As a Charismatic Protestant who converted to Charismatic Catholicism, I find it harder and harder to understand cessassionists. People have been having visions, dreams experienced healings, etc for the entire 2000 years of Christianity’s existence… in the Roman Catholic Church, the various Eastern Orthodox Churches, and Protestantism.

Read St. John of the Cross’s “Dark Night of the Soul” and St. Teresa of Avila’s “The Interior Castle”. They were Christian mystics (don’t be thrown off by that term!!!) and the movement they were a part of predated Charismaticism by around 400 years. Not to mention the countless others who came before them…

pax tecum,

tim

Call me *simple* but I don’t understand the need for discussion of divisions and categories when all I’ve ever wanted and all I desire is to know Jesus.

I know I’m oversimplifying things, but it just confuses me…this: intellectual pursuit for correct ideas and perceptions. Perhaps I’m misled in my understanding of what matters. Then again, perhaps not.

I appreciate your care in this post and your honesty. I am a continuationist and have experienced a little of the miraculous. I have come to the conclusion that the gifts are still for today because I don’t have a reason from Scripture to believe otherwise. It seems to me that Scripture would have taken great care to prepare believers for the transition rather than leave us to infer it from personal experience and church history. But the sign gifts certainly don’t seem a fraction as normative as some of our more charismatic brothers claim.

But, I will mention this. Brother, it is far more miraculous for you to endure through the struggles that you have than for a man to jump out of a wheelchair or for the dead to rise. Your experience of sustaining grace in the midst of intense suffering ranks pretty high as a sign-gift to me. I would rather see that kind of miracle than a thousand physical healings.

May our God in Christ show you the riches of His love and mercy.

1 Cor. 2:2,
Clint

A Charismatic Calvinist! Now there’s an oxymoron if you want one.

But then again, who would have thought that cessationists would ever take a second look at the power of the Kingdom back in the 1980′s?

The miracles of the Kingdom were documented to be continuing well into the 4th century, long after the last apostle died. And they continue to this day, specially to those whose worldview has not foreclosed on the possibilities of them happening.

Remember, even the Lord Yeshua had a partial healing experience with the blind man who could only see shadows.

I know I am being too simplistic but I would really like to see someone who has been blind or have some type of serious physical impairment to be healed instantly. Better yet, see a modern prophet raise someone from the dead. If the gifts of Acts continue then these should be expected.

#2. I really must apologize to you. I completely missed the paragraph about your mom. I have been physically healed of some things — one time instantly — but not of others. My daughter is used in healing ministry yet suffers with migraines, for one thing. There are many mysteries related to suffering, and there are definitely no pat answers. We shouldn’t try to force God into a mold, nor in a box. He is God, and His ways are definitely higher. I humbly hope you will accept my apology for missing the paragraph about your family. I know how difficult this can be. We do know that He will work it for good and even for some higher glory. Keep hoping, keep believing, keep seeking. His promises are eternal, and He’s got amazing discoveries ahead. Many blessings to you and to your loved ones!
In Christ’s love,
Cheryl

Hi there,
I just bumped into your website. I don’t remember exactly how I got there. Not 10 minutes ago I wrote the message below to a friend. You said you are still a cessationist because you haven’t experienced certain things. Isn’t this criteria of experience the one that so many have proudly decried through the years as illegitimate? (“You can’t go by experience,” “They are too much into experience.”)
Here’s the message I wrote to a Facebook friend whose husband is sick: I pray you will touch our beloved Wayne with your divine hand and heal his body for your glory and all of the _____ joy. Thank you for your amazing love for your servant. Amen! My daughter Hannah went to Disneyland this week with friends. They prayed for a person to be healed, and she was. They prayed for a medical doctor’s son, a star basketball player with a shoulder injury, out for the season. He was healed. He started texting friends (all 8th graders from a secular charter school). Curious, they started coming from all over the park. They were utterly amazed to see what God was doing and to experience His touch on their lives. My daughter had about 30 of them excitedly praying en masse to receive Jesus Christ. It’s all on video. It was like a NT revival story — “and there was great joy in that city.” This demonstrates that God WANTS to send revival and “waits to be gracious.” Is He saying, “Hey, I’m no cessationist”?

[...] til reformationens doktriner er forbi. C. Michael Patton fra Reclaimingthemind har skrevet en genial artikel om det. Selv er han en blød cessationist og mener altså at Åndens gaver ophørte med den sidste apostels [...]

You mean Pentecostal/Charismatics should be excluded from the realm of intellect and intelligencia…? Is this a new concept? LOL….you know I am being snarky here…but all my life I have never heard that we were even placed into the same category as thinkers…this is new and I need to get on the train before I miss out on the great intellectual awakening of the Charismatic…

I can say this because as I said the other day….”me are one”. Why does it seem this is something strange? The appeal to Charismatic/Pentecostal has always been to include the poor, the “lower” class and the disenfranchised in some manner. You don’t have to be a genius to be Charismatic, but it seems in most churches that are viewed as more “qualified” you almost do have to be an intellectual giant to be able to speak or do anything aside from being a janitor. I would prefer to be in a church that threw intellectualism out the door and simply worshipped God. But that’s just me.

If anyone from any of the greatest theology universities were to just go and sit for half an hour and ask any one of the people I know from the small, ignored churches about how they love God, they would be surprised to find that these people really do have a genuine love. I prefer to use my mind to study as much as I can but never would I want to think I could ever learn so much there is no more for me to learn. I think it is ok to believe Charismatics and Pentecostals can be as intelligent as any one else.

You are forgetting a leading NT Scholar, Gordon Fee whose work on 1 Corinthians is standard. Also, his work God’s Empowering Presence is a must read for a theology of the Holy Spirit in Paul (or his condensed version Paul, the Spirit and the People of God).

I am with John – go with Keener over Grudem for serious pentecostal/charismatic scholarship or to see that pentecostal/charismatics can produce serious scholarship – case in point is Keeners massive two volume work on John, which Richard Bauckham thinks rivals if not exceeds Raymond Browns two volume AB commentary on John.

Consider too Keener book Gift and Giver: The Holy Spirit for Today.