Error-Abuse

Discerning a Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing from a Man of God

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Discerning a Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing from a Man of God I seek to reveal how these people work to infiltrate our churches.

By Pastor David Cox

Introduction

It is extremely sad to see so many hours that preachers and pastors preach in the pulpit over the years, and probably the least mentioned topic in all this preaching is what the preacher should morally be (his moral example), and what he should be doing in the ministry. It should be a great concern among all men of God, but unfortunately, there are few “biblical preachers“. Most seek what they consider best, and while they will beat horribly the cults and false doctrines of others because they don’t really respect nor highly esteem the Word of God, rarely will they hold themselves, their ministries, and their personal lives to the same standard as they demand from others. Unfortunately when a hypocrite stands before a crowd and teaches, the norm is that the crowd ignores what he says and becomes like what he is morally, a smart (and often Bible quoting) hypocrite. Although this is simply God blessing or cursing us on the basis of what we are, all of this is very firmly presented in the Word of God, and even so, we regularly ignore it (on the part of ministers as well as laymen).

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Don’t shoot the sheep, aiming for the wolves

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By Pastor-Missionary David Cox

To summarize what we understand from the Bible:

1) There are sheep in our fold.

Basically, this means that many (hopefully most or all) of our sheep in our fold are saved people, wanting to serve God and please Him in some degree. Our ministry is to serve the sheep working God’s will and desire for them. On the one hand, we should help them grow spiritually, and on the other hand, we should confront their sin, rebuke it, pray for them, and see them get victory over there sins.

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Apostate spies and traitors 1

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In our understanding of what is an apostate, an apostate is a person who fully knows the truth such as to be saved, and even though knowing that truth, they turn from it.

“Apostate spies” in my opinion are those people who whether knowingly sent by some other religious faith, or just on a curiousity adventure come into our church, and then leaves us. 

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Abusive Churches

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Abusive Churches
By David Cox

Perhaps I should comment on the idea of an “abusive church”. An abusive church is a church that perhaps has orthodox doctrine but has practices and conduct that is not biblical, un-Christlike. Most commonly abusive churches are seen by their refusal to believe in and practice Christian liberty. In order for these people to control the brethren in a way that is advantageous for them, they also use unscriptural church discipline. By this I mean that they use tactics like public shame over issues that they do not have strong scriptural basis for, and they do it in an unscriptural way.




Let me digress with an example. For example, a pastor says that his members have to attend ALL church functions, and can only miss if they ask their pastor for permission first, and he grants it. A valid reason is that you are sick and dying in a hospital. Family reunions out of town, visiting another church, etc. are all invalid. The person ignores this imposed asking-permission structure, so the pastor now publicly says embarrassing things about the family, revealing private matters or joking in such a way as to cause the family shame, embarrassment, or discomfort on some level. Perhaps he removes the man from the deacon board suddenly, or removes either husband or wife from responsibilities or service in the church, because the pastor “has doubts”. The point is to use press to cause wayward members to tow the line. This psychological pressure is what makes them abusive. (Here I would exclude members who are serving, but the pastor or leadership removes them because of serious problems, such as marital separation, infidelity, or drinking/drug/sex problems. Also doctrinal heresy that comes to light would be a legitimate reason for removal.)

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