Wolf Week # 3: Types of false teachers and their different methods - By Elizabeth Prata

Excerpted from here. Our comments in bold.

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Ms. Prata appears in our blog from time to time with her sometimes errant teaching and mistaken beliefs. We have no desire to dishonor her, but she represents herself as a guardian of doctrine and a teacher of Christian women. Her teaching therefore ought to be scrutinized.

A favorite topic of the Doctrinal Police is wolves in the church. She has been writing a series on this topic, but this article contained the below off-topic quote. This sort of thing is exactly why we scrutinize her writing.

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When we read directions telling us to quiet ourselves, to ‘be still’ so we can hear God because too many distractions dampen our ability to hear Him – it says something important about God:

1. It says that God can’t cut through ambient noise to make Himself heard.
2. It says that He created the creation, but can’t control it enough to get His message to the ears of the person to whom He intends to speak.

(This is one of those truly odd comments Ms. Prata dumps into her writing from time to time. 

She seems to think that our status somehow comes to bear on God. But our need to be still says nothing at all about God. Our distraction, fleshly weakness, disobedience, or stubbornness have nothing to do with God's abilities. Putting ourselves into a position of reverence, submission, or yieldedness does not define God in any way. 

What does the Bible say about being still, quiet, or circumspect?

Ps. 4:4 In your anger do not sin; when you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent.

Ps. 37:7 Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him...

Ps. 46:10 Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.

So we find that the Bible commands us to be still. Surely Ms. Prata must be aware of this? But yet she objects. Why?

In actual fact Ms. Prata doesn't tell us the real reason. The reality is, her problem is not about being still, it is the idea that doing so would allow a Christian to hear from God. She doesn't believe God speaks to His people anymore.

She is a cessationist, a person who believes that the "supernatural" gifts of the Spirit ceased in the first century. This means that God doesn't speak today. We discuss this doctrinal perspective in some depth in our series on cessationism.