The False and Misleading Gospel
of "Accepting" Jesus
Christ
We received the following letter regarding the gospel preached by Billy Graham (and many others):
Dear Paul,
I have dear friends who are Pentecostals and Charismatic. I am not but do not presume they are not believers because they do different things than I. I have talked about this subject with them as I have written it here. None outwardly disagree with me and would voice it if they did.
My experience with these people has been that they tend to be emotionally driven. Standard, boring, evangelicals tend to be more reliable, consistent and far less sensitive. My friends tend to put great emphasis on a man for leadership. That, in itself, is dangerous, because depending on a man will inevitably lead to disappointment as that man will eventually and inevitably let you down. Every one of these friends has experienced and expressed great disappointment in man. They also carry the hurt forward. Leaders are necessary and called on by God. If you are called to lead, lead. If to follow, follow. We all have our giftedness and we should exercise what He has given.
I bring these things up, because I read your critique of Billy Graham. I will not dispute what he has or has not done. We really don't know. I have heard him say "Praise the Lord" in public. I have listened to him and he speaks the Gospel as clearly as I have heard. However incomplete you may think that it is, Billy gives a simple, to the point presentation of what you can do on your death bed 60 seconds before last rattling exhale. The Gospel, in it's basic form, must be as acceptable in that last minute as it is in the first minute of realization of the need at the tender ages of first understanding. We do not know the time or the hour that we are called to the earthly end. How can we be ready at all times in our life if it could take a lifetime to get ready.
Yours sounds as though works is a part of the Gospel to me. Maybe you do not agree with works but, if not simple and fast, works is merged and therefore contaminates God's perfect plan.
My upbringing taught that works and faith (grace) could not be separated. Not by faith alone, but works must be integrated to prove your faith.
That last moment is when it can be started and finished or we are all doomed.
Your thoughts????
Tim
Paul's reply:
Greetings in the Lord Jesus Christ,
It finally appears that I have opportunity to answer your letter, Tim, and
I’m thankful, particularly because I have an answer for you, not from
man, but from God. The deathbed conversion
gospel you attribute to Graham as
being so clear and capable of bringing salvation to those who receive it is
a lie. It is not the true gospel of Jesus Christ. Rather, it is a false gospel
that gives those who receive it a misleading sense of assurance.
The gospel
preached by Graham (and so many others) is the cause of much sin, blasphemy,
and devastation. It is responsible for the bloodshed of multitudes. I’m
not exaggerating. I’ll back up what I’m saying with godly reason
and Scripture of truth.
First, to clear the air of your concern about what we preach, we aren’t
preaching works, but the Lord Jesus Christ, with faith in Him through repentance
(a gift of God), and obedience to Him as Lord of all. Without the works born
of repentance that comes by grace, there is no evidence of the true faith of
Christ being present. As it is written:
James 2:17-23 MKJV
(17) Even so, if it does not have works, faith is dead, being by itself.
(18) But someone will say, You have faith, and I have works. Show me your faith
without your works, and I will show you my faith from my works.
(19) You believe that there is one God, you do well; even the demons believe
and tremble.
(20) But will you know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead?
(21) Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he had offered Isaac
his son upon the altar?
(22) Do you see how faith worked with his works, and from the works faith was
made complete?
(23) And the Scripture was fulfilled which says, "Abraham believed God,
and it was imputed to him for righteousness, and he was called the friend of
God."
So where is Graham's error? Contrary to what you think, he is the one that
preaches salvation by works, a work initiated by the will of man, and the flesh,
that of “accepting” Jesus Christ as your “personal Savior.” Let
us be clear about this: It is not man who accepts God, but God Who chooses,
draws, and saves those whom He wills, by His mercy and grace. It has nothing
whatsoever to do with anyone ever accepting Him. Those who think to have something
from God in that manner have only that which is manufactured by religion and
flesh.
“You have not chosen [accepted] Me, but I have chosen you and ordained
you that you should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain;
that whatever you shall ask of the Father in My Name, He may give it to you” (John
15:16).
“No one can come to Me unless the Father Who has sent Me draw him, and
I will raise him up at the last day” (John 6:44).
“For having been drawn to Him [His doing, not
man’s], a Living
Stone, indeed rejected [not accepted] by men, but elect, precious with God...” (1
Peter 2:4).
“As it is written: There is none righteous, no not one; there
is none that understands, there is none that seeks after [accepts] God.
They are all gone out of the way, they have together become unprofitable, there
is none that does good, no, not one” (Romans 3:10-12).
“Herein is love, not that we loved [accepted] God, but that He loved
[accepted] us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1
John 4:10).
“But God, Who is rich in mercy, for His great love with which He loved
us (even when we were dead in sins) has made us alive together with Christ
(by grace you are saved), and has raised us up together and made us sit together
in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show
the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us through Christ
Jesus. For by grace you are saved through faith, and that not of yourselves,
it is the gift of God [you didn’t accept Him; He gives you the gift of
faith to believe on Him]” (Ephesians 2:4-8).
“Accepting Jesus Christ as your Savior” is unscriptural, and doesn’t
require or produce the true works of faith by those who profess to accept Him,
without which, there is no salvation. It proclaims man to be in the driver's
seat and puts the onus on him to make the move towards God, which is self-righteousness.
This designates man as God's superior, the opposite of what the Lord has said
and of what the Scriptures teach. It is not God that needs acceptance from
us; we need acceptance from Him:
“And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again
and receive you to Myself, so that where I am, you may be also” (John 14:3 MKJV).
“Therefore come out from among them and be separated, says the Lord,
and do not touch the unclean thing. And I will receive you and I will
be a Father to you, and you shall be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty” (2 Corinthians 6:17-18 MKJV).
“Wherefore we labor, that, whether present or absent, we may
be accepted of Him” (2 Corinthians 5:9).
“If you do well, shall you not be accepted? And if you do not well,
sin lies at the door. And unto you shall be his desire, and you shall rule
over him” (Genesis 4:7).
“But in every nation he that fears Him, and works righteousness, is
accepted with Him” (Acts 10:35).
“For he that in these things serves Christ is acceptable to
God, and
approved of men” (Romans 14:18).
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach
the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach
deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at
liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord” (Luke
4:18-19).
“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you
present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is
your reasonable service” (Romans 12:1).
I ask anyone to show me one Scripture where it says that you need to “accept
Christ as your personal Savior.” What did John the Baptist say about
this matter? He was the “voice crying in the wilderness” sent to
prepare the way of the Lord. Did he say that he accepted Jesus Christ as His
personal Savior, or that you should? No, he said:
“I indeed baptize you with water, but He Who is mightier than I comes,
the thong of Whose sandals I am not worthy to loose. He shall
baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire...” (Luke 3:16).
And what were his first words to the people? He said:
“Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2).
And what did he have to say to the religious of his day, who came out to hear
him? He told them:
“O generation of vipers, who has warned you to flee from the wrath to
come? Bring forth therefore fruits worthy [acceptable] of repentance; and do
not think to say within yourselves, We have Abraham as our father. For I say
to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones” (Matthew
3:7-9).
How many of you religious would listen to such speech today, without utterly
condemning the speaker? How many would submit themselves to the admonishment
and scrutiny of a prophet preaching, not in your cushy churches, but in the
wilderness of Judea? Not many at all.
And why not? Because you’ve been taught a false gospel, which has told
you that you were saved when you “accepted” Christ. That gospel,
in effect, says, “Forget bringing forth fruits that are worthy of repentance;
there is no need to because you’re saved and therefore accountable to
no one for correction.” Where there is some accountability, as with a
church, it’s to those you’ve hired to do your bidding. Consequently
things are kept superficial, light, and unreal.
The false gospel of “accepting” Jesus Christ, of which Billy Graham
has been one of the greatest proponents, doesn’t teach the requirements
of a Holy God. It is not born of faith, but of the flesh, which it serves.
This tenet, rather than bringing those who adhere to it into the Kingdom of
God, is used to shut out God, His Word, His servants, and His judgments. You
have nullified all that He says and does by this one pernicious idea that because
you “accepted” Christ you’ll now go to Heaven. You fulfill
the Scripture, the words of the very Lord you profess to believe in:
"But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the
Kingdom of Heaven against men. For you neither go in, nor do you allow those
entering to go in" (Matthew 23:13).
The false gospel of “accepting” Christ puts salvation into the
future, after death. You fulfill your part by “accepting” Christ,
and He’ll fulfill His part by changing you after death. Now, there is
some truth here, because our salvation does come after death. However it comes
not after physical death, but death to the world by identification with the
cross of Christ.
The false gospel altogether bypasses the cross, the only way to Heaven. The
false gospel, which says you will go to Heaven if you accept Christ, and to
Hell if you don’t, blinds those who receive and believe it to every evil
imaginable in the present. You want proof? Billy Graham, the greatest proponent
in the past generation of this false gospel, praises the pope as a godly man,
and sanctions those “converted” at his evangelical “crusades” to
go to the Catholic Church, if they wish. He is willing to send the sheep to
the wolves; it makes no difference to him. Why? Because he himself doesn’t
know the true Lord and Savior, and neither does he know wolves from sheep.
He is a wolf.
Regarding the Catholic Church, as an example of Graham's traveling buddies,
has there been a more bloodthirsty and disreputable organization in the history
of mankind? Check your history books to find out. Meanwhile, I tell you that
all other churches Graham sanctions as clean, acceptable, and necessary for
the faith of a new believer, are no different in essence. You are all one,
part of that great whore John wrote about in Revelation, who is drunk with
the blood of the saints. Yes, you praise the prophets and apostles, and the
Lord Himself, even naming your churches after them and Him, and thereby fulfill
the words of the Lord Jesus Christ:
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you build the
tombs of the prophets, and decorate the tombs of the righteous, and say, If
we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with
them in the blood of the prophets. Therefore you are witnesses to yourselves,
that you are the sons of those who killed the prophets; and you fill up the
measure of your fathers” (Matthew 23:29-32).
The false gospel of Graham teaches people not to fear (reverence) God. It
teaches them that if they accept God, He’ll accept them. It talks about
God as love, not as His love truly is, but as a treacherous love that accepts
men in their sins and lies, which bring death. It is a gospel of having your
cake and eating it too, with all its artificial and processed ingredients,
the vital nutrients taken out, making what was intended to be food, poison.
The love of this false god and gospel is nothing more than the love of the
world. “You love me, and I’ll love you. We can all get along, if
we ignore what that tyrant God demands of us, and accept each other.” The
preachers of this gospel are at one with the world, freely mingling with its
organizations and governments, and receiving its praise. Truly, you false Jesus
worshipers don’t hate the world; you love it with the love of your false
god and gospel. God doesn’t call that love. He calls it lust (fornication):
“For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication,
and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants
of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies” (Revelation
18:3).
God sends His messenger to warn and exhort those who would be saved from this
perverse generation:
Revelation 18:4-8 MKJV
(4) And I heard another voice from Heaven, saying, Come out of her, My people,
that you may not be partakers of her sins, and that you may not receive of
her plagues.
(5) For her sins joined together, even up to Heaven, and God has remembered
her unjust deeds.
(6) Reward her as she has rewarded you, and double to her double, according
to her works. In the cup which she mixed, mix double to her.
(7) As much as she has glorified herself and has lived in luxury, so much torment
and sorrow give her. For she says in her heart, I sit as a queen, and I am
not a widow; and I do not see mourning at all.
(8) Therefore her plagues will come in one day, death and mourning and famine.
And she will be consumed with fire, for the Lord God who judges her is strong.
“And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all
those who were slain on the earth” (Revelation 18:24 MKJV).
Certainly, you can say you have your standards, Tim, but rather than justifying
you in the sight of God, those things you do and consider godly condemn you,
because they’re the works of the flesh, and of the righteousness of man.
You have a form of godliness in your Sunday schools, sermons, Bible teachings,
studies, and many works, but you deny the power of God by substituting those
things He despises for those things He requires.
The question then is: What does He want? He wants your heart, not your lips.
He wants reality, not church and religion. He wants a pure people who worship
Him in spirit and truth, rather than a mixture of worldliness and spirituality,
which is utterly repulsive and corrupt in His sight. Didn’t He destroy
the “Christian”/heathen mixture in Noah's day?
He wants us to love Him, which means we identify with Him, the Truth, speaking
and living it in the midst of a wicked and corrupt world, at the cost of our
lives. He wants us to bring His righteousness and blessing to all people. The
false gospel of Billy Graham and many others, which represents another Christ
made in the image of carnal man, brings the wrath of God on all who touch it
and participate in it. It’s true. Look around, and see how all you religious
are perishing. Is Parkinson's disease, one of several conditions from which
Graham suffers, the favor of God and the fruits of His righteousness in man?
What? Is God a liar?
“And he said, If you will carefully listen to the voice of the LORD
your God, and will do that which is right in His sight, and will give ear to
His commandments, and keep all His Laws, I will put none of these diseases
upon you, which I have brought upon the Egyptians; for I am the LORD Who heals
you” (Exodus 15:26).
Does God, or do we, wish for Graham to perish? Not at all. We aren’t
willing that any should perish, but that ALL should come to repentance. Therefore
we speak His Word, for which purpose He sends us, and we know that the Word
we speak won’t return to Him empty.
Watch what happens from this day forward, Tim. What has been hidden has been
promised to be made manifest, and so it is. The Lord is no longer looking the
other way at your ungodly works and hard things you speak against Him.
It’s on account of false gospels that Jude exhorts us to contend for
the faith once delivered to the saints:
“For certain men crept in secretly, those having been of old previously
written into this condemnation, ungodly ones perverting the grace of our God
for unbridled lust, and denying the only Master, God, even our Lord Jesus Christ” (Jude
1:4).
Of such is Billy Graham, who, along with countless others, perverts the grace
of God into wanton lawlessness. Among other things, these people commend pagan
practices in the name of Christ, such as Christmas and Easter, while denying
the God-given Sabbath by substituting Sun-god day worship, as taught and instituted
by the pagan Roman emperor Constantine.
Constantine used the Catholic Church and the Name of Christ to establish dominion
over a citizenry which followed the pagan custom of keeping Sunday. He, in
union with the Catholic Church, outlawed the Sabbath and supplanted it with
Sunday to placate his subjects, thereby implying that men have the power and
ascendancy over God and His Immutable Law.
Accepting Jesus as your personal Savior is just another manifestation of the
teaching that the power of men prevails over God, and in the final analysis,
that men can do as they please, because they are “saved.” No wonder
those who follow this false gospel in the Name of Christ are found doing whatever
is right in their own eyes, with the confusion that ensues causing the heathen
to scoff at His Name.
This is the work of Mystery Babylon, the whore mentioned in Revelation 17.
Babylon, which comes from the word "babble," connotes confusion.
Is it a mystery to you how this could be done in the Name of Christ? It needn’t
be, and won’t be when you repent.
Satan comes as an angel of light. However, his kingdom is divided and does
fall. We are calling on all to repent, to turn from vain and false gospels
and christs unto the true Lord Jesus Christ, Who says:
“Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will
seek to enter in, and shall not be able” (Luke 13:24).
And: “Go in through the narrow gate, for wide is the gate and broad
is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are who go in through
it. Because narrow is the gate and constricted is the way which leads to life,
and there are few who find it” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Tim, I have not directly responded to your thoughts about following men, or
who is right, “standard” evangelicals or Pentecostals and Charismatics.
However, I can say this: If people follow Jesus Christ they won’t be
divided by doctrine, but will be united in Him. Sectarianism is satanic. Those
who are Christ's will follow true men of God, those shepherds appointed by
Him, and not hirelings and self-promoters.
They’ll have no fear of being too dependent on man, because the shepherds
of God look to Christ for their sufficiency, and teach the sheep to do so as
well. They’ll forsake other christs and gospels, selling all they have
buy the truth. They will submit themselves to the Lord Jesus Christ and to
each other, taking up the cross to follow Him. They’ll walk as Christ
walked, and will be found accepted by God, because they are born of Him, and
in Him.
They will be His workmanship and not their own:
“For by grace you are saved through faith, and that not of yourselves,
it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His
workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to good works, which God has before ordained
that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:8-10 MKJV).
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who has blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ; according
as He has chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestinated us unto
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself according to the
good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His
grace, wherein He has made us
ACCEPTED in the Beloved" (Ephesians 1:3-6).
There are several writings on our website that will answer you more completely.
I recommend:
Our Testimonies
The Big Lie Exposed
The Baptism in the Holy Spirit
The Case for Coming Out
The Church
Counterfeit Christianity
Diabolical Doctrines
Here Is the Way It Is
The True Marks of a Cult
Iniquity
Law and Grace
Contending for the faith and the true gospel that was once delivered to the
saints, by which men are saved from all false gods and gospels of men who have
corrupted the truth and made God into their own image,
Paul |
