Evangelist Todd White is pushing back on claims that he repented for not preaching the full gospel and is now newly saved, declaring that he’s been taken out of context and that his critics are sinning in doing so.
White made headlines last week when he preached a sermon and declared that he repented of not preaching the full gospel, with comments like “I feel like I just met Jesus” leading his critics to hope that the known heretic had changed his ways, become saved, and would bear fruit in keeping with repentance. We wrote about this extensively here, here and here, and made the case that if White was repentant and, then like Zacheus there are a few things he would have to do to demonstrate it before we would consider him a brother in the Lord.
He must get out of the ministry, stop preaching (as babes in Christ should not preach), repent of intentionally fooling the masses by knowingly false magic tricks carefully learned and practiced over many years, clarify that not only did he not teach the “full gospel” but that the one previously taught was a false gospel, and if monetary restitution is not possible or practically feasible, then theological restitutions are in order, with Todd doing everything possible to lead those people out of the charismaticism he brought them into.
This has not happened. Rather, Todd clarified his remarks and he is quite discouraging. Here are a few comments he made during yesterday’s service, starting off with assuring people that he didn’t get just saved, but rather has been saved for over 16 years, pointing to his life of holiness after his salvation of evidence of his salvation all those years ago.
Last week I shared in my heart ‘I repent for not preaching the full gospel.’ If any of you think that you know it all about the Gospel, you’re deceived. I don’t care who you are, I don’t care what theologian you are. I don’t care if you’re a doctor of theology, if you’ve got your masters of divinity if you think you know it all, I’m sorry you’re wrong. I have stepped into a new awareness of why I’m really here. I feel like I just got saved. I feel like I’ve just met Jesus. The truth is, if I didn’t meet Jesus when I got saved, I would have continued in sin.
Many thought that the change to Todd was due to newly being exposed to Whitfield, Spurgeon, and Comfort, but it turns out that he’s been reading them for years, and yet has still engaged in his shenanigans. He also mentions Dr. Michael Brown, a decidedly poor resource, and yet Brown will be speaking at White’s Chuch on August 16th. Birds of a feather.
I used an example last week of Ray Comfort’s book . I have read Ray Comfort since I’ve gotten born again. I love his stuff. I’ve read Spurgeon since I got saved. I mention it one time and people are like ‘now he’s reading the right stuff.’ I got news for you. I love them. Andrew Murray is one of my favorite authors in the whole world. I love those. You know who else is a great author? Dr. Michael Brown.
Todd then rips into the movie American Gospel, criticizing the makers for not coming to him directly to asking what he believes, despite there being more than a decade of public content and videos out in the world detailing what he believes. It is clear, at this point, that he doesn’t get it.
There are a lot of people out there that have believe that I’m deceived. Thank you for praying for me. I need it. I need prayer. To say that someone’s wrong and to not get on your face and cry out for their soul. Because if I’m deceived, and you’re not crying out for me, and you say that you love God you’re a liar, because you actually hate me.
If I’m going to tell you that somebody’s deceived, but I’m not going to be one to go on my knees and be (unintelligible) Christ like Jesus did, and cry out for them like to see the truth, then I’m not a Christian. I don’t love them, I love my opinion.
I am overtaken with gratitude for people that have prayed for me, and have said “man, he’s going off.” They made a movie, called the American Gospel, about me. None of them called me to talk to me, not one of them asked me to share my heart, not one of them asked me what I believe. They assumed and put me into a place of guilt because of association and friends like Bill Johnson or Kenneth Copeland. Now all of a sudden Todd’s the biggest heretic on the planet. Or Benny Hinn.
Shame on you for not praying for me and talking to me, but making a movie thinking that you’re God’s police. You’re going to stand before a holy God and answer for your life of judgment and hate and it’s called murder. It’s no different than racism. It’s the same thing It’s called no love. You have no love. If you think that being God’s police officer is love, you’re wrong, because you haven’t prayed with the human tears.
White further clarifies what he meant by repenting of the full gospel.
Jesus is the way. The gospel is the way. When I say I haven’t preached the full gospel, it just means that God has taken me to a depth of his heart that I have not yet seen and I want to see more people come to Christ. I mean in our school at LCU, ‘Todd white repents’ is all over the internet. Well here’s the crazy thing. Like this isn’t justification, I’m telling you what’s out there. Like we should all want to be repentant. Repentance isn’t the days you get saved only. If something’s wrong you repent.
And then fires back at his critics, claiming to be misunderstood and having his viewpoints unfairly characterized, which is sin on the part of the accuser.
There has to be this behemoth desire inside of me to bless those who persecute me and pray for those, who despitefully use me, like despitefully use my name, and say ‘he’s this and he’s that’, without even listening, that’s dangerous. That’s called presumption, an presumption is one of the greatest sins on the planet.
Todd spends the rest of the sermon giving a pentecostal apologetic on the validity of miracles and healing ministry.
So there you have it. From the looks of things, Todd White has repented of presenting the gospel in the wrong way, but has not repented for his plethora of false teaching and false miracles, or shown that he understands the crux of the theological grievances people have.
We have heard that the makers of the American Gospel are still in contact with him and trying to reach out to him further, but it appears that he’s dug in deep. It’s only been a week since his message and we’ll see how this goes, but at this point it seems that from his perspective, the ones who should be doing the most repenting are his critics.
