|
|
Corrections Have Begun
in the House of the Lord
by Mel C. Montgomery
"For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? " I Pet. 4:17.
The Bible gives us numerous accounts of God correcting, judging, and rebuking people, especially leaders. An outstanding example is King David.
This great King of Israel lusted after another man's wife. High and powerful though he may have been, the commands of the Bible applied to him also. "Thou shalt not covet" thy neighbor's wife and "Thou shalt not commit adultery," were his to obey also. David coveted Bathsheba, wife of Uriah, one of David's trusted men. The King lusted after, and committed adultery with her. She became pregnant, and David had her husband killed so that he could marry her.
Thinking he had gotten away with the murder, David married Bathsheba. Let's look at parts of the account:
"And when the mourning was past, David sent and fetched her to his house, and she became his wife, and bare him a son. But the thing that David had done displeased the LORD." II Sam. 11:27.
Just because David's sin was hidden from the eyes of man, does not mean it had been hidden from God. The Lord knows every sin, and the motive of every heart, even the motives of the hearts of leaders.
"And the LORD sent Nathan unto David."
The prophet Nathan loved King David, but the Lord sent him to rebuke the King over his sin. He told the king a parable of a rich man who had many flocks, stealing from a poor man the only little lamb the man had, and eating it. Nathan then asked David what the man's judgment should be. David flew into a rage over the injustice, and pronounced a heavy judgment on the man.
"And David's anger was greatly kindled against the man; and he said to Nathan, As the LORD liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely die . . . and he shall restore . . . because he did this thing, and because he had no pity.
And Nathan said to David, Thou art the man. Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, I anointed thee king over Israel . . . Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the LORD, to do evil in his sight? thou hast killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword, and hast taken his wife to be thy wife, and hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon.
Now therefore the sword shall never depart from thine house; because thou hast despised me, and hast taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be thy wife . . . And David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the LORD. And Nathan said unto David, The LORD also hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die."
God's mercy, compassion, and forgiveness is beyond our understanding. When David repented of the adultery and murder, God quickly forgave David. However, there were still consequences that had been set in montion by David's sin, and they could not be stopped.
"Howbeit, because by this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the LORD to blaspheme, the child also that is born unto thee shall surely die . . . "
The child became gravely ill.
"David therefore besought God for the child; and David fasted, and went in, and lay all night upon the earth. . . And it came to pass on the seventh day, that the child died."
The little child's life had been sown in murder, and now it had been reaped in death. After this crushingly painful setback in his life, David could have sunk into grief for the rest of his life or become bitter with God. However, David chose to immediately turn to God in his pain.
"Then David arose from the earth, and washed, and anointed himself, and changed his apparel, and came into the house of the LORD, and worshipped . . ."
After this, we see David start life all over again, and we see God's blessing return.
"And David comforted Bathsheba his wife, and went in unto her, and lay with her: and she bare a son, and he called his name Solomon: and the LORD loved him." II Samuel 13:1-24.
The next child born to the union of David and Bathsheba grew up to be the wisest man of the Old Testament, the heir to the throne, the builder of the Temple, and the writer of most of the Book of Proverbs.
There are many beautiful lessons for leaders and for the rest of us to learn from David's sin, repentence, and restoration.
We need to understand that God DOES correct leaders, and that such corrections can be painful experiences. And God's corrections of leaders did not end back in Bible days. In a more modern example, the Lord brought a serious but much less painful correction to a man of God named Kenneth Hagin some years ago.
Brother Hagin was preaching in a church service. He stumbled and fell off a platform and broke his arm. He wondered how this could have happened. Since being healed years previously as a teenager when he was within days or hours of death, he had walked in divine health and been accident free. Now he was nursing a broken arm. While recovering in the hospital bed a day or so later, the Lord Jesus appeared to him in an open vision.
The Lord told Brother Hagin that the reason this accident had happened to him was because he had gotten out God's will. Specifically, he had neglected his prophetic ministry and healing ministry. For Hagin, it was just so much easier, and so much less controversial, to simply preach certain sermons and avoid healing and prophecy. Slowly, he had gotten away from his true calling. His disobedience had reached the point that the Lord had needed to get his attention.
The Lord did not break Kenneth Hagin's arm, and He told him so. It was Satan that had set up this accident.
The Lord told Hagin that He could have stopped Satan from doing this, but that He allowed this to happen in order to arrest Hagin's attention. He said that he should be thankful that this accident had happened, because had it not occurred, and had Hagin not been corrected, his continued disobedience would have prevented him from living much longer.
He further told Brother Hagin that He would not completely heal the break. He said that 1% of the break would never heal, as a reminder to Hagin not to get out of His will again. And Brother Hagin testified that over the years when he began to neglect his prophetic or healing ministry, that arm would begin to ache and he would be reminded about God's true call upon his life. Then as soon as he would go back to obeying the Lord, the arm would quit hurting.
God does correct leaders.
In this case, a painful correction took place in the life of Brother Hagin in order to arrest his attention, and to get him to correct his message and bring it back within the boundaries of God's will for his ministry and calling. Brother Hagin submitted himself to God's correction, adjusted his preaching and ministry, and went on to preach and bear good fruit for many more years.
God corrected also Dr. David Cho, pastor of the world's largest church. In the early years of his ministry, Cho worked himself to exaustion insisting on doing everything himself. Cho's health broke. He had to step down from full-time ministry for years, slowly recovering, ministering only occasionally while assistant ministers filled in for him.
The Lord told him that he would never totally recover, as a reminder to him not to get out of His will again by pridefully insisting on doing everything himself. God had actually called Cho to train and raise up other leaders to do the work, but Cho had insisted on having all the attention. Being unable to minister full-time for several years forced Cho to go ahead and train others--as was God's actual will for him to do.
God does correct leaders.
In Dr. Cho's life, God used a painful collapse in health to get his attention and to force him to correct his message and method of ministry. This man of God humbled himself, received His correction, corrected himself, and went on to build a church of over 600,000 members in Seoul, South Korea.
God does correct leaders. And it is often times painful. The correction can range from pain on the order of a broken arm, to a total collapse. In recent days, we have seen the Lord bring very painful correction to two national Charismatic leaders. I wish to address these developments.
The Lord had revealed to me that correction of leaders was coming.
On August 14th of this year, the Spirit of Prophecy came upon me in my office. I sat down, prophesied, and wrote down what the Lord said. Although after flowing in prophecy for the last 18 years, I certainly know when the Word of the Lord has come to me, I never the less submitted the prophecy in private to the judgment of several seasoned men of God, including a nationally known prophet. When they all agreed this Word was from the Lord, I posted it on this website the next day--August 15th, and sent copies of the prophecies out in an e-mail to the subscribers of our newsletter.
In the prophecy, which concerned all of us, but especially our Charismatic and Word of Faith Leaders, the Lord said that He had declared "A Time of Correction." I would encourage you to read it in its entirety by clicking on that link. But for the purposes of this article, allow me to quote briefly from the prophecy. The Lord said:
". . . I have spoken and declared a Time of Correction. It is a time of correction of people and their motives. For too many have forsaken My way and My specific plan for their lives and have substituted their own fleshly ways and plans instead. . . It is a time of correction of teaching and doctrine. For too many have exceeded the boundaries of My word, thinking they were exhorting people and bringing Me glory by doing so. . . Some lie close to being rejected by Me, disqualified from ministry, and coming to be with Me ahead of their appointed time for deviating too far and too consistently from what I have called them to do and teach. Therefore, I counsel you to repent and to return to the teachings and assignment I have given you lest you stumble and not be able to rise again. . . So humble yourselves and receive my correction. Enter ye into this time of correction that I have appointed. . . Receive My correction and take it deeply into your spirit. . ."
The Lord warned that a "time of correction" had begun among ministry leaders. And it has indeed begun.
After that prophecy came forth on August 14th, Charisma reports that one week later to the day, August 21st, Sister Juanita Bynum was beaten up by her estranged husband Bishop Timothy Weeks in a hotel parking lot. He was arrested, bailed out on $40,000, then returned to his pulpit the following Sunday and received a standing ovation.
The Bible says, " Them that sin rebuke before all, that others also may fear." I Timothy 5:20. But we've reached the point in Charismatic circles where we don't rebuke wife-beaters. We give them standing ovations.
A few days after that horror and disgrace, Paula and Randy White announced their plans to divorce.
Tragically my friends, the lives and ministries of some of our national Charismatic leaders have begun to implode. Are these two incidents the "correction of the Lord?" Well clearly God did not break up these two marriages and inspire the Bishop to beat up his wife. Such is not His nature. But on the other hand, He could have stopped both downfalls from happening, just as He could have kept Brother Hagin from breaking his arm, and Brother Cho from collapsing from exaustion. God could have stopped all of these things from happening, but He did not.
Why?
Because He allowed these tragedies to get these leaders' attention. Hagin and Cho listened and corrected themselves. It remains to be seen whether Sister Bynum and Randly and Paula White will do the same.
Correct themselves in what areas?
In teaching and doctrine.
As the Lord said through that prophecy, He is beginning to correct, ". . . teaching and doctrine. For too many have exceeded the boundaries of My word, thinking they were exhorting people and bringing Me glory by doing so. . . "
The Editor of Charisma has written of these scandals the following:
"Holy anger should boil inside us as we see how the name of Jesus is maligned and misused in today’s church. We must aggressively seek accountability and integrity at a time when we have been compromised by hyper-prosperity preaching, carnal showmanship and self-absorbed charlatans. America’s pastors should lift their voices in this hour and denounce this shameful charade before the false prophets of Jezebel completely hijack the American church. The people of God need bold prophets who are not afraid to draw lines and call down the fire of holiness from heaven."
When Brother Grady used the harsh but accurate terms of "prophets of Jezebel," and "self-absorbed charlatans," I believe he was speaking of some of our national Charismatic leaders in general. I do not believe he was applying these specifically to Bynum and the Whites. Nor do I refer to them by those terms. Instead, I believe that Bynum and the Whites--none of whom I have ever met--started out being servants sent by God, who were eventually seduced by what the Bible calls "the deceitfulness of riches," and by the flatteries of men.
The Lord is allowing very painful things to happen to our leaders in order to get their attention, and to begin correcting their messages.
It remains to be seen what will happen with Sister Juanita, Sister Paula, and Brother Randy. Will they treat these painful corrections as just a hiccup on the road of life, shift gears, write a new book, announce new "survival" conferences, and go back to shouting into TV cameras? Will they pass these tremendous set-backs off as attacks of the Devil that somehow prove the validity of their message?
We've seen many Charismatic leaders fall. I can not recall a single one who blamed the Devil and persisted in preaching the same message, who ever amounted to anything in God again.
I pray that they, and we do not make that mistake.
It is time for some tough love.
I write this respectfully and in kindness, but I will never the less be blunt. We and Bynum and the Whites need to face the sobering fact that WHAT THEY PREACH DID NOT WORK FOR THEM. Sister Juanita's hyper-emotional, extreme prayer, extreme worship, extreme-everything brought her only another failed relationship, this time ending in violence. The White's hyper-giving, hyper-breakthrough, hyper-prosperity, hyper-everything lead to their divorce and collapse in ministry.
The plain fact of the matter is that God neither desires nor needs extreme behavior of any kind from us.
Listen to the recordings on this site by the Goodwins, Brother Hagin, Howard Carter, and others. They walked in awesome prophetic anointings for over 50 years of ministry. Listen to their messages in their own words. You won't hear a single message calling for extreme behavior of any sort. No hysterical promises of whatever breakthrough you need in life in return for you sending in "your largest gift possible." No rants about, "God is fixin' to bring your breakthrough! God is gettin' ready to bless you!" No promises of, "as a partner with my ministry I am extending over you the covering of my prayers and anointing."
None of that.
Yet, these men and women of God all were able to hold their FIRST marriages together for over 50 years, and walk in manifestations of Glory and Holy Ghost power the likes of which are rarely seen today.
As the Goodwins so aptly demonstrated, anointing that is strong and genuine is a plant that sinks its roots deep down into the fertile ground of solid scriptural support. It is watered by humility and ethical behavior. It thrives not in its own shadow, but in the bright light of giving God all the glory and drawing no attention to itself. Though God as the Wise Husbandman may prune it back from time to time, bringing painful corrections which causes unnecessary branches fall to the ground, the result is greater fruit not less. And the fruit it produces is a balanced message that Believers may partake of and be strengthened by to work for God, not poisioned by to pursue their own fleshly deceptions.
Such have we not seen from Sister Bynum and the Whites for a long, long time. Nor the peace of it have they known in many years.
So what should we do?
First, notice the goodness of God, and give thanks for it. Before David's sin became public knowledge, God told the matter to Nathan. Similarly, a week before the set-backs of Bynum and the Whites, God gave us a word of prophecy in which He revealed that He had called for "A Time of Correction." When I published that prophecy, I knew the fulfillment would be painful. And it has been. But God gave us that word so that when these things came to pass, we would not be dismayed or shaken in our faith. So lay aside the anger and the outrage. Our fleshly anger does not help God. It hinders Him. "For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God." James 1:20. Instead, like David, pick yourself up off the ground, wash yourself, and Go before the Lord in worship. Turn your anger into thanksgiving to God for His goodness in revealing to us His work. Give thanks for His protecting power that kept Sister Bynum in her hour of trouble. God had a hotel worker nearby, who ran to our Sister's aid and pulled her husband off of her, thus rescuing her from being injured even worse than she was. And finally, give thanks that our God is merciful, and that He is working to correct and redeem these leaders so that in the process of time, they can return to us again with a genuine message and a true fire from Him.
Second, pray for Sister Juanita and Paula and Randy White. Commit them unto the Lord. God is working a work, and it must run its course. If any of you know Bynum or the Whites, and you believe in what I am expressing in this article, please consider forwarding this to them and encouraging them to prayerfully consider what I've written. They no doubt are searching for answers right now.
Third, pray for the pastors and Christian TV leaders who have aided and abetted this farce and explosion of false teaching by inviting Bynum and the Whites back again and again to preach from their pulpits, and to raise millions of dollars for them in telethons. They too need to judge themselves. They have sat calmly by on the platform while this hyper-prosperity, hyper-emotional mess has been preached with their blessing. Many leaders knew better, but dollar signs got in the way of seeing the truth. They too need to repent, judge themselves, and help put an end to the charade.
Fourth, judge your own hearts. These and other ministries have prospered because you and I had "itching ears." We were not content to "endure sound doctrine," and we supported these ministers with our attendance and by sending them offerings and buying their materials.
Fifth, brace yourself. I know in my spirit that more is coming. Correction has begun in the House of the Lord and more leaders are going to find themselves in very painful times of setback and correction. More leaders will be corrected through set-backs before God has cleaned His House. Some yet will fall and never rise again, unless they receive His correction and bring what they are preaching back within scriptural bounds.
Sixth, prepare yourself for criticism. I've alreadly been criticized for simply reprinting on this website articles from Charisma that report excesses that are commonly reported in the newspapers. You too may be criticized if you acknowledge the misconduct that has been rampant in our circles for a long time. Others will blame the Devil. And they will be half-correct. As God allows the Devil to attack in a limited fashion in order to get the attention of our leaders, some will claim that the reason these leaders are being attacked is because they are right, and their message is "right on." And they will condemn you for stating otherwise. But don't allow yourself to be drawn into strife and arguments. Just pray while God does the correcting.
Seventh, support your local church. Many of you have taken your pastor for granted because he wasn't flamboyant, and didn't scream all over the platform and promise you everything your flesh wanted in return for a big offering. And because he wasn't caught up in the charade, you thought he was behind the times. Some of you have written off the ministers who have not preached this same hysteria, calling them "behind the times," and "not up on the cutting-edge of what God is doing today." No, your pastor and many other ministers saw through the deception that fooled you. Respect him and them for that, and give your support to your pastor and to solid ministries that present to you the true and balanced message of the Gospel.
Remember Christ's words, "As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent." Rev. 3:19.
To read a follow-up article addressing developments that occurred after this article was written, please click on the link below:
Copyright 2007 Mel C. Montgomery All rights reserved. Article may be copied and shared with friends if done so without charge and attribute is given.
Contact Guidelines: Brother Mel is especially interested in hearing from: - Anyone who has been blessed by this website.
- Fellow ministers.
- Anyone who knew the Goodwins or other faith giants.
- Anyone who has old recordings they would like to donate to us so that we can share them with the world.
Please keep in in mind: - All e-mails are confidentially screened.
- Sincere questions or comments are always welcome, and will be forwarded to Mel.
- Brother Mel personally reads and answers all e-mails that are forwarded to him.
- Because of the demands on Brother Mel's time, a response will usualy take several days.
Kinds of E-mails that are not forwarded to Mel: - Abusive e-mails. Senders are blocked.
- Jokes, chain letters, spam, etc., are not forwarded.
- Brother Mel will not participate in e-mail debates.
E-Mail: admin@brothermel.com To Subscribe to Our Monthly E-mail Newsletter: CLICK HERE To Invite Brother Mel For Services: To Donate to This Minsitry: Mailing Address: Brother Mel Ministries PO Box 783 Joplin, MO 64802 |
|