EP04 | How to Spot NAR Part 2 ![rw-book-cover](https://img.youtube.com/vi/0jF1Js6PYFE/maxresdefault.jpg) 🔗 **Source:** [EP04 | How to Spot NAR Part 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0jF1Js6PYFE) This is part two of my two-part series on how to spot NAR. If you haven't yet listened to part one, be sure to check it out. In it, I explain the teachings of the so-called apostles of today's new apostolic reformation movement and how these leaders in this movement claim to have extraordinary authority. An authority that's greater even than the authority of the Bible's prophets and apostles. So that includes the authority to give revelations to the global church and even to govern societal institutions. Now after having listened to the first part in this series, you may have recognized that someone you know or even your church has gotten caught up in this movement or you may recognize that after listening today's uh episode. If that's the case and you would like advice on how to respond, then read my co-authored book, Counterfeit Kingdom, where my co-author, Doug Gy, and I offer very specific, very practical advice on how to address the various situations uh that can arise when you encounter NAR. Now that I've explained many of the teachings of this movement, I want to talk about practices in this movement. These are also clues that a church or an organization or a book is part of NAR or promoting NAR. These practices include things like activation of spiritual gifts. The this is this is based on the I well what I already explained is there's a teaching that every Christian is supposed to work miracles, heal the sick, prophesy, raise the dead. And so what will happen is people in this movement will take part in what are called activation exercises. And these are exercises where people are taught how to prophesy, that type of thing, or or learn to work miracles. And there are actually entire schools of supernatural ministry uh such as Bethl School of Supernatural Ministry at Bethl Church where people will enroll to learn how to become miracle workers. And so for example, I visited uh Bethl church in Reading, California some years back now. I talk about this in our book. I tell the whole story in our book Counterfeit Kingdom. But the day I went, I went to the adult Sunday school class and that day they were teaching people how to prophesy and or they were activating people uh in a prophetic gift. And so the way they would do this would they they would ask people in the room if you've never prophesied before but you would like to begin prophesying. They would have these people come to the front of the room and like one at a time and one person would would come to the front of the room and they were basically told to pick someone they didn't know in the in the audience who was in the room and to just say whatever popped into their head as a prophetic word for that person. And they weren't people were told don't filter your thoughts just say whatever pops into your head as long as it's positive and encouraging then then just say it. And so this is an example of a type of prophetic activation exercise that is used to activate people uh into prophesying or into uh using a prophetic gift. Impartation is another practice to look for in this movement. It's believed that apostles and prophets can impart their miraculous gifts to others by like laying their hands on that person or that type of thing. And so the practice of impartation, 24/7 prayer rooms is another practice to look out for. Many churches and organizations that are part of this movement will have a 24/7 prayer room. And often these 24/7 prayer rooms are patterned after the 24/7 prayer room at the International House of Prayer in Kansas City, Missouri, also known as IHOP KC. That place has been embroiled recently in scandal and and Mike Bickl there and all that's come to light with uh allegations of of sexual abuse of women and abusing his prophetic gift to sexually abuse women and and that kind of thing is is I won't get into all that right now, but the International House of Prayer in Kansas City, Missouri really has popularized these 24/7 prayer rooms where prayer will continue non-stop around the clock 24 hours a day, seven days a week, people will sign up to take shifts praying so that the prayer will never stop. You know, the prayer that's going on in these prayer rooms is not just like Christians praying and asking God, will he do things if it's God's will. It's no it's actually prayer declarations are are a focus of these prayer rooms where it's this nar another nar practice where people will see will decree and declare that God will do this or God will do that because in nar is taught that every Christian believer has the authority through their spoken words to declare that someone will be healed of a sickness or declare prosperity or something like that to so that's what's happening in these 24/7 prayer rooms is is these kind of prayer declarations and decrees and there's a lot of a lot of the nar teachings I already talked about like teachings about the end time revival and things like that they undergur the prayer rooms these these prayer rooms like the ones at IHOP Casey were really focused on bringing about this great end time revival and doing it through making prayer declarations so so that those teachings and practic practices lie a lot behind these 24/7 prayer rooms. So, that's something to look out for. I want to be very clear that I'm not saying that every 24/7 prayer room is NAR. I've been accused of that of of saying that if somebody if a church has a 24/7 prayer room, that means it's NAR. I want to be very clear that's not what I'm saying. But people need to beware aware that probably more often than not um I would say more often than not if there is a 247 prayer room it is most likely associated with a church that is part of NAR and is and it will often have been inspired by by IHOP KC which is in our organization. So something to look out for. Also healing rooms. In addition to prayer rooms, you have healing rooms. And these are rooms that are set up often in like shopping centers or someplace in the community. And people can come to receive healing if they're having sickness or mental problems or or financial problems or any kind of problems. They can come to receive healing. And you might think, well, what's wrong with that? It's good to pray and ask God to heal someone of a sickness or you but that's not what's going on here. Again, what's going on in these healing rooms usually is that the the people in these rooms leading are making prayer declarations. They're decreeing and declaring that God will heal someone of a sickness or or heal them of their addiction or or um whatever is going on, whatever problems they're having. And many of these healing rooms are associated with the healing rooms ministries based in Spokane, Washington under uh the leadership of the apostle Cal Pierce who used to be at Bethl Church in Reading and then came out of there and now leads this organization. So that's something to be aware of with healing rooms that they're generally nar another practice I I kind of mentioned this earlier but strategic level spiritual warfare there is a belief that there are these highranking demonic principalities that are ruling over cities and nations and that basically these these demons these high-ranking demons need to be cast out. They would say these demons are even ruling over societal institutions like media and government and education and these all these institutions and they would say that the church has to cast out these high-ranking demons. They need to identify these demons, cast them out and that's the only way that that the gospel can go forth with effectiveness and the church can take dominion of the earth. And so there are a lot of practices related to strategic level spiritual warfare. Prayer walking is one very common one. Again, I want to be very clear. Just because a church is holding a prayer walk or if you've taken part in a prayer walk or you do prayer walking, I'm not saying that makes you nar. I'm not saying prayer walking is always nar. But within the new apostolic reformation movement, they often will do prayer walks. And what happens is teams of people will go to a certain city or region or maybe like a um town hall uh center in a city or something like that and they might they'll pray and seek to cast out these high-ranking demons they believe are you know the demon they believe is ruling over that particular town or that particular city by through their prayers directly confronting that demon and then also taking part in often they'll take part in prophetic acts while they're doing prayer walks. For example, people in this movement might um bury the communion elements like bread and wine or they might pour anointing oil around the perimeter of a city hall building or something like that. They often will go to some location within a city that they think is strategic that where they think that a demon has maybe um based its seat of power and and seek to cast out that demon. and through prayer walking, through prophetic acts, through these practices related to strategic level spiritual warfare. And then the idea is is that then then they can you know proceed to take dominion once the the demon that has been holding that back has been dealt with. So something to be aware of. Soo is another well-known practice in this movement. It's soo o zo. It uh has been popularized by Bethl Church and these are the inner healing and deliverance min it's like an inner healing and deliverance ministry. So people will sign up to take part in these inner healing and deliverance sessions and during these sessions a prophetically trained minister will will lead a person in helping them identify maybe like the root issues that are causing problems in their life. So, someone's struggling with addiction or marriage problems or psychological problems or some besetting sin that they just can't seem to overcome, something like that. They'll sign up for these sessions and then this prophetically trained person will help them to prophetically uncover what is causing their problems, whether it's a demon or maybe they haven't dealt with some kind of unforgiveness in their life or maybe they were abused as a child and they don't remember that. And so that's something to be aware of is is people who've taken part in these soo sessions have claimed to recover memories, recall memories that they had forgotten that like their parents had abused them. And so this is there there are parents who said that their children their adult children have broken off communication with them after their children took part in these soo sess sessions because the child suddenly claimed to recall these memories that the father or mother had abused them and the parents will say that's not true that never happened. Um but this this idea that memories can be recovered. Um this is very controversial. Respected psychological organizations don't take part in this recovered memory therapy. Um and they they actually warn people not to take part in it because they say that false memories can be recovered. But but this is something that people who've taken part in Soozo say is has been included in these Soozo sessions. and other churches have started their own Soozo ministries often in affiliation with the Soozo ministry at Bethl Church or or patterned after it. Another practice to be aware of that's uh very popular in NAR is the practice of making fire tunnels. So, at a fire tunnel, it might happen like at a church meeting where what they'll do is they'll have the people in the congregation uh come up and form two lines and then people can run through the middle of the line and while the people in the lines might pray or or you know lay their hands on them or something like that or and the people that run through the lines claim to have that they have encounters with the Holy Spirit when they run when run through those lines. So that's fire tunnels. Prophetic evangelism is a is another very well-known or very popular practice in this movement. It's it's at Bethl Reading at Bethl Church in Reading. They refer to prophetic evangelism their their type of it they do as treasure hunting. But this is the idea that when people will go a group of people like maybe a group a team of three to five people or something will go will go out into the community. They might go to like a shopping mall or a park or grocery store or something like that and they'll look for people to go up to and to give prophetic words to or to pray for their healing. And Bethl at Bethl Church, the way they practice is the reason they call it treasure hunting is they'll is the teams will pray and ask God to lead them to people whom they refer to as treasures. And then and they'll pray and ask God to give them clues before they go out to the shopping center or wherever. They'll they'll ask God to reveal them to them clues about what to look for so they can identify the people they're supposed to approach. So, for example, they might pray and believe God showed them that they should look for someone who's wearing like a red sweatshirt, maybe someone who's walking on crutches and somebody who's has a hat on. And so they'll go to like a shopping center and look for someone who has a red sweatshirt and is walking on crutches and is wearing some type of hat. And then they'll go up to that person and show them their treasure map and and the clues that they had written on it and say that, you know, God God wanted us to come talk to you is can we pray for your healing or we have a message for you that God has given us to give to you. And they see this as a form of evangelism. So prophetic evangelism is something to watch out for. Another practice to watch out for is known as soaking prayer or soaking worship. And this is where people in this movement will will take part in extended times of prayer and worship often while listening to what's called soaking music. And there's actually special soaking music that people in this movement make and sell. And it's all it's designed to help people have personal encounters uh direct encounters with the Holy Spirit while they're taking part in these soaking sessions. So that's something to watch out for. Another thing that's really emphasized in this movement is dream interpretation. Um, so there are books written, there are courses you can take and pay for and enroll in where leaders in this movement will teach you how to interpret your dreams and to see the messages God might be trying to give to you through your dreams. And and then the final one I'm going to talk about, there are other practices, but these are are some of the major ones that will be clues to look for, is if you run across teachings, books, courses that promise to teach you how to have encounters with angels. That's another big emphasis in this movement. So there are there are people in this movement will claim like during their church services, you know, that maybe they see angels in the service or they can hear angels singing. Sometimes they'll claim that angel feathers have dropped down like from the rafters of the church and but people will seek to to have encounters with with angels in this movement. So that is another practice to watch out for. I've already given you teachings and practices to look out for that are clues that a church or an organization is NAR. But another really important thing to look out for is terminology. NAR terminology. And the reason I say this is a lot of times your first clue that something is NAR will be in the terminology. The teachings are not always stated outright. euphemisms are used or the teachings might might be given more in smaller group meetings or in the books and things like that and they may the the more extreme teachings may not be as overt at the main um Sunday services for example at a church and so because of this the terminology is really important to know and of course so I'm going to give you just a list of a lot of terminology to look out for for example apostles prophets. If you hear reference to apostles and prophets a lot or the adjectives apostolic and prophetic. So, for example, they'll say, you know, that that church is really prophetic or that person is really prophetic or or that's that church is apostolic. These are clues to look out for. Pentecostals and charismatics do talk about apostles and prophets, but they don't define them the same way people in NAR do. an an apostle for a Pentecostal or charismatic may just be a like really effective missionary or church planner. And a prophet is someone who may have the spiritual gift of prophecy, but they don't claim to hold an authoritative office. And so, but churches that really talk a lot about apostles and prophets, that's a clue, definite clue that it may be NAR. And so, that's something to pay attention to. If you heard hear the term spiritual fathers or spiritual mothers, um this is a euphemism. It often refers to leaders who claim to be apostles or prophets, but but they know it's controversial to call themselves an apostle or prophet. And so instead, they'll be referred to as like a spiritual father or a spiritual mother because that doesn't sound so controversial. It sounds nicer and softer. Another euphemism is spiritual covering which is narcode for the blessings. So that's like the finances, the good health, the success and also the protection. So that would be like protection from demons that allegedly come to a believer who is aligned with or submitted to the authority of an anointed church leader. Note that anointed is another nar buzz word that refers to is often used to like refer to a church leader who is believed to have special miraculous powers from the Holy Spirit. Now the highest level of spiritual covering in NAR is provided by an an apostle and is known as an apostolic covering. So if somebody wants to receive the most blessings and protection, then that would mean they need to come under the spiritual covering or essentially they need to uh submit to an apostle in this movement. Activate is something I already mentioned. They're they're teach that's a buzz word to look for because of their teachings about activating spiritual gifts. The billion soul harvest that I talked about that's that's terminology to look out for. The seven mountain mandate is one I haven't mentioned yet, but that's a terminology to look out for. Um, I kind of alluded to this earlier when I when I talked about strategic level spiritual warfare. And in in our prophets have prophesied that the way the church will take dominion of the earth is by taking control of the seven major societal institutions like government, education, um media, the major the major societal institutions. And so this teaching is often referred to as the seven mountain mandate or sometimes they'll they'll refer to the seven spheres of influence or seven cultural spheres. But that's a clue uh that something is nar. If you hear reference to God's manifest presence, that's terminology to watch out for. There are a lot of teachings in this movement that God's presence will be manifested at especially at certain locations like like Bethl Church in Reading or or different NAR churches where they claim to host the presence. That's NAR terminology. And they would claim that God's presence especially manifests in those places which can be seen by the amount of miracles they claim are occurring at that location or the amount of supernatural experiences people claim to be having like like glory clouds glittery glory clouds are appearing and angel feathers are falling and that kind of thing. If you hear reference to a supernatural school of ministry, that's that's our terminology to watch out for related to that. The phrases naturally supernatural or if they talk about leading a naturally supernatural lifestyle or if they referred to normal Christianity, these are phrases that are often used by NAR leaders to refer to teachings that every Christian is supposed to be working miracles in their everyday life. They're supposed to be prophesying and healing the sick and raising the dead just normally a part of their everyday life. It should be part of their quote normal Christianity. Decree and declare I already mentioned that's how they um pray how they've redefined uh prayer in this movement. Related to that is is talk of binding and loosing. So if you hear talk of binding and loosing, that that refers to their belief that they can like bind demons through their prayers or or bind um bad things and they can loose God's blessings. They can lose finances or they can lose healing through their their decrees and declarations. Awakening is a is an buzz phrase or buzz word to look out for. Um they talk a lot about there being a coming spiritual awakening where people will be you know awakened to the basically the truth of all of these teachings and practices and and um end time revival will finally happen and come. Open heavens is a nar buzzphrase to watch out for. This is the idea that over certain churches or certain regions there is this open heavens. There's this place where angels can descend. um and you know go up and down between heaven and earth. And if a church is said to be under an open heavens, they believe that like the people at that church will have more miraculous encounter encounters. They there will be more people who receive physical healing in there, that kind of thing. And you sometimes will hear this phrase open heavens in music that's coming out of NAR churches. That's that's a phrase to look out for. In fact, I I should mention that a lot of this terminology will show up in music that's being produced by NAR churches um like Bethl Church or actually a lot of the music coming out of Hill Song is heavily NAR influence. So you can uh look for this kind of NAR terminology or these buzzwords or or even elevation music. Elevation music is is show signs of NAR influence, you know, and you can look out for the the teachings and and in and the terminology to show up in its music as well. And there's other NAR music as well. So So if you see this terminology or you hear this see it in the lyrics, this this will be a clue that this music is NAR influenced. Often you can see the terminology as well in the names of churches. So for example, there are churches named Open Heaven's Church, Gateway Church. gateway is is our terminology. It's often refers to like like the idea of there being an open heavens or this gateway for the supernatural between heaven and earth that's that's maybe located at a certain church. Greater works church um there's in NAR there's a heavy emphasis on a teaching known as the greater works teaching that that um end times Christians will be able to perform greater miracles than even Jesus worked. So, Greater Works Church, activate church is is the name of Anar Church. Um, so, so just look for this terminology on church website. Listen for it. You know, you'll see it in books or on memes or Facebook posts, things like that. It's good to realize that shifting terminology may be your first clue that a church is starting to go nar. For example, um someone shared with me, she lived in a town in California where Highway 99 ran through this town and there was a sign along Highway 99 that a church had put up. It was like a billboard and this sign said Jesus saves. And from what I understand, this this Jesus saves billboard had been up for a long time in this particular town. According to uh this woman who shared the story with me, she said that the the local Christians really liked the sign. They would take, you know, encouragement from having this sign up in their town when they would see this Jesus saves signs and this encouraging message. But then she noticed that the sign changed at one point. The sign changed, this billboard changed from having the words Jesus saves on it to having the the phrase bringing heaven to earth on it. Well, I already explained that bringing heaven to earth is a NAR teaching. It's also a NAR buzzphrase. Bethl church, a lot of NAR churches talk a lot about bringing heaven to earth. This uh language even shows up in NAR music a lot. And so the sign shifted from a Jesus saves billboard to the same church now having a billboard, but they changed it to say bringing heaven to earth. And this this this showed a shift in terminology that showed that this church had had moved in a nar. And um you may notice subtle shifts in language. When a church is starting to go NAR or if you have a friend who's who's starting to to go NAR, you may notice at first and they're changing language. I was told by someone else about um a young person who had went off to WWAM, youth with a mission. For those who don't know, Youth with a Mission is a very large missions organization that college age students often will will join up with and they'll do, you know, like a gap year kind of thing or they'll go on mission trips with with YWAM and and go through their disciplehip program. And um this particular young person that had gone to WWAM then came back to their home church. Um and this this home church is not in our church. is just a a a more traditional church. And this young person was talking and they they referred to the home church that they were coming back to visit as this house house. And so they talked about, oh, you know, oh well, this house has this and that house over there, referring to another church has that. And um so in Nar they often refer to their churches as houses. And I think the reason that's probably done is because as I already explained the the apostles and prophets in this movement will refer to themselves as spiritual fathers and mothers. They refer to their followers as their spiritual sons and daughters. I'm thinking that maybe this language of house is to kind of kind of incorporates those teachings that each church is kind of its own house with its own spiritual fathers and mothers and and that kind of thing. But but this person who was sharing the story with me took note that they just thought it was a little peculiar uh way to refer to a church as a house and and they noted that that young person hadn't talked that way before they left for YWAM. For those who don't know, YWWAM is heavily influenced by NAR, the NAR movement. I've actually written a a series of articles on my blog at hollypivic.com. If you do a search, you can find those articles there. And I will try to include a link as well in the show notes so you can go check out those articles for yourself. So just be alert to terminology and and when you hear this terminology, just take note of it and and maybe dig a little deeper to see if what you're actually dealing with is actually NAR. So I've shared with you a number of teachings, practices, and terms that will give you a clue whether someone or or something or some organization is NAR. It's important to realize that many people, many churches that are part of the NAR movement will not say they're part of the NAR movement. They may actually deny they're part of this movement because it's so controversial or they may not know the term NAR um as a label for they may not even really realize they're part of a movement. They just know that their church teaches about apostles and prophets and and has these beliefs. So, that's really important to know. But just because someone doesn't know they're part of NAR or they deny it, doesn't mean they're not part of it. If they hold to the core teachings about apostles and prophets and and governing apostles and prophets and and those teachings, related teachings and practices. Thank you very much for listening today and I hope that was helpful. [Music], EP04 | How to Spot NAR Part 2, YouTube, 01kqzezfgxhrd5382f7f5sx33x.