Hermeneutics - An Antidote for 21st Century Cultic and Mind Control Phenomena

Hermeneutics is required to provide adequate controls for interpretation. To find God's point is the important thing. Our ideas may be nice, but God's Word is quick and powerful - Heb 4:12. We may have a high view of inspiration; we may believe strongly in verbal and plenary inspiration; that the Scripture is inerrant and infallible; and these are necessary (see Appendix A); but, if our concepts of hermeneutics are faulty, we have just negated our high concepts, above, and by faulty interpretation, turned God's Word into something that is not God's Word. This book in various forms have been taught in "home" bible studies from 1972 until the present, and as part of a Bible School curriculum taught in local churches in Colorado, Bible Colleges in Alaska, Oregon, and Colorado, and Seminary in Oregon. In fact, it was also taught at lunchtime at the Raytheon plant in Wayland Ma. This set of studies was taught by the author to those involved in a very dangerous pseudo-Christian cult (Children of God). The Holy Spirit used the material to free two of their elders from this group and one of these men is today (circa. 1980) serving God on the mission field. As Cult watcher G. Richard Fisher said at the 1996 "The Culling of Christianity" conference in Saint Louis: "the Church is losing the knowledge of a systematic study of the Scripture." He continued, "Many in the Church no longer view the Bible as 'adequate for godliness and maturity.' Consequently, the door is open to thought that relies on extra biblical experiences." At this same conference, James Bjornstead, president of Evangelical Ministries to New Religions (EMNR) stated, "Hermeneutics today is reduced to one sentence: The Spirit told me." An example from the writing of one of those turncoat "evangelicals", Dr. C. Peter Wagner is given, below. In his book Christianity With Power, pg. 55, Dr. Wagner states: "Jack Deere and myself are just two traditional evangelicals and former cessionists among rapidly increasing numbers of others who believe that a valid source of divine knowledge comes through what some would call "extra biblical revelation." I dare say that the standard-brand evangelical doctrine of "logos only" that we were taught might now find a place on an "endangered doctrines" list, about to become extinct." May the reader extract God's points from his study of this Biblical material and so keep him from serious error.