“Don’t ever take a fence down until you know the reason it was put up.” ~ G.K. Chesterton
Several years ago, my wife and I, were considering joining a local church near our home. We had been visiting this particular church for a month or so and we enjoyed the fellowship, worship, and preaching. However, before making any decision to join this particular church, I wanted to meet with the Pastor to get to know him and to see where he stood on some key issues. The Pastor was very kind, hospitable, and gracious. However, when I began to share my story on how the Lord led me into deliverance ministry, everything changed. He began to share his belief in cessationism. Since I attended Bible School, Seminary, and at one time was a practicing cessationist, I knew exactly where he was coming from. Cessationism is the belief that the spiritual gifts such as speaking in tongues, prophecy, and healing ceased with the Apostolic Age.
My wife and I were told we would not be permitted to join this church because we were continuationists. That is, we believe the spiritual gifts enumerated in 1 Cor. 12 are in operation today (gift of wisdom, knowledge, miracles, discerning of spirits, etc). You can imagine, I was a bit shocked by this Pastor’s statement. I can remember him saying, “You can come and visit our church but you cannot join because you don’t believe what we believe.” At that time, I was already in the process of writing a book, however, when this event happened, I focused my attention to write about the heresy of cessationism.
Before this event, I had viewed cessationism as a mere “nonessential”. This was largely due to being trained in the reformed tradition and being influenced by reformed preachers and teachers. Also, at the time, I had only been a practicing continuationist for about 2 1/2 years. However, after seeing how this doctrine can lead to potential members being excluded from church membership, and understanding the overall implications, my eyes were opened to see how destructive this particular doctrine is.
I wanted to share some of the obvious issues in regards to cessationism:
1. No biblical support.
Tom Pennington, a speaker at John MacArthur’s, Strange Fire Conference in 2013, spoke on the topic “The Case for Cessationism”. During this talk, he stated the following,
“So what is it that Cessationists believe the Spirit has ceased doing? Just one function—He no longer gives believers today the miraculous gifts, like tongues, prophecy, and healing… It is neither His plan nor pattern to give Christians those gifts today as He did in the Apostolic time. They ceased with the Apostles… The New Testament nowhere directly states that the miraculous gifts will cease during the church age. But that argument cuts both ways, because the New Testament doesn’t directly say they will continue either.”
Pennington states the obvious. There is no direct evidence for the doctrine of cessationism. One would think, “If there is no direct evidence, why espouse it?” For many cessationists, like Pennington, they also state the fallacy, “There is no evidence that the spiritual gifts would continue either.”
There are numerous texts that state the exact opposite of what Pennington declares. The most obvious is Mark 16:15-18,
“And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
Scripture is clear that the gifts will continue according to Jesus. Another obvious issue is that the miraculous gifts were not just given to the twelve apostles. We know the following:
- Unknown men were casting out demons (Mark 9: 38-41)
- The seventy appointed by Jesus did miraculous works including driving out demons and healing the sick (Luke 10:1-9, 17-20)
- Stephen the deacon, performed signs and miracles (Acts 6:8)
- Philip the Evangelist, did signs and miracles (Acts 8:4-8)
- Paul and Baranbas who were not a part of the twelve apostles and were later appointed apostles performed miracles (Acts 14:3)
Pennington and other Cessationists, are factually wrong in their assertion. The Bible clearly says the gifts will not only continue but the gifts were given to men who were not a part of the twelve. Therefore, we do have direct evidence of the continuation of the gifts while there is no evidence of the gifts ceasing.
2. The only person that would want to remove the gift of miracles/healings is Satan.
When one speaks of driving out demons, this practice falls under the gift of miracles/healings. We know this because Jesus said the following:
“Teacher, said John, “We saw someone driving out demons in your name and we told him to stop, because he was not one of us.” Do not stop him,” Jesus said. “For no one who does a miracle in my name…” (Mark 9:38-39)
Why would God remove this gift from the Church but still allow Satan and his kingdom to continue tormenting, harassing, and enslaving people? Does that make any sense? However, it would make sense to Satan and his kingdom, to disarm the Church of this weapon and other gifts by convincing people that these gifts are no longer active. The only one that would stand to benefit would be Satan and his kingdom.
In fairness, those who teach cessationism are sound in many areas when it comes to biblical theology. I do not want to make it seem as though these men are wrong in every area. However, this blind spot brings forth severe consequences theologically and practically. Theologically speaking, by default it sows the seed of confusion. For example, one can read Jesus stating,
“These signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons…” (Mark 16:15)
Yet, you can go to a church and be told you are not able to join because you believe in the spiritual gifts. Can you see how a young believer could easily get confused and be swayed to follow unbiblical doctrine? In short, when one reads the above text and others that are similar, it clearly affirms the believing and practicing of the gifts. However, if a leader in a church denies the theological truth found in Scripture and replaces it with traditional ideas that have been popularized, it sows confusion and division.
Moreover, practically speaking, this doctrine is extremely harmful to those who are being tormented. In some cases, people are being tormented with suicidal ideations that are influenced by demons. The usual instruction by church leaders is to tell the parishioner to pray, read the Bible, listen to praise and worship music, and potentially pursue Christian therapy. Although all of these suggestions may help, if the problem is being caused by demons, it will not get to the root issue.
I have personally driven out spirits of suicide and death (in the name of Jesus) that were in people. Once the demons are cast out, the person does not experience the same pressure to commit suicide. Hence, this is only one of many torments! Why would we neglect using the gifts that God has given us to deal with such problems?
I love my Cessationists brothers. However, they are in error when it comes to this crucial topic. In my view, cessationism is a doctrine of demons (1 Tim. 4:1). Again, I’m not saying these brothers are devils who teach this doctrine. Yet, it needs to be stated that this teaching is not from the Spirit of God but from the spirit of error (1 John 4:6).
If you are interested in learning more about why cessationism is heretical, pick up my book, The Deception of Eloquence, I go into great detail explaining cessationism and why we need to utilize the spiritual gifts.
