Here is a book that lingers in the mind like an unresolved chord. In the cacophony of modern theology, where the church often whispers from the shadows of institutional safety, Wolfgang Vondey’s The Scandal of Pentecost: A Theology of the Public Church erupts like the biblical wind and fire it describes—demanding we confront the raw, disruptive birth of the Christian community not as a tidy origin story, but as a scandalous intrusion into public life.

Vondey, a prominent Pentecostal theologian and professor at the University of Birmingham, draws from his deep roots in Pentecostal scholarship to reframe Pentecost as the foundational event where the church emerges as a “public symbol of humanity,” embodying both brokenness and redemption. The book weaves biblical exegesis, historical theology, and philosophical anthropology into a narrative that challenges privatized views of Pentecost. It argues that the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on “all flesh” (Acts 2:17) isn’t a mere spiritual footnote but a transformative scandal, revealing the church’s symbiotic tensions—internal conflicts and external confrontations—that propel it into the world.

Vondey’s engagement with the concept of the church as a public symbol is another highlight of the book. Drawing on the work of public theologians such as Martin Marty, he argues that the church’s public witness is not merely a matter of visibility or influence, but of embodying “the communal character of faith” in a world marked by fragmentation and conflict (p. 8). The church, he writes, is “a faith built of ‘broken symbols,’ manifested above all in the scandal of the crucified Christ” (p. 91). The public nature of the church is thus inseparable from its willingness to embrace brokenness, vulnerability, and the tensions of life in a pluralistic society (p. 91). Vondey is clear that the church’s public vocation is not about triumphalism or domination, but about offering “ordering against chaos and meaning where it had been absent” (p. 12). The church’s task, he suggests, is to engage in a “public hermeneutic” that interprets Christian symbols in ways that are persuasive and life-giving, both within and beyond the boundaries of the faith community (p. 20).

Before I rest my pen, one thing must not go unnoticed: not every academic theological book ends with a poem, but Wolfgang Vondey’s choice to conclude poetically is both striking and fitting. The poem distills the book’s central themes into a vivid, almost breathless sequence of images, capturing the disruptive and transformative energy of Pentecost. Vondey’s language is intentionally visceral—“heart-beating, lips-stammering / sons and daughters / in scandalous intoxication”—evoking the embodied, communal, and even chaotic nature of the Spirit’s outpouring. It’s a powerful poetic summary that resonates long after the final page.

In conclusion, The Scandal of Pentecost is a significant and inspiring contribution to Pentecostal theology and to the wider conversation about the church’s place in the world. It is a work of both scholarship and imagination, rooted in tradition yet open to the future. For those seeking to articulate a public theology of Pentecostalism—one that is both faithful to the Spirit and responsive to the complexities of contemporary life—Vondey’s book is an indispensable resource. It challenges us to embrace the scandal of the Spirit, to risk new forms of community, and to bear witness to the hope that is within us. But perhaps the most enduring gift of Vondey’s work is its reminder that the church’s true vocation is not to seek safety or respectability, but to live in the creative tension of the Spirit’s leading. The scandal of Pentecost is that God’s Spirit refuses to be domesticated—refuses to be confined to our institutions, our traditions, or our comfort zones. Instead, the Spirit calls us out—into the world, into relationship, into the risky, joyful, and sometimes messy work of building communion in the midst of difference. To embrace the scandal of Pentecost is to open ourselves to the Spirit’s surprising, unsettling, and renewing work—not only for our own sake, but for the life of the world.

Reviewed by Ciprian Gheorghe-Luca

In this guest article, Pastor R. Loren Sandford calls for a reformation of the prophetic movement after the many failed prophecies of 2020 including predictions about COVID-19 and the re-election of President Trump.

Never in my life have I felt such a sense of disarray in the body of Christ, and most especially around prophetic ministry. Over the years, too many prophetic words have been published, taken seriously, seized upon by the body of Christ in a flurry of excitement and then failed to materialize. And yet we, the body of Christ, kept listening. I highly value good prophetic ministry, but we’ve been in need of serious prophetic reformation for a very long time.

Going back 21 years there were all the prophetic warnings about an impending Y2K disaster when the computers would crash and the world would fall apart. Prophets told us to store up food and supplies because when the computers crashed, the world would be paralyzed. Some even sold survival packages. It didn’t happen. The reality was that computers simply didn’t work like that, then or now, but almost no one seemed willing to check that out. I knew it prophetically but I believe in objective confirmations, so I asked an IBM executive what was up. Big problem? Yes. What will happen? He told me that people would get their paychecks on Wednesday instead of Friday but the computers wouldn’t crash.

The problem was that, instead of facing facts, people preferred to get stirred up about it and then claim that it didn’t happen because we prayed it wouldn’t happen. The reality was that computers simply didn’t function like that. There never would have been a crash with or without prayer. The prophets were wrong. Something similar, but less known, happened leading up to 2008. A group of otherwise reliable prophets prophesied that Senator Brownbeck of Kansas would be elected president. Brownbeck ran for his party’s nomination and failed.

Many well known prophetic voices told us that that the Covid-19 crisis would dissipate at Passover, 2020. Obviously, it didn’t and here we are, ten months later, wearing masks and enduring the shutdowns. Now we’re looking at a similar situation involving a large number of prophets who predicted a specific political outcome for 2020 that has not come to pass. Some of them are holding onto the idea that the election will be miraculously overturned, but there is no legal path for that to occur.

All of this has shaken the entire charismatic wing of the church. A subtle form of idolatry is being purged away by the hand of God, intended to restore us to the true center and purpose of prophetic ministry if we’ll embrace the shaking. I’ll say it as simply as I can. We placed too much faith in the prophets. Their words – our words – were elevated to the same level of infallibility as the Scriptures by a great many people. Wrong! So very wrong!

The truth is that in this compounded crisis of church closures and prophetic failure, we’re being driven back to the simplicity of Jesus Christ and Him crucified, to that purified message, to that foundation as the central theme. We are being summoned back to a basic, deep and simplified intimacy with God that we seem to have lost and into which we prophetic people were obligated to lead God’s people.

In the charismatic wing of the church we’ve made a lot of noise in recent decades, not just in the prophetic world, but in a long list of other ways. We preached keys to this and keys to that. We built big flashy ministries and cultivated huge ministry platforms. Commercialization of ministry products has exploded. We’ve had ever more dramatic prophetic words issued by those of us with the biggest names and the widest recognition.

In this yearlong crisis we’ve endured, it’s like looking at a building being demolished right down to the foundation so that something better and more solid can be built on it. I hear the voice of the Lord saying STOP. When did you begin relating to the structure itself as if it were the foundation? I must dismantle the structure and restore you to the foundation.

As prophetic people, this a time to come back to the prayer closet where our primary calling lies, on our knees and on our faces, even in sackcloth and ashes repenting. Back to the simple things – the cross, the blood, intimacy with Jesus without all the bling and flash to distract us from the vision of His face. Back to solid Bible study, cherishing the eternal written Word where especially we charismatics have been out of balance in seeking supernatural experiences, dreams and visions while neglecting the study of the eternal and unchanging Word of God, the Bible.

It’s time to return to simple fellowship with one another in love, cherishing the beauty of what God has created in our brothers and sisters. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit the sick and in prison for this is pure religion in the sight of God (James 1:27). Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers and cast out demons, but do it all from simple, quiet intimacy with our Father, our Savior and Holy Spirit.

We need to study again the prophets who went before us and reform the thrust of our own ministries. What was their message? The vast majority of what has been passed down to us in the biblical prophets is a call to come out of idolatry, to purify the focus on God alone. The prophets separated the precious from the vile, the holy from the unholy and good from evil. They pointed out what was idolatry to a people too blind to see it for themselves. Their gift was first and foundationally a gift of discernment, to cut through the fog and see where pollutions had entered in, then to hear from God how to address it, to pass His warnings on. Predictions were predicated on how Israel would choose to respond to the warnings. Would they repent? And if they did not then destruction was certain. Other predictions told them how God would use the destruction to refine and restore them, then to bring them back to the land to live once again under God’s favor.

It was all relational. Biblical prophetic ministry was about relational issues between God and the people He loved. None of the prophets prophesied simply because they could. In fact, Amos 3:7 – Surely the Lord God does nothing Unless He reveals His secret counsel To His servants the prophets. Clearly, not everything a prophet knew or heard was to be spoken aloud, and the same is true today. Much of what we hear is for our ears alone to guide us in how and what we pray, or simply to share the burden on the Lord’s heart in oneness with Him. God does love our company.

I Corinthians 14:3 – But one who prophesies speaks to men for edification and exhortation and consolation. I want to suggest something you may not have seen in this verse. Remember that some things the Lord speaks to a prophet are not to be spoken aloud. Part of what I Corinthians 14:3 is telling us is that we ought to question whether a word we’ve received is really going to benefit the body of Christ to edify, console or exhort, or is it just meant to inform our own praying and connect us with the burden on God’s heart?

We need to ask how something we’re sensing or hearing from God benefits the body of Christ if we were to speak it aloud. Or have we made it just fortune-telling, just something that generates excitement but doesn’t really point people to Jesus or connect them more intimately with Him? Remember that the spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus. Once again, the core of the message is Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

That said, how was prophesying a Trump victory in the election supposed to 1) reveal Jesus or testify to Him in any real way and 2) how was that supposed to edify and strengthen the body of Christ as a body? Did many of us even consider these things before we put that word out there? Was that even a question? Or were we too eager to attract attention and build our followings? I don’t mean to be critical or accusatory here. I’m putting myself in the category of one who normally does not fail in this regard, but I allowed myself to fail in this instance.

Because we failed to ask these questions, instead of strengthening God’s people in the testimony of Jesus and connecting them more intimately and firmly with Him, we rather stirred them up to connect their hope in an idolatrous way to a man or a political party. The fruit is that we’ve thrown the church into disarray and the name of Jesus has been dragged through the mud.

In this regard, it doesn’t really matter who was right and who was wrong, whether we who issued apologies were right or wrong, or whether those who continue to stand on some kind of miracle to overturn the election are right or wrong. The hard fact is that Donald Trump is not in the White House and the charismatic wing of the body of Christ has been badly shaken and divided, not strengthened. For this, we all bear responsibility before the throne of God. Repentance is in order.

PR

This article is from Prophetic Moments 143, used with permission.

Video version (length: 10:57) of this article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CI39wlW5RK4

The authors of this book are both ordained ministers with the Assemblies of God. Joseph Girdler has served in pastoral ministry and is currently the Superintendent of the AG in Kentucky. Carolyn Tennant is professor emerita of North Central University and is an adjunct professor at the Assemblies of God Theological Seminary. Both have doctoral degrees and both have written books prior to this one. This volume focuses on the controversial ministries of the apostle and the prophet. Girdler and Tennant are very qualified to write this book. Girdler wrote his doctoral dissertation on the topic of “apostolicity” and Tennant has taught and ministered in the prophetic in a number of places around the world.

The book consists of a foreword, an introduction, and twelve chapters. Some of the chapter titles are: “Work Details for Apostolicity,” “Apostolicity and Relationships,” “The Prophetic Core,” and “God Uses Creative Prophetic Roles.” One thing that you might notice in this brief sampling of chapter titles is that the authors do not use the words “apostle” or “prophet.” This is a practice that they maintain throughout the book. They refer to biblical individuals who are identified as apostles and prophets by those terms but they do not use them for the contemporary expressions of these ministries. They explain their reasons for this. The authors feel it is best to refrain from using the words “apostle” and “prophet” when referring to ministry in the contemporary church because of the increased number of false apostles and prophets in our day. They prefer to focus on the functions of these ministries rather than the titles.

Girdler and Tennant believe that there is a great lack of knowledge about these two ministries in the modern-day church. They say that most people who attend church do not have a clear picture of what these ministries are. They also say that there are church leaders who do not know what to say about these ministries. The book was written to correct how the lack of knowledge about these ministries, coupled with the abuses that have taken place, have contributed to the neglect or exclusion of the genuine expression of these ministries in some places in the church today. Girdler and Tennant say that this has left a vacuum that Satan has filled with false apostles and prophets. As the authors point out, this results in the church being cut off from two genuine ministries that Jesus gave to it for its good.

The subtitle of the book is Embracing the Authentic Avoiding the Bizarre. The writers help the reader to do this by setting forth both the positive qualities that characterize the life of a genuine apostolic or prophetic person as well as calling attention to signs that indicate that a person is not a genuine minister in these areas. For example, they say that people who genuinely function in the apostolic and prophetic are humble servants, who have been called by the Lord, and exhibit the fruit of the Spirit. False apostles and prophets generally lack these qualities, they are more self-absorbed. This is evidenced by their desire for titles and attention.

God is speaking today and Pastor Loren Sandford urges all of us to pursue biblical discernment.

With so many questionable prophetic words circulating these days, concerning both the wider world and personal prophecies, wouldn’t it be a good thing for the body of Christ to sharpen its discernment? I fear that to fail to do this will ultimately result in a tragic disillusionment with prophetic ministry at a time in history when accurate plumb line prophetic ministry is desperately needed. What are some ways to sort true words from false?

#1: Does this supposed word from God stand the test of Scripture?

Colossians 2:18 warns against the one who takes his “stand on visions he has seen, inflated without cause by his fleshly mind.” It can be supposed revelatory visions we believe reveal a truth or it can be receiving a vision for some ministry you want to do or a position you’re convinced you hold that fills you with an energy that isn’t the Lord. In any case, it must square with the eternal Word. The apostle Paul wrote: “But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed!” (Galatians 1:8)

#2: Does this word reflect the revealed nature and character of God?

Begin this test with I John 4:8: “The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.” God is love. His love may take many forms, ranging from tenderness to discipline and even anger, but it will always be love for our sake – love in the content of the word and love in the spirit of the word.

#3: Does this word line up with what God is already doing and with what the Bible tells us God wants to do? 

Question words that lead us in different directions than those already in evidence, bearing fruit in our lives and ministries. For instance, we founded the church I pastor on a vision for mercy—that we would be a place of refuge and healing. But for a time, we allowed ourselves to be side-tracked by those who called for a spiritual warfare emphasis. The result was predictably wounding. Until God brought about a cleansing, removed the competing voices and restored us to the original vision, warfare nearly destroyed us. We should have known. There have been others who called for a primary emphasis on prophetic ministry as our foundation. It resulted in deception and harm because God had dictated and confirmed a different foundation.

Luke Timothy Johnson is a first-rate biblical exegete and a Roman Catholic. He takes the reader through Luke and Acts, seeing in both the fulfillment in Jesus of the prophetic in the messianic role of prophet, priest and king. Unlike a majority of scholarship grounded in the modern discipline of critical study of the text and background, Johnson sees Luke and Acts as complementary, in fact amounting to what Luke intended to be a single read, or at least read together. Jesus comes and fulfills the Torah in a way that seems to turn Torah on its head. This is contrary to how the Pharisees do Torah, who Johnson sees as seeking to fulfill it in more of a straightforward way.

Johnson sees Jesus’ radical fulfillment of the prophetic in Luke as continuing on in the church in Acts. What Jesus began to do in Luke he continues to do in Acts by the Spirit through the church. And Johnson sees the church’s fulfillment as being even more radical. Jesus began that step toward what was fulfilled later in the church and continues on to this day.

Johnson argues for a prophetic emphasis in both Luke and Acts, which he shows is demonstrated well in the texts themselves. He sees this emphasis grounded in certain prophets of the old covenant: Moses, Elijah, Elisha. Jesus was not like the writing prophets such as Isaiah, but like the prophets who by the Spirit spoke God’s word and embodied, enacted (signs and wonders, etc.) and witnessed to that word, a witness that resulted in suffering. The prophets listed in Luke-Acts is impressive: “Moses, Samuel, David, Elijah, Elisha, Isaiah, Zechariah, Elizabeth, Mary, John, Simeon, Anna, John, Jesus, and those followers of Jesus through whom the spirit of the resurrected one did signs and wonders” (p. 67). The prophetic word and work is to point to and give something of God’s vision ultimately for the world.

I find the thesis that Luke and Acts underscore the prophetic which is fulfilled in Jesus in calling the church back to its true mission and vocation healthy. Yes, the church is prophetic by nature in its calling and constitution. Johnson sees the Pentecostal/charismatic church as important in keeping alive the manifestations of the Spirit seen in Acts.

Loren Sandford, senior pastor of New Song Fellowship, is a graduate of Fuller Theological Seminary and a widely recognized leader within the charismatic renewal. He has authored several books, and written, produced, and recorded several music CDs. This monograph, The Prophetic Church, comes at the heels of a transition in the prophetic streams of the renewal movements. As the prophetic outpouring revivals of the nineties waned, new prophetic ministries have come to the fore. As his title begs the question, Sandford’s thesis argues that intimacy with God is the power and primary mark of the prophetic church to be a light in this generation (18). He argues that “a season of the emergence of lighthouse churches and ministries is now upon us” (16). Sandford’s symbolic writing style, combined with numerous biblical examples provides the reader with vivid images to conceptualize the major thrusts of his proposal. The author’s themes build together to communicate his thesis.

Sandford opens by making bold proclamations regarding an ensuing revival in the church of the Western world. However, he conveys with sadness that the revival will stop short of creating a cultural change or lasting impact on secular society. He supports this premise based upon a hermeneutic in which he utilizes biblical narrative to support end time events and then applies these interpretations to the current state of affairs. He records a few of the historical outpouring events of the nineties by giving account of the Toronto Blessing, Brownsville, Smithton, and Pasadena revivals. Sandford argues that the subsequent rejection of these outpourings by the church, degradation of morality as it relates to God in society and liberal views regarding doctrine and authority of Scripture within the church, have caused an irreversible judgment or course within society that will prevent revival from pervading the current culture (13─16).

Sandford highlights the destiny of the prophetic church in part three. He describes this destiny through a Daniel-Joseph anointing motif and the characteristics of the life of Moses as “force multipliers” (101). He defines this concept of force multipliers as factors which seek to “dramatically increase the effectiveness” of something which already exists (187). The writer’s use of exhortation is befitting to build up the ideas of a bold and faithful community, ready to serve, and shining as the light in the darkness as a result of the their participation with these force multipliers. Part four transitions the reader into a counter-cultural theme of the meanings and biblical importance of honor. He links this culture of honor with the release of God’s power and provides several biblical narratives to demonstrate the correlation. After a short excerpt on the importance of faith, Sandford writes to the issues of prophetic prayer and praise. In this chapter, a prophetic church is described as one who knows its identity, position, and prays and praises with declarative statements which builds an atmosphere of faith. The latter theological concepts are familiar to the various streams within the Word of Faith Movement. However, they may seem somewhat foreign for the evangelical reader.

Do you think that the Christian church as a whole is becoming more receptive to prophetic ministry?

Yes, I do believe that is happening. I say that for several reasons, four of which I’d like to address here. The first is obvious to me personally—I am speaking in many more denominational settings. Ten years ago, theological boundaries would have precluded most from speaking on the topic of prophetic ministry, but this year alone, I will be speaking in Baptist, Nazarene, Lutheran, Methodist, Anglican, Episcopal and Church of Christ churches or conferences, in addition to Pentecostal and Charismatic churches.

Second, the interest level on this topic is no longer superficial. Pastors are admitting that they themselves have had a variety of supernatural spiritual experiences. As a consequence, they are asking some tough and probing theological questions. With these questions comes a heightening demand for intellectual integrity and consistency between recognizing that the Holy Spirit’s gifts are available today and applying that belief to current church life. In other words, if it is for today, how is it meant to function in order to aid the church?

Finally, there is the newfound recognition that three separate issues have to be addressed in any gift, especially the prophetic gift. I call these the Three Pillars of Prophetic Ministry: the prophet and the man, the prophet and the gift and the prophet and the church.

The prophet and the gift espouses that gifting is not instantaneous. People do not stand before world leaders the day after their gifts are bestowed. Moses waited 40 years; Samuel waited 25 years; and even Jeremiah, who the Lord said was not too young, waited 17 years before his first prophetic utterance. During the interval between the gifting and the releasing, the gift must be studied. Biblical, spiritual knowledge must be gained to help lay the foundation for any future task the Lord might give. The novice must learn the difference between the gift of prophecy and the gift of being a prophet, as well as the differences between a trance and a visitation, a dream and a vision, a translation and a transportation. All these things are described in Scripture and happened in Scripture—what if they happened again?

R. Loren Sandford is pastor of New Song Fellowship in Denver, Colorado; he is also the son of John Loren Sandford, co-founder of the Elijah House. Pastor Sandford is himself prophetic and grew up in a prophetic home. His experience of, and exposure to, prophetic ministry qualifies him to write about this subject.

Understanding Prophetic People is divided into three sections. Section one is called “Foundations.” Topics covered in this section are: the profile of the prophetic person, an overview of prophetic ministry, a discussion of what prophetic ministry is not, a description of the prophetic task, the prophet as intercessor, and the office of a prophet.

Of particular interest in this section is Sandford’s profile of the prophetic person. Sandford begins the first chapter by saying: “Prophetic people are generally weird.” In the remainder of the chapter he goes on to describe some of the characteristics of the prophetic person including rarely being happy, being burden bearers, having the gift of weakness, having eccentric personalities, being self-protective, people who are lonely and suffer from rejection, being over serious about life and having unusual experiences. An awareness of these things can help churches, and especially pastors, relate to, and help incorporate prophetic people into the church.

The remaining chapters in section one are devoted to various aspects of prophetic ministry. Significant points that Sandford makes in this section are that prophetic words need to be tested (he is very strong on this), that modern day prophets do not have the right to command and that prophetic words should not be general, but be specific and have substance.

Section two is titled “Hearing God.” In this section Sandford discusses meditation, visions and dreams and the voice of God.

Sandford says that meditation (on the Lord and on His Word) is a must for a prophetic person. Before one can speak the Word of the Lord to people they must first hear it. Sandford says if a prophetic person does not meditate they increase their risk of hearing from sources other than God.

Also in this section Sandford addresses the subject of dreams. He warns us that all dreams are not God communicating with us, some are natural dreams. He also says that dream interpretation is not a science or learned skill, but rather a prophetic gift (which can be developed).

Section three is “Training and Placement.” In this last section Sandford addresses the issues of the need for wilderness experiences and the dark night of the soul and the placement of the prophetic gift within the church.

I thought that this last section of the book was the most powerful. In it Sandford describes some of the experiences that a prophetic person can expect to go through. These experiences purify and prepare them to be the person that God wants them to be. While he specifically applies the experiences of the wilderness and the dark night of the soul to the prophetic, I think that what he writes has relevance for other areas of ministry as well. The wilderness experience and the dark night of the soul are painful times but Sandford provides some insight into their purposes in developing the prophetic person. Sandford is brutally honest and transparent about his own experiences as he has gone through these places of testing.

R. Loren Sandford, Purifying the Prophetic: Breaking Free from the Spirit of Self-Fulfillment (Grand Rapids: Chosen, 2005), 203 pages.

Loren Sandford writes with a twofold purpose: He seeks to confront the culture of self-centered Christianity and to refocus the Charismatic Church on the work and the imitation of Christ. He speaks with a prophetic tone throughout the book—pointing the bony finger of the prophet at sin—while at the same time he nurtures with a pastoral heart, bringing healing to the wounded. Calling attention to the public prophetic errors, such as the fear-filled predictions of Y2K disasters, he asks why there has been no public reprisal against them, or any discrediting of their ministry. In all of this, Sandford names the self-centeredness as parallel to the worship of Baal. To combat this mindset, Sandford sets before the reader a proposal for correction.

Sandford opens with the scriptural illustration of Agabus and the prophetic warning of danger and persecution that he brought to Paul and of the warning of impending famine. In like manner, he calls the contemporary prophets to task with Columbine, Y2K, and 9/11 events as descriptors of failure to prophesy accurately. Leaders of the church, he warns, must be cautious with “the seemingly innocent words” that are spoken. He asks, where is accountability? Pressing further, he confronts prophetic errors with his term “prophetic psychic reading”. Likewise, he disparages the frequent misnomer, “God told me…” In our self-centered culture, we are quick to hear what we want to hear and to ignore the rest. Sandford calls for a course correction.

Sandford uses the scriptural analogies of the Jezebel spirit and Baal worship to describe the same errors in western culture. The corrective, according to Sandford, is to reestablish the foundational things that God has desired for His people: To be a people of faith and to know what it is to love one another—even as Jesus summed up the whole of the Law—to love God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. Self must be subjected to the service of others.

Primary to the thesis of Sandford’s book is the fresh emphasis on the Cross of Christ. Without mincing words, he confronts the excesses of the “word of faith” movement and its “prosperity doctrines.” Nowhere in these does Sandford find the work of the cross in the life of the believer. Further, he pointedly exposes many of the movement’s distortions of scripture. Sandford emphasizes the teachings of Jesus and draws the reader to recall the repeated admonitions to take up ones own cross. Here he also pleads for the teachers of the church to place a fresh emphasis on the precious blood of Jesus Christ. It is the suffering of the cross and the purchase of the blood that will bring the needed corrective to the self-centeredness of the twin errors of the above teaching. Further, these correctives will bring maturity to the infantile and rebellious.

In this guest editorial, Eddie Hyatt points us to Jesus as antidote to wayward spirituality.

While driving to class a few days ago I asked God for a theme for that day. I was teaching from the book of Colossians and had a vague idea where I was going, but desired more clarity about a theme for that lesson. As I prayed and worshipped, the phrase “Don’t Lose Your Focus” was strongly impressed upon my heart and mind. This phrase remained so pronounced in my heart that, at the beginning of the class, I wrote across the board in large letters “Don’t Lose Your Focus” and announced it as the theme for that lesson. I was then astounded at the sequence of events that unfolded.

As I taught that morning, the Holy Spirit seemed to direct our attention to what some New Testament scholars call “The Colossian Heresy.” Although I had taught on the subject before, on this particular day I seemed to receive new and fresh insight into the nature of this 1st century heresy. In essence, they had lost their focus on Christ. After the class was over, I went to the main auditorium where a guest speaker was addressing the student body. As I listened to this individual, well known in the prophetic/apostolic movement, I was astounded to hear “The Colossian Heresy” that I had just delineated being propagated to the student body.

The Nature of the Colossian Heresy

The problem in Colosse was that the believers had lost their focus on Christ and were being distracted by other, even legitimate, things. Paul’s answer was to keep directing their attention back to Christ as the source and fullness of everything they needed. They did not need to look to some other source for knowledge of God, For in Him [Christ] dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily (2:9). There was no need to look elsewhere for some plan or process for achieving spiritual maturity for, You are complete in Him who is the Head of all principality and power (2:10). They did not need to turn to other avenues for obtaining special wisdom and knowledge, for in Christ, Are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (2:3). What was it that was distracting the Colossians and causing them to lose their focus? It was a preoccupation with their own spirituality. They were obsessed with how to be “spiritual” and had become preoccupied with supernatural phenomena such as visions and angelic visitations (2:18). In Col. 2:18 Paul refers to the worship of angels and what he [the heretical teacher] has seen, i.e., visions (NIV). The word “worship” in this passage is a translation of the Greek word threskia and is not the normal word for “worship” in the New Testament. Besides Col. 2:18 it is found in only three other places in the New Testament, Acts 26:3 and James 1:26, 27, where it is translated as “religion.” The point seems to be that the Colossians had developed a “religious” fascination with angels and visions. Why is this a problem? Their fascination with such sensational phenomena has distracted them from their one and only true Source, Jesus Christ. Because of their fascination with esoteric, sensational phenomena, they are no longer, Holding fast to the Head from whom all the body, nourished and knit together … grows with an increase that is from God (2:19). This is serious, for only by abiding in Christ and holding fast to Him can the Colossians experience the fullness of salvation and arrive at spiritual maturity. To complicate matters, the spiritual experiences, with which they are so enamored, have become a basis for pride. They consider themselves a notch above other Christians because of these supernatural encounters. They are an elite group. Although they purport to be humble, it is a false humility that is betrayed by their attitudes and actions (2:18). Perhaps referring to their most prominent teacher, Paul says that he, like his followers, is vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind (2:18).