Joyce Meyer, who lives in a four-million-dollar family compound and famously has a $23k gold toilet, claims that she has the faith that can raise the dead, and you can, too.
Meyer holds to “Little god Theology,” which purports that people are sparks of the divine – a perverted twist on the orthodox understanding of the Imago Dei – and can do everything God does. They argue that Jesus’ miracles were done not by his divinity, but by his faith. If you have faith like Jesus, then you can do the things Jesus did. This unbiblical notion is illustrated by Meyer’s last article in Charisma Mag.
Writing for Charisma Mag, Meyer recalled the account of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead. She goes on to posit that with faith, you too can raise the dead.
When you release your faith, you take some kind of action that shows you believe God will do what He says He will do. You line up your attitudes and actions with God’s promises for you, according to His Word, and hold on to those truths when life gets tough. That’s what Jesus was asking the people to do when He told them to roll away the stone from Lazarus’ grave.
The post at Charisma News was entitled, “How to Walk in the Kind of Faith that Raises the Dead.”
Of course, the Bible never tells us to “release faith.” This would imply that faith is innate with an individual (which is what Pelagians like Meyer believe). Faith, however, is a gift given by God (Ephesians 2:8-9). Lost people don’t have to activate faith, and there is no such thing as unused faith or potential faith or dormant faith. Faith, by definition, is active.
Likewise, Jesus didn’t accomplish miracles because he had faith. Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen. Jesus, being the pre-incarnate Son of God, co-eternal with God the Father, had seen. Jesus accomplished miracles by his divinity and not by faith. Meyer and other practitioners of Little god Theology, however, teach a “Kenotic Christ,” that Jesus emptied himself of all divinity when he took on flesh. This is a heresy that goes back (at least) to 19th Century German theologian, Gottfried Thomasius.
The reason why Little god Theologians “decree and declare” miracles all the time is they truly believe they can do the miracles Christ did because he was no more god than they are, and they are no less God than he is.
In reality, no one has risen the dead since the Apostles walked the earth. There is not a scintilla of evidence that anyone has, anywhere, at any time, raise a corpse back to life after the close of the holy canon. Joyce Meyer may claim to have the faith that can raise the dead, but she has never raised the dead and never will.
Faith given to you by God will save you, but it will not make you God.
