Bad Teaching that Should Be Corrected

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[Linda]

I think I've tried this before, we'll see how it goes. When people have been hurt by actions of others, reconciliation should take place whenever possible. I think we all agree on that.

When elders perpetuate false teaching, I would hope that we all agree the teaching should be corrected publicly and repeatedly, if necessary. In other words, you don't "reconcile" or "forgive" false teaching, you fix it. (Reconciliation may be needed because of actions caused by false teaching, but reconciliation alone is not enough in the case of false teaching. Correction of the error must happen, as well.)

In light of that, I have created a site where we can point out what we view as false teaching perpetuated by this movement of churches. If they truly care about correcting their error they will:

1. Correct it immediately and publicly
2. Not be critical of the people pointing it out
3. Remove all messages that contain the bad teaching.

I thought it would be helpful to minimize discussion, keep the posts small with minimal comment to mostly highlight the bad teaching, and offer a link to it. Also, I am referring to teaching that is recent and/or still available online.

[Linda]

Bad Teaching from Brent Knox, never corrected:

"And so even to give the controls over to God, that's hard, but the real kicker here is God is saying, "give the controls over to people that I work through, and these people are fallible, these people make mistakes, these people are weak at times. You-outta work through it anyway," that's what God says."

The link:

http://www.gcxweb.org/Audio/TheSWord-08-13-2006.aspx

[Linda]

Bad Teaching from Rick Whitney, on his web page:

"Your commitment to your local church will be tested through your relationships with other believers, with your leaders and with your pastors. If we are going to be involved in our local church, “Lock, stock and barrel”, then we are going to be involved with that church’s leadership, pastors, deacons, small group leaders.  And we are going to have to decide if we will submit to them. You and I have to decide whether we believe that God will honor our submission to our spiritual leaders?"

"If someone is going to “Cross over” in their heart and join us, these are the steps. In your local church, in your region, in your movement.  
This is how we show commitment:
1.  We show up. And we keep showing up.
2.  We begin to process and understand what our core beliefs are.
3.  We hold to our beliefs, and begin to speak up for them. We “own” our church’s vision.
4.  We “roll up their sleeves” and get involved in serving.
5.  We begin to be faithful in sharing our time, our money, our home and resources - in our shared vision, our common cause.
6.  And we say, 'This is my family and I will fight for it.' "

The link:
http://www.gcnwdads.com/pages/articles.html
#146

[Linda]

Bad teaching by Mark Darling, HSLT:

Commitment Number Nine. Make the commitment to devote yourself to your local church for the rest of your life. This is going to be controversial, I will explain it. Devote yourself to your local church for the rest of your life. You need other Christians, you need the body of Jesus Christ. There are a lot of Christians today that frankly are not committed, but they like to say they are. To the universal. I'm committed to the universal body of Christ, Mark. I visit this church over here for a while, and then I date this church over here for a while, and then I date this church over here for a while and then I show up at these 22 Christian concerts over here. And it's this wonderful life. Let me tell you something, that is not the kind of commitment I'm talking about, nor do I believe it is the kind of commitment the New Testament is talking about. But it's linking yourself arm in arm in the local church with men and women of like mind and doing something great together, together.

I made a determination as a young man to not leave my church in Ames until and only when I was sent. I was sent. Now, there is, of course, maybe a unique exception within "our movement" and it's a beautiful thing it's why some of us moved to different cities, big metropolitan areas. One, you may need a job and you can still stay linked with Great Commission Churches because you can find one in that city. Secondly, you may be leaving your local church to go to college to join another Great Commission Church that's like minded and I think that will equally accomplish the same thing. I'm here for life. You're not getting rid of me. I'm here.

The link:
http://www.summitview.com/resources/messages
You need to go to the little box entitled category and choose "HSLT"
I recommend listening to the whole message. This message was the straw that broke the camel's back for our family.
Under HSLT 2005, Posted under "Stories from the Week"

[calgal]

Linda:

Thanks for posting this. Your links point out the false teaching from these wolves in sheeps clothing. They are still teaching the same stuff they did 30 years ago. We read it on their websites, we hear in on their podcasts. You can't make that stuff up.

Two examples of former members wanting to be 'reconciled' (and I'm sorry but the great lenght that GC goes to defend the men who excommunicated Larry and Bill is horrendous. Have you all listened to those tapes? And there are others too ... you would think it was an excorsism ...) doesn't change this. This is just a puff PR piece on their own website ... so what?

I keep thinking, am I missing something here? Why in God's name would I want to be reconciled with a CULT? I ran from it as fast as I could from it!!!!!

Today I can live in the light and the truth. Thank you Lord for helping me escape.

Calgal

[Linda]

Bad Teaching: Rick Whitney, Pastor's Conference

Jim McCotter, a good friend to many and an early leader in this movement’s history, said the following.  It was right in the middle of a wave of very difficult persecution, that we were all facing together. 

I will never forget Jim’s words.  Even though we were being attacked, Jim saw beyond the attack, and looked ahead down the road. 

Jim said, “Join us!  If you chose not to, you will still hear about us.  What God is going to do through us.  In good report and evil report.  And you will say to yourself, ‘I once knew them.’”
   
Recently, talking with Nelson Guerra, I heard his glowing memory of those early years.  His comment was, “God really did give us something, didn’t He, Rick?”

The link:
http://www.gcnwdads.com/pages/articles.html
#127

[Linda]

Bad Teaching from Rick Whitney:

I recently heard a brother comment on our church association’s recent history. He used the phrase, “Our organizational wilderness . . . ”  He was reflecting on some of the changes that we have been wrestling with as a church movement.  I understand what he means.     We have gone through changes and it seems like there is no end to the number of Great Commission, “GC acronyms”, that we can come up with.  I understand his humor and maybe his partial frustration. But honestly, nothing has changed.  We are still the same group of men and our bond remains strong.  We have lost a few and yes, it hurts and yes, there have been challenges.  All movements of God have lost men.  Even our Lord lost a few.
But nothing has really changed.


The link:
http://www.gcnwdads.com/pages/articles.html
#133

[calgal]

Linda: I found two interesting reads ... One by Pat Sokoll which starts out ...

Dating?  Romance?  God's Will?                                         

The subject of this paper is whether Christians should be involved in dating.

   The Bible does not specifically instruct us as to the best way to find a wife, nor does it deal with the subject of romantic relationships outside of marriage. In the absence of clear instruction or commands either promoting or forbidding a specific action, we must develop our thinking based on Biblical principles which relate to this topic. Our culture has already established a cultural norm for dating.

And then another by Perry Paulding ... called "The Dating Game" where he says:

While the Bible does not directly address dating

Some of the thinking is so wacked ... so warped ... but hey, getting all the dads and all the leaders to think this way sure gets all the kids paired up nicely to be married and then multiply and trained to fall into line ...

[Neverbeengcm]

Very interesting points Linda and Calgal.  I hope that GCx church members read this and understand the consequences for blindly following the Piper.  Sometimes you might get led right off a cliff.

[EverAStudent]

I said this on another thread, but I think it is even more appropriate to this one.  One of the worst body of teachings for which GCx has never published an actual retraction is Jim McCotter's Leadership Manual.  It has been said that GCx eventually stopped using some of the false teachings in McCotter's leadership book about all men needing to try to become apostles, yet GCx to my knowledge never published a corrective to that book or video, and they still seem to be using his material on authoritarian control over the church.  

Simply quietly stopping the teaching that you once loudly taught via published books, published videos, and via national conferences is not "correcting" the error.  Instead, correcting one's doctrine is standing up and saying, "I taught this and it was wrong.  Here is the biblical reason why it was wrong.  I am sorry for having misdirected you."  

To this day I do not know how many of the current GCx national leaders and local pastors still believe what was written in McCotter's leadership manual.  How many are still practicing what is in that book but simply not referencing the book in public?  After all, much of the present GCx abuse is codified in the pages of that book as being the biblical way to practice and govern churches.  

The book is still available to read here: http://gcxweb.org/Books/Leadership

[Janet Easson Martin]

Linda,

PRAISE GOD for you!!  Your first blog above on this topic makes me so moved and encouraged!!  I only skimmed the next ones and will read them later.  Your move to create a site for the outlined issues alone is EXCELLENT! 

I was also praying for a way for people to get the truth without being attacked or harrassed or THREATENED.  Most of all that they wouldn't have to listen to MORE LIES.  That is what we are trying to escape from in the first place.  IT REALLY HURTS, FURTHER CONFUSES, AND MAKES BELIEVERS LITERALLY UNSTABLE IN THEIR FAITH TO LISTEN TO deception posed as the "amiable" truth.  That is something our enemy loooves to do to Believers - to tell them twistedly WHAT to think.  That's why Jesus warned his disciples against listening to the LEAVEN of the Pharisees, when he adamantly declared "LEAVE THEM".

God assigns us NO OBLIGATION to politely listen to lies on this site.  There is nothing polite at all about being lied to.  If a poster has practiced the actions above I DO NOT READ their posts any longer!!!!     I skip right over them.  I am simply applying the above principle.

GOD cares about Spiritual Bullying and Abuse and wants His people to.  Thank you, Thank you.

I'll message you hopefully tomorrow to hear more.

Your co-worker in Him,

Janet Easson Martin

[marie]

I wanted to repost these older post from Linda  They are well written with the actual words spoken by the men. The error in the wrong teaching is so clear to me now.  I wonder and pray that as Jim Mccotter has now resurfaced with a new "home church movement " I pray that the false teachings He is proclaiming get exposed.    That true repentence would happen within GCM, and that God would remove the chaff.  Let's keep praying. "By this will all men know that we are His disciples, as we LOVE one another."  No more coverups.  No more false loyalty. I am encouraged by this site and the authentic honest hurts , experiences and truths that being shared.

[Moontrap]

Linda,

Hi, I'm kinda new, haven't tacky posted anything yet. It's been almost 2 years since I took a leap of faith and left a GCAC church. And I'm still prossessing. As I read the highlights of the bad teachings above, I must admit that I am struggling to understand exactly what is wrong with some of, most of, these teachings. It would be helpful for me, if you could explain more why these are bad teaching. Are they contrary to biblical teaching? Or do they just take it to far?

Thanks

[Linda]

Sure. I (and many others who post, I'm sure) would be happy to elaborate. It would be helpful to have specific questions about the teachings you are wondering about.

To get the ball rolling, though, it might be helpful to review some basics of Protestant theology, since GC churches consider themselves Protestant. Protestants generally believe in the 5 Solas.

Sola Scriptura (By Scripture Alone)
Sola Christus (Christ Alone)
Sola Fide (Faith Alone)
Sola Gratia (Grace Alone)
Soli Deo Gloria (Glory to God Alone)

The idea, as stated by Brent Knox, that people should give the controls of their life to their fallible pastor is not Protestant teaching. (Besides being wrong, it's not even smart. Why would anyone want to obey a fallible person?) Protestants believe that Scripture is the sole infallible rule of faith and practice. Not pastors. And a person should never give the controls of their life to anyone, but God. There is one mediator between man and God and that is Jesus. It is a very dangerous thing when men try to fulfill a role only Jesus rightfully has.

Keep in mind, though, that these men have no theological training and they learned from men who had no theological training.

The Bible clearly teaches that we are to make no man our master.

[Janet Easson Martin]

Great Explanation, Linda!

Seems Jim Jones also missed that truth.

[blonde]

This are the words of Mark Darling from he himself that shows how biblically illiterate the man is and how abusive that man is:
https://sites.google.com/site/gcmstatementofweaknessexposed/MARKDARLINGQUOTES.mp3

[blonde]

Note, he (Mark Darling) alludes to himself as a prophet near to end of this audio clip. Very scary. Stay away from any of Mark Darling's teachings, publicaly or privately. He teaches bad Bible and thinks of himself as a prophet.

[Moontrap]

Thank you Linda, your response was helpful.

[Linda]

Another thread for PWW.

[PietWowo]

Another thread for PWW.

I just saw this. I haven't read the leadership book for over 30 years... So, I don't remember too much of it.

The word is sparsely used in the Scriptures. A leader needs to be a servant....

I do remember that the book talks about an apostle being a missionary. I agree with that.... but not in the sense of some national leader.... They are ones that go out into other cultures and countries. They need to learn another language (most of the time), a totally different culture, and just really become like a child within that culture.... If they come in as the big leader, they're in for a big disappointment....  They need to humble themselves and really learn wherever they are.... It will take years most of the time. There are many wonderful missionary boards or organizations.... Wycliffe is a great example of this. 

The word apostle is just the Greek word for the Latin word missionary.... A sent one...  It's not about any sort of authority figure... It's about someone, just humbling themselves and becoming like a child...