Brisbane Christian Fellowship at it again needlessly criticising other churches

I’m actually hugely in favour of all of Christendom returning closer to Biblical understandings of God’s promises and requirements.

But, in BCF’s latest member-only online devotion (see below) they hugely miss the mark as usual.

Yes, it’s true that the church fell from the truth. They established ‘formulae’ for getting to heaven. And baptised infants instead of adults who can repent as Jesus outlined.

And it’s true that even in evangelical circles salvation can be formulaic.

But we also know, that in a vast majority of churches worldwide there is genuine teaching about ‘going on in our salvation’.

So many sermons and books on ‘taking up our cross’ and ‘actions must follow faith’ etc.

But BCF & MCF would have us believe they are the only ones teaching this!

And of course, as will no doubt appear in their devotions in following days, there will be the cultish BCF word that we must listen and heed the ‘word of the messenger’ who has supernatural sight for your walk and decisions!

That is a twisted view of Scripture.

Yes, as preached in many churches, we must hear from our leaders. But to cultishly teach we should expect essentially prophetic outpourings in one-on-ones on every decision we make for our specific situation? And if we disobey we go to hell?

That’s what they taught 1993-2016 and likely still today.

It is a debilitating, deceptive and destructive false gospel that cuts out our devotion to the Lord and His word and prayer and guidance from the Holy Spirit as we do these things.

We live by the light of His word to our path. Messengers are only one part of that.

Today’s BCF devotion

To be restored to first love, and established in the gospel of sonship, we must also recognise and turn from the religious philosophies and doctrinal traditions that we have believed and taught in the church as alternatives to the gospel of sonship. Col 2:8. Historically, these doctrines have been the attempts of various leaders and movements, claiming to be part of the church, to define the minimum conditions required for entry into heaven.

The early church fathers, who ministered in the second and third centuries, rejected the gospel of sonship that Paul and the other apostles had outlined in their writings. 1Ti 6:20-21. 2Ti 1:15. These church ‘fathers’ were, in the main, scholars whose theologies were heavily influenced by Greek philosophy. Rom 1:21-22. 1Co 1:19-23. According to their doctrinal assertions, a parent could secure their child’s salvation and entry into heaven by presenting them to a priest for infant baptism. This practice of sprinkling infants with water for their salvation revealed that responsibility for the salvation of children had been formally removed from the family and had been assumed by the church.

Since the Reformation, many within the Evangelical movement have declared that entry into heaven is conditional upon Jesus becoming an individual’s personal Saviour. The essential element of this doctrine is that Christ’s death on the cross was a legal propitiation that saves a person from the wrath of God that is destroying them because of their sins. Jesus Christ paid the penalty for the sin of the whole of mankind, and this salvation is available to those who meet and receive Christ as their personal Saviour. Many Evangelicals now assert that all that is necessary for a person to enter heaven is to acknowledge this truth and to pray the sinner’s prayer. They then receive forgiveness of sins and are saved from eternal damnation.

The reality of becoming an actual son of God through new birth, and its necessity for entering the kingdom of heaven, has been actively rejected by many adherents of this positional, legal gospel. Joh 3:3-5.