John Calvin, the great French-Swiss Reformer, states in his Institutes of Christian Religion that ‘Our wisdom if it is to be thought genuine, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and ourselves.’
I have realised that all human pursuits, whether individual or corporate, religious or secular, temporal or eternal, ultimately succeed or fail on one thing, whether they align with ultimate reality, God.
Even though we believe this, and especially in Christian circles, I suppose few people stop to consider the damage done by false doctrine to the body of Christ.
I woke up this morning to a message in my Facebook Messenger inbox from a student in Malaysia alerting me about the spread of Phaneroo in his country. He got to know me through a series of articles I had written last year about the Movement and wanted some more resources that would help him rightly evaluate Phaneroo in light of the orthodox Christian teaching.
This student was concerned with the rate at which his fellow students are quickly buying into this new trend without time for careful inquiry. Even leaders, especially the Association of Churches of Sarawak (which I am informed is ecumenical), are giving Phaneroo the green light, without biblical deliberations.
I thus write this article for two reasons. The first is to provide an additional resource for those around the world that ask themselves about the distinctive teachings of this Movement.
The second is to follow-up the conversation with the late Joel Nevender, who in our last chat had asked me to elaborate on the critical points at which Phaneroo departs from orthodox Christianity.
This article is written with insights from friends like Eddie Ssemakula, Denis Mugume, Ivan Jjuko, and Nuwamanya Mategyero.
This list is by no means exhaustive. Also, Phaneroo’s doctrines are more nuanced and harder to detect than other false movements. As you will notice, John Calvin’s statement is quite vital, for every cultic Movement misconstrues the doctrine of God and the doctrine of creation, especially the real state of man, both fallen and redeemed.
That said, here are what I consider to be the six deadliest errors of the Phaneroo movement:
1) An unbiblical view on the extent of Sin’s impact on man: Phaneroo teaches that believers do not and cannot sin. As I had mentioned in my previous articles, this is based on a sloppy interpretation of passages like 1 John 5:18, 1 John 3:6; 2 Cor 5:17, 21; and 2 Peter 1:4. What the Bible calls sin is for them merely a ‘mistake.’
But the Church beginning with Christ has maintained that Sin is all pervasive. Individually, sin affected man’s spirit, mind, soul, and body, which also means that sin changed how we view our sinfulness. The regenerate (born again) man grows to discover the depth of his depravity.
The more he comes into the light, the more he sees the blackness of the darkness in him. The Apostles were careful to alert believers about their sinfulness, imploring them to continually ‘put off’ the old man and ‘put on’ the new one (Eph 4:17-32; Col 3:1-11), and to always confess their sin (1 John 1:7-10). Biblical teaching maintains this truth.
2) Antinomianism: Antinomianism is a mindset that holds that under the gospel dispensation of grace the moral law is useless and with no binding obligation on believers. It is an unhealthy view of both the Law and the grace of God, a desire to cast off all restraints of individual responsibility before God and man.
In one of the outreaches we had with RZIM (Ravi Zacharias International Ministries) in Western Uganda, one ‘Papa’ of the Phaneroo fellowship at a College campus confessed to how he was living in fornication and struggling to overcome this sin. And the advice he got from the fellowship leaders was that he should only proclaim his righteousness every time he fornicates.
Paul fumes as he writes to the Corinthian church! ‘It is reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans…And you are arrogant! Ought you not rather mourn? Let him who has done this be removed from among you’ (2 Cor 5:1-13).
We genuinely are justified by faith alone, but the faith that justifies is not alone. Faith, if genuine, must produce works.
And yet, whenever you mention the need to walk according to the principles of God, followers of this movement retort that you are legalistic, a Pharisee who does not want people to walk in freedom. Their view of grace is licentiousness, which Paul rejects in Romans 6.
3) Over-realised Eschatology: This has to do with the confusion between justification, sanctification, and glorification. In addition to claiming that Christians do not sin, Phaneroo teaches that the Christian is not to be sick, or suffer lack. ‘Christ became poor so you may be materially rich,’ a poor interpretation of 2 Cor 8:9.
The movement thus confuses the ‘now’ and the ‘not-yet.’ Indeed, Christians were raised from death to new life, but they are not yet home until Christ returns. It is true that we are now justified, but we are not yet glorified.
While on earth, the Bible calls us to endure hardships without promises of wealth or health. In this walk, even the most faithful of us will be sick unto death (Phil 2:26-27) and need to take medications for our illnesses (1 Tim 5:23). We might miss out on our ministry plans with terrible sickness (2 Tim 4:20) and be buffeted with a messenger from Satan (2 Cor 12:7). We may both abound and lack (Phil 4:11-14).
In short, believers still live and share in the brokenness of this world. Our ministry context is east of Eden, not in it. Only when we are comforted can we comfort others in distress (2 Cor 1:3-8). And indeed, for the apostles, enduring suffering on earth is the mark of being a follower of Christ, God’s suffering Servant.
4) Man-centred (anthropocentric) theology: As my friend Denis Mugume puts it, Phaneroo technically teaches a god who ‘exists for our glory and lives to honour our faith proclamations. Because Christ is in you, you no longer have to pray to God, all you have to do is speak in faith, and it shall be done! God is reduced to an errand boy for whoever has the greatest faith.’
It is hard to hear teachings about the nature of God and His character. The attributes of God: justice, holiness; God’s Trinitarian nature or the mystery of the incarnation; aseity, simplicity, immutability or transcendence lack in their teaching.
God’s omnipotence and omnipresence are exploited for selfish ends with prayer often functioning as a magic wand to meet human needs. God is loved for what He gives, not who He is.
Flowing from this flawed view of God is the false view of the nature of man. ‘I am a god’ they say (a misinterpretation of Psalm 82 and John 10:34-39). Their theology deifies man and humanises God, and in effect blurs God’s distinctiveness from us even in His becoming like us through the incarnation of His Son.
5) Neo-Gnostic Philosophy. This teaching emphasises experiential knowledge, usually termed as ‘deep revelation’ that only the initiated can have. In one of his sermons, Grace Lubega mentions how his followers are ‘deeper than Paul!’
There was a group during the early Church times that too claimed to have secret ‘deep’ knowledge. Gnosticism, and especially Marcion, also used to pick and choose verses for use, rejecting the Old Testament entirely as ‘outdated’ and lacking in ‘love’ and ‘wrathful.’ Marcion also excluded many of the gospels, only using a truncated gospel of Luke ‘purged’ from any hints of the Old Testament law. The standard texts for Gnostics were Pauline letters.
Phaneroo as well does have a shallow view of the Old Testament and almost relies entirely on some portions of the Pauline Epistles. It undervalues the gospels because ‘they belong to the Old Testament.’ For them, every text before the cross is unreliable and less profitable for the ‘new creature.’
The early Church battled Gnostics by establishing the Biblical Canon and Christian Creeds. Indeed, scripture emphatically states that ‘All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work’ (2 Timothy 3:16-17).
We must remember that Paul says this before there was any New Testament Canon. Indeed, the scriptures that the church in Acts (and Christ) used to reveal God’s redemption plan were the Old Testament (Luke 24:44).
6) Low View of Scripture and High View of Experience: This flows from the previous point. The response of the church to the Gnostic heresy was finalising the Canon. The Church believed that only the expository preaching of the Bible by the guidance of the Holy Spirit could root out false teaching. I emphasised this in my previous articles.
But it is difficult to hold a conversation with Phaneroo followers that is text-based. They will say: ‘a man with an experience is not at the mercy of one with arguments.’ When you say ‘wait a minute, but the bible here says this,’ the response is ‘it works for me’ and ‘this is my revelation.’
For the Christian, pragmatism cannot be the basis of doctrine. We must not appeal to experience when scripture is inconvenient.
For Christians, the Bible has to be the only source of revelation and the final arbiter of conversations about God.
Experience, reason, and tradition, though beneficial, must never be exalted to a magisterial position. Phaneroo minimises scripture, raising experiential knowledge to an authoritative level and rejecting tradition and reason entirely. That in itself should alert the faithful of the danger of this movement.
Conclusion
In light of all this (and much more), one needs to examine themselves and ask, what is the Gospel that Christians have consistently believed for 2000 years? Do I know it? And if I do not, do I care? And does my church teach this or something else? Is the Bible exposited in its historical, cultural, and textual context?
The three handmaids of Scripture which are Tradition, Reason, and Experience must be encouraged in every church, for that is how we learn wisdom. But Scripture must reign supreme, subject only to God.
And let us remember, ‘Our wisdom if it is to be thought genuine, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and ourselves.’
I like hearing from you. Feel free to get in touch with me.