Matthew 22:29, “Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God.” 2nd Peter 3:16-17, “As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction. Ye therefore, beloved, seeing ye know these things before, beware lest ye also, being led away with the error of the wicked, fall from your own stedfastness..”
Ray Comfort is an extremely popular evangelist in California. His YouTube videos on average receive over 60,000 views each. That is quite impressive. Unfortunately, Mr. Comfort preaches a false gospel of partial faith in Christ plus works. Here is some helpful information from Michael P. Bowen, refuting Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron on their deadly counterfeit plan of salvation:
The plan of salvation according to Ray Comfort and his cohort Kirk Cameron defines repentance incorrectly. In the most elemental sense possible, their plan of salvation is based upon an academic flaw. Repent, as Christ meant it to be in terms of salvation, means to change your mind from trusting in what you can do for God to trusting only in what He can do for you. Neither of these gentlemen use the original Greek meaning of the word for repent which is metanoia. As defined in the Greek language, metanoia is “meta”(change) and “noia”(mind). Metanoia is simply a “change of mind.” That is all it means. Nothing else is added to it. If someone says it means a change of mind about bananas, they would be wrong. If a crafty pastor who claims salvation is by faith “plus” works and deeds of the law (under the clever guise of “committing your life to Christ”) says that metanoia means a change of mind about sin, he would be wrong. Metanoia, by itself, simply means a “change of mind.” When Christ used the word “repent” He was always referring to “a change of mind.” In proper context, Christ used “a change of mind” to refer to what people were trusting in to get them to heaven. Jesus would tell people to “change their minds” from keeping all the established laws of righteousness to instead trust upon Him alone in terms of Him being the sin-bearer, that He would “solve” the problem of sin once and for all by His death and subsequent resurrection from the dead. You see, Christ took care of the sin problem. When we, in any way whatsoever, attempt to remedy the problem of sin by turning our backs on it, forsaking it, or promising God that we will quit certain things that we know bring Him grief, we are essentially telling Christ that our faith in His death and resurrection from the grave is “not enough” to save us. If there was any way at all we could save ourselves by our works and behavioral changes, Christ may not have had to die on that cross; however, we know that God says in Romans 6:23 that the “wages of sin is death.”
SOURCE: Michael P. Bowen, “I NEVER KNEW YOU”; chapter 11, pp. 114, 115
No man has ever lived good enough to go to Heaven, that is why you must be saved by grace. If going to Heaven were the result of your good life, then salvation would be of debt, not grace. Romans 4:4, “Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt.” Ray Comfort is the most dangerous kind of false prophet, because he employs the HALF-TRUTH. Satan knows that most people will reject an outright lie. But the Devil is much smarter than you or me, knowing exactly how to deceive the simple. So Satan uses the HALF-TRUTH, because the part of the deception that is true can be defended with incontestable logic. A common example of this is that false teachers will claim salvation is by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. That sounds good, and it is so far. But then they will add something else to that faith, negating it. Here's an example:
Jehovah's Witnesses:
“Salvation is a free gift from God. It cannot be earned. Yet it does require effort on our part.”
SOURCE: https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1996081
Do you see the blatant HALF-TRUTH? Indeed, salvation is the free gift of God. The lie is that it requires effort on our part. How can salvation be a free gift if we have to do anything? Obviously it can't. You simply receive a gift. Now take a look at how Ray Comfort employs the same type of deceitful half-truth...
“You need to repent of sin and trust alone in Jesus, and ask God to create a clean heart in you, so you'll love righteousness; because a Christian doesn't walk around high, he doesn't lie or steal or fornicate or look at indecency, he lives in holiness; not to earn Heaven, but out of gratitude to God for His mercy.” —Ray Comfort, “Christian, This Is Why You Aren't Conquering Sin”
Where does the Bible say you have to repent “of sin” to be saved? It doesn't. That is the lie in Ray Comfort's damnable counterfeit gospel. Where does the Bible say that you have to ask God to create a clean heart in you to receive His free gift of eternal life? It doesn't. Ray has added these unbiblical requirements to God's simple plan of salvation. Where does the Bible say that you have to love righteousness to be saved? It doesn't.
Ray says that a Christian doesn't walk around high? I take prescription drugs and I am high all day long...lol. Ray says a Christian doesn't lie, but Sarah lied (Genesis 18:15). Ray says that a Christian doesn't steal, but Jacob stole from his uncle Laban (Genesis 31:20). Ray says that a Christian doesn't fornicate, but Samson fornicated (Judges 16:1). Kindly said, Ray Comfort is a false teacher, who wrests (tortures) the Scriptures to his own destruction.
Please keep in mind in the preceding quote from Ray Comfort, that he is witnessing to a lost man. Ray tells this guy that he must repent of his sins, and ask God to create a clean heart in him, so that he'll love righteousness. Do you see what Ray is horribly doing? He is emphasizing a changed life, not emphasizing Christ's sacrifice on the cross to pay our debt of sin. Ray is focusing on sin, pressuring lost people to turn away from their sinful bad habits, as a requirement to receive God's free gift. Dear reader, this is NOT the Gospel which is taught in the inspired Word of God:
1st Corinthians 15:1-4, “Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:”
As you just read for yourself, Paul's definition of “the gospel” (Good News) doesn't include repenting of sins or asking God to create a clean heart in you! Like most heretics, Ray Comfort is trying to force human reformation upon people, as a requirement to get to Heaven. Ray is saying that if you want to go to Heaven, then you must stop deliberately committing sin, and you must commit to changing your life with God's help, or you cannot be saved. This is all based upon YOUR faithfulness, and not GOD'S righteousness. Ray uses a lot of forked-tongue doublespeak. Here again are the helpful words of Michael P. Bowen, refuting Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron's counterfeit gospel:
Our government has invested millions of dollars into equipment capable of identifying counterfeit money. The problem with counterfeit currency is that it looks “so real” that nobody can tell the difference. It takes special machines to be able to spot fake money, today, because crooks are becoming better and better with each passing day at being able to fool the government with counterfeit money. Similarly, today’s false plans of salvation are becoming more and more harder to detect. Today’s false plans of salvation are very beautiful, they have great appeal to a lonely person’s innermost needs, and they do satisfy to some degree one’s deepest longings for a relationship with Jesus Christ. But because they differ from the plan of salvation that Christ provides, they are wrong, because there is only one gospel message according to the bible. Reader, if you trust the plan of salvation offered to you by anyone other than Christ Himself, you will not make it to heaven. If you instead trust what Christ has said about salvation, He will save you eternally the same instant that you trust in Him alone. For those who place their trust in a counterfeit plan of salvation, such as the counterfeit plan I have presented to you in this chapter, you can expect to meet Christ as your “judge” rather than as your “savior” at the Great White Throne Judgement. Look at what Jesus has to say to all of those who placed only partial faith in Him and the rest of their faith in living the “Christian Lifestyle” as their means to gain entrance into heaven: “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity” (Matthew 7:21-23). From there, all who have trusted in counterfeit forms of the gospel will be sent to the lake of fire. “And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire” (Revelation 20:11-15). Who will you choose to believe, reader, when it comes to where you will spend your eternal destiny? Will you choose the words of men, or will you choose the words of Jesus Christ? This, of course, is up to you.
SOURCE: Michael P. Bowen, “I NEVER KNEW YOU”; chapter 11, pp. 117-119
I once spoke with Jared Baldwin, a former associate pastor of Harvest Baptist Church on Guam. I was talking to a fool. Jared insisted that Ray Comfort is a man of God, as I wasted my time trying to tell him THE TRUTH, that Ray Comfort is a damnable false prophet! Jared is indoctrinated with Lordship Salvation, following his mentor Marty Herron into Hell. Since 2018,, these incompetent ministers are now residing at the Faith Baptist Bible College And Theological Cemetery in Ankeny, Iowa, ruining lives elsewhere with their false gospel of Lordship Salvation.
Dear friend, please reason with me for a moment. If the proponents of Lordship Salvation are saved, and Free Grace Gospel proponents are also saved, then we've got a dilemma. One group says you can be saved by faith alone in the Gospel, but the other group says you cannot, teaching that you must also continue to live the Christian life, surrender all to Christ as Lord of your life, and follow Jesus no matter what the cost. They cannot both be the Gospel.
I watched a very interesting 12 hour documentary by historian film producer, Ken Burns, on 'The American Civil War.' It is heartbreaking history! I heard a quote in the film by President Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) that caught my attention:
“In great contests [battles], each party claims to act in accordance with the will of God—both may be, but one must be, wrong—God cannot be for and against the same thing at the same time!” —President Abraham Lincoln
Either you have to turn away from a lifestyle of sinning to be saved, or you do not, but it cannot be both. Either you have to follow Jesus in obedient Christian service to be saved, or you don't. Either you have to faithfully run the race to get saved, or you don't. Either you have to receive Jesus as your “Savior and Lord,” or just your “Savior,” but it cannot be both. Serving the Lord is strictly a matter of showing how much you love Jesus (John 14:15), but this has absolutely nothing to do with receiving God's free gift of eternal life, which is by faith alone in Jesus Christ as your personal Savior. There is no other option. Without the new birth you don't go to Heaven. Jesus exclaimed in John 3:3b, “Ye must be born again.”
There cannot be TWO plans of salvation. I heard Dr. Kevin Bauder foolishly teach that Free Grace and Lordship Salvation both fall within the realm of orthodox theology. He's got a hole in his theology! Lordship Salvation advocates typically try to keep the discussion of salvation focused on sanctification, to the near exclusion of justification. Lordship Salvation's false repentance confuses sanctification (growth of a believer) with justification (God declaring a sinner righteous). I love this quote from John Bunyan:
“If you do not put a difference between justification wrought by the man Christ without and sanctification wrought by the Spirit of Christ within, you are not able to divide the Word aright; but contrariwise, you corrupt the Word of God, and cast stumbling blocks before the people.” —John Bunyan (1628-1688)
We are made a child of God by yielding to the truth of the Gospel. Salvation is of the LORD! Romans 10:3-4, “For they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.” God alone can SAVE you in response to your yielding, and God alone can SANCTIFY you in response to your yielding. We live the Christian life the SAME way we get saved—BY YIELDING TO GOD, WHICH IS FAITH!
All that God requires to be saved is that by faith you BELIEVE His record in the Bible. Christ died on the cross for our sins. He was buried. Three days later Jesus miraculously resurrected from the dead. If you acknowledge THE TRUTH that you are a guilty sinner (2nd Timothy 2:25; Romans 3:19), and you embrace THE TRUTH that Christ died on the cross as the sacrifice for your sins, was buried and is risen, and that is your only hope for eternal life (1st Corinthians 15:1-4)—you are saved! Acts 16:30b-31, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.”
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