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February 21, 2016

The Convenience of False Believing - Jezebel Edition

By Anthony Wade

Examining the unbiblical stretching of the story of Jezebel.

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And it came to pass, when Joram saw Jehu, that he said, Is it peace, Jehu? And he answered, What peace, so long as the whoredoms of thy mother Jezebel and her witchcrafts are so many? - 2Kings 9: 22 (KJV)

As Christians we often have a tendency to over-Christianize things. To seek overtly spiritual reasons for everyday occurrences. I am sure we see this all the time in church or have been guilty of it ourselves. Far too often the phrase "the Lord showed me" is really just Christo-speak for justifying our own feelings and the desires of our own hearts. It turns out usually to be a pretty good deal for God as everything positive is attributed to a work of the Holy Spirit and everything negative is usually associated with an attack from Satan. Often however it is actually neither. It is just life. This phenomena is what I often refer to as the convenience of false believing. Just as the world encourages a victim mentality, so does the church often times. It is rooted however in taking pious sounding snippets and blowing them up beyond the scope and reality of the Bible.

While this is merely problematic on a personal level it can become dangerous when dealing with false teachers and wannabe prophets. That is because when they apply it with nefarious motives it can result in swaths of Christians being falsely indoctrinated into a belief that is extra-biblical. Once rooted in these false beliefs it can be very difficult to break through with the truth of the Word of God. It is always difficult to admit to oneself that we have been snookered. I remember when writing about the fallacy of "slain in the Spirit" that while liberating to finally know the biblical truth it was embarrassing to have to admit I was wrong for so many years. So it can be as Christendom is littered with extra-biblical teachings and concepts that pollute the body of Christ. That often get our focus off of Jesus Christ. One of these is the notion of the "Jezebel Spirit." Anyone who was raised in charismatic churches has certainly heard this phrase uttered before. The problem is it is often stretched way beyond the parameters of the actual role Jezebel plays in the Bible. Because it is convenient. It is easier to sound deep on a spiritual warfare level than it is to do actual warfare and admit where we are perhaps wrong. So let us reason together and first see who Jezebel actually was.

Jezebel was the daughter of Ethbaal, King of Tyre and Sidon, who was also the priest of the Baal cult. Baal is probably to most infamous of the false gods recorded in the Old Testament. The worship of Baal was known for its lewdness and sensuality. Jezebel would end up marrying the King of Israel, Ahab. There are two main storylines reported in her account that Jezebel is known for. The first is her battles with the Prophet Elijah. When she became Queen, Jezebel turned against all of the true prophets of the Lord and instead set up shrines to worship Baal. Not content with that; she sought to remove all vestiges of Yahweh worship throughout Israel. She ordered all of the prophets of God to be executed. This culminated in the famous encounter on Mount Carmel between Elijah and the 450 prophets of Baal. Even though God slew those 450 prophets, Jezebel was unrepentant and swore she would have Elijah's head.

The second major storyline involved a man named Naboth. He owned a vineyard that Ahab wanted because if its proximity to the palace. Even though the offer was fair, Naboth informed Ahab that the Lord prevented him from selling the vineyard as it was his father's inheritance. This hearkened back to the law given in Leviticus. Ahab was upset and was sulking and whining about it to his wife, so Jezebel resolved the issue by framing the innocent Naboth resulting in the stoning of himself and his sons. Thus the land reverted to the king as property with no legal heir. That is it beloved. These are the two major scriptural stories involving Jezebel. So what can we learn from these stories? What would constitute today a "Jezebel Spirit."

The first thing we must understand is we are not speaking about an actual spirit like we see in many Hollywood depictions. A Jezebel spirit is not a ghost of Jezebel. She is not walking around the halls of your church at night dragging noisy chains behind her. Her spirit refers to the qualities she embodied being allowed in your church or life as Ahab once allowed it in Israel. It is important however to not exceed the Biblical account. Based on the Bible, we can safely conclude that a "Jezebel Spirit" could include some or all of the following:

* A vicious choosing of the falseness of idols over the truth of God; a blind zeal for the false

* A reversal of the God ordained gender roles

* An antagonistic view of true prophecy

* A reckless pursuit of what is evil and wicked to achieve what you want

* A blatant disregard for the laws of God and the Word of God

Beloved these strike me as the main points. There may be sub points but everything else should come back to one of these. When we see mega church prosperity preachers constantly compromising the Word of God to sell temporal riches they are essentially operating in a Jezebel Spirit. The Baal they worship is money. When we continue to see a butchering of the Bible to excuse women taking roles the Bible has clearly said they are not to take, you can argue this stems from a Jezebel Spirit. When false prophecies are widely sought after as they are in the modern Charismatic church, you can refer to this is being influenced by a Jezebel Spirit. I have personally witnessed church members, pastors, and elders pursue their own desires through the most wicked and evil schemes and means possible. The foundations of all of this however is the same thing propping up anything that is anti-Christ and that is a blatant disregard for the laws and Word of God. The new hyper-grace teachings of Joseph Prince actually teach believers to not worry about the Ten Commandments. That you can do anything you want and God will never be angry. All streams of false teaching however flow from a disregard for the Word. That is why there is such a vicious movement underway to pretend unity is more important than doctrine. That discord comes from those who want pure doctrine instead of from those who sow falsely. These are all elements we see in the story of Jezebel. With this as the backdrop, let us examine now how this can be misused.

"The Bible talks about Jezebel and her witchcrafts in 2 Kings 9:22. I believe infirmities are part of Jezebel's witchcrafts. Witchcraft is a spiritual force, one of the powers listed in Ephesians 6, that the enemy uses to attack us." - Jennifer LeClaire

False Prophetess LeClaire has written yet another article for Charisma News, where she serves as an editor. The title is, "Can Jezebel's Witchcraft Really Make You Sick?" It seems that Jennifer became ill six times while writing her first book about Jezebel and since she believes erroneously in on-demand healing from God, she is forced to find a convenient excuse for her apparent lack of faith. Thus this thesis statement, which we must now examine in the light of Scripture to see how much is the Bible and how much is Jennifer. Firstly the Bible does mention the witchcrafts of Jezebel in the verse she references, which is also our key verse for today. It does not however "talk about" these witchcrafts. It merely references a statement from Jehu about the idolatrous stranglehold Jezebel still held over Israel. Here is the note from Gill's Exposition of the Bible:

so long as the whoredoms of thy mother Jezebel and her witchcrafts are so many? which may be understood both literally of corporeal whoredom, and diabolical arts she was addicted to, and figuratively of idolatry, often called whoredom in Scripture, and of the wicked arts and methods she made use of to inveigle and entice persons into it; and both these very often went together; see Nahum 3:4 and of which Joram was guilty, at least in part; he connived at all in her, and did not attempt to restrain her, and therefore had no claim to peace, protection, and safety. - Gill

The Pulpit Commentary agrees and states that the whoredoms are a direct reference to idolatries with no less than 11 cross references. The witchcrafts referenced is probably speaking to the magical arts practiced in the day by many foreign countries including where Jezebel originated from, Phoenicia. Such practices were forbidden in Levitical law yet were spread throughout Israel by Jezebel. But note the key portion of LeClaire's statement here is not based on Scripture but rather on how she feels. She feels that infirmities are part of Jezebel's witchcraft? Well that is great for experiential Christians I suppose but there is not a single verse in the story of Jezebel that actually reveals this. She tries to further buttress her unscriptural feeling by claiming that Ephesians 6 actually lists the powers that Satan uses against us and that witchcraft is one of them. The only problem is Ephesians 6 says no such thing. There is no list of Satanic weapons used against us at all. It talks about spiritual wickedness in high places but there is no list as she claims. So what we have is the typical convenient manner in which someone who traffics in the false for a living leverages some pious sounding rhetoric, throws in some lofty spiritual basis for it but when you peel back the layers you find there is little to no scriptural basis for even the premise. The first verse she references mentions the word witchcraft. She parlays that into supporting a feeling she has and then tries to "biblify" it by flat out misrepresenting an entire chapter of the Bible. Probably hoping the readers would just take her at her word and not do the work of a Berean and actually read Ephesians 6. Here is how LeClaire tries to justify her apparent lack of faith that led to so much illness:

"The Holy Spirit showed me that many times witchcraft against your mind can cause you to focus so much on the symptoms attacking your body that you can't extend your faith to receive God's healing power. In other words, if you aren't careful, when witchcraft attacks your mind you will wind up speaking and thinking about the infirmity rather than speaking and thinking about your healing, allowing the enemy to maintain the stronghold." - Jennifer LeClaire

Beloved watch very carefully how the convenient false believing mind operates in this statement. It usually starts with a declaration of divine revelation because that cannot be questioned without appearing to question God. We see this throughout the world of false teachers, preachers, and prophets. The Lord Told me. The Holy Spirit showed me. When Mark Driscoll wanted to avoid being properly disciplined for the debacle at Mars Hill Church in Seattle he claimed the God audibly spoke to both him and his wife that the discipline plan was a "trap" and that he was "released." What utter nonsense. Just as nonsensical as this statement from LeClaire. I have no doubt that a spirit showed this to her but it wasn't the Holy Spirit. How can we be so sure? Well here are the claims of what the Holy Spirit showed her:

* That witchcraft can attack your mind to get you to focus on symptoms

* That by focusing on symptoms you cannot extend your faith

* That without extending your faith, you cannot receive God's healing power

* That the illness is a stronghold of the devil

Wow, that sure sounds super-spiritual. The only problem is none of it is actually found in the Bible. None of it. So why in the world should we believe the Holy Spirit showed her things that are not in the Bible? What these are however, are the foundational teaching LeClaire believes in regarding healing. The same false beliefs shared by Bill Johnson, Mike Bickle, and countless other false teachers and prophets. The false teaching is that God always wants to heal you so therefore if you are not healed it is because you have done something wrong to block "receiving it." Can satanic forces affect our health? Sure but to automatically assume that every time you are sick that is a stronghold of the devil is absurd. Illness came in to the world through Adam's fall, not Satan. LeClaire however was far from done as she accused Queen Jezebel of "releasing word curses" that lead to depression and fear and used Elijah as an example. This of course is after the victory on Mount Carmel we spoke about earlier. Jezebel was less than pleased:

Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, "So may the gods do to me and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by this time tomorrow." Then he was afraid, and he arose and ran for his life and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there. - 1Kings 19: 2-3 (ESV)

So was Elijah afraid? Absolutely. Was he depressed? So much so that he asked Lord to take his life. The sleight of hand Jennifer LeClaire employs here is in claiming this was a "released word curse." That is not supported anywhere in the text. Jezebel threatened to kill Elijah. He was well aware how many prophets of Yahweh she had already killed. He was afraid naturally and fled into the wilderness where he was overwhelmed. In his discourse with God you can sense Elijah's weariness and loneliness. This was not a word curse. That is not only conjecture on LeClaire's part but it is silly conjecture designed to continue to over spiritualize instead of trying to actually hear what God has to say through His Word. But LeClaire is not interested in what God has to say. She had an agenda this entire time. She wanted to excuse why she was sick so much when she espouses healing on demand. She also wanted to attack her critics, something of a habit for Jennifer. So what better way than to blame her own illnesses on those who would dare speak against her. But how to do that? Simple. Lay the false foundation of the "released word curses."

I believe people can release witchcraft word curses against you. I more than believe it, I know it because my inbox is full of them every week. People curse me, my family, my ministry and more with the wicked words of their mouth--most of the times these are Christians. - Jennifer LeClaire

Once again, her basis is her personal beliefs, which is all this article has been from the start. It is completely unscriptural. She had two problems. One is her propensity for illness when she claims true believers should never be ill because God guarantees healing every time. The second is she doesn't like being called out for the false prophetess she clearly is. In one article she kills both with one stone. One large unbiblical stone. She conjures up the Jezebel Spirit to do her bidding. It wasn't her lack of faith that caused all of her illness because she believes infirmities are part of witchcraft! How convenient. Who is causing all of this sickness? Who is speaking these word curses over her life? Well it must be those mean critics of hers. Always pointing out her sheer lunacy, prophecies that never came through, or that fact that she cannot properly handle the Word of God. Oh and do not lose sight that lurking in the background of this article is the fact that she has written no less than 3 books on Jezebel, including her latest work. How do I know this? Because she offered a link in the article for people to buy it. You see Jennifer has a lot invested in Jezebel. It seems to cause her to operate with a blind zeal for the false. An utter disdain for the Word of God and true prophecy. A reckless pursuit of what is wicked to achieve her ends. There's a term for that I seem to remember"oh yeah; the Jezebel Spirit.

Reverend Anthony Wade - February 21, 2016



Authors Bio:
Credentialed Minister of the Gospel for the Assemblies of God. Owner and founder of 828 ministries. Vice President for Goodwill Industries. Always remember that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.

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