Sam Storms on Charismatic Gifts

by Reformed Reader
The Beginner's Guide to Spiritual Gifts by Dr. Sam Storms, http://www ...

(Note: This is a re-post from June 2015)

I have not read many books about spiritual gifts from a charismatic perspective.  Therefore, I recently worked through Sam Storm’s book, The Beginner’s Guide to Spiritual Gifts, to learn more about charismatic theology/practice.  As a Reformed Christian, I’m not charismatic, but I do want a proper understanding of this movement.  Below is a brief review of this book.

There are ten chapters in this book: 1) When Power Comes to Church (an introduction), 2) Right? Wrong? (10 myths about charismatic/spiritual gifts), 3) Words of Wisdom and Knowledge (prophecy and utterances), 4) Faith and Healing, 5) It’s a Miracle (miracles in the church), 6) Prophecy and Distinguishing of Spirits, 7) Who Said God Said? (knowing the Bible in order to test prophesies), 8) What is the Gift of Tongues, 9) Tongues and Interpretation, 10) Letting Your Gift Find You.  There’s also an appendix on how to pray for healing and one on “when a gifted person falls.”

Storms does give several charismatic stories in attempt to prove his points.  One worth mentioning is his account of a prophet telling a friend that God was going to send a comet to prove that the church should have a 21 day period of prayer and fasting.  The comet came.  This man also said God spoke to him in a dream telling him about a drought and famine, and the next summer was dry (see chapter five).  There are other similar stories of dreams, healings, and revelations.

This book was a reminder to me of why I am not a charismatic. The way Storms explains the passages of Scripture in view (such as 1 Cor. 12) were unconvincing, subjective at times, based on probables at other times, lacking in OT references, and without solid exegetical or theological support.  I was also troubled by Storms’ logic based on experience and emotional appeal (I’m thinking of the logical fallacy of “playing to the gallery”).

Here are some phrases I found unsettling:

“To reject spiritual [charismatic –spl] gifts, to turn from this immediate and gracious divine enabling, is, in a sense, to turn from God. …In denying them, we deny Him” (p. 13).

“If you are not earnestly desiring to prophesy, if you are not praying for an opportunity and occasion to speak prophetically into the lives of the church and other believers, you are disobeying God!” (p. 111).

“It is a sin to despise [charismatic – spl] prophecy” (p. 141).

I also disagree with Storms’ discussion of faith.  He says there are three different kinds of faith: conversion faith (the faith through which we’re justified), continuing faith (the daily faith we have), and charismatic faith, which “appears to be spontaneous and functions as the divinely enabled condition on which the more overtly supernatural activities of God are suspended” (p. 60).  Storms says charismatic faith is not given to every Christian, and it is a special faith that enables a believer to trust God to bring about a sort of blessing not promised in Scripture (p. 61).  Storm then goes on to talk about five levels of faith for healing.  To divide and dissect faith in this way is unhealthy at best.  Here Storms is at odds with the historic confessional understanding of faith: there are not “faiths” that we have as Christians, but “true faith” in Christ alone for justification by grace alone.  I’m not saying that Storms is denying justification by faith alone, but his discussion of faith is not in line with the Reformation; one should remember this when reading Storms’ other works.

I don’t recommend this book, obviously.  I realize that Reformed theology doesn’t have all the answers to Paul’s discussion in 1 Cor. 12, but its answers are better and more biblical than that of charismatic theology.  This book has reminded me of this fact!  As Richard Gaffin and others have said, Scripture is sufficient for us today; we no longer need prophets and revelations.

Sam Storms, The Beginners Guide to Spiritual Gifts (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 2012).

Shane Lems
Hammond, WI, 54015

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When the Category of Evil Disappears (Carson)

by Reformed Reader
“The Intolerance of Tolerance”

Here’s a helpful discussion of evil, truth, and the “new tolerance”:

Once the category of evil disappears, our moral discernment has no structure. Strong fiber is reduced to mush; the skeleton of moral reasoning is taken out, and what is left is jelly-like protoplasm. We end up not only with rampant ethical relativism but with the anemic inability to feel or express moral outrage over pervasive immorality. The failure to recognize the evil in our own hearts is precisely what convinces so many of us that our opinions and motives are above reproach while those who contradict us are stupid or malign. A healthy dose of Augustinian realism about sin, as Mark Ellingsen puts it, could make America a better place: indeed, that is why the founding fathers cared so much about checks and balances, about constitutional limitations, about division of powers: they did not trust anyone precisely because the founders had a robust notion of sin.6 If in our environment the virtue of (the new) tolerance becomes absolute, then ostensibly moral discussions are brought round to this one consideration.

For example, in a recent report by the Australia Institute titled “Mapping Homophobia in Australia,” we are told that 62 percent of evangelical Christians are homophobic. The evidence? People were asked whether they agreed or disagreed with the statement, “I believe that homosexuality is immoral.” If they agreed, they were classified as homophobic. In other words, there was no moral engagement with the complexities surrounding human sexuality, but merely a label used to brand an entire class of people with the supreme shame: intolerance. Again: Millions call themselves “pro-choice” in the matter of abortion. But that is coherent for them because abortion itself is morally neutral, and therefore the choice is devoid of moral significance except for its availability to the sovereign freedom of the individual will. Small wonder that we have arrived at the place where our medical experts can help generate life in the womb, and can kill a baby about to emerge from the womb, with no moral differentiation. It is merely a matter of personal choice.

D. A Carson, The Intolerance of Tolerance, p. 130-131.

Shane Lems
Covenant Presbyterian Church (OPC)
Hammond, WI, 54015

Books Giveaway!!! (ENDED)

by Reformed Reader

It has been quite awhile since we’ve given a book away here, so I thought I’d give two away. I found an extra copy The Law is Not of Faith and I also found an extra copy of my book, The Doctrines of Grace: Student Edition. Since I have an extra of both, I’m giving one of each away!

The Law is Not of Faith
The Doctrines of Grace

How do you enter? Simply reply in the comment box below and be sure to note which book you’d like to win. Also use your email address so I know how to contact you. Finally, you can also enter on our Facebook site and Twitter feed.

I’m going to select the winner for each book in a totally random way (e.g. something like putting names in a hat and letting my young daughter pick!). I’ll announce the winners next Monday or Tuesday (Dec. 31 or Jan. 1).

Thanks for reading the blog! I hope and pray it’s been a blessing to you in the Christian faith, even in a small way.

In Christian love,
Shane Lems
Hammond, WI, 54015

Fundamentalism and Interpretation (Vanhoozer)

by Reformed Reader
Vanhoozer

I have always been skeptical and uneasy about a fundamentalist method of interpreting Scripture. Although I have several other reasons for my unease, one worth mentioning is Kevin Vanhoozer’s helpful critique of the fundamentliast hermeneutic in Is There a Meaning in This Text? Below are a few excerpts.

Though fundamentalists cry “back to the texts themselves!” In reality they tend to confuse the text with their way of reading it. “What it meant” becomes “what it means to us now.” Fundamentalism thus preaches the authority of the text but practices the authority of the interpretive community.

Or, I might add, fundamentalism preaches the authority of the text but practices the authority the community’s leader. Vanhoozer continues:

Thus what appeared as one of the most conservative approaches to the text, fundamentalism, ironically turns out to have more in common with one of the most radical, for in privileging their own interpretive community, fundamentalists discover a strange bedfellow in Stanley Fish. The irony is acute and painful: while professing to stand under the Word, the fundamentalist is actually a User.

…An insubordinate desire for objective certainty ultimately affects the way some read the Bible. A misplaced desire to honor “Holy Scripture” leads many fundamentalists to read the Bible as a book of true statements. The problem, in my opinion, is not so much their identification of The Bible with the Word of God as it is their theory of meaning and reference. A picture of meaning holds fundamentalists captive. This picture equates the meaning of a text with its referent, that is, with its empirical or historical correspondence. Is this is essentially modern theory of meaning and truth that generates literalistic interpretations and harmonizes where all parts of the Bible are read as though the primary intent were to state historical facts. Whereas Bultmann dehistoricizes historical material, fundamentalists may historicize unhistorical material.… Though the Bible contains propositions…it is much more than a collection of proof texts.


Kevin Vanhoozer, Is There a Meaning in This Text? p. 425-426.

Shane Lems
Hammond, WI, 54015

Pietism, Subjectivism, and Christian Worship (Clark)

by Reformed Reader

The pietist movement and subjectivism are two things – among others – that have corroded, watered down, and weakened Christian worship in our day.  When all the emphasis is on the self, feelings, experiences, and emotions, you know you’re in the realm of pietism and subjectivism.

In this type of worship, the objective truths of Scripture – sin and salvation – are only alluded to (if at all) and the enraptured feelings of the inner self are front and center.  Rather than asking what God wants us to do in worship, many simply do what makes them feel a religious “high.”  Unfortunately this is even prevalent in many Reformed and Presbyterian churches which historically have placed the objective truths front and center. I like what Scott Clark said about this topic.

“Perhaps the most outstanding example…of the subjective turn in Reformed piety is in public worship.  It would not be hard to find a Reformed congregation today in which the Sunday (or Saturday night) liturgy begins with twenty-five minutes of Scripture songs sung consecutively, each song blending into the next, perhaps augmented by a Power Point or video presentation.  In this increasingly popular liturgy, the singing is followed by a dramatic presentation which, in turn, is followed by congregational announcements, most of which focus on the various cell-group programs.  Increasingly, the sermon is a brief, colorfully illustrated, emotionally touching collection of anecdotes, in which the hearer is not so much directed to the law and the gospel, but, in one way or another, to one’s self.”

“Anxious to intensify the religious experience of parishioners or to make the church accessible to the nonchurched, many Reformed congregations have turned to new measures, to drama, dance lessons, and even a service arranged thematically by the name of the local professional sports franchise.  Such practices are rather more indebted to eighteenth- and nineteenth-century revival practices than they are to Geneva, Heidelberg, or Westminster Abbey.  Such practices are also symptoms of the synthesis of Reformed worship with the emerging modern culture in which, as Philip Rieff noted, hospital and theater replace the church” (p. 73).

 R. Scott Clark, Recovering the Reformed Confession (Phillipsburg: P&R, 2008).

(This is a re-post from October, 2011.)

Shane lems
Covenant Presbyterian Church (OPC)
Hammond, WI, 54015

The Leading Principle of a Faithful Minister (Newton)

by Reformed Reader

One of John Newton’s lesser known works is called “A Review of Ecclesiastical History.” It’s a book that basicaly summarizes church history from Christ’s birth until the end of the apostolic era. I’ve really enjoyed it so far, and I do recommend it.

In one section, Newton discusses the character of the apostle Paul (book 2, chapter 2). This is a great chapter for pastors to read! Here’s a helpful quote by Newton on Paul’s love for Christ – applied to Christian pastors today:

Supported and animated by this love [for Christ], he [Paul] exerted himself to the utmost, in promoting the knowledge of Him whom he loved, and bearing testimony of His power and grace. Nothing could dishearted, or weary or terrify, or bribe him from his duty: and this must and will be universally the leading principle of a faithful minister.

Should a man possess the tongue of men and angels, the finest genius, and the most admired accomplishments, if he is not constrained and directed by the love of Christ, he will either do nothing, or nothing to the purpose; he will be unable to support either the frowns or the smiles of the world. His studies and endeavors will certainly be influenced by low and selfish views. Interest or a desire of applause may stimulate him to shine as a scholar, a critic, or a philosopher – but til the love of Christ rules in his heart, he will neither have inclination nor power to exert himself for the glory of God or the good of souls.

The inseparable effect, and one of the surest evidences of love to Christ, is a love to his people. Of this likewise our apostle exhibits an instructive and an affecting example….”

John Newton, Works, III, p. 220-221

Shane Lems
Covenant Presbyterian Church (OPC)
Hammond, WI, 54015