Recently, I’ve been wondering if there are even ANY real, genuine Christians preaching from any of the pulpits around the world.

Why would I wonder that, you might well ask me? Well from what I’ve seen on virtually all forms of social media, if you were to search for it you will find at least one person denouncing the prophet or teacher you are wondering about as a ‘wolf in sheep’s clothing’, or a ‘false prophet’. There are virtually no preachers that are unaffected by this modern internet phenomenon of ‘exposing the evil so-called Christian preacher’, exposing those who want to trick us into hell with all their false doctrines, teachings and prophecies. It is a common thing to see long YouTube videos or Facebook posts with a strong analysing of everything these people have ever said in the public eye over the past 20 years, then finding everything biblically wrong with what they might have said, and then using it against them by building a damning case against them and then warning others never to even look at them, otherwise they’ll burn right along with them in hell.

Let me be clear that the bible does warn us that there will be many false teachers in the end of days, greedy and idolatrous money grabbers who are preaching for selfish ambition and who teach doctrines of devils. It is true that in these perilous end times, many weak believers who are still yet babes in Christ are easily lead away by such false doctrines, and are tricked into giving their hard earned money to these greedy people who want us to ‘sow seeds’ into their kingdom, expanding their ‘spiritual’ empire in the name of Christ. I get it; anyone with real discernment can see that this is all true even and especially in our day, and that there is actually a very useful service to the real body of Christ to make others aware of such people (obviously, the exposing of influential heathens like Freemason pop stars etc are also a valuable asset to the body of Christ, but I’m speaking specifically of discernment ministry over those who profess a faith in this blog).

The problem I have though, is with the way the exposing of the (so-called?) brethren is usually done. It’s the way that a lot of this ‘exposing’ is enacted. Many a time, these more mature believers who can see through the charade and who have a genuine heart for those with less discernment will publicly denounce such people without a shred of trembling before the cross, or without employing real Christ-like meekness unto humility in their exposition, from what I have seen. They seem to forget about loving ALL people (even the people/enemies they are exposing) in the process of relieving their frustrations and bitterness over those twisting scriptures to fit their own selfish narrative, and thus to me they actually come across as very self-righteous and even sometimes hotheaded and angry, even though they may be right about what they are saying. Many of these ‘exposers’ have made a full time ministry out of their exposing, focusing solely on that and calling it a ‘discernment’ ministry and even asking for donations themselves to fund it, when what it really is is a platform for them to negatively rant about the mistakes of everyone who doesn’t meet the standard of Christ within their own ministries as they see it, damning them in the process and discrediting any worth to the kingdom of God that might still be gleaned from what they are saying.

Sadly, in order to keep these discernment ministries running, they have to continually discover new ‘dirty laundry’ about even men of God you thought were sound, in order for the people listening to them to still give THEM their attention… how ironic is that?! Many a preacher I have listened to often and get edification from have all been attacked by this kind of ministry at some point, for the shock value of exposing a high profile minister that many people like is too much of a temptation to hold back from for these types of ministries… the higher the profile, the more shocking it is! It works a little bit like a tabloid newspaper, and has the same power in gossip value, just with a Christian bent to it. Shocking exposés sell just as much as sex does! But this Christian version works because we should know as believers that it’s a sin to dwell on lust, and yet we can still feel justified in our outrage for those who don’t match up to what we know of holiness when discernment ministries ‘expose’ them. That is why there has been such a growth in this type of ministry, for to my mind it is actually of the flesh and not the Spirit, according to the way it is usually done. It’s also a common thing for babes in Christ to start up a ministry like this at the start of their walk, for their own path to sanctification has only just begun, yet they still want to contribute to the body of Christ powerfully and have a social media following for themselves. Discernment ministry is perfect for them to engage in because of this, for they can remain justified in the flesh whilst seeming to provide this ‘service’ in a righteous manner, not knowing the real lack of spiritual fruit it has because of neglecting other scriptures and not being lead by the Spirit into gentleness and humility, with a fear of the Lord.

Personally, I have always purposely avoided publicly attacking and exposing even people who I know are wolves tearing apart the flock, for I much prefer the method of discernment through a life lived in powerful prayer and seeking God, and spiritually helping and edifying others to read the scriptures for themselves, so that the Holy Spirit Himself can show them the errors there might be in someone’s ministry, once they get to know Him well. This is where REAL discernment comes from, rather than someone just telling you about it. Discernment is a spiritual gift! People in the discernment ministry tend to hide behind this persona of being a ‘watchman on the wall’, when actually what needs to happen is that we all need to personally focus fully on Jesus Christ and His teachings, and forget the wolves (unless someone asks you on a personal level, one to one, what you might think about that person, to which you might propagate your misgivings and give warnings, yet with love and in respect for their weak humanity). When we do this, He surely does the rest. All too often, genuine men and women of God are unnecessarily exposed as wicked wolves who want to tear apart the sheep because they don’t subscribe to a certain doctrine or something, or have made some statement in the moment in public years ago that they might now wish they hadn’t said (but now can never withdraw because it’s ‘out there’), when in actual fact they are still doing a great service to the body of Christ in many other areas of encouragement and edification. Let’s face it, Christians; none of US are perfect! Yet it is written that teachers of God’s word will be judged more harshly, and yet as we can plainly see, it’s not just God who does the harsh judging!

It is well worth always keeping in mind as a general rule of thumb that we believers (whoever we might be) are also all fragile, broken human beings who are trying to do our best in a world that is basically anti-Christ. Apart from knowing the Holy Spirit personally, everything is stacked against us, spiritually speaking. Due to emphasis on certain areas of scripture with different interpretations and opinions, and yes, people cherry-picking them out of context a lot of the time, we get all these different factions within Christianity, that divides us all against ourselves. Jesus was clear that a kingdom divided against itself will fall (although it’s worth noting that He mentioned it in reference to how satan’s kingdom stands). Lack of unity even among those who are genuine believers is a BIG problem in the wider church, because too often we forget to really, truly LOVE each other and pray earnestly for each other, and to focus on what unites us rather than what divides us. Let me remind you that love always thinks the best of people, whoever they are!

An example I want to make about that last statement is about the prosperity gospel preachers; yes, their doctrines are dangerous and full of error, but to my mind they are and should be considered simply babes in Christ (most of them I believe have a real faith in the Son of God and respect the cross somewhat) who have been deceived themselves into such false doctrine, these doctrines of demons. Even though they don’t realise it, they are predominantly motivational speakers rather than bible teachers, trying to encourage their congregations with a heavy leaning on certain doctrine that supports their fleshly motivational message whilst ignoring other more biblically sound, spiritually discerned doctrines, and yet they preach without the power of the Holy Spirit resting on them blessing their ministry because they really don’t know Him very well at all, and fail to give a rounded message based on scripture as a whole because of their carnality. The result of not knowing Him well is that they take certain spiritual principles and enact them in this fleshly way, which is why they are all so wealthy! And make no mistake, they all believe genuinely that their wealth is actually a gift from God, and they believe that His favour is on them because they have so much wealth. They think this because they ARE carnal believers, and they are deceiving many because they themselves are deceived. This is what doctrines of demons looks like! It’s so subtle. If they were really spiritually reborn, they would be able to see the error they are making because they would know the Spirit personally, who would correct them. As it is, they have faith enough to take certain portions of scripture they like as an authority, but due to reading it carnally and without the guidance of the Holy Spirit revealing the rest of the revelation in scripture, their emphasises are all wrong, resulting in ‘another gospel’ that is essentially damnable. This is where truly mature Christians should be PRAYING for them and their flocks, so that they really will all get born again and have their eyes opened to the many other scriptures that in fact refute the prosperity gospel they subscribe to. They already have a belief in God; that’s a start. But to go from the pinata god whom you bash with a stick until sweeties fall out, to the God who calls us to suffer for His name regardless of the cost, takes revelation and prayer, and a direct move of His power in their lives. The way is narrow, and those who truly find it are few.

In closing, it’s important to recognise that the Holy Spirit DOES recommend that we ‘expose’ evil. But sadly, from where I’m stood, many of these discernment ministries have extracted this exclusively from the rest of scripture and jumped authoritatively on this verse, and use it to justify themselves and their ministry even when their attitude and delivery is out of line with holiness; but, it goes way deeper than that… exposing evil isn’t just on a Facebook meme or a YouTube video, it’s more positively about getting into the word every day on a personal level and rightly dividing scripture as a Spirit-led believer yourself, allowing HIM to show you personally of what He approves of and what is anathema to Him. This over-critical spirit that has pervaded the wider church about singling out high profile preachers by name, who are even sometimes 95% spot on and 5% wrong about stuff, is having a majorly negative influence on weaker believers, and it’s discrediting the work Christ is actually doing through those preachers. We need to be really careful in our judgements, for not only are we ALL guilty of similar sins of holding to error and proselytising it, but even worse we could in fact be limiting and holding God back from doing amazing things within the church, and to the lost around us, because of the attacks from other members of the church on those He has called to be His ministers, warts and all. Remember, we will ALL be judged for EVERY word we say, idle or not. This should give us all a fear of the Lord that should be so much more prevalent in these exposing posts and videos than there actually is at the moment.

A friendly warning in love to all those involved! God bless you.