The Holy Spirit

[aron]

What follows is a tentative view of the Holy Spirit. I must strongly stress that this Alternative View is very tentative. I trust that it will be modified greatly over time. It may be scrapped completely, even tomorrow. Who knows. But this is the vision that has slowly been emerging for me.

The Holy Spirit: an Alternative View

So I was reading the part where Jesus said, "Suffer the little children to come to me, because their angels in heaven are always beholding the face of my Father." I realized that every person has an angel, or angels, assigned to them. When you are very small, pre-verbal, your angel has unfettered access to the Father. And of course they love to be with their Father, and gaze at His glorious face. I remembered that a small child will gaze intently at every thing you show them. You could show them the Hope diamond or a leaf that just fell from a tree, and they will regard each one as an object created by their Father in heaven.

But eventually we create words to represent reality. We call one object "tree", another "rock", etc. and we assign values. Eventually we lie, cheat, and kill over trees, rocks, words, and values. We are distorted, and our words reflect the illusions we create, lost in our own creations. Our angels are cast out from the Father's presence. We are lost.

Jesus is the one who was able to speak, to communicate with words, and simultaneously regard His Father in heaven. This is why we call him the incarnated Word. His word is true, and every other man is a liar (at least partly). And today I think that perhaps what we call the Holy Spirit is really the Great Angel. It is Jesus' Angel. It is His doppelganger, if you will. His spiritual counterpart. His Angel never left the Father's throne. The whole time Jesus was on Earth, His Angel was before the Father's throne. But when Jesus was in heaven, pre-incarnation, His Angel was leading the Israelites in a pillar of Cloud and a pillar of Fire.

That is why Jesus told the disciples, "It is necessary for Me to go. Then the Spirit will come." Because Jesus and the Angel can never be in the same place. One always has to be in front of the Father. That is why in Revelation 1, when John sent greetings to the seven churches in Asia, he didn't mention the Spirit. Because the seven spirits before the throne are actually the seven first-created angels, the so-called Protoctoi (see e.g. Rev 8:2, also see Gabriel's words to Mary: "I stand before God's throne"). But the Great Angel of Revelation 10:5,6 is the Holy Spirit. This is the Angel of the LORD, the Angel of the Covenant, the "Angel of Great Counsel" (LXX). This is the "Captain of the Lord's Host" (Josh 5:4), and Jesus is the Captain of our salvation (Hebrews 2:10).

I know this screws up ideas of the Trinity, because to me there is only One God, and that is the Father, and one Lord, and that is Jesus, and one Spirit, and that is the Holy Spirit, the Great Angel. Lee had it backward: he said that God is one essentially but three economically. But what I see is God is one essentially: the Father. But Jesus and the Holy Spirit are one economically (functionally) with the Father. Jesus said, "You will be one, even as I and the Father are one". So we christians are to be one in purpose, in function, in intention, just as Jesus came to Earth but was still one with His Father in Heaven. Like I said, His Angel never left the throne of the Father. So if Jesus asked us to be one as He and the Father are one, that means I am still me and you are still you but we have common intent, common purpose, feeling. Your mind is my mind, we are like souled, etc. We are one even though we are many.

So Gabriel and Raphael and Michael and Uriel are of the seven Protoctoi before the throne, and the Holy Spirit is unique. The Holy Spirit is one. But on the day of Pentecost you saw many flames dancing over the disciples. Those were the holy spirits (angels) sent to guide each one. Even though you have one Spirit you can have many manifestations. Then you have angels over countries, like in the narrative in Daniel, you have angels over each city like in Revelations 2 and 3, etc. All of them are under the Great Angel who is under Christ who is under the Father.

[aron]

Also, look at people like Witness Lee and Jonathan Cahn and Jim Bakker, currently being discussed on another thread. These people make a living using words. They manipulate symbols for profit. They send out books and pamphlets and video recordings, but instead of pointing people to Jesus the Incarnated Word they create other things like "God's present move on the Earth today" and "Heritage Theme Park" and "The Harbinger" and they sell these creations. At best people are confused and distracted and at worst they are stumbled and misled, and they give up in their search for the Father God in Heaven. So the Spirit behind them is not the Holy Spirit. Once these three men were genuine but something else got in and they pursued other goals. They are no longer one with the Father but have other kingdoms in mind. So they are mixed, and confused, and produce ministries of mixture and confusion.

Surely Lucre has now come into the picture. They have rushed off for the reward of Balaam. Once Peter was offered Lucre for the Holy Spirit but he told the guy to go to hell (Acts 8). But some people accept the temptation of cash, and they are compromised. Look at Elisha's servant Gehazi in 2 Kings 5. Same thing. So their angel, who returned to the Father via repentance and faith in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, is once again expelled. Such a sad story. "The dog has returned to the vomit, the swine to the mud". Their light has become darkness, and how great is the darkness!

[aron]

There are a number of instances in the OT where the angel and God (YHWH) are separate yet overlapped. There is the angel that bears God's name in Exodus 23:21

There is YHWH speaking to Moses in Exodus 3; then Stephen in Acts 7:30 says that an angel spoke to Moses.

Jacob wrestled with an angel, and wrestled with God also.

Manoah and his wife in Judges 13 saw an angel, who they called God.

In Genesis 16/21, the angel sees Hagar and she calls him "The God who sees me".

These angels are THE angel of God. Singular. The one who bears God's name. This is not Gabriel or Michael. This is the Angel of the Lord.

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Agency: this Angel is the Holy Spirit, which is God "economically" because this Angel is one with God. So when you see this Angel you are seeing God. When this Angel talks you are talking to God. So this Angel is God, economically, but not essentially.

The Roman Centurion in Luke 7 said that he was "a man under authority", as was Jesus under God. And the Holy Spirit is under Jesus. See John 15 and 16 for discussion of this -- in these 2 chapters, Jesus presents us the Father, and the Holy Spirit presents us Jesus. In the Gospels, when we see Jesus we see the Father, and in John 15/16, when we see the promised Holy Spirit we see Jesus. Just like when the Roman Centurion spoke, because he was one with Caesar, you heard Caesar through the Centurion. This is agency. This is extension of power, intent, kingdom, domain, through the agency of an intermediary. The key with Jesus and the Holy Spirit is that they are "next in line" from God, so when you get them you get God. Pure, unadulterated God. This is the idea of agency at its finest. Like if the Secretary of State goes to England, he can say, President Smith wants this. Because the Secretary is one with the President. When the Secretary speaks, you hear the President, first-hand.

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Further documentation: an angel told Philip to go down the south Road out of Jerusalem in Acts 8:26, then in verse 29 "the spirit" told Philip to run up to the chariot.

In Revelations 2 and 3 you have Jesus speaking to the angel of the church, then at the end of each message you have "hear what the Spirit is speaking to the churches". So the angel receiving in the beginning is the spirit speaking at the end.

See the pre-Trinity formula: Whoever is ashamed of me and my words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them when he comes in his glory and in the glory of the Father and of the holy angels. You have the glory of the Son, the glory of the Father, and the holy angels. No Holy Spirit mentioned here.


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Lastly, these ideas are not mine. They were in the discussions of the church fathers pre-Nicene. But the rise of the "orthodoxy" movement put an end to this. Also probably a lot of speculative literature got actively repressed. I am guessing the Book of Enoch among others.

Clement wrote a bit about this, as did Origen. The idea that the Spirit/Angel/Christ overlaps. Not always clear which is which. The only thing that is truly original is my idea that the Holy Spirit is the "doppelganger" of Jesus. It his his "other half". Like "spooky action from a distance".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_entanglement

Sorry, but I like physics. But there is a lot of scholarly documentation on the Church Fathers, Pre-Nicene, Pre-Trinitarian Creed, discussing the Spirit/Angel overlap. But once we got the Trinity Formula, most all of this got dropped. I simply revive it here because it makes more sense with the text than the Trinity formula. With the trinity formula, you have to ignore the text. I don't like that. Plus I like physics, and this formula allows me to include angels, principalities, powers etc in my view. Instead of the simple trinity formula, which essentially sheds all those essential details.

[awareness]

Are you diving into angelology bro aron?

[aron]

Originally Posted by awareness

Are you diving into angelology bro aron?

No more than the Bible does, and - please note well - no less. No less. That is my goal. The Trinitarian Formula seems to lead us away from parts of the scriptural text, because the Formula doesn't fit it. So take your pick.

It seems to me that our knowledge of the actual texts are very, very minimal. Yet we are content. Why? Are our formulas that good, to bypass the text? I understand orthodoxy, and think in many ways it has been used to preserve the tradition. But it too easily becomes an excuse to ignore the words themselves. We have our catechisms, and that seems to largely suffice. I am trying to challenge the Catechism that I grew up on. It may be a laughable attempt that I look back on some time from now.

But I am just trying to find out who Jesus' servants are, that the Roman Centurions alluded to in Luke 7. "I also have servants under me..." We can ignore this if that makes us more comfortable. Just pay attention to the parts of the text that fit your formula.

And I wonder why Jesus had to leave the disciples before the Holy Spirit could come. Stuff like that. Why can't you get both Jesus and the Holy Spirit? Maybe because one of them always has to be before the throne. So you can't get both of them in the Upper Room. You either get one or the other. One has to be before the Father's face at all times. I just find it interesting, is all.

[aron]

Also, I'm not interested in new formulations like the Mormons. I say this because I noticed that they have some teachings like that Jesus and Satan were brothers, pre-incarnation, etc. Mormon teachings have a lot of "angel/Spirit" formulations. But I am only interested in stuff that emerged in the first two centuries. Book of Mormon is like 1824 or something. So I am completely disinterested. That goes for pseudo-Dyonisius' "Angelic Hierarchies" which seems to have showed up around the 4th or 5th century CE. Too far removed from the scripture writings. But Origen and Irenaeus and Clement of Alexandria can be useful, because they had access to oral traditions as well as texts and textual variants which can be informative. So I am trying to see what they were talking about, back then. The oldest commentaries occasionally shed brilliant light.

There is a fair amount of interesting scholarly work being done, some of which is insightful, some not very much so. And I don't take Origen or Clement of Alexandria or Irenaeus as "gospel", either. Clement, for example, says that "their angels always behold the Father in heaven" is equivalent to the seven angels who stand before the throne. I totally disagree: only 7 angels are designated as before the throne, but many, many angels can see God. So I don't receive any writing uncritically. I just mine them for ideas. But I'm simply not interested in medieval Merkabah mysticism or New Age angelology or what not. I am trying to access the original writings, as much as possible, and attempt to understand what was meant. What did the Roman Centurion mean, and why did Jesus marvel so, and why did Luke put in these details of "I tell this one come, and he comes, and this one go, and he goes, and this one, do this, and he does it. You just speak the word..." It seems to me that Lee ignored this because it wasn't convenient to his formulations.

[aron]

Originally Posted by aron

The Trinitarian Formula seems to lead us away from parts of the scriptural text, because the Formula doesn't fit it.

I understand orthodoxy, and think in many ways it has been used to preserve the tradition. But it too easily becomes an excuse to ignore the words themselves. We have our catechisms, and that seems to largely suffice. I am trying to challenge the Catechism that I grew up on. It may be a laughable attempt that I look back on some time from now.

My attempts to understand the Holy Spirit vis a vis the holy angels of God may be a challenge to the idea of both orthodox formulations in general and the Trinitarian Formula in specific, but I would like to reaffirm both orthodoxy and the Trinity (not that anyone was waiting with bated breath). I unapologetically re-affirm something that I don't really understand, because I respect tradition. For example I use the word "Sunday" instead of Lord's Day, and celebrate my birthday and Christmas, because that is my daddy and grandaddy did before me. Likewise, 1700 years ago the Christian powers that be cooked up orthodox positions, expunged pseudepigrapha like the Book of Enoch, and came up with semi-coherent formulas like the "Trinity".

I don't like that orthodoxy made us look away from the texts, I don't like that it led to fights over peripheral stuff and led to the Great Schism. I don't like that Martin Luther left the RCC. I don't like that Nee left Protestantism. I don't like that I left the Community Church and went to "God's best" the Local Churches of Witness Lee. But history is what it is, so I accept orthodoxy and all that followed. But what are we to do, brothers?

It's up to me to reconcile with these ideas; therefore I use the idea of "agency", and especially "intent". The Angel of the LORD, bearing the Name of the Lord (Exodus 23:20) is operationally God, because that Angel bears God's intention, or will, perfectly. So the Angel told Moses, "Take off your shoes, because you are standing on holy ground." The Angel collapses the space-time continuum, and when you see the Angel you see God in heaven, on the throne. You hear the voice of God speaking through the Angel. Hagar told the Angel "You are the God who sees me."

One of the key words for me is "clear": the Angel is clear, and God sees you through the agent, the emmissary, Angel. For example, Gabriel said "I stand before God", collapsing the space-time continuum in front of Mary and Zechariah, who were actually standing before God, and speaking to God in Luke chapter 1. The emissary, the agent, is a clear vector of the Divine will; no corrupting opacity of intent makes its way into the Divine. The Angel of the Lord is so pure that He doesn't even have a name like Gabriel or Raphael. This Angel is The Great Angel of Counsel.

So it comes down to obedience. Obey God by repenting and believing into the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, who was the spotless, sinless Lamb of God. The rebellious "unclean" spirits disobeyed God's will. We need to be clean.. "You are already clean because of the word that I have spoken". (John 15:3). Obey Jesus by receiving His commands (John 13:34, 15:17; Rev. 3:8, 10). It is all about obedience. However you understand angels, or the Holy Spirit, is secondary to obedience.

Back to Luke 7. The Roman Centurion obeyed Caesar. He was "a man under authority". When you saw the Centurion you saw the agent or emissary of Caesar. So when the Centurion said, "Go", or "Come", or "Do this" it was Caesar speaking through him. This is a weak representation of spiritual reality. God works through agents. We were disobedient but now have repented and turned. Will we obey? Partial obedience is partial rebellion. The ones who are perfectly obedient are there for our learning. Today it bothers me that Lee taught us to ignore these mediatorial agents, simply because they didn't fit his "Processed Triune God" formula. You got a formula, and a teaching, and were trained to look away from the actual text in front of you. Only Lee's "interpreted word" was allowed to speak to us. I am very grateful today to be free, to muddle through a confusing text. God is there, God is speaking, and will we hear? Will we obey?

We have a choice to be "holy" or "evil", to be "clean" or "unclean". The heavenly realm shows us a picture of our daily choice. There is no gray area. It is either obedience or falling away. That is why I like to look at what the angels are doing. It shows the clear paths: that of God or that of self. Intent is the hardest thing to purge oneself of.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by aron

Why can't you get both Jesus and the Holy Spirit? Maybe because one of them always has to be before the throne. So you can't get both of them in the Upper Room. You either get one or the other. One has to be before the Father's face at all times.

Where do you come by this notion, that one has to be before the Father's face at all times?

[Justin]

For a better understanding on the Holy Spirit i recomend Author/ pastor
Che Ahn's book Say Goodbye to Powerless Christianity

[aron]

Another thing about the doppelganger analogy for the Spirit(s). "Whenever two or more of you come together in My name, I am there." and "Whenever two or more of you on Earth are in agreement, it will be done." Those kind of statements allude to an interesting thing. Your individual spirit may not be able to surmount the "giants" around you. But when your spirit is "one" with another spirit a miracle happens - your spirit is exponentially increased! It is not "One plus one equals two" but "One divine and holy spirit in Christ plus one divine and holy spirit in Christ equals eighteen, or twenty-six!" The troubles that face you, when you are in agreement, are vanished like smoke. So to be in harmony with one another, and to simply receive one another, as God has receive you in Christ Jesus, allows for a phenomenal multiplication of the kingdom's power on Earth. Phenomenal. Stop judging one another and start receiving one another. Then you will see the Holy Spirit move. The angel guarding you suddenly goes from being a mouse to a warrior such as will tremble the Earth. It is the most marvelous experience of transformation I have ever seen.

"Behold, He comes with myriads of His holy ones!!" You wanna see the myriads? Just be one. Be accepting of the person God put next to you. The gate of heaven will open and the myriads of holy ones will come. And the gates of Hades will never withstand your move, because at that point you are being carried "in spirit" in His move. The little one-talented spirit becomes that of a mighty man, able to hit a fly left-handed at 46 paces. You will see the power of the Holy Spirit. Just be accepting, be one. Don't judge. Receive. God will come.

[aron]

Originally Posted by Justin

For a better understanding on the Holy Spirit i recomend Author/ pastor
Che Ahn's book Say Goodbye to Powerless Christianity

A cursory review tells me to get my Holy Spirit from the Word. Che Ahn's bio blurb on his book promotion says that in a decade he went from a nobody to running 5,000 churches. So self-aggrandizement and promotion surely are here. The old confidence game, at work.

Second, this self-styled "apostle" has "anointed" people like Todd Bentley at Lakeland Revival and James Stalnaker at Gateway church in Hollywood CA as his apostolic peers. Oops. And the whole Toronto Airport/Lakeland thing is not really my cup of tea. I don't criticize, or condemn, but the whole shake-and-bark-like-a-dog thing, compared to the pleasure I take in searching the Word, just don't pull hard at me. So I'll probably pass.

[bearbear]

Interesting theory aron. I've always pondered why Jesus said he had to go up in order for the Holy Spirit to come down. The principle that either Jesus or the HS had to be at the throne of God would explain that.

I assume that in your view the Holy Spirit is still an uncreated being as most people think of angels as having been created.

Hebrews 9:14 refers to the Holy Spirit as eternal and there is other scripture that suggests the Holy Spirit is intimately involved in creation (Ps 104:30, Job 26:14, Job 33:4) and also after the earth was created, the Spirit of God was hovering over it (Gen 1:2).

I ascribe to John Bevere's view of the Holy Spirit as the person who "does all the stuff". The Logos comes forth from the Father and in turn directs the Spirit what to do. So Jesus is like the foreman of a factory who gets the blueprints from the Father who is the architect and speaks forth the orders and the Holy Spirit are the workers who carries out all the work.

http://books.google.com/books?id=3_u...%20god&f=false

Regarding the person of the Holy Spirit, in your view the Holy Spirit being the "Great Angel" would have feelings and a personality. This also seems to be confirmed by scripture that ascribes attributes of a person to the Spirit, for example he can be grieved (Eph 4:30), as opposed to some who view the HS as simply a force or influence that emanates from God.

Hebrews 1:14 also refers to angels and spirits interchangeably which would support your view. Perhaps the "Angel of God" references in scripture was just another way of referring to the Holy Spirit.

[OBW]

Interesting theory aron. I've always pondered why Jesus said he had to go up in order for the Holy Spirit to come down. The principle that either Jesus or the HS had to be at the throne of God would explain that.

My question to this and the rest of it is: Does figuring this out really help your living in this life? Does thinking that we know how it is that the Spirit does what He does make a real difference in what he does and how he does it? Does thinking that either Jesus or the Spirit has to be at the throne really change anything?

The point is that it is all what we cannot see and cannot manage or control, therefore figuring it out does not change how it applies to us, if at all. Therefore to get so deep into all of this is to spend time trying to get our theology right at the cost of what? Our focus on obedience?

Some have suggested that for a century the church was living and being instructed in how to live, then with the second, third, fourth, etc. generations of believers, they got too engaged in the minutia of knowing it correctly (doctrine and orthodoxy) and less about the living. Obviously not a whole lot less about the living, because that is still a lot of what is buried in the ritual of the RCC. But even they are more concerned with the dogma than in the practice.

And I believe that this is the reason that the people who write the books on topics like this so often end out being examples of some of the worst of Christianity. It is because they have lost sight of the true core of the faith and are overly distracted to things that are meaningless to our daily living. Once on a rabbit trail, the only thing you see are rabbits. The main road is long gone.

And for me, the purpose of this forum is to identify the rabbit trails, show why they are rabbit trails, identify the bear traps set by poachers, show why they are bear traps set by poachers, and show people the way back to the main road. Digging really deep into one of the rabbit trails does not help those lost on rabbit trails. Instead it makes the rabbit trail look more enticing.

[aron]

Originally Posted by OBW

... the purpose of this forum is to identify the rabbit trails, show why they are rabbit trails, identify the bear traps set by poachers, show why they are bear traps set by poachers, and show people the way back to the main road. Digging really deep into one of the rabbit trails does not help those lost on rabbit trails. Instead it makes the rabbit trail look more enticing.

Everyone has something to bring to the ecclesia. Many of them are "alternate views", including of the Trinity. The ecclesia decides what are rabbit trails and what are not.

Certainly the recommendation of one of our posters, toward the works of Che Ahn, and the New Apostolic Reformation, looks to this sojourning ex-LRC'er to be a bear trap.

http://insightswithbillyvee.wordpres...al-ministries/

The Holy Spirit is ineffable and thus our typed words on an internet forum probably are rabbit trails at best. I admit that, and the rank speculative character of my writing here. But I will attempt a mild justification of my writing on this thread. When I began to "see Jesus" and "look away unto Jesus" in the text of the OT, namely in the Psalms, I began to perceive something I had never imagined: the relation, invisible and unseen, yet very real, of the Son on Earth with His Father in Heaven. In the words of the Psalmist the framework for the spiritual reality began to suggest itself. Not as points of doctrine but as something for me to pay attention to, to learn from, be encouraged from. It is not my relationship with God, but rather my perception, by faith, of the relationship of the Only Begotten Son with His Father. This began to "dwell in me richly", or more richly anyway. It changed me. I think.

Likewise, when I was reading John 1:51 and Jesus said "You will see" I inexplicably took it personally, as if it were a personal command, like I would see it as well as Nathaniel and the others. That led to Luke 7 (an ideosyncratic choice, I know) and thence to the throne scene of Revelations 1. In Revelation 1:17 John wrote that he fell down as dead, from the power of the vision, and I began to feel that motive force, as I read. That led me into the throne scenes of Daniel 7:9,10, Ezekiel 1 & 10, Isaiah 6, Moses on the mountain in Exodus 24 (arguably the template for the tabernacle/temple), and also Zechariah 3.

Now it has long occurred to me that perhaps John the Disciple was not reeling from fermented sea-gull eggs as awareness has suggested, but rather that his Apocalypse was a carefully composed document, borne forth from years of reading, prayer, observation. John's throne scene in Revelation chapter 1 is deliberate, and central to everything that went before, and is to follow.

So -- I conclude with this: for me, seeing the relations between the Holy Spirit and the ministering spirits (Heb 1:14) in the scriptural text, is a template for me with others here on Earth. Yes, I have the Beatitudes and the rest of the gospels, but just as the Psalms showed me something deeper and hidden, that of the Son with the Father, so the throne scene opened for me, a window to the kingdom of heaven, and suggested relations therein. Now, did that impact my living? Given the rambling, semi-coherent style of my composition, probably not much. But hopefully it didn't distract anyone. I really write for my own personal benefit.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by OBW

My question to this and the rest of it is: Does figuring this out really help your living in this life? Does thinking that we know how it is that the Spirit does what He does make a real difference in what he does and how he does it? Does thinking that either Jesus or the Spirit has to be at the throne really change anything?

It's still prolly better than sitting at the bar every night slurping up cold ones and cracking one liners to the ladies ...

aron's way is to look at the scriptures afresh. Much better than systematizing trinitarian doctrines for our consumption or posting wiki articles. Gag!

If God didn't want us to explore each and every verse, then why would He even write them?

[aron]

Originally Posted by bearbear

I've always pondered why Jesus said he had to go up in order for the Holy Spirit to come down. The principle that either Jesus or the HS had to be at the throne of God would explain that..

Yes it has some explanatory power for me.

Originally Posted by bearbear

I assume that in your view the Holy Spirit is still an uncreated being as most people think of angels as having been created..

Yes.

Originally Posted by bearbear

The Logos comes forth from the Father and in turn directs the Spirit what to do...

Right. That is what I see. Jesus is the Great High Priest. He is interceding with the Father, and through Him the Father directs the flow of the Spirit.

Originally Posted by bearbear

Regarding the person of the Holy Spirit, in your view the Holy Spirit being the "Great Angel" would have feelings and a personality. This also seems to be confirmed by scripture that ascribes attributes of a person to the Spirit, for example he can be grieved (Eph 4:30), as opposed to some who view the HS as simply a force or influence that emanates from God..

Also we can see, perhaps, the relations of the Holy Spirit with the ministering angels. This relationship is key because it is a picture of the relationship you and I should have. They are many, but they are one. You and I are very different but in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ we are one. We can cooperate, and function together. You don't lord over me or I over you. We are not like the Gentiles who need whips and chains and guns for people to get in line.

The Personality of the Holy Spirit is a very interesting notion.

[Justin]

Originally Posted by aron

A cursory review tells me to get my Holy Spirit from the Word. Che Ahn's bio blurb on his book promotion says that in a decade he went from a nobody to running 5,000 churches. So self-aggrandizement and promotion surely are here. The old confidence game, at work.

Second, this self-styled "apostle" has "anointed" people like Todd Bentley at Lakeland Revival and James Stalnaker at Gateway church in Hollywood CA as his apostolic peers. Oops. And the whole Toronto Airport/Lakeland thing is not really my cup of tea. I don't criticize, or condemn, but the whole shake-and-bark-like-a-dog thing, compared to the pleasure I take in searching the Word, just don't pull hard at me. So I'll probably pass.

The Radical Middle would be highly reconmended by Bill Jackson ( Vineyard pastor ) then on the divine Balance between the WORD & THE H.Spirit

[Justin]

Originally Posted by Justin

The Radical Middle would be highly reconmended by Bill Jackson ( Vineyard pastor ) then on the divine Balance between the WORD & THE H.Spirit

I Know John Wimber who's benn highly critisized by Hank Hanagraff has taught much on having the divine balance of the WORD & THE SPIRIT
who come's from a Quaker /Calvary Chapel backgroung