Bethel’s False Gospel and Other Issues (Exploring the Worship Music Debate #3)

All Articles / By /
Approximate Reading Time: 44 minutes

[Note: This article is a work in progress. I will update it as time allows, but I want to help people see that the greatest danger of Bethel Church is their false gospel, while all other issues are symptoms of that false teaching.]

After looking at the broad issues surrounding churches using music from Bethel, Hillsong, and Elevation, it’s essential to consider why these specific groups pose such a danger. After all, why should we be concerned about music sending people to a ministry that may get one or two things wrong? No one is perfect, right?

The remaining articles will reveal two major issues within each church: how they intentionally distort the Bible and how they preach a different Jesus. These warnings come in obedience to these New Testament passages:

Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world. (1 John 4:1-3 LSB)

Therefore, beloved, since you are looking for these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, spotless and blameless, and consider the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard lest you, having been carried away by the error of unprincipled men, fall from your own steadfastness, but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. (2 Peter 3:14–18 LSB)

The greatest danger to the church always comes from within. 1 John reminds us that it’s not enough for someone to talk about Jesus. They must confess Him. They must accurately represent who Jesus is. Likewise, 2 Peter warns us against those who twist the Bible. These destructive acts can only be done by those who have a form of godliness but deny its power (2 Timothy 3:5).

The issue isn’t using music from a church that differs on minor beliefs. Rather, these groups are dangerous because they teach a false gospel. Because they teach a false gospel, they go on to teach other dangerous or heretical doctrines. To support them is to support wolves in sheep’s clothing. These people may open a Bible and talk about Jesus, but anyone whom God saves under these ministries isn’t saved because of the teachers but despite them.

Table of Contents

Why Should Christians Avoid Bethel Church?

When looking at any church or teacher, our first question should be, “Do they preach a true gospel and confess the true Jesus?” If not, nothing else really matters. To that end, the first two points of this article are the most important. Anything after “Supernatural Gifts and a False Gospel” shows how Bethel’s false gospel leads to more unbiblical teachings and practices. 

Unbiblical teaching on supernatural gifts and abilities

The issue with Bethel isn’t that they believe God still grants supernatural gifts today. It’s hard to read the book of Acts without wondering if we should live similar lives as the apostles. John Piper is one of the most famous preachers today and has been open that he believes spiritual gifts exist today but must be exercised according to the Bible. The sticking point is that Bethel Church goes beyond the bounds of Scripture.

This section will show numerous examples of Bethel Church’s unbiblical teaching and practice of spiritual gifts. As you read these, ask two important questions: 

  1. Are these the behaviors modeled by Jesus, the prophets, and the apostles?
  2. Are the regular failures and unverifiable “successes” what Jesus, the prophets, and the apostles experienced? 

If the answer isn’t “yes” to both, then a core teaching of Bethel Church’s ministry is unbiblical.

Unbiblical examples of prophecy, healing, and tongues

Bethel has a school where people learn to use spiritual gifts as Bethel understands them. They list one of their goals as “Naturally Supernatural,” saying (emphasis mine):

“The school is designed to equip students not just to minister in the gifts of the Spirit but to live a supernatural lifestyle. You experience life-changing revelation about yourself and the world around you as you become aware of the Kingdom within you and are encouraged to be naturally supernatural by bringing heaven to earth wherever you go. We believe Jesus meant it when He taught us to pray “Your Kingdom come…on earth as it is in Heaven.”

The school website offers the free ebook “The Supernatural Ways of Royalty: Discovering Your Rights and Privileges of Being a Son or Daughter of God” by Bill Johnson and Kris Vallatton. In explaining one of the functions of prayer and prophecy, they say this (emphasis mine):

“In Hebrews 1:14 it says of the angels, “Are they not ministering spirits sent out to render service for the sake of those who will receive salvation?” The angels are there to make sure that the sons and daughters of the King come into their destiny and that the mission of the Kingdom actually happens. What many of us don’t realize is that we have a role in commissioning the angels. 

Psalm 103:19-22 says: The Lord has established His throne in the heavens, and His sovereignty rules over all. Bless the Lord, you His angels, mighty in strength who perform His word, obeying the voice of His word. Bless, the Lord, all you His hosts, you who serve Him, doing His will. Bless the Lord all you works of His in all places of His dominion. Bless the Lord, oh my soul. 

The angels heed the voice of His word, but the Church is His voice to declare that word on earth. I am proposing to you that the angels actually receive their commissioning from the prayers and prophecies of the saints. I don’t think we have to tell the angels what to do; I think we just need to pray and prophesy in the Name of the Lord, and when they hear the word of the Lord they go out and perform it. But we can only declare a word of the Lord that commissions the angels if we are under authority and therefore have authority to send them.”

One article on their school’s website begins by saying, “I knew a man who would know people’s secret sins the moment he laid eyes on them….. I know quite a few people who, from a young age, saw into the spiritual realm like you and I see into the physical realm. They see angels and demons constantly, without actively looking for them.” 

There’s an infamous story about a group of students who found a 15-year-old having an asthma attack and allegedly spent over 5 minutes trying to heal him miraculously. One even ran home to get her Bible. An ambulance was finally called, and the young man died four days later. Adding to the heartbreak, the boy’s mother said people from Bethel visited and even prophesied that he’d be raised from the dead.

There’s a similar story about a group of students hiking when one fell down a cliff. Rather than seek help, the two students spent an hour trying to heal him and debating whether they should even call for help.

Some students lengthened a woman’s leg and removed her pain through a healing session that included dancing around her.

However, some insist there is proof of healing. Elizabeth Reisinger frequently shares miraculous healings on her Facebook page. One post includes a video of a woman who’d lost part of her pinky in a childhood accident. As people gather around and command the finger to grow, the crowd starts cheering and crying as they witness her finger grow to its full length. Reisinger also posted a “before” and “after” picture of the healed finger, which you can see below.

Notice the knuckle crease below the pinkies in each photo. They’re lined up in the “before,” but the knuckle crease on the “healed” finger in the second photo is significantly higher. Yet despite this obvious sleight of hand, healings like this are celebrated as proof of God’s miraculous healing power.

We also can’t forget the tragic story of Olive, the two-year-old girl at Bethel who died in her sleep. Rather than mourning as parents who lost a child in a sin-cursed world, Bethel’s theology led Olive’s parents to spend six days holding prayer and worship services, showing their faith in Jesus to resurrect their daughter. This was odd to many, yet not at all surprising since Bill Johnson teaches it’s always God’s will to heal. You can read my own thoughts during the event here. As with other healings that could be confirmed, Olive’s parents and Bethel Church had to move on and hold a funeral for a little girl who hadn’t been mourned for six days.

However, many in Bethel do claim to experience real successes that are truly miraculous. 

  • Bethel’s own “testimonies” page shares numerous stories of incredible healings. 
  • In his book “When Heaven Invades Earth,” Bill Johnson shares what happened when an evangelist in Africa visited a grieving family: “She [a 9-year-old girl] was raised up about 12 hours after her death because someone was full of the Holy Spirit. He overflowed with the resurrection power of Jesus that filled him while he was trying to comfort to the family!” 
  • In “The Supernatural Ways of Royalty,” Johnson and Vallotton share what is actively happening in the world today: “Armed with the power of the Holy Spirit and commissioned to represent the King’s Son, we are healing the sick, raising the dead, and displacing devils. This is resulting in paupers becoming princes and the kingdom of this world becoming the Kingdom of our God!“ Toward the end of the book, Kris Vallotton shares the miraculous healing power (and personal voice) of Jesus that eventually led to his salvation: “I cried out in desperation, ‘If there is a God, if you heal my mother, I will find out who you are and I will serve you the rest of my life!’ An audible voice answered, ‘My name is Jesus Christ and you have what you requested!” The next morning my mother woke up completely healed. Her psoriasis was gone!”

One thing these various miracles have in common is that they’re always offered as a story without any evidence. Researchers have even asked for proof of Bethel’s claims, getting a response like this: “‘Being able to verify physical healings through medical records retrieved before and after healing is a time-consuming process, and one that not every person is willing or able to pursue,’ Tesauro said, in a series of statements for Shasta Scout that were recently confirmed by current Bethel Communications Director Brad Everett.’ The same website linked above reports that GMRI has done controlled research, but their website shows a clear bias as people who want to show the medical field that miraculous healing is real.

Prophecy is just as misunderstood as healing. Here’s a moment of spontaneous prophecy where God shows the singer an uncoiling rope. People in the room are meant to take that prophecy to mean God is unraveling their stress. Note how this is indistinguishable from a psychological trick psychics use: “cold reading.”

Bethel even encourages their people to be willing to get prophecy wrong. Pastor Renee Evans shares a class she leads where she and students get together to “practice prophesying.” She proudly tells the congregation that they sometimes get things wrong in these meetings, but “that does not make people a false prophet” (despite Deuteronomy 18:21-22 clearly contradicting her). She tells everyone to ask God for a word for someone; if God doesn’t give one, they should just make one up. A former Bethel student shares similar experiences, saying, “Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, your prophecies are horrible misses. But you don’t remember them being a terrible flop — you remember the one time it worked.”

For the sake of space, I will briefly mention an unbiblical definition of tongues. Their beliefs state, “We believe in the baptism of the Holy Spirit, speaking in other tongues, and the operation of the nine gifts of the Spirit,” and Bill Johnson discusses praying in tongues here. You can see my thorough discussion about why biblical tongues are only human languages here. 

What’s the issue?

Notice the trend in these examples. 

  • People say they have gifts never mentioned in Scripture, or they redefine those gifts we do see in the New Testament.
  • Prophecy is subjectively defined by whoever uses it: vague cold readings, making things up, or giving commands to angels.
  • Most healings and prophecies fail.
  • When they fail, even if it harms another, that doesn’t make the healer or prophet wrong.
  • Those that verifiably succeed are short-lived placebo effects, small things like a limb getting slightly longer, or outright deception.
  • In the age of smartphones, dramatic healings and resurrections always happen at times when no one can see or record them.

To Bethel’s credit, they aren’t shy about these things, which gives us no shortage of examples. So, as we evaluate the handful of examples here and the many more available across the internet, we want to ask two essential questions:

  1. Are these the behaviors modeled by Jesus, the prophets, and the apostles?
  2. Are the regular failures and unverifiable “successes” what Jesus, the prophets, and the apostles experienced? 

But the prophet who speaks a word presumptuously in My name which I have not commanded him to speak, or which he speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die.’ Now you may say in your heart, ‘How will we know the word which Yahweh has not spoken?’ When a prophet speaks in the name of Yahweh, if the thing does not come about or come true, that is the thing which Yahweh has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him. (Deuteronomy 18:20-22 LSB)

God took prophecy in His name so seriously that any failed prophecy would earn the death penalty. Biblical prophecy has always been measured by its accuracy to confirm that the person truly speaks for God. Saying “God says” when God didn’t say it isn’t just getting it wrong; it’s blasphemy. 

We never see an Old Testament prophet say something about Israel or the coming Messiah that they got wrong. Jesus didn’t prophesy anything without absolute confidence that it would come to pass. Likewise, places like 1 Corinthians 14:29 and 1 John 4:1 make it clear that genuine prophecy is never expected to be wrong.

When it comes to prophecy, Bethel equips their people to be the false prophets Jeremiah was warned about:

Then Yahweh said to me, “The prophets are prophesying lies in My name. I have neither sent them nor commanded them nor spoken to them; they are prophesying to you a vision of lies, divination, futility, and the deception of their own hearts. Therefore thus says Yahweh concerning the prophets who are prophesying in My name, although it was not I who sent them—yet they keep saying, ‘There will be no sword or famine in this land’—by that sword and famine those prophets shall meet their end! The people also to whom they are prophesying will be thrown out into the streets of Jerusalem because of the famine and the sword; and there will be no one to bury them—neither them, nor their wives, nor their sons, nor their daughters—for I will pour out their own evil on them. (Jeremiah 14:14-16 LSB)

This stuff matters. Bethel’s level of false prophecy isn’t just a simple misunderstanding. It’s dangerous and disastrous for the leaders and those who follow their false teachings. God does not tolerate people speaking for Him when He hasn’t spoken to them.

There’s also no concept of a failed healing attempt unless the healer wasn’t reliant on God, as seen when Jesus rebuked the disciples for being unable to cast out a demon in Matthew 17:14-21. Healings took place in front of others and were so miraculous and undeniable that onlookers were open to the gospel of the God they clearly represented. Likewise, we have no reason to believe that paralytics or lepers eventually reverted back to their ailments.

Supernatural gifts are central to everything Bethel does. They have ministries and an entire school dedicated to it. People cannot follow Bethel without getting swept up in this teaching.

And, as we’ve seen, that core belief of Bethel is unbiblical. It doesn’t align with what we’ve seen from the prophets, apostles, or the Jesus they claim to follow. And, most dangerously of all, this unbiblical teaching has found its way to the gospel they preach.

Supernatural gifts and a false gospel

All false teachers will inevitably preach a false gospel. While we can look at things like Bethel’s mission statement and see encouraging statements like this:

We believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, the one and only Son of God, was conceived of the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, and is God’s Anointed One, empowered by the Holy Spirit to inaugurate God’s kingdom on earth. He was crucified for our sins, died, was buried, resurrected, and ascended into heaven, and is now alive today in the presence of God the Father and in His people. He is “true God” and “true man.”

We can look just a bit further down and see this:

We believe in the victorious, redemptive work of Christ on the cross provides freedom from the power of the enemy – sin, lies, sickness, and torment.

Understand what is said in this short statement: at the cross, Jesus Christ died to redeem us from sin and torment (which I trust they mean in the traditional sense), but also lies and sickness. 

Bethel’s over-emphasis on supernatural gifts demands that they preach a false gospel and confess a false Jesus. Let’s look at the gospel issues in their church doctrine statement, how they falsely teach evangelism, the means of salvation, and how we can know we’re truly saved.

Jesus saves us from lies

What lies did Jesus die to rescue us from? It’s ambiguous. But based on the context of Bethel Church’s focus on the supernatural, how Bill Johnson discusses lies, and the clear influence of the Word of Faith heresy on the church, we can get an idea of their understanding of Christ’s redemptive sacrifice under God’s wrath. 

  • In this 20-minute clip, these are lies created by a literal “spirit of deception” that makes us doubt our authority or holds our neighbors captive. It’s the lie that God can’t heal marriage or that someone can’t be successful in life. Before the ending prayer, he tells the congregation they need to receive grace from Jesus to expel these lies.
  • This sermon talks about mental strongholds, which are lies that allow Satan to invade our thoughts based on interpreting 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 to mean those strongholds are personal thoughts and not unbiblical worldviews. Johnson says, “The renewed mind enables us to usher in the miraculous.” How? According to him, the renewed mind proves God’s will, and God’s will is for Heaven to be on Earth. Therefore, the renewed mind allows us to perform miracles to bring Heaven according to God’s will. Those lies also create anxiety and inhibit our ability to be artistically creative, which is vital because Zechariah 1 shows that God defeats worldwide demonic oppression through artists.
  • Bill Johnson said, “The enemy lies to us to make problems appear bigger than the solutions we carry.”
  • Kris Vallotton, Senior Associate Leader at Bethel, once preached, “That’s why I believe that Paul said ‘but especially that you would prophesy,’ because when you prophesy words become worlds and you’ve changed people’s destiny. You create things that are not and you call them as though they are. I believe that you could change history through prophetic proclamations. I believe that Daniel changed Israel’s history through prophetic proclamations.”

The Word of Faith movement teaches that our words and beliefs have power. Based on Bethel’s consistent teaching about our authority to command things in the name of Jesus (or to unshackle God so He can act), the only explanation is that they believe Christ’s sacrifice on the cross empowers us to stop believing the lies of Satan and his demons and instead live the supernatural life we’re called to.

Jesus saves us from sickness

At this point, we know what healing means at Bethel Church. However, it’s worth pointing out that Bethel Church doesn’t just believe Jesus can cure disease or even that Jesus gives people the gift of healing. Rather, they believe bodily healing is as central to the gospel as the forgiveness of sins. Placing healing in that category means that it’s an absolute and guaranteed part of the Christian life. 

According to Bethel Church, the gospel of Jesus Christ is physical healing. 

Bill Johnson said as much when he wrote, “How can God choose not to heal someone when He already purchased their healing? Was His blood enough for all sin, or just certain sins? Were the stripes He bore only for certain illnesses, or certain seasons of time? When He bore stripes in His body He made a payment for our miracle. He already decided to heal. You can’t decide not to buy something after you’ve already bought it. 

Read that carefully and clearly. The brief mention of Christ’s death paying for sins is said in the midst of Him paying for all physical healing. Bill Johnson very clearly states Bethel’s understanding of Christ’s sacrificial death. They’ve defined the gospel they preach.

Johnson continues preaching this gospel of physical healing in this sermon clip, saying, “I refuse to create a theology that allows for sickness.” He claims that Paul’s thorn in the flesh is sickness, then says, “That’s a different gospel. Jesus didn’t model it, and he didn’t teach it. And Paul said you can’t change the standard [referring to Galatians 1:8].” To Bill Johnson, only a false gospel allows sickness to be God’s will. 

He clearly states it again in a sermon clip on Bill Johnson’s official YouTube channel titled “Divine Health Is Your Inheritance.” He even claims, “Anytime an affliction gets more painful under prayer it’s because the anointing torments a demon. And the reason he’ll increase the pain is to try to bring fear to the person who’s sick and fear to the person who’s praying.” So all sickness is demonic, and anytime someone continues suffering under physical maladies it’s because the sufferer or the person praying needs more faith to overcome that demon.

Johnson remains consistent in his understanding of Christ’s work on the cross in another clip on his official channel: “I believe it is the provision of the Lord in His suffering on our behalf Jesus bore stripes in His body through brutal beating as an atoning work to deal with the power of sickness and disease.”

In the end, Johnson’s false gospel stems from the false Jesus he preaches. I’ll cover this in-depth when we talk about “Kenosis” in a future section, but here’s a summary of how one false teaching has led to a false gospel of physical healing:

  • Jesus never did anything as God.
  • Jesus did everything by the Spirit to model to us everything humans can do through the Spirit today.
  • It was always Jesus’s will to heal those who came to Him.
  • Therefore, it’s always God’s will to heal people today.

It’s always God’s will to heal today because it was always Jesus’s will to heal during His earthly ministry. We are given power from the same source to do the same things. Thus, part of the gospel is our “inheritance” to heal and be healed by others.

False evangelism and false assurance

Bill Johnson’s popular book “When Heaven Invades Earth” works under one fundamental assumption: true Christians should demonstrate the power of God in their lives. But he doesn’t mean the ability to turn from sin, please God, or live a life of holiness and surrender. To Johnson, the truest evidence of a person indwelt by the Holy Spirit is the manifestation of supernatural power.

David Shrock has a concise and honest review of the book. In the review, Shrock takes great care to conclude that the book is heretical, a charge none of us should ever make lightly. I’d like to share several excerpts from the book with a small bit of commentary to help us see just how twisted Bill Johnson’s understanding of the gospel truly is and why he and Bethel Church deserve such a title.

Jesus gave people the right to disbelieve it all if there was no demonstration of power upon His ministry. I hunger for the day when the Church will make the same statement to the world. If we’re not doing the miracles that Jesus did, you don’t have to believe us. (page 93)

Signs will always accompany a true gospel message. Any church not giving the gospel alongside miracles isn’t sharing a true, or at least complete, gospel. He doubles down on this toward the end of the book:

We must realize the sad truth—it is common for people to acknowledge the kindness of the Church and still not be brought to repentance. But power forces the issue because of its inherent ability to humble mankind.

Jesus said, “If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would have no sin.”

Is He saying that sin didn’t exist in the hearts of the Jews until He performed miracles? I doubt it very much. He is explaining the principle revealed in Peter’s repentance. Power exposes sin and brings people to a decision. When power is missing, we are not using the weapons that were in Jesus’ arsenal when He ministered to the lost. The outcome? Most remain lost. Power forces people to be aware of God on a personal level, and it is demanding in nature. (page 115, emphasis mine)

Why are people lost? Why aren’t our kids, friends, or neighbors being saved? Because we aren’t demonstrating the power of God through miracles. The word of God isn’t sufficient to call people to repentance. To Bill Johnson, the true power of the gospel is in the signs and miracles. 

However, the supernatural isn’t just helpful in calling people to repentance. Bill Johnson says that God promises entire cities will repent if enough people perform miracles in them.

But there is another message contained in this story [in Matthew 11:20-26]. Tyre, Sidon, and Sodom would have repented had they been exposed to the same dimension of outpouring! Did you hear it? They would have repented! It’s a prophetic promise for today. Miracles on the streets of the “sin cities” of the world will cause them to repent! It is this secret that gives us access to the heart of these great cities! The San Franciscos and the Amsterdams, the New Orleans and the Rio de Janeiros of this world will repent […] if there is an army of saints, full of the Holy Ghost, walking their streets, caring for the broken, bringing the God of power into their impossible circumstances. They will repent! That’s a promise. They simply await those with the message of the Kingdom to come. 

Powerlessness cancels that possibility, and in its place comes God’s judgment. (page 118, emphasis mine)

Again, Johnson clearly states that miracles don’t just help with the gospel; they are absolutely central to it. Performing enough miracles secures God’s promise to save entire cities. 

But people don’t just need to witness God – they need to witness us. Everyone’s salvation hinges on whether we have enough faith to perform miracles, then go out to cities and perform enough of those miracles for God to keep His promise. Johnson’s language throughout the book doesn’t just call for us to be Christ’s representatives as we obey the Great Commission. According to Johnson, millions will be saved or lost based on whether we take hold of God’s promise.

The anointing Jesus received was the equipment necessary, given by the Father to make it possible for Him to live beyond human limitations. For He was not only to redeem man, He was to reveal the Father. In doing so, He was to unveil the Father’s realm called heaven. That would include doing supernatural things. The anointing is what linked Jesus, the man, to the divine, enabling Him to destroy the works of the devil. (page 75, emphasis mine)

Previously in the book, Bill Johnson wrote, “If He performed miracles because He was God, then they would be unattainable for us. But if He did them as a man, I am responsible to pursue His lifestyle.” He diminishes the power and godhood of Jesus by elevating us to the same level of power and authority as the God of the universe who took on human flesh. Thus, evidence of salvation is the ability to do what Jesus did.

God is our Father, and we inherit His genetic code. Every believer has written into his or her spiritual DNA the desire for the supernatural. It is our predetermined sense of destiny. This God-born passion dissipates when it has been taught and reasoned away, when it’s not been exercised, or when it’s been buried under disappointment.

The spirit of the antichrist is at work today, attempting to influence believers to reject everything that has to do with the Holy Spirit’s anointing. This rejection takes on many religious forms, but basically it boils down to this: we reject what we can’t control. That spirit has worked to reduce the gospel to a mere intellectual message, rather than a supernatural God encounter. It tolerates the mention of power if it’s in the past. Occasionally it considers that power is appropriate for people in far away places. But, never does this spirit expect the anointing of God’s power to be available in the here and now. The spirit of control works against one of God’s favorite elements in man: faith. Trust is misplaced as it becomes anchored in man’s ability to reason. (page 77, emphasis mine)

This is classic evidence of conditioning. Bill Johnson says that salvation gives us God’s (symbolic?) genetic code, with certain expectations of what we can do. He then closes off anyone who hasn’t experienced the supernatural or doubts Johnson’s claims by insisting that any dispute is from the antichrist. By going all-in on the supernatural being evidence of salvation, he claims that anyone who questions or doesn’t experience it is under the influence of Christ’s enemy. 

It’s also worth noting that Johnson draws a line between intellect and experience. The book has a pattern of setting the reader against religion, and he often accuses religion of squashing our ability to live out a supernatural life as we’re meant to. Here, he makes it clear that truth isn’t what we know but what we experience. We must encounter God through the supernatural to truly live in a way that pleases Him. Anything less than that is just empty religion.

Pastor Surprise is an apostolic leader working with Rolland and Heidi Baker of Iris Ministries in Mozambique. During an evangelistic crusade in which he was preaching, a 9-year-old girl died, which threatened to end the series of meetings. The entire village was stricken with grief. The next day Pastor Surprise went to visit the family, and the child’s body was still in the hut where she had died the night before. As he was praying for the family, he happened to be holding the little girl’s hand. He was not praying for her to rise from the dead, yet after a few minutes the young girl squeezed his hand. She was raised up about 12 hours after her death because someone was full of the Holy Spirit. He overflowed with the resurrection power of Jesus that filled him while he was trying to comfort to the family!

A bottle is not completely full until it overflows. So it is with the Holy Spirit. Fullness is measured in overflow. When we get introspective, we restrict the flow of the Holy Spirit. We become like the Dead Sea; water flows in, but nothing flows out, and nothing can live in its stagnant waters. The Holy Spirit is released through faith and compassion, and faith and compassion are never self-centered. (page 72, emphasis mine)

Salvation can be evidenced without us even trying. A missionary in Africa was so filled with the Holy Spirit that He poured out of him, resurrecting a young girl. This is the sort of lifestyle Johnson claims should be standard for Christians.

Beyond that, being “filled with the Spirit” in Ephesians 5:8 now becomes a literal command that can be measured. This story and its teaching imply that a believer can have the Holy Spirit, but He may only partially fill them. We will only know we’re “filled with the Spirit” when the supernatural happens around us. 

These examples, and many more to be found across Bethel’s teachings, share one thing in common. All of them place the greatest emphasis on the supernatural. The supernatural is required to give the gospel, and demonstrating enough of it even guarantees that people will be saved. And the supernatural lifestyle necessary to give the gospel is the same one that confirms our own salvation. If we truly have the Holy Spirit inside of us, we should always expect Him to work miracles through us. Based on Bethel’s teachings, this is the core of the gospel and salvation.

The prosperity gospel

The Prosperity Gospel is a false gospel that teaches Jesus died to grant us health, wealth, and prosperity in this life. We’ve seen Bethel emphasize the “health” part, but Bill Johnson demonstrates its entire teaching.

In one sermon clip, Bill Johnson says that the purpose of the gospel is to create inward change in us so that our future generations can gain physical blessings:

What does it look like to have a soul that is prosperous? It was dealt with in Third John verse 2: “I pray that you would be in health and prosper, even as your soul prospers.” So the target, the aim of the gospel, is to heal people on the inside. Jen’s word this morning was perfect during prayer time, healing people on the inside. And so, picture this: He says, “Those who fear the Lord, something happens on their internal world where things start getting healed.” And it becomes so significant that it prepares the next generation to be able to steward a vast inheritance of land.

In a similar sermon, he says the inward change from the gospel will impact our physical health and financial situation: 

What does it look like to have bounty in the soul? In our intellect? It means that instead of anxiety and resentment and those kinds of things that plague our fault life, instead of those things taking root, we actually remain a creative expression of God in the earth. As soon as I become anxious over details of my life, as soon as I become worried and fearful over situations, as soon as I begin to entertain resentment and vindication and stuff on people, I lose my creative edge. And the thing the enemy fears the most, in many ways, is an accurate expression of who our God is as a creator through His people that are free to think out of a place of abundance and a place of divine health. The Lord would actually express His nature into culture, into society through people that are healed here and healed here, whole in these places of the soul. Now, from God’s perspective in the New Testament, He wants us bountiful here, but then He says, “May you prosper and be in good health.” In other words, what’s going on inside of you, let it shape your physical health, let it shape your emotional and mental health, but also let it shape your finances, your financial world.

Johnson also teaches the Prosperity Gospel in “The Supernatural Power of the Transformed Mind” (emphasis mine):

For many years I misunderstood the biblical concept of desire. Psalm 37:4 tells us: ‘Delight yourself in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart.’ Like many pastors, I foolishly taught that if you delighted yourself in the Lord, He would change your desires by telling you what to desire. But that’s not at all what this means. That verse literally means that God wants to be impacted by what you think and dream. God is after your desires. The word desire is made up of the prefix ‘de’ meaning ‘of,’ and sire meaning ‘father.’ Desire is, by nature, of the Father. 

The bolded language is similar to other prosperity preachers. The idea is that our desires move God. He is waiting for our permission to act and give us what we desire as long as we have enough faith in Him. Yet Johnson takes it further by saying that our desires are “of the Father.” Of course, this ignores what God says about our hearts and the desires it creates:

The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick; who can know it? (Jeremiah 17:9)

With these teachings, we once again see the purpose and benefits of Christ’s death redefined. Our assurance of salvation depends on our improved health and wealth, not the perfect work of Jesus on the cross to secure our salvation. It’s just one more example of the false gospel coming out of Bethel Church.

What’s the issue?

What is the gospel?

Now I make known to you, brothers, the gospel which I proclaimed as good news to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I proclaimed to you as good news, unless you believed for nothing.

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. After that He appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep. After that, He appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also. (1 Corinthians 15:1-8 LSB)

Bethel talks about Christ dying for sins yet redefines it to include dying for our physical healing and prosperity in this life. They add to the gospel to suit their greater desire for supernatural gifts. Not only do they promise something Jesus never died for, but Christ’s inconsistency with granting healing or prosperity undermines the effectiveness of His death to redeem us from our sins. Look at what God clearly teaches about what Christ’s brutal death purchased:

Who Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, so that having died to sin, we might live to righteousness; by His WOUNDS YOU WERE HEALED (1 Peter 2:24)

He didn’t bear our illnesses. He didn’t die to save us from poverty. The innocent Savior took on the guilt of His people, suffering in our place so that we could be made righteous. His wounds healed our guilt before a holy God, nothing more and nothing less.

In addition to changing the gospel, they change what is required to give it. Bill Johnson clearly states that the supernatural should accompany the gospel and that no one should believe it unless miracles accompany the truth of Jesus.

And according to Paul’s custom, he went to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and setting before them that the Christ had to suffer and rise again from the dead, and saying, “This Jesus whom I am proclaiming to you is that Christ.” And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, along with a great multitude of the God-fearing Greeks and not a few of the leading women. (Acts 17:2-4 LSB)

According to Bill Johnson, the Apostle Paul gave an incomplete gospel because he only used Scripture to present the gospel.

What does God say about those who preach a different version of Jesus?

Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world. (1 John 4:1-3 LSB)

It’s not enough to talk about Jesus. You must confess the true Jesus. Those who intentionally change the character and nature of Jesus Christ are not from God. They are false prophets.

How about those who twist God’s word to serve themselves?

Therefore, beloved, since you are looking for these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, spotless and blameless, and consider the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard lest you, having been carried away by the error of unprincipled men, fall from your own steadfastness, (2 Peter 3:14-17 LSB)

If a teacher or church spends decades twisting Scripture, it’s a sign they are more than misguided. It’s intentional. Distorting God’s word is the behavior of those who are untaught, unstable, and unprincipled.

But how should we respond to anyone intentionally changing the gospel?

But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should proclaim to you a gospel contrary to the gospel we have proclaimed to you, let him be accursed! (Galatians 1:8 LSB)

Paul’s strong language shows us how important the gospel is. We cannot be flippant about understanding it, nor can we hand-wave those who intentionally preach a different version of it. Embracing these accursed teachers is disastrous for the universal church, the local church, and individual believers. That’s why he warned Timothy against those who rise from within the church and try to lead others to a different gospel:

But know this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, without gentleness, without love for good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, but having denied its power. Keep away from such men as these. For among them are those who enter into households and take captive weak women weighed down with sins, being led on by various desires, always learning and never able to come to the full knowledge of the truth. (2 Timothy 3:1-7 LSB)

Bethel seeks after experiences. Their entire ministry centers around emotional experiences. They lead thousands astray by teaching them to do the same. What they say appears very godly, yet their understanding of the gospel, its delivery, and our assurance of salvation shows a lack of trust in its true power. Instead, they teach that the full reality of the gospel is only understood by our experiences. 

Bethel says some good things on their official website. Some of Bill Johnson’s sermons have biblical truth in them. I also do not doubt that Jesus has saved people at Bethel church. But having an appearance of godliness isn’t the same as following the true Jesus.

Nathan Knight wisely wrote, “Stated Belief + Actual Practice = Actual Belief.” Bethel is a perfect example of this. They say some good things, and things like “Rediscovering Bethel” have even tried to address many criticisms against Bill Johnson and Bethel Church. But when we take those stated beliefs and hold them up against what else is said and done, we get a clear picture of what Bethel actually believes.

Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorn bushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. (Matthew 7:15-18 LSB)

Be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood. I know that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them. (Acts 20:28-30)

For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. Therefore it is not surprising if his ministers also disguise themselves as ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to their deeds. (2 Corinthians 11:13-15 LSB)

But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. And many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned. And in their greed they will exploit you with false words, their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. (2 Peter 2:1-3)

The evidence is there: Bethel doesn’t believe in a true gospel. They don’t confess the true Jesus. They are the kinds of false teachers and false prophets the New Testament warns us against. The greatest danger to the church will always come from within, from those who appear godly yet want to lead people astray in the name of a false Jesus. Bethel Church is a perfect example of that danger.

Trying to explain the contradictions

Note that every single Bill Johnson clip I’ve linked to in this article has him wearing glasses. His son Eric has significant hearing loss. His late wife, Beni Johnson, passed away from cancer in 2022. Although Johnson addressed the reality of his truly difficult situation, his words in no way match what he’s spent years proclaiming from the pulpit, in books, or what he continues to preach. 

Stated Belief + Actual Practice = Actual Belief. Because of Bethel’s actual beliefs, thousands who have trusted in Jesus’s sacrificial death to heal their diseases are left confused, lost, and questioning the strength of their faith.

Bethel has been producing “Rediscovering Bethel” where they try to explain or clarify many misunderstandings about their teaching. In one titled “The Theology of Sickness and Healing,” Bill Johnson and Dann Farrelly explain the claims of “It’s God’s will to heal everyone” are intentionally bold, but they don’t mean it. Johnson then says:

“I don’t want to create a theology around what didn’t happen. That’s a really big deal for me. My approach to the faith things is: I’ll tell people, I say listen, faith brings answers. Enduring faith brings answers with character. So sometimes we’re in a journey, we’re in a process, and the Lord is building. He’s building us. He’s not just doing something through us. it’s not just about the miracle or the deliverance or whatever it might be. It’s about people becoming like Christ and enduring faith is a part of that power, you know. The whole ‘baptism of the Holy Spirit for the purpose of power.’ Power was for the miracle but it was also for the endurance until the miracle came.” 

I’d encourage watching the full video to understand how they justify all their past and present teachings. The bolded part above is Johnson clearly saying he only wants to focus on the successes and not try to understand why the gospel of Jesus Christ doesn’t always heal. The rest of that quote is valuable because it shows the lengths required to explain to his flock why their faith isn’t bringing the healing that Bethel promised them would come. 

In the end, though, this backpedaling completely contradicts their belief that Christ’s death was sufficient to pay for every sin and every sickness. Once again, read how Bill Johnson claimed it’s always God’s will to heal. Was His blood enough for all sin, or just certain sins? Were the stripes He bore only for certain illnesses, or certain seasons of time? When He bore stripes in His body He made a payment for our miracle. He already decided to heal. You can’t decide not to buy something after you’ve already bought it. 

As time has passed, Bill Johnson’s version of Jesus has proven He can’t heal His people. It turns out the stripes Jesus bore were for certain illnesses and certain seasons of time. To continue justifying this false gospel, Johnson can no longer overlook his own physical ailments, losing his wife to cancer, and the thousands of heartbroken people in his congregation and around the world who trust Jesus just as Bethel Church has taught them to.

The “Rediscovering Bethel” video was released in 2021 and seems to contradict much of the bold claims of Bethel Church. One could hope that they’ve at least stopped offering empty promises. But that’s not what happened. In early 2023, Bill Johnson released the sermon clip previously linked in this article titled “Divine Health Is Your Inheritance,” continuing to show that Bethel Church’s beliefs on healing remain contradictory and unbiblical. 

New Apostolic Reformation / Independent Network Charismatics

There is a growing movement called the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR), a label created by C. Peter Wagner, who popularized it. Bethel Church rejects that association, saying, “We don’t belong to anything of that nature, but we heartily agree with many of the things some of our friends in different organizations are really pursuing.” Instead, they align with Independent Network Charismatics (INC). However, if you compare the beliefs of the NAR and Bethel’s preferred INC, they are almost indistinguishable. Both groups center around these core tenets:

  • Continuation of apostles and prophets
  • Dominionism and the “Seven Mountain Mandate”
  • A form of Prosperity Theology attached to Dominionism
  • People still receive supernatural revelation 
  • Signs, wonders, and miracles are normal for today

It’s important not to get too hung up on which group’s label we want to give Bethel. Movements like the NAR and INC provide useful umbrella terms to quickly describe a set of beliefs. Still, the most important thing to analyze is Bethel’s specific beliefs that align with these groups.

We’ve already taken a deep look at their belief that miracles are normal for today and redefining prophecy to teach that God still speaks outside of His word (supernatural revelation). Now, let’s look at two other core NAR/INC beliefs that drive much of what Bethel does.

Continuation of apostles

“Is Bill Johnson an Apostle?” In this 12-minute video, Bill Johnson and Dann Farrelly answer that question with a “yes” and give clear insight into what they believe an apostle is today.

I will include some quotes from the video with my own comments after each.

The way I look at the apostolic gift, the apostolic calling, is that both the apostle and the prophet have a position. Their position gives them a perception of heaven and how it’s to affect earth. It’s a culturizing role. ….. It has to do with perception; it has to do with impact. The pastor is moved by the needs of the sheep, as he should be. You don’t want him dreaming about, you know, 100 years down the road and you want him caring for the flock. And so he has a perception on the here and now, the pain of this person, the success of this one. Yes, and that’s a gift that God’s given him. It’s a position of perception, where the apostle and the prophet tend to see more future-type things. Wisdom enables us to see a structure, order, these steps bring about this result. And again, it’s not a more spiritual position, I don’t believe. I don’t think it’s a hierarchy but it’s a, it’s like you stand here, tell us what you see. You stand here, tell us. So the pastor says, “Well, I see these people are hurting.” The apostle says, “I see this is what God is building into the earth.”

To Johnson, an apostle is more like an entrepreneur or influencer. While a pastor focuses on the day-to-day needs of people, apostles look at the bigger picture and use their insights to lead the church into making a cultural impact. Elsewhere, he and others like him defend this by rightly pointing out that the apostles were earth-shakers who forever changed history. But because Bill Johnson believes the universal church is meant to conquer the world (as we’ll discuss in Dominionism below), he views apostles like himself as the ones who will lead the church in that calling.

Dann Farrelly: I would say that marks of true apostolic leadership are servanthood and humility; that should be part of it—the ability to endure suffering for the cause of the kingdom. We see signs and wonders are a part of it as well. I think Paul and Peter interpreted Old Testament scripture for their communities, you know, so there’s a measure of that.

Dann Farrelly rightly points out what we see about apostles in the New Testament. In a way, an apostle’s qualifications are similar to a pastor’s because many of them boil down to being a mature believer. However, like a pastor, the New Testament also gives us unique identifiers that set them apart from spiritually mature Christians.

Apostles performed signs and wonders.

The signs of a true apostle were worked out among you with all perseverance, by signs and wonders and miracles. (2 Corinthians 2:12) 

Miracles are central to Bethel’s theology, and Bill Johnson isn’t shy about how prevalent they should be in the life of a Christian. However, there seems to be no evidence that Bill Johnson has ever performed a sign or miracle. At best, we see things like this where he leads the church in healing others of invisible maladies with no verifiable evidence. This is especially problematic since the apostles’ miracles were so clear, objective, and undeniable that onlookers had no choice but to conclude those men must represent God.

Apostles witnessed the resurrected Jesus.

When choosing a new apostle to replace Judas, there was an explicit requirement that no “apostle” today fulfills: “Therefore it is necessary that of the men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us— beginning with the baptism of John until the day that He was taken up from us—one of these must become a witness with us of His resurrection.” (Acts 1:21-22). 

An apostle had to be one who had witnessed the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is why Jesus appeared to Paul in Acts 9:1-8, later leading Paul to defend his apostleship by saying, “and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also. For I am the least of the apostles, and not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. (1 Corinthians 15:8-9)

The marks of an apostle include undeniable miracles performed by someone who personally witnessed Jesus Christ after His resurrection. For all the humility and willingness to suffer that Bill Johnson may possess, he has neither performed miracles nor seen the resurrected Savior.

Promoting what the Bible warns against

Bill Johnson also wrote a book called “When Heaven Invades Earth, ” demonstrating his theology. 

In this post-denominational era we are seeing an unprecedented movement of believers gathering around spiritual fathers (not gender specific). In times past we gathered around certain truths, which led to the formation of denominations. The strength of such a gathering is the obvious agreement in doctrine, and usually practice. The weakness is it doesn’t allow for much variety or change. At the turn of the Twentieth Century, the people who received the baptism in the Holy Spirit with speaking in tongues were no longer welcome in many of these churches, because most denominations held statements of faith cast in stone.

But now this gravitational pull toward fathers is happening even within denominations. Such a gathering of believers allows for differences in nonessential doctrines without causing division. Many consider this movement to be a restoration of the apostolic order of God. (When Heaven Invades Earth, page 86, emphasis mine)

This further explains Johnson’s understanding of apostles being cultural influencers. Rather than believers submitting to leadership in their local church, Johnson places high value on people from all churches and denominations rallying around spiritual fathers and mothers outside their church walls. To him, this proves that God is bringing the universal church back to the apostolic methods He originally designed.

Beyond undermining the value and intention of the local church, this raises two severe concerns. First, Bill Johnson encourages people to rally around certain Christian personalities, despite this New Testament warning:

Now I exhort you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all agree and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be made complete in the same mind and in the same judgment. For I have been informed concerning you, my brothers, by Chloe’s people, that there are quarrels among you. Now I mean this, that each one of you is saying, “I am of Paul,” and “I of Apollos,” and “I of Cephas,” and “I of Christ.” Has Christ been divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? (1 Corinthians 1:10-13)

Johnson claims this return to the “apostolic order” is meant to break down denominational divisions. Yet, he believes this must be accomplished through what we can only describe as the “Christian celebrity epidemic” in modern Christianity.

Second, he encourages people to look beyond what their local church may teach and find a spiritual father they want to follow. Once again, the New Testament gives us a clear warning against this:

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. (2 Timothy 4:3-4)

Bill Johnson praises our culture’s desire to latch on to a particular teacher they resonate with. God warns that this behavior will only worsen as Christ’s return draws closer. 

When beliefs lead to action

Finally, it’s worth looking at what this unbiblical understanding of apostleship leads to. The video below is a gathering of apostles agreeing to cast out the literal “spirit of racism” using Gandalf’s staff from the Lord of the Rings movie.

After explaining their apostolic authority to make declarations and then explaining this iconic scene from the Lord of the Rings, they invite the church to join them in casting out the spirit. At the 4:46 mark, you see them actually act out this scene, slamming the wooden staff down three times and purging racism from the church once and for all.

Many Christians saw this and laughed. But it’s important to ask why this happened in the first place. What’s going on in Bethel and the movement they are part of to lead to this? 

Ultimately, this is the danger of going beyond the confines of the Bible. When God’s word isn’t sufficient to tell us what is true, our fleshly interpretations will lead to fleshly behaviors. Reverence for God gives way to experimentation and experientialism. You must constantly come up with new and exciting things because the church’s very foundation is based on experiences. And, on rare occasions, they must rely on gimmicks like this to keep things fresh.

Apostolically reenacting a scene from a movie to purge the spirit of racism was probably very exciting. But what’s happened since? What happens next? 

When someone misunderstands apostleship, everything that follows will be built on that unbiblical foundation. Sound biblical teaching and instruction is either misinterpreted or outright ignored. In its place is whatever feels right in the moment, even if it’s blasphemously done “In Jesus’s name.”

What’s the issue?

We’ve looked at the issues around a few specific problems with believing apostles are still around today. However, one quote from the Rediscovering Bethel video above shows the fundamental issue in Bethel:

Dann Farrelly: “We’ve [I think he means the universal church] been comfortable with pastors and teachers and evangelists, but we’re uncomfortable… and part of the church says prophets and apostles were a foundational gift that just was for a season and ended, and that now it’s the season of pastors teachers and evangelists. And we would say: no, that we don’t think that’s the way it is.”


Bill Johnson: “It doesn’t say that.”


Dann: “No, it doesn’t say that. I think they look around the lack of them and go ‘I guess they’re gone.’”

Bill Johnson insists the Bible doesn’t say that apostles were meant to be a foundation and not a role meant to continue. However, it very clearly does say that apostles were temporary:

So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone, in whom the whole building, being joined together, is growing into a holy sanctuary in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit. (Ephesians 2:19-22 LSB)

Paul calls on the process of constructing a building to explain how God has designed the church. During construction, you begin by laying a unique piece called a “cornerstone” that must be cut perfectly because the rest of the building depends on its quality. After laying that cornerstone, you build a foundation from it. After the foundation is laid, you build the rest of the building on top of it.

(Image credit to Chris Lenoir)

Like a cornerstone, Jesus Christ is unique. And like a foundation, the apostles only existed for God to build upon their work. But both Jesus Christ and the apostolic foundation are done being laid, just as a builder doesn’t lay another piece of foundation in the middle of a wall.

Like supernatural gifts, Bethel Church goes beyond what God teaches about apostles because they completely misunderstand its original function. We see ridiculous moments like the Gandalf staff because they aren’t acting as apostles and, therefore, have the freedom to make up whatever seems right to them at the time. Appealing to their alleged authority makes moments like banishing the spirit of racism seem significant, but it’s yet another experience in a long line of unbiblical experiences people continually show up for.

Bill Johnson and others worldwide aren’t apostles for many biblical reasons. But at the most fundamental level, they aren’t apostles simply because God is no longer laying a foundation for what He has been building for nearly 2,000 years. Insisting they are apostles, especially by claiming God’s word doesn’t say otherwise, is another instance of unbiblical beliefs leading to unbiblical actions.

Dominionism and the Seven Mountains Mandate

In progress

Kenosis

In progress

Grave soaking and the dangers of experimenting

In progress

Holy laughter, aka “drunk in the Spirit”

In progress

The Holy Spirit’s presence as gold dust

In progress

Female pastors

In progress

The Passion Translation

In progress

1 thought on “Bethel’s False Gospel and Other Issues (Exploring the Worship Music Debate #3)”

  1. Pingback: Why Churches Must Avoid Music from Bethel, Hillsong, and Elevation (Exploring the Worship Music Debate, Part 2) – Onward in the Faith

Comments are closed.