Beth Moore wrote on Twitter recently that she is baffled by how seldom some Christian leaders feel the need to apologize, whether in public or private, when they spread misinformation.
The Living Proof Ministries founder said she was speaking on the behalf of someone else. “It seems, if you’re a watchdog for the church, you get to bite at will. You’re somehow above the ethics of Jesus,” Moore said. “You will answer to the Lord for spreading misinformation. I am concerned about your spiritual condition because here is what I know: the Holy Spirit convicts of sin. If you walk in the Spirit, have an active prayer life and spend time in the holy Scriptures, you can’t go on and on and live with not asking forgiveness. I say this as one who has sinned grievously. If you walk with God, the time between sin & repentance is miserable.”
“Slander, cyber stalking, and smearing people’s reputations are sins,” Moore said. “If you don’t have conviction of sin, it is not because your wrongs are alright with God. It is because something is awry inside of you.”
Moore then shifted her Twitter thread to address something said about her by a well-respected evangelical pastor at a conference in October 2019.
“I’m going to tell y’all a story because I think this is important and enough time is gone by that I hope it will be obvious it’s not meant to be self-serving,” she wrote.
John MacArthur Tells Beth Moore To ‘Go Home’
Moore was referring to comments made by three of Grace Community Church’s (GCC) elders at a 2019 conference session hosted by the church.
During GCC’s 2019 “Truth Matters Conference,” Todd Friel, host of Wretched TV and Radio, played a word association game with GCC’s pastor-teacher, John MacArthur, GCC elder and “Grace to You”’s executive director, Phil Johnson, and GCC’s pastor of local outreach and elder, Mike Riccardi, during one of their Q&A’s. Voddie Bauchman was supposed to attend the panel but needed to rest instead; Friel joked that he was too weak.
RELATED: Truth Matters Conference Takes Aim at Beth Moore, Female Preachers
Friel explained that he would say a word and then let each of them give a one word or short answer response to that word. MacArthur joked that he felt like he was being set up before giving his answer to Friel’s first word “Beth Moore.” The well-respected pastor responded, “Go home.” A chorus of laughter and gasps filled the room.
“There’s no case that can be made biblically for a woman preacher,” MacArthur said after the room quieted down. “Period, paragraph, end of discussion.”
Phil Johnson Calls Beth Moore a ‘Narcissist’
Johnson’s word was “narcissistic.” He said, “I think the first time that I saw her, I thought she is what it looks like to preach yourself rather than Christ.” Elaborating on his answer, Johnson said, “In fact, she has said that. She said ‘I read the Bible and I try to find myself in the narrative—I put myself in the narrative’ and that is exactly what she does.”
Riccardi’s responded, “I heard John MacArthur say, ‘Period, paragraph, end of story.’”
MacArthur Blasts Women Preachers; SBC
MacArthur then said he would like to add one more thing to his comment regarding Beth Moore, comparing her to a Home Shopping Network jewelry salesperson.
“Just because you have the skill to sell jewelry on the tv sales channel doesn’t mean you should be preaching,” MacArthur said. “There are people who have certain hawking skills—natural abilities to sell—they have energy and personality and all of that—umm, that doesn’t qualify you to preach.”
“I think that the church is caving into women preachers,” MacArthur said. He expressed that he is very troubled by the trend, citing the support that some evangelicals lended to Paula White’s book. “She’s a heretic and a prosperity preacher…When leaders of evangelicalism roll over for women preachers, feminists have really won the battle.”
