Page 384. Another awful distortion of Scripture, in my opinion, is in regard to the word help in Romans 8:26. The Spirit helps our infirmities. He explains that God's help can be, yes, soft and passive. It also can be a partnership. But then, it could manifest itself as aggressive!, violent, angry. He quotes Rick Renner as calling this the insanity of the Holy Spirit. That is, the Spirit becomes enraged when he sees us in trouble. He is insanely angry for us.

It troubles me even to copy these words for your perusal; may the Spirit of God not be grieved or offended in what I report to you. But that is what they said.

Page 386. "Son of Man". Jesus called Himself that, referring to Daniel 7:13, and said that the Son of Man comes with the clouds of heaven. Storm clouds of Heaven. Yes, He comes like a storm against evil, working all things for our good.

Here's a case of ripping away from Daniel and Jesus a clear prophecy of His coming in the clouds of glory, and making the text serve a needy people here and now, who can call on Jesus and he will respond.

Surely Jesus will respond to His people. But why use this roundabout way of saying it? To be novel? Exciting? Relevant? Surely this leader knows enough Scriptures that will say what he is thinking without wresting these to the ground and forcing their obedience to his imagination!

Page 391.Occasionally Mr. Maloney becomes the "seer" or "prophet" in his book. For example, "A new authority is arising in the midst of God's people to decree what we are seeing and hearing in heaven will be seen and heard on earth. God will be made manifest in a tangible way."

Who are the "we"? The new apostles? The people who are influenced by these apostles? How different is this concept from the one Jesus told us to pray, "...Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven"!

As for "tangible", is not a 2000-year-old body of believers with a history of great faith and power and victories all over the earth, not tangible enough? When God saves a man, is that man not a tangible evidence of who God is and what God can do? What is it more that is being prophesied here?

Page 392. Here is where Maloney enlarges on his concept of "tangible" manifestation, and every believer needs to listen to his words and their source of authority.

He says that, yes, people are blessed who have seen and not heard, as Jesus said in John 20:29. But, (and this is James Maloney speaking, not me, not Jesus), it stands to reason ... Here is an admission by an apostolic leader of our day, that modern apostolic reasoning shall be allowed to trump the very words of Jesus Himself... it stands to reason that God is big enough to manifest His presence tangibly. I don't think... Now there is the source of Maloney's authority, not God's Word... I don't think God ever intended all people to worship Him without feeling Him in their five senses. Why would he give us ability to feel and not expect us to feel Him?

Folks, this is sensual carnal reasoning. So, when I feel something in my hand, it increases my faith. When people experience something, that is when their faith is to be encouraged. Hmmm… we walk by sight and not by faith after all.

Page 403. The preaching of salvation and forgiveness is not enough. I have heard in other places, and I feel Maloney would concur, that there is a difference between the "Gospel" and the "Gospel of the Kingdom." It matters not to them when you show them both ideas in one passage, their minds are made up... There must be something more than "just" forgiveness.

Yet in Scripture, signs and wonders followed. These signs shall follow those who believe. Believe what? Signs and wonders? Miracles? They believed the Gospel, the good news that sins can be forgiven, that our names can be written in Heaven. Signs and wonders were not preached. Repentance and forgiveness were, and God did the rest as He saw fit, and He'll do that today, too.

Page 417. Here he makes a teaching out of the "Benjamin Gate", one of the ways into the city of Jerusalem. Benjamin's mother, Rachel, died in giving him birth. This was not at some gate, but he moves quickly to Nehemiah for that, and talks of the restoration of the gates in Nehemiah 3. He says that that restoration can be taken allegorically to represent specific releases and moves of God

He speaks all of this as though it were true, not just as some example. We are now coming, he authoritatively states, into the days of the Benjamin Gate. "I am firmly persuaded." So we should be?

There is a connection, he says, between the release of the prophetic, and the Benjamin Gate in praise and worship. The connection is travail. This new generation are the Benjamins! They will host multitudes of young people crowding through the Benjamin gate. This represents the birthing of new life.

Benjamin, says he, represents a generation that God wants to bring forth out of the "agony of the church".. In the Benjamin Gate will be the magnetism for Christian youth.

Of course, this kind of thing was already happening in the day of this "prophecy". Music in particular has brought the youth in, in spite of the protests of people whose music was godly and meaningful.

According to Maloney, just as the Beatles reshaped secular music, our new generation will reshape what we see as the church.

He claims that there always must be a musical communication in a generation. It is progressive, alarming to the old, but it has power to pacify them anyway.

So far I have not been fully pacified by the modern sounds in church, though I agree that some beautiful new things have come our way. (See my chapter on Music.)

Page 432. To allow for those who will not accept his book, he concedes at the end that one cannot change a cessationist's mind. For the curious, a cessationist is one who believes the gifts and miraculous have stopped. He assumes that everyone who disbelieves him must have some bad theology. In fact, there are people in the church today who are quite fundamental, who still believe that God can answer prayers miraculously, that He can in fact do what He wants to do.

But Maloney asserts that cessationsists will say he is deceived or a charlatan trying to lead into esoteric experiences. “But my conviction is that these encounters did happen, though some will say I am lying.”

I have given no one any reason yet to believe he is lying. I haven't shared the stories yet, only his theology. Whatever your stand on miracles today, I ask you to listen to this man's claims and add to that his documentation of such, and see what you think.

One more thing on this point. I was struck by his use of the word "conviction" above. He is convicted these things happened. Convinced, I understand. Convicted sounds like he has reason to doubt some of these things, but has decided to accept them by faith, conviction. Maybe a small point.

Page 433. Finally, he speaks here of the restoration of supernatural signs. Who is to bring about such a restoration? If I were to see the need, could I do it? Is God already doing it sovereignly? That is the question. And for me nothing in this book satisfies the answer to that question. You may have a different take.