The following are my comments on Vincent Cheung’s statements posted at his website:
Cessationism and Church Selection [by Vincent Cheung –CD]
~ Adapted from email correspondence ~
“Arminians are not always explicit about their Arminianism. They might assume it, but they do not always explicitly assert human freedom in contradiction to divine sovereignty. They might often tell the man to decide, such as to decide to believe and obey, but although they say this with false assumptions behind it, the statement itself is acceptable – the Calvinist must also tell the man to decide for God.
That said, my judgment is that unless a church is explicit about its Arminianism, a Christian who is informed and convinced of the doctrines concerning God’s sovereignty should attend an Arminian charismatic/non-cessationist church rather than a Reformed or Calvinist cessationist church. I believe that cessationism is so heretical and so harmful that it warrants this policy.
But I cannot make an absolute generalization. Many cessationist churches are indeed better than charismatic/non-cessationist churches, but these charismatics churches must be terrible! You will have to carefully compare the options and decide.”
This adapted response by Vincent Cheung confirms that Cheung puts greater importance on cessationism vs continuationism (i.e., non-cessationism) than on God’s sovereignty (e.g., the Godhood of God, the basic teaching that God is God, etc.) UNLESS the “charismatic/non-cessationist churches” are too terribly weird and wacky. Cheung’s judgement is that you should NOT select a “church” that teaches a “doctrine of demons” UNLESS the “non-doctrine-of-demons church” (??) is too “terrible.” If it is too “terrible” then go ahead and attend the “doctrine-of-demons church.”
I am not in this post arguing whether or not a given position is a “doctrine of demons” or “terrible”; I am only arguing that by Cheung’s own standard of judgment he is endorsing the idea that in certain (“terrible”) cases Christians are to attend a “church” that teaches “doctrines of demons.” In other words, according to Cheung there are evidently certain extreme cases where Christians are to attend worship at a Synagogue of Satan.
Agrammatos 