Here is an email that I (Daniel) sent to a pastor that I know at the $ity Church and his reply to it . . .
The following is the email that I wrote in response to a ministry newsletter that he sent me concerning Pat Robertson (a Christian) inviting Mit Romney (a Mormon) to speak at Regent University.
Brother Ed,
Thank you for sending me the latest ministry letter. It has been very helpful for me to see who in Christendom is supporting this unbeliever Mit Romney. I have been suspect of Pat Robertson for many years. His ecumenical ways seem to drive him further and further away from the orthodox faith. I have a question for you about Rabbi Daniel Lapin. Do you know why the City Church is inviting an unbelieving/unconverted Jew to preach in their Church? Do you agree that this is the same as Pat having Mit speak at his college? Has the City Church compromised their “evangelicalism” to the degree that they will invite an “enemy of the cross of Christ” into the house of God’s children?
Grace and Agape Love,
Daniel Raplee
“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.”
His Response . . .
have no response on the the Rabbi issue. I have no clue, but doubt Wendell is compromising the gospel in having him there at a meeting.
He is not allowing him to preach from the pulpit to the church, but only there to discuss Old Testament prosperity to an elect group studying that single subject.
At least He worships the same God, whereas Romney not only worship a false god, but plans to be one himself.
go figure….
Brother Ed
My Response . . .
Thank you very much once again for taking the time to respond to my emails.I am deeply concerned about the answers that you have provided in defense of Wendell Smith and the City Church inviting an enemy of the Cross Jesus Christ to address their congregation. Once again it would seem that your answers are invariably subjective and lack proper Biblical Theology.
The most concerning and disturbing statement that you wrote is, “At least he (the unbelieving Rabbi) worships the same God (as Ed and Wendell and all other Christians) . . . Does this Rabbi confess Jesus the Christ as his Saviour and Lord? Certainly not. Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is an antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son. Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father. 1Jn 2:22,23. This Rabbi “hath not the Father because he denieth the Son therefore he does not and cannot worship the same God as a born-again Christian. He is not regenerated by the Holy Ghost and the blood of Christ has not washed away his sins through faith. If Jesus’ blood is not over his sins then he cannot worship the Father. If he dies in his sin he will spend eternity in Hell (right there with Mit Romney and all other unbelievers, Jews, Greeks, Atheists, Mormons, Catholics, and Buddhists). All of these so called evangelicals that are telling him that he “worships the same God as they do will have to face an angry God on the day of Judgment for helping him to go to hell! I am in fear and trembling for those who will stand guilty of this apostasy-crime before our King.
“Brethren, my hearts desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved. . . They have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge . . . [they] have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God . . . How shall believe in him of whom they have not heard?
This year they are bringing in Rabbi Daniel Lapin. Below is part of an email Pastor Wendell sent out to justify bringing in a non-Christian to speak on wealth. (Note: Spelling mistakes are from the email…not mine)
Before immigrating to the United States in 1973, Rabbi Lapin studied Torah, economics, physics and mathematics in Johannesburg, London and Jerusalem. This unlikely combination forms the bedrock of his conviction that no conflict exists between faith and wealth, the physical and spiritual, or virtue and strength.
Noted for his best-selling book “Thou Shall Prosper” and radio show on San Fransisco’s KSFO, Rabbi Lapin translates life principles from the Bible into practical and entertaining tools that enhance family, financial and spiritual lives. 2007 Newsweek Magazine included him in its list of America’s 50 most influencial rabbis.
President George W. Bush appointed him to serve two terms on a United States Commission and he has won the admiration of other noted figures such as Dr. James Dobson, John Ashcroft, Rabbi Reuven Bulka, Pastor Joe Hagee, Jack Kemp, Dr. D.J. Kennedy, Rush Limbaugh, Michael Medved, Rabbi Avigdor Miller, the late Secretary of the Treasury William E. Simon, and Zig Ziglar.
One person is conspicuously absent from this description – Jesus Christ! Why do we need to have a Jewish Rabbi come in and teach about wealth? I am just floored by this. Pastor Wendell fails to mention the controversy that surrounded Rabbi Daniel Lapin.
Here is where Daniel Lapin gets his material for his book “Thou Shall Prosper” (taken from his web site).
By blending contemporary business stories and his own business experiences with the wisdom of the Torah, Talmud, and even examples from the Zohar, (the Jewish book of Kabalah or mysticism), Rabbi Daniel Lapin, your rabbi, explains the essence of each commandment and shows you how to use this knowledge to prosper financially.
Are the people of the city church going to be taught from Kabalah, just like Madonna? What are they thinking? How can they bring in a false teacher who denies Christ to teach principles of wealth using Jewish Mysticism?
Let them alone: they be blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch. Matthew 15:14
If you attend the city church, WAKE UP you sleepy Christian. Take heed to the command of Christ and forget not your first love. Don’t be drunk with the wine of prosperity and commit adultery with a false gospel.
Below are Daniel Lapin’s 10 commandments of wealth.
1st Commandment: Believe in the Dignity and Morality of Business 2nd Commandment: Extend the Network of your Connectedness to Many People 3rd Commandment: Get to Know Yourself 4th Commandment: Do Not Pursue Perfection 5th Commandment: Lead Consistently and Constantly 6th Commandment: Constantly Change the Changeable, While Steadfastly Clinging to the Unchangeable 7th Commandment: Learn to Foretell the Future 8Th Commandment: Know Your Money 9th Commandment: Act Rich: Give Away 10% of Your After Tax Income 10th Commandment: Never Retire
Contrast it with what Jesus said:
No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.
Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?
Mark Driscoll played a clip from a Joel Osteen broadcast and gave a commentary of the message. I thought it was perfect! Thank God for pastors like Mark Driscoll who will stand up for truth and discuss the false claims made by the “health and wealth” prosperity gospel.
I am amused by some of the comments by Osteen supporters like the following:
I heard this scripture today, and it really got me thinking…
Psalm 11:5
The LORD trieth the righteous: but the wicked and him that loveth violence his soul hateth.
I have lately been pondering the sins I have become desensitized to. There are many. This scripture got me thinking about violence. God hates violence…not only that, his soul hates the wicked, and those who love violence. I found it revealing that there are the wicked, and those who love violence. God hates them both.
This scripture made me realize I use violence as a form of entertainment. I use violence as entertainment in movies, video games, fighting sports like boxing, and even cheering for fights in hockey. Our culture has elevated violence to the point when we see a murder on the movie screen (or in the news for that matter), it doesn’t make us think twice any more. We become complacent and uncaring when we hear of those who are victims of violence.
When I began meditating on this, I realized I do not think about violence the way God thinks of it.
The most troubling part of my view on violence is how it makes me view the cross. I don’t view how Jesus suffered on the cross with the same reaction I should. I view it through the lens of all the violence I have seen in movies, watching murders, fights, blood and guts. What Jesus endured on the cross almost seems commonplace to me. Lord forgive me.
I saw this article at reformedgeek.com, and found it to be exactly what I experienced at the mega-church I attended. It is a good read, and the video at the bottom is a must!
****************************** Article written by Todd Friel.
This might seem a little strange, but hang in there til the end because I think this has a powerful punch line.Proof-texting is one of the main reasons false teachers can find a home inside of evangelicalism. The false teacher can take a verse out of context and apply it to a teaching that the verse was never intended to support. Prosperity teachers love to do this with the Old Testament, especially the Proverbs. How do they get away with this? Most pew-warmers don’t understand what the Proverbs are.
Proverbs are written in a catchy way (the shorter they are, the less likely they are to contain a thorough theology on an issue) that help us remember GENERAL truths that if applied faithfully will TYPICALLY (but not always) make life better. There is a heavy emphasis on physical well being and wealth in the Proverbs and we have to be careful to not pull out these individual guiding PRINCIPLES and turn them into a GUARANTEE.
We must balance the promises of prosperity in the Proverbs with other Proverbs and with the rest of the Bible’s teachings on blessings. Let me give you an example and then I will show you how easily this can be done and why we must be good Bereans.
Proverbs 10:3 says, “The Lord will not let the Godly starve to death, but He refuses to satisfy the craving of the wicked. The smiling prosperity preacher will announce, If you are a Christian, you have God’s favor and He won’t let you starve to death.
Wrong.
That is not the PRINCIPLE of the verse. The principle is: God is on the side of His children and He stands opposed to the wicked. How do we know that?
1. The Proverbs are designed to be general principles that typically make life better.
2. Proverbs are not individual promises that guarantee you will always succeed.
3. From a practical standpoint, many Godly Christians have starved to death, or worse.
4. When I read this verse with the rest of the Bible in view, I know that this single verse cannot be a guarantee I will never starve and the wicked will go hungry.
Let’s just take a look at the life of Job. Didn’t he understand this Proverb? What about Psalm 73? Asaph laments that the wicked seem to prosper while he, a Godly man, seems to struggle. That appears to be in direct conflict with this verse IF you teach that the Proverbs are individual guarantees of success.
So what does this have to do with the price of corn in Oklahoma on a Tuesday? It means that we must always, always, always read every verse in the Bible in its immediate context and in context of the whole Bible. If you fail to keep the rest of Scripture in view, you can twist Scripture and the next thing you know, you will have a mega church.
Do you remember the movie The Shining? It was the creepiest, scariest horror movie of the 70’s (and yes, I saw it before God saved me). It was dark, bloody and downright evil. I would like you to watch the attached re-made movie trailer for The Shining. (There is nothing offensive about what you are going to watch and this is NOT an endorsement of the movie.)
What you are about to witness is movie proof-texting. A clever individual pulled out little snippets of this gruesome movie to make it look downright charming. As you view this, keep the context of the whole movie in view. And keep this in mind, if you do not keep the entire context of the Bible in mind when you read Scripture, you might not end up twisting Scripture yourself, but you may be duped by someone who does.
TULSA, Okla. (AP) — Twenty years ago, televangelist Oral Roberts said he was reading a spy novel when God appeared to him and told him to raise $8 million for Roberts’ university, or else he would be ”called home.”
Now, his son, Oral Roberts University President Richard Roberts, says God is speaking again, telling him to deny lurid allegations in a lawsuit that threatens to engulf this 44-year-old Bible Belt college in scandal.
I like this quote:
”We have asked and asked and asked to see the finances of our school and what they’re doing with our money, and we’ve been told no,” said, Cross who is majoring in government. ”Now we know why. As a student, I’m not going to stand for it any longer.”
If they are not spending the money poorly, what would they need to hide? I dare anyone who goes to the City Church to ask for details of where the money goes. A good question to ask is how much money the pastors make. Remember, the wives are all pastors too…so see what they make.
Here are a list of the charges filed against ORU:
– A longtime maintenance employee was fired so that an underage male friend of Mrs. Roberts could have his position.
– Mrs. Roberts — who is a member of the board of regents and is referred to as ORU’s ”first lady” on the university’s Web site — frequently had cell-phone bills of more than $800 per month, with hundreds of text messages sent between 1 a.m. to 3 a.m. to ”underage males who had been provided phones at university expense.”
– The university jet was used to take one daughter and several friends on a senior trip to Orlando, Fla., and the Bahamas. The $29,411 trip was billed to the ministry as an ”evangelistic function of the president.”
– Mrs. Roberts spent more than $39,000 at one Chico’s clothing store alone in less than a year, and had other accounts in Texas and California. She also repeatedly said, ”As long as I wear it once on TV, we can charge it off.” The document cites inconsistencies in clothing purchases and actual usage on TV.
– Mrs. Roberts was given a white Lexus SUV and a red Mercedes convertible by ministry donors.
– University and ministry employees are regularly summoned to the Roberts’ home to do the daughters’ homework.
– The university and ministry maintain a stable of horses for exclusive use by the Roberts’ children.
– The Roberts’ home has been remodeled 11 times in the past 14 years.
I think this scripture describes what we see in these people:
And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed. By covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words; for a long time their judgment has not been idle, and their destruction does not slumber. 2 Peter 2:2-3
For those who think lots of people going to your church means good fruit…Peter told us many would follow destructive ways (not a few). So be careful how you define fruit. The world defines Christ by these high profile speakers, who use covetousness to extract money (exploit people) and get rich. They take from the poor to live lavish lifestyles. It is a sad state of Christianity we currently live in, where the health and wealth doctrines are largely going unchallenged as they slander the name of Christ time and time again.
My prayer is that they would repent and follow Christ for His riches, and not seeking the things below.
Richard Roberts said he will step aside temporarily as president of Oral Roberts University as the school fights a wrongful termination lawsuit by three former professors who accuse Roberts and his wife of misconduct.
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