Chapter 11.7

The Cessation of Miracle Working in the Church

The Completion of the NT & the Purpose of the Gift

 

Table of Topics

A) Introduction to the History of Miracle Working in the Church

B) A Survey of the History of Miracle Working in the Church

B.1) Miracle Working in the 1st Century Church: James- “Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church”

B.2) Miracle Working in the 2nd Century Church: Irenaeus- “The dead even have been raised up”

B.3) Miracle Working in the 3rd Century Church: Origen- “traces remain”

B.4) Miracle Working in the 4th & 5th Century Church: Chrysostom- “The gifts have long since ceased”

B.5) Miracle Working in the Medieval Church: Roman Catholic propaganda

B.6) Miracle Working in the Reformation Church: Calvin- “We are not forging some new gospel”

B.7) Miracle Working in the Revival Church: Edwards- “since the canon of Scripture has been completed . . . those extraordinary gifts have ceased.”

Table of Topics

continued

B.8) Miracle Working in the 19^th Century Church: Spurgeon—“He gave that gift to the Church in its infancy, but now it needs it no longer”

B.9) Miracle Working in the 20^th Century Church

B.9.a) Early 1900’s

B.9.b) Early super-supernaturalists: Allen, Coe, and Branham

8.9.c) Prominent Women: McPherson & Kuhlman

8.9.d) Contemporary super-supernaturalists: Roberts, Bakker, & Swaggart

C) Proposed Reasons for the Obvious and Drastic Decline of Miracle Working Gifts in Church History & Their Supposed Restoration Today

D) A Biblical and Historical Reconstruction of the Distribution of the NT Documents and the Resulting Cessation of Miracle Working Gifts

Extras & Endnotes

 

Primary Points

• The spiritual gifts of healing and miracle working ceased to operate in the Church sometime in the third century.
• For over 1600 years, the Church universally believed that these gifts had fulfilled their function in the early Church and no longer operated.
• The 1^st century NT record reveals that both the occurrences and importance of healing declined from the day of Pentecost.
• Irenaeus in the 2nd century confirmed that the healing gift was not exorcisms, operated after the Apostles, included raising the dead, was not simply praying for people, and resulted in compete healings.
• Origen, the greatest scholar in the 3rd century confirmed that miraculous gifts had essentially ceased.
• The scarcity of the miracle working gifts in the 2nd and 3rd century Church is evidenced by the conspicuous absence of their mention in the vast majority of the documents written by the early Church Fathers.
• While Chrysostom in the 4th century was not opposed to God granting miraculous powers, he insisted that supernatural virtue had replaced, and was superior to, miracle working as evidence of Christianity.
• Contrary to the claims of modern super-supernaturalists, Augustine’s position on the miracle working gifts was the same as John Chrysostom.
• Reports of miracle working after the rise of the Roman Catholic Church involve several suspicious elements including the use of relics, the support of unbiblical doctrines, and the reports being several decades removed from those supposed to have performed the miracle.
• If there was ever a period of post-Apostolic history in which God would have granted miracle working gifts, the Reformation in Europe and Great Awakening in America would have been it. But they were denounced by the leaders of these true movements of God.
• Early Pentecostalism and the initiation of super-supernaturalism was led by charismatic show people who were at best known to be deceitful, greedy, and sexually immoral, if not outright demonic. Yet they are still worshipped in modern super-supernaturalism.

Primary Points

continued

• Super-supernaturalists admit the miraculous gifts have been generally absent from the Church for at least 1600 years, but claim they have been quenched by a lack of spirituality among Christians.
• Historically speaking, the reception, authentication, and then widespread copying, canonization, and distribution of the NT revelation, and the cessation of the Scripture and sign gifts all occurred c. 250. The best explanation is the biblical teaching that the purpose of the latter was the former and when their purpose was accomplished, these gifts ceased.

A) Introduction to the History of Miracle Working in the Church

We have claimed throughout Knowing Our God (KOG) that the spiritual gifts of healing and miracle working ceased to operate in the Church sometime in the third century. This coincided with the completion of the revelation, copying, distribution, and canonization of the NT revelation. Therefore, because the divine purpose of giving people miraculous powers was to authenticate them as messengers of the NT revelation, these gifts ceased as well.

Such a claim should not surprise us, as it has been historically and universally agreed in the Church that the gift and office of Apostleship certainly ceased. ^[1] Accordingly, Dr. Thomas Edgar writes:

Since “Apostle” in the full sense of the gift was only a temporary gift and did not continue in the church, the biblical precedent is established that some gifts given in the apostolic age did not continue and were only temporary. It is contrary to Scripture to assume that all gifts and all happenings of the apostolic church are to continue and to be expected in today’s church. ^[2]

Thus, it is for good reason that the account of the first century miracle working of the Apostles is called the Acts of the Apostles. ^[3] And not only is the continuation of miracle working not promised in Scripture, it is flat out denied by history as we shall see.

Elsewhere in KOG we argue that the Apostle Paul had anticipated this very thing in 1 Corinthians 13:8-13 when he said the Scripture and sign gifts would cease when that which was in parts was completed. ^[4] Elsewhere as well we address the historical cessation of the gift of tongues, knowledge, and prophecy. ^[5] Here we focus specifically on the historical testimony of the Church to the cessation of the gifts of healing and miracle working.

For over 1600 years, the Church universally believed that these gifts had fulfilled their function in the early Church and no longer operated. This is the view we have referred to as historicism. If that is the case, then modern super-supernaturalists have the burden of explaining why they think they have returned. This is especially in light of the fact that God is not granting Scripture-quality, Apostolic revelation today. Again, every God-sent miracle worker in Scripture was also a source of new, absolutely divinely authoritative revelation, and if such revelation is not being granted today, why should we believe that the sign gifts have been restored?

Because the clear and overwhelming historical evidence for the cessation of the gifts of healing and miracle working is such a blow to the super-supernaturalist’s claims, they have either: 1) denied that they ceased, 2) admitted their cessation but claim it was the fault of the Church, or suggested other rather ridiculous arguments.

For example, as we document below, super-supernaturalist author Jack Deere repeatedly admits that based on Church history the miraculous gifts did cease. Nevertheless, he attempts to disparage that very evidence when he writes:

[F]ew people really possess the necessary linguistic skills or the critical abilities to evaluate many of the original sources. I have read a number of anticharismatic reviews of church history . . . Yet the majority of these authors possess neither the ability to read the original historical sources in Greek and Latin . . . nor the critical skills to evaluate them. ^[6]

There is no honest recognition here that the writings of the Church Fathers have been accurately and faithfully translated into English, just as Scripture has. As we quote directly from these writings throughout this chapter, it will be obvious to the reader that it does not require a doctorate degree in linguistics or antiquity to understand what they are plainly saying.

In addition, super-supernaturalist generally claim that these gifts have been restored to them now because they are more faith-filled then those who supposedly quench the gifts. On the contrary, God Himself sovereignly withdrew these gifts because they fulfilled His purpose for them. These things we wish to support here.

There are several issues that must first be clarified, and that will serve to simplify much of the confusion regarding this topic. First, we have discussed elsewhere that it is important to differentiate between miracles that God does (direct miracles), and miracle working performed through people possessing miraculous gifts (delegating miracle working). In other words, there is no doubt that God has continued to bless His Church with miracles throughout history, and often in answer to prayer. But these miracles must be automatically excluded from a discussion regarding the historical occurrence of people possessing the sign gifts. ^[7]

Secondly, also as discussed elsewhere, exorcisms cannot be confused with the miraculous gifts. Exorcisms have been performed by Christians and non-Christians alike from ancient times, and although healings resulting from them make up a large part of the present and historical evidence that super-supernaturalists offer as proof of the operation of the miraculous gifts, this evidence must be excluded, as it does nothing of the sort. The Apostles miraculously healed people apart from exorcism and if people today are going to claim their gifts than they must exhibit the same attributes. ^[8]

Thirdly, it should be said that the vast majority of even super-supernaturalists agree that there was at least a drastic, and relatively swift decrease in the manifestations of the miraculous gifts after the age of the Apostles. In the words of super-supernaturalist theologian Max Turner, the gift of healing “became eclipsed” in the early Church.^[9] Accordingly, few would disagree with Robert L. Saucy, Distinguished Professor of Systematic Theology at Talbot School of Theology, who writes:

The conclusion that the era of Christ and the early apostolic church was a particular time of miracles that did not continue at the same level in the later church is strongly confirmed by the witness of church history. . . . While the evaluations of many reported miracles may differ, it seems impossible to deny that miraculous activity of the quality and extent associated with the era of Christ and the Apostles is not found as a continuing phenomenon in the later church. ^[10]

The fact that even super-supernaturalists agree with this is demonstrated by the multitude of reasons they offer to explain the sharp decline in the manifestations of the miraculous gifts in the early history of the Church. These will be addressed later. ^[11] First, let us establish the fact that the Church has historically believed these gifts completely ceased in the very early history of Christianity.

B) A Survey of the History of Miracle Working in the Church

B.1) Miracle Working in the 1st Century Church:

James: “Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church”

The NT record reveals that both the occurrences and importance of healing declined as the Church moved further away from the day of Pentecost. Indeed, in the Church’s earliest history multitudes were being healed by the Apostles (cf. Acts 5:16), but some 25 years later, Paul the greatest Apostle, could not even heal himself (cf. 2 Cor 12:7-10). This is not to deny that the Apostle still worked miracles later in his life when it was necessary for God to authenticate him as a messenger of new divine revelation. However, in the Apostle’s later life and writings it would seem that the occurrences of his miracle working had diminished.

He advises Timothy to take a common remedy for his stomach illnesses (cf. 1 Tim 5:23). Likewise, he was forced to leave his companion “Trophimus sick in Miletus” (2 Tim 4:20). Paul’s “fellow worker” Epaphroditus, “was ill, and almost died. But God had mercy on him” (Phil 2:25-27). There is no hint at all that God used the gift of healing through Paul to heal Epaphroditus but rather that God Himself healed him without human intervention.

This decrease in the importance of healing is also demonstrated by noting the numerous mentions of it in the Gospels and Acts. But when we get to the NT letters, the idea of physical healing in general is mentioned only twice (cf. 1 Cor 12; Jas 5:14), and only one of those references concerns miraculous healers. The writer of Hebrews speaks of these gifts as something in the past (cf. Heb. 2:3-4). The epistle of James, one of the earliest Christian documents, encourages the sick to seek the prayers of the local church elders, not the ministry of a faith healer.

And surely if they had any value for the churches under Timothy’s and Titus’s care, Paul would have mentioned them in letters that were “instructions so that” these Christian leaders, and those today, would “know how people ought to conduct themselves in God’s household, which is the church of the living God” (1 Tim. 3:14-15). Paul does not even hint at the need or value of miracle working gifts in the Pastoral Epistles. ^[12]

The Apostle Peter never mentions miracle working, and neither does the Apostle John, apart from his description of Christ’s ministry in his gospel. The Apostles’ relative silence concerning these miraculous gifts would seem to reflect the relatively minor and temporary part they played in the life of Christians in the early Church. ^[13]

In response to these biblical facts, super-supernaturalist teacher Jack Deere has claimed that the reason miracle working gifts are not mentioned in the later epistles is because these epistles are for teaching purposes, not story-telling like Acts. ^[14] However, there should be no doubt that if miracle working were as important to the effectiveness and health of the Church as Mr. Deere and super-supernaturalists claim, we would find it being addressed in more of the NT.

Why then do we see a decrease in the emphasis of miracle working even within the NT itself? Because the need to authenticate the new NT revelation even in the first century decreased, and, as demonstrated elsewhere, this was the purpose of these gifts. ^[15]

B.2) Miracle Working in the 2nd Century Church:

Irenaeus: the dead even have been raised up”

Perhaps the earliest mention of miraculous spiritual gifts in accepted Christian literature ^[16] outside of the NT comes from Bishop Ignatius (c. 107). In his Letter to the Church in Smyrna he describes them as “endowed with every spiritual gift” ^[17] suggesting the miraculous ones as well.

The earliest clear mention we have of such gifts outside of the NT is in the writings of Justin Martyr (c. 150) in his apologetic piece with the Jewish unbeliever Trypho. Justin writes:

Some are becoming disciples in the name of Christ, and quitting the path of error; who are also receiving gifts, each as he is worthy, illumined through the name of this Christ. For one receives the spirit of understanding, another of counsel, another of strength, another of healing, another of foreknowledge, another of teaching, and another of the fear of God. ^[18]

Here, it would seem, we find a clear mention of the gift of healing by someone writing very close to the death of the Apostles. However, it is interesting to note that this man, being “perhaps the greatest of the Apologists” ^[19] mentioned miracles so very little. Especially considering that much of his writing was directed to Jewish Christians for which the value of miracle working would have been particularly important (cf. 1 Cor 1:22). On the contrary, as we quote Justin and other early Church leaders elsewhere, it was the miracle of the new birth and conversion in Christ that he and other Fathers consistently pointed to as proof that their God was greater than anyone else’s god, not healing. ^[20]

In addition, Justin notes in another of his writings that healings are also occurring through exorcisms:

For numberless demoniacs throughout the whole world, and in your city, many of our Christian men exorcising them in the name of Jesus Christ, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate, have healed and do heal, rendering helpless and driving the possessing devils out of the men, though they could not be cured by all the other exorcists, and those who used incantations and drugs. ^[21]

And the vast number of accounts of healings in the post-apostolic age of the Church are described as exorcisms, which again, are not manifestations of the gift of healing.

Now we turn to Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, who writes (c. 180) somewhat more specifically than Justin:

Wherefore, also, those who are in truth His disciples, receiving grace from Him, do in His name perform [miracles], so as to promote the welfare of other men, according to the gift which each one has received from Him. For some do certainly and truly drive out devils, so that those who have thus been cleansed from evil spirits frequently both believe [in Christ], and join themselves to the Church. . . .

Others still, heal the sick by laying their hands upon them, and they are made whole. Yea, moreover, as I have said, the dead even have been raised up, and remained among us for many years. ^[22]

Here, Irenaeus confirms several claims we have made. First, Irenaeus distinguishes between driving “out devils” and healing “the sick by laying their hands upon them,” again reflecting a difference between exorcisms and the gift of healing.

Secondly, gifts of healing obviously operated well after the deaths of the Apostles. This disproves the traditional historicist (cessationist) position that these gifts were only given to first century Apostles and men who worked with them.

Thirdly, the gift of healing in the post-Apostolic generation included the ability to raise people from the dead. This would seem a serious blow to the super-supernaturalists who attempt to excuse the rather pathetic power of modern day “miracle workers” by claiming we should not expect them to be as powerful as the Apostles. ^[23] However, the gift of healing in the second century could raise people from the dead, and if someone possesses it today then we can expect them to do the same, just as the Apostles did.

Finally, Bishop Irenaeus confirmed that the gift of healing was “laying . . . hands upon” someone and making them “whole.” This reflects our claims elsewhere that the gift was not merely effectively praying for people. In addition, the Bishop’s words reflect that the result of the gift of healing in the second century was a complete and instantaneous healing upon the touch of the healer.

However, again, we find a man who wrote extensively in order to defend the authenticity of the Christian faith, and yet mentions miracles very little. It is obvious if these men had more to mention, they would have, just as the Gospel writers and Luke did to authenticate Christianity in their own day. These men, however, do not have the events to record that the earlier Church did.

B.3) Miracle Working in the 3rd Century Church:

Origen: “Some traces remain”

While Irenaeus is recognized as the most important authority on Christianity in the second century, Origen of Alexandria (c. 185-254) holds that place for the third century. No Church leader had traveled more widely and was more respected for his Christian scholarship. Writing in another apologetic piece (Against Celsus, c. 240), to answer pagan critics of Christianity, Origen says:

The Holy Spirit gave [past tense] signs of His [the Holy Spirit’s] presence at the beginning of Christ’s ministry, and after His ascension He gave still more; but since that time these signs have diminished, although there are still traces of them with a few who have had their souls purified by the gospel. ^[24]

Clearly for Origen, by the middle of the third century, miraculous gifts are primarily a thing of the past. This testimony would be over 1750 years ago, and as we will see, reflects the world-wide testimony of the Church from this point on. And it again becomes obvious in Against Celsus, a writing that is supposed to defend the faith against doubters, that Origen must use other proofs than miracle working in his day.

Nonetheless, other Church leaders attest to the presence of these gifts into the third century. The controversial Church leader Novation (c. 240) wrote:

This is He [Christ] who places prophets in the Church, instructs teachers, directs tongues, gives powers and healings, does wonderful works, offers discrimination of spirits, affords powers of government, suggests counsels, and orders and arranges whatever other gifts there are of charismata; and thus makes the Lord’s Church everywhere, and in all, perfected and complete. ^[25]

However, about the same time, Victorian, Bishop of Petau, in a commentary on Revelation (c. 270), writes:

The Apostles through signs, wonders and mighty deeds overcame the unbelievers [i.e. those without faith]. After this the faith of the Church was given the comfort of the interpreted prophetic Scriptures. ^[26]

It would seem the Bishop is recognizing a change from Apostolic Christianity to his own day, and reflecting the fact that the miracle working gifts were given for the authentication of the NT revelation and then ceased.

A possible example of a miracle worker in the third century is Gregory Thaumaturgus (Gr.: “miracle worker” c. 213-270), Bishop of Neo-Caesarea. While his own authentic writings have no mention of his miracle working, about a century later his respected biographers Gregory of Nyssa (c. 330-395) and Basil of Caesarea (c. 330-379) claimed that he had healed people.

While some of these accounts of Thaumaturgus seem credible, we encounter what some see as the exaggeration that occurs over time and that will become rather rampant in the Middle Ages. For example, his biographers, a century removed, claim that at his command he instantly dried up a whole lake in order to settle a dispute over its ownership between two brothers.

Accordingly, in his classic study of miracle working in the ancient Church, Cambridge scholar H. B. Swete (1835-1917) concluded:

[U]pon the whole the references in postapostolic writings to “workings of miracles” . . . are relatively few, while on the other hand there is a growing insistence on the spiritual and ethical effects of the Spirit’s indwelling in the hearts of men. ^[27]

Likewise, Dr. Philip Schaff (1819-1893), the recognized dean of early Church history, sums up his view of the references to miracle working in this period and says:

It is remarkable that the genuine writings of the ante-Nicene [pre 325 A.D.] church are more free from miraculous and superstitious elements than the annuls of the Nicene age [after 325 A.D.] and the Middle Ages. . . . Most of the statements of the apologists are couched in general terms and refer to the extraordinary cures from demoniacal possession . . . and other diseases. . . .

Origen . . . speaks . . . of the growing scarcity of miracles. . . . The strongest passage on this subject is found in Irenaeus, who, in contending against the heretics, mentions, besides the prophecies and miraculous cures of demoniacs, even the raising of the dead among contemporary events taking place. ^[28]

The relative scarcity of any claims to miracle working in the second and third century Church is also evidenced by the conspicuous absence of any such thing from the vast majority of the documents written by the early Church Fathers. As already pointed out, only one reference each can be found in all the writings of the most prolific writers of this period including Justin, Irenaeus, and Origen that can even be suggested to refer to miraculous gifts.

Nor can any references to these gifts be found in the writings of the rest of the recognized Church Fathers of this period including: Clement of Rome, Mathetes, Polycarp, Papias, ^[29] Tatian, Theophilus, Athenagoras, Clement of Alexandria, Minucius Felix, Commodian, Hippolytus, Cyprian, Tertullian, ^[30] Caius, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius, Methodius, and Arnobius. We can include in this list some very important documents in the early Church including the Epistle of Barnabas, the Vision of Hermas, and the Didache.

None of these copious Christian writings in second and third century Christianity mentions anything of the gifts of healing and miracle working. Thus our suggestion above that there was indeed a drastic and swift decline in any kind of manifestations of the miraculous gifts after the Age of the Apostles is clearly reflected in early Church history.

In summary, the historical evidence suggests a great decrease in the amount of miracle working in the Church between the years 100 and 250. Origen’s statement around 240 would seem to best characterize the opinion of the Church at this time, especially because while he mainly resided in the East, he had traveled in the West as well, and nonetheless claimed that since Apostolic days, the miraculous gifts “have diminished, although there are still traces of them.”

B.4) Miracle Working in the 4th & 5th Century Church: Chrysostom- “The gifts have long since ceased”

In general, the leaders of the fourth and fifth centuries in the Church confirm the testimony of the third century. Our most important source here is Eusebius (c. 263-c. 339), an early Church historian second in value only to Luke. Writing in the third book of his Ecclesiastical History (c. 325), he records events that occurred in the early second century. Notice in the following excerpt how he views the gifts he describes as a bygone phenomena:

Among the shining lights of the period was Quadratus, who according to the written evidence was, like Philip’s daughters, eminent from a prophetic gift. Besides them many others were well known at the time, belonging to the first stage in the apostolic succession . . . for even at that late date many miraculous powers of the divine Spirit worked through them, so that at the first hearing whole crowds in a body embraced with a wholehearted eagerness the worship of the universal Creator. ^[31]

While Eusebius recognizes that the immediate successors of the Apostles had “miraculous powers,” he describes them as operating at a “late date” even though he is speaking of events occurring just after c. 100. Accordingly, the rather liberal, but respected Church historian Adolf von Harnack (1851-1930) wrote:

Eusebius is not the first to look back upon the age of the Spirit and of power as the bygone heroic age of the church, for Origen had already pronounced this judgment on the past from an impoverished present. ^[32]

Several decades after Eusebius wrote, Bishop Theodoret (393-466), in his Commentary on the First Epistle to the Corinthians related:

In former times those who accepted the divine preaching and who were baptized for their salvation were given visible signs of the grace of the Holy Spirit at work in them. Some . . . performed miracles. ^[33]

Clearly, this great man of God considered the miraculous gifts as a thing of the past.

Likewise, Theodore of Mopsuestia (c. 350-428), a bishop of Antioch, stated that:

Without a doubt [the miraculous gifts which] accompanied the effusion of the Spirit in the Apostolic age, but they have ceased long ago to find a place among us. ^[34]

This perspective is particularly evident in the teaching of the most influential person in the Eastern Church at this time, John Chrysostom (c. 347-407). In his expository homilies from the NT he remarks regarding the miraculous gifts:

He [the Spirit] ought now to have come, if He was about to come when the [miraculous] gifts ceased; for they have long since ceased. ^[35]

Do not then urge the fact that signs are not done now, as a proof that they were not done then. For as then they were usefully wrought, so now are they no longer so wrought. ^[36]

While Chrysostom clearly confirms that the miraculous gifts are not operating in the Church, he dispels the popular idea that ecclesiastical bureaucrats were the reason. Chrysostom held a lot of authority in the Eastern churches and far from squelching them, he obviously would have welcomed the miraculous gifts if they were operating. Accordingly, he writes:

Truly, the church was more like heaven in Paul’s time, because the Spirit governed everything and moved each one of the members in turn. But now it seems we have only the symbols of those gifts. We also have only two or three speaking in the service, but these are only a pale shadow of what prevailed then. The present church is like a woman who has fallen from her former, prosperous days and who retains only the outward signs of that prosperity, displaying the boxes and caskets in which she kept her wealth, but which are now empty. This is true not only in the matter of gifts but in life and virtue as well. ^[37]

While Chrysostom was in no way opposed to God granting miraculous powers, he insisted, as have we, that virtue apologetics is superior to miracle working as evidence of Christianity. A smattering of statements from him confirms this:

Neither let us account ourselves worse off, in that we do not work miracles now. For that will never be any advantage to us . . . if we take heed to all virtue. ^[38]

Do not then therefore seek signs, but the soul’s health. . . . For in truth, if we all live as we ought, workers of miracles would not be admired so much as we by the children of heathen. . . . For if thou change from inhumanity to almsgiving . . . if thou withdraw from theatres and go to church . . . if thou draw back thine eyes from an harlot . . . if instead of satanical songs, thou has learnt spiritual psalms . . . these are the greatest miracles, these the wonderful signs. ^[39]

[Miraculous] Spiritual gifts played a vital role in the beginning of the Church. Now they have ceased. Let no one therefore wait for miracles. . . . If then we practice this [charity], and all the self-denial that flows from it, we shall have no need of signs; even as on the other hand, if we do not practice it, we shall gain nothing by the signs. ^[40]

When, however, the one sort are careless about virtue, and those who do regard it withdraw themselves far from our ranks, how are we to subdue our enemies? For even if miracles were wrought now, who would be persuaded? Or who of those without would give heed unto us, our iniquity being thus prevalent? For so it is, that our upright living seems unto the many the more trustworthy argument of the two: miracles admitting of a bad construction on the part of obstinate bad men: whereas a pure life will have abundant power to stop the mouth of the devil himself. 1 Cor Homily 6.8

Accordingly, the Presbyterian theologian Donald Bloesch writes:

John Chrysostom contended that the evidence of the Spirit is character, not the display of charismatic powers. The extraordinary gifts of the Spirit played a positive role in the apostolic church, but now the challenge was to live a holy life through faith working by love. ^[41]

The accounts of Augustine (354-430) in the West are much more detailed and reflect this very thing. While modern super-supernaturalists are eager to use Augustine’s testimony as historical evidence of the continuation of the miracle working gifts into the fifth century, they ignore Augustine’s own stated position on the matter, and fail to carefully assess his testimonies to miracles. As for Augustine’s position on the miracle working gifts, it was the same as his counterpart in the East, John Chrysostom.

In his tract, On the Profit of Believing, Augustine reflects the general belief of Christians at the time when he writes that miracle working as recorded in Scripture was, “done at a very suitable time” so that the biblical testimonies of such things would be effective in the present. ^[42]

Accordingly, the respected Dutch theologian Herman Bavinck (1854-1921) writes that Augustine believed:

[A]fter Jesus’ departure, his miraculous power is also continued in the disciples. Many miracles are recounted not only in Acts, but Paul also bears witness to this miracle-working power of the Apostles. For a time this power continues to be operative in the church as well. But it ceased when Christianity was established and the church became the object in which God glorified the miracles of his grace. It is now spiritual miracles in which God manifests his power and glory. ^[43]

Later, in his Retractions, Augustine confirms that Apostolic miracle working has ceased, but wishes to specify that direct divine miracles are still occurring when he writes:

Not even now, when a hand is laid on the baptized, do they receive the Holy Spirit in such a way that they speak with the tongues of all nations, nor are the sick now healed by the shadow of the preachers of Christ. Even though such things happened at that time, manifestly they ceased later.

But what I said is not to be so interpreted that no miracles are believed to be performed in the name of Christ at the present time. For, when I wrote that book, I myself had recently learned that a blind man had been restored to sight in Milan near the bodies of the martyrs in that very city, and I knew about some others, so numerous even in these times, that we cannot know about all of them nor enumerate those we know. ^[44]

Obviously then, while we have no evidence that Augustine believed God-sent miracle workers were operating in his day, he did definitely believe that God was still performing direct miracles, even if they involved the relics of martyrs. Accordingly, he writes in the City of God:

For even now miracles are wrought in the name of Christ, whether by His sacraments [like baptism or communion] or by the prayers or relics of His saints; but they are not so brilliant and conspicuous as to cause them to be published with such glory as accompanied the former miracles [of Christ and the Apostles]. ^[45]

Therefore, Augustine confirms that it is not through those possessing the gifts of miracle working that miracles in the fifth century Church are occurring, and even these are not as miraculous as the biblical ones. This brings up the second error modern super-supernaturalists commit in using the testimony of Augustine to support the idea that miraculous gifts have continued throughout the history to the Church. Namely, they fail to distinguish Augustine’s testimony to direct divine miracles and cures resulting from exorcism, prayers, and relics, from those being performed by the command of a miracle worker, the latter being necessary to support the beliefs of modern super-supernaturalists.

Accordingly, Dr. Saucy relates:

A brief sketch of the first ten of a much longer list of miracles recorded by Augustine in his City of God provides an example of what was deemed miraculous in his time:

In the first, a blind man was cured by a saint’s relics. In the second, painful surgical intervention was made unnecessary by fervent prayer. In the third, a woman was cured of breast cancer by following advice received in a dream to have a newly baptized woman make the sign of the cross on the affected breast. In the fourth, a physician was healed of gout by baptism. In the fifth, a man suffering from paralysis and hernia was healed by the same sacrament.

The sixth instance recorded that demons, who were causing sickness among both cattle and slaves on a farm, were driven out by a priest who celebrated the Eucharist there and offered prayers. In the seventh, a paralytic was healed at a shrine built over a deposit of “holy soil” brought from the vicinity of Christ’s tomb. The eighth involved two miracles: a demon was driven from a youth at a shrine, and the injury done to the youth’s eye by the departing demon was miraculously healed.

In the ninth, a young female demoniac was freed from possession when she anointed herself with some oil into which had fallen the tears of a priest who was praying for her. In the tenth, a demon was driven out of a young man by the assertion that “even today miracles are being wrought in the name of Christ, sometimes through His sacraments and sometimes through the intercession of the relics of the saints” ^[46]

So we readily see the importance of discerning real manifestations of the gift of healing from exorcisms, healings from prayers, and evidently other rather weird stuff. Whether or not some of these things were legitimate miracles or not may be hard to say, but there are no traces of the gift of healing and miracle working here. As we discuss elsewhere, it is probable that many of the cures that occurred particularly surrounding the worship of relics and gravesites was empowered by “mind-cure.” ^[47]

Accordingly, even the Pentecostal Church historian Stanley M. Burgess writes:

Although Augustine does not suggest in his narrative that any one person exercised a gift of healing, the miraculous recoveries reported here involve divine intervention in response to the prayers of the Hippo congregation and those healed. While Augustine holds that certain signs and wonders have ceased, he readily acknowledges that the involvement of God through the Holy Spirit in human affairs still includes miraculous intervention, bypassing natural processes and exceeding normal human expectations. ^[48]

While Dr. Burgess wishes to find evidence in Augustine for the miracle working gifts, it must be admitted that direct divine miracles performed by God in answer to prayer, healings occurring as a result of exorcizing demons, and even the supposed miracles surrounding the tombs and relics of “saints,” do not constitute examples of the biblical gifts of miracle working which enabled a messenger of new divine revelation to perform a miracle on command.

However, even into the fourth century, Hilary of Poitiers (c. 300-367), a leader in the Western Church, seemed to imply that miraculous gifts were operating when he wrote:

The gift of the Spirit is manifest . . . where there is . . . the gift of healings, that by the cure of disease we should bear witness to His grace . . . or by the working of miracles. ^[49]

In spite of the brevity and lack of detail in Hilary’s account, we would conclude that this is the latest authentic reference to the operation of the biblical gift of healing in early Church history. Therefore, while Origen perhaps over a hundred years earlier had said only “traces” of such gifts remained, it would seem those same “traces” continued for some time. However, it is with the testimony of Hilary (c. 350 A.D.) that we mark the cessation of the miracle working gifts in the Church. This is because only groups considered to be rather fringe and heretical to authentic Christianity claimed such gifts thereafter.

Even when Pentecostalism became rather accepted as a Christian sect in the 1950’s, it was still a very minority view among Christians that the miraculous gifts had been restored to the Church. It is therefore the comparison of Hilary’s testimony (c. 350), with the relative acceptance of Pentecostalism (c. 1950’s) that we claim throughout KOG that for over 1600 years the rather universal opinion of the Christian Church was that these gifts were no longer operating.

Our survey of this period reveals an element of exaggeration in a former Professor of Theology at Wheaton, W. A. Elwell, in his comment in the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology that “The writings of the church fathers prove that “the gifts of healings” were exercised in the church centuries after the apostolic period.” ^[50] If accuracy is important, it would seem a better term other than “centuries” could have been used to describe 150-250 years.

Yet Dr. Elwell’s bias is revealed later in the article when he describes the gift of healing as “a permanent gift of the Spirit to the church” ^[51] and claims that it is not God who suspended such gifts, but “institutional ecclesiasticism” that has led to today’s supposed “loss of the church’s awareness of the Spirit’s presence and experience of the Spirit’s power.” ^[52] On the contrary, again, even Augustine was obviously a great proponent of miracles, and it is rather ridiculous to suggest that he would have suppressed such gifts if they had been operating. Augustine simply claimed they were not.

B.5) Miracle Working in the Medieval Church:

Roman Catholic propaganda

The period after that discussed above involves the rise of the Roman Catholic Church, known as the Ecclesiastical Period. Thus, miracles chronicled within this period of time are referred by some as the Ecclesiastical miracles, and they are put into an entirely different class for reasons that will become evident. Reports of miracle working during this period are suspect for several reasons.

First of all, many of the reports, at best, involve direct miracles performed by God, and not delegated miracle working by those possessing gifts of healing. In addition, reports of healings during this period invariably involve things that automatically bring them under suspicion such as apparitions of Mary, or the touching of the relics, bones, or gravesites of Roman Catholic “saints.”

Finally, Douglas Judisch points out two additional attributes of Roman Catholic claims from particularly the Middle Ages:

First, they [the miracles] are not claimed by the one who supposedly performed them (in contrast to Christ and Paul), but rather by those who write the eulogies of the saints concerned. And second, the supposed miracles are used to support the growing cults [and idolatrous worship] of the saints, their relics, and the transubstantiated host, as well as other doctrines and practices contrary to Scripture. This latter consideration particularly relegates the “miracles” of the fourth century and following to the status of fiction or demonic enterprise. ^[53]

Along these lines, B. B. Warfield (1851-1921) also conducted a very extensive study on this period in his book Counterfeit Miracles, and likewise concludes concerning the literature and claims of this period regarding miracles:

No known writer claims to have himself wrought miracles, or names any of his predecessors as having done so. The honor is left to unknown and obscure men, and afterward to the “rotten bones” of saints who while living did no such works. ^[54]

Dr. Warfield had based much of his conclusions concerning this era on the detailed and widely respected study of English scholar Conyers Middleton in the eighteenth century who wrote:

If those venerable saints and martyrs were not endued with them when living, they had amends made to them when dead, if we can believe the reports of their successors, by a profusion of them on their bones and relics; which suggests a farther cause of suspecting the faith and judgment of those early ages.

For how can we think it credible, that God should withhold his distinguishing favours from his faithful servants when living, to bestow them on their rotten bones? Or employ his extraordinary power to no other use but to perpetuate a manifest imposture in his church? ^[55]

Even the renowned nineteenth century Roman Catholic historian, theologian, and cardinal, John Henry Newman (1801-1890), in his rather exhaustive study of the subject entitled, The Miracles of Ecclesiastical History Compared with Those of Scripture, admits that the reports of miracles during this period can hardly be trusted. And even though he wrote his critique generations ago, it would seem to apply very well to reports of miracles even in our own day:

Ecclesiastical miracles, that is, miracles posterior to the Apostolic age, are, on the whole, different in object, character, and evidence, from those of Scripture on the whole. The Scripture miracles are for the most part evidence of a Divine Revelation, and that for the sake of those who have been instructed in it, and in order to the instruction of multitudes; but the miracles which follow have sometimes no discoverable or direct object, or but a slight object; they happen for the sake of individuals . . .

The miracles of Scripture are, on the whole, grave, simple, majestic; those of ecclesiastical history often partake of what may be called a romantic character, and of that wildness and inequality which enters into the notion of romance. The miracles of Scripture are undeniably beyond nature; those of ecclesiastical history are often scarcely more than extraordinary accidents or coincidences, or events which seem to betray exaggerations or errors in the statement. ^[56]

Likewise, Dr. Saucy writes concerning this period:

Reports of miracles became noticeably different from the fourth century on, both in number and sensationalism. In these later accounts . . . many instances must be labeled bizarre even by the most sympathetic reader.

In addition, Dr. Saucy also points out:

The greatness of many of the church leaders of this period and throughout the Middle Ages cannot be denied. But many nonbiblical elements that affected their understanding and practice of the miraculous had been accepted into Christianity by this time, including the veneration of saints and martyrs, the traffic in relics, Christian magic, an excessive preoccupation with demonism, and miracle-mongering [sound familiar?]. . . .

Since by this time the saintliness of a person was measured to some extent by the amount of miraculous power he had, we frequently find miracles attributed to saints by their biographers, even though those saints at the time did not claim to work miracles themselves. Interestingly, the farther a biographer was removed in time from the saint of whom he wrote, the more the life of the saint was glorified with miracles. ^[57]

Along these lines, as we will note below, the exaggeration of miracles in the Middle Ages by the Roman Catholic Church was designed to support their extra-biblical doctrines and practices. Even the Pentecostal historian Dr. Burgess writes: “The reader must be reminded that anyone dealing in hagiographic material [i.e. histories of Roman Catholic saints] should constantly be alert to the serious problem of credibility.” ^[58]

Accordingly, the theological leader of the Medieval Roman Catholic Church, Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274), who was often more reasonable, honest, and biblical than his contemporaries, wrote in his Commentary on Matthew that Christ and His disciples had worked miracles sufficient to prove the Christian faith once and for all, and therefore, no further miraculous proof of doctrines were necessary. ^[59]

For our part, therefore, we maintain the testimonies of Origen, Eusebius, Chrysostom, and Augustine before the Middle Ages to the absence of the gifts of miracle working in the Church, which is confirmed after this period as well by the Reformers.

B.6) Miracle Working in the Reformation Church:

Calvin- “we are not forging some new gospel”

Collin Brown writes under his entry on “Miracles” in the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (ISBE) that:

The Reformers were, in general, skeptical of postbiblical miracles. Calvin, in particular, repudiated the claim that continued miracles in the [Roman Catholic] Church accredited the teaching of the [Roman Catholic] Church. He denounced such works as “sheer delusions of Satan” that drew people away from God and that should be repudiated in accordance with the teachings of Scripture (Dt. 13; Mt. 24:24; and 2 Thess. 2:9; Institutes, Prefatory Address; cf. also i.8.5-7; i.13.13; i.14.18; iv.19.6,18).

The miracles of Scripture accredit the biblical revelation, which Calvin insisted was the test of all truth in religion. Miracles which draw people away from this [the Scripture] do not bring glory to God in the way that the biblical miracles do. Hence they must be rejected . . .

Following the Reformation, the Roman Catholic Church continued to appeal to miracles in the Church as divine accreditation of its position [some of which was extra or unbiblical doctrines], whereas Reformed theology, in line with Calvin, insisted that miracles ceased with the apostolic age. ^[60]

Accordingly, Calvin (1509–1564) wrote in the preface of his Institutes of the Christian Religion:

In demanding miracles of us, they [the Roman Catholics] act dishonestly. For we are not forging some new gospel, but are retaining that very gospel whose truth all the miracles that Jesus Christ and his disciples ever wrought serve to confirm. . . .

The Donatists of old overwhelmed the simplicity of the multitude with this battering ram: that they were mighty in miracles. We, therefore, now answer our adversaries as Augustine then answered the Donatists: the Lord made us wary of these miracle workers when he predicted that false prophets with lying signs and prodigies would come to draw even the elect (if possible) into error [Matt. 24:24]. ^[61]

Likewise, Calvin wrote regarding the list of miraculous gifts in 1 Corinthians 12:

As to the passage before us, we must observe, that of the offices which Paul makes mention of, some are perpetual, others temporary. Those that are perpetual, are such as are necessary for the government of the Church; those that are temporary, are such as were appointed at the beginning for the founding of the Church, and the raising up of Christ’s kingdom; and these, in a short time afterwards, ceased. ^[62]

Along the same line, Calvin wrote in his commentary on James:

That the gift of healing was temporary, all are constrained to allow, and events clearly prove; then the sign of it ought not to be deemed perpetual. It hence follows, that they who at this day set anointing among the sacraments, are not the true followers, but the apes of the Apostles, except they restore the effect produced by it, which God has taken away from the world for more than fourteen hundred years. ^[63]

Calvin probably wrote this sometime in the 1560’s and so evidently placed the cessation of the miraculous gifts sometime in the second century.

Along the same lines, Martin Luther (1483–1546) had stated in a sermon:

But now that the Apostles have preached the Word and have given their writings, and nothing more than what they have written remains to be revealed, no new and special revelation or miracle is necessary. ^[64]

Accordingly, Theodore Graebner writes of Luther:

Luther, by his powerful wrestling with God in prayer, caused life to be restored to dying Melanchthon. Similarly, in 1541, Myconius, lying in the last stages of consumption, was saved through Luther’s prayer. Yet Luther spoke very contemptuously of modern signs and wonder-working. Would that all Christians today retained both the common sense of the Reformer in the face of miracle-working healers, and his great reliance on Christian prayer when illness enters their homes! ^[65]

If there ever was a period of Church history in which the sign gift of miracle working would have been restored, it would seem it would have occurred during this unprecedented period of great apostasy and the recovery and resurgence of the Gospel. However, the gifts so many claim today were absent in the Reformation. And those who claim it was so merely because Reformation leaders disdained miracles do not understand those leaders, much less God.

B.7) Miracle Working in the Revival Church: Edwards- since the canon of Scripture has been completed . . . those extraordinary gifts have ceased.

We have documented elsewhere that while the leaders of the Great Awakening, including the Wesleys, Whitefield, and Edwards, certainly witnessed many of the supernatural phenomena that is occurring among super-supernaturalists today, they generally condemned such manifestations as demonic deceptions. ^[66]

While John Wesley (1703-1791) was relatively more open to the occurrence of miraculous gifts than his contemporaries, he still held the general view that these gifts had ceased in the early history of the Church. Wesley believed that miraculous gifts ceased at about the time of Constantine (280-337), “when the empire became Christian, because then, a general corruption both of faith and morals infected the church.” ^[67]

An early biographer of George Whitefield (1714-1770), the founder and foremost leader of the Great Awakening said the revivalist:

renounced all pretentions to the extraordinary powers and signs of Apostleship, gifts of healing, speaking with tongues, the faith of miracles; things peculiar to the age of inspiration, and extinct with them. ^[68]

Here we are reminded of something that the founder of the Great Awakening revival in the eighteenth century, George Whitefield, wrote concerning a similar misconception then:

Great need have you, my brethren, at this time to take the Apostle’s advice and to try the spirits whether they be of God. For the devil is beginning to mimic God’s work and, because terrors will not do, he is now transforming himself into an angel of light, in order more effectually to gain his point. Brother________, as well as brother _________, I believe, imagines there will be a power given to work miracles. . . .

But, alas! what need is there of miracles, such as healing sick bodies and restoring sight to blind eyes, when we see greater miracles done every day by the power of God’s Word? Do not the spiritually blind now see? Are not the spiritually dead now raised and the leprous souls now cleansed, and have not the poor the Gospel preached to them? And if we have the thing already which such miracles were only intended to introduce, why should we tempt God in requiring further signs?” ^[69]

This is the same question we would ask super-supernaturalists today.

Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758) was likewise very clear on his belief that miracle working gifts had ceased in the early history of the Church. ^[70] Several writings reveal his conviction:

Another distinction which divines make of the gifts of the Spirit are of extraordinary and ordinary. The extraordinary gifts of the Spirit are the same with miraculous gifts; such as gifts of prophecy and working miracles, and others mentioned by the Apostle in the text [1 Cor. 12:12–14] and other parts of the epistle. These are called extraordinary gifts of the Spirit, because they are as such as are not given in the ordinary course of God’s providence. They are not bestowed in a way of God’s ordinary providential dealings with his children; but only on extraordinary occasions, as they were bestowed on the prophets and Apostles to enable them to reveal the mind and will of God before the canon of the Scripture was complete.

And so they were bestowed on the primitive church in order to the founding and establishing the Christian church in the world. But since the canon of Scripture has been completed, and the Christian church full founded and established, those extraordinary gifts have ceased. ^[71]

Therefore, I do not expect a restoration of these miraculous gifts in the approaching glorious times of the church, nor do I desire it . . . I had rather enjoy the sweet influences of the Spirit, showing Christ’s spiritual divine beauty, infi­nite grace, and dying love, drawing forth the holy exercises of faith, divine love, sweet complacence, and humble joy in God, one quarter of an hour, than to have prophetical visions and revelations the whole year. ^[72]

Nonetheless, in Edwards’ day, some claimed the miraculous gifts and deluded others into thinking they possessed them. In response, Edwards preached that such a situation was “lamentable” and a great “door is opened to Satan” for deception, making the “church of God like a city brought down and exposed continually to its worst enemies.” ^[73]

An important question arises at this point? If the leaders of the Reformation and Great Awakening, the two greatest revivals since Apostolic days, did not testify to miracle working gifts or believe in their restoration, why was this so? Was it because they were dull, or overly skeptical anti-supernaturalists as modern super-supernaturalists wish to claim? On the contrary, it is a historical fact that during these great revivals, miracle working gifts were absent, and claims to them were generally made by those wishing to authenticate their heretical doctrines.

Accordingly, B. B. Warfield reflects the literature of this time when he says:

The theologians of the post-Reformation era, a very clear-headed body of men, taught with great distinctness that the charismata ceased with the Apostolic age. ^[74]

B.8) Miracle Working in the 19^th Century Church: Spurgeon—“He gave that gift to the Church in its infancy, but now it needs it no longer”

The rather universal belief in the Church that the gift of miracle working had ceased continued in the nineteenth century as well. For example, Charles Simeon (1759-1836), the most influential leader of the Church of England in his day, wrote:

Are we all to possess the power of ‘working miracles, and speaking divers kinds of tongues? No; the time for such things is long since passed. . . . No such power exists at this day except in the conceit of a few brain-sick enthusiasts. ^[75]

Nonetheless, it was about this time that the heretical Irvingites, no doubt among those “brain-sick enthusiasts” that Simeon was referring to, began to claim the miraculous gifts for themselves. The beliefs of their fellow Christians on the matter is reflected by the fact that they were rejected from the Presbyterian Church and labeled as the heretics they were. ^[76]

On the heels of Edward Irving’s downfall came a real revivalist, Charles H. Spurgeon (1834-1892), the most influential preacher of his time. Modern super-supernaturalists like to use Spurgeon as an example of a faith healer in the Church, but he would have been offended by them doing so. It is true that God seemed to answer a number of Spurgeon’s prayers for the physical healing of people, but neither he nor anyone should label such a thing as the gift of miracle working.

Accordingly, one of his biographers records:

Spurgeon prayed for persons in sicknesses of various kinds, and although in many a case there was no betterment, in others there was improvement that appeared miraculous. Dr. Conwell examined several of these experiences, and . . . report[ed] seven specific instances of what was considered healing in response to Spurgeon’s prayers.

[Conwell wrote] “The belief in Mr. Spurgeon’s healing power became among some classes a positive superstition, and he was obliged to overcome the very false and extravagant impressions . . . by mentioning the matter from the pulpit, and rebuking the theories of the extremely enthusiastic. He felt it was becoming too much like the shrines of Catholic Europe.

Spurgeon declared that the subject of divine healing was very much a mystery to him. He said he prayed about sickness just as he prayed about anything else, and that in some instances God answered with healing, whereas in others, for reasons beyond our understanding, He allowed the suffering to continue. ^[77]

As we have demonstrated elsewhere, the periodic healing in answer to prayer is not the biblical gift of miracle working. More to our current point, Spurgeon believed that the gift had ceased. In a sermon to a missions agency he stated:

Ones of my hearers may [say] “I think you ought to make excuse [for the fact that contemporary evangelism is less effective than that which the NT Apostles experienced], for ministers now cannot work miracles.” Well, I have considered that too, and certainly it is a drawback, but, I take it, not a very great one; for if it had been, God would not have allowed it to exist. He gave that gift to the Church in its infancy, but now it needs it no longer.

We mistake in attributing too much to miracles. What was one of them? Wherever the Apostles went they could speak the language of the people. Well, in the time it would have taken Paul to walk from here to Hindostan, we could learn Hindostani. ^[78]

Spurgeon confirms several things concerning the historical perspective of the Church. First, the gift of miracle working was not available to missionaries in the 19^th century. Therefore, while “power evangelism” may be a popular idea today, it was not in Spurgeon’s time. Secondly, not only was the gift of tongues not available either, but Spurgeon held to the historical and biblical view that it was the miraculous ability to speak real foreign human languages.

After the above historical survey, one wonders what the super-supernaturalist Jack Deere is talking about when he claims:

I began to read church history with an open mind, actually looking for evidence of the gifts of the Spirit [apparently he means the miraculous gifts]. I found that there was much more historical evidence for the presence of the miraculous gifts throughout the history of the church than I had been led to believe. ^[79]

Mr. Deere does not cite a single example, not here, and not anywhere in his entire discussion regarding the issue.

What we do see in the nineteenth century regarding miracles is the massive rise of Christian cults such as Christian Science claiming such things. The fraudulent and heretical nature of these claims are discussed at length in the next chapter. ^[80]

B.9) Miracle Working in the 20^th Century Church: Warfield—“The period most commonly set for their continuance is three centuries”

Unfortunately, the habit of fringe, widely rejected sects claiming miracles, while authentic Christianity denounced them, continued into the 1900’s. While cults such as Christian Science and Mormonism reflected this role in the 1800’s, early Pentecostalism would do so in the twentieth century, claiming the resurgence of these gifts only among them after centuries of their absence.

B.9.a) Early 1900’s

Elsewhere in KOG we have documented the fact that until the 1980’s super-supernaturalism and “miracle working” in general were almost universally held in the Church as fraudulent, if not demonic. Warfield (1851-1921) expresses the rather exclusive view of Christianity throughout most of the twentieth century when he writes:

These gifts were not the possession of the primitive Christian as such . . . they were distinctively the authentication of the Apostles. They were part of the credentials of the Apostles as the authoritative agents of God in founding the church. . . .

The theologians of the post-Reformation era, a very clear-headed body of men, taught with great distinctness that the charismata ceased with the Apostolic age. But this teaching gradually gave way, pretty generally throughout the Protestant churches, but especially in England, to the view that they continued for a while in the post-Apostolic period, and only slowly died out like a light fading by increasing distance from its source. The period most commonly set for their continuance is three centuries; the date of their cessation is ordinarily said to have been about the time of Constantine.

This, as early as the opening of the eighteenth century, had become the leading opinion, at least among theologians of the Anglican school, as Conyers Middleton, writing in the middle of that century, advises us. “The most prevailing opinion . . . is that they subsisted through the first three centuries, and then ceased in the beginning of the fourth, or as soon as Christianity came to be established by the civil power. ^[81]

Accordingly, the “most prevailing opinion” of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries is essentially our own as outlined above.

We have also outlined the beginnings of super-supernaturalism in America in the early 1900’s through the efforts of ones like Charles Parham (1873-1929) and William Seymour (1870-1922). We noted several reasons for concern about these founders of the movement including Mr. Parham’s false teachings, severe racism, and immorality, and Mr. Seymours meetings being dominated by occultists. Unfortunately, the credentials of the “miracle workers” in super-supernaturalism get no better.

B.9.b) Early super-supernaturalists: Allen, Coe, and Branham

The next leaders of this movement are widely recognized as A. A. Allen, William Branham, and Jack Coe. While in a 1994 teaching, Todd Hunter, National Coordinator of the Association of Vineyard Churches manages to put a positive spin on their ministries, ^[82] the Charismatic Bible teacher Hank Hanegraaff writes:

In sharp contrast, denominational leaders within Pentecostalism candidly acknowledged the reprehensible influences these men had on the Christian cause. Rather than commend them, they condemned the flamboyant lifestyles and fantastic lies of these endtime restorationists. ^[83]

Concerning A. A. Allen (1911-1970), whom Benny Hinn praises today “as a great man of God” ^[84] Hanegraaff says:

The Assemblies of God denomination in particular was horrified by the antics of A. A. Allen, whose dogmatic and undocumented claims included the deception that he could raise people from the dead. . . . Allen’s specialty was to heal his disciples from sickness and sin by delivering them from demons. . . .

Allen’s Miracle Magazine chronicled . . . the cure of a “fat sister.” Mrs. Alvester Williams, from Las Vegas, Nevada, allegedly “took 200 pounds off instantly using ‘God’s reducing plan’. The magazine’s editor added a note that read, “This lady’s body could be seen shrinking visibly, as she sat in the service”. . . .

Unlike the leaders of today’s Counterfeit Revival, they [authorities of the Assemblies of God] were embarrassed by such outlandish claims and outrageous conduct.

Thus, when, Allen was arrested for drunk driving during a Tennessee revival in 1955, the first of many alcohol-related experiences . . . the leadership of the Assemblies of God had reached its limit. Ralph Riggs, superintendent of the General Council of the Assemblies of God, advised Allen to get out of public ministry. . . . When Pentecostal leaders turned against Allen, his wife Lexie, stood by her man. . . . Despite Lexie’s loyalty, in the end Allen divorced her. . . .

Though he was excommunicated by Pentecostal leaders in his day, he is extolled by Counterfeit Revival leaders in ours. Rodney Howard-Brown, for one, urges devotees: “Read the life stories of some of the great men of God, men like A. A. Allen.” ^[85]

One could wish that contemporary leaders of the Assembly of God churches would set the record straight on this man and denounce modern men like him as their predecessors did. Of course, very few of Allen’s supposed miracles were ever verified by doctors. Randi James in his book, Faith Healers, writes that Allen claimed to habitually experience visions, divine voices, and other direct inspirations from God and he became one of the first televangelist to supposedly cast out demons over the airwaves. His “health and wealth Gospel” teachings were a primary theme of his ministry, even selling “prosperity clothes” for $100 and $1000 dollar donations. ^[86]

Todd Hunter, national coordinator of the Association of Vineyard Churches, has also praised a man named Jack Coe (1918-1956) in the message cited above. Hanegraaff writes:

Coe was arguably even more extreme in his preaching and practice than either Allen or Branham. Coe on occasion would actually “pick people up out of wheelchairs. If they fell, he’d say you didn’t have faith.” While [Charismatic] leader Oral Roberts considered Jack Coe “a man of great faith,” many other well-known religious leaders considered Coe a master of gimmicks and fabrications. . . .

The Assemblies of God were so embarrassed by Coe’s exaggerated claims that they finally expelled him in 1953 on the grounds that he was “misleading the public”. . . .

[A]fter the death of her husband, [Juanita Coe] published a devastating series of articles titled Enemies of the Cross. The articles . . . exposed the fraudulent exaggerations and financial excesses of healing restorationists. Despite being up “against a ruthless group of men who had millions of dollars to fight with,” [she] exposed the deceptions of healing evangelists who used “great swelling words” to fleece the flock. . . . As a result of [her] expose, pastors and parishioners alike were faced with the fact that the power of God had been prostituted through the power of gimmicks. . . . Healing restorationists retaliated by . . . label[ing] Jack Coe’s widow a turncoat. ^[87]

Concerning William Branham (1909-1965), Hanegraaff says:

If ever a man was revered by leaders of today’s Counterfeit Revival, that man was William Branham. . . . Kenneth Hagin and Jack Deere continue to extol the work that God started through the healing revivals of Branham and his imitators. . . . Despite the fact that Branham denied such essential Christian doctrines as the Trinity, endtime restorationist Paul Cain calls him “the greatest prophet that ever lived in any of my generations or any of the generations of revival I’ve lived through.”

The Dictionary of Christianity in America acknowledges that “the post-World War II healing revival in Pentecostalism began in the ministry of William Branham” . . . On May 7, 1946, while the prophet Branham was still only a humble, if mystical, game warden, a two-hundred-pound angel . . . appeared to him in a secret cave. . . . The angel . . . advised Branham that he would be able to disclose details about the lives of devotees through the word of knowledge. . . .

Brother Bosworth pointed out that for Branham to exercise his gift, he was dependent on the presence of an angel: “He does not begin praying for the healing of the afflicted in body in the healing line each night . . . until he is conscious of the presence of the Angel with him on the platform.

As crowds began to dwindle in 1959, Branham announced he would abandon his “ability to read the very thoughts of men’s hearts” and return to a healing ministry. To prepare people for his magical powers, he resorted to telling them anecdotal stories of his healing heroics in days gone by. . . .

Branham’s failed prophecies were only exceeded by his false doctrines. His dogmatic “serpent’s seed doctrine” held that Eve had sexual intercourse with the serpent and conceived Cain. . . . Branham was adamant in his denial of the biblical doctrine of the Trinity. . . . He began to insist that “believers baptized by a Trinitarian formula must be rebaptized in the name of Jesus only. . . . ^[88]

Considering Branham’s doctrines and character, his “angel” immediately reminds one of the Apostle Paul’s warning about “satan [who] masquerades as an angel of light.” (2 Co. 11:14). In addition, Branham’s experiences and doctrinal heresies resemble closely the founders of cults such as the Mormons and Jehovah Witnesses.

The Pentecostal Dr. Ronald Kydd, Research Professor of Church History at Tyndale Seminary, in an effort to find historical evidence for legitimate and biblical healing ministries, suggests that William Branham is an example. Nonetheless, he admits that, “At times he could be . . . remarkably bitter and angry.” ^[89] Kydd goes on to relate:

Unfortunately, controversy kept pace with legend. In 1947, one year after his initial foray into prayer for the sick, Branham held a series of meetings in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. A pastor who had helped handle the logistics of the services later stated that many whom Branham had pronounced healed in fact died.

The same charge was laid against the evangelist a year later by W J. Taylor, a district superintendent with the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada. He and his executive called for a thorough investigation. While he expressed warm regard for Branham as a person, Taylor presented evidence to suggest that the claims on the numbers of people healed were vastly overdrawn, and he commented, “I firmly believe there is a possibility that this whole business is wrong.

Throughout his ministry Branham insisted that people had to believe that he had a special relationship with God if they hoped to be healed. It is certain that he thought he was the divinely appointed prophet for his generation. ^[90]

Likewise, Pentecostal historian Walter Hollenweger writes of Branham, “by contrast to what he claimed, only a small percentage of those who sought healing were in fact healed.” ^[91] We doubt even this is true unless only mere psychological healings are admitted.

Dr. Kydd concludes:

Branham died on December 24, 1965, as the result of a car accident, but his influence persisted. Many people refused to accept his departure, leading to a delay of his funeral in hopes that he would come back to life. His body was eventually buried, but he continues to have a large and devoted following. Some still expect him to rise from the dead. All of them are convinced that his books and tapes must be circulated as widely as possible. As a result, he is known in many parts of the world, and he has influenced a number of younger healing evangelists. . . .

William Marrion Branham played an important role in one part of mid -twentieth-century religious life. He was convinced that he was commissioned to be an agent of healing. People either loved him or hated him. Some thought he was God; others thought he was a dupe of the devil. Some thought he was the end-time messenger sent by God, and some still do.

However one assesses his work, it must be acknowledged that he did much to foster a very widespread expectation that God could be counted on to heal miraculously. This led to an international healing movement in which thousands of people were caught up. ^[92]

B.9.c) Prominent Women: McPherson & Kuhlman

Philip Jenkins, Distinguished Professor of History and Religious Studies at Penn State notes that, “The presence of ‘excitable females’ among the [early] Pentecostal leadership was . . . horrifying” ^[93] to mainstream Christianity. Yet super-supernaturalism in the 20^th century was heavily influenced by female celebrities.

One of the first was Aimee Semple McPherson (1890-1944) who founded the Foursquare Gospel church, which continues worldwide with over two million members, although over 90% of whom are outside the United States. ^[94] Nonetheless, Dr. Jenkins writes:

[S]he never lost the label of cult leader, partly because of the powerful sexuality and “animal magnetism” that she was accused of deploying in her public appearances. . . .

Aimee McPherson’s image as a cult leader was sealed when a scandal suggested that she was a hypocrite who used religion to make a good living, perhaps committing the very sexual sins that she so often denounced.

In May 1926, reports that Aimee had drowned while swimming caused enormous grief among her followers. Several days later, however, she reappeared in Mexico, claiming that she had been kidnapped. Her story fell apart, and the mysterious incident seems instead to have involved a romantic escapade with her lover, a married engineer at station KFSG [her radio station]. She faced trial for conspiracy to produce false testimony, though her popularity was still sufficient to save her from jail. The case once more confirmed the worst stereotypes of the new generation of religious entrepreneurs. ^[95]

Unfortunately, Ms. McPherson’s life got no better. She was in a rather constant power struggle over the Foursquare Gospel Church with her mother and daughter. In August of 1930 she had a nervous breakdown. A year later she married her second husband, in violation of rules she herself had set up, forbidding people to remarry if their previous spouse was still living. Two years later, Ms. McPherson separated from her second husband and divorced him a year later. We will say here what could be repeated throughout this section: It does not matter what people do on a stage. Their private lives reveal their real spiritual nature. In 1944 Ms. McPherson died of an overdose of prescription sleeping pills for which she did not have a prescription, some believing it to be a suicide. ^[96]

Kathryn Kuhlman (1907-1976) is one of the major names in super-supernaturalism in the mid-twentieth century. She had a weekly TV program in the 1960s and 1970s which aired nationally called I Believe In Miracles. While she was incredibly popular, there are several things that not only bring her Christian faith into question, but surely reveal her true spirituality. Unfortunately the results of her “miracle service” involved habitual fraud which we discuss elsewhere. ^[97] She divorced her first husband after four years of marriage. ^[98] She married her second husband after he was invited to speak in the church she pastored, and then left his wife and children for Ms. Kuhlman. Six years later she left him as well.

Unfortunately, like many of the founding celebrities of super-supernaturalism Ms. Kuhlman seemed to have stretched the truth in order to exaggerate her spirituality. As even the Pentecostal Dr. Kydd writes:

Kuhlman consistently distanced herself from formal theological training. The information that she gave to those who wrote about her emphasized that whatever she had learned she had learned from her study of the Bible and from the Holy Spirit. But this appears to have been misinformation [a lie].

Before the publication of Warner’s biography of Kuhlman, it was unknown publicly that she had been enrolled at Simpson Bible Institute in Seattle from 1924 to 1926 and that she had sat in on classes at L.I.F.E. Bible school in Los Angeles shortly after. The former was operated by the Christian and Missionary Alliance, and the latter founded by the famous Aimee Semple McPherson. Attendance at these two institutions would certainly have introduced her to theology.

Why Kuhlman suppressed these facts is unclear. In the first instance, she was probably not particularly proud of her time at Simpson Bible Institute. Warner’s research suggests that she had trouble with the restrictive rules of the Bible school, leading to her expulsion in 1926. A second explanation for her secretiveness, Warner proposes, might have been a desire not to be associated with McPherson, who was fighting off a scandal of her own in 1926, and a third possibility was that “Kathryn wanted to make it on her own. She and the Holy Spirit and self-study made her what she was. ^[99]

Finally, Ms. Kuhlman’s greed, arrogance, and self-centeredness are all well documented. Dr. Kydd writes:

Throughout her life she had a taste for the best in everything. This also attracted negative attention. In 1975 she found herself embroiled in a $430,000 lawsuit brought against her by a former business manager. . . .

Buckingham refers to her as a loner and as one who refused advice: “If Kathryn had any one great weakness in her long and fruitful career, it was her refusal to submit herself to the godly people around her. Moses submitted himself to elders. And the Apostle Paul taught Christians to ‘submit one to another.’ But, for some strange reason, the whole idea threatened her.”

[H]umility did not . . . correspond well to her conduct. Her performance was ostentatious; her speech and movement, overdrawn. Her clothing was flashy. . . . The centerpiece of Kuhlman’s ministry, the “miracle service,” was freighted with drama. . . . She was the focal point of the service, insisting on absolute control.” What she said directed attention to God; the way in which she acted pulled attention to herself. There are contradictions about all of us, but in Kuhlman they were particularly striking. ^[100]

All this, again, makes it surprising that contemporary leaders of super-supernaturalism embrace and glorify women such as these, instead of denouncing them. The reason is that such women claimed to perform miracles, yet we demonstrate elsewhere that even these claims were outright lies. ^[101]

Finally, the “super-star” nature of these personalities in super-supernaturalism reveals another worldly, pagan characteristic of the movement. There is widespread worship of their most “charismatic” rather than spiritual leaders. The Apostle Paul denounced this kind of celebrity worship among the Corinthians when he wrote:

Brothers, I could not address you as spiritual but as worldly—mere infants in Christ. . . . You are still worldly . . . . For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not mere men? (1 Cor 3:1-4)

We once again see one more thing that super-supernaturalism has in common with the spiritual weaknesses of the Corinthians.

B.9.d) Contemporary super-supernaturalists: Roberts, Bakker, & Swaggart

The sad history of super-supernaturalism in America has continued to our own time. In 1977 Oral Roberts claimed to have a vision from a 900-foot-tall Jesus who told him to build City of Faith Medical and Research Center. In 1986, during a fund raising drive, Mr. Roberts announced to his television audience that unless he raised $8 million by that March, God would kill him. He raised $9.1 million. Unfortunately, the City of Faith was in operation for only eight years before closing in late 1989. We have also documented Mr. Roberts’ fraudulent claims to healing elsewhere. ^[102]

In the mid-1980’s super-supernaturalist leaders were plagued by sexual scandals. It started with Jimmy Swaggart’s televised attacks on fellow super-supernatural celebrities Marvin Gorman and Jim Bakker. Indeed, the super-supernaturalist Mr. Gorman was having an affair with a member of his congregation and Mr. Bakker’s sexual immorality became nation-wide headlines.

Not surprisingly, Mr. Gorman hired a private investigator to uncover Mr. Swaggart’s own adulterous behavior with a prostitute. Mr. Swaggart publicly confessed his sin, asking for forgiveness. Nonetheless, five years later in 1991, Mr. Swaggart was caught by California police in the company of another prostitute, Rosemary Garcia. When the patrolman asked Garcia why she was with Swaggart, she replied, “He asked me for sex. I mean, that’s why he stopped me. That’s what I do. I’m a prostitute.” ^[103]

As we document elsewhere, the embarrassing moral decadence of the modern celebrities of super-supernaturalism has continued. In our view, only a large scale demonic deception engulfing a vast number of unregenerate people, and a Church being infiltrated with pagan values, could explain how such men and women have been accepted as authentic God-sent miracle workers, especially when authentic Christianity had resisted similar claims throughout over 1600 years of history. ^[104]

 

C) Proposed Reasons for the Obvious and Drastic Decline of Miracle Working Gifts in Church History & Their Supposed Restoration Today

Because even super-supernaturalist historians admit that the miraculous gifts were virtually nonexistent for a period of at least 1600 years in the Church, they have seen the need to suggest reasons for their obvious decline then, and their supposed return today. Their only biblical argument is the “Latter Rain” theory that can be demonstrated to be based on a very loose interpretation of Joel’s prophecy to the Jews that God will bless their crops with the normal cycle of rainfall after the Second Coming of Christ. ^[105]

Without biblical reasons to explain a gap in the operation of the miracle working gifts, there have been a multitude of theoretical reasons suggested as to why the gifts essentially disappeared for sixteen centuries, but have now been restored to the Church.

Accordingly, a foremost founder of modern super-supernaturalism, David duPlessis said:

The Holy Spirit continued in control until the close of the first century, when He was largely rejected and His position as leader usurped by man. The results are written in history. The missionary movement halted. The dark ages ensued. ^[106]

duPlessis does not provide any examples of how second century Church leaders “rejected” the Spirit’s “position as leader” because there is no evidence of such a thing.

Along the same lines, Donald Bloesch has written:

With the mainstream of [Roman] catholic tradition I contend that all of the charisms belong to the wider ministry of the church in every generation. Some have fallen into eclipse, but not because the gifts have ceased with the passing of the apostolic church. Rather, through its desire to control, the church has grieved and quenched the Spirit so that the Spirit’s distribution of the gifts has been impeded. We need to seek and pray for wisdom, boldness and power, and only then will the Holy Spirit begin manifesting himself within us and through us. ^[107]

Likewise, super-supernaturalist Jack Deere claims:

It is possible that God never intended that these gifts should cease, but rather it is the church that has rejected these gifts. The loss of these gifts could be due to the rise of an ungifted bureaucratic leadership who put out gifted people. ^[108]

Unfortunately, even D. M. Lloyd-Jones (1899–1981) reflected this view when he wrote, rather ironically in a book entitled The Sovereign Spirit:

We say, ‘If you read your history, you will find that these supernatural gifts did not happen for a few centuries.’ But we do not ask, ‘Why did they not happen?’ Or if we do, we give the wrong answer. It is not that God withdrew, it is that the church in her ‘wisdom’ and cleverness became institutionalized, quenched the Spirit, and made the manifestations of the power of the Spirit well-nigh impossible. ^[109]

The general consensus here, then, is that somehow the organizational structure of the Church, or the wicked acts of unholy Church leaders has suppressed the operation and desire of the Holy Spirit to grant miracle working gifts. This implies that this is the reason they are not operating today as well, and all that is needed is for Christian leaders to be more “open” about accepting these gifts, or the Holy Spirit will not or cannot manifest them.

This is nonsense for several reasons. First, there is no historical evidence whatsoever of such a thing in the early centuries of the Church, nor in its subsequent history. On the contrary, as we have noted above, the leaders of the early Church, including Augustine and Chrysostom were very open to the miraculous, the latter lamenting the fact that the miracle working gifts had ceased.

Secondly, super-supernaturalism reflects its common man-centeredness here when it claims that some wicked Church leaders could stop the sovereign will of the Holy Spirit to grant such gifts. It would seem they have completely ignored the biblical fact that these miraculous gifts “are the work of one and the same Spirit, and He gives them to each one, just as He determines” in His own sovereign way, not dependent on any preconditions on the part of Christ’s Body.

We would further point out that the post-apostolic Church leaders were not only Spirit-filled Christians, but far more open to the miraculous and much less controlling than the Pharisees of the NT era. Did the Jewish religious leaders and structures in any way inhibit the miraculous works of the Holy Spirit then? Then it is absurd to suggest the early Church did so.

Along these lines, we have written elsewhere:

The heart of modern super-supernaturalism in regards to miraculous methods of divine revelation is the unbiblical assumption that God is bound to, for example, use the same methods of revelation now, as He did in the first century church. Both biblical and secular history reveal the fact that this has not been the case. Even concerning biblical times we read:

Love the LORD your God and keep His [written] requirements, His [written] decrees, His [written] laws and His [written] commands always. ² Remember today that your children were not the ones who saw and experienced the [miraculous] discipline of the LORD your God: His majesty, His mighty hand, His outstretched arm; ³ the [miraculous] signs He performed and the things He did in the heart of Egypt, both to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to His whole country; ⁴ what He did to the Egyptian army, to its horses and chariots, how He overwhelmed them with the waters of the Red Sea as they were pursuing you, and how the LORD brought lasting ruin on them.

⁵ It was not your children who saw what He [miraculously] did for you in the desert until you arrived at this place, ⁶ and what He did to Dathan and Abiram, sons of Eliab the Reubenite, when the earth opened its mouth right in the middle of all Israel and swallowed them up with their households, their tents and every living thing that belonged to them. ⁷ But it was your own eyes that saw all these great things the LORD has done. (Deut, 11:2-7)

In other words, and contrary to super-supernaturalism, the miraculous revelation that was experienced by one generation of God’s people, was not to be experienced by another, no matter how helpful we might think it would be. Also contrary to super-supernaturalism, it was not because of some spiritual deficiency on the part of the later generation that caused God to withhold such miraculous means of revelation. In fact, the “children” spoken of here who experienced far less miraculous communication than their forefathers were more pleasing to God and entered the Promised Land. ^[110]

A total disregard for the sovereign nature of spiritual gifts is likewise reflected when the super-supernaturalist and popular Christian apologist J. P. Moreland claims that the growing popularity of super-supernaturalist doctrine in “scholarly opinion has been partly responsible for the renewal of miraculous ministry in the Western church.” ^[111] In other words, it is because the seminaries have recently become more accepting of the idea that the miraculous gifts have been restored to the Church after centuries of being absent, that God is now free to do so.

Again, there is no biblical or historical evidence for such a view and it is man-centered, dismissing the sovereignty that the Holy Spirit has demonstrated throughout Church history to do what He wants, when He wants, and with whom He wants.

The Pentecostal seminary Professor C. Samuel Storms suggests another erroneous line of reasoning for the cessation of the miraculous gifts when he writes:

If the gifts were sporadic [again, that’s putting it lightly], there may be an explanation other than the theory that they were restricted to the first century. We must remember that prior to the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century, the average Christian did not have access to the Bible in his or her own language. . . . That is hardly the sort of atmosphere in which people would be aware of spiritual gifts . . . and thus hardly the sort of atmosphere in which we would expect them to seek and pray for such phenomena or to recognize them were they to be manifest. . . . I think it entirely possible that numerous churches that advocated cessationism experienced these gifts but dismissed them as something less than the miraculous manifestation of the Holy Spirit. ^[112]

There would seem to be so many holes in such an argument that one wonders which one to plug first. And it might be added that such arguments are not just merely coming from any Christian, but rather the former President of a Christian Bible school.

Is God dependent on our Bible knowledge in order to grant miraculous gifts? On the contrary, God gives them as He determines, not as we “seek and pray for such phenomena.” Are we to believe that, for example, the gift of healing has been available for centuries to heal all kinds of diseases, but has not operated because Christians have not sought it? Dr. Storms’ suggestion that “numerous churches . . . experienced these gifts” is only wishful thinking and concrete historical evidence denies such a claim. And how could you experience the real gift of healing someone by command and then “dismiss [it] as something less than the miraculous manifestation of the Holy Spirit”? In fact, a historical case could be made for the fact that biblical ignorance increases the abundance of super-supernaturalism, or at least claims to it.

Accordingly, Dr. Saucy points out:

With regard to biblical ignorance, it is doubtful that history shows any relation to Bible knowledge and the reports of miracles. In fact, numerous reports of miracles come from times (such as the Middle Ages) when the average believer had little access to the Scriptures. ^[113]

While many of the rather desperate explanations given by super-supernaturalist for the cessation of the miracle working gifts cite early Church leadership and growing organizational structures as the culprit, others blame the early Christians themselves. Super-supernaturalism’s characteristic arrogance is then again revealed because the inevitable conclusion is that the reason they have supposedly been blessed with such gifts is because of their superior faith, desires, or virtue. This is used then to also imply that the reason many contemporary Christians are not experiencing these gifts is because of their inferior faith, desires, or virtue.

For example, in the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, a standard Christian reference work, the Pentecostal Professor Cottle writes:

The operation of these gifts gradually diminished, no doubt, to the growth of the ecclesiasticism and asceticism. The ritual of the Church became formalized and impersonal while the ascetic temper relegated physical healings to a relatively insignificant place. . . .

Charismatics and neo-Pentecostals from all branches of the Christian church have experienced and are emphasizing a renewal of these apostolic charismata. Perhaps this revival of interest and emphasis upon the gifts of healing within the modern Church will help all Christians to reaffirm the reality and permanence of the charismata.

Such a statement is inexcusable. At least half of the Church doubts that anyone today really has “experienced . . . a renewal of . . . apostolic charismata,” and the implication is clear that the reason other Christians are not experiencing them is because of the same things that stopped them earlier. For example, would Dr. Cottle really claim that historicist churches have “relegated physical healings to a relatively insignificant place” compared to super-supernaturalist churches? Does he really think that we do not desire healing for ourselves and others as much as they? Is God not granting us such healings because we are more “formalized and impersonal”? Cottle’s whole entry under “Gift of Healing” is blatantly biased by his beliefs, making it not only useless to the rest of Christianity, but offensive as well. ^[114]

Along the same lines, Mr. Deere writes:

On this view, when people stopped seeking spiritual gifts, in direct disobedience to God’s commands (1 Cor. 12:31; 14:1, 39) and stopped making provision for their exercise within their churches, then they ceased to experience the gifts. Or their loss could be due to the judgment of God for the unbelief, apostasy, or legalism in the church. ^[115]

Likewise, the super-supernatural Dr. Storms writes:

If we concede that certain spiritual gifts were less prevalent than others in the history of the church [that’s putting it lightly], their absence may well be due to unbelief, apostasy, and other sins that serve only to quench and grieve the Holy Spirit. We should not be surprised at the infrequency of miraculous gifts in periods of church history marked by theological ignorance and personal immorality” ^[116]

First of all, the language of Mr. Deere and Dr. Storms is offensive. The clear implication is that Christian historicists who hold to the historical teaching and experience of the Church regarding the sign gifts, are the source of the “unbelief, apostasy, or legalism in the church,” that has stopped God from granting the miraculous gifts Church-wide today.

We would sincerely ask if the super-supernaturalist churches these men attend are significantly superior in grace toward people, faith in God, personal holiness, or theological enlightenment then the contemporary historicists churches that do not claim miracle working gifts? Is the super-supernaturalist movement marked with significantly more spirituality than those “periods of church history” that were marked by an “an infrequency of miraculous gifts” such as the Protestant Reformation?

There simply is no way that super-supernaturalists can explain the obvious nonexistence of these gifts for hundreds of years and their supposed restoration today without exalting themselves above Christian historicists today and throughout the centuries. Their desperate desire to avoid the biblical and historical reason the miraculous gifts ceased, lead them to not only condemn modern Christians, but the godliest Christians throughout the ages such as Augustine, Chrysostom, Calvin, Luther, Edwards, and Spurgeon who, if living today, would actually be condemning the super-supernaturalists.

D) A Biblical and Historical Reconstruction of the Distribution of the NT Documents and the Resulting Cessation of Miracle Working Gifts

The super-supernaturalists’ efforts to explain the obvious disappearance of the miracle working gifts reveals the strength of the historical evidence for their cessation. No one can take an honest look at the historical evidence and conclude anything other than the fact that the miraculous gifts described in Scripture became extremely rare by 250 A.D. and completely ceased by 350 A.D. Despite Jack Deere’s claim that, “[F]ew people really possess the necessary linguistic skills or the critical abilities to evaluate many of the original sources,” we believe the historical record is rather clear and a significant argument against modern super-supernaturalism being of God.

In addition, the weakness of the super-supernaturalist arguments also reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of the purpose of the miraculous gifts. If it is recognized that their purpose was to authenticate the NT revelation that was to accompany the implementation of the New Covenant, until that revelation was inscripturated just as its OT counterpart, then the real reason, and the correct timing, that these gifts ceased to function becomes evident. Namely, that these gifts were gradually and eventually completely replaced by the distribution of copies of recognized NT documents to the various local churches.

The autographs of the NT were revealed and recorded over approximately a 45 year period, c. 50-95 A.D. Historical evidence suggests that the distribution of these documents was both relatively swift and widespread. For example, the Apostle Paul was in the habit of telling his recipients to make sure that what he wrote was made available to other churches as well. To the Colossians he writes: “After this letter has been read to you, see that it is also read in the church of the Laodiceans and that you in turn read the letter from Laodicea” (4:16; cf. 1 Th. 5:27). So already by the year c. 60 ^[117] we see a pattern in the Scriptures for the dissemination of NT documents.

In addition, it is important to notice that the Apostle consistently charges Timothy with the preservation, teaching, and dissemination of the NT revelation, but gives no hint that he is to expect additional revelation. Rather, the overwhelming emphasis of the Apostle, at the end of his life, is that Timothy be careful and faithful with teaching and spreading the NT revelation that had already been deposited (cf. 1 Tim 4:13; 6:3-5, 20; 2 Tim 2:2, 15; 3:14-4:4)

Early Church history confirms the wide and relatively rapid distribution of the NT documents. Second century documents such as 2 Clement (2:4; 14:1; c. 100-140 ^[118]) and The Epistle of Barnabas (4:14; c. 80-130 ^[119]) quote from Christ’s teachings. By c. 150 Justin Martyr can describe the common practice of Christian churches as follows:

And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of the Apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits. ^[120]

Justin also shows familiarity with the Synoptic Gospels and the letters of the Apostle Paul, as well as Hebrews and Acts and states that John’s Revelation is authoritative Scripture. ^[121] Many other early writers from 180 and after quote NT documents as Scripture. ^[122] Likewise, because of the rapid spread of Christianity to other lands, as early as the first half of the second century (100-150) parts of the NT had been translated into Syriac and Old Latin. By the third century, authoritative lists of the canon of the NT documents were being made by Origen (c. 185-254) and others.

At this point, we can suggest an obvious and important correlation between the historical evidence for when the miraculous gifts ceased, and when the NT documents had been widely distributed. By mid third century, the need for the churches to have authoritative lists of the NT documents attests to their relatively wide distribution. It is at this same time that the widely traveled Church historian and leader Origen writes:

The Holy Spirit gave [past tense] signs of His [the Holy Spirit’s] presence at the beginning of Christ’s ministry, and after His ascension He gave still more; but since that time these signs have diminished, although there are still traces of them with a few who have had their souls purified by the gospel.^[123]

By the time of Chrysostom and Augustine (c. 350-450) these men are saying these gifts have long since ceased.

All of this provides the best scenario for why the operation of the sign gifts was quickly decreasing during the first 150 years after the NT revelation was completed, and then ceasing altogether. These gifts operated for the purpose of authenticating the NT revelation in the absence of Scripture. As the written NT revelation became increasingly available to churches throughout the known world by around 250, both the need and the use of these gifts generally cease. It is suggested here that this is the approximate time that the Apostle Paul’s prediction was fulfilled that these gifts would “cease” when “the completed thing” (1 Cor 13:10) became available. ^[124]

Accordingly, the influential Baptist theologian Augustus Strong (1836-1921) wrote:

[Miracle working is] the natural accompaniments and attestations of new communications from God. The great epochs of miracles – represented by Moses, the prophets, the first and second comings of Christ -are coincident with the great epochs of revelation. Miracles serve to draw attention to new truth, and cease when this truth has gained currency and foothold. ^[125]

Along the same lines, Sinclair B. Ferguson, Professor of Systematic Theology at Westminster Seminary writes:

The primary function of these gifts itself suggests their impermanence. Given the historical setting, it would be as misguided to expect the cessation of these confirmatory signs to be synchronized with the death of the last Apostle, as it would be to assume that the acceptance of the canon of Scripture would be dated at the hour in which the last book of the New Testament was first read. In the nature of the case, such cessation would be as gradual as the gathering and establishing of the canon. In this sense the gradual cessation of these gifts follows the pattern which their inner significance suggests. ^[126]

This points to a significant difference between the traditional historicist (cessationist) position and the conclusion of this study. Because traditional historicism inseparably attached the miraculous gifts to those holding the office of Apostle in the early Church, or those the Apostles personally laid hands on, it attempted to prove historically that these gifts ceased with the death of such people which would not have been much past A.D. 150. ^[127]

The conclusion of this study, however, has defined the historicist position by stating that the miraculous gifts were inseparably attached to the reception, communication, and authentication of the NT revelation until it was inscripturated, copied, and distributed like its OT counterpart. This gives a ready reason for the increasingly rare, but actual operation of the Scripture and sign gifts until around A.D. 250 when their God ordained purpose was completed.

Extras & Endnotes

A Devotion to Dad

Our Father, we thank you for the discernment that past generations of Christians have exercised regarding claims to the miraculous. We pray that you would help to restore that wisdom, and therefore protect the Church from modern frauds and false ministers.

Gauging Your Grasp

1. What is the general consensus of Church historians regarding the timing of the cessation of the spiritual gifts of healing and miracle working?
2. Why do we claim the NT reflects a decreasing frequency and importance of miracle working in the first century? Do you agree or disagree?
3. What are several aspects of the gift of miracle working that are reflected in the 2^nd century writing of Irenaeus?
4. What did the 3rd century Bible scholar Origen confirm concerning miraculous gifts?
5. What other evidence do we offer to claim a relative scarcity of miracle working gifts operating in the 2nd and 3rd century Church?
6. What are some things that the 4^th century Church leader Chrysostom confirmed about miracle working in his day? What did he view was superior as a proof of the Christian faith?
7. What was Augustine’s view of the presence of the miracle working gifts?
8. Why are many Church historians suspicious of reports of miracle working after the rise of the Roman Catholic Church?
9. What is significant about the absence of miracle working gifts even during such periods of Church history such as the Protestant Reformation and the Great Awakening?
10. What was characteristic of the foremost founders of early super-supernaturalism in America?
11. While most super-supernaturalists admit the miraculous gifts have been generally absent from the Church for at least 1600 years, what reasons do they generally give for their absence? Why do we claim such explanations are rather ridiculous and even arrogant?
12. What is our explanation for the timing and the continuing duration of the cessation of miracle working gifts? What two significant historical events in the Church occur at relatively the same time to support our view?

Recommended Reading

• Books 10 and 11 of Knowing Our God.
• Counterfeit Miracles by B. B. Warfield (Banner of Truth Trust, 1972). A classic on the topic of miracles and miracle working.

Publications & Particulars

1. For further discussion on the cessation of the gift of Apostleship see chapter 8.5. ↑

2. Thomas R. Edgar, “The Cessation of the Sign Gifts” BSac 145 (1988), 382. ↑

3. For further discussion on the abuse of Acts in super-supernaturalism see section 11.3.B. ↑

4. Regarding our claim the Apostle Paul had anticipated the cessation of the Scripture and sign gifts when the NT revelation was completed see chapter 8.6. ↑

5. Regarding the historical cessation of the gift of tongues, knowledge, and prophecy see chapters 12.13; 8.5; and 9.13 respectively. ↑

6. Jack Deere, Surprised by the Power of the Spirit (Zondervan, 1993), 273, n. 17. ↑

7. For further discussion of the critical distinction between direct divine miracles and delegated human miracle working see section 10.3.A.1. ↑

8. For further discussion on the distinction between healing and exorcism see section 11.10.B. ↑

9. Max Turner, The Holy Spirit and Spiritual Gifts (Hendrickson, 1998), 301-2. ↑

10. Robert L. Saucy in Are Miraculous Gifts for Today?, Wayne Grudem ed. (Zondervan, 1996), 112, 113. Although, unfortunately, Dr. Saucy is imprecise in using the word “miracles” instead of “miracle working,” his conclusions still stand even for the latter. ↑

11. It may be helpful at this point to note that super-supernatural theologians can be placed in one of two camps: 1) Continuationists, and 2) Restorationists. Continuationists insist that the miraculous gifts never ceased at all in the history of the Church, while Restorationists admit that they became virtually non-existent at times in the Church, but have now been “restored” to the Church in various degrees. This differentiation between Continuationists and Restorationists should not be taken too far however, because super-supernatural arguments are often too blurred to really categorize them as one or the other. ↑

12. The “gift” that the Apostle Paul says he does not want Timothy to neglect in 1 Timothy 4:14 is obviously defined by the “preaching . . . and teaching” that the Apostle exhorts him to “devote” himself to in v. 13. It has nothing to do with miracle working. The “gift” that the Apostle exhorts Timothy to “fan into flame” in 2 Timothy 1:6 is simply the “Spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline” of which the Apostle reminds him was given to him by God (v. 7) when he came to a “sincere” and saving “faith” in Christ (v. 5).

    Again, there would seem to be no hint of the gifts of healing or miracle working here. See Acts 2:28; 10:45; Hebrews 6:4 where the Holy Spirit itself is described as a “gift”. ↑

13. For further on the rarity of miracle working gifts see chapter 10.2.B. ↑

14. Deere, Power, 239-240. ↑

15. For further discussion of the purpose of gifts of healing and miracle working see sections 3.1.D; 7.1.B.5; 7.3.C; 7.6.F. ↑

16. Warfield explains why it is important to dismiss the evidence in the apocryphal literature of the time when he notes:

    All that has been heretofore said concerns the church writers, properly so-called, the literary remains of the church considered as the body of right-believing Christians. Alongside of this literature, however, there existed a flourishing growth of apocryphal writings-Acts of Apostles and the like—springing up in the fertile soil of Ebionitish and Gnostic heresy, the most respectable example of which is furnished by the Clementina. In these anonymous, or more usually pseudonymous, writings, there is no dearth of miraculous story, from whatever age they come. (Counterfeit Miracles [Banner of Truth Trust, 1972], 17-18) ↑

17. Ignatius, Epistle to Smyrna, online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

18. Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, XXXIX; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

19. McGrath, Alister E., Christian Theology (Blackwell, 1997), 10. ↑

20. Regarding the fact that the early Church pointed to supernatural virtue rather than physical miracle working for proving Christianity see section 5.9.A.1. ↑

21. Justin Martyr, 2nd Apology, ch. 6; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

22. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book II, ch. 23, Book V. ch. 6.1; online at http://www.ccel.org. B. B. Warfield (1851-1921) suggested that Irenaeus’ testimony to the raising of the dead referred to an Apostle and not to any one living during the Bishop’s lifetime (12, 13, 15, 241). He bases this on the fact that Irenaeus’ contemporary, Theophilus of Antioch, apparently refused to relate a specific instance of such a thing even after being asked by a critic of Christianity. Nonetheless, Irenaeus’ language seems to reflect more contemporary events for the Bishop and he is writing some ninety years after the Apostles. ↑

23. For examples of super-supernaturalists attempting to excuse the great difference between the healings we see in Scripture and those being claimed today see chapter 11.1. ↑

24. Origen, Against Celsus, sec. VII.9, 11; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

25. Novation, Treatise of Novation Concerning the Trinity, ch. XXIX; online at http://www.ccel.org. The suggestion by some cessationists that Novation’s use of present tense verbs does not mean he meant the present seems very unlikely when we notice that Novation mentions other things that Christ was certainly doing in his day including, “affords powers of government, suggests counsels, and orders and arranges whatever other gifts there are of charismata”. ↑

26. Jon Ruthven, On the Cessation of the Charismata: The Protestant Polemic on Postbiblical Miracles (Sheffield, 1997), 28 ↑

27. Henry Barclay Swete, The Holy Spirit in the Ancient Church (MacMillan, 1912) 400-01. ↑

28. Warfield, 239-40. ↑

29. Papias mentions a raising from the dead that occurred in the days of Phillip the Evangelist, obviously then being part of the Apostolic period and concerning one of the original messengers of the NT revelation (see Acts 8:5-6). And in fact, Papias would seem to confirm his belief that such things were not occurring in his own day. (Warfield, 14). ↑

30. R. E. Cottle in his entry, “Gifts, Spiritual” in the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (ISBE), also claims that the writings of Tertullian (c. 160-225) are evidence of the gift of healing. His reference here demonstrates the common error of those looking for evidence of this gift when they confuse exorcisms or fakery with the gift. And even more, Tertullian here is speaking of healings performed by false prophets and he is explaining that they get their deceptive powers from demons:

    And we affirm indeed the existence of certain spiritual essences; nor is their name unfamiliar. The philosophers acknowledge there are demons . . . They inflict, accordingly, upon our bodies diseases and other grievous calamities, while by violent assaults they hurry the soul into sudden and extraordinary excesses.

    Very kind too, no doubt, are [false prophets such as Croesi and Pyrrhi] in regard to the healing of diseases. For, first of all, they make you ill [by demonic power]; then, to get a miracle out of it, they command the application of remedies either altogether new, or contrary to those in use, and straightway withdrawing hurtful influence, they are supposed to have wrought a cure. What need, then, to speak of their other artifices, or yet further of the deceptive power which they have as spirits: … all done with the one object of showing that men should believe in the deity of stones, and not seek after the only true God?” (Apology, ch. XXII, online at http://www.ccel.org) (Geoffrey W. Bromiley, ed., 4 vols., [Eerdmans, 1988], 2:648)

    It is clearly misleading for Mr. Cottle to use this as a reference supporting the idea the gift of healing was operating in Tertullian’s time. ↑

31. Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, trans. G. A. Williamson, ed. Andrew Louth (Penguin Books, 1989), III.37, Louth, 100. ↑

32. Quoted by Warfield, 240. ↑

33. Theodoret, Commentary on the First Epistle to the Corinthians, 2.40; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

34. Donald Bloesch, The Holy Spirit: Works and Gifts (Intervarsity, 2000), 85. ↑

35. Chrysostom, Homily on 2 Thessalonians, 4; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

36. Chrysostom, Homilies on the Epistles of Paul to the Corinthians, 6; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

37. Ibid., 36-7. ↑

38. Chrysostom, Homily on Matthew, 24; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

39. Ibid., 32. ↑

40. Ibid., 46. ↑

41. Bloesch, 85. ↑

42. Augustine, On the Profit of Believing, 34; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

43. Herman Bavinck, Prolegomena, Church Dogmatics (Baker, 2003), 339. Bavink references: Augustine, City of God, XXIL. 8; On the Profit of Believing, XVI; On True Religion, XV. Available online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

44. Augustine, The Retractions, in The Fathers of the Church, vol. 60 (The Catholic Univ. of America Press, 1968), p. 55. ↑

45. Augustine, City of God, xxii.8; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

46. Saucy, Miraculous Gifts, 115-116. ↑

47. As we discuss elsewhere, it is probable that many of the cures that occurred particularly surrounding the worship of relics and gravesites was empowered by “mind-cure.” see ↑

48. Stanley M. Burgess, The Spirit and the Church: Antiquity (Hendrickson, 1984). ↑

49. Hilary of Poitiers, On the Trinity, viii.30; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

50. Walter Elwell, Evangelical Dictionary of Theology (EDT) (Baker, 1984), 1043. ↑

51. Ibid. ↑

52. Ibid., 1045. ↑

53. Douglas Judisch, An Evaluation of Claims to the Charismatic Gifts (Baker, 1978), 79-80. See also chapters 2 and 3 of Warfield (Counterfeit) in which he convincingly exposes the fraud of the Roman Catholic claims to God-empowered miracle working by some of its saints. It is this dubious Roman Catholic tradition that any one is forced to rely upon if they wish to assert that there has been a continual string of miracle workers throughout Church history. Without these “Roman Catholic miracles”, one is forced to admit that the miraculous gifts of the Apostolic period did indeed cease. ↑

54. Warfield, 30. He also points out concerning the apocryphal writings of the second and third centuries:

    In these anonymous, or more usually pseudonymous, writings, there is no dearth of miraculous story, from whatever age they come. Later, these wild and miraculous documents were taken over into the Catholic church, usually after a certain amount of reworking by which they were cleansed to a greater or less-usually less–extent of their heresies, but not in the least bit of their apocryphal miracle-stories. Indeed, by the relative elimination of their heresies in the Catholic reworking . . . their miracle-mongering-was made even more the prominent feature of these documents, and more exclusively the sole purpose of their narrative.

    It is from these apocryphal miracle-stories and not from the miracles of the New Testament, that the luxuriant growth of the miraculous stories of later ecclesiastical writings draw their descent. And this is as much as to say that their ultimate parentage must be traced to those heathen wonder-tales to which we have just had occasion to allude. (18)

    Furthermore, Warfield gives a specific account of how spurious testimonies of miracle working have occurred in the Church even outside of Roman Catholicism. For example, he writes of Thomas Becket (12^th century Archbishop of Canterbury), who had supposedly worked miracles in the Church of England:

    Nothing further need be said of this than what has been briefly said by A. G. Headlam in the course of a discussion of miracles, which he read at the Church Congress at Middlesbrough (1912):

    Reference has been made to miracles of St. Thomas of Canterbury,” he says, “and it is maintained that those miracles are supported by as good evidence as the Gospel narratives, and that they represent just the same strong ethical character that our Lord’s work did.

    I do not think that any one who makes assertions of this sort can have looked at the evidence for a moment. We have very full accounts of the life of Thomas Becket, and we have many letters written by him. In none whatever of the early narratives is there any reference to miracles performed in his lifetime. Neither he himself nor his contemporaries claimed that he could work miracles. The stories of miraculous happenings are entirely confined to the miracles believed to have been worked by his dead body after his death, and these narratives are exactly of the same character as those recorded at Lourdes, for example, at the present day.

    Many of them represent answers to prayers which were offered up in different parts of the world in the name of St. Thomas, many of them are trivial, and some repellent. Some doubtless represent real cures, which were worked among those who went on a pilgrimage, just as there can be no doubt that real cures are experienced by those who go to Lourdes. What their character may be we need not discuss at this moment, but the whole tone of the narrative represents something quite different from anything that we experience when reading the story of the Gospel.”

    We return now to the main question: What are we to think of these [ecclesiastical] miracles? There is but one historical answer which can be given. They represent an infusion of Heathen modes of thought into the church.

    If we wish to trace this heathen infusion along the line of literary development, we must take our start from those Apocryphal Acts of Encratite tendency which, in a former lecture, we had occasion to point to as naturalizing the heathen wondertales-then a fashionable literary form-in the church. Once naturalized in the church, these Christian wondertales developed along the line of the church’s own development. As time went on, E. von Dobschutz explains, the church drew ever closer to the Encratite ideals which were glorified in the Apocryphal Acts, and it was this which gave their tendency to the new Christian romances which began to multiply in the later fourth century, and are represented to us especially by Athanasius’ Life of Antony, and Jerome’s Lives of Paul, Hilarion, and Malchus. “Whether there is any historical kernel in them or not,” remarks Von Dobschutz, “they are exactly like the older Christian romances, described already, in their fundamental traits– loose structure, miraculousness, and asceticism.” (60-61) ↑

55. Conyers Middleton, A Free Inquiry into the Miraculous Powers which are Supposed to have Subsisted in the Christian Church, from the Earliest Ages through Several Successive Centuries, 25. ↑

56. Cited by Warfield, 53-54. ↑

57. Ibid., 116. ↑

58. Burgess, Antiquity, 123. ↑

59. Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Matthew, 10. 1; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

60. Collin Brown, “Miracles” ISBE, 3:378. ↑

61. John Calvin, “Prefatory Address to King Francis I of France, § 3,” in Institutes of the Christian Religion, 2 vols., trans. Ford Lewis Battles (Westminster, 1960), 1:16–17. ↑

62. John Calvin, Bible Commentaries, 1 Cor 12:28; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

63. John Calvin, Bible Commentaries, James 5:15; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

64. Martin Luther, Luther’s Works, vol. 24: Sermons on the Gospel of St. John, Chapters 14–16, ed. Jaroslav Pelikan (Concordia, 1961), 367. ↑

65. Theodore Graebner, Faith Healing (Concordia, 1951), 4-6. Contrast real history with Mr. Cottle’s claim in the ISBE that: “Gifts of healing, however, have never been totally absent from the Church’s life. Francis of Assisi, Luther, Wesley, the Waldenses, the early Moravians, the Quakers, and others have experienced these gifts intermittently through-out church history.” (ISBE, 2:648)

    This is completely false in Luther’s case. St. Francis’s claims no doubt need to be dealt with the same suspicion as other Roman Catholic claims in the Middle Ages. He gives no evidence whatsoever for the claims he makes for the other groups. It is unfortunate and inexcusable to find such misleading and undocumented information in a standard Christian reference work as the ISBE. ↑

66. Regarding manifestations common in super-supernaturalism that were condemned by the leaders of the Great Awakening see section 4.10.D. ↑

67. John Wesley, Works, New York, 1856, V:706. Warfield, 8. ↑

68. Josiah Smith, A Sermon on the Character and Preaching of the Rev. Mr. Whitefield in Heimert, 66. Wipf & Stock Publishers (April 2006). ↑

69. Arnold Dallimore, George Whitefield, 2 vols. (The Banner of Truth Trust, 1970), 348-9. ↑

70. The Pentecostal Barry Chant in his article: “Myths about Jonathan Edwards” notes:

    The impression has been given by some writers that Edwards believed in the supernatural gifts and powers of the Holy Spirit listed in 1 Corinthians 12. For example, Chevreau points out plainly that Charles Chauncy, a strong critic of the Awakening, denied the need for spiritual gifts in his day and in doing so, Chevreau implies that Edwards held the opposite view. In fact, he did not. Edwards was also a cessationist. He plainly believed that the signs, wonders and miracles of the New Testament ceased at the end of the apostolic age. (Renewal Journal at http://www.renewaljournal.com) ↑

71. Jonathan Edwards, “Love More Excellent Than Extraordinary Gifts of the Spirit,” in The Works of Jonathan Edwards, vol. 8: Ethical Writings, ed., Paul Ramsey (Yale, 1989), 153. ↑

72. Jonathan Edwards, Treatise on Religious Affections, II:275; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

73. John Gerstner, The Rational Biblical Theology of Jonathan Edwards, 3 vols. (Berea, 1991), 174. ↑

74. Warfield, 6. ↑

75. Bloesch, 13o. ↑

76. Regarding the condemnation of the 19^th century version of charismatism, the Irvingites, see section 4.10.E.4. ↑

77. Dallimore, 140-41. ↑

78. Charles Spurgeon, “Sermon delivered April 27, 1856, at New Park Street Chapel, Southwark, on behalf of the Baptist Missionary Society; online at http://www.wholesomewords.org. ↑

79. Deere, Power 75. ↑

80. For further discussion of Christian cults claiming miracles in the nineteenth through twentieth centuries see section 4.10.E. ↑

81. Warfield. ↑

82. Todd Hunter, “Revival in Focus,” Missionary Viejo Vineyard, Mission Viejo, CA, 10-23-94, audiotape. ↑

83. Hank Hanegraaff, Counterfeit Revival (Word, 1997), 131. ↑

84. Benny Hinn, “Praise the Lord,” telecast by TBN, 4-12-91, audiotape. ↑

85. Hanegraaff, 131-134. ↑

86. James Randi, The Faith Healers (Prometheus Books, 1989), 85. ↑

87. Hanegraaff, 139. ↑

88. Ibid., 134-137. ↑

89. Ronald Kydd, Healing Through the Centuries: Models for Understanding (Hendrickson, 1998), 174. ↑

90. Ibid. ↑

91. Ibid. ↑

92. Ibid., 175-6, 180. ↑

93. Philip Jenkins, Mystics and Messiahs: Cults and New Religions in American History (Oxford University Press, 2000), 66. ↑

94. “Aimee Semple McPherson” at Wikipedia online at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Semple_McPherson. ↑

95. Jenkins, 67-8. ↑

96. “Aimee Semple McPherson” at Wikipedia online at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Semple_McPherson. ↑

97. Unfortunately, the results of Kuhlman’s “miracle services” involved habitual fraud which we discuss elsewhere. See sections 11.7.B.9.c and 11.8.E.2. ↑

98. Richard Quebedeaux, The New Charismatics: The Origins, Development, and Significance of Neo-Pentecostalism (Doubleday, 1976), 86. ↑

99. Kydd, 193. ↑

100. Ibid., 181, 183, 194, 197. ↑

101. The reason is that such women claimed to perform miracles, yet we demonstrate elsewhere that even these claims were outright lies. See sections 11.7.B.9.c and 11.8.E.2 ↑

102. We have also documented Mr. Roberts’ fraudulent claims to healing elsewhere. See section 11.8.E.3. ↑

103. See Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_evangelist _scandal ↑

104. For further discussion of the fake revival and pagan nature of modern super-supernaturalism see chapter 10.15. ↑

105. Regarding the “latter rain” theory based on Joel 2, see section 11.3.E. ↑

106. “Golden Jubilees, ” International Review of Missions 47 (April 1958), 193-194. ↑

107. Bloesch, 294 ↑

108. Deere, Power, 72. ↑

109. D. M. Lloyd-Jones, The Sovereign Spirit: Discerning the Gifts (Harold Shaw, 1985), 50. ↑

110. Excerpt from section 10.7.C ↑

111. J. P. Moreland, Kingdom Triangle (Zondervan, 2007), 175. ↑

112. Miraculous Gifts, 201. ↑

113. Ibid., 229. ↑

114. Cottle, ISBE 2: 648. ↑

115. Deere, Power, 72. ↑

116. Miraculous Gifts, 203. ↑

117. D. A. Carson, Douglas Moo, Leon Morris, Introduction to the New Testament (Zondervan, 1992), 335. ↑

118. 2 Clement, online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

119. The Epistle of Barnabas, online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

120. Justin Martyr, First Apology, ch. 67, “Weekly Worship of the Christians.”; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

121. See ISBE, 1:604. ↑

122. Ibid., see list here. ↑

123. Origen, Against Celsus, sec. VII.9, 11; online at http://www.ccel.org. ↑

124. Regarding Paul’s teaching in 1 Corinthians 13:8-13 that the Scripture and sign gifts would cease with the completion of the NT revelation see chapter 8.6. ↑

125. Augustus H. Strong, Systematic Theology 3 Vols. (Judson, 1907, 1953), 128. ↑

126. Sinclair Ferguson, The Holy Spirit (Intervarsity, 1996), 226. ↑

127. For example, the traditional historicist position is reflected by Andrew F. Walls in the New Bible Dictionary when he says:

     Healing and other spectacular gifts, such as prophecy and tongues, are abundantly attested in the apostolic church, related, like the apostolic witness, to the special [and unprecedented] dispensation of the Holy Spirit; but they are strangely missing in the 2^nd-century church, the writers of those days speaking of them as a thing in the past—in the apostolic age, in fact.

     Likewise, the popular Christian apologist Norm Geisler reflects traditional historicism when he writes:

     Since these divinely authorized channels of “all truth” died in the first century [i.e. Apostles], it follows that divine revelation ceased with them. If revelation ceased there was no longer a need for miraculous signs of a new revelation. (Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics [Baker, 1999], 471.)

     This view was popularized by B. B. Warfield and his monumental study of miracles. Although we quote Warfield above as stating that the majority scholarly opinion in the Church since the 1700’s reflected what we write here, he wrote:

     The writings of the so-called Apostolic Fathers contain no clear and certain allusions to miracle-working or to the exercise of the charismatic gifts, contemporaneously with themselves. (10)

     Other Christian scholars such as Robert Gaffin and Thomas Edgar have followed this line of reasoning as well. There are two problems with this view. One, it does not seem to do justice to the historical evidence. Warfield and others are simply too skeptical of the testimonies of the several early Church leaders we have quoted.

     Secondly, it is rather easy for super-supernaturalists to demonstrate that the miracle working gifts were not exclusively attached to the Apostles and this straw man is used for their purposes. Accordingly, the super-supernaturalist J. P. Moreland is glad to point out:

     Cessationism is the idea that the miraculous gifts of the Spirit, such as prophecy, healing, miracles, and tongues (see I Cor. 12:8 – 10; 13:8-10), ceased with the death of the Apostles and, thus, are no longer available today. (Kingdom, 175).

     Either out of ignorance or convenience, Dr. Moreland leaves out of his definition of historicism the view of Dr. Ferguson as quoted here, which reflects our own.

     It is more biblical, historical, and condemning of super-supernaturalism to insist that every God-sent miracle worker in Scripture was a messenger of new divine revelation. This practice continued in the early Church until about 250 A. D. when the NT revelation was sufficiently received, recorded, copied, recognized, and distributed, at which point the gifts ceased as well. ↑