Some
fantastic heretics I have known
Posted:
February 21, 2010
11:00 am Eastern
by
Thomas R. Horn
RaidersNewsNetwork.com
 Recently
while searching for a particular
document that I had placed in an old
photo album years ago for safe keeping
(usually how we wind up actually
losing things, right!?), I took an
unexpected stroll down memory lane.
I had
gone through at least a dozen books of
images, old newspaper clippings,
seeing members of churches we had
pastored and records of events frozen
in time from nearly 30 years inside
institutionalized Christianity, when
finally between dusty storage bins and
spider webs I found what I was looking
for. I placed the coveted item among
the research notes for the new book on
Spiritual Warfare that my wife Nita
and I plan to write later this year,
then returned everything else to the
closets.
That
should have been that, but for the
next week the old memories in those
boxes kept calling to me about things
and friends I had nearly
forgotten—people who represented the
true mission of the Church and were
wonderful examples to my wife and I
about what it means to be a Christian.
Their names would not be recognized by
most today—dedicated believers like
O.R. Cross, Henrietta Stewart,
Lorraine Morgan, Wyoming Rosebud
Dollar, C.K. Barnes, Eugene &
Evelyn Fuller, Annie Walton, and
others of the New Testament clan.
And
then there was that other group,
hiding in plain sight among the
believers, sometimes
even leading them, the ones the
Bible calls "clouds without
water, carried about of winds; trees
whose fruit withereth, without fruit,
twice dead, plucked up by the
roots" (Jude 1:12).
Among
this second class were—and still
are—some fantastic heretics I have
known.
Take
our old friend Carlton
Pearson for instance. When I was
pastor of Life Center and then Family Worship Center near
Portland, Oregon during the 80s, my
church was the host for TBN's West
Coast broadcasts and special events
where some of America's top
evangelists appeared almost nightly
for a while, including Carlton on
numerous occasions. In those days, the Church
was in flux. The Great Generation with
its Faith of the Fathers was getting
older, and errant doctrines made
delicious by nasty end-time agents
known as demons were finding more and
more willing hearts who were having
the time of their lives abandoning solid theology
in exchange for such teachings as
"The Doctrine of Inclusion"
(in which nobody goes to hell)
eventually branding such false
prophets as heretics
(including Carlton Pearson) among
thoughtful evangelicals. I can
tell you Carlton didn't start out that
way. He was a sweet man with a heart
of gold who unfortunately not only
lost his way, but embraced delusion.
God only knows how many he has since
led astray.
Then
there were those who embraced things
far worse than "Inclusion."
For instance, "Kingdom Age"
theology (also known as
Reconstructionism, Kingdom Now
Theology, Theonomy, Dominion Theology,
and most recently, Dominionism), which
singularly has wrought some of the
most far-reaching destruction within
the Body of Christ this century.
Dominionism
is a form of hyper-Calvinism (though
supported by both reconstructionists
and non-reconstructionists) that
ultimately seeks to establish the
Kingdom of God on earth through the
union of politics and religion. Though
ravenously popular among most
talking-heads for the Religious Right,
combining religious faith with
politics as a legislative system of
governance such as Dominionism would
do, hearkens the formula upon
which Antichrist will come to power.
Note how in the book of Revelation,
chapter 13, the political
figure of Antichrist derives
ultra-national dominance from the
world’s religious faithful
through the influence of an
ecclesiastical leader known as the
False Prophet. Similar political enthusiasm
exists among dominionists despite the
fact that neither Jesus nor His
disciples (who turned the world upside
down through preaching the gospel of
Christ, the true "power of
God," according to Paul) ever
imagined the goal of changing the
world through supplanting secular
government with an authoritarian
theocracy. In fact, Jesus made it
clear that His followers would not
fight earthly authorities purely
because His kingdom was "not of
this world" (John 18:36). While
every modern citizen—religious and
non-religious—has the responsibility
to lobby for moral good, combining the
mission of the church with political
aspirations is not only unprecedented
in New Testament theology—including
the life of Christ and the
pattern of the New Testament
church—but a tragic scheme concocted
by sinister forces that seek to defer
the Church from its true power while
enriching insincere bureaucrats. So...
let me take this moment to also add
that, while I personally appreciate
the values represented by such people
as Sarah Palin (and I vote!), my
prayer for believers is that they will
not be fooled (again) into believing
in 2012 that they can fulfill the will
of God by pulling a voting lever.
"While
I personally appreciate
the values represented by
such people as Sarah Palin
(and I vote!), my prayer
for believers is that they
will not be fooled (again)
into believing in 2012
that they can fulfill the
will of God by pulling a
voting lever." Thomas
Horn
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While
great heresies like "Dominionism"
and "Inclusion" are, or
should be, self evident, other
contenders for the most spectacular
heresies in the world today would have
to include the Prosperity Movement,
Ecumenical Modernism, and Dual
Covenant (wherein Jews do not need to
accept Jesus as Messiah) espoused by
such well-known preachers as John
Hagee . Yet those aged voices that
called out to me recently from my fading
boxes of memories also reminded that, while it's easier today to get
an "amen" while condemning
the BIG LIE of Dominionism, the most
insidious doctrines are those
"smaller lucifers," which
are often harder to perceive. For
instance how easy it is (and was) to
see through the glaring examples of
self-serving and lavish lifestyles
that some of my old televangelist
friends sought support for, while
overlooking or even excusing
Luciferianisn (selfishness) that is
measured in the tiniest of portions,
minute amounts so cleverly concealed
within subtle and popular doctrines
today that they are nearly impossible
to detect.
Ask
any evangelist who has tried to take
the Gospel outside the four-doors of
the local assembly what I mean and
hear them repeat stories of how
quickly certain members arose to
resist the plan and to grumble over
the resources that could otherwise be
used to benefit them. This is
the cancer that two decades of
prosperity preaching, inward focusing
and me-ism has produced. Of course
most of these anti-evangelists wrap
their Luciferianism in nifty religious
phrases—like Judas Iscariot did when
he pretended to care for the poor but
secretly wanted to steal the value of
the oil that was used to anoint the
feet of Jesus (John 12:1-6).
These
types resemble Judas in another way as
well; they don't even know how they
are thus being used as fleshy gloves,
the earthen hands of that invisible
spirit, the master of waterless clouds
operating within or behind them that
hates true fishers of men. But for
those with eyes to see, the father of
lies always gives himself away through
his envy of others, seeking what he
can gain from believers and religion,
not what he can give, then pretending
that there is something wrong with
those he cannot control, those that
get things done like Jesus did,
disparaging them, while he himself
accomplishes nothing but division,
diversion, and destruction.
Perhaps
you have seen this spirit in the
actions or heard it in the mouths of
people you thought were your partners.
When once you (or somebody you knew)
had nothing more to give them, they
turned away from you, or worse,
against you and revealed the awful
truth: their religious spirit had only
come for what it could get, gain,
take, absorb, and then turned "to
kill and to destroy" (John
10:10a).
Thankfully
the verse above goes on to describe
the true spirit of Christ,
which comes so that people might have
life, and that they might have it more
abundantly. This is why it is wise to
observe what religious people do, not
only what they say, so that ultimately
it becomes clear what spirit is
operating within them. "Ye shall
know them by their fruits," Jesus
said in Matthew 7:16.
Yes,
it's true, I have personally known
some fantastic heretics. But as I get
older and the institution that I
served so long breathes its final
breaths and crumbles beneath the
mighty tsunami of Dominionism,
Prosperity Cultism and other doctrines
of demons, I wonder about the
survivors, where they will go now and
how they will persevere, and I find
that my pastor's heart is concerned
most of all with those little lucifers
still lurking in plain sight among
them.
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FLASHBAK:
Derek & Sharon
Gilbert Interview
Tom Horn On Modern
Apostasy, Dominionism
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(Remember
"Where's Waldo?" -- See if
you can find pastor Horn among some of
his children's church members in this
photo from the 1980s. Click
image for full-size)
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