John Hagee: No Need for Jesus

[Blue Tick]

“There are right now Jewish people on this earth who have a powerful and special relationship with God… They have been chosen by the ‘election of grace’ in which God does what he does without asking man to approve or understand it. Let us put an end to the Christian chatter that ‘all the Jews are lost’ and can't be in the will of God until they convert to Christianity... There are a certain number of Jews in relationship with God right now through divine election.” (Source: Hagee, Should Christians Support Israel?, Pages 124-25, 127)

"The Jewish people have a relationship to God through the law of God as given through Moses… I believe that every Jewish person who lives in the light of the Torah, which is the word of God, has a relationship with God and will come to redemption.” (Source: Julia Duin, "San Antonio Fundamentalist Battles Anti-Semitism," The Houston Chronicle)

“The law of Moses is sufficient enough to bring a person into the knowledge of God until God gives him a greater revelation. And God has not.” (Source: Julia Duin, “San Antonio Fundamentalist Battles Anti-Semitism,” The Houston Chronicle)

“If God blinded the Jewish people to the identity of Jesus as Messiah, how could He send them to hell for not seeing what he had forbidden them to see?” (Source: John Hagee, personal faxed correspondence to CRI, 18 October 1994, Page 3)

"Jesus refused to produce a sign because it was not the Father’s will, nor his, to be Messiah." (Source: Hagee, In Defense of Israel, p 138)

"The Jews were not rejecting Jesus as Messiah; it was Jesus who was refusing to be the Messiah." (Source: Hagee, In Defense of Israel, p. 140)

"They wanted him to be their Messiah, but he flatly refused." (Source: Hagee, In Defense of Israel, p. 141)

"Jesus rejected to the last detail the role of Messiah in word or deed." (Source: Hagee, In Defense of Israel, p. 145)

The insanity of sin...

 

[Blueridge Believer]

Is it proper to make fun of the fact that he is overweight?
There are plenty of theological errors that we could point out, why must we even enter into the topic of his weight?

Would we be as equally critical of Martin Luther or Spurgeon about their weight?

You are correct dear brother. I repent.

 

[Ivan]

What a suprise for the fat man one day when he wakes up in the hell he fails to warn these poor jews about.

And yet don't some evangelicals leaders acknowledge, support or endorse him?

Mike Huckabee spoke at his "church."

Yeah, and Huckabee is a Southern Baptist too. Of course that doesn't make me very happy. Of course Huckabee is doing what politicans do, compromise. The problem that has developed after Super Tuesday is that it has become apparent that Huckabee has a great deal of support in the South and that makes him capable of having some say in the nomination of the next President.

I'd be shocked if McCain chose him as a running mate, but McCain is going to need the support of Huckabee and that makes him a player. This is all pure speculation on my part, but I don't like the way things are shaping up. Of course, I don't think I have ever liked the way things have shaped up in Presidential politics in my lifetime!

We talk and talk about this. Bottom line: our hope is not found in these people, in politics, this or any government or even in this nation. Our hope is in Christ. If it were not so I would be the most miserable of people.

 

[MrMerlin777]

Personally I find Hagee to be a mental and theological pigmy.

I pay little to no attention to the man or anything he has to say with that blusterous voice of his.

 

[Ivan]

Personally I find Hagee to be a mental and theological pigmy.

I pay little to no attention to the man or anything he has to say with that blusterous voice of his.

Granted, but there are so many who do pay attention to him...apparently. Why? I haven't a clue.

 

[raekwon]

I wouldn't be surprised if Rev. Gov. Huckabee's sermon was the most biblical that church had heard for years.

 

[MrMerlin777]

Personally I find Hagee to be a mental and theological pigmy.

I pay little to no attention to the man or anything he has to say with that blusterous voice of his.

Granted, but there are so many who do pay attention to him...apparently. Why? I haven't a clue.

Niether do I. It's such a pity that people buy his "bill o' goods". I'm more and more believing that American "churchianity" is a lemming looking for a high enough cliff.

 

[Ivan]

Personally I find Hagee to be a mental and theological pigmy.

I pay little to no attention to the man or anything he has to say with that blusterous voice of his.

Granted, but there are so many who do pay attention to him...apparently. Why? I haven't a clue.

Niether do I. It's such a pity that people buy his "bill o' goods". I'm more and more believing that American "churchianity" is a lemming looking for a high enough cliff.

My friend, the Church is in desperate need of revival, which only God can send to us. We must beg God that He will sent it. It is our only hope.

 

[Pilgrim]

And yet don't some evangelicals leaders acknowledge, support or endorse him?

Evangelical and political, too.

Awhile back I actually wrote letters to TBN and Kenneth Copeland basically asking them why they provided air time to Hagee since he doesn't believe that Jesus is Christ or that He is necessary for salvation if you have the right genes. TBN never responded. Copeland sent me a response saying that I'd need to contact Hagee if I thought there was something wrong with his theology, but KCM had no problem with it.

Including Gary Bauer and Jonathan Falwell. See here.

 

[MrMerlin777]

Granted, but there are so many who do pay attention to him...apparently. Why? I haven't a clue.

Niether do I. It's such a pity that people buy his "bill o' goods". I'm more and more believing that American "churchianity" is a lemming looking for a high enough cliff.

My friend, the Church is in desperate need of revival, which only God can send to us. We must beg God that He will sent it. It is our only hope.

Indeed, we must humble ourselves, pray and seek the Lord's face.

 

[J. David Kear]

Another John, Calvin, had this to say about the designation “the Israel of God” from Galatians chapter 6.

“This is an indirect ridicule of the vain boasting of the false apostles, who vaunted of being the descendants of Abraham according to the flesh. There are two classes who bear this name, a pretended Israel, which appears to be so in the sight of men, — and the Israel of God. Circumcision was a disguise before men, but regeneration is a truth before God.”

 

[Anton Bruckner]

My friend, the Church is in desperate need of revival, which only God can send to us. We must beg God that He will sent it. It is our only hope.

depends on what you mean by revival, I think the problem today is gross biblical illiteracy.

It is because of Biblical ignorance many are led astray by the likes of Haggee and Osteen.

Proverbs 30: 2Surely I am more brutish than any man, and have not the understanding of a man.

3I neither learned wisdom, nor have the knowledge of the holy.

 

[Ivan]

My friend, the Church is in desperate need of revival, which only God can send to us. We must beg God that He will sent it. It is our only hope.

depends on what you mean by revival, I think the problem today is gross biblical illiteracy.

It is because of Biblical ignorance many are led astray by the likes of Haggee and Osteen.

Proverbs 30: 2Surely I am more brutish than any man, and have not the understanding of a man.

3I neither learned wisdom, nor have the knowledge of the holy.

That's a good start.

 

[Semper Fidelis]

It saddens but it doesn't surprise me. Honestly, most American's view of salvation doesn't require that Christ suffered and died either. Most people today don't have the time to hear Paul warning them in Galatians 1-4 about departing for another Gospel and that Christ died in vain if a law had been given that could have attained to righteousness.

That stuff doesn't interest them. They need the list of things to do. We're moral, the Jews are moral, the Mormons are moral, the Catholics are moral, the Hindus are moral, and so is my next door neighbor who doesn't really believe in anything. We're all basically good people and, as Joel Osteen notes, some of us find Jesus to be a more helpful way to be good.

Doctor Laura has a much bigger audience than Hagee does. Have you ever noticed how many "Christians" call into her show for moral advice?

As long as we're all law-keepers then Hagee's views are not at all shocking.

 

[DMcFadden]

Evangelical theology is such a mish-mash, Rich. A few generations ago, Arminians had the common sense to realize that the substitutionary atonement was incompatible with their view of free will. If Jesus really DIED for us, then you cannot escape the logical traps set by John Owen in the Death of Death. So, Finney spoke (consistently at least) of Christ suffering for us rather than dying for us to pay the price. The other day I challenged a seminary grad who insisted on holding to a substitutionary atonement (penal satisfaction and all) while simultaneously rejecting anything but the prescient view of foreknowledge in Romans 8:29-30. Talk about an incompatible system! If foreknowledge is taken presciently, it results in utter nonsense when applied to the rest of the "Golden Chain."

One can be premillennial, even mildly dispensational, without taking the ridiculous trajectory of Hagee. I can even remember a presbyterian OT prof in seminary (the implacable opponent of all dispensationalism) arguing that Jews can make it to heaven without the Gospel.

People like Osteen still speak of "accepting Christ" and being "converted." But, what results from the various theological influences and confluences is about as clear as mud. No wonder the people jump to accept anything somebody authoritative sounding (Hagee) or therapeutic/motivational (Osteen) has to say.

 

[toddpedlar]

He does have big head! Never though about it before......

Key sign of steroid use is an expanding head circumference... hm...

 

[Semper Fidelis]

Evangelical theology is such a mish-mash, Rich. A few generations ago, Arminians had the common sense to realize that the substitutionary atonement was incompatible with their view of free will. If Jesus really DIED for us, then you cannot escape the logical traps set by John Owen in the Death of Death. So, Finney spoke (consistently at least) of Christ suffering for us rather than dying for us to pay the price. The other day I challenged a seminary grad who insisted on holding to a substitutionary atonement (penal satisfaction and all) while simultaneously rejecting anything but the prescient view of foreknowledge in Romans 8:29-30. Talk about an incompatible system! If foreknowledge is taken presciently, it results in utter nonsense when applied to the rest of the "Golden Chain."

One can be premillennial, even mildly dispensational, without taking the ridiculous trajectory of Hagee. I can even remember a presbyterian OT prof in seminary (the implacable opponent of all dispensationalism) arguing that Jews can make it to heaven without the Gospel.

People like Osteen still speak of "accepting Christ" and being "converted." But, what results from the various theological influences and confluences is about as clear as mud. No wonder the people jump to accept anything somebody authoritative sounding (Hagee) or therapeutic/motivational (Osteen) has to say.

Dennis,

I wasn't saying that it was necessarily predictable because he was pre-mil or dispensational, per se, but because most "Evangelicals" today are becoming rank Pelagians. The Gospel has been taken for granted so much today that it is brand new information to many. I believe that Arminianism is poison to the Gospel but at least Churches a generation ago could still be heard to be preaching about the Blood of Christ. Your average dispensational of yesteryear could, at least, be forgiven a little for not thinking through the necessity of Christ's atonement for all if He atoned for their sin completely but I think many were just blissfully ignorant and didn't care to think too hard. The average person that watches Hagee with interest is probably the same that watches Osteen with interest. They may be preaching a slightly different variant but the message is the same: the law is sufficient for righteousness. Christ died in vain.

 

[DMcFadden]

Dennis,

I wasn't saying that it was necessarily predictable because he was pre-mil or dispensational, per se, but because most "Evangelicals" today are becoming rank Pelagians. The Gospel has been taken for granted so much today that it is brand new information to many. I believe that Arminianism is poison to the Gospel but at least Churches a generation ago could still be heard to be preaching about the Blood of Christ. Your average dispensational of yesteryear could, at least, be forgiven a little for not thinking through the necessity of Christ's atonement for all if He atoned for their sin completely but I think many were just blissfully ignorant and didn't care to think too hard. The average person that watches Hagee with interest is probably the same that watches Osteen with interest. They may be preaching a slightly different variant but the message is the same: the law is sufficient for righteousness. Christ died in vain.

Rich, sorry to miscommunicate. I wasn't trying to accuse you as tarring with too broad a brush. We are in agreement. Pelagian? YES! Christ died in vain? Unfortunately, that is exactly the consequence of their views. I am quite taken with the White Horse Inn theme this year about Christless, crossless "Christianity." The average evangelical does not understand the necessity of the atonement. And, with the emphasis upon Americanized individualism and free "choice," their theology really doesn't require an atonement.

I guess it would have been clearer to have simply agreed with you and then made my generalizing comment that outside of decidedly Calvinist/Reformed circles, we are coasting on the fumes of theology people no longer understand or believe. And, just as I know some dispi folk who understand the atonement biblically (e.g., John MacArthur), there are "evangelicals" from presbyterian backgrounds who have watered it down so much that it means nothing. My beef is with the wishy-washy mish-mash of evangelicalism (one of my pet peeves).

My suspicion is that some of the problem relates to the original fundamentalist coalition. It included dispensationalists who went on to found Biola and Dallas as well as pentecostal-holiness types. But, it also boasted numbers of Reformed folks such as Machen. There was enough "good" theology that informed the movement, that even the Arminians could not help but speak in the categories of the substitutionary atonement. The current Fuller Seminary alumni mag includes an "identity" theme regarding evangelicalism. One of the great historians commented on how evangelicals at the beginning of the last century all stressed the atonement, but that as the decades unfolded, their understanding of it changed. Duh!

In the nomenclature of Osteen, who needs an atonement? The meaning of Jesus' death is not in his satisfaction of the wrath of a holy God. It involves his sacrificial example of suffering for us, an act that God graciously accepted when he freely forgave us our sins. The therapeutic "gospel" does not require a cross or a Christ. All it demands is a touchy feely God, sort of like an all powerful, older, Stuart Smalley figure.

Unless the evangelical world wakes up to the cross of Christ and the meaning of the atonement, they will only have the trite moralism of motivational speakers like Osteen, not a transformational Gospel of Good News!

 

[Semper Fidelis]

Amen Dennis. I know this sounds kind of strange but I sometimes feel like a missionary in the middle of a Church that claims Christ. You and I are kindred spirits in this and you're able to articulate some of the forces/movements that got us here better than I but I can see its fruit. The fruit is much of the reason I've become less convinced of the maxim that certain things can be compromised as long as they're getting some of it right. I don't think many are accounting for the real lack of "Gospel" that is being presented from many pulpits today. Even when I'm trying to present it as an alarm bell and out of concern/love for others, it sometimes seems to others as if I'm just being mean.

I had a friend that showed up to Okinawa a few months back that had attended a PCA in Northern VA that had very loose subscription. I ended up leaving because the Pastor's preaching was so "application" based that he turned even the indicatives of the Gospel into "how to's".

Anyway, this friend came to the island and I was excited and told him how our small Church had a Pastor committed to the Doctrines of Grace and that the larger Church was preaching through the Purpose-Drivien Church. He looked at me blankly as if he didn't even know what I was talking about and related that his priority was a Church that had a good high school program for his kids.

I'm not saying this because I envy the other Church or am bitter toward the man but out of sadness that this is what the expectation is for a Church and that people aren't first asking: "Where is the Gospel found?" I've honestly been told by some ministers here to "Be Nice..." when I point out that some of the Pentecostal Churches here are corrupting the Gospel.

I could enumerate, for hours, some of the symptomatic things that really scare me regarding the priority of men who state that they are ministers for the Gospel. I don't know why I feel like such an oddball because when I read the Scriptures, the priorities really leap out at me so clearly that I wonder how men so quickly abandon it for other programs.

I can tell you this, though: there are men and women in Church that are rejoicing at the news!

I'm sorry to sidetrack this thread but this Hagee thing is just another example of how difficult it is going to be, increasingly, for men who really want to preach the Gospel. At the same time, however, we will increasingly find a harvest among men who call themselves Christian but have *never* heard the Gospel.

 

[Dr Mike Kear]

I also came across this statement from David Brog, executive director of John Hagee's Christians United for Israel:

“All activities of CUFI [Christians United for Israel] are strictly non-conversionary. Christians who work with Jews in supporting Israel realize how sensitive we are in talking about conversion and talking about Jesus. So those who work with us tend not to talk about Jesus more, but talk about Jesus less. They realize it will interfere with what they are trying to do -- building a bridge to the Jewish community to ensure the survival of Judeo-Christian Civilization.” (Source: The Washington Times, "Christian Group to Advocate More Support for Israel ," by Julia Duin)

 

[Amazing Grace]

Isn't great to be able to spend so much time pointing out the sins of others? Hageeites, Copelandites, Olsteenites. FVerites, NPPerites et al get all of our attention, yet we forget about the Puritanites, PCAites, RCAites, Baptistites, etc etc etc. Repentance starts in the house of God!!!!!! HUman nature has the uncanny ability to give one the doctorate of heretical optometrists for others. Yes all these people and their ministries do deserve to be opposed, but let us not forget to look at ourselves too..

 

[Dr Mike Kear]

"Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints." (Jude 3)

 

[Stephen]

What a suprise for the fat man one day when he wakes up in the hell he fails to warn these poor jews about.

And yet don't some evangelicals leaders acknowledge, support or endorse him?

Mike Huckabee spoke at his "church."

Well surprise, surprise, surprise. Now we know why the Huck is no longer a minister but a politician. He is better as politician

 

[Stephen]

And yet don't some evangelicals leaders acknowledge, support or endorse him?

Mike Huckabee spoke at his "church."

Hmmm my best Beavis voice: Huckabee is losing.

Yeah, but that is no consolation considering what we may end up with for a President.

 

[caddy]

Is this portion still on his site?

I'm not finding it:

Christians United for Israel:

“All activities of CUFI [Christians United for Israel] are strictly non-conversionary. Christians who work with Jews in supporting Israel realize how sensitive we are in talking about conversion and talking about Jesus. So those who work with us tend not to talk about Jesus more, but talk about Jesus less. They realize it will interfere with what they are trying to do -- building a bridge to the Jewish community to ensure the survival of Judeo-Christian Civilization.” (Source: The Washington Times, "Christian Group to Advocate More Support for Israel ," by Julia Duin).

 

[caddy]

Somebody's in his ear. He now has a "special message":

Christians United for Israel: Pastor John Hagee's Teachings

 

[py3ak]

I think the simple "Judeo-Christian" phrase represents something of an intellectual compromise. "If any man love not the Lord Jesus let him be anathema." Why are we speaking of ourselves as being in intellectual alliance with them?

 

[Semper Fidelis]

Isn't great to be able to spend so much time pointing out the sins of others? Hageeites, Copelandites, Olsteenites. FVerites, NPPerites et al get all of our attention, yet we forget about the Puritanites, PCAites, RCAites, Baptistites, etc etc etc. Repentance starts in the house of God!!!!!! HUman nature has the uncanny ability to give one the doctorate of heretical optometrists for others. Yes all these people and their ministries do deserve to be opposed, but let us not forget to look at ourselves too..

If anything, this board allows and frequently engages in self-criticism of people who are simply clanging cymbals.

It's a both-and situation here. You might feel a bit differently about the damage to real lives that this does if you were actuall picking up the pieces and trying to teach the Gospel to men and women who have been exposed to this.

I've had the privilege of laboring among folks where doctrinal error like this has been exported. While we're back in the comfort of the U.S. with an option to worship elsewhere, we sit back and get incensed when there is criticism of a zeal to spread a version of the Gospel that is no Gospel at all. "At least they're hearing something...", we reason to ourselves. We comfort ourselves with the fact that they heard "something about Jesus" and then feel guilty if we wonder whether that something is any Gospel at all.

I can tell you that the question occurs to me regularly and I worry about men's souls. It's not because I haven't looked at my own heart and my own backyard first but because my heart and my backyard is right in the thick of it. Most people in the Third World are only getting TBN variants of Christianity and I'm convinced they're being left dead in their sins and trespasses. There is such a thing as damnable error in the name of Jesus Christ after all. It's not enough for me, anymore, to measure the relative zeal of a body of people and conclude that the purveyors of this false Gospel may at least be commended for being enthusiastic about Jesus. I've seen the destructive effects on too many people and people-groups that I love. You see, I have no problem telling a bunch of "Reformed" people that there are a lot of navel gazers among them who focus more on being separated from their neighbor than having a passion to herald the Gospel but I also have no problem calling a false Gospel for what it is.

When the feces that Hagee spreads becomes institutionalized into thinking along with a number of other types of errors, it contributes to a large scale problem of men and women who call themselves Christians who become hardened to the Truth. The same thing happens in orthodox congregations so hard-heartedness is not a one-sided problem.

But this thread is about outright error and the undermining of the Gospel. It's the kind of stuff that is corroding the Church from within and infiltrates the Church in subtle and obvious ways but all toward its destruction.

And, thus, I will unabashedly oppose this kind of error at every turn and point out to men that its genesis is from the very pit of Hell and to run from it with all their might.

 

[Ivan]

Pastor Ivan is correct. We need to pray for revival...but this starts with the individual Christian, particularly if he's a father, husband, or elder in Christ's Church. May it be so.

This is my understanding of revival, that it begins with me. And I need it. And I will seek it.

 

[Semper Fidelis]

Pastor Ivan is correct. We need to pray for revival...but this starts with the individual Christian, particularly if he's a father, husband, or elder in Christ's Church. May it be so.

This is my understanding of revival, that it begins with me. And I need it. And I will seek it.

It would be wonderful to have another Great Awakening like the first that was based not on manipulation of men and using "new measures" but men and women who come under the conviction of sin and embrace the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As Edwards noted, though, this can't be something that men "plan" as if the Holy Spirit has to make an appearance whenever men decide to hold a revival meeting.

I think that any such movement will be very unlike what most Americans have become accustomed to after a couple of centuries of tent revivals and crusades where it is has been manufactured and marketed down to a science.