Perilous Times Shall Come
by Betty Swinford
For years, I have observed both the New Age and the Kingdom Age, and it has come to my attention over and over that there are distinct parallels between the two. In fact, some are beginning to call it “The New Age of the Kingdom of God.” Both movements agree that “for the new to enter, the old must be revitalized or done away with.” Between the two, millions have been lured into their web of deceit. Both cater to man’s insatiable thirst for power and control; and man is elevated, while Christ is brought low.
Here, then, are some startling parallels between these two movements:
New Age Beliefs:
Though multitudes are being swept into the New Age, the elite among them claim to be the l44,000 spoken of in the book of Revelation.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
We must understand that there are many different levels of belief among the Kingdom Agers, or Kingdom Now people. Some are more radical than others. Also, they go by various names, such as: Dominion Theology, Sonship, Manchild Company, Reconstructionists, Charismatic Renewal, and others. Some of them believe that they are the l44,000 as well.
While conducting meetings in Modesto, California some years ago, I encountered a large group of on-fire teenagers. They invited me on a Friday night to a home where they were meeting for refreshments. I accepted. During the course of the evening, a young red-haired man appeared who began teaching them that they were a part of the l44,000 who would take the world for Christ. When I broke in to remind them that the 7th and l4th chapters of Revelation were speaking of the Jews, I was hurriedly ushered to my car. I never saw them again.
Biblical Response:
“Beloved, believe not every spirit, but test the spirits whether they are of God; because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (I John 4:l).
New Age Beliefs:
They will take over the world and bring complete restoration, creating the perfect world. They will banish evil from the earth and create a world of peace and harmony.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
They, likewise, will take over the world, recreate it and banish evil from the earth. There will be no more pornography, murder, drugs, homosexuality, and other evil. A Spirit-filled president will occupy the White House and there will be a Spirit-filled Congress and Senate.
Biblical Response:
“For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be” (Matthew 24:21).
New Age Beliefs:
Barbara Marx Hubbard who was a New Age Leader, said, “We have no choice, dearly beloved. It is a case of the destruction of the whole planet, or the elimination of the ego-driven, godless l/4 who if allowed to live will reproduce their defective disconnection. We are in charge of God’s selection process. He selects; we destroy. We are the riders of the Pale Horse, Death.” The New Agers teach that we are all cells in the brain of God: put them together and you have God. But, since some of these cells are diseased, they must be cut out or eliminated. So, while they speak of peace and harmony, the kiss of death is upon their lips.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
It is imperative that Christians be united while they take over the world and establish Christ’s kingdom on earth. However, there are those who refuse to “cast aside traditions and insist upon clinging to the old Pharisaical ways.” They say that “until we think like gods and act like gods, we will never usher in the Kingdom of God.” “It will be preferable to administer correction, however some will be literally killed.” We “must submit to the latter-day apostles and prophets as though it were Jesus Christ Himself, and whoever will not submit, will be destroyed from off the earth.”
Biblical Response:
“… yes, the time comes, that whoever kills you will think that he does God service” (John l6:2).
New Age Beliefs:
They believe in ongoing evolution. When the peoples of the world are in complete harmony, there will be a “Quantum Leap,” which is a giant step forward into the next phase of our evolution.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
While they don’t believe in ongoing evolution, they do believe in ongoing revelation. This, in effect, makes the Bible incomplete, for whatever the new apostles and prophets speak is equal to the Word of God. Nor can the prophets be judged. One TV minister said, “It’s not so much faith in Jesus Christ, as it is how you treat the latter-day apostles and prophets.”
Biblical Response:
“Let the prophets speak, two or three, and let the others judge” (I Corinthians l4:29).
“I have not sent these prophets, yet they ran; I have not spoken to them, yet they prophesied” (Jeremiah 23:21).
“For I testify to every man that hears the words of this book, If any man shall add to these things, God shall add to him the plagues written in this book” (Revelation 22:l8).
New Age Beliefs:
Mind control is of an essence to the New Age. Some time ago, they spent thirty million dollars to go into businesses like Pacific Bell Telephone Company in California and U.S. West in Flagstaff, Arizona to promote “consciousness-raising techniques” to better the workers’ productivity. Christians objected and the project was eventually dropped.
Subliminal music is played in stores to encourage the shopper to purchase more goods. Even their rain forest, ocean and bird-singing music contain hidden messages geared to mind control.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
A minister’s wife told me that when they pastored in Dallas, Texas, they operated a mind control clinic that was so secretive no one in their church even knew about it.
My niece worked for a chiropractor who claimed to be a Christian. He gave his workers leaflets and demanded that each morning they read to him aloud from the leaflets. It went like this: “I am vitally healthy and successful in every way. My organs are functioning perfectly and I am totally at peace. There is love in my heart and there is absolutely no fear. I choose everything that is good and will draw new patients into this office, loving them and being loved in return.”
Many ministers require their congregations to repeat after him key phrases over and over. He calls this, “getting it into your spirit.” But, is that what it is, or is it a form of control?
Biblical Response:
“Stand fast, therefore, in the liberty with which Christ has made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage” (Galatians 5:l).
New Age Beliefs:
They are strongly into visualization. Since we are all cells in the Global Brain (God), whatever the majority is visualizing is what God is visualizing. “Whatever you visualize,” they say, “will come to pass.”
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
They, too, believe in visualization. If you desire something, visualize it into existence. One TV minister said, “Whatever you can see in your mind is yours.”
Biblical Response:
“You ask and receive not, because you ask amiss, that you may consume it upon your lusts” (James 4:3).
New Age Beliefs:
They are gods. The god spirit resides in all of us. All we need to do is rise to our full potential. To reach one’s godhood, we must eliminate all reasoning power. (In other words, we must blindly follow the teachings of the New Age.) Drugs, yoga, meditation, hypnosis, psychology, channeling, and visualization can help to accomplish this.
Children, too, are being taught to make contact with their spirit guides and “be filled with pure light.” Their instructors guide them into a state of peace and perfection as they visualize themselves filled “with the light of the universe.”
Then, when the world is healed, it may trigger a “Planetary Pentecost” in which many will be healed and even raised from the dead. At that time, they will all be filled with the power of Christ.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
They are gods. They say, “As dogs have puppies and cats have kittens, so God has little gods.” As such, we are expected to perform miracles and take the world for Christ. They teach that in the days to come, children will be performing miracles on a daily basis.
But, there is one big however involved. They get their power from “Secret Techniques” and “Hidden Truths.” Once one learns the spiritual laws upon which faith is based, and once these secret techniques have been mastered, God must respond to them even if they are exercised by His worst enemies. It’s interesting to note that every lodge and every secret society claims to be privy to secrets and truths no one else knows.
Biblical Response:
“For then shall arise false christs and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders, insomuch that if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect” (Matthew 24:24).
We tend to forget that Satan has the power to create miracles, too. The magicians in Moses’ day produced the same miracles as Moses. Satan is forever the great counterfeiter.
New Age Beliefs:
They believe in an invisible army, or ascended masters of wisdom. In short, they believe in spirit guides who will assist them and give advice on how to take over the world. (Even Hitler claimed to have a spirit guide from Tibet.)
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
They too believe in an invisible army, only theirs is the cloud of witnesses from Hebrews chapter l2. These witnesses will impart to them wisdom and guidance in conquering the world for Christ, and restore it like the Garden of Eden. Bishop Earl Paulk freely admits to conversations with his dead sister, Joan, who guides him and gives him advice. Kingdom Agers claim that in the future, they will have a much closer relationship with departed saints.
Biblical Response:
“There shall not be found among you… a charmer, or a consulter of mediums, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all these things are an abomination to the Lord” (Deuteronomy l8:l0-l2). (A necromancer is one who interrogates the dead.)
I might add that while in Seattle some years ago, I saw on television a spirit channeler who put herself in a trance in order to contact her spirit guide. While a group of teenagers watched in rapt attention, the woman began to twitch spasmodically. Then, as she was possessed by the spirit (demon), she began speaking in a man’s voice great swelling philosophies.
Another channeler under her spirit guide’s influence conducted what could have passed for a prayer line. As she laid her hands on those standing in a line, they would break into sobs and fall backwards as if they had been slain in the Spirit.
We must always remember when anyone lays hands on us , they can only impart the spirit that is in them.
Both the New Agers and the Kingdom Agers speak our language. That’s the very thing that makes it so deceptive and so deadly. II Corinthians ll:l3-l5 tells us clearly that, “Such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel, for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore, it is no great thing if his ministers also are transformed into the ministers of righteousness.”
New Age Beliefs:
They practice astral projection, commonly called soul travel, where one leaves his body and travels to other places in the spirit. When one channeler came back into her body, she fell into a friend’s arms exclaiming, “Oh it’s so wonderful out there, I didn’t ever want to come back.”
One can only speculate on the horror she would have experienced had she been unable to get back into her body.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
An Assembly of God minister’s wife related to me her experience in soul travel. And, one popular television preacher said he left his body and journeyed to a distant place to minister to someone.
Kingdom Now people don’t call it astral projection, however. They glorify it by calling it journaling.
Both groups accomplish this through meditation, although the New Agers also use various other methods to leave their bodies.
Biblical Response:
“Wherefore, thus saith the Lord God, I am against your amulets, with which you hunt the souls to make them fly…” (Ezekiel l3:20). The Living Bible says magic charms.
The truth is, various methods are used to leave one’s body. It may sound very spiritual to say a person has left his body to go minister to another individual, but it is a dangerous practice.
New Age Beliefs:
At their moment of transformation, all opposition will be eliminated. The way the spirit guide describes, this sounds exactly like the rapture. According to Peter Russell, those who disappear will be exported to another non-physical realm. John Randolph Price’s spirit guide told him that the earth’s inhabitants who don’t want to be a part of the “Quantum Leap” will be removed from the earth.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
There is no rapture. Bishop Paulk talks about “those who stand foolishly gazing into the heavens waiting for some dramatic escape from earth.” Kingdom Now people call this an escapist mentality. They say further that the words caught up in I Thessalonians 4:l7 simply mean that they will be caught up with excitement when Jesus comes to receive from their hands the kingdom they have established for Him.
Biblical Response:
“For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air, and so shall we ever be with the Lord” (l Thessalonians 4:l6, l7).
What they fail to consider is that the words caught up come from the Greek word Harpazo, which means to be suddenly snatched away.
New Age Beliefs:
They will be transformed. According to Barbara Marx Hubbard, this transformation, “… will come to the peoples of the earth together in an instant of time. It means co-experiencing the same force at the same time and acting together in accordance with the idea which you will all have from within.” At that moment, they will receive the Christ anointing and will become divine.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
They will be transformed together at the same instant, as a corporate body. Jesus was a man who attained to the highest degree of perfection, received the Christ anointing and became a Manifested Son of God. Just so, at their moment of transformation, they will receive the Christ anointing, along with bodies that are immortal. Now, they are co-equal with Christ. Bishop Paulk declares, “This is a generation which indeed will never see death.” The last enemy to be defeated is death and at their transformation, they will have defeated that foe.
Biblical Response:
“And as it is appointed unto man once to die, but after this the judgment” (Hebrews 9:27).
“Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither does corruption inherit incorruption” (I Corinthians l5:50).
New Age Beliefs:
They believe in three separate experiences:
1. The birth of the Christ consciousness, typified by the birth of Jesus.
2. Release from worldly glamour or desire, typified by Jesus’ baptism at the Jordan River and His subsequent wilderness testing.
3. To be equipped to follow the divine plan, an initiation given by the Lord of the World, at which point one becomes divine.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
They too believe in three separate experiences:
1. To be born again as typified by the Feast of Passover.
2. To be baptized in the Holy Spirit, followed by a wilderness testing, typified by the Feast of Pentecost.
3. To be unveiled to the world as a Manifested Son of God, at which point they are equal with Jesus.
Biblical Response:
“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine but, after their own lusts, shall heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears” (II Timothy 4:3).
New Age Beliefs:
John Randolph Price claims that through meditation he sees “images of a new heaven and a new earth. The planet will be healed and harmonized. We can let His kingdom come, we can let the will of God be done on earth as it is in heaven. We can literally turn on the light of the world, dissolve the darkness, and begin the New Age of spirituality on Planet Earth.”
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
“The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever” (Revelation ll:l5).
“But the saints of the Most High shall take the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever, even forever and ever” (Daniel 7:l8).
Biblical Response:
“I beheld, and the same horn (antichrist) made war with the saints and prevailed against them… And he shall speak great words against the Most high, and shall wear out the saints” (Daniel 7:21, 25).
As with all false doctrine, scripture is taken out of context in an attempt to prove their claims. According to Revelation 20:6, we will indeed rule and reign with Christ, but only after He has come the second time to set up His kingdom, not because we have established the kingdom for Him!
New Age Beliefs:
Price says, “Why not reverse the polarity of the force field and achieve a critical mass of positive energy?”
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
A minister’s wife told me that it is possible to draw power from the magnetic field and use it for either good or evil.
Biblical Response:
“Simon… to whom they all gave heed, from the least to the greatest, saying, ‘This man is the great power of God. And to him they had regard, because that for a long time he had bewitched them with sorceries’” (Acts 8:l0, ll).
Any power not born of the Holy Spirit is a power to be avoided. One can only wonder if the miracles that occur in questionable ministries are through the power of occult methods.
New Age Beliefs:
Holistic medicine–and this covers too wide a range to deal with here–I can only say that after my back surgery, I experienced terrible pain in my legs. A holistic nurse entered the room, telling me that she could get rid of the pain. She began rubbing her hands down my legs, and then flinging her hands through the air to shake off the pain. Sensing an evil spirit, I silently asked for a covering of the blood of Jesus. Instantly, the nurse threw her hands into the air, cried, “I can’t do this, it’s not working!” and left them room.
Kingdom Age Beliefs:
I‘m sure this is not true of all Kingdom Now people, but here are some examples that I have personally encountered:
To find out what food you are allergic to, they will have you hold in your outstretched hand some food item. If your arm drops, they conclude that you are allergic to that food.
I was tired in ministry and two Christian women wanted to give me “a shot of energy.” This they would accomplish by laying one hand on me and then drawing energy from the air with their other hands. I politely declined the offer.
Conclusion
Since there is but a fine line between these two movements, it’s not difficult to see that to be trapped in one is as deadly as becoming ensnared in the other. Unfortunately, we live in a day when we must sift through everything we hear, for error abounds as never before.
One favorite saying among the Kingdom Now people is, “I know it’s not in the Bible, but…” The word “but” carries a dire warning and should be enough to make us abandon that particular teaching, for if it cannot be found in the scriptures, it is simply unacceptable.