitely um but let me let me share with you on the mark and Matthew passages you mentioned about prayer because prayer is a big issue and I get because these statements are really extremely read them to you again what people can be confused in mark 11:24 Jesus says therefore I tell you whatever you ask in prayer believe that you have received it and it will be yours now I'm not one of those who wants to water down what Jesus says okay he's like believes that you've received it and it's yours mm-hmm that is a pretty bold and sweeping statement and so faith the point is faith is a huge factor in prayer huge factor in prayer and leaving God and believing about the things that were praying for believing that we're receiving them is actually a really important thing mm-hmm I don't know how any way to water that down so here's where they'll be like seat myk's myk's word of faith name it but here's I say yeah but that's not the only thing Jesus ever said about prayer you know like he said a lot of things about prayer and so like it'd be like if I was giving you driving instructions and I said you know stay to the right you know and I'm and that's my driving and you take that one instruction that's like the only driving rule there is now for life stay to the right then you die because you can't love that thing in every situation in every scenario no matter what and so yeah if faith is a huge factor but it's not the only one it's not the only factor we read in Scripture that we are that if we in James that if we ask to fulfill our own pleasures yes then we ask a miss and we do not receive answers for those prayers we read in first John that if we pray anything according to his will I just wrote that down literally yeah so it so oh there's other issues so my faith is huge but God's will Trump's that but but asking for things that are you know according to my pleasures no matter how much faith I've got I'm wrong not gonna be answered you ask and do not receive because you ask amiss to fulfill your own pleasure as it says in James that was the verse that when I was coming out of the new thought one of the verses that just kind of made me sit down heavy was that verse in James I whatever you ask you ask with selfish motives like you don't get it because you're Alan say James for the beginning of the chapter there yeah there's more though in Matthew 6:10 Jesus is giving us the model prayer right our Father who art in heaven hallowed be your name your kingdom come your will be done this is in the model prayer like this is like the static understanding of what every prayer should be like it doesn't have to always be the word for word the same prayer but the ideas that are in here should be in all our prayers your will be done God but there are many who come as though prayer is a way of exercising my own will and getting God to bend to my will that's what it kind of becomes but the idea is I want God's will to be done and that's why if we ask according to his will he hears us now I don't always know what God's will is maybe someone out there does I haven't met that person you know and so I would say the bottom line is they have a truth about prayer faith is huge really important but it's taken out of context of the other truths about prayer and it's all of the truths about a thing that helped us understand it thoroughly and stay away from you know weird weird stuff or you have this people trying to push their own will to accomplish their own desires because they've taken one verse out of the rest of Scripture yeah and it's kind of the consequences of this first being taken out of context are quite interesting because if you ask anything if you were to take it literally like I have an eight-year-old and eight-year-old you don't know what you know about the Bible so you have a child asking you about it right you know like it's like oh I don't know how do you explain this to an eight-year-old one of the things she asked was that she's also in so many questions she's basically saying well why doesn't God just give us all what we want kind of thing you know it's like that that scene and gosh that movie with Jim Carrey in it where he plays God for a day or something and he gets it's ridiculous and very theologically unsound and I watched I watched Bible movies or movies that are like that just to pick him apart my husband gets on me he hates watching movies like that with me but like he's going through all the emails and he's like I don't know how to answer them so he says yes to everybody and then then chaos breaks out that's kind of what I see in my mind and that's kind of how I explained it to her I'm like it's it's giving so much power to people that people think they have you know that if you were to give everybody everything they asked for and everything they wanted there would be no end to the selfish desires that would be met yeah that's why it's within his will like there has to be there's rules to this you know like there you can't just you know believe and receive and have enough faith and get it all the time you know and so that's kind of how I explained it to her is that the consequences of believing that are you you believe things that you think can actually and I remember as a kid thinking I could walk through walls like move things with my mind and because scriptures like this were quoted to me now that I could transport and go places and make unicorns exist literally yeah it's like you're tapping into this power out there in the universe that you mentioned yeah instead of you're you're making your requests requests not demands known to God yes he's the power he's the one in control and he has a will of his own could you imagine like how this would play out like there's a Christian who's you know a farmer and they're praying for rain for their crops and so it starts to rain and then Kenneth Copeland comes by in his private jet flying by and he's like rebuking the rain because the storm is gonna mess up his flight plans yes so then the rain must stop of course and then the farmer prays and he's like no I need extreme rain I need it right now and so boom major storm you know happens and somebody else says well there's a big storm so they pray that it changes course and goes somewhere else and someone else is on the road praying that no don't let it come to me it's just it's it's inane mm-hmm um to just just to think that if you get a crowd of a hundred people that all know each other and you you just ask that all their desires would be met how many of them especially if they're like early 20s teens are praying that a certain person will become their spouse and that person is praying that someone else will become their spouse we need God's will we don't know what's going on you know I we're narrow-minded we're self self focused generally speaking and we need God to say no to many of our prayers according to his purposes and planets and then things that we think that may not be like why would God allow me to be sick why would God allow bad things you know and that's that's where our that's where we kind of take it down to understanding that there are certain things that we may not be able to understand because we're human but understanding God's sovereignty and and the control that he's in and both of us have made videos on this by the way I'm sure about things like this like how does you know scripture reconcile but it's it's that faith factor and knowing that we're not in control and that he is the next to that I am going to ask you about one of them was probably the last one I had to unlearn in the new age it was a very difficult one in its Matthew 7:7 basically Matthew 7 I call it like the New Age chapter if if New Age New Thought teachers were to take any book out of the Bible and kind of just rearrange it for what they want it would be the book of Matthew they loved messing with the Gospel of Matthew but Matthew 7 in particular is one that they'll use a lot and both of these are in Matthew I'll read both of them first one Matthew 7 chapter 7 verses 1 through 2 a lot of people are gonna know this one do not judge or you too will be judged for in the same way you judge others you will be judged with the measure you use it will be measured to you when I was in the law of attraction this was one that was quoted a lot they would have this huge long teaching about basically what you what you do to others you do to yourself it goes back to that whole mirror concept that whatever is out there and whatever you put out in the university will get back so don't judge because if you judge you'll get back judgment and it's a very peaceful co-existence kind of life set and mind set and that's the scripture that they use and that is repeated again in mark 424 and John 6:37 on so many words so unpack that Mike what does that mean well it seems to me that there's there's a truth in this right I mean yes yeah it's just I would say there's something missing in the information and so let me see if I can respond by first affirming right that yeah the way you judge you'll be judged yeah the way you treat others you'll be treated to an extent and and and yet there's a personal God behind it and not just sort of like a blind force sort of causing you know action and reaction to take place it's more like God's judgment that's actually taking place at some point in the future but let's talk about this idea of who you are to judge in Matthew 7 because I don't talk about how it's maybe imbalanced and in Matthew 7 we're told judge not lest you be judged right but the person who tells you okay so don't judge they say stop judging they're judging you yeah they're judging you to even say that you're not to say that you shouldn't judge so obviously they don't think it's wrong to disapprove of what other people are doing because they're disapproved you're doing it becomes almost like a like a one-way you know mirror like they can they can use it against you but it doesn't work on them and that's how I often hear it used in our culture today yeah this idea of not judging it becomes a sort of one way thing we when I say don't judge what I mean is we're judging you what you're doing that's what I really mean it so becomes kind of nonsensical so what did Jesus like actually mean when he said about this whole thing in judging well it's clear in the context really read the verses he says judge not that you be not judged for with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged and with the measure you use it will be measured to you that's all they quote but yeah god please stop talking there he said why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye but do not notice the log that is in your own eye or how can you say to your mother let me take the speck out of your eye when there is the log in your own eye you hypocrite first take the log out of your own eye then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye so Jesus there's a problem and the problem is you judge others without judging yourself mm-hmm see if I look at you and I say I think what you're doing is wrong I need to be looking at me to find out what I'm doing wrong too so I don't quit all judgment I just stop pointing it at others and I also pointed it me I deal with this log in my eye this the big problems of my life I've got to deal with these before between me and God me and other people I've got a deal constantly with the issues that come up in my heart and life I need to deal with those things I need to judge myself then I can judge fairly other people and I won't be like a blind hypocrite like I'll actually help them because I'm humbled I know my position I know my weaknesses I know my failures and I'm in a position now after having like self judged discerned my own issues to be able to help others with their issues humbly and not as like a hypocrite that's key because a lot of people I don't know about you Mike but I get a lot of email saying you shouldn't judge at all like you know especially with some of the videos that you know we're talking about bringing certain may be teachers or teachings into light and disagreeing with them but this is what I really like about the way you broke that down is that you're first checking yourself you're making sure a that you're not in sin that we not that we're not guilty of what we're you know bringing them two of the things that we're holding them accountable to especially teachers and we're humbling ourselves we're making sure that we're doing it in the right spirit we're not bashing we're not exposing you know like how some people just go off the deep end the heart is in the right place it's done in the right spirit I think that's important because Jesus says once that's done then you can go to your brother and bring this grievance or you know then you can basically judge properly like there's an improper and proper way to judge so I kind of wanted to emphasize that because I liked that I liked that it was it wasn't just that you don't judge it's check yourself first like make sure that you're not just in this negative festering mindset before you actually go out and and render judgment yeah and there's an ironic application of this which is the person who tells you don't judge yes and they misunderstand that they're actually doing the judging of you at that moment they're the one with the log in their eye because they're telling you don't judge but they haven't even reflected on their own statement yet thought about their own position yeah and it's like but you're judging me and you're telling me not to judge like you're the hypocrite with the log in your eye not the madness at that point and and yeah I we just we just need to to self reflect first deal with my own issues first and then actively go out there and help other people with their problems which they do have of course they have just like I have and you have and we do need help but we need help from humble people who've dealt with their own issues before God so that they're not just dumping their garbage on us they're helping us yeah I like to use Paul T was an example because he kind of went out to tell because I made a video about this about not judging because it's something I'm actually really passionate about because I used to do this all the time in the New Age it was just don't judge anybody for their actions for anything like that so once I in learned that it was just you know easy to talk about correctly but Paul Paul is a great example of this because Paul basically was a Pharisee became a Christian a disciple rather and went and basically told other people to repent you know like stop doing what you're doing because Jesus is the way and nowadays that's a very judgmental thing to do you know repent of your ways and and turn to the only way you know of salvation wishes in Jesus so I think that's interesting that people neglect the rest of Scripture and the story of the disciples and the Apostles that that's what they did and that's what we are supposed to do the spirit in which we do it doesn't matter though yeah yeah in fact the Bible kind of breaks down good judging and bad judging in different ways so like it'll actually say like good judging is dealing with your own issues and then having correct not not self righteous judgments but correct judgments about other people to help them right to benefit them it's it is in exposing the major issues that are going on in the world and this is what all the prophets did this is what Jesus did and the Apostles did they can like you said Paul confronted the sin issues of his culture but always with the desire to see them come to God right and they didn't maybe they didn't like it but who likes getting bad news nobody likes it but it's needful like the doctor needs to tell me what's wrong with me so that's a good thing but there's another bad kind of judgment and that is when we call evil good or we call good evil the bob was really strict about this it's like don't you dare say that bad things are okay and don't you say that okay things are bad mm-hmm and when I say never judge anyone I'm also sort of saying whatever they're doing is okay and yeah so I kind of end up they like me but I end up approving of things that are hurtful to them hurtful to the people around them and so I end up not really benefiting them except that they know they like me because I'm so kind and approved you know proving yeah but that's kind of just being a people pleaser I think and not really helping I always say that it's usually the the people that you surround yourself with the best friends that you have are the ones that always tell you what you want to hear so we're going to go to Matthew 7:7 this is probably for me personally the biggest one on this whole list and a lot of people will resonate with this too because this goes back to mark 11:24 ask whatever you believe we might even bounce off more off of that but Matthew 7:7 asking it will be given to you seek and you will find knock and the door will be open to you for everyone who asks receives he who seeks fun and him who knocks the door will be opened this this verse is the life verse of so many New Agers Esther Hicks channels an entity a group of consciousness is what it is named Abraham Abraham author of the book right the attraction law of attraction law of attraction and there's many others too to New Agers that are into this there's more laws than just that but one of them is is there's a book that's written by this entity its channeled book called ask believe and receive basically it's based on this scripture and everything that surrounds this teaching is on this scripture break it down what does this mean Mike um well I think it means a lot of things it's tough because then as you know in trying to explain these things you're thinking like how do I reach someone who has the mentality yeah that that has been propagated by Esther Hicks and these other people you know science what we said about Matthew are about mark 11:24 as well yeah yeah but there's like a okay there's a basic general idea that I think we want to expose and that is the idea that God just gives you whatever you want mm-hm like full stop there's nothing else that kind of like the previous verses you know where it was like ask him believe that's it there's nothing else to this story there's nothing relational there's nothing about God's will there's nothing about your motives there's none of that right but just imagine like as a parent if you operate it under that policy you just told your daughter whatever you asked for I'll give it to you whatever you want you can have it like this would be terribly unhealthy for children yes but it would be equally bad for adults it would be very bad for us to be honest and so this needs to be taken in context of having character that's transformative the likeness of Christ into loving God first and not yourself the point Jesus is making is that is that prayer really is this thing where you're relying on God for everything and you're trusting in him and you can you can go to him you can go to him for everything whereas people might feel distanced from God like what does he care about me why can't I really appeal to God for help but I don't want to treat it like he's a force to be manipulated yes you know that I can you know it's like in in Star Wars it's a force and I can use the force and interact with the force right but but this isn't the idea I don't want to bend God to my will we've talked about that already this is where I think the law of attraction can potentially really ruin people and I know a student who went to my church who was really ruined by the law of attraction really yeah she read the book she had some videos that she watched online about it and it turned her into this like real narcissist she I mean I counseled with her multiple times in private about all these issues and stuff and it's just really ruined her because it was teaching her whatever she wants she just has to want it and want it and want it that you're a powerful being and that you you can you can possess whatever you want and need because basically the center of the universe yeah effectively that that's the impact I had and that's that's basically idolatry self idolatry and so it really messed her life up unfortunately so this again it's only part of the story on prayer just to remind us right and James it's James 4:3 that's the verse you ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions in first John 5:14 he says if we ask anything according to his will he hears us so we see prayer is a place of yielding where we offer requests but we bend to his will and Jesus models this for us because when he's in the Garden of Gethsemane about to go to the cross mm-hmm he says if you know if it's if there's any other way let this cup pass like I don't want to have to go to the cross then he says not my will be done but your will be done right so Jesus himself who has obviously does an understandable desire to not go through the crucifixion he's exposing to us the need for the cross like there is no other way for us to be saved we need him to go to the cross but he's modeling for us right this is written for our sakes yes modeling for us the example of praying even in the most dire and painful circumstances you have your requests you make them known but you yield to God in his will because his plans are good ultimately even if you can't see it or feel it in the moment it's a great point just to springboard off of that the first thing that comes to my mind with people who aren't receiving shilling specifically how would you talk to somebody because what I see repeatedly especially this year cuz I'm new to learning about a lot of this stuff this this hyper charismatic stuff that's going on I'm very much a student of it but one of the things that I keep hearing is God should always heal a hundred percent of the time should always heal if you are in a position where you're not you know getting what you're believing for if you're not getting your healing and then maybe somebody else does how would you break that down to that person how scripturally would you say that because everything you just said makes so much sense to me but it is an offense to somebody else who says no God should always give me my healing God should always give me my supernatural encounter I need to have enough faith what would you say that sometimes God's plans are bigger than our plans and better and as as difficult as this might be to swallow but remember the analogy I gave you earlier about the whole like the cheap replacement of abundant life versus the abundant life that Christ was talking about yeah that immediate healing is as important as it is as valuable as it is don't get me wrong right like I have issues that I want healed yeah you too right I've had chronic back problem for quite a while now prayed and prayed and prayed and pray you know and yet I trust in God that he's using it for his glory in my life I don't think it's a lack of prayer or faith I think it's his will why because I've prayed and trusted and I've sought prayer with others and I and I go well God's using it and this is not just my idea this is what scripture tells us and I think Paul the Apostle gives us well Jesus gives us a great example he he doesn't get healing he dies on the cross mm-hmm right for the salvation of all mankind and for this glorious eternal experience so it was worth it it was better than him bypassing the cross mm-hmm and sometimes our situations are actually better we just have a hard time seeing it because we're still you know pre resurrection basically we're not on the good side we're not in the benefit of those sufferings yet but here's an example in second Corinthians 12 this is the famous passage and every word faith movement has to explain it away mm-hmm but this is pulsed thorn in the flesh but let's read it and just gather a few important points whether you think it was a physical illness or not is irrelevant let's read it and think about it he says that in 2nd Corinthians 12:7 so to keep me from being conceited or arrogant because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations so God had revealed things to pollen II was like he knew so much and read seen so much that something had to keep him humble and he says a thorn was given to me in the flesh a messenger of Satan to harass me to keep me from being conceited so he's got this evil demonic thing going on whether it's physical illness spiritual attack it's obviously something really unpleasant right we can agree there yeah you know because I don't care if it's a spiritual attack or a physical illness or job stress all of these things are the same thing not pleasant in my life right not prosperity I'm suffering here they're all suffering and so he's suffering and it's given to him by by ultimately God even though it's has a demonic some kind of demonic element to it the reason for it is uh telling ya they keep him humble yeah so so in God's view Paul's humility was more important than Paul's prosperity or sense of well-being Wow yeah mind-blowing what a perfect scripture for that yeah I'm more about my character than he does about my health your comfort and I should too yeah but then he goes on in verse 8 he says three times I pleaded with the Lord about this that it should leave me but he said to me and here's God's response Paul obviously a man of great faith the Apostle Paul right and God says to him my grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in weakness and he's clearly saying Paul I I want you to be weak because when you're weak you rely on my grace for your life and it is my strength that enables you to get through these hard times and I'm glorified in that so Paul's response like what lesson he learned from all this he says and he concludes and this is again just reading straight through the text second corinthians verse chapter twelve verse nine here therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses of my I'll be glad I'll rejoice I'll boast in my weaknesses so that the power of Christ may rest upon me that chokes me up a little bit oh this is so sobering and as I go through hard times that won't leave me through prayer yeah I rest on these promises I rest on these scriptures and I'm like lord I feel myself relying on you I feel myself humbled and just trusting in you and just relying upon you right now and in that I rejoice because there is this great spiritual benefit through these great physical trials that I'm going through amen but seeing it's hard for some people because they refuse to hear anything else other than you're gonna get your healing you're gonna get your blessing God will always heal and God will will come through and so to keep their mindset and this is in my opinion and I'm gonna say this very boldly because I have researched cults since the inception of me coming out of a new thought it reminds me of a type of mind control because you're told to certain to think certain things and if you stop thinking these certain things then you're not going to get what you want so you're you're you're told think positive think positive don't think anything else and then he they take scriptures like this to to plant to them and give to them and say it's Scripture you're gonna get your blessing you just wait you're gonna get your blessing don't think about anything else don't speak that into existence and so they don't so to hear an alternative you not even an alternative you a scriptural view a contextual view of this which I find incredibly beautiful to be honest this that God can use this for his glory that's a foreign concept to them thanks for breaking that down I really like that we followed up with that with the healing because yeah and this hope is so much better much better they have the cheap imitation is I'm gonna pretend that things are getting better even if they don't even if they hard to maintain but the hope that we have is I don't wanna leave you hopeless the hope is even in the worst of my moments I'm learning to trust in God and rely on Christ and God's strength is being made perfect in my weakness even then I can still rejoice in that character transformation and the work of God in my life and I know not that I'll be healed of this today eventually I will have glory to come and the resurrection exaltation that comes upon the new recreation of all things that God brings like I have a much greater hope that's to come it just doesn't mean your best life now exactly in the sense of best life physical things and now being it's all about today and we can't see beyond this life you know yeah I'm we'll move on in a second but I kind of want to add this because I have a friend who's chronically ill we met years ago she's one of my best friends she has everything under the Sun wrong with her and she was deeply entrenched in New Age and we met because of a Facebook group that I run still sick to this day and she is basically bedridden and she reads her Bible all the time and before is a New Ager she had this basically like blind hope now as a Christian I believe I can't remember the scripture but I believe it was the blind man it was the blind man I believe because the disciples in him are walking by and they're saying what did he do to be born this way and he said he was he's like this to bring glory to God basically you know like this was determined and so many I'm kind of impaired of phrasing but he's saying that this is to bring glory to God you know and he spits on the ground uses mud and restores him but I remember her quoting that scripture and she said you know I can glorify God that somehow this brings glory to him and she is just so in love with Jesus yeah and she's sick every day of her life and she's so in love with Jesus and I just I love that I think it's one of those beautiful things in the world yeah I really do I really really do and I think that there's an element of that every needs to learn to absorb and appreciate but I would say it's not that she'll never get rich yelling oh she will it's just about that delay and and trusting God and letting him work in this time because it will come but the promise is at the resurrection not necessarily at some point yeah so the next scripture that we have on the list is proverbs 23:7 as a man speaks in his heart so is he basically again you'll attract what you'll think a lot think about this Tyson she like energies and an attraction this is something that a lot of word of faith preachers use and again this isn't proverbs so this is something you can't necessarily contextually sometimes take into account but Solomon helped write most of the Proverbs this particular proverb what does it mean what would this you know mean to a Christian yeah yeah so like you said with context is not as easy in the book of Proverbs as it is in other books because it's a collection of like sayings the sayings of the wise so it's like a bunch of clever wise sayings all crammed together sometimes you'll have a whole chapter that's on one topic in this case there's a few verses that are all related so you can give it some context verses 6 through 8 is like one section proverbs 23 6 says and I'll give it all in context what does it mean when it says like as a man thinks in his heart so he is I think that's new King James Version it's it says do not eat the bread of a man who is stingy do not desire his delicacies this is really interesting that that's the context right like your head you're with a buddy and you know that they're stingy and they're like oh no yeah go ahead and have some but you know you know they don't mean it right and so that's the context from let me read it again I do not eat the bread of a man who stingy do not desire his delicacies for he's like one who's inwardly calculating eat and drink he says to you eat and drink he says to you but his heart is not with you you will vomit up the morsels that you have eaten and waste your pleasant words and so the the the other translation that has the the phrase as he thinks in his heart so he is here's what it really means it means the inner life review the real you his words don't do it his thought to do so he says oh yeah eat and enjoy it go ahead you can have some of my food but his inner thoughts are oh man this guy getting my food and I'm bugged by it so the real you is the inner thought life you that's the real you that's all it's about it's not about attracting things to you it's not about getting things it's about revealing who's the real you the face you put on to the world and things you say or the inner thought life of the person and the Bible is actually really big on this to the idea that my inner person my inner thought life that's the real me and Jesus he reinforces this when he's like hey if you look at somebody with lust mm-hmm if you look to lust just I haven't done anything I've just I just looked lust is in my art you've committed adultery in your heart so the real you is the is in the thought life which really to me shows me how desperately I need Jesus mm-hmm and that's the point of the proverb has nothing to do with getting things attracting things just your thought life reveals the real you as you think so you are that's actually really simplistic way to put it too and it reminds me of Ephesians because I always kind of like to pair James and Ephesians together because this is where faith without works comes in which has nothing to do with salvation by the way I mean for people watching men cannot see your faith so there's a certain way that you have to have works that show you have been saved so like if you're saved and you don't act like you're saved people are gonna wonder about that and then if you pair it together with Ephesians though it's quite beautiful because Paul is saying without faith I mean patience 210 I mean it you're saved by faith by grace not by works it's because God can see your heart so it's like he can see your inner thoughts he can see your inward desires he can see your face men can't so they look at what they can see and they see those works and they go hand in hand but one has to do everything with salvation and the other is not it's just a result of your salvation so that's what that reminds me of when you broke that out all right next one we have is this is a huge one this is how a lot of people think that we're gods were divine and hopefully it'll be as some to break down we have John 10 John chapter 10 verses 34 through 35 and there's a lot more to the passage but I'll read it jesus answered them he's talking to the Pharisees because they're bickering together with him it is is it not written in your law I have said Ye are gods and it goes down basically you know two more but people will take that little scripture and of course this is self-explanatory this is basically Jesus saying we're enlightened we're divine many people have interpreted this passage correctly and beautifully and explained it so what is the biblical view of this passage okay so this one actually gets it just genuinely gets complicated this is a passage that is easily becomes complicated I'll just put it that way and to do like a full teaching on it it would take like an hour so where's my summary I will say this a lot of people will take weird unbiblical beliefs and they'll try to shoehorn them into tough passages so you get to a passage you go well that's a difficult passage I wonder what it means and then they'll come and they'll cram doctrines that are totally unbiblical and it becomes hard to fight because you just find this to be a challenging passage so you you don't think it means what they think but you're trying to figure out what it means you know so let me give you like the short summary and hopefully it'll help and you can ask questions yeah Jesus is actually quoting Psalm 82 in John 10 he quoted he's quoting Psalm 82 so we need to look at Psalm 82 and ask what is this about so I'm gonna give you a summary of Psalm 82 then we're gonna read it because it's very short it's only eight verses so here's the summary the leaders of governments or nations or cities they're being rebuked in Psalm 82 for ruling unjustly that's the the leaders of either governments nations or cities they're being rebuked for judging or ruling unjustly and for not protecting the weak and the fatherless I I think that in Psalm 82 is referring to human rulers because and I'll give you more support here's the biblical context right in Exodus when people would go to the rulers it's said that they're going to God so they would have a problem and it says go to God but the people they're going to are the rulers and that's the same word referenced in Psalm 82 it's Elohim Elohim is a much more flexible word in Hebrew than the word God in English so it's a little clumsy when we try to use the term you know across languages but that's where it gets into a long explanation so yeah also if you asked like why do why is it said to be going to God when I'm going to rulers of the people of God well the answer is in Romans 13 it's because their Authority represents God Romans 13 tells us that governmental power comes from God and they're there as God's representatives or God's ministers to basically help I mean God cares about society and any authority that anyone has in society ultimately comes from God it reminds me of Moses whenever he went before the Pharaoh he said you will be like God to them yeah you'll be like God Pharoah that's what the way you're not literally being God but you are going to represent him exactly yeah okay so we can see the connection between human rulers and God not in identity but because of Authority they're borrowing from God as they're ruling over other people and put it that way so let me read the Psalm 82 to us and point out what it means in context and then we'll see how why Jesus used it that way so Psalm 82 it says a psalm of Asaph god has taken his place in the divine council in the midst of the gods he holds judgment how long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked now he's he's rebuking these rulers these people that are ruling over others he says how long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked give justice to the weak and the fatherless maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute rescue the weak and needy deliver them from the hand of the wicked so there's this rebuke you're not taking care of the needy you're not you're not using your power to take care of those who have no power that's the idea government's out of balance as it usually is it seems right and then as he goes on in verse 5 he says about these rulers about these things he calls God's in this text they neither they have neither knowledge nor understanding they walk about and darkness all the foundations of the earth are shaken so they're basically their stupid rulers they don't get their job and they're not doing it right and so God then now he cast judgment on them now here's what's gonna happen he says ice you are God's sons of the Most High all of you nevertheless like men you shall die and fall like any Prince then it can so he's gonna he's gonna destroy them then in verse eight he concludes the whole Psalm by saying arise O God judged the earth for you shall inherit all the nations so to summarize Psalm 82 there's these rulers that are unjust God's gonna destroy them and then in verse 8 he's gonna take over the nations himself when Jesus uses it the one thing that understand is this is not a comparison it's a contrast and that one key really helps us with this it's like a how much more thing hey if this can be said of human rulers how much more can it be said of God who comes in in human form and the difference in the psalm is and/or in the passage in John 10 Jesus he makes a contrast between these ye are God's people and himself he says of the ye are gods they're the ones to whom the Word of God came so they're on earth the Word of God comes to them but in verse 36 he says did you know he speaks of himself as the one whom the father consecrated and sent into the world so they're on the earth the word God comes to them Jesus he comes from heaven is sent into the world and he says hey if the word of God came to them and they could be in any sense called gods how much more how much more can the one who comes from heaven be called you know call himself God even so Jesus is kind of clever cuz he's basically he's basically a attributing divine hood to himself and yeah so yeah but he's not giving it to anyone else he's wrong he's contrasting look at look at how much greater I am than all of these things so Jesus is uniquely different in John we see this he's the one who's with God and He is God mm-hmm cool with God in John 5 he's the creator of all things in John 1 in the in John 10 the same passage he's in the father and the father's in him in John 8 he calls himself the I am yeah like so he's clearly got in what I love about Psalm 82 is this the last verse after rebuking these rulers I said to your gods that you're gonna die it says that God's gonna arise and he's gonna judge the earth and God will inherit the nation's that's Jesus roll he's the inheritor of all nations he's the king of kings lord of lords yeah he hurts all things so in Psalm 82 8 God will inherit all things and Jesus is gonna be the one who inherits all things so this is actually implying the deity of Christ even as Islam but the here's the key oh I shouldn't mention one thing before some people don't interpret these as human rulers they put it as being angelic beings or like spiritual forces of powerful forces that are sort of behind the human rulers behind the knee and that's that's fine it doesn't change the fact that Jesus is doing this contrast he's saying I'm greater than those things that's the point but so in no case under no interpretation does it make us gods no interpretation doesn't make us gods that's the point yeah under no interpretation am I now some sort of deity type thing that was Satan's lie in the garden oh yeah be like god that was say other lie he told himself we read about in Isaiah where he says I will be like God yeah yeah yeah I'm glad that you pointed that out by the way that this is interpreted in different ways so some not everybody is an agreement that some some people think they're human rulers other people say that they're divine it doesn't matter and that that's a that's a very interesting you know study but in this context and John 10 no matter how you define it it doesn't mean what people are saying that it means in the New Age yeah because the people who would disagree be like Mike those are human rulers that's the majority position but those who would disagree would and with with that position they would stand locked arm with me and fully agree yeah he ain't calling people God's like oh yeah we all agree on that like that's not on the table as an option for this passage if you look at the rest of the text of Scripture we can see Jesus is there's only one God there's no one like him the scripture says there's no one like him and Jesus comes and he's he's that one God who was with us you know he's God the Son but there's there's indeed no idea that humans are like God right that was the original lie that was why the Pharisees when Jesus claimed to be equal with God they tried to kill Jesus they're gonna pick up stones and kill him because the only options in the Jew are either your God or you've blaspheme so I would say those are still the only two options for those who say we're little gods right well which is the Word of Faith meeting yeah either you really are God or your blaspheming well the scripture shows you're not God so you're definitely blaspheming that ties into their belief in having some sort of power to be able to speak things into existence and because we have divine power so this is not just a new-age belief guys like this is in our churches yeah this is word of faith teaching and that's why they're one in the same is that if you hear from your pastor or whoever's at your pulpit and they're saying that you have that you are that you are able it all ties into this because you're able to speak things into existence and you're able to manifest visualize you're able to always have that healing and always have what you want money whatever it is it's because your divine it always comes down to this is that they believe scripturally that it says that you're like little ear little guts and that's why you are given the power to do these things and that's why we're breaking this down is that that's not what these scriptures me at all in the scripture when you say that someone creates things you're saying that their God oh yeah and so I get why they're like yeah well we are gods but I'm like no no no no but God alone creates read Isaiah like he's as I created all alone I did it alone created was created through Christ but if you the John one right everything that was created was created through Jesus yes okay but if I create things now we have things that were created that weren't created through Jesus mm-hmm I mean may or may be you say well I'm doing it through Jesus somehow accepted creations done there's no more further there's like a hundred problems every direction for you when you travel down this path we just give up on it entirely and this is why I'm when people I have a very high view of Scripture and again with everything that I'm learning this year with some hyper charismatic stuff that's going on there's a high view of experience versus Scripture so that's why in a lot of places a lot of pulpits you'll find that your encounters and experience will trump scripture so don't put God in a box is something I've been hearing a lot lately and I he's not in a box but I am you know like I am within the confines of Scripture it'd be like if you said to me like hey Mike do you think your wife's gonna cheat on you and I said oh no of course not I know my wife she would never do that and you say don't put her in a box like what do you mean there's no limits to her character there's no there's no reliability there's no things that she said that I can trust that I can say here's the box she's put herself in and I trust that you know and that's what we're doing with Scripture we're just like God said this of course he's gonna keep his word that's a good way of putting it yeah God did these things he's not gonna change his character and so I'm not putting him in a box I just know him you know and I yeah that's that's a very simplistic way to put it the next one is Romans 4:17 this is a huge one and we're to face circles the God that gives life to the dead and calls things that are not as though they were again this is a speaking into existence we know why it's used in new-age sort of thought circles because we've gone through that before scripturally speaking in Romans 4:17 what is Paul saying in context I love Romans so I love Romans for I appreciate it so much but let me say let's back up and get some context Romans gives us like the gospel you know a big careful explanation of the gospel and what it does in the first you know three chapters it establishes that all of us have sinned and we need salvation right we need salvation through Jesus and then it it's going to tell us that that salvation comes by faith but I'm saved by faith and this is really important for understanding Romans 4:17 so after telling us that salvation comes by faith one of the things that Paul's gonna do in Chapter four is he wants to establish that this has always been the teaching of the Bible this isn't a new thing that we just learned with Jesus this is something we knew back in Genesis though Paul's like he's trying to preach to people say look this isn't even new this salvation by faith thing apart from works it comes from Genesis like the first book of the Bible so he uses Abraham as his example which is just brilliant and he shows in Genesis where it says that abraham believed God and God accounted it to Abraham for righteousness that's righteousness by faith he believed he was kind of righteous so Paul's building this biblical case that salvation through faith has always been the teaching of Scripture so it's a brilliant thing it shows God's working through thousands of years you know to communicate the gospel to us in all sorts of different ways so when we get to Romans 4:17 and we have this phrase he calls things that are not as though they were what does this refer to does it refer to us speaking things into existence well it's first thing I'll say is no it's referring to God not me right I'm not doing anything here whatever it's talking about it's only God that's doing it so I'm not I'm not thinking that I do whatever God does I mean God creates the world does that mean I created the world like of course not so it's about God not us it's not telling us what we'll do is telling us what he has done what he does and in fact it's something that God alone can do when he calls things that are not as though they were it's something that only God can do that's it that's a God claim yeah so let me read Isaiah 44 verses 6 through 8 and and notice that when he calls things that are not as though they were he's actually not even speaking about creation at all and he's speaking about Abraham he says Abraham you're gonna have descendants and I'm gonna bless them you know the world through you and all this and Abraham believes him now what the moment Abraham had no kids but God's talking about it like it's just a reality and so God is predicting the future and he's gonna accomplish what he predicts so it's about prophecy and fulfillment of prophecy is what it's about hmm so Isaiah 44 talks about this too as he have 44 6 through 8 thus says the lord the king of israel and his redeemer the lord of hosts I am the first and I am the last besides me there is no God another verse for the little God's people there is no God who is like me let him proclaim it which is kind of like almost like a mocking joke that God's putting out towards those who think they're like God go ahead and try it so he's gonna challenge them you think you're like God do this he says let him declare and set it before me since I appointed an ancient people let him let them do what is to come let them speak the future right let them declare what is to come and what will happen this is this is God's like throwing the gauntlet down God saying hey if you want to say you're like me predict the future like I do go for it yeah and so and he declares that no one can in verse eight he says fear not nor be afraid have I not told you from of old and declared it and you are my witnesses is there a god besides me there is no rock I know not any Isaiah 44 is amazing chapter oh yeah oh yeah God's like yeah there's me and there's no one like me and yeah and I'm gonna prove it through telling you the future prophecy house yeah so he calls things that are not as though they were he prophesized and then he can make it happen God alone can do this and the application of the Romans passage 4:17 is not that I can declare the future but that God can and I should trust him because he can the application is faith remember Romans 1 through 4 even into 5 is all about establishing that I simply trust in God for salvation the one who can tell the future alone who alone can do that I just believe him and I can be saved so there's the full context it's beautiful stuff it has nothing to do with me pretending I can do what God alone it goes back to what you said in the beginning it's if you were to take the Bible alone you would never come up with that I mean if you were to read Romans Romans in general we're taking one scripture you know like that's how you have to have really your ice you're using your ice it's eisegesis like you're coming in and you're coming with your own interpretation and you're using that scripture you're taking a round pick fitting it into a square hole making it work the way you want it to work you broke that down really well thank you good next one so New Agers have this view on fear there's a hierarchy of emotion and a hierarchy of feelings and vibration and each one is attached if you will to feeling so you have the middle ground which is like contentment and then you have love all the way up here at the bottom are at the top and in between you have like joy gratitude all the good feelings and then below you have things like jealousy bitterness anger and at the very bottom is fear fear if you're in a place of fear to them you are on the lowest frequency if you believe that God sends people to hell God is jealous things like that they believe that's a very fear base they call it fear-based I hear that a lot believe the scripture that they'll use I suffered parts of first John chapter 4 verses 16 through 18 god is love whoever lives in love lives in God and God in him so this is another one of those scriptures that kind of makes you divine there is no fear in love perfect love drives out fear if you fear you're not in love break that down what is what is John saying here what does that mean okay so the first thing we'll recognize about this passage in first John is that it's actually talking not just about fear in general but a very specific fear it's talking about the fear of judgment the fear that when you die you will be judged and sentenced to hell effectively that's that's the focus of the fear in first John 4 which is probably the worst fear you can have I think yes but let me slowly read it with that in mind let's read it first John 4 17 through 19 and then we'll talk about how this relates to New Age thinking so it says by this is love perfected with us so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment so the idea is that love is perfected in my heart the work of love so that I have no fear about the future judgment and then I read on it said because as he is so also are we in this world there is no fear in love but perfect love casts out fear for fear and has to do with punishment that's the fears the fear of punishment the specific kind of fear not any kind of fear in general and whoever fears has not been perfected in love we love because He first loved us so the context is not just any fear at all of any kind like I'm afraid if I eat these razor blades it will kill me you know like I'm not gonna that's not a wrong fear that's a good healthy fear there is healthy fear it's a real thing yeah yeah so the fear that's that I you know I don't want to fear whoever fears has not been perfected in love is talking about believers Christians who have Christ but they're still fearful of judgment they just don't get how much God loves them they don't get what God's done for them how much Christ has cleansed them and forgiven them and so there's a sanctification that needs to be done and understanding God's love understanding God's kindness understanding God's grace in Christ that they need so that they can be have those fears removed so there's no fear of judgment for them for them I say but it's only for them because it doesn't mean this doesn't mean that everybody's saved for a couple reasons one there's different kinds of love in Scripture for instance Dimas he left Paul the Apostle in the New Testament and he just abandoned him and Paul says the reason why is because he loved the world he loved the world he loved this present age that's really interesting so demas love was his downfall because he loved the wrong things mm-hm and so there's there can be bad love there's other things where you know the scripture tells us first John do not love the world or the things in the world so our love is supposed to be for God this love is directed towards God it's not just love in general like be a loving person it's no no love towards God there's love is relational so love without context of what you're loving doesn't make sense you can't just say love and fill in the blank mm-hmm right I can't love you violence like I can't just fill in the blank with anything I want I need to put God in that blank I need to say I love God with all your heart soul mind and strength and they love your neighbor as yourself there's a priority of love I'm so yeah be grounded and love be grounded in the love of God in Christ but there's another side of this which is the healthy fear and the fear even of judgment for those who don't know Jesus those who were living in rebellion against God Jesus highlighted this because he said I will tell you who to fear that's his words that probably New Agers don't realize Jesus said this is what Doreen this is why Doreen had her her lightbulb woman is she read through the Bible and read Jesus's words and realized oh this is not the Jesus I thought I loved her story I think it's silly so beautiful so wonderful yeah Jesus says I will tell you who to fear fear him right who after your bodies dead can cast your soul into hell well what what what wait first John says I should have no fear yeah but that's for those who are in Christ Jesus is saying that this fear of judgment you should have it and it should drive you to Jesus who totally wipes away your sin who totally cures the problem of your rebellion so that then you have no fear of judgment because of what Jesus has done for you that's the full that's the full story about about fear and about love I think in Christ I have no fear of judgment I'm perfectly right to have no fear out of Christ I have a healthy proper fear and it's the beginning of wisdom proverbs says the beginning of wisdom is he Lord so not just a sense of Terror like a general sense of a agitation but a real awareness of genuine danger if I continue in a rebellious life against God and I reject his offering of Jesus to save me that's good I like that I like a few light bulb moments myself during that because I left first John it's one of my favorite John's my favorite disciple of all time every time I read the gospel revelation I'm still figuring out but I love oh yeah I like staying agnostic about my eschatology because I'm like I know all right next one oh this one's fun this is a Galatians 6 verses 7 through 8 it's really simple a man reaps what he sews now again we know what this means to most New Agers people in word of faith so a financial seed and the whole getting and giving back thing that one's easy to define scripturally what was pulsing so yeah reaping what he's so what we sow is often confused with things like karma or what goes around comes around but what I think what it ultimately comes down to is that it's if you extend the time when you reap what you sow if you extend it out to Judgment Day then it then it becomes a biblical concept but if I try to put it all happening right now in this life that's when it becomes more like this sort of difficult to apply you know some people don't seem like they're reaping what they're selling other people seem like they are you know and it just seems like on wait why does that mean everything that happens to you deserve it is that what that means and then when someone's rich they're reaping what they've sown so all the wealthy must be all the righteous people so let me read the text and show you why I think it's about eternal things which are by the way better than the temporary things of this life so it's talking about reaping and sowing the things that matter not the things that will burn so in Galatians six seven through nine I'll read the verses says do not be deceived God is not mocked for whatever one so is that he will also reap it says God is not mocked because sometimes we think we can get away with it that's the idea you know when I think I can sin and get away with it I'm mocking God but I will I'll reap what I sow it's a farming thing you know your plant stuff you're gonna get the crops you plant then in verse eight for the one who sews to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption but the one who sews to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life just talking about that Judgment Day that without that final judgment where my whole life is laid out and I see the fruit of my real life live before God not just the experiences I had during life and then verse 9 says let us not grow weary of doing good for in due season we will reap if we do not give up so it's about an eternal reaping not a another right now reaping but when it talks about the Spirit in the flesh it's it this seems to be different than the new-age idea like because I love that they're focused on love but I think that their understanding of love is missing something yes and so I think this helps escalations it didn't talk about the one who says to love will of love reap corruption or of love reap eternal life and one who sews to hate or reproach it didn't say love and hate it said the spirit and the flesh and galatians tells us what the spirit in the flesh are and this this for flesh for instance the works of the flesh it says in galatians 5 our sexual immorality impurity sensuality idolatry idolatry is a little god's thing right i was just gonna say idolatry sorcery which would include all sorts of you know tarot cards mediums channeling things like this like all that kind of stuff enmity that's when you you have bitter despising of other people right strife jealousy fits of anger rivalries dissensions divisions in the drunkenness orgies and things like of these in other words said yeah some of the flesh is said it's not just not love it's it's sin now on contrast about the spirit it says the fruit of the Spirit and it gives a list is love joy peace patience kindness goodness faithfulness gentleness self-control against such there is no law so kindness gentleness goodness faithfulness patience love yes love is in there but it's that biblical view of love no now he's going to add that right the biblical view of love is relational and it focuses on loving God first God's my first love right and then I love others as myself that's the biblical view of love and if you have that where God's the top priority it keeps you from having other loves become idols like with Dimas who loved the world right he loved the world but that means he didn't love the Lord properly mm-hmm sometimes if we lift up love absent of the priority of loving God first then we can actually be falling into idolatry we can be falling into selfishness we can we can actually be in the flesh thinking that we're walking in love yeah that makes sense the next one is I think simple to understand it's proverbs again another proverbs 118 21 the tongue can bring life or death and once again we understand this to be used as speaking a profession to declare things into existence biblically the tongue can bring life or death means something else to a believer what does it mean Mike okay the tongue can bring life or death this I've heard Christians go too far with this passage too easy yeah where I ever heard a New Age person do it this is what the problem is that it's a limit churches yeah yeah and in a sense it's understandable confusion but it's still confusion so I want to try to hopefully I can explain there's two verses in Proverbs here that go together they go together and as proverbs 18 verse 20 and 21 so I want to read them in in context because you can see clearly these these verses go together and then it changes your understanding of the path a little bit a psoases from the fruit of a man's mouth his stomach is satisfied and he is satisfied by the yield of his lips death and life are in the power of the tongue and those who love it will eat its fruit ah so he's talking about eating the fruit of the things you say and the verse before it mentions the fruit of the things you say the fruit of a man's mouth is by the fruit of his mouth his stomach is satisfied so what's clear is this that the fruit of a man's mouth is the things that we say out loud and then it comes back into our lives and does impact us well that sounds consistent with the New Age view right but there's more to it than that yeah yeah yeah so I think it means something like this we're gonna eat our words for better or worse in our lives and it can even lead to life or death for us that's that verse about death and life it can even lead to a very very much to life or death what we say has a major impact on our lives major impacts on our lives and this is consistent in Proverbs yes we the power of words we agree on here but they're not creating reality we're just we're just gonna have to deal with what we say and what we say is gonna impact our lives so there's interesting statistic about jobs and why people get fired from jobs I found this out a while ago I thought was really interesting the number one reason why people get fired from jobs is not poor job performance it's bad attitudes yeah I thought it was really interesting and then I thought yeah I looked at my old life and I thought yeah man people I know who can't hold a job it's an attitude issue usually it's not like they came late to work it's they mouth off and they're mean to customers and hit yeah it's the mouth right and so their bad language or bad words or unfruitful talk ends up coming back into their life but in a very practical way right the same thing can be said of marriages marriages that break down because the spouse will or both of them will not control their tongue and they just say such horrible things that eventually it kills the marriage or friendships where you've lost the friendship because that person will not guard their speech Wars literally wars have gone down because of the stuff that leaders said to each other and so yes that's in life are in the power of the tongue but it's a much more practical thing it's not mystical I think just very practical I had a friend actually years ago as a truly sad story who he just got in the flesh he mouthed off to his boss decided he was gonna quit so he goes I quit he'd had the job for years and years and years it was a good job a lot of job security pension and all that kind of stuff but he quit he walked away because he just wanted to vent like proverbs says the fool vents all his feelings a fool Vince all his feelings but a wise man quietly holds it back this crusher says so he should have just held it back well after a week or two he went back to his job and he thought he could get it back but his boss was like no I'm done with you you do great work but I can't stand you Wow you know and you fired so I have no obligation you're the Union you can't appeal to the Union or anything so he lost his job consequently he couldn't get it he couldn't find another good job maybe because his attitude I don't know um he ended up using drugs I'm not kidding Wow and a couple years later he died as a result of his lifestyle that's so sad and it all started because he wouldn't control his tongue at work and I'm like yeah death and life are in the power of your tongue but it's not you creating reality it's you having horrible and negative impact on the people around you and yourself because of your uncontrolled tongue that's that's what I see in this passage it's a natural consequence yeah but if we add the mystical idea that our words are creating reality or that we're creators with God that's completely unbiblical that's completely forced on the text we don't we don't see that at all so and it's not even the negativity is forbidden it's just foolish talk that's forbidden that's the ID you don't speak foolish things that's what proverbs focuses on don't be a fool it doesn't say don't be negative because sometimes sometimes negative words are the right words that's a good point sometimes they do right um Jesus talked to spoke very negative words about people and to people and others time you spoke very positive words he always spoke true words and the right words at the right time yeah we shouldn't lie we shouldn't have complaints with ingratitude we shouldn't slander and gossip but there can be lies that are positive as well everything's fine you look great today don't worry about it everything will be fine that won't kill you don't worry you know they feel fine I mean yeah for any of us who've been upset because advertisers lied to us about their products positively promising things and making this feel good and then we bought the thing we're like nope that wasn't it yeah you know that positive stuff can be just as foolish as negative stuff and worse sometimes because it's just a way of manipulating others yeah it's a good way of putting that thank you thank you for breaking that down I'm sorry to hear about your friend yeah yeah that's unfortunate next one all right now this one's uh this one has been coated to me personally a lot especially this month because of my recent video because I don't think people quite understand this is a proof text for a lot of in a lot of hyper charismatic groups for the experiences of the supernatural encounters being able to declare things and word of faith and of course news new thought new way to use this but I've seen this so much more in hyper charismatic groups and it's John 14 chapter 14 verses 12 through 14 Jesus says that he who believes in Him will do even greater things than these which is the stuff that he was doing all the miracles and whatever you ask for in my name I will do which we went over you may ask me for anything in my name and I will do it the key thing to focus on in this is that we will do greater things than Jesus did which is why we can kind of like go into the new age to have these super hyper experiences we can go to the realm of heaven and see Jesus himself and we can leave our bodies and have our spirits go to heaven and we can visit with angels all the time and just these really intense supernatural claims based on this one Scripture so we're supposed to do greater things than Jesus did before I answer the greater things part but I guess I will forget this I just want to mention that there's nothing about these this kind of expecting people to have these out-of-body experiences it was such a rare thing happened to Paul but it was so rare that he considered it like boasting to even talk about it because it's like this doesn't happen guys like this is not a normal thing that's not a normal Christian experience the Christian experiences Jesus is actually with me right now not I'm leaving to go to be with him like why would I need to leave to be with him he's with me right now and it also tells us in Scripture that Satan disguises his angels as ministers of light meaning that if I have these experiences I may well be encountering demons to lead me astray impersonating angelic being tonight can I throw a reverse that years something that they would say is because you haven't watched my physics of heaven video but in Chapter I believe it's chapter 4 or 5 there is a chapter called authentic versus counterfeit and in this chapter they're saying that because there's a counterfeit in the New Age there has to be an authentic so the difference is is that if you're a believer in Jesus Christ God and they use the scripture that he will not hand you a serpent if you ask for a fish so if you're asking God for a supernatural encounter he's not gonna hand you a serpent he's not gonna give you a demonic encounter they believe that if you are saved you are sealed that God would not allow a demonic accounter to come to you and much less an angel that's really a demon or you know a counterfeit spirit they will use that scripture and say because I'm a child of God because I'm sealed and saved by the Holy Spirit I am protected from that ever happening okay I think I think the more biblical understanding would be God won't give you the demonic encounter he's not gonna give you the serpent he doesn't say there are no serpents he's just like I'm not gonna give you the serpent when you're asking for a fish but yet are there actually you know demonic encounters are we not yet warned like why are we even warned that Satan disguised as Angels as ministers of light why are we told in first John that we need to test all things because many false prophets have gone into the world and it's telling that both of those scriptures in Corinthians and first John were written to mmm in Colossians it warns us about you know messing around with angels right intruding into the worship of angels and all this kind of stuff and says stay away from all that stuff like this is just not the direction you want to go the idea that um as long as I'm asking God for a good experience I'll always get that yes imagine if that's not true how are you setting you and your vineyard but you're setting people up like as long as you're asking for a good experience but if it's not true what are you setting them up for deception deception right because God tells us I don't want you to do this mediumship thing I don't want you to do in doing these things are all forbidden in Scripture right they're all forbidden when it comes to our spiritual life it's pray that's it I'm not seeking for all those kind of encounters and so by going in thinking that I'm guaranteed good encounters with good spirits and all that when yet even scripture tells me test the spirits that seems really scary seems like they're being set up to be deceived mm-hmm yeah and the oh the other idea that there's for the counterfeit there's always the real thing no telling if you read this book Mike you'll your head will explode it's on my reading list yeah physics heaven but um but I don't see how that's true there's always a real thing for the counterfeit like how is that true like where is this they'll say that um you can Satan can't create okay so they'll say that Satan everything that Satan uses to trick you is taken from God so like Satan talking to you and by the way this is why it's good to know their mindset people who are watching like this is good you need to know what people are believing to correctly interpret it oh yeah um they'll say like for example Satan and Jesus you know whenever he was tempted Satan used great Scripture he already used what he used what was already there he didn't create that so what they'll say is okay if there's there's a if you can channel spirits there has to be an authentic version of that now I'm not kidding this is what they'll say auras spirit got its channeling crystals everything anything that's negative in the New Age they're saying but it was God's first so because Satan can't create this is what they say this is not what I believe yeah because he cannot create it all had to be from God first so it's kind of like somebody gave me the example of like plastic you can you eat we took what was already there and created something from it mmm so if we were to go back to the original we would have something authentic and that's what they claim they're doing okay so I mean my gut just wants to say that's nonsense but let me let me try to give a biblical example to build a bridge with somebody thinks so in the Old Testament to these false gods like Baal and stuff they would sacrifice their children by burning them alive on the on the molten heated hands of the idol the metal hands heated up really hot to the red-hot put their children on their and burn them to death gods now by this principle there's got to be some Christian version of that right hmm you make a good point like whoa what's the Christian version of sacrificing my children what there isn't one guys there's enough there isn't one this is this is why God's actually says about this about these burning these children he says it never entered my mind I mind yeah he says I never I never even never had any desire for that sort of horrible evil thing do not do those things now in the same you know context he says the same kind of stuff about sorcery and witchcraft and mediums and channeling and all those kinds of things and so this is I I will be so bold as to say this is doctrines of demons to teach me that I am to go into these things that God rebuked and refuted throughout the scriptures and I'm to learn their ways and call it Christian when God consistently rebukes Israel for doing exactly that yeah when they when they made the golden calf when Moses went up to the Mount Sinai and he's getting the Ten Commandments and they made the golden calf do you know what they called the golden calf the called him Yahweh yes the name of God and God wasn't like well for every ungodly Idol out there there is the truth you found the true one there's the Yahweh idol in steady prose that Commandments down and there's this radical judgment that happens as a result of these things so it's it is the worst most dangerous kind of nonsense to say that sort of thing so leading off of that because we unpacked that because that's gonna be a foundation to dissect this scripture because this is the scripture that's used to back up all those beliefs that I just kind of set out there because again I see this in hyper charismatic groups to back up some really interesting [Music] unsettling things that we can see because we're supposed to do greater things than him but biblically speaking what does that mean like when he says Jesus says he who believes in Him will do even greater things than these what is he saying to the disciples in context okay so let's break it down there's two possible meanings and sometimes when you Konno passages you don't know what to do with it you can ask what are my options like what could it mean that's fair to the text and well it's that word greater is what it kind of hinges on greater could refer to quality or it could refer to quantity greater and quality or greater in quantity like I have a greater number of chickens or greater quality of chickens you know like what kind of greater are we talking about and so let's say if we're gonna take it as quality we're gonna do greater miracles qualitatively greater than Jesus did let me just look at what Jesus did because it has nothing to do with astral projection or any whatever that stuff is there's nothing to do with channeling or anything like that he's just healed people a guy born blind right he healed a guy born blind he cast out demons in fact he cast over a thousand demons out of one guy right we are legion but it was supposed to be a thousand if I remember correctly so you'd have to cast out even more demons like I will have to cast out 2,000 to be able to get greater in quality walked on water I have to walk on air he raised the dead I have to bring people to life they didn't even exist I don't know like how do you do greater than raising the dead he died for us and rose again what am I getting my weight I'm gonna do greater than dying for the world and saving them and rising from the dead no that doesn't really make sense does it if what we do is greater in kind then I just want to see it because astral projection and weird what'll ends up being you know pagan practices this has nothing to do with Jesus he wears these things wears these greater things and the apostles why didn't they do greater things than Jesus right when we read about like Paul he had a handkerchief yeah people touched it and were healed well Jesus was greater because he just said the word and long distance healed people they didn't have to touch anything so Jesus was greater than Paul why did Paul have to leave a Pafford Dittus sick in my leadest this follower of his he had to leave him sick and he says he almost died and Paul left him there so he could heal naturally because the prayer thing wasn't working I don't remember Jesus ever having that issue and a far like heroes in the scripture don't do greater qualitative works than Jesus then why would I think that we're supposed to do that today on the other option is that it's quantity quantity greater numbers of miracles numbers of works than Jesus did not in quality and I guess if we could he saves us for eternity no one can beat that that's his that's his great miracle right no but Jesus departs he leaves the earth and he says you'll do greater works than these I think it's about numbers because we're continuing for 2,000 years to do things in the name of Jesus and so number wise yes the works continue but now they continue it's not just Jesus going around doing things it's Christians going around doing things in his name I've never thought about it that way that's uh yeah compelling and this is and this is a big transfer because in the Jewish mindset you don't do things in the name of anybody but God but Jesus is telling them you're gonna do stuff in my name so let me with that in mind let's read the passage again right Jesus in verse 12 of John 14 truly truly I say to you whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do and greater works than these he will do because I'm going to the Father this is a continuation because Jesus is leaving why why our works gonna be greater he's leaving that's the reason why he's not around to continue we're gonna be doing the work and it's better than that though because he does the work through us that's the next two verses verse 13 and 14 he says whatever you ask in my name this I will do that the father may be glorified in the son if you ask me anything in my name I will do it so you ask God and God does it know Jesus does it right because Jesus is God this is this is an elevation of who Christ is Jesus says I'm gonna leave the earth and I'm gonna continue working through my people okay so I don't think it's though that each individual believer does miracles more miraculous than Jesus I think it's Christ continuing his miracles in answering the prayers of believers throughout time we've had two thousand years of answered prayer which is definitely greater at least in quantity than the things that Jesus did but then there's a last issue that people probably still hung up on which is anything we ask him anything we can you can do anything and this is where we get the name it and claim it stuff or I'm gonna believe for and you fill in the blank I'm just gonna believe for this because it's anything but here I'll just add again it's not the only thing we say everything God says about prayer everything Jesus tells us about prayer not just one sentence because the same one who said anything right he also said that we should pray your will be done not mine you can't you can't just turn right all the time yes and we get this example then like Paul the Apostle Paul the Apostle writes to Rome Romans 1 and he's writing to them and he's like man I want to come see you guys and he's praying constantly that God will allow him to come see them in Rome but look at he doesn't say I get anything I asked for in prayer even though it's a good thing I just want to visit the believers in Rome he still thinks God's will might overrule his prayers so Romans 1 verses 9 through 10 he says without ceasing I mentioned you always in my prayers asking that somehow by God's will I may now at last succeed in coming to you by God's will by God's will so even his travel plans for ministry purposes are not things that he assumes are gonna happen yeah well probably have to believe it you have to believe it well maybe the believing it is something God gives you in the moment and you don't have to stir it up in yourself and if you go well if I'm not believing it maybe the Lord doesn't have it for me I don't know I don't know how to make that happen I shouldn't kid myself on these things that was good yeah and then of course the messenger of Satan that we read about earlier where Paul pleads we ask anything in my name I'll do it well obviously he doesn't mean anything with no qualifications about God's will or God's plan or God's better purposes when he's praying about the thorn in his flesh God tells him no my grace is enough for you that's a paradigm shift for me because I never actually understood I never understood that Scripture so never ever would have thought it was more of a quantity thing that that makes a lot of sense to me personally yeah at least that's my best understanding of it yeah I would have to adopt that understanding at this point um the next day we can kind of put together because they are great pop culture scriptures we have Philippians 4 which is everybody probably has this on there there's probably bumper stickers and you know wall mounts Philippians 4:13 I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength and the next one is a very another very popular one Jeremiah 29:11 for I know the plans I have for you plans to prosper you and not to harm you plans to give you a hope and a future everybody loves to kind of take these scriptures they get tattoos of them they you know post them online but contextually speaking I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength written by Paul who's in prison Jeremiah 29:11 anybody's read Jeremiah knows that that's a what do they call him the weeping prophet yeah yeah it's kind of a depressing book um these yet they're both similar because people like to use these scriptures this is more for our culture but also for people who think that we can live a prosperous life I know a very popular TV preacher who uses these to kind of back up that we are supposed to have prosperous lives but in the context of Scripture what do they mean okay me to say this is sometimes people rip these verses out of people's hands by telling him it doesn't mean what you think but then they leave them empty-handed and they don't give them some hope or stuff like but what but where where's the hope I do get from this verse so I don't want to just tell them tell us what it doesn't mean I want us to understand what it does mean and how it does apply to our lives because they are beautiful wonderful hopeful scriptures yeah they just don't mean what some people think they mean so some people quote Philippians 4:13 we'll start with that one as I can do all things through him who strengthens me in other words we're my team's gonna win the Super Bowl cuz I can do anything through Christ who strengthens me I'm gonna have a success in business I'm gonna achieve my goals yeah I'm gonna make it through college because I can do anything the Christ who strengthens me I'm gonna win this marathon because I can do anything through Christ who strengthens me but that that is definitely out of context and I'm kind of I'm kind of glad it does it it should even feel wrong that we think we can quote that verse to just get whatever we want it should just feel wrong to our spirit like it just feels wrong like I feel like it's not right for me to just do whatever I want I want what the Lord once and I don't always know what he wants you know so what is it really about Philippians 4 verse 11 it's about I'm starting in verse 11 two verses back and we're gonna find out it's about Paul going through suffering it's not even about avoiding suffering it's about going through suffering so let me read it says not that I'm speaking of being a need for I have learned and here's the lesson he's learned in whatever situation I am to be content this is something I never hear preached from prosperity preachers contentment contentment I know how to be brought low and I know how to abound in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of facing Plenty and hunger abundance in need so there's a secret he's learned he knows how to go through pain and difficult times lowness in his life and hunger in need in in all those sorts of things and the secret is verse 13 I can do all things through him who strengthens me or you could put it this way I can get through any circumstance because I have Jesus with me and that is a beautiful truth and it has nothing to do with winning the Super Bowl it's taking it in context and what Paul meant it to be but I mean he's in prison he's about to die and he's learned the secret of not happiness but it's it's about being content and in it in any situation you're in it's through Christ so it's like whenever you think about it through those lens yeah it can apply to us but not it's yeah in some superficial ways I think some people can do yes not that the spiritual person gets what they want mm-hmm it's that the spiritual person realizes they already have what they need and it's Christ yeah that's good we should make a meme out of that the next one is similar because this again is written by Jeremiah weeping prophet lamenting because Jerusalem he's warning them he's like repent please you know as sackcloth and ashes but all people ever really quote from Jeremiah is this scripture what does it mean in context okay well first let me just start by this like since there's so many passages taken out of context that we've been going over here just imagine if I did this to you Melissa if I could something you said out of context and then pretended that you made a promise you never made and then tried to hold you to it give me an example oh well I I when I was in junior high this is a sad example and I'm not proud of it I'm not proud of a lot of things engineer yeah when I was in junior high I was doing really poorly in my typing class we had typing class back yeah we did - and this typing class and I'm sitting there and the teachers saw that I was just being a goofball and I was not being responsible and my grades were really bad really really bad and she tells me you know if you're not gonna try why do you even come or no I think she said if you're not gonna try you shouldn't even come and I intentionally thought to myself you don't have to go to class I don't have to go to school I want to go to her class so I'm not even kidding after after it was my last period of the day so after I got to that period for like a week or two I just left school I ditched her class and I thought to myself if I get in trouble I'm gonna tell the principal or whoever that she told me that I said I shouldn't come why because because part of what she said was something I liked and wanted to use for my benefit but it was wrong and long story short I I ended up getting in the principal's office and I used my little trick and I don't know how this worked it worked she she got reprimanded by the principal for telling a student not to come to school no way and and I and I sat there i was like I can't believe that works well the problem is that you're not gonna pull one over on God it's not gonna work on here and this is what we're doing is we're taking his stuff I mean it worked on her actually I flunked your high so I didn't really work for me there's actually a really good analogy though because you're taking something you're kind of again making it fit into your life yeah he's what you mean but here's how I can use it yeah what happens unfortunately so the context of Jeremiah 29:11 is it's about Israel it's not about you yes it's about Israel it's about Israel long ago right before they were utterly destroyed by the Babylonians and the temple was ruined and burned down and destroyed by the Babylonians and they were carried off into Babylon into captivity and right before this happens God's like my plans are for your prosperity and then they're destroyed well what's up with that what's what's the real context what's going on the real context is that they're in rebellion and God's going to judge them but he tells them I don't want this path for you I want to bless you but your rebellion is gonna bring judgment instead of blessings and then he gives him a promise he's like yeah but when you return to me I will bring you back into the blessings I have for you that's the short explanation of it that's just a short version apply to the individual in the 21st century yes I think that how it applies to us is we realize I don't have a promised land on earth like Israel did they had to physically have the physical Promised Land of Israel and this sort of you know country promises to them as a country about God's blessings if they will turn their hearts to him that's something God's done with Israel and nobody else I don't pretend not to me but what I do have is I do have some promises from God I promises of Christ being with me I promises of God using all the circumstances of my life for his glory and for my good and I have the promises of eternal joy and eternal life and all those wonderful things and I hold on to those things and I say my job is just to obey you God and let you bring these things out in my life but the danger is when I take promises of physical prosperity to Israel and I apply them as though their promises of immediate physical prosperity to all people who were in Christ and that that ends up being a problem and in fact even in Jeremiah's day he tells them that it's gonna be 70 years before God brings them back into the land for most of the Israelites that means they will die before these promises are fulfilled and that kind of is our situation I will it's upon the death of my life that the fullness of God's promises are gonna be experienced by me and so there's like yeah there's a future and a hope but I need to project it forward to heaven if I want to apply it to my life do you think no harm can ever come to a Christian absolutely not yeah yeah I think that if I would flip it not only say it no of course not I mean look at Jesus look at the apostles look at any Christian you've ever met look at any human you've ever met that no harm could come to people is silly but I would say this is that if your if your experience of what it means to know God and relate with God if it if it depends on you having prosperity right now it's the cheap imitation yes the cheap imitation um you know this is what Jesus encountered over and over he feeds the multitude he multiplies the bread gives 5,000 people food and then they're like show us a sign that you're really really the one and he's like what basically all paraphrase like what do you want and they go make more bread and he's like you don't get it he says I'm I am the bread of life he tells them don't labour for the food which perishes but for that which lasts for eternal life and he's trying to turn their eyes off this temporary world up to eternity and this is the same struggle with people who want to quote these verses about right now prosperity and they don't realize how cheap that is compared to the eternal wonderful heavenly things that God has for us some that's good last one last one to our last one thank you by the way you're breaking this down really well I'm really enjoying this oh good this is kind of everything put together with word of faith prosperity and hyper charisma and a new age romans 12:2 do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind this is basically used to think only positive things because if you're and it sounds so simple and cheap to say I don't think only positive things basically it's saying that kind of like what I was saying before about if you are wanting healing or if you're looking for a breakthrough or anything there's like almost like this lock on the head of thinking anything else so if you're trying to renew your mind you're trying to get into the proper mindset for your breakthrough scripturally speaking it's another romans passage what does that mean in context okay so as we encounter here we encounter some truths about the thinking changes my life those things are true but when it but it's like two different whole different world views that are coming out the text there's the biblical worldview then there's this kind of new-age worldview we talk about vibrations frequencies this stuff is is is not like I get what they're saying it's just not true quantum mechanics quantum science yeah well and the edges of science like quantum mechanics quantum mechanics is like probably the most abused current scientific thing you know everybody wants to grab it and prove whatever they want to prove with it and when you actually research these things you go oh it's not that at all so and I get a theist want to use quantum mechanics to yeah anyway that's a whole other discussion yeah but it seems as though that's the really bad or poor understandings or uses of the of the thing anyhow let's just read it in context right Romans 12 verses 1 & 2 and try to pick up what it's saying right I appeal to you therefore brothers by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice holy and acceptable to God which is your spiritual worship so it's about me giving myself to God that's the primary thing here then he goes on to explain what that looks like he says do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind that by testing you may discern what is the will of God what is the good and acceptable and perfect the will of God which is good and accept the one perfect excuse me so there's an order of thought here in verse one I present my body as a sacrifice that means I walk in obedience to God and I say you know my life belongs to you God whatever you want I'm gonna do that I'm gonna prioritize your priorities I'm gonna live for you and then there's the they're partially the result of that the result of physical obedience to God where it's the transformation of my mind this this I think means when you find that when you look at your inner person and you have this messed-up thought life and you want it to change one of the things that you can do is you can say God I will live for you with my body my actions will glorify your name I will I will choose to follow Christ to cast off sin to not be conformed of the world and I will obey Christ and then I find that even my thoughts are changing so the path to a changed mind is a being a living sacrifice for God living for God that's the idea does that make sense oh yeah definitely yeah the be transform is I'm not transforming anything externally no what I'm transformed yes I'm not affecting anything outside of me here these this body is obeying God this mind is being changed to be more like Christ and it's not about impacting vibrations or any of that kind of stuff it's about the change of character which to me is the most important kind because the one person I have to live with is me wherever I go yeah yeah there I am so so that that becomes so valuable and so wonderful and so beautiful so it's not about getting what I want it's about being transformed as I give God what he wants my life a living sacrifice and he changes me from the inside out and so it's it's all God focused and not me focused actually which is the theme to this isn't it because every single scripture that we've gone over and again there are hundreds of others it's awesome it's not about us it's it's all focused towards Jesus okay and then that this perfect segue to the to the final point I'll make on this first which is Romans 12:1 and 2 it starts with the phrase therefore right therefore by the mercies of God present your bodies a living sacrifice well when you see you therefore it's nice to wonder what it's there for therefore implies something they just said leads to this you know at least to a conclusion well the thing that was said in the previous verse Romans 11:36 was for from him God and through him and to him are all things to him be glory forever amen so because everything's from God everything's for God everything's belongs to him right it comes through him it's all his he deserves all glory therefore live your life for God and as you're doing that you he will change your mind you will transform you sing some vacation it's the sanctification verse in a way yeah absolutely yeah so we could probably sit here for another five six seven hours and go over all these scriptures but 15 will do yeah yeah I hope it's always beneficial for people I really hope people like the lights go on or others are equipped you know to minister to those who have these you know false understandings of these guys seriously Mike I think that the way that you handle information the way that scripture is you know kind of broken down I just appreciate your style and your kindness I think that there are so many times where we can kind of take how people view Scripture and just kind of attack them instead of actually explaining to them or helping them see that there's another view to this you know that well I'll tell you that's my natural man go out I see and I've expressed this to many people I pride like I I struggle with pride and people pleasing those are like my two things and and having people kind of come alongside and keep that in check as important but thinking we know everything about this is telling because I I didn't know anything about scripture before I got out of the New Age but I thought I did and it took me a long time to unlearn this and unhinge myself from these meanings so I think that a lot of people are gonna be very happy with this video they're gonna be relieved they're gonna be they're gonna have an answer to their question so I want to thank you for for coming on and doing this and taking this time because it's it took a long time to do this but we did it and it's gonna be amazing success yes thank you thank you is there anything you want to add before we close out all the one ad is is a I'm gonna put this video on my channel as well and you guys this has been melissa dougherty i'll put links to her stuff in the comments below or in the description below I want people to be able to have access to your content as well and to know that you're out there doing this stuff I think you're doing great stuff you have stuff on the law of attraction on a bunch of a whole bunch of New Age stuff that I think we do need to be familiar with our new thought attics in general apologetics is kind of my passion you know in kind of dissecting other religions in general apologetics in theology and this has been really helpful for me because I didn't have to go and find out New Age teachings on all these passages you were able to bring that yeah and then I was able to try to respond you know gorgeous what people want cuz people don't know what they actually mean every New Ager every word of faith everybody knows what they actually think they mean yeah but if you're to take that and and you know explain it from the biblical context it's completely different so that's yeah thank you thank you for doing that thank you for taking the time to prepare for this because it's really gonna bless people it's worth doing totally thanks I appreciate what you're doing I hope you keep doing it can't stop now I know we can't stop now or it kind of in this CD thanks thanks again Mike for coming on this is this was amazing this was a edifying it was a blessing I really appreciate this I'm sure that we're gonna get you some good feedback yeah thank you so much god bless you you too [Music] you

Channel: Mike Winger

Views: 268,350

Rating: 4.8567529 out of 5

Keywords: new age Bible verses, word of faith Bible verses, word of faith, mike Winger, melissa Dougherty, what does the new age teach, what Bible verses does the new age use, is the new age biblical, new thought movement, new thought Christianity, new age Christianity, name it and claim it, vibrations, new age scripture, new age churches, new age teaching in the church, hyper charismatic

Id: d3NVJU82du8

Length: 124min 32sec (7472 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 01 2019