So many sadly mis interpret/mis-appropriate what power is...coming away is simple but not always easy...I remember Christy Livingston sang this in a set back in 2012 split with Jennifer Scheible...BLESS BOTH OF THEM since I mention them here...VERY MUCH ADORE TWO GREAT SISTERS!!!!
Again I must say... certainly no reason to try to fake a move...couldn't agree more with Mike on that...that really would be costly, foolish & deceptive....I say why when God's Spirit is being poured out all of the time on all who ask...If you seek you will find...He will give WITHOUT MEASURE!!! We are not hanging around n a theological discussion room now, but are beginning to approach the throne in vast numbers corporately...I LOVE IT!!!!!!! THIS IS THE GREAT MARRIAGE SUPPER OF THE LAMB!!!! AMEN!!!
A lot of people struggle with alcohol addiction. Although the bible clearly states that drinking some wine is ok. It might not be ok for some people. At least that's why my church uses juice instead of wine.
Luke 7:33-35 "For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine; and ye say, He hath a devil. The Son of man is come eating and drinking; and ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners! But wisdom is justified of all her children." This is the only tradition Jesus handed down it is where the church gathers. We should recognize him as Lord here most of all.
Study of the word can not ever be merely reading scripture...we MUST experience our GOD...scriptures alone will be lifeless without the POWER & DEMONSTRATION of the HOLY GHOST...Jesus didn't die & resurrect to make us pentecostals or charismatics either..I do not adhere to any stream, I know the classic argument mentioned in scripture ( one says's I am of Paul, the other of Apollos, etc...but Jesus really did just always mark me in such away that the streams & denomination labels just seemed so ridiculous & unnecessarily lesser. I was never trying to 'throw rocks' or criticize others....but have met MUCH resistance when God wants to bring SWEET RELEASE! HE"S GONNA MAKE SURE HIS BRIDE GET'S THE SWEET RELEASE AFTER ALL!!! REST ASSURED FOLKS!!!
Folks, this talk sounds really pious and "biblical", but it isn't. Let me count the ways: Mike Bickle totally botches his paraphrase of Acts 2 in a way that gives support to his private idea of "the wine of the Spirit". He said there were 2 different things going on at Pentecost that caused 2 different responses from those present, the tongues and something else that made the same people there say the Christians were drunk. (There was also wind and fire in Acts 2, but any response to these other phenomena by those present is not given). NO. There were NOT 2 different THINGS going on, there were 2 different kinds of MEN there: 1) the "devout Jews" from other nations (whose native language was not Hebrew) who heard God's mighty works being extolled in their own tongues and marveled (because the tongues were produced by Israelite Jewish Christians who could not speak those foreign tongues apart from the Spirit), and 2) those pointedly described as "others" who were mocking what was going on, saying the Christians were full of new wine. Bickle confuses the whole situation by implying that the "unbelievers" who marveled at the tongues also mocked at some mysterious second manifestation that reminded them of drunkenness. NO. Those who marveled were described as "devout Jews" from foreign lands who were living in Jerusalem at that time. Those who mocked were NOT THE SAME MEN who marveled, they are clearly distinguished from the devout marvelers by calling them "others". Acts 2 never uses the term "unbelievers" at all, although the "others" who were mocking certainly reacted in an unbelieving way. What is clear is that those who marveled were NOT described as unbelievers, they were "devout Jews" who responded to the Christian message as soon as Peter gives it. Bickle even claims that in verse 16, Peter says that this pseudo-drunken stuff is the sign that Joel was talking about in his prophecy (verse 19). NO. In verse 15, Peter says these men are NOT drunk, and that the true explanation of all the REAL manifestations of the Spirit they are witnessing (verse 16) is that which Joel prophesied. Verse 19 (in the prophecy) simply refers to "signs on the earth." That's it, nothing about a behavior that could reasonably be confused with drunkenness at all. It's the "others" who respond with MOCKERY who call it drunkenness, neither Peter nor the text ever suggest that anything that looks like drunkenness is actually going on. That idea is a complete fabrication of Bickle's which he then reads into the text. The "others" are unreliable narrators due to their lack of faith, yet Bickle mixes in their misinterpretation with what the text actually affirms, until his poor audience is hopelessly confused about this issue of what a move of the Holy Spirit ought to look like. In fact, though Bickle speaks for an hour about separating out the false from the true, he never gives his poor young impressionable followers ANY objective criteria so THEY can distinguish the two, apart from his correct observation that the Spirit's activity in Acts 2 was followed by a huge influx of new believers into the church (which only occurs after Peter gives them a solid presentation of the Gospel of Christ crucified). So what do his followers do the next time the "Spirit moves" in a meeting, and there isn't a clear Gospel presentation followed by an immediate and huge influx of converts? How do THEY know what to think? It's clear BICKLE THINKS he can tell the difference from his 40 years of experience, but he never tells them in an objective fashion HOW to exercise their OWN discernment. He never even gives them any objective criteria so they can judge Bickle's confidence in his own discernment. So the practical upshot of all this is confusion and dependency of his followers on Bickle's opinions. All they can do is watch all kinds of crazy stuff going on and then see what MIKE BICKLE has to say about it. And, as keeps repeating, one night it's a true move of the Spirit and the next it's men imitating what came the night before, but it LOOKs exactly the same. Great. Maybe Bickle's discernment IS completely subjective, so there's nothing objective he can give them. Self-confidence is not an objective measurement of one's ability to do anything. Sometimes confidence follows real ability, but very often it's just a subjective quality of a man's personality, and has no necessary relation to objective competence. Young people, like his many followers, do not know this yet, that is why young people are so easily mislead. I know, I was one once. I'm the same age as Mike Bickle and this supposedly mature man, who is leading a movement of thousands, cannot seem to think logically, or convey what a key biblical text like Acts 2 plainly says, or give his hearers any way to objectively evaluate something as important to Christians as the nature of the Holy Spirit. The new testament is full of definitive statements about the Spirit -- what its purpose is, what is does to and for believers, what its fruit is, etc. etc. Instead we get an hour of Mike Bickle's OPINIONS concerning "manifestations" of the Spirit, including his own pet doctrine that there's a "Wine of the Spirit", even though he admits that's not in the Bible. You know what else isn't in the Bible? This whole idea of "manifestations" of the Spirit that his thinking is based on. The Spirit produces the fruit of good character, it leads people into truth, it convicts the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment, it enables the believer to NOT walk according to the flesh, etc. It produces results, results of a particular kind, it doesn't just "manifest" itself in unusual behavior that leaves people scratching their heads as to what the purpose of "that" was. It's a divine PERSON who acts according to His specific purposes in the world, and those purposes are clear, and clearly spelled out in Scripture. The "devout Jews" in Acts 2 who were NOT mockers of God understood EXACTLY what the tongues-speakers were saying. If Bickle worked in the business world or even taught at a seminary, where you have to back up your opinions with logic, objective criteria, or basic Bible comprehension, he'd be laughed out of the room. ANY other room that employs a man his age, that is, except the room he's in, because the room he's in is a room he created for himself, where he's the "prophet" in charge, and a room full of 20 year olds doesn't have the critical thinking skills to know how bad his presentation is. These kids all ought to leave IHOP and go to a decent college where they can be taught how to read properly, how to think logically, and how to judge the world around them objectively.
