“Ninety percent of the people around the world connected to the Charismatic movement take ownership of the prosperity gospel,” he said. “Twenty-four to 25 million of them deny the trinity. One hundred million of them are Roman Catholics. This is not some fringe; this is the movement. And it is growing at a rapid rate.”

The Rev. John MacArthur, influential author, pastor and seminary president, responded to critics of the three-day Strange Fire conference at his Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, Calif., that many pastors believe is causing dissention among the faithful because he’s teaching that the Charismatic movement is leading people astray and dishonors the Holy Spirit.

MacArthur commented that some of his critics have said that he’s fixated on the Charismatic movement, a claim he countered by noting that in his 45 years in ministry, this was his first conference he’s held on the movement, and believes it has come too late.

“In response to this conference, there have been some attacks, and we’ve been unable to escape them,” MacArthur said to the more than 3,000 attendees at the conference Friday night. “I just want to address those, because I do think that it’s important to answer the criticisms that have come.”

He first said that he hosted the Strange Fire conference to help the Church, and people who believe the Bible is the word of God and that God has revealed Himself clearly and consistently and without contradiction.

“This is for the true church, so that they can discern; so that they can be protected from error; and so that they can be a source of truth for others outside the church,” he said, adding that his book, Strange Fire: The Danger of Offending the Holy Spirit With Counterfeit Worship, can withstand the most intense scrutiny, when measured against the word of God in the Bible.

MacArthur also commented that the conference wasn’t for nonbelievers within the Charismatic movement, for which there are many, he contends. “I don’t expect nonbelievers to have a desire for the truth, a hunger for the truth or to search out the truth. That’s not what unbelievers do unless they’re being prompted by the Holy Spirit.”

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