Category: Mailbag

Church, Mailbag

The Mailbag: How can I tell if a church is doctrinally sound?

Michelle Lesley

Originally published March 11, 2019

 

How do I know if a church is doctrinally sound? Do I base it off their statement of faith?

This is such a great question in a day when you can’t really trust that a building with the word “church” on the sign out front actually teaches and practices sound doctrine.

Because it would be impossible to cover every single aspect of doctrine that churches need to handle biblically, and because many of my readers are new to some of the deeper points of theology, what I want to do is give you some “signposts” to look for as you’re checking out a new church that will help indicate whether or not that particular church is likely to be one that handles those harder to understand points of theology in a doctrinally sound way.

First, check out these resources under “What to look for in a church” at my Searching for a new church? tab at the top of this page. These should be helpful if you’re unfamiliar with the biblical issues that a church should be handling correctly:

What to look for in a church

How Can I Find a Good Church? 

Finding a New Church: Starting from Scratch

Six Questions for a Potential Church

Nine Reasons Discerning Women Are Leaving Your Church

Six Ways Not to Forsake the Assembly

7 Reasons Church is Not Optional and Non-Negotiable for Christians

What the Bible Says About Church Membership

A Word Fitly Spoken Podcast: Is This Church for You? with Michelle Lesley and Amy Spreeman

Church Shopping? 35 Key Questions to Ask the Church at Berean Research

Looking for a Church Home? at Challies, by Don Whitney

#008: Church Shopping? Factors To Consider When Choosing Which Church To Join at Cage Free Theology


What Should I Look For In A Church? John MacArthur answers with Jonny Ardavanis

Here’s a handy evaluation sheet created by Dr. Jack Hughes. Use it when you visit a potential church to determine whether or not it’s worth pursuing. (Save the photo and print it out, or type the questions into your own document.)

If you are a brand new Christian and you aren’t sure what the answers to the questions in these articles should be, ask the person who led you to Christ, a pastor you know to be biblically trustworthy, or a friend who’s a mature Christian to help. You can also use the search bar at the top of this page to see if I’ve addressed your question. And, make liberal use of Got Questions? It’s a wonderful website that gives simple, biblical answers to all kinds of questions about the Bible, church, theology and other issues.

A church’s stance on many of these theological issues can be found in their statement of faith, which most churches post on their websites (often under the heading “What We Believe,” “Doctrinal Distinctives,” or something similar). While you’re on the church website, here are some other things to look for that can give you a fuller picture of whether or not the church is likely to be doctrinally sound.

⛪ Be wary of a church with no statement of faith on their website at all, and be cautious if they have a very simplistic statement of faith with few or no Bible verses cited to support it. Generally speaking, in my experience, the longer and more detailed a statement of faith is, and the more Scripture references it has, the more likely it is to be a doctrinally sound church.

⛪ A few things to look for in the statement of faith:

•The Trinity: You’re looking for language along the lines of, “We believe in one God in three persons.” If you see three “modes” or three “manifestations,” that’s the language of modalism, and it is not a doctrinally sound church.

•Some churches have a section of their statement of faith on spiritual gifts or the Holy Spirit and include wording indicating whether they are a continuationist (ex: “we believe all the spiritual gifts are in operation in the church today”) or cessationist (ex: “we believe God has ceased giving supernatural gifts such as healing and tongues to individual Christians”) church. Generally speaking, a church is more likely to be doctrinally sound if it holds the cessationist view. (No, I am not saying every continuationist church is heretical. I’m strictly talking probabilities here.) If there is anything in the statement of faith that indicates that a Believer will or must speak in tongues in order to be saved or as a result of salvation, or that the “baptism of the Holy Spirit” occurs separately from salvation, it is not a doctrinally sound church.

•Some churches intentionally indicate that they are complementarian in the “Marriage and Family” or “Church Leadership” section of their statement of faith by stating that the husband leads the family and the wife submits to her husband, or by explaining that the roles of pastor and elder are limited to men. It’s usually a good sign when a church makes a point of saying these things. A church that indicates it’s egalitarian is not doctrinally sound.

⛪ If you find the pastor’s name listed here, it’s not a doctrinally sound church.

⛪ If a church subscribes to a creed/confession/catechism you know to be biblical (ex: 1689 London Baptist, Westminster, Heidelberg, etc.) there’s a better chance they’re a doctrinally sound church. 

⛪ Some churches have a page on their website where they recommend books, blogs, and other resources. If they’re recommending doctrinally sound materials by trustworthy authors and teachers (click here for a few), that can be a good sign. Conversely, if they’re recommending materials by authors and teachers listed here, that’s a bad sign.

⛪ If they have a women’s ministry page, check out who’s speaking at the next conference they’re going to and who is the author of the Bible study materials they use.

⛪ Check the staff page and make sure they don’t have women serving as pastors/elders. (Be aware that some churches are now using titles like “Coach,” “Director,” “Facilitator,” etc. to disguise the fact that women are serving in unbiblical positions of leadership. Regardless of the way the position title is worded, women are not to serve in pastoral or elder offices or in any position in which they will be teaching or exercising authority over men.)

⛪ Check the sermon archives for a couple of things: 1) to see if they invite women or false teachers as guest preachers, and 2) does the pastor preach mainly expositorily or topically? Listen to several sermons to familiarize yourself with his style and presentation.

⛪ Some churches post videos of their entire worship service on YouTube, Vimeo, or Facebook. This is also a good way to listen to sermons and to discover whether or not women are unbiblically leading parts of the worship service.

Additionally, videos of the entire worship service allow you to find out about the church’s music. Be extremely cautious of churches who use music from Bethel, Hillsong, Elevation, Phil Wickham, Brandon Lake, and other heretical sources, particularly if they also darken the sanctuary and what you’re seeing looks more like a rock concert than an orderly, reverent worship service. Churches that leave the lights on, sing hymns and worship songs from doctrinally sound sources, and are led by a minister of music rather than a band or someone who reminds you of a rock star are much more likely to be doctrinally sound.

Keep in mind, however, that there are lots of churches out there who look perfectly doctrinally sound “on paper,” or even on video, but are not practicing what their website or woship service videos preach. Take a look at these statements of faith for example: Lakewood (Joel Osteen), North Point (Andy Stanley), and Bethel (Bethel). On the surface, and especially to those newly saved or not very familiar with the Bible, these statements of faith look fairly decent (although…notice that few to no Scriptures are listed, and they are short and/or somewhat vague), but the practices of these churches may be surprising in comparison.

Because churches’ practices and teachings often differ – sometimes significantly – from what you see in their statement of faith, you’ll have to dig deeper in order to get a better feel for the church’s doctrine. Make an appointment to go in and talk to the pastor about what the church teaches and ask any questions you might have. And visit the church for a while before joining to see how things actually go. The most a church website can do is help you weed out the churches that are definitely bad. A church website cannot tell you that a church is definitely good.

If you’re looking for a new church but you aren’t sure where to start, check the church search engines and churches recommended by my readers at the Searching for a new church? tab at the top of this page.

If you have a question about: a Bible passage, an aspect of theology, a current issue in Christianity, or how to biblically handle a family, life, or church situation, comment below (I’ll hold all questions in queue {unpublished} for a future edition of The Mailbag) or send me an e-mail or private message. If your question is chosen for publication, your anonymity will be protected.

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The Mailbag: How can we get women to WANT to come to Bible study?

Michelle Lesley

Originally published March 19, 2018

My church is blessed to have two strong ladies’ Bible study leaders – one during the week for those who are available and one on Saturday for those who cannot attend during the week – who have the discernment to choose biblical content, study, and lead scripturally sound discussion. My prayer is that more women in my church would have the desire to attend these Bible studies, not only learning and growing spiritually but also for fellowship with each other and drawing closer to each other. If you have any ideas for actually getting women to want to study God’s word with other women I would love to hear them.

Been there, done that. I once taught a women’s Bible study class that consistently had only one to two women in it. I think our maximum attendance was one day when we had a whopping…four. The other women of the church chose to attend the “fluffier” classes that were being offered, and many just didn’t attend at all.

There could be any number of spiritual and practical reasons women aren’t attending your (or another reader’s) Bible studies.

☞ People are extraordinarily busy these days, especially women. Jam-packed schedules are probably the main reason for your low attendance. I’ll be honest, if I worked a full time job outside the home as well as taking care of my home and family, I’d be very unlikely to attend any Bible study class besides Sunday School. I’d want to devote that time to my family or to rest.

☞ Perhaps there are more false converts in your church than you’re aware of. People who aren’t saved are not new creatures in Christ and are devoid of the Holy Spirit, so they have no organic desire to spend time in God’s Word or with God’s people beyond the minimal amount required to fulfill whatever fleshly agenda brings them to church in the first place. There’s no human way to give them the desire to attend Bible study. Only God can accomplish that by saving them.

☞ If you go to a doctrinally sound church, your ladies may feel like they get plenty of good Bible study already and what they really want is unstructured fellowship time. See my article All Word and No Play: The Importance of Fun and Fellowship in the Doctrinally Sound Church.

☞ There may be something about the teaching style or the materials, that – even though they’re doctrinally sound – are rubbing people the wrong way. Maybe the teacher lectures and your ladies want more discussion. Maybe she talks over their heads in a very academic style. Maybe the materials are too expensive or there’s something about the book that is off-putting. Maybe your church only does “canned” (workbook, DVD, etc.) studies and what your ladies really want is to study books of the Bible, or vice versa.

☞ Hopefully this isn’t the case, but if there are factions in your church, someone could be surreptitiously – out of jealousy, sowing discord, or other reasons – discouraging the women from attending.

☞ The logistics of the class might be inconvenient for some. Do you offer child care for those who need it? Is the class held on a convenient day of the week and time of day? Is your church and the room you’re using for the class accessible to women with disabilities? 

These are just a few things that came to mind. Some of them may have to do with the class or the teacher. Others have more to do with the women themselves. What can you do to encourage more women to attend?

✔ Pray – and be ready to be in it for the long haul – that God will change hearts and give the women of your church a greater desire for His Word. In the end, God is the only One who knows all of the reasons women aren’t attending Bible study, and He is the only One with the power to transform them and overcome those reasons. Pray fervently and trust Him.

✔ If you’re truly stumped as to why women aren’t attending Bible study, ask them. You could do so face to face, individually, or, with your pastor’s permission, send out an anonymous survey (you’ll probably get a better response this way) asking things like, “Is the lecture style teaching we offer a fit for you?” or “Would you be able to attend if we offered child care?”, and also leave space to write in comments. (Naturally, you would not be asking things like whether or not you should water down the theology of the class, but if you can remove a practical barrier to attendance, why wouldn’t you?)

✔ Ask your pastor for advice. He knows the heartbeat of your congregation and will probably have some valuable counsel and suggestions.

✔ Be willing to try something different in the class. If you’ve only ever done workbook studies, do a study of a book of the Bible. Maybe a Saturday class isn’t convenient for a lot of people but a Sunday class would be. “I Shall Not be Moved” is for the theology of the class, not the logistics of it.

✔ Be willing to try something different than the class. There’s more than one way to skin a cat, and there’s more than one way to do discipleship. Bible studies are awesome, but how about taking a semester off and doing some one on one Titus 2 discipleship instead? Or some unstructured “let’s just sit and chat” fellowships or ladies’ night outs? Or a prayer group? Or some outreach projects? If your ladies are already getting good preaching in the worship service and good teaching in Sunday School, it’s OK to try a discipleship method other than a Bible study class.

✔ Are you doing enough publicity well in advance of the class? You should start a minimum of 3-4 weeks before the class begins, and you should blitz with a variety of media: verbal announcements in multiple worship services, announce it in the church bulletin, newsletter, web site, and social media pages, have Sunday School classes announce it, send out a church-wide e-mail, put up fliers around the church, and encourage the ladies who are already attending the classes to personally, individually invite other women.

✔ If your pastor is OK with it, consider having one of the women who has been a faithful member of the class give a testimony (during the worship service, in the church newsletter, or wherever appropriate) about how the class has helped and blessed her, the relationships she has built through the class, etc.

In the end, the old saying is true: “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.” You may bend over backwards and pray your kneecaps off and you may still have a small attendance. That’s OK. That’s on God. All you are responsible for is to pray, trust and obey Him, and be faithful to Him where He has planted you. God doesn’t measure your success by how many women attend your event, but by your faithfulness to Him.

God doesn’t measure your success by how many women attend your event, but by your faithfulness to Him.

If you have a question about: a Bible passage, an aspect of theology, a current issue in Christianity, or how to biblically handle a family, life, or church situation, comment below (I’ll hold all questions in queue {unpublished} for a future edition of The Mailbag) or send me an e-mail or private message. If your question is chosen for publication, your anonymity will be protected.

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The Mailbag: Can women serve on the pastor search committee?

Michelle Lesley

Our church is currently searching for a new pastor. We have an advisory board (pastor search committee), appointed and led by our head deacon, which is comprised of six men and six women (individuals, not married couples) who have been instructed from Scripture about how to search for a pastor.

I don’t agree with women being involved because Paul speaks about women in the Bible (1 Timothy 2:11-15, 1 Corinthians 14:34, and Ephesians 5:23-27). Knowing that women can’t preach, why would there be women involved on this board! Also, the women on this board are not very active in our church.

I don’t feel like we can approach this as we would be basically run off from this church, since we’ve seen it done to one of our friends who went and spoke to our previous pastor about plagiarism. How do you think I should approach this situation?

I’m so sorry this situation is causing you angst, and I hope I can help alleviate some of it. There’s a lot going on here, so let’s take this step by step.

I’m familiar with pastor search committees. I’ve never personally served on one, but I know how they generally operate. The pastor search committee locates potential candidates for the position of pastor, sifts through all of them, finds the best candidate (or possibly two or three), and presents the candidate to the church to be voted on. You didn’t say how your church’s advisory board functions, so I’m just going to assume that this is the general way they operate.

May I take this opportunity to say I’m really glad the board at your church has been instructed from Scripture about finding a pastor and what makes a pastor biblically qualified or not. A previous church I was a member of had a pastor search committee that brought in some sort of consulting firm to train them that I surmise was light on (or possibly void of) Scripture, and heavy on more extra-biblical metrics like requiring a particular degree or level of formal education, charisma, pragmatic church growth methods, fundraising, etc. So the fact that your advisory board was trained with Scripture is something to be thankful for.

I don’t agree with women being involved because Paul speaks about women in the Bible (1 Timothy 2:11-15, 1 Corinthians 14:34, and Ephesians 5:23-27).

Yes, God, through Paul, does speak about women in the Bible, but does what He says in these passages apply to this particular situation of women serving on church boards and committees?

Ephesians 5:23-27 is about wives submitting to their own husbands and husband loving their wives as Christ loved the church. It is not applicable to women serving on church boards/committees unless one of these women has a husband who has told her he does not want her to serve on this committee and she has defied him and is serving anyway.

First Corinthians 14:34 is about keeping order in the worship service, not about women who have been asked by church leadership to serve on a board/committee (which is not a worship service) to offer their input and help search for a pastor. So this passage doesn’t apply, either.

First Timothy 2:11-15 is about as close as you’re going to come to a passage that’s applicable to this situation. Women are not to “exercise authority over a man”. (The “teaching” part doesn’t apply because the women on the board/committee aren’t teaching or preaching to the men, they’re working with them discussing candidates, reviewing resumes, etc.).

Now these women are not exercising authority over men merely by being appointed to this advisory board. If a woman were the head of the committee, or if there were more women than men on the committee, then you’d have an authority issue.

But the way things stand, the only ways I can think of that these women might attempt to exercise authority over the men on the board is by a) being bossy, telling the men what to do or not to do, insisting on their own way, etc., or b) forming a voting bloc to thwart a decision the men are all in favor of. (You did not mention whether the head deacon is included in the “six men” or whether he is the seventh man on the committee. If he’s the seventh man, and a voting member of the board, the women won’t be able to form a voting bloc.)

Furthermore, these women are not exercising authority over the men of the congregation merely because they’ve been asked to help find the next pastor. They are church members representing the congregation, sorting through pastoral candidates, and offering input.

Knowing that women can’t preach, why would there be women involved on this board!

Because they’re members of your church, representing your congregation, sorting through pastoral candidates, and offering input. There are men in your congregation who aren’t biblically qualified to preach, either, but that doesn’t mean they couldn’t serve on this board. Being qualified to preach has nothing to do with serving on this board. They’re two separate issues.

Just because God prohibits women from leading the church in some ways doesn’t mean He prohibits women from serving the church in every way. We have to be sure we’re not placing restrictions on women that go beyond Scripture. That’s legalism, and that’s a sin.

Just because God prohibits women from leading the church in some ways doesn’t mean He prohibits women from serving the church in every way.

When you get a new pastor, he’s going to be the pastor of the men and the women of your church. There’s nothing wrong with some of the church’s women offering input on the various candidates. There are often things women pick up on about people (such as the pastoral candidate, his wife, or his children) that men don’t pick up on, because God created women to be generally more intuitive about people, body language, tone of voice, facial expressions, and so on. Women’s input is valuable in a situation like this.

Also, the women on this board are not very active in our church.

This is problematic. (Or it could be, depending on what you mean by “not very active”.) The picture I get from the phrase “not very active” is a person who misses church a lot (without a good, biblical reason) and isn’t plugged in and serving. If that’s the case, these women shouldn’t be serving in any capacity, let alone a position of responsibility like this board, because they aren’t faithful and committed to the church. The same goes for any men on the board who “aren’t very active”. You don’t get to be “faithful in much” until you’re first “faithful in little,” because if you’re “unrighteous in little,” you’re going to be “unrighteous in much”. (Luke 16:10)

I don’t feel like we can approach this as we would be basically run off from this church, since we’ve seen it done to one of our friends who went and spoke to our previous pastor about plagiarism. How do you think I should approach this situation?

I’m not privy to the details about your friend approaching the previous pastor about plagiarism. Perhaps he was committing the sin of plagiarism, and your friend went to him humbly, lovingly, in obedience to Matthew 18:15-20 and expressed her concerns firmly but kindly, and the pastor was evil and kicked her out of the church when she did nothing wrong. Maybe that’s why that pastor isn’t there any more.

On the other hand, maybe your friend didn’t handle the situation biblically. Maybe she falsely accused the pastor, and sinfully left in a huff when properly confronted with her own sin.

I’m not saying either of those things definitely happened, I’m saying I have no way of knowing exactly what happened. But this isn’t about your friend. This is about you.

The first thing you need to do is to speak to your husband about the situation – because while Ephesians 5:22-33 doesn’t apply to the women whose husbands are OK with them serving on the advisory board, it does apply to whether or not your husband (if you’re married) is OK with you “approaching this situation” with anyone. If he’s a Believer and a member of the church, it might be best for him to handle things.

If he’s not OK with you approaching someone about this situation, don’t. Respect and submit to his decision, or you will be the one in violation of the Ephesians passage you cited.

If your husband is OK with you speaking to someone about the board, I would suggest setting up an appointment with the head deacon, maybe inviting him over for coffee with you and your husband or something like that, and – calmly, kindly, and rationally – express to him only your concerns about people who are not faithful members of the church serving on the committee. Because, as you’ve explained things to me, that is really the only biblical issue here.

Unless you have clear, concrete, irrefutable evidence that one or more of the women on this board are behaving in an obviously and verifiably sinful way, there’s nothing else to “approach”. These women have been asked to help find a new pastor and offer input according to Scripture, and there’s nothing unbiblical about that.

Because Scripture doesn’t prohibit women from doing the tasks required of pastor search committee members, this is an issue of Christian liberty. If you, as a woman, would feel uncomfortable serving on a pastor search committee, then by all means, don’t sin against your conscience and agree to serve. If you’re married and your husband doesn’t want you to serve on a pastor search committee, you should respect and submit to his decision and not serve. If a church wishes to make a policy that only men may serve on a pastor search committee, they are well within biblical parameters to do so.

That being said, the role of women on a committee that makes decisions impacting the church’s direction, policies, ecclesiology, etc., is that of helping and offering input. It would not be biblical for decision-making power in these matters to rest solely or primarily in the hands of women.

You might think of it like a marriage. In a healthy, godly marriage, husbands and wives work together. They discuss how to handle various issues, the wife offers suggestions and input, and she handles tasks that are within her jurisdiction. The wise husband listens to the wise counsel of his wife and uses it to make the most well-informed and godly decisions he can.

That’s how women should function on a church committee.

In order to facilitate that dynamic, here are some parameters for structuring a standing church committee that I believe would be wise (this is my opinion born of knowledge of Scripture and decades of church experience, not law; there could also be exceptions depending on the purpose of the committee):

  • Committees should be chaired by men
  • Committees should be comprised of less than 50% women.
  • Unless they have some sort of needed expertise uniquely related to the purpose of the committee, women should not serve on committees which oversee ministries, activities, or events comprised only of men (e.g. the men’s ministry, security team, the men who fix widows’ cars, do repair work for them, etc.)

With a little wisdom, women can biblically serve on church committees, conscience and church policy permitting.

If you have a question about: a Bible passage, an aspect of theology, a current issue in Christianity, or how to biblically handle a family, life, or church situation, comment below (I’ll hold all questions in queue {unpublished} for a future edition of The Mailbag) or send me an e-mail or private message. If your question is chosen for publication, your anonymity will be protected.

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The Mailbag: Should Christians drink alcohol?

Michelle Lesley

Originally published March 13, 2017

I wanted to know what is your stance on drinking alcohol? Meaning drinking not to get drunk but having wine with dinner etc.

Great question, but just to tweak it a little, let’s look at the Bible’s stance on drinking alcohol. I don’t want readers to base their beliefs about alcohol usage (or anything else) on my opinions, but on what the Bible says about it.

The Bible does not prohibit Christians from drinking alcohol, only from drunkenness. Christians are not required to partake of alcohol, but may do so in moderation if they like, so long as their use of alcohol does not violate any other Scriptural principles, such as:

Evangelism
Would your drinking alcohol in some way hurt your witness to lost people? If a lost person came to your house and saw alcohol in the fridge, or saw you buying alcohol at the store, or drinking alcohol in a restaurant, would it inhibit your ability to share the gospel with that person due to her perceptions about people who drink alcohol? Could you hand a person a tract with one hand while holding a bottle of beer in the other?

Love for the brotherhood
Do you love your brothers and sisters in Christ enough to deny yourself alcohol if that would set a better example for them, if it would confuse them or cause them to violate their own consciences, or if it would be more conducive to your discipleship of them? There are many people who have had such bad experiences associated with alcohol that your drinking would destroy their trust in, and respect for, you. There are new Christians who aren’t yet mature enough to understand that seeing you – a godly person they look up to – take a drink doesn’t mean that any and all drinking is OK for Christians. Read what Paul had to say about eating meat offered to idols and apply these principles to your consumption of alcohol.

Flaunting Liberty
I occasionally see Christians post pictures of bottles of alcohol, intentionally posed pictures of themselves drinking, and so forth, on social media, and I have to wonder – especially for those who are well aware that this is a difficult issue for many Christians – why? Is it to throw their liberty in the face of other Christians whose consciences prevent them from drinking? Is it to prove a point? Is it a result of being puffed up with the knowledge that they have the liberty to drink? Is it to dare onlookers to take them to task in order to excoriate the person with the Scriptures regarding liberty and alcohol? None of these are godly attitudes.

Authority
Has your husband, employer, school, government, or anyone else in rightful authority over you asked you not to drink? We are to submit to those God has placed in authority over us.

Ambassadorship
Would your drinking in any way tarnish the reputation of Christ, your church, or Christianity as a whole? God is jealous for His holy name, and we are commissioned to represent Him well.

Self Control
One of the fruits of the Spirit is self control. Obviously, if you’re drunk, you’re not really in control of yourself, but there’s another aspect of drinking which requires self control. Are you able to deny yourself your right to have a drink when spiritual concerns, such as the ones mentioned above, outweigh your liberty to imbibe?

Drinking alcohol is a far deeper question than just “Can I or can’t I?” The question we should be asking about drinking (and all other activities) is: “Will doing this further the cause of Christ in my life and the lives of others?”.

Additional Resources:

What does the Bible say about drinking? at Got Questions

Do Not be Drunk with Wine, Part 3 by John MacArthur

Christians and Alcohol by Tim Challies

If you have a question about: a Bible passage, an aspect of theology, a current issue in Christianity, or how to biblically handle a family, life, or church situation, comment below (I’ll hold all questions in queue {unpublished} for a future edition of The Mailbag) or send me an e-mail or private message. If your question is chosen for publication, your anonymity will be protected.

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The Mailbag: Applying Twisted Scripture to Pseudo-“Christian” Events, Ideas, and Fads

Michelle Lesley

Originally published March 7, 2023

The Asbury “revival”. Jesus Revolution. Bethel. The Enneagram. IF:Gathering...

Week after week, we see the ads, the social media posts, and the news stories of the latest, greatest “Christian” thing on the horizon.

Discerning Christians speak up in our churches, with our friends, and on our Facebook pages and rightly warn about the dangerous teachings and agendas these things push.

Other concerned Christians, genuinely fearing the “baby will be thrown out with the bathwater,” push back on those warnings. And sometimes, though they often have the best of intentions, they misapply Scripture or biblical principles to do so.

During the recent furor over the so-called Asbury “revival,” I saw, and was asked about, several of those misapplied Scriptures and principles employed in defense of the idea that we shouldn’t be so quick or so willing to publicly and confidently say something is not of God.

These Scriptures and principles could be applied to a myriad of things past and present, and will surely be employed again the next time a pseudo-“Christian” event, idea, or fad pops up, so let’s take a look at them and untangle them…

These Scriptures and principles will surely be employed again the next time a pseudo-“Christian” event, idea, or fad pops up, so let’s take a look at them and untangle them…

In response to doctrinally sound Christians decrying the Asbury event, one genuinely concerned lady asked:

What about Scripture that says “whoever is not against us is for us” in Mark 9:38-40? How do we apply this? Only God knows their heart, and I’m sure that people did come to know the Lord because of this.

There are several points in her question I’d like to address:

What about Scripture that says “whoever is not against us is for us” in Mark 9:38-40? How do we apply this?

John said to him, “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.” But Jesus said, “Do not stop him, for no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. For the one who is not against us is for us.
Mark 9:38-40

Because we know that God’s Word never contradicts itself, and Jesus never contradicted Himself or Scripture during His earthly ministry, we have to understand passages like Mark 9:38-40 within the context of the entirety of the New Testament. In this case, we understand it in light of…

Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’
Matthew 7:21-23 (emphasis added)

…and…

“Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you?”
Luke 6:46 (emphasis added)

Notice Jesus is the speaker in all three of these passages. Again, Jesus did not contradict Himself during His earthly ministry.

We have to understand that there are a great many people out there who claim to be Christians and who, at first glance, look very much like Christians, but are not living in obedience to Christ, and/or are not teaching what accords with sound doctrine. Scripture calls those people liars and false teachers.

So when Jesus says in Mark 9:38-40 and other passages, that whoever is not against Him is for Him and vice versa, He’s defining “for Him” as someone who’s genuinely regenerated, obedient to Scripture, and teaching sound doctrine. Everybody else, regardless of what they might claim, is against Him according to Scripture.

You might think of it like this. When the disciples came to Jesus and said, “We tried to stop those guys because they aren’t part of our group,” and Jesus said, “Don’t. They’re still ‘with’ us,” it would have been similar to Him saying, “Don’t stop them. They’re doctrinally sound Presbyterians. We’re doctrinally sound Baptists. We preach the same gospel. We’re on the same team.”.

What He would not have been saying would have been something like, “It’s OK that they’re [Catholic, Mormon, prosperity gospel, New Apostolic Reformation, or any other heretical religion that claims to worship Jesus]. They say they love Me, so don’t stop them. Maybe some good will come out of this and a few people will get saved.”

Every week during his pastoral prayer, my pastor leads us to pray for a sister church in the area, and in his prayer, he always says, “Lord, we thank you that we are not the only expression of a Bible believing, God honoring, Christ exalting, Spirit filled church in this area.”

It’s kind of like that.

Only God knows their heart…

That’s not an excuse for failing to exercise discernment as Scripture commands us. God doesn’t require us to know other people’s hearts. He does require us to evaluate their observable behavior and teaching, compare it to Scripture, and stay away from it, warn others about it, and eradicate it from the church if it’s false.

“Only God knows their heart” is not an excuse for failing to exercise discernment as Scripture commands us.

Furthermore, Scripture tells us we do know their hearts:

The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good; and the evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth what is evil. For his mouth speaks from the abundance of his heart.
Luke 6:45

“Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorn bushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will know them by their fruits.
Matthew 7:15-20

And by this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments. The one who says, “I have come to know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him; but whoever keeps His word, truly in him the love of God has been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him: the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked.
1 John 2:3-6

We can’t read people’s minds, but we certainly can know their hearts when their words and actions demonstrate what’s in their hearts.

…and I’m sure that people did come to know the Lord because of this.

1. That’s speculation on your part. Is it possible some people did get genuinely saved at this event? Yes, but we don’t have any proof of that. It’s an assumption.

2. The only way someone could have gotten saved at this event is if she heard the biblical gospel of law and grace, sin and repentance, and Jesus’ vicarious life, death, burial, and resurrection explicitly preached or explained. Here’s the biblical gospel. Was it proclaimed and explained at this event? If not, no salvations took place.

3. That idea is pragmatism. People come to Christ in all sorts of horrible situations and under all sorts of horrible teaching. People came to Christ in concentration camps, while they were still Muslims, in Catholic “churches,” while working as prostitutes, while practicing homosexuality, etc. The fact that people get saved while in those horrible situations or under that horrible teaching doesn’t magically make those situations and that teaching good. It means that God is so good and powerful and merciful that, through the power of His Word, He can save someone out of those situations and teaching.

But if even one person got saved, wasn’t it worth it?

Let me begin my answer to that question with another question.

Did you know that several medical procedures that have saved the lives of many people were discovered in World War II concentration camps by performing torturous experiments on inmates? Does the fact that those medical procedures have helped so many people justify the torture the Nazis inflicted on their victims?

Of course it doesn’t. Neither does one person (or even a bunch of people) getting saved excuse, nullify, justify, or make sin and false teaching “worth it”.

Stop and take a few moments to meditate on how high, and holy, and worthy of all honor, glory, majesty, praise, and reverence is God, the almighty King of the universe. Think about the excruciating pain Jesus went through on the cross, and the agony of having every drop of God’s wrath against sin poured out on Him. So that He might bear your sin and mine. So that we could be forgiven and free and saved from an eternity in Hell.

How could we ever say that the sewer slime of committing any sin against that God is “worth it,” no matter what the outcome might be?

No. A blasphemy-fest isn’t “worth it”. God doesn’t consider false teaching “worth it” if someone gets saved. He’s perfectly capable of saving everyone He means to save without such events.

You discerning Christians speaking out against this event should just back off like Gamaliel suggested in Acts 5 and let it play out. If it’s not of God, it will come to nothing.

So in the present case I tell you, keep away from these men and let them alone, for if this plan or this undertaking is of man, it will fail; but if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them. You might even be found opposing God!”
Acts 5:38-39

{Be sure to read that passage in its entirety (Acts 5:17-42), so you can get the context and all the details.}

Sisters, we’ve got to get it through our heads that the book of Acts is largely historical narrative like Genesis or Judges or Nehemiah. Not only that, it is also a historical narrative of transition from Old Testament Judaism to New Testament Christianity. Many of the things we read about in Acts are not to be understood as normative of, or instruction to the church today. (Those sorts of things are mainly in the pastoral epistles – 1&2 Timothy and Titus.)

Such is the case with the Gamaliel passage in Acts 5. This is a descriptive passage (it simply tells us what happened), not a prescriptive passage (instructions for us to follow). And be thankful for that, because the disciples get beaten a lot in Acts 5.

Nowhere in God’s didactic instruction to the New Testament church does He tell us to back off an event or teacher that claims to be “Christian” and just let things play out. Nowhere. Instead, we repeatedly see instruction throughout the New Testament (and even the Old Testament) to be wise and discerning, test the spirits, and have nothing to do with false teachers, either as individuals or the church.

We also have to take into account that Gamaliel was a Pharisee who was still hanging out with the rest of the Council. Know what that means? He wasn’t a Believer. You take Gamaliel’s advice, and you’re taking the advice of a lost person – over God’s instructions – about how to handle a situation in the church.

Gamaliel is not the hero of this story. If he were, he would have believed the gospel the disciples proclaimed, and prevented the Council from beating them and forbidding them to preach. And he probably would have suffered the same consequences the disciples suffered.

Gamaliel isn’t the hero of this story. If he were, he’d have believed the gospel the disciples proclaimed, and prevented them from being beaten & forbidden to preach. And he probably would have suffered the same fate as the disciples.

Finally, though Gamaliel, in his limited experience, could cite a couple of instances in which this rubric seemed to work, we have the advantage of looking back across much more history, over many more years, and in many more places, and we can see that his advice doesn’t always work. How long has Islam been hanging around? Hinduism? Mormonism? Buddhism? Catholicism? Certainly none of those religious movements are of God, and still, here they all are.

Don’t take Gamaliel’s advice in these situations, submit to God’s instructions to the church.

Be careful that you are not calling what is of God as not. Very serious thing to do.

It may not always be meant this way, but this kind of warning can come across as a veiled threat.

Be careful you are not calling something “of God” when it is not. That is also a very serious thing to do, especially if what you’re basing your conclusion on is your feelings, opinions, experiences, and out of context, misapplied Scripture, rather than on rightly handled, in context Scripture.

God can bring good out of anything!

Of course He can. God is out for His glory and the good of His people. But that doesn’t make the situation or false teaching itself good or excusable or that we shouldn’t warn against it if it’s bad. Scripture says the opposite.

When God sovereignly brings something good and holy out of a bad or sinful situation, it doesn’t mean that bad or sinful situation is good and holy. It means God is good and holy.

For example: A Mormon who studies her Bible and/or is evangelized can get genuinely saved while still in Mormonism. (And God will save her out of Mormonism.) That doesn’t make Mormonism Christian or good or biblical. That means God is good and merciful and kind.

When God sovereignly brings something good and holy out of a bad or sinful situation, it doesn’t mean that bad or sinful *situation* is good and holy. It means *God* is good and holy.

Be ready. The next “Christian” thing is just around the corner. Study your Bible and be prepared to correctly apply rightly handled Scripture as you carefully evaluate it according to God’s Word.

If you have a question about: a Bible passage, an aspect of theology, a current issue in Christianity, or how to biblically handle a family, life, or church situation, comment below (I’ll hold all questions in queue {unpublished} for a future edition of The Mailbag) or send me an e-mail or private message. If your question is chosen for publication, your anonymity will be protected.