I was thinking about how I would view this if it were my wife and we were in a service and this happened. As a Pentecostal I have seen a lot of stuff over the years. My wife was dying of congestive heart failure 3 years ago and now she don't even need diuretics. God is a miracle worker. No need to follow them around. As for getting gold fillings I would tell her not to give too much heed to it- but listen to the message and test it according to scripture, watch the ministers life and look for the fruit of the Spirit.

Signs and wonders are not necessarily a good thing- though its neat to see them. Why? Because an evil and adulterous generation SEEKS after a sign. (Matthew 12:38-39) And the last days are characerized by LYING signs and wonders. As it is written... Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie. (II Thessalonians 2:8-11)

My thoughts are that no matter what type of phenomena takes place we must NOT allow the phenomena to be the final authority- nor should we allow it to be the basis for authenticating the speaker. The message of genuine repentance is a tremendous message and I have taught it for months on end now; however, the greater message is Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Who is preaching the CROSS these days? Who is preaching on the blood of Christ? Who has been brought into question concerning the resurrection of the dead?

God used the prophets to do a lot of weird things to get peoples attention (eating dung cakes, laying on side for 100's of days, etc.)- but this is not what we are seeing today with the 'manifestations' of various kinds. But what is the message? What are the FRUITS of their life? That is how we shall know them. Men and women are known by their fruits.

Consider this:

¶ If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder,
 2 And the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them;
.3 Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams: for the LORD your God proveth you, to know whether ye love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.


It is a strange thing that the "signs of the times" are shouting "REPENT" and yet who is listening? If a man would not be persuaded if one would return from the dead- will they repent at the sight of gold or silver? What miracle is greater than resurrection from the dead? My point is this- there are going to be a lot of signs and wonders taking place in these last days. We better not follow signs- we better follow Christ. :-)

God Bless

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Robert Wurtz II

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andrew james

Quote:

“You are wrong. If their hearts are right they would not be in a place of deception, God would not allow it if there hearts were in the place of 'being after God's own heart'!”

I’m afraid I’ve gotta stand with andrewjames on this one, Greg. I think your judgments against Aaron and his wife (as well as all who might believe the gold dust phenomena) are far too harsh, and possibly unjust. Do you honestly believe that you can know what their heart motives are? Do you really think that you can stand in that place and declare that “if their hearts are right they would not be in a place of deception?” Pretty presumptuous stuff. You are obviously angry at something, but I’m afraid that your anger has caused you to cross some personal boundaries you probably shouldn’t be crossing.

Quote:

“I would not want to be branded with gold teeth, it would be a shame to me. Why did not Jesus have all gold teeth? Why would he not give them to His followers? Why didn't gold dust fall from Jesus hair? It grieves my spirit to even write these things but it shows the utter deception that these phenomena carry. Its contrary to the message of Christ and the apostles and really in light of scripture of new doctrines, deceptions, miracles, signs and wonders, I am flabbergasted that any Christian with the Holy Spirit wouldn't be alarmed with these happenings. It's a NEW thing people and has not been happening all throughout church history. We are being deceived!!”

I’ve been following this thread for awhile and have some problems with the way several posters have been responding. I have yet to read the scriptural evidence that this phenomena could not be from God. (This is a good time to point out that I am in no way associated with this phenomena, and am personally uncomfortable with it.) Some of the main responses here are emotional diatribes based on the presumption that this “gold thing” is unbiblical. Maybe it is, but forgive me if I don’t jump on either wagon just yet.

Jesus tells us how to judge whether these things are from Him or not. “You will know them by their fruits.” (Matthew 7:16) Our judgments need to be based on the fruit of both the leaders and participants of this movement. (Fruit = their words, actions, character, and zeal and success in reaching the lost.) So my big question is … what is their fruit like? I honestly don’t know, as I’m not anywhere around this movement. That’s why I would shy away from making too many bold judgments against it at the present time.

I have read a little about it from different sources, and haven’t seen an obvious relationship to the “Word of Truth” (prosperity) movement. (That relationship has been expressed here a couple of times.) The explanations I’ve read don’t seem to indicate that the gold dust/fillings are God’s stamp of approval on the philosophy that He wants us to be wealthy and healthy. I’ve only read the idea that this phenomena is from God so we can have greater revelation of His character – either His generosity or His holiness. (Which gold would be a symbol of.) What do I know? Nothing, really … so I stay my judgments. And I haven’t seen any posts yet that might help me to make righteous judgments on this issue. Where is the scriptural evidence that it is an unbiblical movement? And what about the fruit? I just don't know. Do you?

You come against “new things”, but that is not a particularly strong argument. No, Jesus didn’t have gold dust falling from His hair. Neither did He speak in tongues. Do we toss that out too? Think about all the amazing phenomena that came out of the revivals of the 18th and 19 centuries. New stuff. People falling out of their houses under conviction of the Spirit. Ships off the east coast that didn’t dare to dock because of the presence of the Spirit that met them when they arrived. (And everyone ultimately getting saved on board.) People screaming in terror and hanging onto pillars of the church when hearing “Sinners In The Hands Of An Angry God.” None of these things are described in the New Testament record. They were "new things." It’s God’s prerogative to do new things if He so desires. It’s our job to test these new things, and to judge them with a righteous judgment. Let’s just make sure it’s righteous.

I’m not for the gold dust movement … but I’m not going to take an emphatic stand against it until I can be certain that God is not moving in new ways that I just don’t understand. I’m going to examine the fruit. I’m going to examine any underlying or hidden doctrines. We have a great opportunity with Aaron and his wife in Australia to get some first-hand reports. Let’s listen and learn. Calmly.

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Gregg Dennington

Our common desire to track down personal, affirmative miracles which tell us that we are something special in God’s eye opens for that which speaks out of flesh. We all have a tendency to spell Jesus with a small “j” to reduce and downplay his total claims on each his child. Fleshly desire to bring confirmation and self-gratification opens for meaningless miracles and minimises on the greater one which is death to self and the world through the Cross of Christ.

Many will appear on the religious scene in the name of love for Jesus and zeal for the Kingdom and will do it just to be able to claim fame and publicity – prophets and apostles back their position by predictive pronouncements and vanity miracles which redefine the Berean investigative attitude in terms of openness to anything strange as being spiritual – another name for it is gullibility. Many are ready to deceive, and many are ready to be deceived.

Now, the difficult part is to show constructive love towards the deceived – the miracle itself produces an air of truth, love and reliability to be apprehended by the one who had the experience. Someone out there cares. The one attacking the experience and stealing the blessing is looked upon as the perpetrator in this game, not the deceiver who shows such immense care by transferring the so called blessing.
The issue and difficulty lies with our view of what we think God is occupied with. What is a blessing from above? By what means does He develop our love for him? Does he allow us have our miracles our way?

Greg gets furious when friends shallowly accept anything which looks like a spiritual intervention as a gift from God – and so do I. But are we turning our backs to our friends. On the contrary. . .

Who are the ones to be judged? What about the necessity to judge? Anything drawing the attention of God’s children away from God as he really is, needs to be discerned and judged. Anything that twists the view of God needs to be judged. This judgment would come under the title prophetic contextual criticism based on the insight of who God is and what God does. The simple man engages in such procedures and calls it speaking truth in love. Many of us heartily dislike the plain man’s approach, not wanting to be corrected, not willing to be brought under conviction.

There is a picture of Jesus in the first chapter of the book Revelation. It shows Jesus as he is while walking among the churches. There is a sword in his mouth, and it is directed towards the ones in the churches who bring falsehood, who twist the view of what church is meant to be.

Our dilemma is this: He has a sword in his mouth.
Our dilemma is this: His sword is ready to cut.
Our dilemma is this: We prefer our own contextual interpretations.
Our dilemma is this: Our Christianity, yours and mine, does not measure up to Christ.
We all need to move on, guarding against deception and eagerly watching and waiting for His salvation which brings gold of a different kind.
Lars W.

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Lars Widerberg

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Robert Wurtz II

"Our common desire to track down personal, affirmative miracles which tell us that we are something special in God’s eye opens for that which speaks out of flesh."

That's it too isn't it. But my point is this why are we just picking on those who happen to be involved with weird miracles? Why not all those who have drawn attention to themselves in the public arena by having a public minsitry?
Do we really have to have a public forum where the intention is obviously not to build up but to tear down?
What if it was my crusade to see anybody who has a website so beat up publicly and have there name run through the mudd that they would reject the path that there on. And when they do so i could say "praise God i got rid of all those evil websites."
or "praise God i got rid of all those useless church building's."
how about this one"Praise God i helped Him get rid of those preists i mean pastors."
why stop at miracles? let's take this one the whole way. And then my convictions can right and my mission from God can be correct and you can be wrong.
You know something God is not all lovey doevey but that is a facet of Him, He is also a jealous God as well as Jesus. There is a balance that is needed in the body of Christ and the only way to get that is to truly understand that our flesh is already dead and that Christ lives in us.
Be blessed y'all I pray for mercy and justice to prevail and a real revelation of Christ in us the hope of glory. May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.
Andy

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andrew james

Brethren,

I wholeheartedly ask that we truly consider the words in both Lars and Roberts replies. Thank you both for helping to express what I felt but couldn't form into words. This is not a witch hunt, but a guard and a loving concern for the sheep of which we all are, even if it dosen't get conveyed 'properly', hope that can be kept in mind.

I have been following from afar as the replies have come in and asked myself the same questions as to the reality or unreality of what this may or maynot be. I find it all very greivous, primarily because it detracts and is a cause of division.

I will offer the following for now:

God's Blessing or God's Approval
From the book "New Wine in New Wineskins"
- Zac Poonen

There are two types of believers - those who seek only God's blessing and those who seek God's approval; and there is a world of difference between the two. In Rev. 7:9-14, we read of a great multitude of believers - so vast that they cannot even be numbered. Their testimony is that they owe their salvation to their God (v. 10) and that their robes are washed white in the blood of Christ (v. 14); or in other words, that God has blessed them. This is good, no doubt. But it is a vastly different testimony from that of the group of believers mentioned in Rev. 14:1-5.

There we read of a small group that can be numbered. In fact they are only 144000 - a small number, when you consider that they have been selected out of the billions of people who have lived on earth. Their testimony is that they followed Christ totally on earth, no guile was found in their mouth, and they kept themselves from being defiled by 'women' (that is, the women mentioned in Revelation 17 - Babylon and her daughters). Or in other words, they pleased God.

Notice the contrast. The first group received God's blessings. The second received God's approval. We get what we seek. If we are satisfied with God's blessing, then that is all we will get. And if we are satisfied with God's material blessings alone, then we will not even advance to getting His spiritual blessings.

Most believers are satisfied with being blessed by God - and that too mostly in the material realm alone. That is why Christian book stores are flooded with books on how one can be healed of one's sicknesses and become wealthy by tithing, etc. The emphasis is on physical and material well-being - health and prosperity. This is the clearest symptom of a self-centred life. And yet, we read in God's word, that Jesus died in order that we should no longer live for ourselves but only for Him (2 Cor. 5:15); or in other words, not to please ourselves but only Him. Or to put it in yet another way, Jesus died in order to deliver us from a self-centred life, and to bring us into a God-centred life.

One of the things that can puzzle us these days is the way God blesses a lot of Christian work that is so thoroughly compromising in its character. Does this mean that God is not disturbed by the compromises and the deviations from His word? No, it certainly does not mean that. God blesses many ministries that He cannot totally approve of.

Even when Moses disobeyed God's word and struck the rock (when God had told him to speak to it), God still 'blessed' that disobedient ministry. In fact, two million people were blessed through it. Yet God dealt with His disobedient servant severely afterwards (Num. 20:8-13). God blessed that ministry because He loved those two million needy people, and not because He approved of what His servant did. It is even so today.

Many ministries are blessed because God loves the needy people who need salvation, healing, etc. But He certainly does not approve of much that goes on in the name of Jesus today. He will certainly punish the compromising preachers in due time.

The only condition to be fulfilled in order to get God's material blessings is that one must be either good or evil! For Jesus said that God sends sunshine and rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous (Matt. 5:45). Material blessing is therefore no sign of God's approval on one's life. Two million Israelites disobeyed God for forty years in the wilderness - so greatly that God was angry with them (Heb. 3:17). Yet God gave them food and healing throughout all those years - and that too miraculously (Deut. 8:2). Even miraculous answers to prayer in the physical realm are therefore no indication that God is happy with a person's life.

God's approval, on the other hand, rested on Jesus when He was thirty years old, only because of one reason: Jesus had faithfully overcome temptation during all those years. He had lived a life centred in His Father and not in Himself. He never did what pleased Himself (Rom. 15:3). At His baptism, the Father testified, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased" and not "This is My well-beloved Son whom I have blessed". The latter testimony would have meant nothing. It was the former, indicating God's approval, that meant everything for Jesus. To follow Jesus is to seek for the same testimony ourselves.

As children of Adam, we are all born self-centred. We grow up expecting everything to revolve around us and to serve us. When we get converted, we expect God also to serve us and bless us in various ways. We come to Him initially to be blessed with His forgiveness, and then go on to seek the blessing of healing, answer to prayer, material prosperity, employment, housing, marriage partner, etc. But it is possible for our lives to be self-centred still, even when we are deeply 'religious' in our own and other people's eyes. God becomes just one more person in our 'orbit', and we seek to get what we can out of Him. The prodigal son came back in order to get food from his father; but the father still received him. God receives us even when our motives are utterly selfish. He loves us so much that He longs to receive us even when we come to Him with an obviously self-centred motive. His hope however is that we will mature quickly to realise that true spirituality is to partake of His own nature, which is to give rather than to receive. With the vast majority of His children, however, God is never able to realise that purpose. They live and die in their self-centredness thinking only of 'I', 'Me' and 'Mine' and of material and physical blessings.

To be mature is to have our mind renewed so that it is no longer centred on what we can get out of God, but rather on what God can get out of us in our one earthly life. This renewing of our mind is what brings transformation (Rom. 12:2). This is what qualified the 144000 (in Rev. 14) to stand with the Lamb on Mount Zion.

True spirituality is not just getting victory over anger, irritability, lustful thoughts, love of money, etc. It is to cease living for oneself. It is to cease seeking our own - our own gain, our own comfort, our own convenience, our own will, our own rights, our own honour and even our own `spirituality'.

When the disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray, He taught them a prayer that does not contain the words 'I', 'Me' or 'Mine' in it even once (Lk. 11:1-4). He taught us there to be concerned first about the Father's name, kingdom and will, and then to be concerned as much about our fellow believers (their material and spiritual welfare) as about ourselves ('us', 'us, 'us' and not 'me', 'me', 'me'). It is easy to learn that prayer 'by heart' and to repeat it like a parrot. But to learn that lesson in our heart requires that we truly forsake all and put God in the centre of our heart. The law that we will find most frequently in our members (Rom. 7:22), if we are honest in judging ourselves, will be the law of selfishness, the lust to seek our own convenience and our own rights all through life.

Jesus taught us to seek the kingdom of God first - that is to dethrone 'Self' and to put God and His interests in the centre of our life. Jesus gave up the comfort of heaven in order to do His Father's will on earth. Paul gave up the comfort of being a Christian businessman living luxuriously in Tarsus, in order to be an apostle facing hardships for the Lord. Every one of the apostles lived that sacrificial God-centred life. They gave their all for the promotion of God's kingdom on earth, unlike many of today's 'tourist preachers'.

A holiness that still leaves us seeking our own comfort and convenience is a false holiness - even if we have overcome anger and dirty thoughts. This is what many have not realised; and hence Satan has been able to deceive them. Many Christians travel or migrate to different countries seeking conveniences and comfort and wealth. They can still have God's blessings upon their lives, but not God's approval - for no one can serve both God and mammon (that is, wealth, pleasure, comfort, etc.). If we think that God's blessing on our lives and on our children is an indication that He is also happy with us, then Satan has truly deceived us. God's blessing and God's approval are two totally different things. At the end of our earthly lives, the testimony that we have should be the testimony that Enoch had before he left the earth: "He pleased God" (Heb. 11:5). Only three words - but no one can have a more powerful testimony to his earthly life. This is the testimony that Jesus and Paul had. To merely have a testimony that `He was blessed by God' is worth nothing, for millions of unbelievers too can have that testimony.

God looks for those who will seek His approval, and not just His blessing.

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Mike Balog

I am posting an extended version of my wifes testimony, as I PMed to Greg last night, for further discussion. This will be my last post on this matter, as I don't want to cause further strife in this community. Anyone who would like to discuss further, I am contactable via email, msn messeger, or you can PM me.
She told me that when this phenomena happened, no one was praying for her and she was praying on her own. People were checking in other people's mouths. My wife had a funny taste in her mouth, and someone looked to see her tongue covered in gold. Next we checked her fillings and saw them change to gold before our eyes.
Before this happened, she was going through some issues of self hatred and thought God felt the same of her. This made her feel special to God, because He could have done anything with the gold, but He put it in her teeth. It's not an obvious thing (it happened to her back molars), but it's a special thing between her and God, that no one else had to know about. Just like a private word from God, just for her.
It had nothing to do with the gold or the teeth, but the motives behind it. He knew what she needed at the time to make her feel valued. She wasn't looking for the sign, it just happened.
Yours in Christ
Aaron
Ps-To Greg, no hard feelings bro':-)

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Aaron Ireland

Greg,

I have seen the same thing happen to other people in a meeting.

I am a firm believer of the Bible and I do check things with the Bible so I don't go astray.

But, can you imagine when Jesus first turned the water into wine and people say, "Well....can we believe this? Let's check the Bible...."

I guess when people start to seek after the phenomenum then there is a problem. But, if people get closer to God through the miracle, I say, "Praise the Lord!"

People say, "Why miracles?" I'd like to say, "Why not?" Only God knows the why and why not. Why do we need to put our experience of God and God in a box?

Happy experiencing God!

Joy
P.S. Ugh..... I hope I don't get some of you angry.....