5 More Reviews of MacArthur’s “Strange Fire”

John MacArthur’s Strange Fire as Parody of Jonathan Edwards’ Theology, by William De Arteaga
The thesis of John MacArthur’s new book, Strange Fire is that Pentecostalism and the Charismatic Movement, are heretical movements that must be rebuked and eliminated from the church. 1 Everything to do with these movements is fraudulent, inauthentic or a misrepresentation of the true Gospel of Jesus Christ. Strange Fire continues his war on the Pentecostals and charismatics begun with his book published twenty years ago… [Read more]

John MacArthur’s Strange Fire, Reviewed by Charles Carrin
You will soon be hearing about two books: Strange Fire by Dr. John MacArthur and Holy Fire by Dr. R.T. Kendall. Dr. Kendall has written only in the emergency to defend Scripture and charismatic Christians from Dr. MacArthur attack. John MacArthur is a man of significant Christian stature.  He is the author of more than 150 books, a study Bible, other best-selling material, and a College President.  R.T. Kendall is equally a man of great achievement. He holds a PhD. from Oxford University, authored more than 60 books, for twenty-five years was pastor of… [Read more]

John MacArthur’s Strange Fire, reviewed by Craig S. Keener
While offering some very needed points, John MacArthur’s Strange Fire unfortunately extrapolates from those points to an entire “movement.” As I note below, I also believe that MacArthur suppresses some biblical truth on the basis of a postbiblical doctrine, the very offense with which he charges others. Nevertheless, there is much to be learned from his criticisms; he has brought again to our attention some serious errors that charismatic churches must be on their guard against. I start with some agreeable points in the book and then move to points where I believe MacArthur has clearly overstepped the bounds  of reason and Christian civility… [Read more]

Why I Took Time to Respond to John MacArthur’s Strange Fire
Someone has asked me, “Why waste your time on responding to MacArthur’s writings against the charismatics?” When I was in my 20s, I wrote a critique of John MacArthur’s Charismatic Chaos because a brother in the Lord broke fellowship with me and my friends after reading MacArthur’s book. Jesus said to His disciples, “If they reject you, they’ve rejected me.” So to my mind, restoring a brother to… [Read more]

Strange Fire and Churches of Christ
Maybe you’ve noticed that over the past few weeks, there has been a lot of talk around charismatic vs. not charismatic protestant Christians. Some people held a conference, and John MacArthur wrote a book about it. Mark Driscoll even showed up at the conference and started giving away his newest book and just confused everyone. But what caught my eye is what these non-Charismatics called the conference. They called it, “Strange Fire” Which may not mean much to you, but… [Read more]

Tetraevangelion: New Bulgarian Translation

Tetraevangelion: New Bulgarian Translation: Matthew, Mark, Luke, Acts, John, Epistles, Apocalypse (New Bulgarian Translation of the Bible) (Bulgarian Edition)

New Bulgarian Translation (NBT) 2007-2013

MATTHEW: New Bulgarian Translation (NBT), 2009

MARK: MATTHEW: New Bulgarian Translation (NBT), 2011

JOHN: Gospel, Epistles, Apocalypse New Bulgarian Translation (NBT), 2007

LUKE: Gospel, Acts New Bulgarian Translation (NBT), 2013

More on the Glory of God

Kenneth E. Hagin: The Glory of God

T.L. Lowery: Show me Thy Glory

David Franklin: A Call to Righteousness

2011: A New Generation Called to the Presence of God

2012: 4 Points to the Glory of God

2013: GOD is DOING a NEW THING

A GENERATION can change a NATION

Great Ministry Season

God has blessed again with a great ministry season with Revival Harvest Campaign 2013, which started with another timely service at Pendleton. We ministered to the local Covenant of Faith congregation delivering a message on the Glory of God.

Another positive outlook was the series on the Signs of the Last Days, which followed at the Church of God in Laurens a few weeks later. This visit was the first one for us in so many different ways. The following Wednesday night service was dedicated completely on the topic of the Rapture of the Church.

Finally, a great blessing to all of us was the time at the North-East Fellowship of Gaffney. The Sunday night service with a great alter call that followed was designated with a theme from Hebrews 13: God is still the same!

You can read more on Revival Harvest Campaign through the years here: https://cupandcross.com/tag/harvest/

That’s My King

GIVE THANKS

When you change a GENERATION you change a NATION

In the CHANGE of one GENERATION is a change for the whole NATION

The success of Israel was in the GLORY of GOD and its power to overturn evil kings and political systems

• In the case of Moses this was the Pharoah
• In the case of David this was Saul
• In the case of Ezekiel this was Babylon

And EVERY TIME the people who followed the glory were blessed and received the covenant promises

See why this is important for US today

We live in a post-Christian America

1. Less than 20% of Americans regularly ATTEND church

2. Mid-sized churches are SHRINKING amid booming small churches and megachurches

3. Established denominations 40 to 190 years old are DECLINING and disappearing

4. By 2050, the percentage of the U.S. population attending church will be HALF of what it was in 1990

5. At the same times ABORTIONS are on the rise

6. There’s an open GAY reformation within the walls of the church

7. The next WAR is a matter of days

There’s absolutely no doubt in anyone’s mind that today we live in a post-Christian America!

And while all this is happening:

• PRAYER is not what it used to be in our churches
• People are still playing church POLITICS
• Corporate strategies are replacing the vision of GOD

And we as a church are failing to ENTER the GLORY of GOD

Paul said: “Our fathers were under the cloud and all passed through the sea;
And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud
And did all drink the same spiritual drink of the spiritual Rock that followed them
And that Rock was Christ. But with many of them God was not well pleased…

We claim that we’ve been  saved, sanctified and filled with the Holy Ghost, but do we please GOD today?
For the change of a generation leads to a change of the whole nation…

JESUS IS IN EVERY BOOK OF THE BIBLE

In Genesis, Jesus Christ is the seed of the woman.
In Exodus, He is the passover lamb.
In Leviticus, He is our high priest.
In Numbers, He is the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night.
In Deuteronomy, He is the prophet like unto Moses.
In Joshua, He is the captain of our salvation.
In Judges, He is our judge and lawgiver.
In Ruth, He is our kinsman redeemer.
In 1st and 2nd Samuel, He is our trusted prophet.
In Kings and Chronicles, He is our reigning king.
In Ezra, He is the rebuilder of the broken down walls of human life.
In Esther, He is our Mordecai.
In Job, He is our ever-living redeemer.
In Psalms, He is our shepherd.
In Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, He is our wisdom.
In the Song of Solomon, He is the loving bridegroom.
In Isaiah, He is the prince of peace.
In Jeremiah, He is the righteous branch.
In Lamentations, He is our weeping prophet.
In Ezekiel, He is the wonderful four-faced man.
In Daniel, He is the forth man in life’s “fiery furnace.”
In Hosea, He is the faithful husband, forever married to the backslider.
In Joel, He is the baptizer with the Holy Ghost and fire.
In Amos, He is our burden-bearer.
In Obadiah, He is the mighty to save.
In Jonah, He is our great foreign missionary.
In Micah, He is the messenger of beautiful feet.
In Nahum, He is the avenger of God’s elect.
In Habakkuk, he is God’s evangelist, crying, “revive thy work in the midst of the years.”
In Zephaniah, He is our Saviour.
In Haggai, He is the restorer of God’s lost heritage.
In Zechariah, He is the fountain opened up in the house of David for sin and uncleanness.
In Malachi, He is the Sun of Righteousness, rising with healing in His wings.

In Matthew, He is King of the Jews.
In Mark, He is the Servant.
In Luke, He is the Son of Man, feeling what you feel.
In John, He is the Son of God.
In Acts, He is the Savior of the world.
In Romans, He is the righteousness of God.
In 1st Corinthians, He is the Rock that followed Israel.
In 2nd Corinthians, He is the Triumphant One, giving victory.
In Galatians, He is your liberty; He sets you free.
In Ephesians, He is Head of the Church.
In Philippians, He is your joy.
In Colossians, He is your completeness.
In 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, He is your hope.
In 1st Timothy, He is your faith.
In 2nd Timothy, He is your stability.
In Philemon, He is your Benefactor.
In Titus, He is truth.
In Hebrews, He is your perfection.
In James, he is the Power behind your faith.
In 1st Peter, He is your example.
In 2nd Peter, He is your purity.
In 1st John, He is your life.
In 2nd John, He is your pattern.
In 3rd John, He is your motivation.
In Jude, He is the foundation of your faith.
In Revelation, He is your coming King.

5 Reviews of MacArthur’s “Strange Fire”

John MacArthur Strikes Again with Strange Fire
By Vinson Synan
John MacArthur, the Calvinist, Fundamentalist, Cessationist preacher from California has done it again. With his newest attack on Pentecostals and Charismatics, Strange Fire, MacArthur, like Don Quixote tilting at windmills, continues his hopeless quest to put an end to the most energetic and fastest growing group of Christians in the world. MacArthur never quits. This is his third book on the subject, and perhaps his last. [Read more]

Frank Macchia on the Gifts of God to the Church
In the context of this hoopla over cessationism, it might be interesting to see how the issue of spiritual gifts was dealt with in the first round of international talks between the World Alliance of Reformed Churches and the Pentecostals (of which I was a participant). We agreed together that all of the gifts from the New Testament have value today, but that both global church families tended to favor different lists of gifts from the New Testament. In response, we affirmed that no single list of gifts is to be held up as all determinative for judging the quality of a church’s spirituality and that both sides must expand its horizonsby embracing the value of the gifts cherished by the other side… [Read more]

John MacArthur’s Strange Fire, Reviewed by R. Loren Sandford 
Strange Fire by John MacArthur is basically an attack on anything and everything related to the Charismatic Movement and the various movements descended from it, as if the whole of it were composed of one monolithic set of doctrines and practices that all of us espouse. It invalidates anything that smacks of the supernatural or of emotion freely expressed in God’s presence. MacArthur pours his vitriol – and I mean vitriol – through the filter of his own prejudices and theological presuppositions in a way that blinds… [Read more]

John MacArthur’s Strange Fire, A Brief Biblical Response by Jon Ruthven
As we shall see, John MacArthur’s abhorrence of “further revelation” via prophecy and related spiritual gifts derives, not from scripture, but from the frustration of Calvinists under Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658) of watching so many of their members defect to the Quakers, the crazy charismatics of the time. People were falling down, making a lot of noise and encountering Jesus in visions, prophecies, and healings. Sound familiar? Calvinist scholastics responded to this outrage with the Westminster Confession of Faith (WCF)—often now regarded as the gold standard…
[Read more]

John MacArthur’s Strange Fire, Reviewed by Eddie L. Hyatt
As a life-long Pentecostal-Charismatic, I recommend that every Pentecostal-Charismatic leader read Strange Fire by John MacArthur. I say this because we need to see how the bizarre “spiritual” behavior and doctrinal extremes by some in our movement are viewed by those on the outside and are used to whitewash the entire movement. We have done a very poor job of addressing these problems from within, so I do not doubt that God has raised up a voice that is fundamentally opposed to our movement to address these extremes. If God could use a pagan Babylonian king to discipline his people Israel for their sins(Jeremiah 25:8-11), could he not use a merciless fundamentalist preacher… [Read more]

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