embraced “another gospel” of nutritional and medical misinformation, error and quackery, occult practices and New Age teaching, all under the banner of “God’s provision.”
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However, God is a God of truth. The Apostle John wrote “No lie is of the truth” (I John 2:21b). The Psalmist stated “All His (the LORD’S) works are done in truth” (Psalm 33:4b). If healing systems are based on misinformation or occultism, they are not “from God.”
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God’s desire for the spiritual purity of His people in the Old Testament has not changed. Christians are called to truth because God calls them to Himself. But spiritual integrity cannot exist together with intellectual dishonesty. Christians are in a precarious position, spiritually, when they become so desensitized that trite, trivial and erroneous use of scripture to promote products and practices goes unnoticed, unchallenged. And the danger may even include their physical health as well. If Christians don’t examine the way the Word of God is being used, how well are they examining their other sources of information? If Scripture is misrepresented, what other information is also being misrepresented?
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Christians who avoid examining, or accede to, the rampant misuse of Scripture cannot claim to “love the truth” and should plan on being deceived (2 Thessalonians 2:10-11). When alternative practices find their way into a church or Christian community, false teaching almost always comes in the same package. A faction will take root and grow. Their once biblical world view will shift to include misinformation and occultism - where subjective experience becomes the basis for all decision making. When remonstrance is offered, even though appropriately and biblically, the practitioners (and some clients) will often choose to leave a church rather than give up their false beliefs. The body of Christ is dismembered.
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How Does This Happen?
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Desperate Christians with serious or chronic illnesses may be tempted to try questionable alternative practices. Highly conscientious people who want to feel they are doing everything they can to be more useful to God may also be attracted. Disappointment with physicians, impersonal care, or human error may send some people to the doors of an unconventional practitioner. The equation of scientifically based medicine with “the world system” leads some to reject the medicine as being ungodly. The view that “natural” equals good that is from God may attract some folks. The need to be in control of what is happening with their health leads some to simpler explanations and treatments which involve them more.
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A recent series in the Kansas City Star (October 20-22, 1996) on the Amish, alternative health, and huckstering, gives some additional insight into how Christians are influenced to use such practices. A traveling “nutritional consultant” who moves among Amish communities with his phoney blood tests and microscope was interviewed. “Ich kann schvetza vie sie dien” he tells
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