One often hears the term ‘blasphemy against the Holy Spirit’, particularly from the mouths of those within the Charismatic movement. Many non-Charismatics and Charismatics alike who persistently question various doctrines and practices considered by the Charismatic movement to be of God, are quite often confronted with the warning to take heed lest they be in danger of committing the unpardonable sin.

Is the Charismatic movement right in sounding such a warning? Are those who adhere to it’s teachings, and those who don’t, equally in danger of one day committing the unforgivable sin simply because they have some questions and concerns regarding the teachings and practices of the Charismatic movement and merely seek to follow biblical procedure and test them in light of Holy Scripture? Or is the use of the term ‘blasphemy against the Holy Spirit’ being wholly misused, and even abused, in Charismatic assemblies today in order to shut the mouths of genuine inquirers?

This booklet presents a biblical examination of the term ‘blasphemy against the Holy Spirit’, and compares its use today with what the Lord Jesus Christ meant when He warned of the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. It then shifts the spotlight onto the Charismatic movement itself: its claims of healings, miracles, prophecies and other signs, and most importantly its gospel, and poses the question, ‘Is the Charismatic movement of God?’

We begin our study with a look at the words of Jesus Christ pertaining to the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit:

"Wherefore I say unto you, all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men. And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come" (Matt. 12:31,32).

The principal requirement, if we are to arrive at a proper and biblically accurate conclusion as to what the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is, is to conduct a proper and contextual study of the relevant scriptures. Not a study exclusive to the above two verses only, but also of those which immediately precede them and those which follow. We turn our attention then to the Gospel of Matthew chapter 12, wherein is found the passage containing the words of Jesus Christ which have to do with the unpardonable sin.

In our opening verse we read of a man possessed of a demon who had been struck dumb and blind by the invader, brought to the Lord Jesus Who, with a word, cast out the demon, at which time the man, previously unable to speak or see, immediately regained both the ability to speak and the sense of sight. A true miracle had occurred at the hands of Jesus Christ through the power of Almighty God (see Jn.14:10).

Upon seeing this mighty and clearly undeniable work of God, the people stood amazed and exclaimed, ‘Is not this the Son of David?’ This was not so much a question as it was a statement. The Jews were in effect saying, ‘This must be the Messiah’ (cf. Jn 7:31). The common people were well acquainted with the prophecy in Isaiah 35:5: "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped."

This key verse in our study shows the Pharisees’ indignant response to the people who had made such a comment in v.23 and who stood in awe at what they had just seen, which at once reveals what the hearts of the Pharisees were full of. The Pharisees were jealous of Jesus. They envied and even hated Him, and would do or say anything to discredit Him in the eyes of the people (cf. Matt. 27:18). The Pharisees could not deny what had happened, for all the people had seen it with their own eyes. So in a determined effort to discredit the Lord in the eyes of the people, they shifted their attention to the source or origin of Christ’s power so as to cast doubt in the minds of the people as to who this man, Jesus, was. Their allegation was that Jesus Christ did not in fact cast out demons by the power of God but that He, being in collusion with Beelzebub (Satan), had commanded the demon to leave by Satan’s power. The word Beelzebub is derived from ba’al zebul, which means ‘lord of the dwelling’ in which evil spirits dwell. Others believe it to mean ‘god of filth’ or ‘god of dung’. In the corresponding scripture from Mark 3:22, the scribes were united in the Pharisees’ condemnation of the Lord and pronounced, "He hath Beelzebub, and by the prince of the devils casteth He out devils", insinuating that Jesus had an agreement or compact with Beelzebub and, far from being a benefactor, was a dangerous malefactor who sought to deceive the people.

Can you see what they were in effect saying? Neither the Pharisees in Matthew 12, or the Scribes in Mark 3, were denying that a demon had been cast out, or that Jesus had been responsible for its expulsion. They could not deny what had occurred, for everyone around them had seen the deed for themselves and the evidence that some great work had taken place was irrefutable. The Scribes’ and Pharisees’ outrageous claim, their last desperate attempt to discredit Jesus in the eyes of the people, was that Jesus did it by Satan’s power and not by the power of God. What the people had seen, according to the Pharisees, was a flagrant display of satanic power and not the Holy power of God. The Pharisees were accusing Jesus Christ of endeavouring to mislead the people by making Himself out to be the Son of God, whilst all the while deceiving them by employing satanic power and claiming it was through the power of God that He cast out demons.

In response to the Pharisees’ blasphemous, unwarranted, unfounded and utterly absurd claim, the Lord Jesus Christ responds by explaining that a kingdom, a city, or even a house (family), would not and could not properly stand if it were divided against itself. "Jesus replied to their claim by saying, in essence, ‘If I’m casting out Satan by using Satan’s power, what do you think Satan is doing to himself?’ Obviously the Devil would be destroying his own kingdom, which would make no sense at all. The Pharisees had such hatred for Christ that their logic was twisted. Instead of being rational, they were being ridiculous."

In this verse, Jesus proceeds to calmly and logically state that if Satan truly cast out his own demons then he would be opposed to himself, his own work. The Lord Jesus then asked how Satan’s kingdom could possibly continue to stand if there was such a conflict of interest within it. Of course, the Pharisees had no answer to this. Those mentioned later in the passage who asked Jesus, "...Master, we would see a sign from thee" (Matt. 12:38), were in all likelihood not the same group of Pharisees who had earlier made the blasphemous accusation that Christ worked by Satan’s power, but a different set "...who would not content themselves with the signs He gave, unless He would give them such further proof as they should demand." One minute the Pharisees were claiming that Jesus is casting out demons by the power of Satan and the next other Pharisees were referring to Him as ‘Master’ (instructor, teacher) and with feigned respect, asking Him to perform for them a sign. But why ask for a sign when they had time after time all witnessed Him perform countless miracles?

In this scripture the Lord Jesus pursues His line of reasoning and asks them, if it was by Beelzebub that He cast out demons, then by whose power were the Jews casting them out? "There were those among the Jews who, by invocation of the name of the Most High God, or the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob did sometimes cast out devils. Josephus speaks of some in his time that did it (‘The Works of Josephus’ 8.2.5), we read of Jewish exorcists (Acts 19:13), and of some that in Christ’s name cast out devils, though they did not follow Jesus and His apostles (Mk. 9:38). These the Pharisees condemned not, but imputed what they did to the Spirit of God. It was therefore merely from spite and envy to Christ, that they would own that others cast out devils by the Spirit of God, but suggest that He did it by compact with Beelzebub. The judgements of envy are made not by reason, but prejudice."

Here the Lord Jesus continues His response to the Pharisees’ slanderous allegation by saying that if He indeed was casting out demons by the Spirit of God, then the fulfilment of the Scriptures had occurred in their midst. The Kingdom of God had come upon them and He was indeed Who He said He was: the Son of God! "His exorcizing activity, while resembling that of others, is unique. In Him—and Him alone—God acts to establish His final rule which entails crushing Satan’s empire. Far from operating in Satan’s power, Jesus assaults Satan (not just his underlings, as did other exorcists), binds him and frees his victims."

In verses 28 & 29 of Matthew 12, the kingdom of Satan is clearly shown to be vulnerable, for we see his angels being driven out of the hearts of men. The Kingdom of God is seen here, not only as something future, but also as a very present reality (cf. Matt. 7:13,14; 11:28-30; 23:37; Jn. 7:39). Jesus explains that to advance the Kingdom of God on earth, He was to deal with the strong man, the captor, Satan. Satan had long held people captive in his kingdom of darkness, which involved, in part, the possession of humans by demons. In order for these captives to be set free, the captor himself had to be taken captive, or bound. The outward demonstration that Jesus Christ had overcome the strong man, Satan, was in the casting out of demons thus setting the captives free. Christ’s work upon the cross being the supreme work of destruction upon the one who had the power of death, that is the Devil (Heb. 2:14).

Jesus was here saying that He, being infinitely more powerful than Satan, had come to bind the strong man, and to point out the need for the strong man to be bound (immobilized) in order that his goods could be spoiled. "Jesus is doing all this because by means of His incarnation, His victory over the Devil in the desert of temptation, His words of authority addressed to the demons, His entire activity, He has begun to bind Beelzebul, a process of binding or curtailment of power that was going to be further strengthened by means of His victory over Satan on the cross (Col. 2:15) and in the Resurrection, Ascension and Coronation (Rev. 12:5, 9-12). He has done, is doing, and will do this through the power, not of Beelzebub himself surely, but of the Holy Spirit, as He has just said."

The passage indicates Christ’s personal power over Satan. Jesus is speaking in this verse in a language which was recognizable to the Jews. In effect, He was saying that He would ‘lead captivity captive.’ This was an Old Testament phrase signifying a conquest over one’s enemies (cf. 1Sam. 30:26), and in particular, those who had formerly led others captive (Isa. 49:24,25; cf. Eph. 4:8; Col. 2:15). Isaiah 49:24,25 is also a most interesting and helpful passage, for therein lies the key to understanding exactly what it is that Jesus is describing in Matthew 12:29. Here in Isaiah we see the nation of Israel as captives, lawful captives. They had offended God and were rightly delivered into captivity. This is also what happened to man at the Fall. Man had sinned and, consequently, God delivered him into the captor’s (Satan’s) hands. Man could not free himself from the bondage he was now in (cf.v.24) and needed a Savior, a Deliverer, to set him free.

In all probability, it was the enemies of Israel whose words we see in Isaiah 49:24- "Shall the prey be taken from the mighty, or the lawful captive delivered?" They were asking in effect, ‘Who could possibly take the prey from the mighty?’ (the captives from the captors?). Who would have ever thought that Israel could have been taken from their mighty captors? But they were! In verse 25 we see God saying, "...Even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered..." because it was God Himself, the Almighty One, who would contend with Israel’s foes. This, in fact, was what Jesus was doing in Matthew 12. The strong man, Satan, the mighty one who had held the prey captive, had himself been taken captive. Jesus the Lord, the Almighty One, in due time, came to bind (i.e., to deprive of liberty), the strong man and spoil his house, i.e., set the captives free (Col. 2:15; Eph. 4:8). The captor, Satan, has now become the captive and has been stripped of his armour (Lk. 11:22). The captives in both passages were delivered by God’s leading captivity captive (Psa. 68:18; Eph. 4:8; cf. Num. 23:8; Zech. 9:11; Rom. 8:31; 1 Jn. 3:8).

"He that is not hearty for Christ, will be reckoned with as really against Him: he that is cold in the cause, is looked upon as an enemy. We must be entirely, faithfully and immovably on Christ’s side: it is the right side, and will at last be the rising side. The latter clause is to the same purport. Christ’s errand into the world was to gather in His harvest, to gather in those whom the Father had given Him (Jn. 11:52). Christ expects and requires from those who are with Him, that they gather with Him; gather others to Him. If we gather not with Christ, we scatter; it is not enough not to do hurt, but we must do good." Christ expects His people to preach His Gospel and to promote it as the only way God saves. Any who go against this biblical command, any who tolerate other gospels and claim that people are just as saved, that they are just as much of Christ as those who believe only in His Gospel as God’s power unto salvation, do not gather with the Lord but scatter, for they are His enemies.

WHAT IS THE
BLASPHEMY AGAINST THE HOLY SPIRIT?

The blasphemy against the Holy Spirit must, in accordance with the context of our passage, have been committed, or at the very least been on the verge of being committed, in the verses we have just looked at. The context demands it! No other conclusion can be reached but that of the Pharisees being the guilty party.

In vv. 31 & 32 the Lord Jesus Christ warns the people, and in particular the Pharisees, of just what they were in danger of doing. He told them the very truth. In one of the two principle verses of our study, the Lord Jesus here states in verse 31 that all sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, even blasphemies directed toward the Son of man (see v. 32), but that there is one, and ONLY one, sin that will never, and can never, be forgiven, not in time or eternity, and that is the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. "One might speak against Jesus’ humanness—the way He looked, spoke or acted—but if one claimed that His miraculous works, done by the Holy Spirit to prove Christ’s Deity, were actually done by Satan, that person was in a hopeless state of rejection. He or she could not be saved. That is what Jesus was saying. If those Pharisees had seen and heard all that Jesus had said and done, yet still were convinced it was satanic, they were hopeless. They had concluded the opposite of what was clearly true, and had done so with full revelation."

Let us look again at what the Pharisees were alleging in Matthew 12:24: "...this fellow doth not cast out devils, but by Beelzebub the prince of the devils." It is vital, in order to attain a proper understanding of what the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit actually is, to realise that this statement was not made in ignorance of who Jesus claimed to be or of the fact that He was casting out demons.

The evil Pharisees consciously and purposely disputed the indisputable. The Pharisees were belligerently persistent in their denial that Jesus was the Christ. They had heard His teachings and had seen His miracles which, as was the case with the apostles’ miracles in Acts 4:16, they could not and did not inwardly, nor amongst themselves, deny were in fact being performed through the power of God. One Pharisee, Nicodemus, told the Lord "...we know that Thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that Thou doest, except God be with Him" (Jn. 3:2 cf. Jn 11:47). But outwardly, motivated by jealously and hatred towards Christ Jesus, they did most vehemently cast aspersions upon their origin, insisting that Jesus’ power was Satan’s power. "Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit (i.e. against the manifest activity of God, as seen in verse 28) is more serious than other forms of slander and abuse. It indicates a deliberate refusal to acknowledge God’s power, a totally perverted orientation, like that of Isaiah 5:20 (‘those who call evil good and good evil’). This was what the Pharisees were doing in attributing Jesus’ healings to satanic power....the incognito character of Jesus’ ministry means that failure to recognize Him for what He was might be excusable (cf. Acts 3:17); even Peter ‘spoke against’ Him (Matt. 26:69-75) and was forgiven. The difference is then between failure to recognize the light and deliberate rejection of it once recognized; compare Numbers 15:30,31 for unforgivable blasphemy in contrast with unwitting sin in vv.27-29 of the same chapter...the punishment for blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is not only on earth, but extends to the age to come; it indicates a hardening against God which is deliberate and irreversible."

Here we have it in a nutshell. The clear and unmistakable definition of what the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit really is. It is the ‘deliberate rejection once recognized’ of the power of God, or the activity of God if you will. It is an act of rejection which is performed willingly and without ignorance of what one is actually doing. The blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is something which could not, therefore, ever be committed by a Gospel-believing, Holy Spirit-filled, born-again believer, for how could a born again child of God, after having recognized a work as that done by the hand of God, or the only Gospel of God, ever reject it and pronounce it a thing of the Devil? The Charismatic movement, as we shall come to see in greater detail, claims that its works and wonders are a demonstration of God’s power, but its false gospel and the endless array of failed healings and false prophecies left in its wake evidence anything but the power of God at work. The Charismatic movement has yet to prove that its works are of God, and so they cannot be recognized as the works of God. How then can one be guilty of rejecting something as being from God which has not the hallmarks of a work of God? When all the evidence points to a work or sign as being a counterfeit, one is well within one’s rights, and is commanded by Scripture, to reject it. But it is not a work of God that is being rejected, hence it is no blasphemy of His Spirit that is being committed. The whole basis for the rejection lies not in the fact that one is deliberately rejecting what one has recognised as the power of God at work, but that the sign or wonder has been rightly recognised as not being a work of God at all. Therefore how can one be committing the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit when, in rejecting a work of the Charismatic movement, all one is doing is rejecting a counterfeit?

According to the leaders of the Charismatic movement, who have an erroneous understanding of what the blasphemy is and have passed on their perverted interpretation to their people, the blasphemy is being committed when one (rightly, biblically and sincerely) raises questions and seeks to test the biblical validity and veracity of the gospel of the Charismatic movement, or what is manifesting and presenting itself through the Charismatic movement as a work of God, and those who are performing the ‘signs’. The Pharisees were not guilty of this. They did not test what Christ had done, or His teachings, to see if He was truly of God, they were not genuine seekers of the truth, but flat out denied His claims and works out of envy and prejudice. No honest and sincere person is doing this when judging the alleged miracles of the Charismatic movement, but is rightly and properly seeking to examine, question and test its claims, wonders and signs to see if it is the power of God involved. Nowhere in the Scriptures are any condemned for employing this biblical directive.

"Throughout the ages...false teaching has thrived on incorrect versions, and often people have become mentally ill, fearing they have committed the unpardonable sin. It must be stressed that the Bible teaches only ONE unforgivable sin and that is the rejection of Christ. Any message which does not exalt Christ is uninspired. The work of the Holy Spirit is to exalt Christ; when a person rejects that message, there is no forgiveness, either in this world or the next." Any gospel that does not rightly exalt Christ Jesus as Lord and Savior of HIS people elected by God before the foundation of the world, which is at odds with God’s testimony of Who His Son is and what His Son has done and for whom He has done it, is therefore uninspired. It is a false gospel and no one who believes it is saved. Christ is revealed exclusively in and through the Gospel and any spirit promoting any other gospel is not the Spirit of God. There is no forgiveness for anyone who rejects the Gospel, for Christ says in a clear and unmistakable manner that he who does not believe it shall be damned! (Mk. 16:16).

Importantly, and perhaps surprisingly, we are not warranted to believe that the Pharisees had in fact committed the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, for Jesus’ words to them were in the form of a warning and not a sentence. "...we are not true to the context, when we say that the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost is that of attributing to the Son of man complicity with Satan. That is blasphemy against the Son of man, and He distinctly said that such may be forgiven (see v. 32). What, then, is the nature of the warning? The Lord had said, ‘If by the Spirit I cast out demons, then is the Kingdom of God come upon you;’ and in those words He evidently intended to teach that there are only these alternatives; exorcism of demons is either by Satan or by the Spirit of God. They said that He had wrought by Satan. In so doing they had denied that he wrought by the Spirit, which according to His interpretation meant that they were refusing the Kingdom of God. In the presence of the claims of that Kingdom, in the presence of the demonstration of the power of that Kingdom, they were refusing it. THAT, if it be ultimately and finally persisted in, is the sin against the Holy Ghost which has no forgiveness. The sin against the Holy Ghost is the ultimate refusal to believe on the testimony of the Spirit concerning Jesus Christ. The sin against the Holy Ghost is persistent, determined, and final rejection of the Spirit’s demonstration of the meaning of the Kingdom, and of the power of the King."

We see then from our study how far removed the true ingredients which go to make up the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit are from that which many are falsely accused of in these last days. The leaders who promote a perverted idea of what the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is and who use this biblical term in order to fill their bridled followers with fear, who in turn, with equal zeal, espouse the same perversion of what Scripture teaches, have no idea what they are saying. They are in serious breach of the proper teaching of God’s Word.

One man says of the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit: "It denotes the conscious and wicked rejection of the saving power and grace of God toward man." There are others who are of the persuasion that "...the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit was a dispensational sin committable only during the ministry of Jesus Christ whilst here in human form, and is therefore a sin which cannot be carried out today and, in a primary sense, they are correct." But the Scriptures themselves point out that, by its very nature, this sin can still be committed as the Holy Spirit may still be resisted and rejected by the non-elect. "...anyone, with evidence of the Lord’s power before his eyes, who should declare it to be satanic, exhibits a condition of heart beyond divine illumination and therefore hopeless." "...they sin against the Holy Spirit who, with evil intention, resist God’s truth, although by its brightness they are so touched that they cannot claim ignorance."

As there is only one Way to the Father, the Lord Jesus Christ as He is revealed in the Gospel, so too, there is at the last only one way to stay out of heaven and that is by a persistent, stubborn and evil rejection of the true Jesus of the true Gospel. It is important to be clear on this point, that there is only one unpardonable sin and not several. Murderers may be forgiven their sin, adulterers may be forgiven their sin, homosexuality, lying, stealing and coveting are all sins which may be forgiven. But the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is that unique sin for which there is no forgiveness. "There remains nothing for him who doth despite to the Spirit of Grace but a ‘certain fearful looking for of judgement and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries,’ (Heb. 10:27,29). This is that ‘sin unto death’ whose remission is not to be prayed for, 1 John 5:16: for He having taken upon Him to make effectual unto us the great remedy provided in the blood of Christ for the pardon of our sins, if He in the prosecution of that work be despised, blasphemed, despitefully used, there neither is relief nor can there be pardon for that sin." Of course no elect child of God can ever commit this blasphemy. Only those who at the end are proven to be reprobate are the ones who can and do commit this unforgivable sin.

I cannot emphasize the following point enough to every believer, that the Bible encourages us to test everything and to hold fast only that which is good: "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good" (1 Thess. 5:21. cf. Prov. 14:15; 1Jn. 4:1). We are to reject all that is not of God and to accept and embrace all that is of God. The Christian abides in the doctrine of Christ and no other. Any abidance in false gospels is a denial of the true as the one and unique Gospel that testifies to the true God and the only way He saves. Belief in any false gospel reveals the believer of such a gospel to be no Christian at all. We are to make absolutely certain we are fully aware and biblically—as distinct from experientially—certain of what we are embracing. The Christian, and all who aspire to be Christians, is to judge ALL things by the standard of the written Word of God, for this is his authority, and is not to be overwhelmed by experience perceived to be of God. 1 Corinthians 2:15 plainly states: "...he that is spiritual judgeth all things..." meaning "...he who is sanctified is capable of judging about matters of human wisdom, and has also a relish and savour of divine truths."

We implore the charismatic person to not be found trusting in their own judgement that which is of God and that which is not but to do it objectively in light of Holy Scripture. Read what the Scriptures have to say and do not read into the Scriptures what you would like them to be saying. Do not give place to naivety and ignorance in your lives. Do not give place in your lives to untested doctrines of false gospels, which cannot save. Test and examine the gospel you have been taught and look at the Gospel which the Holy Scriptures attest to. Become aware and learned and knowledgeable of the subtleties of false gospels and false ministers. Be willing to know the truth as God has written It and be fully abandoned to it regardless of the earthly consequences. In commenting on 1 Thessalonians 5:21, one man encourages those who claim to have a desire to become Christians to, "Subject everything submitted to you to be believed to the proper test...." He adds that one must "...carefully examine everything proposed for their belief. They are not to receive it on trust; to take it on assertion; to believe it because it was urged with vehemence, zeal, or plausibility. In the various opinions and doctrines which are submitted to them for adoption, they are to apply the appropriate tests from reason and the Word of God; and what they find to be true they are to embrace; what is false they are to reject. Christianity does not require men to disregard their reason, or to be credulous. It does not expect them to believe anything because others say it is so. It does not make it a duty to receive as undoubted truth all that synods and councils have decreed; or all that is advanced by ministers of religion. It is, more than any other form of religion, the friend of free inquiry, and would lead men everywhere to understand the reason of the opinions which they entertain." True Christianity does not use fear or intimidation to ensure that its teachings be adopted and upheld. Christians are not in bondage, but have been made free by the truth they believe. Truth has nothing to do with fear and intimidation. Truth has to do with freedom from these things and the Lord Jesus has made it clear that "...the truth shall make you free" (Jn. 8:32).

The final scripture in our text is a reiteration of the Lord’s warning made in the previous verse, with one inclusion, ‘...whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him...’ There are several instances in the Bible where we find men who blasphemed the Lord Jesus Christ and yet later received mercy, repented and were forgiven. The apostle Paul, in 1Timothy 1:13, admitted that prior to his conversion he was "...a blasphemer and a persecutor..." This, however, was done in ignorance of the truth. Jesus prayed for those who ignorantly reviled Him at the cross, asking the Father to "...forgive them for they know not what they do" (Lk. 23:34). Many who reviled Him were forgiven, including one who was crucified with Him.

Thus ends our study of what the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is. Clearly, there has been a great deal of confusion and mystery over what the blasphemy is and whether one has committed it or not. Hopefully, this section of the booklet has cleared up much of that confusion so prevalent in the minds of many sincere Charismatics, and of those who are so often falsely accused of this sin by charismatic people and leaders alike.

Charismatics need to be extremely careful before they take it upon themselves to accuse anyone of committing the unpardonable sin. It is not a term that should be bandied about for it is no light thing to accuse someone of this sin. Today, the term ‘blasphemy against the Holy Spirit’ is all too frequently used in ignorance of its true, biblical definition, and, as we may conclude from our study, in a careless, wrongful and unjustified manner. To those leaders who employ this term as a way of silencing the ‘trouble makers’ in their assemblies who are merely following a biblical directive—to test everything and hold fast to that which is good—we say ‘be aware of what you are doing and repent of it and believe the true Gospel, lest God Himself take vengeance upon you!’

"You’d better watch out you don’t commit the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit." This warning is one that is often heard from leaders of Charismatic churches and from the lips of Charismatics, in response to those who are genuinely and rightly questioning and examining whether the doctrines and fruits of the Charismatic movement are of God. Sadly, so many have ceased a proper and biblical study of the movement and its claims for fear of committing this sin. They have allowed themselves to be intimidated and threatened to the point of putting their doubts aside and remaining in two minds concerning the movement. They, like people of the past, have acquiesced to the claim that the leaders are those who know and the common folk should but listen and believe, failing to remember that the Lord Jesus spoke of blind leaders who would lead the blind. At the best of times it is foolish and irresponsible to entrust one’s children to a perfect stranger, how much more perilous an act is it to entrust one’s eternal future to what a man says and not question and examine his words in light of the Holy Scriptures. So many today have unwittingly fallen into the trap of believing what a man says God’s word is saying, rather than hearing and believing what God’s word is really saying. What God has actually said and what many say He has said are often two vastly different propositions.

Anyone who comes along, even Charismatics themselves who are beginning to have doubts as to whether what they have experienced and are involved in is from God, is warned not to question past a certain point but just believe lest they stumble into committing the unpardonable sin. Imagine someone telling you to believe something and then censoring you from a biblical investigation with the threat that is tantamount to having one’s name blotted out of the Lamb’s Book of Life! Our suspicions must be raised when encountering such people or ‘churches’ who discourage questions, or certain types of questions, and the use of the mind which God gave us. The Charismatic catch phrase let go and let God, and the edict to leave one’s mind at the door are among the most dangerous things anyone could ever do and are totally without biblical support. Abandonment of the mind and one’s reasoning is an integral part of Occultism and has nothing whatsoever to do with being a Christian. Christianity is not, nor ever has been, made up of people who blindly and mindlessly accept what they are told or see. The Bible encourages, rather than opposes, the scrutiny of itself by those against it, for the truth has nothing to hide. It is the suppression of inquiry that is the key ingredient of any oppressive and potentially totalitarian organization.

Whenever you encounter any religious group telling you to accept and believe something they are teaching or that is occurring in their meetings which they claim is of God, INDEPENDENTLY OF YOUR MINDS, take it as a clear warning from God to flee that group and never have anything more to do with it. God gave us our minds, and He expects us to use our minds before we accept anything being presented to us as truth. If our minds are not active we are in danger of becoming mere instruments, puppets if you will, of those whose minds are active.

Within Charismatic circles, the genuine truth-seeker and his persistent inquiries are often met, not with a calm and orderly exposition of Scripture, but with a brisk warning that he not dare to question what everyone else is comfortable in believing is of God. Often the enquirer is made to feel the odd one out, and that something is wrong with them rather than the teaching or practice in question if they are not as quick as others to accept what has been offered them. This is nothing less than one of the many cheap tactics used by cults the world over. The underlying theme to so many people’s involvement with any organization is the natural desire to belong. Cults know this human trait very well and they have a lot of experience with people who at first questioned, but upon fear of excommunication etc., have virtually turned their backs on what they know to be legitimate concerns in order that they might belong. And oh how these people, in turn, attack those who raise the same concerns in private conversations or in publications such as this. Conveniently for those leaders who have no answer for, but only a fear of, certain questions from their followers, it is strongly recommended that enquirers cease to ask dangerous and ‘boat-rocking’ questions lest they be guilty of the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. No one wants to offend God, so the questions are forgotten and blind belief put in their place. Many ‘pastors’ have been professionally trained to give pat answers to questions of doubt. They resort to pastor speak and often leave their hearers wondering what on earth they meant by what they have said. No true Christian minister will ever leave his listeners in any doubt as to what the Gospel is, of Who God is or of how God saves.

Does all this sound familiar to you? It certainly does to this author. You see, dear reader, if there is one thing that cults of every description do, from the Roman Catholic Church down to the smallest suburban cult, it is to discourage a persistent questioning of their teachings and practices. It is not expedient for any of these groups to have people among their ranks who, rather than tow the line (and lengthen it), want to examine it and see what makes it tick. What these groups want is believers, not questioners. Much like the hypnotist who searches for the right subject because he can do nothing with the non-suggestive person, cults of every description are happiest with those people who readily accept what they are taught and experience as being unquestionably from God. It is preferred that the cult member not be too inquisitive, not one who questions incessantly but rather one who is credulous and instantly accepts everything he hears. And, if any do have questions, that they readily accept the first explanation given to them.

One can be assured that detailed explanations of hard to understand teachings and dubious practices will not be volunteered to those who just accept what they have been taught and experienced. Such people are also told to never question the hierarchy lest they be found offending, or at the very least doubting, God. Now of course, not every charismatic pastor or elder is like this. Some do take the time to sit down with confused members of their congregations and genuinely attempt to explain that what they teach and practice is in line with the Scriptures. But at the same time, any persistent questioning is often met with what has become the final refuge for all truth-fearers, that of warning that the unpardonable sin may be committed if any further questioning or doubting is expressed. ‘Just ask God to help you believe’ rather than ‘search the Scriptures’ is the usual advice. Ironically, Charismatic pastors who warn that the blasphemy may be committed are often automatically thought of as very wise and God-fearing men merely because they have sounded such a warning, when in reality it is not God whom these leaders fear but Truth! Charismatics, and any denomination for that matter, need to realise that simply because a man has undergone several years of indoctrination does not mean that man is a man of God and that he has the truth. It just means that he has been taught, and has fully complied with, the teachings etc., of the particular group that has taught him and now employs him.

The writers of the Didache, a first or second century treatise of Christian morals and practices, must surely have been the fore-fathers of those like-minded persons today. They insisted, in stark contrast with 1 John 4:1 and other verses of scripture, that "You must neither test nor examine a prophet who speaks in the spirit: for ‘every sin shall be forgiven, but not this sin" (Bettenson p. 51). This mirrors precisely the saying of many Charismatic leaders who, in the face of questions, many of which they know they have no answer for, respond with a perverted use of the scriptural warning "...touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm" (1 Chron. 16:22). But how, we ask the writers of the Didache, was a person to know that the one speaking was doing so in the Spirit and was who he claimed to be if his words were not to be tested and examined? Their interpretation of the unpardonable sin was as flawed as that of the modern charismatic, for it runs opposite to the commandment of 1 John 4:1, that Christians are to test everyone that comes their way claiming they, their words and their works, are of God. Christians are not to allow anyone to lord it over them, they are not to be as those who were ruled by the Nicolaitanes, but have a right, nay a biblical command, to test and examine all that is presented to them as truth. The writers of the Didache seemed to have a protect the leadership at all costs mentality. But what did they have to fear? What did they have to hide? Would not the questions of would-be followers give these people the opportunity to further explain their teachings and provide them with the opportunity to prove that what they were saying was indeed of God? The truth bearer need not fear questions, for they are the window of opportunity to explain in further detail what is being taught and show that what they are teaching is in line with the word of God. But leaders of cult-like groups such as the Charismatic movement would prefer not to have you ask any questions, that their tenets might enjoy a smooth ride into the minds and lives of the religiously gullible. Questioning and inquiry is not encouraged, which is at odds with what the Scriptures show. The Bereans questioned and put to the test the apostle Paul and Apollos in Acts 17:11, to which the apostle Paul offered no protest or rebuke. Neither Paul or Apollos addressed their inquirers by saying, ‘How dare you question me!’ No man of God anywhere in the Scriptures tried to avoid questions about what he was preaching because he had nothing to fear, and as we said earlier, they saw people’s questions as a positive sign in that it gave them opportunity to further expand on and explain what they had been teaching. The Lord Jesus commended the Christians at Ephesus in Revelation 2:2 for testing those who claimed they were apostles but were not and were found to be liars. These Christians did not know these men, so for all they knew they could have been apostles, nevertheless this did not exclude them from having their claim tested. Rather than rebuke those who examine and put to the test those who claim to be of God, the Lord Jesus encourages true Christians to do so and heartily commends them when they do.

As we have observed in our exposition of Matthew 12:22-32, genuine questioning and searching for, and a desire to know, the truth is not what constitutes the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, nor can it even be remotely associated with it. Sadly, it must be reported that many Charismatics who read this booklet will still believe what they believe about the blasphemy, not in accord with reason or logic or anything so silly as that, but simply because their pastor says, ‘This is the blasphemy and he is wrong’. There are not a few Charismatics with whom I have had experience, who at first listened and seemed to see what I had been showing them about the Charismatic movement etc., but after returning to their ‘pastors’ and hearing a word from them, they quickly returned into the arms of deception and I never saw or heard from them again. Such people are not moved at all by what the Word of God says, only by what their ‘pastors’ say the word of God says! All that they have read in this booklet, all that they have seen in the Scriptures dealt with in this booklet, will be swept aside and forgotten, with no logical answer or explanation to any of the points made. They are promptly and conveniently dumped and ignored after they hear their leaders speak. ‘He’s the pastor, he must know,’ they say, and that’s that. These people are intimidated by fear because they are ignorant of the truth. Truth makes a man free of fear! It would be fair to say that most religious people today are followers of men, which may explain why the words of pastors have an almost hypnotic influence upon them, an influence so powerful that even verifiable and documented facts and plain Scriptural evidence is ignored. These people are much closer to having an immunity to the truth than being lovers of it!

It is important to note that the pastor is not the final authority. No pastor, not even the one who is truly of God, should be looked upon and trusted in to the point that what they are saying is accepted as the truth purely because it is they who have said it. The apostle Paul taught the Galatians that if he, or even an angel from heaven, were to come preaching a gospel that differed from the one he had taught them, they were to consider him, or the angel, as accursed!! (see Gal. 1). This passage from the Bible clearly teaches that reputation is NEVER to be allowed to influence our judgement as to whether a man is speaking the truth. "To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them" (Isa. 8:20). The pastor is not to be looked upon as some superman who has all the answers and is accurate and correct on every point. He is not to be blindly followed, and the mind’s analytical capabilities are not to be put on hold when he speaks. My friends, it is the Word Of God, the Holy Bible, which is the final authority. Let us not become as those in the dark ages who followed every word of their leaders because they simply could not examine their teachers, for they had no Bible to refer to. People in those days thought, ‘Who are we to argue against what these men are saying? They are the ones who have done all the studying and we are but simple folk.’ The point is, how do we know that what your ‘pastor’ has been taught and the conclusions he has arrived at is the truth? Are we to judge a man as speaking the truth merely because he speaks it with confidence and conviction? Hardly! True Christians have no obligation to blindly accept and believe what their leaders say, but have the freedom to question and examine what they are taught before it is believed. We now have God’s Holy Word. We have a holy Standard by which to test and examine all that the professed pastors and leaders present to us today as truth, and the responsibility remains firmly with the individual to make sure that what he is being taught, and consequently adhering to, is in fact THE Truth. The apostle Peter, writing to Christians, informs us that "We have a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place..." (2 Pet. 1:19). It will do no one any good to say to God at the end, ‘But I sincerely believed what my pastor told me was Your word’ or ‘The only reason I believed what he was saying is because I believed it to be the truth’. Far from being rewarded for such ignorance and gullibility, this will only redouble the damnation he deserves for believing lies about God, thinking them to be truth, and is an open admission of ignorance, which reveals the absence of the love of the truth.

This author has spoken with many Charismatics and has often found a mind-set which at first listens and seemingly understands and is even temporarily swayed by the truth, but is later proven to be a mere head knowledge. The seed sown in them endured for awhile, but as with that sown in stony ground, it soon died and withered away for it had no root. The minds of such people are like that of children—they bounce from one teaching to another never actually arriving at the knowledge and belief of the truth. The information does not sink down into their hearts but is discarded and forgotten as quickly as it was ‘gained’. It is then replaced by a counterfeit truth which they are more familiar, and certainly more comfortable, with. Rarely does it ever become heart knowledge which is acted upon. This is the classic mind-set of any cult member and of those the Bible describes as "...children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive" (Eph. 4:14). These sorts of people are among the blind who follow the blind leaders whom Jesus Christ spoke of in Matthew 15:14, saying that "...both shall fall into the ditch." Its not just the teachers who have got it wrong that will suffer eternal punishment for their promotion of lies, but those who have blindly followed them who will also suffer everlasting damnation for their adherence to false gospels and unbiblical practices.

There is a large element amongst the leaders of charismatic churches—and it must be said of nearly every other denomination—including pastors, elders and deacons, who equally resist the truth for they know that if they are proven wrong by any examination of what they believe and teach, their lives would have to change drastically. They would have to resign their position if they turned from their error and believed the truth. They would no longer have a title or office. Perhaps they might even lose their families. They would be asking, ‘Where will the next meal come from’; ‘What will I do now’; and ‘What about the embarrassment?’ So, not only are these men not keen to address questions about what they teach, often because they do not know the answers themselves, but also because they don’t even want to think about such things, for they do not have a genuine desire to know the truth but only to remain comfortable with what they teach the truth is and the livelihood and prestige it provides. To these people we say: those of God believe God’s one and only Gospel. They all love the truth and go wherever it leads them. They fear no questions and they seek to avoid none of the answers. The Lord meets all the needs of His people, He is rich in mercy and pleased to show it to all His chosen. Follow His Word of Truth for His Word "... is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path" (Psa. 119:105).

The Pharisees in Matthew 12:22-32 were not questioning or searching for truth. They were firmly established in their religion and had the respect of the people and had no intention of changing. They loved "...to go in long clothing, and love(d) salutations in the marketplaces, and the chief seats in the synagogues, and the uppermost rooms at feasts" (Mk. 12:38,39). They were loaded with prestige and position and had built up credible reputations in the eyes of the people, and they looked down on anything that would threaten their comfortable existence. The Pharisees flatly stated that Jesus Christ cast out demons, and in effect did all His miracles, by the power of Satan. They did not do this ignorantly, but knowing who Jesus was, they deliberately rejected Him. This could not be any further removed from the meaning the Charismatic movement has placed on the term ‘blasphemy against the Holy Spirit’ when accusing their own adherents, and those of other denominations, when they simply question that which is being presented to them as truth. Incidentally, not only did the Pharisees say that Christ cast out demons by satanic power, but they also excommunicated any who dared to question their ruling or reject their declaration, and follow the Lord (see Jn. 7:12,13; 9:22, 34; 12:42). The tactics of false ministers have not changed, only the organizations they represent.

We, according to the Charismatic movement, must believe that what they have called the work and the signs of the Holy Spirit are the work and signs of the Holy Spirit, or we run the risk of committing the unpardonable sin! All will go to hell if they do not believe what the Charismatic movement believes is of God! I mean, what other type of organization could get away with such obvious bullying and intimidatory tactics as this, other than a cult of religiously deluded zealots? Blind religious followers the world over seem to just accept the totalitarian governments of religious institutions and their iron rule, and by their subservience only make these monolithic money-making enterprises stronger by the hour. ‘Don’t dare question what we say about it, just believe and accept it,’ and the most extraordinary thing is that most people do! Now most won’t come out and say it that blatantly, but this is exactly what they are, in effect, saying, which is no different to what any cult says of its claims. ‘We are right and anyone who disagrees is anathema.’ Men like Kenneth Hagin and Kenneth Copeland of the Faith movement actually warn of physical illness and even imminent death awaiting those who deny their words or call their movement a cult. Everyone claims to have the truth and everyone vehemently and stringently defends their religious group as being the one that has the truth. The true Christian does not defend any group but says, ‘God is right and everyone else is wrong. Believe what God says His Gospel is or you will be damned.’ It is never ‘believe what WE say...’ or ‘you must belong to our group...’

Let me ask the following questions at this point. Just who made the Charismatic movement the authority on the Holy Spirit? And, what is this Charismatic movement? In answer to the first question, the authority of the Charismatic movement is self-appointed. Its foundation is not the word of God, but is underpinned by its subjective experiences. The Charismatic movement is made up of a large group of people who undeniably have a zeal of God, but that zeal is not according to right knowledge of God or His Gospel. They have experienced a mixture of psychological and supernatural occurrences in their lives and have been taught some truths, but not the truth. They have subsequently accepted all their experiences as being of God—and therefore the teachings which accompany those experiences as also being of God—simply because they all claim to love Jesus and sing His praises, not to mention the ‘positive’ influence this movement has had on their lives. It is an acceptance based on the foolish presumption that people with good intentions cannot be deceived, and the age old deception—energized by man’s wicked and deceptive heart—that continues to fool people to this day, ‘how could so many be so wrong?’ There was a multitude prior to the flood, while a man was building an ark, who thought the same way. I dare say they don’t think like that now. The ‘safety in numbers’ philosophy, as with those who drowned in the flood, just does not tread water.

CAN A TRUE BORN-AGAIN CHRISTIAN
EVER COMMIT THE BLASPHEMY?

Can a true born-again, Spirit-filled, believer accidentally or unintentionally commit the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit? The answer is an unequivocal NO!!! As we have seen in our study thus far, the unpardonable sin can only ever be committed by one who purposely rejects that which he has recognized as the power of God, denying it is the power of God. It can only ever be committed by one who, once having recognized the Gospel or activity of God, rejects it and labels it satanic.

What a nightmare it would be, and how totally ludicrous the concept, to live the Christian life filled with love for God and His Gospel and a desire to do His will, filled with His Holy Spirit, and at the same time live in constant fear of one day committing the unpardonable sin! How can a Christian, whose past, present and future sins have ALL been washed away by the blood of Christ, possibly commit a sin for which there is no forgiveness??? As many have rightly stated, if you fear you may have committed this sin against the Holy Spirit, you can be assured you have not. Does it sound plausible to you that God would leave a Christian in fear that one day he might commit the unpardonable sin? Of course not! Those who have committed it know full well that they have. Moreover, the teaching that a Christian can commit this sin is a direct attack upon the biblical principle that once a chosen one of God has become one with Christ, he cannot lose his salvation (Jn. 10:28,29; Eph. 4:30; 1 Peter 1:3-5). Those who say otherwise, who hold to the Arminian view that one can lose one’s salvation, are akin to the Romish fear-mongers of the dark ages, whose lives were steeped in superstition and whose gospels were according to works.

The author is a born again Christian who loves the Lord Jesus Christ and the glorious Gospel wherein is revealed His saving Righteousness, and is committed to obeying His Gospel and to the defence of His Gospel and Name. How could a true Christian ever call a genuine work of God a work of the Devil? This is not, I repeat NOT, the blasphemy against God’s Holy Spirit anyway. The blasphemy is knowing full well in one’s heart that what is occurring or being taught is of God and yet calling it satanic. It is summed up well in Isaiah 5:20: "WOE unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!" The next part of this booklet will examine this so-called ‘Charismatic’ movement, which many believe to be the receptacle in which God is bathing His people in these last days, and will prove that it cannot be of God.

The real issue, that which is being missed in all the din of false accusations and warnings and fear-mongering that the blasphemy may be being committed, is the primary question, which is of paramount importance: ‘Is that which is taught and occurring in and through the Charismatic movement of God? Do we accept the claims of this movement simply because they say ‘Jesus is Lord’ and have several of the fundamentals of Christian teaching, such as the Virgin birth and the historical fact that Christ died, was buried and is resurrected, correct in their theology? Then why not accept Roman Catholicism and all her ‘miracles’ and ‘apparitions’ as being of God? For they, too, are correct in many of the fundamental doctrines of true biblical Christianity. No, my friends. Do not be fooled by that which looks and sounds just like the real thing. If it looks like a duck and sounds like a duck, LOOK CLOSER, it may be a decoy! Moreover, there are plenty of people who have been misinformed about what the ‘duck’ actually is and what it looks like. Satan is a master illusionist and he continues to keep millions in his kingdom of darkness by using a vast array of spiritual decoys including counterfeit gospels. Be wise and search the Scriptures, and you will discover what the genuine article really is.

No one has ever proven from the Bible, nor has anyone from the Charismatic movement ever convinced the movement’s enemies, that her practices and so-called ‘miracles and signs’ are indeed of God. In light of this, how can anyone with any confidence feel comfortable in believing that the charismatic gospel is the Gospel of God. If its signs and wonders are not of God, how could its message of salvation be, and vice versa? From the Bible, we learn that one of the chief signs that a miracle was of God was that even His enemies were convinced and could not deny it. Jesus’ enemies were convinced: "...What do we? For this man doeth many miracles" (Jn. 11:47) and the apostles’ enemies were likewise convinced that their miracles were indeed of God: "...What shall we do to these men? For that indeed a notable miracle hath been done by them is manifest to all them that dwell in Jerusalem; and we cannot deny it" (Acts 4:16). If these men were really of God, why would they want to deny it? But the enemies of the Charismatic movement are far from convinced, be they secular or Christian, that what is happening in and amongst the Charismatic churches and people is of God, not because of any ill feeling towards the people, not from any prejudice or biased views, not from any jealousy or envy, but from the glaringly obvious fact that, to the Christian at least, their claims, let alone their gospel, just do not match that which is portrayed in the Scriptures.

It is at best high presumption and at worst utter blasphemy against God to accept and believe that merely because the name of Jesus is being proclaimed and praised and apparent ‘healings’ and ‘prophecies’ etc., are being performed in His name, that this automatically means that all is being done by the hand of God and that this, in turn, is verification that the doctrinal teachings of the Charismatic movement are all correct and above board. The attitude is, ‘I love God, I worship God and therefore whatever happens once I have prayed or laid hands on someone or have hands laid on me, must be of God. How dare anyone say it is not so. I say I love God and therefore that is the only prerequisite I need to assure me that anything that happens to me, and in our meetings, is from the true God!!!!!!!!’ In other words, sincerity is the force-shield of life. No one can touch you, let alone can you be wrong, as long as you are sincere!! The scripture that is often employed by those so persuaded, is Luke 11:11: "If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone?" It is presumptious, to say the least, to automatically infer from this verse that what the charismatic is praying for is in fact bread! It has yet to be proven that it IS bread they are asking for. If they are asking for the gift of tongues, which has ceased, how could it possibly be the true gift they are receiving? To ask for bread is to ask for what the will of God is for a person, so to ask for something that is no longer available is simply not asking for bread. And how, for that matter, can any charismatic be calling on the true God for bread when they have not even heard of the true God, not having had the true Gospel taught to them? "How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard?..." (Rom. 10:14). If the gospel the Charismatics have been taught and believe is a false gospel, how then can it be the true God they are calling on and to whom they are making their requests? They haven’t even gotten to step one yet—knowing God and believing His Gospel—so how inappropriate of them to presume to use the true God’s Scripture to justify what they are asking their god for. The Charismatic movement is a movement of high presumption. Its followers, like the followers of any false christian organization, have assumed so much and taken for granted that which they should have examined. There is no doubting that Charismatic people do evince a certain zeal, but it is misplaced and not according to knowledge. A zeal which is founded on ignorance is of no benefit to anyone. Remember, just because you disagree with a teaching does not automatically mean that what you believe instead of it is the truth. The gospel of the Charismatic movement is another gospel and not the Gospel of God, so it is not even the Baker they are addressing when they ask for what they perceive to be bread. They are living in a fantasy world, a religious Disneyland of delusion and illusion. The Gospel of God is what God says it is, not what the Charismatic movement claims it is. Bread is that which the Baker calls bread, not what the buyer insists it is.

No doubt, many Charismatics who read this booklet will say that once this author has explained the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, he then goes right ahead and commits it himself by saying that the Charismatic movement is not of God! I would encourage those people at this point to go back to the commencement of the booklet and re-read everything up to this chapter in the hope that, upon a second reading, they will come to a clearer understanding of what the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit really is.

There are many good and reliable books which provide a detailed study of the history of Pentecostal and Charismatic movements, including a biblical study of their teachings and practices. However we shall, as space permits, proceed to give a brief general overview of these two movements and similar groups which have appeared throughout history, which have so heavily relied upon signs and wonders as evidence that they are indeed of God. Religious movements and groups may be easily and readily identified as not being of God simply by an examination of what gospel they teach. One can look at the signs and the wonders emanating from a group and study these closely to see whether or not they coincide with those of Holy Scripture, but the quickest way to learn if what is happening in a religious organization is of God or not is to look at the gospel they promote, for one can be assured that if the gospel they teach is false, then it cannot be God Who is behind the signs and wonders of that group.

Firstly, let us return to the days of the early Church. Jesus Christ, in Acts 1:8, told the apostles, "...ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you..." Once this had occurred, as may be seen in Acts chapter 2, the apostles were enabled by God’s Holy Spirit to speak in unlearned but recognizable human languages (tongues), thus making it possible for those who were not familiar with Hebrew or Aramaic to hear of the wonderful works of God pronounced in their own language. The apostles were also enabled by the Holy Spirit to perform instantaneous healings and miracles and the casting out of demons. These signs and wonders were always, and only, accompanied by the true teaching of God’s Holy Word (Mk. 16:20 cf. 1 Cor. 2:4,5; Heb. 2:3,4) for they were in fact, the evidence, or sign, that the men speaking were of God. The only other people who were able to perform the same signs, by the same Holy Spirit, were those upon whom the apostles had laid their hands. It is important to note that the Scriptures have no record of these men ever having laid hands on others, thus conveying to them the gifts of the Holy Spirit which they had received at the beginning through the laying on of the apostles’ hands. This is possibly the strongest argument for the cessation of the gifts. Perhaps an even more forceful argument is that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is never to be heard where the Charismatic-type ‘healings’ and ‘miracles’ have occurred. It is always a false gospel, and not God’s one and only Gospel that is preached. Only a fool would insist that God would be working His signs and His miracles through the hands of accursed men preaching an equally accursed gospel and not God’s only Gospel.

Ever since the passing away of the apostles and those upon whom they conveyed the gifts, and even during their own life time, there have been many who have claimed to have the gifts of the Holy Spirit and the ability to perform miracles. Some even claimed to be apostles themselves (Rev. 2:2). There are even people today who claim to be apostles of God. These claimants all have an affinity with a man described for us in the Book of Acts. In Acts 8:9-11 we learn of a man during the apostles’ time, named Simon, a sorcerer who, unbeknownst to him, was in league with Satan, yet of whom "...all gave heed, from the least to the greatest, saying, THIS MAN IS THE GREAT POWER OF GOD. And to him they had regard, because that of long time he had bewitched them with sorceries" (Acts 8:10,11). How could so many be so wrong? Quite easily!! Here is the biblical precedent, here is the evidence that no charismatic person can afford to ignore, that proves that a man working sorceries by Satan, CAN be construed BY THE VAST MAJORITY NO LESS, as actually performing miracles through the power of God! Now, imagine a whole religious movement filled with such men. How powerful and influential it would be, and how utterly convinced its followers would be, of its Godly origin. But no matter how convinced its followers, or how abundant and powerful its signs, a movement cannot rightly be judged to be of God unless it preaches and promotes the only true God by means of His one and only Gospel. So many throughout the history of the world have labelled men of Satan as ‘men of God’ who worked the ‘work of God’, when all the time their works were being performed by the Devil himself whilst being indoctrinated into believing false gospels! Such men would have instantly been recognized for what they were had the Gospel been known among their followers, for by it they would have recognized the gospel that accompanied the signs and wonders as counterfeit and not at all of God.

One man has stated in response to those who claim that charismatic gifts continued after the apostles for several centuries, that: "There is little or no evidence at all for miracle-working during the first fifty years of the post-Apostolic Church; it is slight and unimportant for the next fifty years; it grows more abundant during the next century (the third); and it becomes abundant and precise only in the fourth century, to increase still further in the fifth and beyond." The more time that has elapsed since the days of the apostles and those whom they laid their hands on, the more claims of miracles of healings etc. Every one of these groups and individuals espoused a gospel other than the one God teaches His people. Erroneous teachings—in particular false gospels—and counterfeit signs go hand in hand and are equally repugnant. Satan wants to be as God. And what he sees God do he tries to emulate. What better way for Satan’s false gospels to gain acceptance with the people, even the majority who profess and believe themselves to be Christians, than by signs and wonders that all have the appearance of the genuine, but in reality are inspired by the prince of demons!

As time went on, there was an ever-increasing number of heretical cults who claimed the gifts of the Holy Spirit. The more time that had elapsed people became less familiar with the truth, and so in came the false signs, the false visions and counterfeit healings and miracles, etc., all supported by gospels which contained truth to varying degrees, but never the whole truth. It is vitally important to note that all these groups taught heresies, which, of course, the Holy Spirit would never bless and confirm with His true signs and gifts. It is also of great import to realise that of all the claims being made today by the Charismatic movement, there is nothing new; nothing which has not been claimed by various other erroneous and heretical groups throughout history. The Charismatic movement’s claims are nothing new, for the Roman Catholic Church, for instance, has had a continuous claim on the miraculous since its inception. The history of the Roman Catholic Church is replete with claims of the miraculous. Though not necessarily doubting the actual occurrence of such things, no true believer will for a moment entertain the possibility that even one of the signs or miracles performed at the hands of Roman Catholic leaders and ‘saints’ was actually from God. For God would then be a God who works true miracles through men who lead people into false gospels that have never saved anyone.

The reality of the situation is that the claims of the Charismatic movement, far from being what the Church has been waiting for, are in direct contrast with what the Lord Jesus prophesied would attend the last days. Jesus did not say that there would be a restoration of the sign gifts and of revival in the Church, but that the last days would be signified by apostasy, false signs and lying wonders (Matt. 24:24; Mk. 13:22). Multitudes would be swept away with such signs, which perhaps is what led the Lord to ask: "...when the Son of man cometh, shall He find faith on the earth?" (Lk. 18:8). What is interesting to note is the fact that these last days are witnessing a monumental revival of paganism and the occult, and the professing church is as much a part of this revival as is any other group. None of the seducing and deceptive signs and wonders today are leading anyone to the true Gospel. "Today, in spite of the warnings by both Jesus and Paul (2 Tim. 3:7,8), there is scarcely any thought that today’s signs and wonders might be part of the very spiritual deception which the Bible foretells." Numerous occultic practices are being embraced by those within the walls of professing christendom. New Age techniques and the customs of the East, such as Yoga and meditation, are now being practised in the ‘christian church’ all in the name of Jesus! All the while, this occult revival in Christian clothing is aiding and abetting the rising tide of ecumenicism, which continues to engulf more and more who at one time wanted nothing to do with it. The leaders of this Tsunami-like wave of occultic driven pseudo christianity are the Charismatic and Pentecostal movements.

Now, if false miracles were only occurring outside of what is recognized as the Church, they would be far more identifiable and easily avoidable. But the fact is that these false signs are occurring within the walls of professing christendom. They are false signs for they are always, always, always accompanied by erroneous doctrine, other gospels which cannot save. Just how clear the source of modern-day Charismatic signs and wonders is can be seen in the fact that there is more than one former witch and former occultist who has left the Charismatic movement because what they witnessed therein was exactly what they had escaped!

The following is advice which no person can do without: "THE FIRST AND MAJOR TEST OF THE SOURCE OF ANY MIRACLE IS TO ANALYZE THE DOCTRINE OF THE MIRACLE WORKER. If the doctrine attested to by the miracle opposes any fundamental truth of Scripture, (in particular the Gospel), the person working the wonder is either deceived or a deceiver (however wide his smile and however loud his professed love for Jesus is). The source of such miracle working power is demonic. God will not and does not oppose Himself. THOSE PERFORMING HIS WORKS WILL TEACH HIS DOCTRINE... The Incarnate Word and the Written Word never contradict each other. THEY ARE BOTH THE REVELATION OF GOD. Wherever Christ and His Word are opposed, denied or compromised, THERE is the work of evil. No divine miracle can grow out of that soil....the connection of alleged miracles with erroneous doctrine invalidates their claims to be genuine works of God." Like oil and water, false signs and the true Gospel, or a false gospel and true signs, simply will not mix.

A very clear warning against ‘miracle workers’ is presented in Deuteronomy 13:1-5: "If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, and the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, ‘Let us go after other gods’, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them; Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams: for the Lord your God proveth you, to know whether ye love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul..." "The people were not to believe or obey him ( the miracle worker), if he taught them anything contrary to what God had taught them. The false prophet’s appearance among them was a test of their love of God. Would the people of God follow the false prophet, mesmerized by his acts of power, or would they continue in the commandments of the Lord? IF THE PEOPLE WERE IGNORANT OF GOD’S WORD, THEY WOULD HAVE NO SAFETY AGAINST SUCH EVIL WORKERS. They would not have a standard by which to test his teaching. Also, if they forgot that a miracle could be caused by an evil source, their souls would be in great danger. The same rule applies today." The charismatic person is in an extremely perilous situation because he is part of a group that claims to be Christian and is surrounded by signs and experiences which all seem to be leading people to God and enhancing their lives, yet unbeknownst to him the charismatic has embraced a false gospel which, far from having saved him, has only served to deceive him. Religions the world over have done, and continue to do, the very same thing whether in the name of Christ or not. People are following particular religious beliefs based on their experiences, and the new ‘peace’ they now feel and how improved their lives have become, rather than examining the gospels these groups are teaching. Gospels identify the gods they promote. False gospels promote false gods and only the true Gospel reveals the true God. THE GOSPEL IS THE ISSUE and not improved peace-filled lives and an abundance of experiences that make a person feel ‘spiritual’.

The first century Church witnessed various erroneous cults that insisted the gifts, including tongues and miracles, were still in existence and operating through them. The second century saw the rise of a man named Montanus, a self-proclaimed prophet from Phrygia, who gave utterances as if God Himself were speaking through him, not unlike the false prophets of the Charismatic movement that abound in our own day. Montanus believed that he was a prophet sent from God to reform Christianity through asceticism, tongues and prophetic revelation, which he believed to be equal to that of Scripture. Many of today’s Charismatic ‘prophets’ also claim that their words are coming directly from God and should be adhered to accordingly. Such ‘prophecies’ are often published and can be purchased, and are often placed inside Bibles as if they were equal to the Word of God. "Montanus opposed formalism in the Church and boldly intimidated Christians by claiming his followers were more spiritual than those who had only the ‘dead letter’ of the Scriptures. In most respects, Montanists were orthodox. But the movement was schismatic, believing only themselves to be the true Church. The rest of professing christendom branded Montanism as a serious heresy to be rejected (cf. Rom. 16:17). Augustine wrote against the movement, and the Council at Constantinople decreed that Montanism was tantamount to Paganism." Much of what history has taught us has been lost, and most Charismatics today have absolutely no idea of what has preceded their movement, or of how indistinguishable the practices of universally recognized cultic and heretical groups of the past were to their own group. Charismatics need to become informed, just like this author was over a decade ago, of the origins and spiritual forefathers of the Charismatic movement.

The prophecies of Montanus were false, and the tongues that he spoke were not the biblical gift but the mere ecstatic speech which prevailed in many pagan tribes or cults. This, coupled with the fact that he did not preach the Gospel of God but another, showed clearly that he was not a man of God. None can be of God if they abide not in the Gospel of God (2 Jn. 9). No true miracles and signs can ever come from one who promotes a false gospel, just like black can never be white and white can never be black. "The contemporary Charismatic movement is in many ways the spiritual heir of Montanism. In fact, it would not be at all unfair to call today’s Charismatic movement neo-Montanism. At least one leading Charismatic writer, Larry Christensen, agrees, and even claims the Montanist movement as a part of the Charismatic historical tradition." (L. Christensen, ‘Pentecostalism’s Forgotten Fore-runner’, from ‘Aspects of Pentecostal-Charismatic Origins’ by V. Synan, ed., pp. 32-34).

Two brief quotes from early ‘Church’ fathers Chrysostom and Augustine, both of whom lived in the fourth century, provide some interesting insight into what was occurring in their day. Firstly, Chrysostom, commenting on 1 Corinthians 12:1,2 and specifically alluding to the gifts, states: "This whole place is very obscure: but the obscurity is produced by our ignorance of the facts referred to and by their cessation, being such as then used to occur but now no longer take place." Augustine asserted, "For who expects in these days that those on whom hands are laid that they may receive the Holy Spirit should forthwith begin to speak with tongues?" This latter quotation has been used in a most cunning and deceptive way by some in the Charismatic movement, being purposely misquoted so as to show that Augustine testified that there were genuine signs of the biblical gifts, including tongues, being performed in his day. The first three words of Augustine’s statement have been changed from ‘For who expects...’ to, ‘For we expect...’

Throughout the following centuries there arose a cavalcade of claimants to the gifts. Many of these were from the Roman Catholic Church. All such signs and wonders that occurred in the Roman Catholic Church then, as now, were attended by false teachings and therefore could not possibly have come from God. Moreover, the very characteristics of Roman Catholic ‘miracles’, as with those of the Charismatic movement, show clearly that they are not of the same type, they do not have the same characteristic features as those that Jesus or the apostles performed. For example, ‘Transubstantiation’ is a miracle, according to the Roman Catholic Church, in which the bread and the wine of communion literally become the body and blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, though it remains indiscernible to the human senses! No miracle of this type is recorded in Scripture. In contrast to this, every miracle of God was obvious and apparent to all, believer and unbeliever alike. It had tangible evidence to support it. One could readily see that a change had occurred: the blind man could see; the crippled man could walk; the deaf could hear and even the dead became alive again. One did not merely hear about a true miracle of God; people were not forced into believing it with some blind ‘faith’ at the threat of being excommunicated or by fear of committing the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit if they did not believe, for they could all see it for themselves. Even the enemies of God could not deny a miracle of God. Such is the evidence of a true miracle from God (see Jesus turning the water into wine in John 2).

There are multiplied millions of people who are now on the broad way that leads to destruction whom Jesus speaks of in Matthew 7, who are following leaders or movements that promote false gospels and which titillate and seduce them with signs and wonders that could not possibly be coming from God, lest God be found to confirm doctrines of demons with true signs and wonders. We should not be surprised at this, for the Bible says that in the last days "...there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders..." (Matt. 24:24) and, "...some shall depart from THE faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils" (1Tim. 4:1).

The late Seventeenth century saw the emergence of a group known as the Cevennol prophets. This "...group of militant protestants in the Cevennes region of southern France began to prophesy, experience visions, and speak in tongues. The group...are remembered for their political and military activities, not their spiritual legacy. They were rabidly anti-Catholic, and advocated the use of armed force against the Catholic Church. Many of them were consequently persecuted and killed by Rome. At the other end of the spectrum, the Jansenists, a group of Roman Catholic loyalists who opposed the Reformers’ teaching on justification by faith, also claimed to be able to speak in tongues in the 1700's. Another group that practised a form of tongues was the Shakers, an American sect with Quaker roots that flourished in the mid-1700's. Mother Ann Lee, founder of the sect, regarded herself as the female equivalent of Jesus Christ! She claimed to be able to speak in 72 languages. The Shakers believed sexual intercourse was sinful, even within marriage. They spoke in ‘tongues’ while dancing and singing in a trance-like state."

Edward Irving, whom many consider to be the fore-runner of the modern-day Charismatic movement, led a church in the 1800's which practised so-called speaking in tongues and included those who also claimed to be prophets and prophetesses. Irving not only preached a false gospel, but he also taught erroneous tenets such as the heretical concept that Christ’s flesh was sinful. Many at the centre of Irvingism believed in the restoration of the sign gifts but later recanted and confessed that they had been deceived and used by the Devil. One such person, Robert Baxter, a confidante of Irving’s, experienced many things that he initially deemed to be of God, but later renounced. His lengthy testimony states in part: "The whole work is a mimicry of the gift of tongues—and so of prophesying and all the other works of the power. It is Satan as an angel of light, imitating as far as is permitted, the Holy Spirit of God." (’The Charismatics and the Word of God’, p. 219).

The Pentecostal/Charismatic movement owes a very great deal to the early Black Holiness Churches. Black Holiness Pentecostalism, which formed between 1885 and 1916 "... is not a denomination but rather a movement encompassing several denominations professing belief in Spirit baptism accompanied by several signs including speaking in tongues, with historic roots embracing, but not always restricted to, both a Wesleyan-Arminian and finished work of Calvary orientation. Participants believe that the baptism in the Holy Spirit is a normative postconversion experience available to all Christians for the purpose of becoming more effective witnesses in carrying out the Great Commission" (‘Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements’, p. 77). This is rather ironical to say the least, since the true Gospel of God was never preached by this movement. These Black Holiness Churches were the breeding ground from which sprang the modern-day Pentecostal/Charismatic movement: "Perhaps more than any other twentieth-century religious movement in the West, Black Holiness-Pentecostalism is regarded by many as a highly significant catalyst and spawning ground for scores of denominations including the Charismatic renewal, all emphasizing the centrality of the Holy Spirit. So little attention had been given to Black Holiness-Pentecostalism by historians that Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, while visiting the U.S. from Germany, referred to its participants as the ‘step-children of modern church history’" (‘Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements’, p.77).

Very few publications, be they Christian or secular and for reasons known only to them, have ever touched on the curious connection between those early Black Holiness Churches, from which Pentecostalism and Charismaticism emerged, and the Voodoo religion of those very black men and women that made up these early gatherings. The word Voodoo is derived from a West African word for God. The above mentioned Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic movements, a pro-Charismatic and Pentecostal publication, admits: " ...it appears from the evidence that Black Holiness-Pentecostalism shares the legacy of black slave religion, whose historic roots are anchored deep in African and Afro-Caribbean religion" (p.77), the most prominent African and Afro-Caribbean religion being Voodoo. And this is the movement that fathered the Charismatic and Pentecostal movements of today! Not only was the Black Holiness movement filled with false signs and lying wonders, it also promoted the satanically inspired gospel of John Wesley’s Arminian way, and had within its constitution all sorts of traditions and practices carried over from the Voodoo religion.

Several years ago a little-known, yet highly significant, article entitled, ‘Hear That Long Snake Moan’, appeared in the progressive L.A. Weekly. Written by Michael Ventura in the Spring of 1987, it shed much light on the origins and ancestry of the modern-day Pentecostal/Charismatic movements. Here are some extremely revealing excerpts from this article: "W.E.B. DuBois described black Christianist religion as a meeting of three elements: ‘The Preacher, the Music, and the Frenzy.’ It is in the frenzy that, with both black and white fundamentalists, we find African Voodoo absolutely intact, with merely the symbols changed. The object of the Voodoo ceremony is possession by the god. Possession by the Holy Ghost is as much ‘a formal goal of the religion’ in Holiness and Pentecostal churches as possession is in Voodoo. Writes Paul Oliver in his ‘Songsters and Saints’: ‘Placing himself in the hands of God, the supplicant sought possession by the Holy Spirit...Glossolalia, or uttering unintelligible syllables believed to be the language of the Holy Ghost, was evidence to many that the speaker was possessed by the Holy Spirit...and this was an essential part of the process of sanctification. People possessed of the Spirit in church might ‘fall out’ in a trance and might even require to be forcibly held down or controlled until they came around.’"

Ventura adds that one man named Metraux, "...observed the relationship, too, saying that ‘a pentecostal preacher describing his feelings when ‘the spirit was upon him,’ listed to me exactly the same symptoms as those which I heard from the mouths of people who had been possessed by the ‘loa’ (gods)...Undeniably the ecstasy which breaks out during the ceremonies of certain Protestant sects in the South of the United States reflects a survival, if not of the rites, then at least of religious behaviour" (p.43). Voodoo customs and traditions were kept very much alive by the black slaves who had been shipped to America in the nineteenth century. They would often drum the voodoo rhythms in the cotton fields and sing. When the slave masters discovered what they were doing, they outlawed the drumming. In place of this, the Voodoo-devoted black slaves turned to tapping out the voodoo beat using their feet through what we know today as tap-dancing. This satanic, beat driven music is continued today in Charismatic assemblies through its use of Rock ‘n’ Roll, a style of music which has indisputable links with Voodoo, as is attested by some of the world’s leading secular musicians. It was from this very Voodoo slave religion that a "...’black style’ of worship developed in an unstructured way....It was the slave’s adaption to Christianity without being completely divested of his native religious worship style that later proved to be significant in its impact on black religious lifestyle" (‘Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements’, p.77).

Michael Ventura makes a further comment on the disturbing similarities between the manifestations and occurrences during Voodoo ceremonies and early Black Holiness-Pentecostal gatherings: "The wild movements of the ‘horse’ mounted by the godly ‘rider’; the wild speech, including speaking in tongues which in Haiti is sometimes referred to as ‘talking with Africa’; the unpredictability of the possession, how, excited by the music, the frenzy can strike people who don’t want it and don’t believe in it (this is a common occurrence in Charismatic meetings, especially the Toronto Blessing meetings where many who doubted and disbelieved the veracity of the phenomena occurring in those meetings suddenly found themselves rolling about on the floor in hysterical and uncontrolled laughter), you find all of these central Voodoo phenomena in most black and white fundamentalist churches (needless to say the author here is referring to those Pentecostal and Charismatic Fundamentalist churches). Maya Deren tells of first resisting and then being overpowered by a god during a ceremony she was observing..." (p. 43). Interesting to note that it has been reported by some people who have been present with those who were experimenting with drugs such as LSD, but who had not themselves partaken of it, that suddenly and without warning they, too, began to experience the effects of the drug which others had taken but which they had refused, showing that a spiritual experience was taking place. This same phenomena is reported by many who have attended charismatic meetings as mere observers. Suddenly, they too experienced being ‘slain in the spirit’ or speaking in ‘tongues’, unable to control their mouths (one woman needed to have a towel stuffed in her mouth in order to stop her ‘tongues’ speaking!), or rolling about on the floor in hysterical laughter, some people even trying to divest themselves of their clothing. A spiritual experience is taking place, but the spirit behind it all is NOT the Holy Spirit of God.

In more recent times, there appeared on the scene a woman named Agnes Ozman who, on January 1, 1901, whilst enrolled at the Bethel Bible College of Pentecostalism co-founder Charles F. Parham, in Topeka, Kansas, claimed to have received the gift of tongues just as it was given on the day of Pentecost. What ensued was what would later become known as the Azusa St. meetings, which began in 1907 and were attended by people from all over the world, much like the infamous ‘Toronto Blessing’ meetings in our own day to which people foolishly flock. Even now many, if not most, Charismatics believe that the series of meetings at Azusa St., which were held three times a day, seven days a week and went on for years, was a second Pentecost, but as the following quotes from the very founders of Pentecostalism no less and other eye-witnesses will show, these venerated meetings were far from godly and in accordance with biblical order or precedent. The following is an eye-witness account of what occurred at Azusa St. one evening: "When I visited the Azusa St. Mission, the first person to attract my attention was a woman with a thin, white silk waist on, who stood shaking from head to foot...There were several rows of chairs in front of her that were filled with seekers. The coloured leader, Seymour, was preaching; but I could not keep my eyes off the woman who continued to shake until a man in front of her slid down out of his chair and became unconscious. I then lost sight of the woman. The man who fell in a vision was pale and thin, and under high nerve pressure, and continued in the same position on the floor until after a number of seekers had gathered around the altar. Then he arose, staggered to them and began to shake his hand in front of their faces and wave his arms over their heads and moan. He was still apparently in a half-conscious state. Then he put his hands on the heads of the women and began to shake their hair. Some of them lost control of themselves and went under a hypnotic spell. He rubbed a man’s jaw until the victim tumbled over on the floor and lay for half an hour, then suddenly began to jabber. Those who had received their ‘Pentecost’ cried out, ‘He has the baptism, he has the baptism!’" I challenge anyone to find for me a biblical precedent for any of this that was Holy Spirit-inspired and not a display of demonic-inspired lunacy! Only the naive, the gullible and the ignorant could possibly be deceived by such madness into thinking that they were in the presence, and under the influence, of the Holy Spirit.

The eye-witness account continues: "A young colored woman, doing her best to get the gibberish, went through all kinds of contortions in her efforts to get her tongue to work. While work among the seekers at the altar was going on, a colored woman had her arms around a white man’s neck, praying for him. A man of maturer years leaped out of his chair and began to stutter. He did not utter a distinct syllable, but as fast as tongue would work, he said, ‘tut-tut-tut-tut-tut.’ This was evidence he had his ‘baptism’. The woman who had on the silk waist appeared again, this time singing a far away tune that sounded very unnatural and repulsive....When the altar call was made, a woman walked up to the front and kissed a man...kissing between the sexes is a common occurrence in the tongues meetings." (‘Demons and Tongues’, pp. 71-73, A. White).

Another witness to these meetings, where disorder and confusion reigned, had this to report: "Our missionaries have been stationed at Los Angeles (where the Azusa St. meetings were held), during the whole history of the Tongues movement, and have watched it closely from the very first outbreak in Seymour’s meetings; and truly, conditions have been such that it would be impossible to publish the things that have occurred there. The familiarity between sexes in the public meetings has been shocking, to say the least. Hell has reaped an awful harvest and infidelity has become more strongly rooted on the Pacific coast than ever before." (‘Demons and Tongues’, p. 82).

The ‘Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements’, reporting on William J. Seymour, co-founder of Pentecostalism and pastor of the Azusa St. Mission, said, "Seymour moved away from a theology of tongues as the initial physical evidence of baptism in the Spirit. In point of fact, Seymour ultimately repudiated the "initial evidence" teaching (speaking in tongues) as providing "an open door for witches and spiritualists and free-lovism"." (p.36). Strange, those who spoke in tongues in the Bible did not have any trouble with witches or the like at their meetings. "Azusa was typically described by the press as a ‘colored’ congregation that met in a ‘tumble-down shack’ and made the night ‘hideous’ through the ‘howlings of the worshippers’..." (p.36). Seymour’s co-founder, Charles Parham, concluded the following: "Never were God’s servants surrounded with more deceptive counterfeits of real divine experience than in this day and age...the magician’s work is so well nigh perfect, that it often is indeed hard to distinguish the true and the false...I have witnessed great dangers in the work here in Los Angeles, and in pointing them out I shall not refer to individuals, but to the work itself as a whole, so that we all may see the error of our way and get back to God." (‘The Life Of Charles Parham’, pp. 166-167). And this from the leaders of events that are held in as high regard today as those which occurred on the day of Pentecost, by those who have perpetuated such ungodly events. Now it is one thing to shrug off the critiques of those exposing Pentecostal or Charismatic movements, but to ignore, or choose to remain ignorant of, the very warnings of the leaders who co-founded Pentecostalism and to choose to continue the traditions and practices, which these leaders themselves condemned, is utter stupidity.

One of, if not the most, disturbing aspect of these meetings at Azusa St., which many today ignorantly and blasphemously hold to as equal to the events of the day of Pentecost as recorded in the Scriptures, may be seen in the following accounts: "...spiritualists and mediums from the numerous occult societies of Los Angeles began to attend and contribute their seances and trances to the service.. Disturbed by these developments, Seymour wrote to Parham (his spiritual father) for advice on how to handle ‘the spirits’ and begged him to come to Los Angeles and take over supervision of the revival." (‘The Holiness Pentecostal Movement in the United States’, p.110). "W.J. Seymour was still writing urgent letters appealing for help, as spiritualistic manifestations, hypnotic forces and fleshly contortions as known in the colored Camp meetings in the South, had broken loose in the meetings." (‘The Life Of Charles Parham’, p.156). Does any of this sound even remotely like a description of meetings between true Christians in the Bible? Of course not! Unlike the Azusa St. meetings, which not only attracted spiritualists and mediums and the like, but saw them actually take an active and not insignificant part in the meetings, we see that the outpouring of God’s one and only Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost resulted in the following, as is recorded for us in Acts 5:12,13: "And by the hands of the apostles were many signs and wonders wrought among the people; (and they were all with one accord in Solomon’s Porch. And of the rest durst no man join himself to them: but the people magnified them." No medium or witch dared to approach the Holy Spirit who was resident in the apostles who were performing genuine miracles by the power of the Holy Spirit. Rather than be a place to avoid, the meetings at Azusa Street were, in reality, a Mecca for spiritualists, witches and mediums alike! Merely because these facts are little known and rarely reported does not alter the fact that they are all documented and verifiable, historical FACT!!

The final comments from the pen of Azusa Street founder, Charles F. Parham, should resound in the minds of every charismatic today as they begin to see, and come to terms with, the corrupt foundation upon which their movement is based: "Let me speak plainly with regard to the work as I have found it here. I found hypnotic influences, familiar spirit influences, spiritualistic influences, mesmeric influences and all kinds of spells and spasms, falling in trances etc. All of these things are foreign to and unknown in the movement (the Apostolic Faith movement) outside of Los Angeles, except in the places visited by the workers sent out from this city." (‘The Life Of Charles Parham’, p. 168). Parham added: "After preaching two or three times, I was informed by two of the elders, one who was a hypnotist (I had seen him lay his hands on many who came through chattering, jabbering, speaking no language at all) that I was not wanted in this place" (‘The Life Of Charles Parham’, p. 163). I doubt whether there are very many Charismatics at all who are aware of the controversy and very un-Christian occurrences which characterized the infamous Azusa St. meetings.

The Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements informs us that: "There is now historical evidence to suggest that the Azusa St. revival was no more than confirmation of a phenomenon that had already begun among Black Holiness-Pentecostals"(p.80).

"Many former charismatics, including pastors, have renounced what they had at first believed were true gifts of the Holy Spirit. It is seldom realized that there are many former charismatics and pentecostals who have reassessed the whole issue in terms of Scripture, experience and history and have turned their back on the claims of a modern-day revival of biblical gifts. A former Pentecostal pastor of 25 years, G.E. Gardner, declared, "I have heard hundreds of messages in tongues, and interpretations. Not one has ever added anything of value to the meeting" (‘The Corinthian Catastrophe’, p.53). Gardner adds that the seeking of these modern charismatic experiences is ‘never harmless’ (‘The Corinthian Catastrophe’, p.55).

One of the most moving testimonies in this regard comes from a man who spent over 20 years in the pentecostal atmosphere of the Apostolic Faith Mission, Full Gospel Church and Assemblies of God, attending and assisting major campaigns by various leaders. He wrote: "I laid hands on the sick. I rebuked death. I prophesied. I spoke in tongues. I interpreted. I would say now, in all sincerity, that I saw and experienced nothing which would lead me to believe that Pentecostalism offers ANYTHING along the lines of the New Testament Church’s experience" (‘Reformation Today’, Oct/Nov. 1973, K. Haarnhof, p.20). The above quoted Pentecostal minister acknowledges that there are many sincere people in the Charismatic and Pentecostal movements, but his conclusions and his exposure of the ‘faulty doctrinal basis, manipulative indoctrination’ and ‘charged atmosphere’ remain firm. Sincerity can never be the evidence that substantiates what one is zealous for as being of God. And a zeal without right knowledge can never be of, or lead to, the true God (see Rom. 10:1-4). No one is saved because of zeal alone, or by sincerity alone, but only if one has been given the gift of the love of the truth that is revealed by God in His mighty Gospel.

As can be clearly and immediately observed by the discerning believer in whom God’s Word and Spirit reside, these meetings at Azusa St., which initiated the first wave of modern-day charismania upon the world, were far from God-ordained. The meetings were clearly a satanic counterfeit of the wonderful events that occurred on the one and only birthday of the Christian Church: the day of Pentecost as described in the book of Acts. The Azusa St. meetings were not only a hive of satanic experiences and a spiritual free-for-all, but importantly, these experiences, which millions of people are seeking even today, also gave credibility to false gospels and the acceptance of such in the minds and hearts of their recipients. God’s Gospel was never preached at Azusa Street and the Holy Spirit, therefore, never performed any work there. Nevertheless, the facts and the Scriptures were thrown to the wind as, from this unsightly and unscriptural mess, the Pentecostal movement grew and grew and later became popularly referred to, in the mid-1960's, as the Charismatic movement.

One New Testament scholar has made the following observation: "Too long Christians have assumed that the noncharismatic must produce incontestable biblical evidence that the miraculous sign gifts did cease. However, noncharismatics have no burden to prove this, since it has already been proved by history. It is an irrefutable fact admitted by many Pentecostals. Therefore the charismatics must prove biblically that the sign gifts will start up again during the Church Age and that today’s phenomena are this reoccurrence. In other words, they must prove that their experiences are the reoccurrence of gifts that have not occurred for almost 1900 years." (‘The Cessation Of The Sign Gifts’, p. 374). While this is a very good point, it would be a rather futile exercise seeing that the Gospel has never once been preached by these charismatic groups, who place so much emphasis on their signs and wonders rather than on the Person and Work of Jesus Christ. The signs and wonders are really only the tip of the iceberg. What the even greater evil in all this Pentecostal and Charismatic chaos is, is the fact that amid all the excitement and smiling faces and the ecstatic experiences, the Gospel is not being preached and therefore no one is being saved. People have simply been hoodwinked, by all the activity and ecstatic hullabaloo occurring within Pentecostalism and Charismaticism, into believing that because all is being done in the name of Jesus, these movements are sanctioned by God Himself and all involved are Christians. Nothing could be further from the truth! If there is no Gospel, that is, God’s Gospel, then it is not a Christian gathering and any phenomena present is anything but Christian. The Scriptures state clearly in 2 John 9 that "Whosoever transgresseth and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, HATH NOT GOD..." If individuals who hold not to God’s Gospel have not God, what makes anyone think that a gathering of such people is attended, ordered and supported, by God? The math is quite simple: NO GOSPEL - NO GOD!!

In light of all the evidence presented thus far, we can only conclude that though there are many sincere people in the Charismatic movement, the movement itself cannot be of God, for all the ‘gifts’, all the ‘signs’, all the ‘wonders’ it lays claim to are just as flawed and riddled with imperfection as those that are common to every like cult that has preceded it. This movement is nothing new, just the largest of its kind. There is no true Gospel accompanying any of these lying signs and wonders, so how can God be the one behind them? What would be the point of all these signs and wonders if the people experiencing them are not being taught the truth and being saved? I suggest that, rather than tearing this booklet up in anger and frustration at this point, the charismatic have courage enough to continue into the next chapter and learn some more startling facts about the movement he so zealously seeks to defend and be a part of.

There is so much that Charismatics are ignorant of concerning the movement they follow, not the least of which being the fact that the Roman Catholic Church—the mother of all harlots—has welcomed this experience-centred movement whose subjective theology is akin to her own, and perceived it as the vehicle that will bring so-called Protestants and Roman Catholics together, and eventually a one-world religion wholly based and united over identical experiences, irrespective of individual doctrinal belief. Even the Pope has given his official blessing to the Charismatic movement.

1971 was the year which saw the emergence of what was to become a very influential book. Entitled, ‘The Pentecostal Movement In The (Roman) Catholic Church’, it was authored by a Roman Catholic priest named Edward D. O’Connor. The book became recognized as a classic a