6/9/95
Testimony of Carl Widrig Jr (Hebrews928@juno.com)
NOT THE ONLY ONE
When I was born-again (1Peter 1:23) in Feb. 1988 during my sophomore year at
UC Irvine in Southern California, I was "born" into two movements at the same time:
Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa , and the Vineyard Christian Fellowship of Newport
Beach (pastor John McClure, married to daughter of Ray Ortlund). For
example, I was baptized at Pirates Cove in Corona Del Mar, Newport Beach
by a Calvary Chapel pastor on May 21, 1988; then the very next night (a Sunday
night), I was "baptized in the Holy Spirit" (speaking in tongues) at the
conclusion of a Vineyard Newport Beach meeting.
I attended meetings at both Calvary Chapel (example: Greg Denham College
and Career Group circa April 1988) and Vineyard movements
till Feb. 1989, during which time Paul Cain first showed up at the Spiritual
Warfare Conference at the Anaheim Vineyard (I was at the last meeting on a
Sunday night), announcing that the Great End-Times, hospital clearing,
nationally televised stadium filling Revival was at hand, therefore we were
to get ready for it (God had chosen the Vineyard, "God's strange act", to
usher in the Revival if we were up to it). From that time on, having bought
the The K.C. Prophets et. al (who impressed me with their apparent deep knowledge
of the Scriptures), I became very involved in the Newport Beach Vineyard
(inc. Sunday school teacher, tear-down team after Sunday night service,
ministry team, feeding the poor).
By April 1989, I was trying to "keep my head down" to avoid being
removed from the Vineyard movement by the Vineyard Angel who was swinging his
sword in the Vineyard to judge the prideful (those who wouldn't submit to
what was going on in the Vineyard.) Also in April, Bob Jones came to the
Newport Beach Vineyard for a Sunday morning service, and basically took over
the meeting with his "ministry," during the end of which time he pronounced
"holiness unto the Lord" on me, waving his hand on my forehead (I have a
cassette tape of the service the following Sunday (4/30/89) called "Bob Jones
Follow-Up", in which McClure enthusiastically summarizes the whole very
cultic atmosphere at the time - on hindsight a very revealing piece of
evidence).
When I went back to my seat, just after getting "blessed" by Bob Jones,
Steve Fuller (grandson of Charles E. Fuller, founder of Fuller Theological
Seminary), the associate pastor of Newport Vineyard at that time, told me for
the first time that God had given him dreams, visions, et. al. regarding
God's call to him to quit his position with Newport Vineyard, move to my
hometown area of San Jose (Almaden Valley), and plant a Vineyard (Fuller
brought up the name "Dave Shaw" in the conversation too - he was the pastor
of Santa Clara Vineyard, and I had visited his church whenever I went home to
San Jose for the holidays, often bringing my unsaved friends along) that
would focus on young people (i.e. my friends, all of which at this time were
all antagonistic towards the changes in me since my "born-again" experience).
Fuller told me that he and Dave Shaw had this idea about me coming along with
Fuller up to San Jose following my graduation from UCI to help plant the
church, and he also wanted to talk to me about my friends who lived in San
Jose. I knew Steve Fuller pretty well prior to this occasion because we had
walked the campus of UC Irvine together evangelizing people since the
previous Fall in anticipation of a Revival that would break out on the UCI
campus (per some "prophetic words" by John McClure - I remember him giving
this word at a Sunday morning meeting - the revival didn't happen by the way
- THEY NEVER DO).
That summer, the Prophesy II Conference took place at Anaheim Vineyard
(early July 1989). Several things happened at this conference that I
remember. I remember Mike Bickle and Bob Jones mentioning up on stage that,
"no matter what others will think of the Vineyard when God starts the Revival
thing, remember one thing: God is for the Vineyard." One night that week,
Paul Cain slammed his fist on the podium, announcing that those who would
mess with him and the other Prophets were touching the Lord's anointed and
would be judged for it (one friend I had, Will Bloomer, left the Vineyard
after this - I remember him challenging me with this on the phone - I
mentioned to him that Paul Cain must be of God, after all, Walter Martin had
been investigating Paul Cain and had dropped dead just a few days prior to
Paul Cain's announcement - I wasn't the only one who made this connection.)
During the same conference, I remember having a "critical spirit" towards
Paul Cain at another afternoon meeting, and a few days later I came down
with Chicken Pox - guess what I thought the cause was of this? Between the
Vineyard Angel, and Paul Cain's "touch not" rhetoric, and my Chicken Pox, I
was totally spiritually intimidated (can you say, "cult"), and threw off all
willingness to discern for myself what was going on - after all, God WAS for
the Vineyard, and who was I to question that? (a "babe"). By the way,
everyone I knew, including Steve Fuller, totally witnessed and were well
aware of all these things, yet God apparently overlooked this cultic stuff
(as if all was well in the Vineyard) to tell Fuller to move to San Jose and
plant a Vineyard. Not!
So from Feb. 1989 - July 1990, I lived in this constant atmosphere of,
"Get ready for the great End-Times Revival" - of course, the Rapture and the
Second Coming, the hope of the Christian per Paul the Apostle, was the
furthest thing from my mind. The Vineyard would have me to believe that it is
all my fault that I was moved away from the hope of the gospel (and that they
never were moved away) - after all, "the conferences are for those who
already have the foundation."
Upon my graduation from UCI in June 1990, after struggling for months
about what "God's will was for my life" ("Is He 'calling' me to San Jose, or
should I stay in Irvine following my grad."?), I finally moved to San Jose on
July 10, 1990. On the way up I picked up a Grace Ministries audio cassette
tape at the Anaheim Vineyard bookstore I would listen to many times thereafter,
a tape of Paul Cain being interviewed by Mike Bickle, (# 91222 Paul
Cain’s Early Ministry (Testimony)), another very revealing piece of evidence.
For the first time since Feb. 1989, I was suddenly living in an
atmosphere that was rather silent about what was going on down in Southern
California. Steve Fuller embraced Rick Joyner's book, The Harvest (which I
had encouraged him to read), but was more focused on making a living as a
real estate agent, and planting a church, then in "emphasizing" his
eschatological leanings. This new atmosphere helped me in my "quiet times"
to read the Bible without the winds (Bob Jones did say that he saw a "wind"
blowing at the Gathering of the Prophets Conference at the UCI Events Center
in September 1989) of false doctrine blowing through my brain.
This set me up for discovery #1: Hebrews 9:28. On September 7, 1990,
while vacationing in Oregon, I understood in a way I had not previously
grasped that I was suppose to be actively "looking" (KJV) for Christ's
coming again to bring me "salvation" (i.e. a transformed, resurrected,
glorified body). This realization was the first indication to me that
the Vineyard was completely out of touch with the Holy Spirit - I had
NEVER heard this "eagerly waiting" mindset taught NOR practiced by those I
looked up to in the Vineyard.
But even after grasping Heb.9:28, I was so deep into the hope of the
Revival, I was quickly moved away again from the hope of the gospel until
"seeing it" again in late December 1990, this time as my "hope" & my
"calling" (Eph.1:18).
Also during the Fall of 1990, I tossed out the idea that Christians
need to "pray about it." I was now understanding that God's will is to simply
do the written Word of God, knowing that God is in total control of your
life, rather than to "seek God" to "hear God's voice" re some secret
wonderful plan/calling on my life (a mentality missing from the pages of the
New Testatment) that could be missed if I didn't "pray about it." This major
discovery met with sharp protest from Steve Fuller (Mr. dreams and visions re
"God's will" on a regular basis), who was teaching us to have a "hearing
heart" per Solomon's petition for wisdom from God, so as to find out God's
will for those "major issues" in life (ministry, marriage, the geographic will
of God). He said that I would be "seriously misleading the flock" to teach
that we should "NEVER pray about it!" (note: There has been much confusion
among readers of this paragraph as to what I am saying here. See Garry
Friesen's book, Decision Making & the Will of God, Multnomah Press, 1980,
for more information promoting my view and refuting the view I am speaking
against in this paragraph. The "Experiencing God" teachings of Henry Blackaby
can also be considered representative of the teachings I am speaking
against in this paragraph.)
The next major improvement in my understanding of God and His Word came
on around Jan. 1, 1991, when I stopped at Mark 1:14-15, and for the first
time asked the question, "What 'gospel' is this? What 'kingdom' is 'at
hand'?" (I had never looked into the subject of "the kingdom of God" from a
doctrinal/theological level - I was too busy reading the Bible to allow God
to speak to me through the Scriptures to show me his secret wonderful plan
for my life). Luke 21:31 helped me to understand that the kingdom Jesus
preached was His eschatological (Rev.20) kingdom that will be established at
His second coming (note: my kingdom understanding has far developed since
then, culminating in my book, The Doctrine of the Kingdom of God).
A few days later, Steve Fuller just happened to pick Mark 1:14-15 to start
off his "Cosmic Worldview" teaching on his drawing board during our
Monday night home group meeting. He taught us that in this passage,
Jesus said, "the kingdom of God is HERE!" (that's not what my Bible said),
that the power of God was "here" to defeat Satan via Signs & Wonders.
This was the first time I had ever heard this explained like this, and it
stuck out to me like a sore thumb after having JUST understood the passage
a few days before. I was beginning to see a trend here with the Vineyard
holding an obvious bias against Biblical eschatology.
All during this time, from Sept. 1990 - April 1991, I was beginning to
boil over with rage as I realized that on critical issue after critical
issue, the Vineyard et. al. had sorely misled me, in the meantime presuming
to be some sort of (at times intimidating and abusive) spiritual authority
over me. I was greatly offended and did not hesitate to communicate this to
EVERYONE I knew (the US Mail made alot of $$$ off me, as did the local copy
store).
Then one evening (c. 4/9/91), I was sitting in my room and looked across
the room to the latest issue of Equipping the Saints. On the cover was
something like: "Revival Fire". For the first time ever (I was so SLOW to
grasp this!), I realized that this Revival thing was a replacement hope for
the hope of the gospel, a hope so central to the Christian faith according to
the Scriptures; This was nothing short of a scandal, and evidence that the
Vineyard was so completely out of tune with God that He had allowed them to
succumb to this truly warped, demonic cultic eschatological twist on the
Scriptures (this "Revival" thing). The Vineyard was living in pursuit of the
Revival and God's secret will/calling on their life instead of living (simply
doing the Word, abiding in faith, hope, and love) in pursuit of Christ at the
right hand of God and the hope of the resurrection per Paul in Phil 3. I
called my three closest Steve Fuller Vineyard friends to come over so that I
could talk to them about what I was so upset about, and they came over and I
spilled the beans on them. The very next morning, it was me, them, and Steve
Fuller in his home office praying before our first outing to feed the
Hillsdale Ave. poor, and I broke the news (literally erasing his cosmic
worldview on his drawing board and drawing a diagram that compared the race
the Vineyard was running to that of a Christian according to Paul the
Apostle) to Fuller in much intensity and excitement that "the Vineyard is a
cult," to which he responded in a very calm and collected with a smile on his
face way, in front of my friends (two of which I had "led to the Lord" and
encouraged to get involved in Fuller's Vineyard, which two friends have since
realized that I was right about the Vineyard and have left too, praise God),
that I would "be judged" for saying that the Vineyard is a cult ("but in a
way", he also said, "aren't all churches a cult?"), and that I was not
accurately representing the Vineyard he "knew," and that I was hearing what I
wanted to hear.
Intimidated, I quieted down and went to feed the poor, but it was too
late - I was on to Fuller and the Vineyard, and when Fuller called me about
the earlier incident, I told him that I was leaving the Vineyard.
During that same period I had been involved with another Vineyard closer
to downtown San Jose, officially called the San Jose Vineyard at the time. I
decided to stay at this Vineyard for a while longer to find out if I really
had a handle on what the Vineyard really is. This led to a few meetings with
the pastor Chuck Bell following a letter I wrote to him. He acknowledged
that the Vineyard in Southern California was messed up (re issues that Wimber
had since admitted to after the Ernie Gruen incident), that many Vineyard
pastors he knew in the Greater Bay Area had also been upset about it, and
then he lent me George Eldon Ladd's book, Critical Questions About theKingdom of God, telling me (this was the first time I heard this) that
Wimber's views on the kingdom were in line with (and taken from) Ladd. So
now I had found the Ladd-Wimber-Cosmic Worldview connection, further
establishing that the Vineyard I "knew" really was the Vineyard of reality.
So on July 3, 1991, I boldly, and in defiance of their supposed
authority over me and all other Christians, wrote my "I'm leaving" letter to
the Vineyard, explaining in it that the Vineyard's lack of emphasis on "the
hope," their doctrine of the kingdom of God, and their Revival alternative
hope was so disgusting that I couldn't stand anymore to associate with the
Vineyard, nor would I want to continue to attend the Vineyard as if they are
"OK."
A month later I got a hold of Albert James Dager's report on the KC
Prophets and the Vineyard - "finally someone else who knew about what the
Vineyard is really like," I thought. I then read Dave Hunt's book, WhateverHappened to Heaven?, and again, the teachings of the Vineyard and the effects
they had on their eschatological emphases was the same thing Hunt had warned
the Church of back in 1988 in this book. Amazing. I'm not the only one.
One more discovery came long after I left the Vineyard, this one in
April of 1993. Back in Dec. 1992, I had read another book by G.E. Ladd,
called The Gospel of the Kingdom. In April of 1993, I read it again for
research purposes regarding my book on the kingdom of God - this time I saw
something about Ladd that I hadn't previously seen - where's the gospel?
Where is the mention of propitiation, justification, and substitution? Just
a few weeks earlier, a brother in Christ had emphasized to me these
doctrines, which doctrines I had believed and understood all along, but they
weren't emphasized in my mind as being critically (the first thing I would
talk about re why Christ's death saves a believer) important to the doctrine
of the cross. Ladd's emphasis on why Jesus died on the cross was a spiritual
warfare "break the [controlling] power of" Satan, sin, and death "gospel." No
wonder Wimber's original presentation of the gospel in Power Evangelism was
so lacking re "the cross" (but in his Revised Edition, he still didn't teach
the hope of the gospel as being part of the message that is to accompany
signs & wonders - too bad Col. 1:5 & Heb.1:14 - 2:5 are a witness against
him). No wonder I hadn't noticed this about Ladd's book in December 1992 - I
had a Vineyard background, and the Vineyard's typical emphasis re the cross
is that it was a spiritual defeat of Satan (a la Christus Victor),
not a substitutionary work that appeased God's wrath and enabled Him to legally
and righteously justify the sinner from the penalty of breaking God's law
(which penalty is physical death) (although on paper the Vineyard affirms all
this, as did George Ladd in his 1974 work, A Theology of the New Testament).
END OF TESTIMONY OF CARL WIDRIG JR (Hebrews928@juno.com)
The One Hope of the Gospel
