Jenn Johnson's Horrid Bethel Defense  🔗 **Source:** [Jenn Johnson's Horrid Bethel Defense](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDAfiS7nUXg&t=167s) And this brings up another article that came out not too long ago and I forgot all about this. I didn't have time to cover this when we did this. Jen Johnson gets out and basically tries to say that Bethel leaders are trustworthy. And they quote saying here, "Bethel is a is big and messy and has trustworthy leaders." Obviously, that's not the case, Jen Johnson. Jen Johnson, if you don't remember, is the same woman who tried to compare the Holy Spirit to the genie from Aladdin, saying that he's blue and all these other things and whatnot. It's Uh really, really sad. Let's just read this part here. So, worship pastor and singer Jen Johnson, president of Bethel Music, answered tough questions this week about the organization of Bethel Church and the charismatic congregation led by her father-in-law Bill Johnson. Uh Worship Ministry Training founder, blah blah blah blah blah, asked Jen to address concerns that some worship leaders have about using Bethel songs because Bethel, obviously, is getting a lot of backlash from this. People don't want to play their songs anymore because they're starting to wake up, which is a good thing. Which is a good thing. Today, April 10th, Jen Johnson released her single "Mad at God." It stems from raw feelings following the 2022 death of her mother-in-law, Beni Johnson. Uh this week, Jen Johnson, 43, also announced that her first solo project, Happy, comes out on May 22nd. This brings up another thing, especially with the whole, you know, word of faith and the crazy part of the charismatics and what they teach at Bethel. They believe in healing. They believe it is God's will to heal all the time. And I'm not trying to make light of a tragic situation um at all. It's a tragedy and it's very, very sad, especially when somebody dies. I believe Beni Johnson died of cancer. Very, very sad. So, I promise you I'm not trying to make light at any type of tragedy whatsoever. But you really think it would have opened eyes when she wasn't healed. You know? Or even go back to when Bethel had that wake up Olive campaign where they were trying to raise a poor little girl from the dead who died very, very young. When those things weren't working, when those things didn't happen, you have to start questioning your bad theology in which you believe it is always God's will to heal. God in Exodus, when Moses is talking to the burning bush, God said, "Who is it that created the death, the mute, the blind? Was it not I?" God does create sickness. God does allow for sickness on this side of Earth. There is sin in this Earth, all going back to Adam and Eve. Sickness, disease, things of that nature is a result of sin being in the world. Doesn't mean somebody personally sinned and that's why they got sick. We don't know that. I'm not going to presume upon God. But we do know that sin is in or sickness and disease and all these things are in the world because of sin. It's just a reality that we are going to deal with until Christ come back Christ comes back and makes us all new again. We need to remember that as Christians. One day, this isn't our final resting place. Healing's not going to be We are going to die one day. Unless Christ returns, we are going to die one day. But in his return, we will receive brand new bodies, perfect, sinless, no sin, new heaven, new Earth. It'll be amazing. Uh the article goes on to continue saying since 2000, Johnson and her husband, Brian, served as the blah blah blah blah blah. An honest interview. I I've never I have not watched this video. I just saw the stuff that came out about it. Well, Jen, thank you for being here. I am, to be honest, a bit nervous about That's ridiculously long. We're not going to be able to listen to all that. Um But it looks like it is split up into chapters. Bethel is a do. Was Jesus God while on Earth? I brought up baby Olive and Beni. Tarot cards. I'm going to have Before I I might have to do a thorough review on this. Cuz these are things I'm curious to how they skirt around them cuz they are very, very weighty topics. Um Let's just read the article for now. Before we do, I do want to get your comments. Nigel says their lack of reverence and godly fear is shocking to me and it is to me, too. You're absolutely right. Elaine said, "Trustworthy? She must be kidding." Cathy said, "God has a lot of merciful restraint not to strike a lot of people with lightning. Talk about the Holy Spirit that way." Yeah, exactly. Very, very sad. Goes on to continue saying here, "Staff members love Let's just read it from up here. Jen Johnson, who's been a part of Bethel Church since age 16, told Alex, 'It's a very big organization with people of various beliefs and good hearts and good intentions. We don't know the heart, but kind of just a lot of different things that necessarily we wouldn't all uh we wouldn't all on the leadership level vouch for.'" Sounds like covering up for leadership just from that little excerpt. "Staff members lovingly referred to Bethel Church as a zoo because there's a lot of life and a lot of mess at Jen, adding, 'I definitely have seen a beautiful, healthy correction along the years.' Johnson expressed her gratitude for the heart of the church, saying she knows leaders well. They are very good, trustworthy people. They are very human and trying to live their lives according to the Bible. Well, obviously, your prophetic ministry leader wasn't. One of the beautiful things though, and I'd be remiss to say this, is because I too am a sinner but a sinner saved by grace. And even those people, no matter what you've done, you can be forgiven by Jesus Christ. That's one of the beautiful things we need to remember. "Uh we definitely don't all believe the same things at Bethel," she continued, "and there are definitely some very weird things that have happened from people who are in the lower levels, especially of leadership, but also higher, myself included, because we're all human." So, I wanted to say everybody. Johnson, who said she's not a theologian, obviously, uh she needs to read R.C. Sproul's book of Everyone's a Theologian. Uh then tackled faith-related questions that Alex pulled from Bill Johnson's material, citing controversial chapter in Bill's book When Heaven Invades Earth, um and asked Jen Johnson if Jesus was fully God while on Earth or just a man fully yielded to God. And that was a controversial statement that Bill Johnson said he was going to correct and change but never actually did, from my understanding. He uh went on to double down. He He's like flip-flopping, depending on who he's talking to, from what I saw about that. She responded and said, "I believe that Jesus was fully God and fully man. And if you read out our statement of faith on the website, it says the same thing." When she asked if her father-in-law's beliefs might have shifted through the years, Jen replied, "I think if you were going to talk to him right now, he would tell you Jesus was fully God and fully man. People often take one-liners out of context." That's really hard to take what what Bill Johnson said there was that Jesus did not perform his miracles as God, but he performed them as a man in right relationship with God. Basically, denying the deity of Christ when performing miracles. Why? Because it feeds into Bethel's theology. Bethel believes that you, everyone, can perform these supernatural miracles. And if Jesus was performing these miracles as God, the God-man, not just only a man, then that means we can't do that. Why did Jesus perform the miracles that he did? It was to show that he was the son of God. We need to remember that in scriptures. These healings and all these things that he did were foretold all the way back into the Old Testament. He did those things to prove his Messiahship, that he is the son of God. He didn't do it to show us that we can all do these things. Otherwise, we'd all be doing it. I hate how church leaders does this on their website. You have to like click a new note and then it goes to the "Uh we believe that God heals," says Bethel Music Jen Johnson. Alex also asked Jen Johnson about concerns he's had regarding Bethel's beliefs about healing and prophecy. Specifically, he asked her if the church claims that if we're not healed, it's because of a lack of faith, citing the death of Beni Johnson and 2-year-old Olive, the daughter of a Bethel worship leader. Those tragedies didn't shift the church's viewpoint, according to Jen Johnson. "Uh we believe that God heals and that's what the Bible says," she said. "So, when something doesn't happen, we don't necessarily try to look inward to our own self on why it didn't happen," Jen said. "But more importantly, we stay anchored and grounded in the God uh who is and who he says he is and what he does, and that is that he heals." Well, obviously, he didn't heal in those situations. And I'm not saying it's because of a lack of faith or anything like that. Once again, I'm not trying to turn a tragedy into a talking point uh and diminish what happened. This tragic. It's horrible. But it should make you look back and reflect, maybe we were wrong in these areas. Maybe we don't have our theology all together. Maybe we need to go back and actually read the Bible for what it says. Very sad. Elaine said, "I feel fearful for Jen Johnson and other leadership at Bethel." And I that I would, too. Johnson continued, "It's very difficult when something doesn't happen that you were praying for and hoped for. And we've all lived that in our faith, but it doesn't change our belief system. Why didn't someone get healed? I don't know, but I'm going to pray for the next person that needs a miracle. It doesn't change the foundation of our faith when something doesn't go to plan. We just have to surrender it." Yes. We we don't go back and go why God did you not heal this person? You just know that God is sovereign over all things, but that's not what you're saying. You go on to say that God heals. And that he heals. Obviously, he didn't heal in those situations. There's a lot of ministry in this Christian walk of ours and there's a lot of surrender that gets involved in going. Uh God, I don't understand this, but I know who you are. I'm going to stay anchored and grounded to that. Pray for the sick, cast out demons. Uh cast out demons. I'm going to stay connected to what your word says. Even though I might not have seen something happened that I prayed for. It sounds like to me you need to go back and recheck your theology. Next, Alex asked about the syncretism or using practices not found in the Bible including aura readings, crystals, fire tunnels, and destiny cards, which are all things by the way that um Bill Johnson, the psychic it says here, endorsed in his book The Physics of Heaven, uh which poised that the New Age movement teaches some key truths. Um Not only that, uh you know, the these things were practiced at Bethel and talked about especially in Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry. She says here in her response, "There's a lot of thin lines, but at the same time there is a very gracious God," replied Jen. "I think God looks at the heart more than anything else and our desire to know him and to be like him and to follow him and to help others come to know him. Her father-in-law might not have been careful enough when endorsing a person." So, she tiptoed around that question. Hey, you know, the the heart does matter. God looks at the heart, not so much of the action. I think that is seen in the Bible, but you also need to remember that God is not accepting of blasphemous forms of worship at all. At all, period. What happened with Cain and Abel? God accepted Abel's sacrifice. God rejected Cain's sacrifice. Why? Because it was not in accordance with God. Bible doesn't mention where their their their their their their heart was and all these other things, but Cain's sacrifice was not accepted. Why? Because it was the work of his hands. He was trying and this is what I infer. He was trying to basically earn God's favor through works. That was not pleasing to God, not acceptable to God. Go back to Nadab and Abihu in the Old Testament with Aaron's sons. They offered a strange fire to God that was not in accordance with what God had set forth. He was very specific on while the offerings were supposed to go, the burnt offerings, things of this nature, and they offered up a strange fire to God. God rejected that worship. Not only that, they were drunk when they did it, and they were stricken dead because of that. Very very very wrong. God is not accepting of all forms of worship just because your intentions are good. God cares very very I mean, the why else would he say Jesus say in the uh New Testament uh talking about, "Hey, if you if you have something against your brother, leave your leave your offering at the altar, go, make right with your brother, then come back." Don't show up when you have something in your heart against somebody else. That's not going to be acceptable and pleasing to God. Elaine said, "Word of Faith and NAR folk will not admit that they could have any of their theology wrong. If we don't agree, then we are the ones with the lack of faith according to their theology." And Elaine would know. Elaine, Kathy, so many of you people have come out of the Word of Faith NAR world. You know this. Uh Elaine said, "Been there, done that, have the t-shirt, unfortunately." But praise God he dragged you out of that, Elaine. Praise God for that. Uh goes on to say, "One of Johnson's biggest passions," she said, "is to be open to the following following the voice of God, to know him by his word, and to follow him by his spirit and his voice, no matter what it looks like." Okay, how do you hear the voice of God? You read your Bible. That's how we know the ver Hebrews even says it back in the day that they had um what's the passage? Let's just pull it up while we're here cuz I don't want to misquote it, but Hebrews chapter 1 I think makes that absolutely abundantly clear. And you can watch me type as I do this because I oops. Mhm. Here it is. God, after he spoke long ago to the fathers in the in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, what does it say? He still does it? No, it doesn't say he still does that. It says, "In these last days he has spoken to us in his son, whom he appointed as the heir of all things through whom the whole also he made the world." This is how God talks to us through his son. And his son is all over the Bible. That is how we hear the voice of God by reading our Bible. You want to hear God's voice? Open up the Bible and read it. None of this other craziness that we see. Um she goes on to say that even if people think you're crazy that you fall that you follow, Johnson said, kind of like that scene in Chronicles of Narnia where Lucy follows Aslan in the forest because she seems uh it it was just called the Bible, not a movie from a C.S. Lewis book. "Some weird practices do cross the line," admitted Johnson, "but for the most part people's hearts are in a really good place. People can find God in science, nature, and sound, and even in colors," she said, "with the key being whether" I I don't think you're going to find God in a tarot card reading. Obviously, God can reveal himself through any means, so I don't want to discredit that, but these people will believe that these are God-honoring things, and that's the difference. It's not a God-honoring thing. It's a sin. It's wrong. Johnson also emphasized the importance of accountability and checks and balances amongst her leadership. Johnson shared that she grew up in a really healthy in a really healthy view of prophecy of encouraging, exhorting people, and helping people bring Was Was prophecy always exhorting and helping and encouraging? No. No, most of the time it was actually really bad. Like, "Hey, stop doing this or God is going to do this to you." And it was not a good thing. Look at all the different prophecies that we see inside the Bible. How many of these are going to be good things? But for some reason, and this is this is all over the NAR world, they don't believe in negative prophecies or anything like that, or at least they downplay it, and they only encourage prophecies that are encouraging, exhorting, and helping bring people into God's doing and what he is saying. When asked about failed prophecies, she said, "What matters is people's heart and obedience," going back to that cop-out. Obviously, she Listen, why would they do this? This just makes them look even dumber to have her answer these questions. A great phrase that they teach us at Bethel is, "I'm learning the voice of God and I'm practicing hearing the voice of God." How about you just read your Bible? Read your Bible. Uh Pointing at the importance of humility, God wants us to risk hearing him. How dare you presume God wants us to risk hearing him? Where'd she pull that from? That's not from the Bible. I promise you that. Oh my gosh. Sherry said, "Sorry, I'm late in joining the comments." Good to see you, family, and blessings. Always nice to have you on here, Sherry. Um Nigel jumped in said, "God reaching people stuck in the NAR Word of Faith cults is him saving the uttermost. If he can save them, he can save anyone." Amen to that, Sherry. Agreed. Sorry, I'm getting pop-ups here on my phone. Oh, it looks like a bunch of people's power's out at my work. Uh we got a work chat, so uh fun times in Oklahoma. Praise God power's not out over here. Uh continuing on, it says, uh she said he's more concerned about our obedience than our failure. That sounds like an oxy oxymoron. If you're obedient and read his word and do what it says and don't go outside those bounds. Obviously, God doesn't want us to make a mess of people's lives, but sadly that's what Bethel has been doing. She goes on to address the worship leaders part here, said, "Basically, you know, should people continue to support Bethel music?" Goes on to say, um Bethel Music President Jen Johnson said the two organizations are quote financially separate. Sure. Uh with royalties going to the worship leaders and songwriters who serve at the eight or nine different churches. I don't see that as financially separate. Just because it's a separate name on there doesn't mean the money's going to separate people. Um So, it's not just one church that's a part of it, but Bethel Church is just where it's based from. Johnson said at Bethel Music, "The Lord has called us to serve the movement and the group of people, local community, we're still in faithful serving the people of God." As for what to say to worship leaders, Johnson expressed gratitude for their ministries. "My life was changed going up in church with people of God singing praises to God. There's just nothing like it. It's the best thing you can do with your life if you're a musician, worship leader, or sound guy," said Johnson, "is to give your time, your heart, and your efforts gifts to the house of God and the people of God." Johnson said, "How about just worship uh Jesus or Oh my gosh. Johnson said she and her songwriting team quote ask the Lord what he's saying from his word and by his spirit and then craft that into a song for the body of Christ for edification and exhortation and the purification of God's people." Their music does not purify people. Oh my gosh. Um and the singing should not be for the body of Christ. The singing should be to God. When we sing praises, praise and worship music inside church, it should be to God. It's not to the people. It's to God. Who cares how it makes you feel? Yes, do I get I am trust me, I am not an unemotional person. I am very emotional during praise and worship services at church and things of that nature and I'm over there and the older I get it seems the more I do it. I am crying my eyes out because some lyrics are just so beautiful and I'm just praising God. It is okay if praising God gives you emotion, but it's not for you. The praise is for God. You don't write praise and worship songs for humans. You write praise and worship songs for God. She goes on to say she's thankful for the global body of Christ and she said and how God is moving in different denominations. Sherry said preach him. Their music does not purify people. Uh Leslie Good jumped in said I can't get through the title of the Jen Johnson comment that they were trustworthy. I just laughed and scrolled by. The blue genie and angels farting was just the final nope for me. Oh my goodness. It would be for me too. It would absolutely be for me too. Let's continue on going. Uh Johnson continued one of the biggest privileges of my life is getting to travel and be a part of those different expressions and maybe we believe slightly different things but that's just the details at the end of it. We're not going to be all right when we get to heaven. Jesus is going to be like you were great here, missed it there, love your heart. It seems like she just covers it up with that every single time. So when people stumble over belief it breaks my heart a bit. Obviously there are some big things there are some non-negotiables in the word of God. Yeah, and you're not reading. Johnson concluded by saying Bethel music uses lyrics to direct people's eyes to Jesus of who he is, what he's doing, and who we are through him. That's our goal. That's to connect people to Jesus. Your goal should be to give praise to God. That's the whole point of praise and worship music is to give praise to God. It's not for the people, it's for God. Cathy said so many of the songs are very me oriented. And like I said, I don't believe I do believe that you can give praise and worship to God through songs that talk about the great things that God has done in your life. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. But it does get to a point where it really gets me me me, I I I. Where is it about God? Or you're just singing about the good feelings you get. Like I said, I I'm not so hardline where I be like it has to be zero I's or me's or anything like that in there. Uh but you know, there there is a line. Sherry said did she even mention the victims survivors? One time. None times she says. Not according to this article. Like I said, I haven't watched the actual video which I'll probably do at some point in time because that just I mean if this article's I don't know if I want to put my ears through that. Maybe we'll do a live and go over that video at some point in time., Jenn Johnson's Horrid Bethel Defense, YouTube, 01kq7yjvd7eraa19t81a6aw9ed.