The head pastor of one of America's "10 healthiest churches" has resigned after confessing that he committed adultery three years ago.
David Loveless, head pastor of Discovery Church, relinquished his pastoral duties at the Orlando megachurch this month, according to the Orlando Sentinel.
But Loveless is not the only Orlando-area pastor to confess an adulterous relationship lately. In the past six months, two other pastors, Summit Church's Isaac Hunter and The Gathering Place's Sam Hinn, also resigned.
According to a statement released by Discovery Church's elders, Loveless's affair ended approximately three years ago. However, he only made it known to church leaders within the past few weeks.
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This was in addition to Joel Hunter's son, Isaac Hunter's adultery reported about last week when he apparently committed suicide.
On the note of adultery, RNS noted the multiple cases of adultery among Florida pastors of late. Charismatic Movement's chief magazine,Charisma's Jennifer LeClarie claims:
"The spirit of Jezebel is often behind this immoral trend, tapping into the lust of the flesh with its seductive agenda.
Sadly, the spirit of Jezebel is picking off pastors one by one as they succumb to the evil desires in their own hearts. Too few recognize the sinister workings of Jezebel's covert seduction...Jezebel is essentially a spirit of seduction that woos people into sexual immorality and idolatry. Jezebel comes to kill, steal and destory by tempting you and then escorting you, willingly, into immorality and idolatry. "
End quote.
Just an ever-so-slight change on "the devil made me do it!" claim.
Just an ever-so-slight change on "the devil made me do it!" claim.
This emphasizes the inability of Charismatics to rightly and biblically deal with sin. Giving lip service to sin, they give the emphasize on a spirit called,Jezabel, and thus end up making these pastors more of a victim than offender. This is wrong. Those who commit adultery or any fornication are solely responsible for their sin before the thrice Holy God and blaming Satan or one of his demons won't cut it before the Judge of all men. Why, blaming Eve didn't even work for Adam. How much less will blaming a supposed spirit called Jezable, work in justifying one's sexual immorality done in HIS name?
Jezebel in Scripture was a real woman who seduced her husband into idolatry. In Revelation 2:20, Jesus says she is a false prophetess who leads and teaches people so that they commit immorality and idolatry. I would say this is far more akin to the Charismatic movement which is loaded with prophetesses and which are all false since there are no prophets nor prophetesses today, now that the canon of Scripture is closed.
Here is what noted Bible teacher, John MacArthur says about Jezebel in his New Testament Commentary on Revelation:
Quote:
The indictment is that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, and she teaches and leads My bond-servants astray so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols. The sin, apparently involving the majority of the Thyatira church’s members, was twofold. First, they violated the biblical teaching that women are not to be teachers or preachers in the church (1 Tim. 2:12). That led them to tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess. They compounded their error of permitting her to teach by allowing her to teach error. As a result, Jesus declares, she teaches and leads My bond-servants astray so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols.
Jezebel undoubtedly was not the false prophetess’s real name, but like the infamous wife of King Ahab, she was Satan’s agent to corrupt God’s people. Therefore the Lord branded her with the symbolic name Jezebel. The Old Testament Jezebel was an unspeakably vile woman—so much so that the Bible names marrying her as the most evil thing wicked King Ahab did: “Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord more than all who were before him. It came about, as though it had been a trivial thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, that he married Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and went to serve Baal and worshiped him” (1 Kings 16:30–31). Through Jezebel’s evil influence, Baal worship became widespread in Israel.
Like her Old Testament counterpart, the woman in Thyatira who falsely called herself a prophetess succeeded in leading Christ’s bond-servants astray so that they committed acts of immorality and ate things sacrificed to idols. One might speculate that she may have espoused the philosophical dualism so prevalent in contemporary Greek philosophy. When brought into the church, that teaching held that the spirit is good, and the flesh is evil. Since God is only interested in the spirit, its purveyors falsely argued, it doesn’t matter what one does with one’s body. Thus, according to Jezebel, it did not matter if Christians committed acts of immorality or ate things sacrificed to idols. She may also have taken a twisted, antinomian view of God’s grace, arguing that it did not matter if Christians sinned, since God would graciously forgive them. Perhaps she also encouraged Christians to experience the deep things of Satan so they could better witness to the unsaved. Whatever the specific content of her false teaching, it led the majority of the Thyatiran believers astray from truth and righteousness.
The Bible teaches that true Christians can fall into sexual immorality (cf. 1 Cor. 6:15–20) and idolatry (cf. 1 Cor. 10:21). But to lead other Christians into false doctrine or immoral living is a very serious sin, one meriting the most severe punishment. In Matthew 18:6–10, Jesus graphically described the serious consequences for those who lead other believers into sin...
End quote.
(MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (1999). Revelation 1–11 (pp. 100–101). Chicago: Moody Press.)
So contrary to Charisma magazine, there's no real spirit called Jezabel, but rather its a description based on the original Jezebel, the entire lifestyle (practices) and doctrines of such a vile woman.
For more information on the blasphemy and error of the Charismatic movement, go here.
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