Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Romans 12:2
Unbelief in the Church
Wildolive came into being to address a hole in the theology of most denominations concerning the significance of the re-creation of Israel as prophesied in the Bible. But while considering the absence of belief in healing and teaching on healing it became clear that the church does not uphold and teach several areas of Biblical truth?
The author is sorry if the criticisms below sound harsh or they upset anyone, but they come from a deep concern that we are not following our Lord wholeheartedly because of inherited beliefs and disbeliefs that should have been discarded long ago.
There appears to be several areas of unbiblical belief in the church.
| Creation | The Genesis account being made secondary to popular Evolution |
| Israel | Belief in Biblical prophecy replaced by Replacement Theology and a Socialist political narrative. |
| Political positions | Biblical positions have been forced out or made to conform to socialist doctrine - also “social gospel.” |
| Secular worldview | Formed from TV and other media (belonging to the World) |
| Post Modernism | Failure to stand against moral relativism and the concepts of different truths having equal validity. Post Modernism |
| Pollution from the world | Failure to perceive the lies that have been sown into our consciousness - see The Marketing of Evil and The World Turned Upside Down |
| Sexual morality | Alarming numbers of ministers have been unfaithful to their wives and Biblical standards are being downplayed. |
| Tolerance/ Interfaith | Attempting to appease other outlooks and religions |
It could be reasoned that all these issues hinge upon Christians judging the Bible by their worldview instead of judging their worldview by the Bible. This is worrying when you remember that our understanding of the world is inherited from our upbringing, education or imbibed from the world's media.
This decline in faith has been going on for some time but it is much advanced by the Post-modern worldview. That is, there is no one right answer, merely various meta-narratives that are all valid for their adherents. This is the prevailing way of thinking but it cannot be compatible with “I am the way, the truth and the life.”
Problems started to creep into the church when it adopted Greek philosophy in place of Hebrew theology, cut off its roots (as wild olive shoots grafted into Israel (Romans 11)), abandoned or even forbade the Bible holy days to invent its own and became anti-Semitic.
A study of Church History will show that the “conversion” of the emperor Constantine did not so much render the Empire Christian - Christendom - , as bring the church under the control of the Empire or the Establishment.
As he was showing Thomas Aquinas the glories of the Vatican, the Pope remarked: "We cannot say with Peter of old, silver and gold have I none" Thomas replied: "Nor can we say, "Such as I have I give to thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk."
Why not? - What went wrong?
Consider all the things the church lost but has partly regained in the course of "The Church age" (the times of the Gentiles)
Creation vs Evolution
Many Christians start their unbelief with the very first chapter of the Bible. After as start like that, further unbelief is very likely to follow.
Many Christians accept unthinkingly what popular (secular *) science teaches and then try to make the Genesis account match this by using invalid philosophical manipulations of the word of God with arguments such as a day being a thousand years.
1 Television presenters would have you believe that science and Biblical faith are polar opposites and that no scientist believes in the Bible account of creation. This is not true! Many great scientists have been believers. Scientists who do not hold the secular view are squeezed out of work in Television. (eg David Bellamy)
2 Education is now under the ownership of the left leaning world, and teaching Creation could be career limiting. One Christian teacher of our acquaintance professed herself amazed that any intelligent and educated person would believe in Creation as described in the first book of the Bible.
If the church has problems with the first chapters of the Bible, is it any wonder it has problems with everything else?Healing
Most Christians accept what the secular medical profession maintain is possible, or not possible, and then discount or ignore what the Bible clearly spells out when it is incompatible with that. But Healing is Important to the Gospel and the Kingdom.
Yes, Christians pray that God will heal and often He does, but they ignore what Jesus actually taught about healing. Neither Jesus nor his apostles/disciples prayed that someone be healed: they commanded that people be healed in the Name of Jesus! They exercised faith: they put their faith on the line.
James is the only one in the New Testament to advise the sick to get the church elders to pray for them. He speaks of the prayer of faith, but what does that mean?
What is not the prayer of faith?
1 “If you can......” How did Jesus respond to that? With indignation.
2 Unbelieving prayer – recognizable for its minor key, mournful sound like a lament.
3 What about the people who always want prayer for healing because they crave the attention and would miss it if they were healed? Why did Jesus ask people who were obviously sick, what they wanted him to do for them?
The people who were healed in the Bible did not pray vaguely that God would heal, without any strong belief that He would. Jesus always responded to Trust / Faith.
What is the prayer of faith like?
1 It should sound more like a vigorous, optimistic march than a mournful lament.
2 It should quote scripture to convince oneself and God that He will heal.
3 It should give praise and glory to God that what is being claimed has been granted and will come to pass.
The sad truth is that people have not appropriated the Bible's healing message and been healed, because nobody taught them they could. Also, man made traditions and doctrines destroy trust for Healing. One such is "...if it be thy will." If you are not convinced that it is God's will to heal anyone and everyone who trusts him, you have already failed to pray in faith!
Greek thinking
Could such unbelief stem from Greek thinking rather than Hebrew thinking. The church's habit of spiritualising, or treating as allegory, passages demanding faith has resulted in the Atonement for salvation being taken literally while the healing in the Atonement is taken as an allegory, for the healing of our souls and not literal healing of our bodies.
Greek thinking also separates body and spirit, whilst Hebrew sees the whole person as a unity; body, soul and spirit . Thus Yeshua, operating in Hebrew thought patterns, provided atonement to restore us and make us whole in body, soul and spirit.
Just to end on a positive note - Healing On The Streets is a non-denominational move which is taking believers on to the streets and public places with a banner proclaiming, "HEALING" where they minister to passers-by in the power of the Holy Spirit and the name of Jesus.
Israel
Israel is the bottom button test, according to Derek Prince. (referring to buttoning up a coat) If you get it wrong about Israel, everything else will be wrong too.
Christian Zionism was the norm among the leading evangelicals in the nineteenth century but the socialist political worldview has prevailed since Israel became a nation, and as the political propaganda and reworking of history has prevailed in the world, the church has gone along with it by twisting its theology to match progressive secular thinking. Little David Israel has been rebranded as Goliath by the Christian Palestinianists.
The Christian Left
The Christian Left has sought to re-emphasize and re-frame issues in the Bible in terms of socialist thinking. See also Social Gospel.
Academia has sold the church Greek philosophy in place of Hebrew theology.
Regular, Biblical belief is labelled, right wing or Christian fundamentalist, whereas what this really reveals is that the church in general has shifted to the left, isolating what used to be mainstream views.
The label "Christian fundamentalism", far from being a compliment, places a loyalty to Biblical truth on a level with Islamic extremism and violence that stems from adherence to the uncomfortably violent sections of the Qur'an and Hadith.
Ecology
Much of the church is claiming Ecology as its mission. Churches are following the evolutionist popular science that preaches that man can destroy the planet and must save it.
By picking up the world's agenda and trying to conform Christianity to it people seek to make it relevant. However, this is to ignore the fact that not all scientists believe in anthropogenic climate change; but those who don't are shut out of television and public debate.
Tolerance, Interfaith, Multiculturalism
All of these can be taken too far, and lead the Christian into Syncretism. We can and should work to live at peace with neighbours of other faiths but we can not compromise our faith with faiths, particularly Islam, that preach another prophet who supersedes Jesus and denies that he is the Son of God and that he died on the cross. To compromise is to capitulate!
The world may, mistakenly, seek to appease Islam but the church must not.
What forms your worldview?
Television and the wider media have played a major part in deceiving Christians about the matters considered on this page. This is especially true concerning coverage of Israel. See media. Many of the lessons that can be learned from Media coverage of Israel could well be applied to these other topics.
I fear that television is the opiate of too many Christians.
Whatever happened to, “Seek ye first the Kingdom of Heaven”?
Updated 12/07/12
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