Tuesday, October 30, 2012

HOW TO RECEIVE THE HOLY SPIRIT ( ACCORDING TO GLORIA COPELAND )


Gloria Copeland says of the Holy Spirit, "Some teach that He is automatically received at the time of salvation. It is certainly true that if you are born again, the Holy Spirit has been with you and has worked in your life. But He has had to work from the outside and is limited in His ministry to you.
(John 14:16,17). The world cannot receive the Holy Spirit. Jesus told His disciples that they knew the Holy Spirit for He was with them and would be in them. The world can receive Jesus as Savior and be born again, but only a believer (one who has already made Jesus Lord) can receive the indwelling of the Holy Spirit."
Commenting on "acts 18: 16,17; 19:2 from these instances we can see that the apostles laid there hands on men who were already believers to receive the holy Spirit. These Scriptures reveal that the indwelling of the holy Spirit is not automatically received at the time of the new birth.
You receive the holy Spirit by faith just as you receive Jesus as the Lord.(Gal.3:14)"
Now what in the world do the Copelands believe gives one the new birth except the Holy Spirit. What she does is mistake a few instances of the new people groups that needed to have the apostles approval. Acts 10:40- shows us that they received the Spirit as they believed .The gentiles speak in tongues as proof of their salvation.Act 11: 17" ..therefore God gave them the same gift as he did unto us, when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ;" What is the gift? The Holy Spirit. This kind of teaching is not only abusive but has much in common with the cults.
The Bible: The believer is born of God (God is the source of our regeneration)
I Jn 5:1 "Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves Him who begot also loves him who is begotten of Him." As soon as one believes the Bible says we have God the Spirit dwelling inside.
The believer is indwelt by God when they believe (Holy Spirit)- I John 4:15, Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides In him, and he in God."
Eph. 1:13 In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,"
Eph. 4:3And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 2 Cor. 1:21-22Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed us is God 22who also has sealed us and given us the Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee."
I Jn 2:26-27 "These things I have written to you concerning those who try to deceive you. 27 But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him."
Every believer is sealed with the Holy Spirit and that same Holy Spirit is the anointing that lives in us. So every believer is "anointed" with the Holy Spirit.
Gloria Copeland goes on" Christians must be taught to believe for the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. The disciples in the upper room on the day of Pentecost had been taught about receiving the Holy Spirit by the Master. The entrance of God's words gives light or understanding (Ps. 119:130).
For example, healing belonged to you the moment you were born into God's family; but if you never get into the Word and see that divine health is yours, you will continue to be sick."
If this were true the same faith that saves someone would instantly heal them as well. But the Copelands don't really believe in faith but in the power of their words which will get them whatever they want. That’s why all this becomes a separate event. Heres how its done…
"Five Steps in Action form
1.Ask without fear, knowing that God said you would receive His Holy Spirit.
2.Speak no more English.
3.Come unto Jesus. Open your mouth wide and drink in the Holy Spirit, breathing in as deeply as possible. You are to know that at this moment you receive the Holy Spirit by faith. As you breathe in, you are being filled with the Spirit. "
(this is an occult technique in which the prana energy fills the air, nowhere does Scripture tell one to do this to receive the Holy Spirit ,who already lives inside all the believers. While I  believe in a continual filling as the Scripture teaches, this is not what they are describing.1 Cor.12:13 "For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body-- whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free-- and have all been made to drink into one Spirit." What Spirit than are they receiving if they breathe him in.)
[It needs to further be pointed out that this also is found in Oneness Pentecostalism. In J.E.Stiles booklet " Why receive the Holy Spirit and how to receive him" on p.21 states "Now as you open your mouth, and breath in, don't pray, don't talk don't say a single word, just breathe in deeply... If you will sit quietly for a time...just breathing in the breath of God, you certainly will feel a moving of the Spirit.. Just lift your voice  and speak the sounds that seem easy to make,...After you have spoken for considerable time, stop and breathe deeply again and you will get a a fresh anointing.]
4."Raise your voice. Use your lips, tongue, and voice to speak out the praise in an unknown language as the Spirit gives you the utterance.
[Recently at John Hagee's Church Kenneth Copeland spoke explaining how his wife got filled with the Spirit  "And the church Gloria came from, dear God. She was raised in a little church out in the country, they didn’t have a pastor half the time. Didn’t believe anything. She’d been saved and filled with the Holy Ghost 3 months before she ever heard the word new birth. She did not know what it was! "(Aug 18,1999 Hagess program on TBN) How is this possible in light of her booklet instructing others to be filled a certain way by asking specifically and breathing the Spirit it in. This shows these people are confused.
5.Allow the rivers of living water to flow from you with the greatest of freedom. You are magnifying God-extolling (praising enthusiastically) the Father God who is Love and offering up the praise of thanksgiving unto Him.
'Now that you have received the Holy Spirit, rely on the Word that Jesus spoke, "He shall remain with you forever."
(note: He will remain with you forever long before you did all this, if you received Christ the way the Bible teaches.
She goes on to say Jesus said the holy Spirit would be given to teach you, not just some things, but ALL the truth .
(Gods will is the Holy Spirit "the promise is for you' , Gloria Copeland reprint 1991) Kenneth Copeland publications)
Really! Do the Copeland's believe they have all the truth? Not even a single apostle believed this, because God used several to write the Scriptures.
John 16:13"However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come."
To guide means to show the way (literally or figuratively [teach]) the object would be the word which he would then guide us into, he will make us wise in the word not beyond it.
Here's how she explains he will do it. "This great one has been instructed to lead you into all the truth, he will lead you, be quick to follow.  The problem with this is he leads us into the truth of the word. Biblically John 14:26 "But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you."The purpose was for the apostles to have a perfect recollection and the witness be written to us
John 15:26-27 "But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me. "And you also will bear witness, because you have been with Me from the beginning."
What the Copeland's have done is come up with "many new revelations" outside the word which they believe the Spirit has taught them. So this "ALL the truth certainly means more than what is written to guide you. Yet Paul who had a greater revelation than all the Apostles said in 1 Cor.4:6 do not go beyond what is written that no one of you be puffed up for one against another."
The Scripture says  2 Tim. 3:16-17 "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work."
While the Copeland's believe this, it is surface level because they teach beyond what is written which Paul commanded not to. So the Spirit leads one into the truth of the word, not outside it. One can only wonder what Spirit this is, since he was not received when one has a new birth but is given separately on account of ones faith, which to the Copeland's is a "force."

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