Did Kenneth Copeland Really Call God “The Biggest Failure of All Time?”
By Troy J. Edwards
You are of the father the slanderer “devil” and the desires of your father it is your will to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and did not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own: for he is a liar, and the father of lies. (John 8:44; Context Group Version)
You can love a man, or hate a man, but you most certainly should never misrepresent a man. You can disagree with a person’s doctrine but you become an ally with Satan when you claim that a person believes something that they don’t. To claim that someone embraces a particular idea about God that cannot be proven by a clear examination of all that thy have taught is called slander and has its origins with the evil one.
There is no greater example of this than the lie that continues to circulate via social media and so-called “apologetic ministry” web pages about a statement made by the well-known Word-Faith minister, Kenneth Copeland (Many of these so-called “ministries” need to be more “apologetic” in apologizing for their slander of others—pun intended). Copeland is alleged to have called God the “biggest failure of all time.”
I admit that I have not listened to a lot of Kenneth Copeland sermons nor have I read any book by him all the way through. But the little I have read or heard from him has never given me the impression that he believes God to be a literal failure. Therefore, I refer to an excellent book by James R. Spencer titled, “Bleeding Hearts and Propaganda: The Fall of Reason in the Church” to assist us in getting a better clarification of what Copeland actually said and meant when he made the alleged statement:
GOD–The BIGGEST FAILURE OF ALL TIME!In Christianity in Crisis Hanegraaff also suggest that Copeland believes "God is the biggest failure of all time." It is true that Copeland uttered those words, but a rational person would ask "What does he mean by them?" Words are symbols which represent thoughts. Our job is to take a man’s words and figure out what he meant by them–not to try to trap him into translating his words into a meaning he did not place on them.Hanegraaff suggests Copeland’s words mean he has no respect for God and deems Him to be a failure. If Copeland believes that, he is not a Christian, let alone a minister of the gospel!Of course, that is not what he means! When you go to those words in context, it immediately becomes clear what he is saying. He is addressing the fact that people get down on themselves because of their personal failures. So he reminds us that God Himself is a "failure" in the sense that He "failed" when–in Copeland’s words–"He lost His top-ranking, most anointed angel; the first man He ever created; the first woman He ever created; the whole earth and all the fullness therein; a third of the angels, at least–that’s a big loss, man." He made that statement on a "Praise-a-Thon" program on Trinity Broadcasting Network in April, 1988.Obviously, the failures here were Lucifer, Adam, Eve, and the demon angels–not God. Copeland is saying that God has suffered disappointment and can understand our human condition. It is ludicrous to try to suggest from the text that Copeland sees some flaw in God in all this. That is absolutely not what he was saying. When Hanegraaff plays that game, he is being supremely biased and he undermines truth–the very thing an apologist should be striving to exalt.Copeland in saying "God is the greatest failure of all time" is being ironic. He is using a rhetorical device to communicate something about the heart of God for his creatures. This is a preaching technique pastors have used throughout the ages. To suggest that Copeland is attacking the character or nature of God is as backwards as saying he doesn’t think Jesus is God.But Hanegraaff, in his determination to throw the Faith Teachers out of the Church not only claims they believe Jesus is not God and that God is a failure, he also says the Faith Teachers believe men can become gods.Spencer, James Bleeding Hearts and Propaganda: The Fall of Reason in the Church (Lafayette, LA: Huntington House Publishers, 1995), pp. 183, 184
Obviously, Copeland’s words were taken out of context. Copeland was made to say something that he really did not say. The misrepresentation of someone’s words is not a minor thing. How can one trust another to tell the truth about someone’s ministry and doctrine when that individual cannot be fair and unbiased in examining said minister’s words and motives? And yet, these “apologetic” ministries claim to be serving Christ. Nonetheless, their tactics are more in line with Satan’s slanderous ways.
Be cautious in reading things by these so-called apologetics ministries, especially in their attacks upon other ministers. While I intend to put out more material on these topics in the future, in the meantime I would recommend some of the YouTube videos by my friend, Rod Saunders, in which he tackles some of these issue as well as a book by another friend, Gregg Huestis titled, “Another Side of the Coin: The Other Side of the Faith Message.”
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