Joni Eareckson Tada
***Update***
So the unsound practice of Joni Tada continues. She's teaching pastors and leaders at the notorious Willow Creek Church who has women pastors (founder Bill Hybels had to step down), on how to lead. Please do not continue to say she's "sharing her testimony". She TEACHES MEN about LIVING a "Christian" life--sanctification. Telling OTHERS how to live, how to understand God and His work in life, how to THINK about "suffering", even using Roman Catholic mystic monk Lawrence to do it.
"So when Tada, an author and artist known mostly as just “Joni,” took the stage at this summer’s annual Global Leadership Summit held at Willow Creek, a Chicago-area megachurch, she told the pastors and other leaders gathered that if they want to succeed they are going to have to admit their imperfections.
“The most effective leaders do not rise to power in spite of their weakness,” Tada said. “They lead with power because of their weakness.”
~article from Roys News
She has been a member of the Lausanne Congress (Lausanne Senior Associate for Evangelism Among Disabled People until 2013). She has been a board member since 1989 and was a plenary speaker that year. Lausanne Congress is a pragmatic/inter-faith/
“I'm grateful for Lausanne’s commitment to the whole Gospel of Christ. The 2010 Lausanne Congress will emphasize that true evangelism means reaching out in Jesus’ name to every part of society — including those who are sick, hungry, poor and disabled.”
Mrs. Joni Eareckson Tada
Founder, Joni and Friends International Disability Center
Lausanne Senior Associate for Evangelism Among Disabled People
Link to see her endorsement here.
UPDATE 7/31/24 on Lausanne is at Disntr: "How the Lausanne Movement Is Hijacking Christianity to Jumpstart a Global Marxist Revolution – Part I".
She signed the 2009 inter-faith Manhattan Declaration (supposed to have addressed key moral issues in our country like abortion and homosexual "marriage") which John MacArthur refused to sign b/c it was not explicitly Christian & joined w/ Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox without explicitly showing the fundamental chasm between Christians and the rest.
The Manhattan Declaration states in part:
"We, as Orthodox, Catholic, and Evangelical Christians, have gathered, beginning in New York on September 28, 2009, to make the following declaration, which we sign as individuals, not on behalf of our organizations, but speaking to and from our communities. We act together in obedience to the one true God, the triune God of holiness and love, who has laid total claim on our lives and by that claim calls us with believers in all ages and all nations to seek and defend the good of all who bear his image." (emphasis, mine)
But Scripture states:
2Co 6:14 Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? 15 What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? 16 What agreement has the temple of God with idols?
The answer: NONE. Moreover, Israel tried to find help from the pagan Egyptians against God's sanction. It was spiritual harlotry just as marrying women outside of Israel led to spiritual harlotry.
Isa 30:1 “Ah, stubborn children,” declares the LORD, “who carry out a plan, but not mine, and who make an alliance, but not of my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin"
Tada endorsed RC "First Things" Journal
She also campaigned for pro-abortionist (he's ok with some abortions, not for abolishing it) Roman Catholic Marc Rubio around 2016.
2012 Tada participated in pagan prayer circles with Nancy Leigh DeMoss (links are down below) Prayer circles info: https://tottministries.
She sounds VERY similar to John Piper and his sensuality as he uses the exact same word (no coincidence--biblical Christians do not think like this):
“Jesus is ecstasy beyond compare and if new hardships draw us closer to Him, I'm more than content with it.” ~Joni Eareckson Tada posted on Joni & Friends, November 19, 2018
This quote sounds more like Ann Voskamp and John Piper with such sensual spiritual errotica talk about Jesus than she does a sound, biblical Christian. This statement is hardly biblical, nor God-fearing, nor worthy of Christ Jesus the King. It's quite fleshly and emotive.
"Never forget, the point of the kitchen is the banquet. The aim of hermeneutics: happiness. The goal of exegesis: ecstasy." - John Piper, April 29, 2014 on X (Twitter)
Lawrence was a Roman Catholic Carmelite monk, so all his doctrine and practice will be false. He was a mystic, claiming that his practices led to a "higher spiritual life" in his monastery, so that's also pagan.
According to Wikipedia, Lawrence's order:
"The Discalced Carmelites are friars and nuns who dedicate themselves to a life of prayer. The Carmelite nuns live in cloistered (enclosed) monasteries and follow a completely contemplative life. The Carmelite friars, while following a contemplative life, also engage in the promotion of spirituality through their retreat centres, parishes and churches. Lay people, known as the Secular Order, follow their contemplative call in their everyday activities. Devotion to the Virgin Mary is a characteristic of Carmelites and is symbolised by wearing the brown scapular."
Another infamous Carmelite nun was mystic Teresa of Avila, the founder of the Discalced Carmelites along with John of the Cross. She's a favorite in the contemplative spirituality evangelical circles. They're all connected to the mystic & original Carmelites, the "Desert Fathers" who worshipped Mary.
In this video where she says she read Lawrence in high school, so her devotion to the Catholic monk started over 50 years ago: https://www.youtube.com/
https://joniandfriends.org/
Why "Jesus Calling" is bad: here and here.
https://www.jesuscalling.com/
Transcript :
Joni: These are women who through their decisions, whether with their husbands, with their children, in their homes, their communities, in their churches, these people, these women can be great influencers for good. They can help shape the destiny not only of their families and their churches and their communities, but the destiny of this nation. These women are change agents for the gospel of Jesus Christ. And that I get a chance to encourage them? That’s pretty cool!
Joni: Because all the speakers had an opportunity to stand in it. And of course, I had an opportunity to wheel inside that circle. May revival begin with me.
Joni: May renewal in the church begin with me inside that circle.
Tada teaches men and women about their walk, their sanctification. She focuses pretty singularly on the "theology of suffering". This is teaching doctrine and crosses over from retelling her testimony of her accident, which everyone's heard of for the last 50 years (which is why she's invited to speak in the first place), to violating Scripture in teaching men.
Moreover, she was CHAPLAIN for the US Paralympics in 2000. This is another violation of Scripture. Her video is here.
She's also on the Today's Christian Woman advisory board. This is a division of the notorious "Christianity Today" that promotes all manner of false doctrine, feminism, mysticism, and heretics.
Therefore Tada's position as CEO, and the president of the ministry is also a woman, Laura Gardner. It is structured not like a ministry but a business with a president and senior vice presidents as well as chiefs of Executive, finance, marketing, operating, finance. This is not how a ministry should run. Scripture shows us how and fundamentally it is connected to a local church. Women are NOT leaders over men in ministry according to Paul's epistles (1 Tim. 3, Titus 2).
John 15:18 “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. 20 Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours.
A good example who does get heat for being specific on the Gospel as well as pointing out heretical teachers is Justin Peters. While I disagree with him at times on some things, and sometimes he doesn't take a hard enough stand against certain false teachers (they all deserve harsh criticism), he's also in a wheelchair. A disability isn't a shield from criticism nor lack of discernment.
