Jay C. Adams

"You can pray to him (the Holy Spirit), ask him for help, be honest with him about your desperate need for strength, wisdom, healing, holiness, and growth in your spiritual life... Approach him, seek him, implore him, and trust him." - Costi Hinn, Knowing the Spirit

There is a pattern within scandals in the Charismatic movement: 1. Massive evidence piles up of misconduct, fake prophecy, heretical theology, etc. 2. Movement leaders make it an "agree to disagree" issue or simply cover it up. 3. An actual crime or legally punishable offense occurs that makes it unfeasible to cover up any longer. 4. Said leaders finally distance themselves (typically quietly) With Shawn Bolz, there was enough evidence in 2016 to determine that he was faking prophecy, but it took SA allegations to finally sink the ship. With Todd Bentley, there was enough evidence from...pretty much day one to determine that he was a fraud and a deceiver, but it took adultery and abandonment of his wife and children to get any Charismatic leaders to distance themselves (and even then many continued propping him up). With The Passion Translation, there were people like @MikeWingerii and before him @AJWTheology who gave Charismatics EVERYTHING THEY NEEDED to determine that this work was harmful and dangerous.... But it took allegations of plagiarism to move the ball forward. Time to ask the deeper questions: why are these leaders ALWAYS LATE? Why are they never leading the charge for truth and accountability when it counts? Why are they waiting for lawsuits or prison sentences to decide that someone is untrustworthy? I'm not here to answer that question for those leaders, but I definitely will not stop asking it.

@MaxkwTet @MikeWingerii I'm a fan of the "BS" Translation. That's the "Brian Simons" translation, of course.

@MikeWingerii Ya know, the Passion paraphrase does have a sort of a ring to it too 🧐 🤷🏽‍♂️

Good.

@JoshuaBarzon Go to 7, remove 35. I think they've had more reach and influence than the JWs, but I could be wrong in which case I'd flip to them.

You have to go one for the rest of your life, and you have to remove one from ever existing. What are you choosing?

@RELEVANT I covered NT Wright’s claims (which are not new as he has been saying this stuff for decades) in my extensive series on Women in Ministry.

This is crazy.

I will pay the fines for any @MLB Christian player who wears a Bible verse on their uniform. @MLB is ANTI-CHRISTIAN

Baptist pastor Matthew Olson of FBC Sharon just preached through the entire bible for 96 hours straight, setting an unofficial world record for longest marathon speech. Watch till the end to see his final words.

Hey Jasmine… Black pilot here. I think you missed the plot. Then again, that’s becoming a pattern. I graduated from West Point. I went through Army flight school. I learned to fly the AH-64 Apache. I deployed to combat and flew 55 combat missions over Baghdad. Nobody handed me a cockpit because of my skin color. Nobody lowered the standards for me. Nobody looked at me and said, “Let’s check a diversity box.” That’s what people like you don’t seem to understand. Suggesting that Black pilots, Black engineers, Black doctors, or Black leaders need special preferences to succeed is not empowering, it’s insulting. I didn’t want a different standard. I wanted the same standard. And when you’re flying into combat, the American people don’t care what race the pilot is. They care whether the pilot is qualified. Merit isn’t racist. Excellence isn’t discriminatory. And reducing every achievement to skin color says far more about your worldview than it does about mine.

@TheDog620 @HwsEleutheroi Grok suggests Craig Truglia. 😉

🔥 MAJOR DEBATE ANNOUNCEMENT 🔥 This Thursday at 5:30 PM CST, @HwsEleutheroi and I will be live to reveal an epic debate that is officially in the works. Who is it? What's the topic? Tune in and find out. 🔥 👇👇 youtube.com/watch?v=FFK5sF…

@HwsEleutheroi @WardRadioShow Great conversation after ending the call. It's sad that the state of modern Mormonism is so childish and intentionally ignorant. Well done keeping your composure.

Today on the DL at 5pm EDT we will be joined by some of the guys from @WardRadioShow to talk about their Calvinism parody song from a few weeks back. Join us!

Petition for you to consider. Drop The Passion Translation from YouVersion. c.org/SstDxTvgqN

Long ago I was asked if I would stop my criticisms of The Passion Translation if they changed the name to reflect that it isn’t really a translation. I said no. But I might be willing to reconsider that. If they named it after the author we could have a deal. Allow me to suggest that they name it after Brian Simmons to correctly distinguish that it’s his product and not the result of translating. This could communicate the value of the work well and avoid the confusion Brian has so far created. I hereby suggest “The BS Version” as a working and accurate title.

For anyone that have watched @MikeWingerii's Gary Morgan video and watched the meeting interaction, I think those of us who have dealt with narcissistic spiritual abusers might recognize some things that a person who hasn't dealt with these types might not recognize. They might see Gary as a bad guy but Allen and Peter as guys with genuinely good hearts that are trying to do the right thing. But the whole thing is rotten to the core. This might be a bit long but - I want to break down some of the tactics happening in the video: 1. Spiritual and secret knowledge weaponized as an alibi: What do I mean by that? Some might look at the Zoom call and wonder how they can see all of the evidence and say something like, "We're just interpreting the claims differently." The point is not to convince Mike. They likely knew this was going to go public eventually, so what they are doing here is signaling their spiritual and emotional superiority. Notice that Peter does this often especially after Mike gets worked up. They remain even-keeled and dismissive and their tactic is this: Make sure Mike looks out of control in certain aspects and we look like we're under control and contrite. This is why they will say, "I could see how an objective person would see it the way you see it Mike." That's belitting Mike but it's also meant to belittle YOU the viewer. You just don't KNOW enough about Gary, the situation, and how God works. Sure, you might be objective but you're not enlightened to the true truth. Why would they admit that? Because the goal is to signal that there is a truth beyond the facts - it is spiritual gaslighting. Notice how Peter and Allen do not have answers for the questions. Peter shrugs when proven he lied multiple times, Allen obfuscates and transfers questions into an investigation of Mike (what would make YOU realize this is false? Also, here are some unverifiable stories of Gary's prophetic gift that prove he's telling the truth because I was there. Trust me.) This tactic isn't to resolve the situation with Mike or the accusers, they've already written them off. It's to rally the unwavering believers to their own cause by showing that Mike and others are just not open to the Spirit's leading here. In fact, THEY are the deceptive ones (classic DARVO) because of the fake Facebook account and other issues. I had this same thing happen in ministry when I brought up abuse in a family in the church. "Well, no one actually KNOWS our family so unless you talk to a member of our family you don't know the whole story. Also, he's bad because X,Y, Z." 2. False transparency: Multiple times you will find that Gary, Peter, and Allen will signal to their own transparency. "We're the ones that asked for a recording." "We really wanted to turn over our electronics." "Of course we would pay for a third party investigation." "I have screenshots of my e-mail being compromised and I wanted to get to the bottom of it." "I WANTED to meet with Nathaniel and Hayley and look, Nathaniel seems to by lying about his own convictions he even apologized! What about that? This is intended to make the observer start to question their own lying eyes. Maybe there IS more to the story but Gary, Peter and Allen just can't say. They're too upstanding of individuals and Nathaniel DID apologize and claims he did so because he felt forced? That sounds like something someone with an axe to grind would do doesn't it? Innuendo and impugning the character of the accuser. But they don't actually provide any of that transparency (notice Peter was annoyed that a previous meeting he was in WAS recorded). They have an answer for why all of those things didn't happen. "we really wanted them to but... but... but... mostly it's Nathaniel's fault. But we're sorry he felt attacked." Again, I have experienced this. I, too, was forced into a situation where I apologized before a church for doing something small in relation to the large abuse going on. I was the one that stood in front of the congregation and had to voice my apologies to keep my job and then that apology was used against me one year later. Sound familiar? 3. It's YOUR prerogative MIKE: Peter breaks this out multiple times. It's the same as saying, "You are just too emotional to listen to reason and the Spirit. I can't force you too." Again, a way of undermining the case without having to refute any evidence and with the ability to move the goal posts when evidence is presented because Mike (the one seeking justice) is unhinged (without saying that outright. Basically it's saying, "if you would step out of your echo chamber and listen you would see it our way." And again, it's not intended to convince Mike. It's intended to convince the observer. There's more than just this, but these are three HUGE tactics used very brazenly in this zoom call. It introduces fallacies, baits emotions, and invites emotional accusation and derailing into ancillary accusations which makes the conversation move all over the place instead of stay centralized on what's most important. Chris falls for this a few times in the call but I don't blame him. With people like this it's like trying to nail jello against the wall. And that's their goal. Hope this helps.

Seeing some response to my statement on @MikhailaFuller's podcast about speaking in tongues. Some potentially helpful clarification: First, I am not a cessationist (though I see myself being accused of it). I state in the interview that I believe that the spiritual sign gifts (tongues, prophesy, healing) still take place today, just not normatively like they were in the Apostolic era. Nonetheless, I hold to the standard exegetical position that biblical tongues refer to known languages. In Acts 2, the foundational instance, foreign speakers understood the disciples in their own native languages, establishing the clearest precedent for interpreting the phenomenon throughout Scripture. Secondly, while bliblical specialists and theologians debate whether tongues encompass human languages alone or include angelic speech, the consensus recognizes that a tongue functions as a language -- either immediately intelligible to hearers or requiring interpretation. The requirement that Paul places on interpretation in 1 Corinthians 14 indicates that tongues contain objective, propositional meaning subject to translation, and his statement that “every valid instance of tongues contains intrinsic, propositional meaning" reinforces this understanding. A prominent scholarly argument identifies glossolalia as “the miraculous ability to speak unlearned human and (possibly) divine or angelic languages,” with the most common usage of “tongues” referring to ordinary human languages. The term γλῶσσα throughout the NT carries two primary meanings: the human organ or a human language, and careful word studies demonstrate that it never denotes non-cognitive utterance. However, scholarly consensus isn’t absolute the core agreement across interpretations centers on cognitive content: tongues communicate meaningful, intelligible information rather than incoherent utterance. Third, the early church evidence after the Apostolic era is virtually unanimous: the Early Church Fathers consistently interpreted the gift of tongues as the capacity to speak the many languages used across the earth. Their writings indicate the gift served an evangelistic purpose enabling communication with non-Christian populations. The Patristics universally understood “tongues” in Acts and 1 Corinthians to refer to human languages, and ancient Christians understood the biblical gift of tongues as a miracle involving intelligible human languages. When the fathers described the phenomenon, they used concrete language: John Chrysostom wrote that believers “would suddenly speak in Persian, another in Latin, another in the language of the Indians or of some other people” (Homilies on First Corinthians, Homily 35), and Augustine stated that disciples “spoke in the languages of all the nations” (Sermon 269, Sermo CCLXIX. The most significant, and almost exclusive, early figure associated with ecstatic speech for tongues was Montanus, a 2nd-century prophet whose followers emphasized speaking in tongues; he was actually excommunicated (not necessarily for his position on tongues) around AD 177. By the late 2nd century, ecstatic interpretations of tongues were present but only in context of ecclesiastical concern. One interesting nuance appears with Philastrius in the 4th century, who understood angels as capable of conversing in all languages and believed the apostles received this same ability at Pentecost. However, this doesn’t represent a departure from the “knowable language” framework rather, the Early Church Fathers understood the gift of tongues as the ability to speak all languages spoken by people. The Church Fathers agreed the gift was the ability to speak all languages known to humankind, an ability they ascribed to angels, suggesting the “languages of angels” would not refer to a distinct heavenly language but rather to the capacity to communicate with anyone encountered. The historical record shows no discussion among the fathers of ecstatic utterances, unknown languages, or supernatural unintelligible speech. The gift remained firmly anchored to practical, learnable human languages throughout Patristic interpretation. So if you've stuck around this long, I think my position is both exegetically and historically sound.

This might be the most important video on the internet right now. @NateAsks youtu.be/MPPLd-SNkPc?si…

If you’re hanging on by a thread make sure it's attached to the hem of His garment.

Want to win a FREE premium leather ESV? My friends at @crossway have partnered with barzonDESIGN.com to give away this stunning ESV Veritas ($350 value) from their redesigned Bible line. To enter: Follow @JoshuaBarzon, like + repost, & tag someone below. Ends on 5/15.

After seeing that all the writing money is romantasy now, I am officially announcing my new pen name and series - Lobellia Troutswallow's A Kingdom of Angst and Boning. When beautiful 20 year old Glorendirerial Pufferdown goes to magic dragon school for magical dragons she meets Prince Tyrendrial Starfire who is cruel yet hot. And probably an elf or something. Their passion ignites a war between the gnomes and the local planetarium. Only then Gloreandreal is kidnapped by the minotaur pirate Hernand The WellHung. Swooning with even more passion, will Glerendreiaiel choose the dragons of prophecy or forbidden love? Book 1: A Crown of Wolves and Roses Book 2: The Sword of Length and Girth Book 3: The Sword of Length and Girth 2: The Swordening Book 4: A Knight of Mist and Lilacs Book 5: A Shadow of Flame and Shadows Book 5.5: A Moat of Sorrow and Burritos Book 6: The Loins of El've'ns'mo'oor Book 7: A (noun) of (noun) and (noun) TBD Book 8: A Court of Wings and Thorns and Crowns and Book 9: Gundum Wing Onyx Tensai Angel Genesis Alpha Force Go Book 10: Smut Throne I should be able to get all ten books banged out by the weekend. I will make BILLIONS.

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