Asleep No More: False Teacher of the Year 2016

It's that time of year, the time of caring and giving. As the nights grow longer and the days grow colder we retreat indoors to the warmth I pray you all are taking the opportunity to fend off the wrath of satan by studying the word of God. I am in two studies this year, John and Hebrews, and what a delight! I've always loved John, but this is my first study of Hebrews and I wish I had studied this a long time ago.

One of the greatest (read: most effective) tools Satan has is to drive a wedge between us and God through ignorance of God's word, His commands, His desires. And doing this is a very simple task, simply present a false version of God's word in a manner that is more palatable to the unaware than the true word of God. Some folks are very good at it. Tops in 2013 was John Shore, leader of the Not All ~~There~~ Like That "Christians", in 2014 it was Steven McSwain a self-professed "Christian Atheist", a title that he enjoys, and last year it was Mark Sandlin, a "pastor" in the "Christian" Left who believes that social justice takes presidence uber alles.

Again I wanted to nominate Gretta Vosper, but prayerful reflection again eliminates her from the running. I can't consider her because of 1 Corinthians 5:12, where God tells us not to judge those outside the church. Gretta is an atheist therefore she's outside of the Church, even though she's conducting her self help seminars inside a church building - but that building became a tomb years ago, and her acolytes mere animated corpses shuffling off to hell.

This year's winner will come as no surprise to anyone, his efforts to stand front and center as the New Apostolic Reformation's False Teacher of choice are impressive and has achieved the "Second Peter Principle" to earn this recognition:

18 For speaking out arrogant words of vanity they entice by fleshly desires, by sensuality, those who barely escape from the ones who live in error, 19 promising them freedom while they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by what a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved. 20 For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. 21 For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them. (2 Peter 2:18-21)

Attention To Orders (Romans 16:17-18)

For inventing his own Gospel with creativity above and beyond the call of duty, for misrepresenting the very word of God with bold faced aplomb, and re-defining the clearly stated word of God through personal revelation the nominating committee (admittedly a committee of one) sadly announces that the False Teacher of the year for 2016 is Rick Joyner, author of over 50 books, the Founder and Executive Director of MorningStar Ministries and Heritage International Ministries which operates the Heritage International Ministries Conference Retreat Center at the site of the former P.T.L. Club of Jim and Tammie Faye Baker fame, and Senior Pastor of MorningStar Fellowship Church, which meets in the lobby of the hotel at Heritage. And, oh yeah, he's a prophet and an Apostle.

There isn't a bandwagon that Rick Joyner won't jump on to aggrandize himself and his teaching. In the late 1990s it was the Y2K bandwagon and he claimed that the Lord “finally did begin to speak” about the issue. God supposedly told Rick that, “The most severe difficulties will come from the panic generated by the situation” and “The Lord told me to observe the problems that Y2K will cause in the natural world as a reflection of the problems we have in the body of Christ.” As anyone over the age of 20 knows, the "Y2K bug" was the biggest non-event of the century. I know many people in the tech world who were hired to fix the "Y2K bug" and earned fabulous bonuses for doing not much of anything to avert it. Rick even jumped on the Four Blood Moons bandwagon and the Shemitah band wagon with one hop claiming that the fourth blood moon coming close to the Shemitah would be a "Tipping point for America" - although he never claimed what a "tipping point" actually means.

On New Years Eve, 1997 he and Bob Jones released a prophecy claiming that entire cities in the Midwest are going to be leveled by five feet of rain, the city of Los Angeles is going to be leveled by an earthquake, and for good measure World War 3 is going to break out and Tokyo will be leveled by an earthquake, and all this is going to happen before the year 2000. (download the transcript here). Just an aside: at the time that the Joyner and Bob Jones issued these dire warnings about the impending destruction of the West Coast, Joyner was selling cabins at his East Coast “Moravian community.” (Morningstar Prophetic Bulletin, April, 1998) Coincidence? I will be charitable and say "maybe not".

Mr. Joyner's prophecies are interesting (to say the least)

There is a meltdown of authority going on in the world and a corresponding increase of lawlessness. The earth itself is also going through travail to give birth to the messengers of power who are sent to prepare the way for the coming of the kingdom by preaching the gospel of the kingdom throughout the earth. (2005)

Christians can cure ebola just by their presence

... [27 secs] You know in heaven there is no ebola. It can't get in and there is authority that can be received - I believe that there is some that are called to receive it, maybe many - total authority over ebola. Somebody with ebola, they come into the room the ebola is gone. That person is healed. It cannot exist in their presence. (source)

Ignore Ephesians 1:13, according to Mr Joyner the holy spirit requires teamwork and esprit de corps

From the first Day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit has proven that He will only come to the degree that we have unity (Rick Joyner, "Azusa Street - The Fire That Could Not Die", The Morning Star Journal, Volume 7, Number 1)

Mr. Joyner claims to have gone to heaven, not only that, he claims to be a doctor

You want false teaching? Here's his take on the AntiChrist, the beast of Revelation:

"This man of sin is the personification of the sin of man. This is our basic nature until we are changed in Christ. This is the mature fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. The root and power of the man of sin is the serpent; the beast had to be fully revealed in man - whatever is sown must also be reaped. In this beast we see ourselves without Christ. By this revelation we begin to perceive the depth of the unfathomable grace and mercy of God and our profound need to be reborn in Christ. (There Were Two Trees In The Garden, Rick Joyner, pp 16-17)

Mr. Joyner started off 2016 by using God to pick the Super Bowl winner for him. and closed out the year by comparing the twelve apostles with Donald Trump.

Mr. Joyner is above us mere Christians, he's a member of a "New Breed", a generation of Super Christians that will become "divine" or "God in the flesh" and with their awesomeness will manifest Christ here on earth with signs and wonders and pass down judgements to cleanse the church and the world of sin so Christ can return and... wait - did I get that right? Christ cannot return until Rick Joyner and his pals in the New Apostolic Reformation cleanse the earth for him? Look, I scoured the bible looking for the reference and couldn't find anything... (forehead slap) Silly Me! This is an extra biblical revelation that's only available to infallible prophets like Rick Joyner!

Mr. Joyner labors under the impression that a false prophet is not a false prophet but a mistaken prophet, that it's ok to play fast and loose with the name of the Lord and prophesy anything in His name:

You expect two-year olds to wear diapers and make a mess with just about everything they touch. We have to allow the young in Christ to be immature, and yes, make messes. Young and immature prophetic people will act like young and immature prophetic people. The belief that some have tried to impose on the prophetic—that if you made one mistake you are a false prophet—inhibits their maturity, or worse, it can profoundly distort their character. (source)

One of the greatest hazards affecting maturing prophets is the erroneous interpretation of the Old Testament exhortation that if a prophet ever predicted something which did not come to pass he was no longer to be considered a true prophet (see Deuteronomy 18:20-22). The warning was that if this happened, the prophet had been presumptuous and the people were not to fear him. If one predicts something in the name of the Lord, and it does not come to pass, he has probably spoken presumptuously and needs to be repented of, but that does not make him a false prophet. No one could step out in the faith required to walk in his calling if he knew that a single mistake would ruin him for life. (Source: The Prophetic Ministry, The Morning Star Prophetic Newsletter, Rick Joyner, n.d. Vol. 3, No. 2, Pg. 2)

By Mr. Joyner's interpretation of this passage there's no such thing as a False Prophet. The primary way of determining a false prophet is his prophesy has come true or not, but according to Mr. Joyner that's not a big deal, anyone can say anything followed by "...thus sayeth the Lord" and regardless of the honesty of the statement Mr. Joyner expects to be treated as an official spokesman for God regardless of how silly his statements are, or how unbiblical his claims. One can only wonder how Mr. Joyner would talk his way around Deuteronomy 13:1-5

1 “If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, 2 and the sign or the wonder comes true, concerning which he spoke to you, saying, ‘Let us go after other gods (whom you have not known) and let us serve them,’ 3 you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams; for the Lord your God is testing you to find out if you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. 4 You shall follow the Lord your God and fear Him; and you shall keep His commandments, listen to His voice, serve Him, and cling to Him. 5 But that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he has counseled rebellion against the Lord your God who brought you from the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of slavery, to seduce you from the way in which the Lord your God commanded you to walk. So you shall purge the evil from among you.

Luckily for Mr. Rick we don't put false prophets to death, but purging him from our midst is not out of the question. However that seems to be a dimmer and dimmer possibility with each passing day. The New Apostolic Reformation grows and gains strength every single day and the "holy laughter" of the goats getting their ears tickled is nearly deafening. We are truly watching the great falling away that Paul warned us about in 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4. Our best defense is prayer that we can help lead the victims of these false teachers to the true word of God. That, and hand them their own Golden God in acknowledgement of being the False Teacher of the Year