I want to reiterate a point that I have made several times in the past few years, which is the absolute necessity to seek a balanced position on the cessationism vs non-cessationism debate. If you don’t intentionally seek a balanced perspective here, you will not be able to guard against extremes on your side of the fence. You may even embrace extremes on your side of the fence.
The real problem here is not men identifying as cessationist or as non-cessationist. There are very godly, spiritual, discerning men on both sides of this divide.
The real problem is men failing to get on the right side of the real watershed issue, which is men pretending that there are genuine prophets and apostles today in the exact same sense as the Bible, and men pretending to have genuine “thus saith the Lord” revelation, which is, by definition, the word of God, and which has the same authority as the Bible. It can supersede Scripture or give an “official” interpretation of Scripture.
If we divide here, then all the godly, whether they identify as cessationist or non-cessationist, will take a stand together against heretical movements and practices that undermine the absolute authority of the word of God and biblical Christianity, and they will challenge compromises that appear to be inclined in that direction.
If we divide here, then we will discover that the solid evangelical cessationists also believe that God is on the throne, that God answers prayers, that God works miracles, that God heals, and that God still speaks and leads in many amazing ways.
The balancing factor in regard to the latter point is that God does not give new revelation but rather illuminates men in the right understanding and right application of the word of God. These illuminations come in many ways, sometimes powerfully. Godly men may say “revelation,” but they mean “illumination.” Godly men may say “God spoke to me,” but they are not claiming “thus saith the Lord” in the sense of an OT prophet or a Agabus from the NT. They are simply claiming that God made his instruction or direction clear. Cessationists enjoy this privilege and experience too.
The real difference between biblical cessationists and biblical non-cessationists is simple. The former are focused on false prophets and apostles and bogus “thus saith the Lord.” They regard themselves as cessationists because they oppose error that undermines the authority of the word of God and leaves the door wide open for lying spirits that pretend to be the Holy Spirit. The latter are focused on the fact that God still works supernaturally. They regard themselves as non-cessationists because they believe that God still speaks to man outside the Bible, giving them illumination on its meaning and direction on its application. These two positions don’t really differ much on what they believe. They are actually very close.
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