How did he twist scripture?
ARTICLE by Don Veinot
Some groups which could be classified as cults or abusive religious groups by Evangelicals strongly discourage thinking independently from the groups leadership. Jehovah’s Witnesses Watchtower Bible and Tract Society went so far in the 1980s as to run articles which boldly declared to “Avoid Independent Thinking.” Once the organization has made a decree the followers must simply hear and obey. When I teach on this I often find Evangelicals shaking their head with a sort of tsk, tsk reaction. But many Christians, it seems, are not in much better shape. Extra biblical official positions are handed down and lots of Evangelicals march in lock step. If someone dares question, they are viewed as an anti-Christ or at least back slidden in the faith.
We find this quite a bit in dealing with apologetics and false teachers. For example, in 1999 there was a great deal of hype and hoopla about Y2K. Michael Hyatt, Chuck Missler, James Dobson and many others were pronouncing the end of the world as we know. At midnight on December 31, 1999 all of the computers in the world would shut down, electricity production would cease, coffee makers would stop functioning and cars would no longer start. Back to horse and buggy days and Hyatt even suggested that his readers needed to decide how far would they be willing to go in protecting their food supplies. Kill the hungry hordes of invaders perhaps?
We looked at this carefully and printed our findings in early 1999 in an article titled, “Y2K: Genuine Crisis or Over-hyped Circus”. The response was quick with letters, notes and emails asking why we didn’t believe the Bible? How could we question and “attack” these faithful godly leaders? Our financial support dropped substantially.
About 3 years later we published our book, A Matter of Basic Principles: Bill Gothard and the Christian Life. This one really cut to the heart of the matter. Has God given an authority which must be unquestioningly obeyed, as Gothard has historically taught?
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