BBF CHURCH HOSTS ECUMENIST TIM LAHAYE

[Distributed by Way of Life Literature’s Fundamental Baptist Information Service. Copyright 1994. These articles cannot be stored on BBS or Internet sites and cannot be sold or placed by themselves or with other material in any electronic format for sale, but may be distributed for free by e-mail or by print. They must be left intact and nothing removed or changed, including these informational headers. This is a listing for Fundamental Baptists and other fundamentalist, Bible-believing Christians. Our goal is not devotional but is TO PROVIDE INFORMATION TO ASSIST PREACHERS IN THE PROTECTION OF THE CHURCHES IN THIS APOSTATE HOUR. If you desire to receive this type of material on a regular basis, e-mail us, give us your name, address, and the name of the church you are a member of, and request to be placed on the list. Please note that this is not a free service. We take up a quarterly offering to fund this ministry, and each subscriber is expected to participate. To unsubscribe or to submit a change of address, send your name and the request to fbns@wayoflife.org. This is not an automated list. Changes in the database often require two to four days to activate. Some of these articles are from O Timothy magazine. David W. Cloud, Editor. O Timothy is a monthly magazine in its 17th year of publication. Subscription is $20/yr. Way of Life publishes many helpful books. The catalog is located at the web site -- http://www.wayoflife.org/.]

June 3, 2000 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061-0368, fbns@wayoflife.org) -- The following article first appeared in O Timothy magazine, Volume 12, Issue 1, 1994.

A half-page ad in the December 1994 Baptist Bible Tribune announced a prophecy conference (January 1995) at the Cherry Street Baptist Church in Springfield, Missouri, featuring ecumenist Tim LaHaye. The Senior Pastor of this church is Kenneth Gillming. Tribune Editor James O. Combs is also scheduled to speak at this conference.

This is very sad. For professing fundamental Baptist leaders to yoke together with men who openly practice the most unbiblical forms of ecumenical fellowship is disgraceful. It is confusion of the worst sort. What message are the young men being trained in BBF churches and schools receiving from this? They are learning that biblical separation is not important. They are being brainwashed with the philosophy of neutralism in the face of apostasy and disobedience. Instead of inviting LaHaye to their conference, Gillming and Combs should be publicly exposing him for his error and warning others to beware of his philosophy.

Tim LaHaye and his wife, Beverly, have a long history of extreme ecumenism. LaHaye has been the president of Moral Majority of California and a board member of the national Moral Majority. In this capacity he joined hands with every sort of apostasy, including Romanism and Judaism. As the head of the American Coalition for Traditional Values, LaHaye yoked together with such "distinguished Christian leaders" (his own words in 1984) as Demos Shakarian, Charismatic head of the Full Gospel Business Men's Fellowship International; United Methodist pastor Don Wildmon; Jim Bakker of the PTL Club; Kenneth Copeland; Rex Humbard; Robert Tilton; Thomas Zimmerman, then head of the Assemblies of God; Paul Crouch, head of the Trinity Broadcasting Network; and Jimmy Swaggart. These men are as radically ecumenical and as opposed to fundamentalist, biblical separatism as any you will find. Three have since been disgraced through their moral and financial corruption. Paul Crouch hates fundamentalists and has publicly cursed them. Thomas Zimmerman was at the forefront of breaking down the walls of separation between old-line pentecostals and Romanists. For LaHaye to be the leader of this unholy, mixed multitude is wickedness.

LaHaye's ecumenism isn't limited to his political activities. He frequently joins hands with apostates at all sorts of ecumenical gatherings. For example, when the charismatic Rock Christian Network was launched in 1986, Tim LaHaye's beaming face joined those of Charismatic mystics Oral Roberts, Paul Yonggi Cho, and Demos Shakarian, Catholic priest John Bertolucci, and others. LaHaye has appeared regularly at "Jesus" rock festivals in various parts of the country, joining hands with rock 'n' rollers and ecumenists, including Tom Skinner and Tony Campolo. Tim LaHaye spoke at Oral Roberts University's 1990 Christian School Conference. He was co-chairman of the Jerusalem '90 charismatic conference which featured Paul Yonggi Cho and James Robison. In a promotional brochure, LaHaye praised radical charismatic "faith healer" Morris Cerullo upon his takeover of the PTL TV Network. LaHaye said he was glad it would not be lost "to the body of Christ" and that because of Cerullo's faith, the network would "continue to be used to preach the Gospel and to present positive programming" (Calvary Contender, Nov. 1, 1990). What amazing blindness!

Beverely LaHaye is an enthusiastic supporter of her husband's ecumenical stance. Through her Concerned Women for America (CWA) organization she is encouraging Christians to forget their differences and join hands to effect political and social change. CWA's radical, unscriptural ecumenism was demonstrated in a CWA radio broadcast I heard Oct. 13, 1994. The speaker was an unsaved Jew, Dennis Prager, who was also the keynote speaker at this year's CWA national conference. Prager was speaking about the moral problems of America, and promoted, as a solution, that all religious people of good will must come together to resist the powers of secularism. The statement was made that "All Christians must come together." This dangerous, unscriptural sentiment was echoed by the hosts of CWA's broadcast. Like her husband, Mrs. LaHaye does not limit her ecumenical wanderings to political activities. She was a featured speaker at the 15th anniversary celebration of the charismatic magazine Charisma. On this occasion she joined hands with Oral Roberts, members of the rock group Petra, and Charles and Frances Hunter to celebrate this dangerous, unscriptural publication. Beverly LaHaye has spoken at least twice at the annual conference sponsored by the charismatic Christian Believers United (CBU) Fellowship. Calvary Contender editor Jerry Huffman notes, "When you ask charismatics to join your political crusade, it must be hard to say no when they want you to 'join' their religious 'crusade.' Satan is subtle! As husband Dr. Tim LaHaye admitted last year: 'If you had told me ten years ago that I would be on a platform with a Catholic Priest and a rabbi, I would have said you were crazy'" (Calvary Contender, March 1, 1986).

We repeat, for supposed fundamental Baptists to feature these ecumenists at a prophecy conference is a great and serious error. It needs to be rebuked in no uncertain terms. Where are the Baptist Bible Fellowship men who will publicly and unhesitatingly lift their voices against this confusion? I know many BBF preachers who are sickened by this type of thing. Let your voices be heard! The only thing good men have to do for error to triumph is to do nothing (O Timothy, Volume 12, Issue 1, 1995, Way of Life Literature, 1701 Harns Rd., Oak Harbor, WA 98277).