At the beginning of my Christian life, I was immersed in the charismatic movement. Having trusted Christ as my Savior in my apartment one evening and proclaiming my new life in Christ during a lunchtime Bible study the next day, I became immersed in the culture of charismata, with one workplace acquaintance having served as the head usher for Katherine Kuhlman, a second workplace acquaintance serving as the head usher for Frederick K. Price, and being swept along by the group into involvement with the Shekinah Fellowship on Saturday evenings in Long Beach, headed by the notorious Brant Baker, Greg Laurie’s mentor.
I did not grow up in a Christian home. I probably attended fewer than
ten church services my entire life. Everything was new to me. My knowledge of
Scripture was approaching zero. The Shekinah Fellowship conducted a wonderfully
choreographed experience with impressive production values, expertly performed
music by the orchestra, and a captivating women’s choir featuring slender and
attractive young women with long and perfectly coiffed hair. The effect on the
5 senses was overwhelming.
My problems began by reading the Word of God and being invited to a Church
service after several months. I always wondered why none of my charismatic
colleagues ever asked me to Church. But it was at Church, a Baptist Church that
I observed a contrast between the charismatic approach to Christian worship and
that on display at a Baptist Church.
The charismatic guys were always talking about what happened to them, their
experiences, and how they felt. The Baptist guys always talked about what the
Bible teaches. I came to an important conclusion before I had gathered all the
necessary facts. Sometimes decision-makers have to conclude all of the
information can be gathered. My life since then has persuaded me as I continue
to gather facts that my conclusion was the correct one.
There are two ways to approach biblical truth and personal experiences.
One can either use the Bible as a means of interpreting and understanding
experiences, or one can use personal experiences to understand and interpret
the Bible. The former approach is correct because it relies on the Bible as the
final authority. The latter approach is the most popular and is the prevailing
approach to life experiences and the use of the Bible in most churches today
and by most who profess to be Christians in our day.
Advance 49 years, with me now serving as a pastor who has recently
undertaken a series of messages focused on the evidence found in each Bible
book of satanic and demonic activity. Over the years, I have noticed that most
Bible commentators overlook and seem to minimize the evidence found in so many
books of the Bible for the existence of and the activity of Satan and his
minions. My ministry experiences, demonic activity that I have personally dealt
with, and demonized people I have ministered to, spurred me to a concern that
people attending Church be alerted to what the Bible shows and what
translations into English sometimes minimize.
While preparing my message for the book of Exodus and the pieces of
evidence in Exodus showing satanic and demonic activity, I became curious about
the worship practices of Egyptian idolaters and how they affected the children
of Israel. Try as I may, I could not find source material that spoke to their
practices during the pagan worship of laypeople. Everyone knows what pagan
priests did, their sex rituals, and the sacrifice of infants. But I wanted to
know what the moms and dads did while the priests killed the babies. I was at a
loss.
One Egyptologist used a phrase that caught my attention, “pagan frenzy.”
Unfortunately, the term “pagan frenzy” did not register in my mind until days
had passed after reading it. For the life of me, I have not discovered where I
originally read the phrase. If you can provide a source for me, I would be very
appreciative.
During my study of Exodus, I recall the occasion when Moses and Joshua descend from Mount Sinai. Exodus 32.17-18:
17 And when Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said unto Moses, There is a noise of war in the camp.
18 And he said, It is not the voice of them that shout for mastery, neither is it the voice of them that cry for being overcome: but the noise of them that sing do I hear.
Commentators suspect that Joshua’s conclusion was based upon him being
a man of war. I beg to differ. I am persuaded Joshua was mistaken about what
the children of Israel were doing because he was a man who grew up in Goshen.
Moses correctly perceived what was happening because he had grown up in the
court of Pharaoh, and he recognized the sounds of “pagan frenzy.”
When the Law of Moses was given to govern the nation, the religious
practices of the children of Israel bore no resemblance to the religious
observances of the surrounding nations. Pagan idolatrous worship was
characterized at the grassroots level by “pagan frenzy” and is easily
explained.
When God deals with people, He exposes them to the truth that is to be
ingested into the mind and subsequently hidden in the heart. False religion has
no truth and must rely upon external stimuli to provide a counterfeit sense of
religious experience. God works from the inside out, with inwardly impactful
truth working to externally exhibited conduct. False religion imposes, in the
form of external stimulus, a false religious experience.
Described by the Egyptologist as “pagan frenzy,” it is a feature of
false religion throughout the world and history. There must be loud music
emphasizing rhythm. More than anything else, there must be rhythm. There must
also be dancing and chanting. Whether on the steppes of Asia, the plains of
North America, the jungles of Africa, or the Middle East's dervishes, the
drums, chanting, and dancing is characteristic of pagan worship. Such conduct
is never seen in the prescribed worship of the Jewish people under the Law of
Moses.
Some would say, ”But David danced before the ark of the Lord.” Yes, he
did. However, David’s dance of delight as he led the procession to transport
the Ark of the Covenant was not worshipping in compliance with the dictates of
the Mosaic Law. It was a public demonstration of delight in front of the people
during a parade down Main Street!
With this contrast between pagan worship and the prescribed worship of
the Jewish people according to the dictates of the Law of Moses, there is no
question about the worship that took place when God’s people gathered in Churches
at the beginning of the Christian era. There was no “pagan frenzy” on display
when God’s people gathered, especially considering that the fruit of the Spirit
described by the Apostle Paul in Galatians 5.22-23 includes temperance,
self-control, and is nothing like what is frequently seen on display during
Pentecostal and charismatic worship services in our day.
Now for my opinion. I am persuaded that the beginning of Pentecostalism
that occurred in Lawrence, Kansas, in the year 1900 and later spread to the
state of Texas and then to the Azusa Street Mission in Los Angeles was not a
work of God. It was a successful ploy by the devil to introduce into Christian
worship “pagan frenzy.” And the scheme has been successful throughout the
world.
I have some experience with “pagan frenzy.” Owing to my father’s
career, I grew up among Native Americans throughout the United States. My
parents frequently took me to the Saturday night “war dances” on Indian
reservations in North and South Dakota. These dances have evolved over the
years from what they used to be, pagan worship designed to seek the favor of
spirits in preparation for battle to showy demonstrations and contests.
There is no longer any “pagan frenzy” that I am aware of among Native
Americans, but being away from the reservations for more than half a century, I
may be wrong. The “pagan frenzy” is now seen in Pentecostal churches,
charismatic worship, and increasingly in Baptist churches.
God help us all as more and more
Churches wrongly seek to worship God the “pagan frenzy” way.
