Main Title: Joseph Prince mocks God & Jesus in the Lord’s Prayer with 10 lies
Sub Title: Joseph Prince’s weird exegesis on the Lord’s prayer demolished by 5 heavyweights: Martyn Lloyd-Jones, John Stott, Arthur Pink, Charles Spurgeon & DA Carson
– By Rev George Ong
Announcements:
1. One video by Pastor Jason Lim & two videos on Joseph Prince.
2. Don’t miss the short articles of
Martyn Lloyd-Jones, John Stott, Arthur Pink,
Charles Spurgeon & DA Carson
3. Again, clearing the backlog of Joseph Prince’s rubbish
in his sermons on 14 and 21 Jan 2024.
(This article was also sent to Rev Dr Ngoei Foong Nghian, General Secretary, National Council of Churches of Singapore (NCCS) office, and for the attention of the Executive Committee Members.)
of how Joseph Prince mocked God and Jesus in the Lord’s Prayer
as New Creation Church
roared with laughter and enjoyed the entertainment.
In two Sunday sermons aired on YouTube,
14 & 21 Jan 2024, Joseph Prince said;
Please click here to view the 3-minute video:
“So, the Lord’s Prayer, strictly speaking,
is a Kingdom prayer.
And we called it the Lord’s prayer.
It could be the disciples’ prayer
because the disciples asked Him to teach them how to pray.
So, don’t you think if Jesus taught you how to pray that prayer,
the disciples were praying that prayer probably every single day.
Do you think so?
But if the Lord’s prayer, listen carefully,
don’t you believe they will be praying that prayer every day?
How come in the Upper Room, Jesus turned around and told them,
‘Until now, you have asked nothing in My name.’
Peter can say,
‘Wait, wait, wait, wait, Lord, You taught us how to pray the Lord’s prayer,
isn’t that asking in Your name?’
Up till now, you have asked nothing from the Father in My name.
There’s a prayer that is beyond any other prayer you have prayed.
Even those by the prophets in the Old Covenant and all that.
The prayer we pray is not like the kind of prayer.
When I pray for you all just now,
notice I pray in the name of Jesus, Amen.
There’s so much more there.
There’s so much more there.
And when you pray,
have you realised that when you pray,
‘Father in heaven,’
it’s like, even you have lost before you prayed.
Why?
You are implying distance.
But there’s no distance.
That’s why your prayers don’t get answered
because there’s no faith release
and you’re believing the wrong thing.
Father in heaven.
Tien ah! (Heavens)
You look up.
God hear my prayer.
Even Jesus taught the disciples to pray like this: The Lord’s prayer.
He says Our Father who art in heaven.
Notice there is a distance.
In Paul’s letters, it’s never
‘Our Father who art in heaven,’
it is Father.
When Jesus addressed Him,
Jesus didn’t say
‘My Father in heaven,’
He says, ‘Father.’
Straightaway, it’s not an absence from His presence.
Oh, you are on earth, and He is in heaven.
Why?
Because the secret of the Upper Room is this.
It’s a picture of the third heaven where God’s Throne is.
And you know something?
We are all there.
I say we are all there.
It’s a family feeling.
He also said this.
Up till now, you have asked nothing in My name.
Drop now, chapter 16.
We go back to Ephesians 2 in while.
He says most assuredly, I say to you
whatever you asked the Father in My name,
He will give it to you.
Until now until now until now.
Even I taught you the Lord’s prayer in the Sermon on the Mount,
even though I taught you the Lord’s prayer
because you asked Me teach us how to pray
like John taught his disciples.
Even though I taught you the Lord’s prayer,
which is perfect and beautiful for its time; at that time,
the feeling of sonship haven’t come yet,
the spirit of sonship rather.
Are you listening? Alright.
So, He was introducing them the Father,
yet there was a distance.
So, He says,
‘Our Father who art in heaven.’
But after that there’s no Father in heaven.
We are seated (with Christ in the heavenlies).
Go back to that again.
Come on, go back to that (Ephesians 2:4-7).
God, who is rich in mercy
because of His great love with which He loved us.”
George Ong’s comments:
10 Lies that Joseph Prince Told in the Video:
Lie 1. The Lord’s Prayer is a Kingdom prayer for the Jews and not the Church.
Response: It is a prayer for all Christians: Jews and Gentiles. Please see Martyn Lloyd-Jones and Arthur Pink’s articles.
Lie 2. The Lord’s prayer was perfect and beautiful for its time; at that time.
Response: It is applicable for all time after Jesus had taught them to pray.
Lie 3. The disciples didn’t pray the Lord’s prayer such as every day, and especially after John 16:23-24.
Response: If so, how did the Historic Church which prayed the Lord’s prayer learn it from? It must be the Lord’s disciples who had passed it down to the Early Church, and then to the Christian Church throughout the generations.
Lie 4. When a person prays, ‘Our Father in heaven’ in the Lord’s prayer, there is a distance between God and the person because of the 2 words (our Father) ‘in heaven’.
Response: This is the weirdest exegesis on Matthew 6:9 I have ever heard.
Lie 5. A person praying the Lord’s prayer ‘Our Father in heaven’ won’t get his prayers answered because they are believing in the wrong thing.
Response: Joseph Prince is scorning Father God and the Lord Jesus.
Lie 6. The prayer of John 16:23-24 about praying in Jesus’ name is superior to the ‘Our Father in heaven’ in the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew 6:9.
Response: They are both essentially on the same plain. Please see Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ articles.
Lie 7. The prayer in John 16:23-24 is beyond any other prayer you have prayed.
Response: There is no concrete difference between the prayers in John 16:23-24 and Matthew 6:9 as both are New Covenant prayers that have the privilege to address God as Father.
Lie 8. When Joseph Prince shouted ‘Tien ah’ (heavens).
Response: Joseph Prince is mocking Father God and the Lord Jesus.
Lie 9. The Upper Room is a picture of the third heaven where God’s Throne is.
Response: There isn’t a single text in scripture that can support the view that the Upper Room is a picture of the third heaven.
Lie 10. We are all seated with Christ in the heavenlies (Eph 1:20).
Response: This is a half-truth and a half-truth is a lie. This is because a half-truth distorts truth and distorted truth is no longer the truth.
Hence, Joseph Prince
has mocked Father God and the Lord Jesus with 10 lies.
If Joseph Prince dares to mock God and Christ,
how can he not be a son of the devil?
Allow me to let 5 heavyweights – Bible commentators
to handle this shameless charlatan, Joseph Prince
regarding his one-of-a-kind Bible exegesis.
They are none other than Martyn Lloyd-Jones, John Stott,
Arthur Pink, Charles Spurgeon and DA Carson.
In ‘Studies in the Sermon on the Mount,’
Martyn Lloyd-Jones said:
“The Lord’s Prayer covers everything;
and all we do is to take these principles
and employ and expand them
and base our every petition upon them.
That is the way in which it is to be approached.
And as you look at it in that way,
I think you will agree with St. Augustine and Martin Luther
and many other saints who have said that
there is nothing more wonderful in the entire Bible
than the Lord’s Prayer.”
George Ong’s comments:
Here we have Augustine, our very well-known church father
and Martin Luther, the premier leader of the Reformation,
who speaks so highly of the Lord’s prayer,
as against Joseph Prince, a small fry in the doctrinal arena,
who dared to speak ill of the Lord’s prayer,
by implying that when you prayed that prayer,
you may not reach God because of the distance
between heaven and earth.
In ‘Studies in the Sermon on the Mount,’
Martyn Lloyd-Jones said:
“Let us go on to another observation,
which is one that we have been emphasizing right through our consideration of this Sermon.
It is that this prayer is obviously meant not only for the disciples,
but for all Christians in all places and at all times.
When we were dealing with the Beatitudes,
we constantly repeated that they are applicable to every Christian.
The Sermon on the Mount
was not meant only for the disciples at that time
and for the Jews in some coming kingdom age;
it is meant for Christian people now and at all times,
and has always been applicable.
Exactly as we have had to judge ourselves
by the teaching of the fifth chapter
with respect to the relationship of the Christian to the law,
so we come face to face with this prayer,
and with what our Lord says in this matter:
‘After this manner therefore pray ye.’
He speaks to us today exactly
as He spoke to the people who were about Him at that particular time.
Indeed, as we have already seen,
unless our prayer corresponds to this particular pattern and form,
it is not true prayer.
… It is only those who are true believers in the Lord Jesus Christ
who can say, ‘Our Father’.
It is only the people of whom the Beatitudes are true
who can say with any confidence, ‘Our Father’.
… So when our Lord says, ‘Our Father’,
He is obviously thinking of Christian people,
and that is why I say that this is a Christian prayer.”
George Ong’s comments:
With what Martyn Lloyd-Jones said about the fact
that the Lord’s prayer is for all Christians of all time,
you can once and for all throw Joseph Prince’s teaching
that it is only for the Jews or the disciples at that time
and not for Christians of all time
into the rubbish chute.
Martyn Lloyd-Jones by making the statement:
“unless our prayer corresponds to this particular pattern and form,
it is not true prayer,”
proves that Joseph Prince isn’t teaching about true praying
but a bogus form of praying.
In ‘Studies in the Sermon on the Mount,’
Martyn Lloyd-Jones said:
“The next point is that there are some people in trouble about the Lord’s Prayer
because it does not say ‘for Christ’s sake’,
or because it is not offered specifically in Christ’s name.
They say that it cannot be a prayer for Christian people
because Christians should always pray in the name of Christ.
The answer to this is, of course, that our Lord, as we have seen,
was simply laying down principles
which must always govern man’s relationship to God.
He was not concerned to say everything
about that relationship at this point.
But He was concerned to say this;
that whoever comes into the presence of God must always realize these things.
Later on, in His life and teaching
He will teach them explicitly about praying in His name.
But it is surely clear that even in the Lord’s Prayer,
praying in Christ’s name is implicit.
No man can truly say
‘Our Father which art in heaven’,
save one who knows the Lord Jesus Christ and who is in Christ.
So, it is implicit even at the very beginning.
But, in any case,
that does not affect the principles
which our Lord teaches here so plainly.”
George Ong’s comments:
With that clear and cogent explanation by Martyn Lloyd-Jones,
Joseph Prince’s false difference
between the Lord’s prayer and the prayer of John 16:23-24,
and the superiority of John 16:23-24 about praying in Jesus’ name
over the Lord’s prayer,
is shamefully exposed.
In ‘Studies in the Sermon on the Mount,’
Martyn Lloyd-Jones said:
“You notice, however, that He adds immediately,
‘Which art in heaven’.
This is a most wonderful thing
– ‘Our Father which art in heaven.’
… Do you notice how often the apostle Paul in his Epistles uses a most striking phrase?
He talks about the ‘God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ’.
That is most significant.
It is simply calling attention to what our Lord says at this point.
‘Our Father.’
… Our Lord says,
‘Our Father which art in heaven;’
and Paul says
‘the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ’.
Anyone like Christ, says Paul in effect,
must have a wonderful Father,
and, thank God, God is such a Father,
the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
It is vital when we pray to God, and call Him our Father,
that we should remind ourselves
that He is
‘our Father
which is in heaven’,
that we should remind ourselves
of His majesty and of His greatness and of His almighty power.
… Remember also that He has all power to punish, and all power to bless.
He is able to save,
He is able to destroy.
Indeed, as the wise man who wrote the book of Ecclesiastes put it,
it is vital when we pray to God
that we should remember that
‘He is in heaven and we are upon the earth’.
Then remember His holiness and His justice, His utter, absolute righteousness.
Let us remember, says the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews,
that whenever we approach Him
we must do so
‘with reverence and godly fear:
for our God is a consuming fire’.
That is the way to pray, says Christ,
take these two things together,
never separate these two truths.
Remember that you are approaching the almighty, eternal, ever-blessed holy God.
But remember also that that God, in Christ, has become your Father,
who not only knows all about you in the sense that He is omniscient,
He knows all about you also in the sense that a father knows all about his child.
He knows what is good for the child.
Put these two things together.
God in His almightiness is looking at you
with a holy love and knows your every need.”
George Ong’s comments:
Joseph Prince’s teaching
that when we pray to the God who is in heaven
while we are on earth,
implies there is a distance between God and man,
is pure rubbish.
It is his Anyhow Ham Tam (any old how) Theology.
Joseph Prince’s God is that He is just your buddy
you can sit next to
– that we are seated in the heavenlies with Him (Eph 1:20).
But as usual, that is only the half-truth.
The other half-truth that Joseph Prince ‘hides’ from you
is Hebrews 12:29 as raised by Martyn Lloyd-Jones,
‘with reverence and godly fear:
for our God is a consuming fire’.
We have to remember that God is still a consuming fire, a God of wrath,
not just under the Old Covenant in Deuteronomy 4:24,
Deuteronomy 4:24 NIV
24 “For the Lord your God is a consuming fire…”
but also under the New in Hebrews 12:29:
Hebrews 12:29 NIV
29 for our “God is a consuming fire.”
And the Book of Hebrews, and Hebrews 12:29, in particular,
were written to believers to warn them that
if they were to become apostates and abandon the faith,
they would come under God’s wrath and anger
because God is still a consuming fire.
Do you see the vital difference
between how Martyn Lloyd-Jones and Joseph Prince
explains the same phenomenon.
While one, Joseph Prince, poisons the minds of people with garbage,
that God in heaven means He is far away from us on earth to even hear our prayers,
the other, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, presents the perfect balance of the whole truth,
that while God is our Father, who cares enough to hear our prayers,
He is at the same time in heaven, reminding us that He is the Almighty and one who is to be feared too.
In ‘The Message of the Sermon on the Mount,’
John Stott wrote:
“The so-called ‘Lord’s Prayer’ was given by Jesus
as a model of what genuine Christian prayer is like.
… Jesus told us to address him as (literally)
‘our Father in the heavens’.
This implies first that he is personal,
… God is just as personal as we are, in fact more so.
Secondly, he is loving.
He is not an ogre who terrifies us with hideous cruelty,
nor the kind of father we sometimes read or hear about
– autocrat, playboy, drunkard
– but he himself fulfils the ideal of fatherhood in his loving care for his children.
Thirdly, he is powerful.
He is not only good but great.
The words
‘in the heavens’
denote not the place of his abode
so much as the authority and power at his command
as the creator and ruler of all things.
Thus, he combines fatherly love
with heavenly power,
and what his love
directs his power is able to perform.”
George Ong’s comments:
Like Martyn Lloyd-Jones,
John Stott asserts the view
that the Lord’s prayer is for Christians,
and not for the Jews or Old Covenant believers
that Joseph Prince falsely teaches.
Like Lloyd-Jones,
John Stott also brings about the balance of the whole truth
– that while God is our Father, who is loving and caring towards us,
He is at the same time powerful and great because He dwells in the heavens.
This contradicts Joseph Prince’s position
that just because God is in the heavens,
He is so far away from us,
and so we aren’t sure whether He is really listening to our prayers.
In ‘Sermon on the Mount,’
Arthur Pink wrote:
“A few of our readers may have been disturbed
by the foolish and harmful error
that the Lord’s prayer was not designed
and is not suited for use in this dispensation:
that instead, it is “Jewish”
and intended for a godly remnant
in some “great tribulation period” yet future.
One would think the very stating of such a fantasy
quite sufficient to expose its absurdity
to those with any spiritual intelligence.
Neither our Lord nor any of His apostles
gave any warning that this prayer
was not to be used by Christians,
or any intimation that it was designed for a future age.
The fact that it is found in Luke’s Gospel
‘as well as Matthew’s
is clear indication that
it is to be employed by Jewish and Gentile saints alike.
There is nothing whatever in this prayer
which is unsuited to Christians now,
yea, everything in it is needed by them.
That it is addressed to “our Father”
furnishes all the warrant we need for it to be used
by all the members of His family.
Then let none of God’s children
allow Satan to rob them
of this valuable part of their birthright.”
George Ong’s comments:
Arthur Pink has rightfully said that those,
such as Joseph Prince,
who say that the Lord’s prayer is not for Christians,
but the Jews in another dispensation,
is promoting a foolish and harmful error
and lacking in spiritual intelligence.
In ‘Sermon on the Mount,’
Arthur Pink wrote:
“Our Father which art in heaven.”
This opening clause presents to us the Object to whom we pray
and the most endearing relation which He sustains to us.
By directing us to address the great God as
“Our Father
which art in heaven”
we are assured of His love
and power…”
… “Our Father.”
… “Which art in heaven.”
Here we are reminded of God’s greatness,
of His infinite elevation above us.
If the words “Our Father”
inspire confidence and love,
“which art in heaven”
should fill us with humility and awe.
… These words,
“which art in heaven,”
should serve as a guide to direct us in our praying.
Heaven is a high and exalted place,
and we should address ourselves to God
as One who is infinitely above us.”
George Ong’s comments:
Again, like Martyn Lloyd-Jones and John Stott,
Arthur Pinks brings out the balance
between our responses towards
“our father”
“who art in heaven”.
While we are assured of the love of “our Father” towards us,
we must at the same time recognise His power and infinite greatness above us
because He lives in the heavens.
Again, Joseph Prince is exposed for his false teaching on the Lord’s prayer.
In ‘Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew,’
Charles Spurgeon said:
“We pray as children to a Father,
and we pray as brothers, for we say, “Our Father.”
“Our Father” is a familiar name,
but the words “which art in heaven”
suggest the reverence due unto him.
Our Father and yet in heaven:
in heaven and yet our Father.
May his name be treated reverently,
and may all that is about him
– his Word and his gospel
– be regarded with the deepest awe!
It is for us so to walk before the Lord in all lowliness,
that all shall see that we reverence the character of the thrice-holy One.”
George Ong’s comments:
Charles Spurgeon echoed the views of Martyn Lloyd-Jones, John Stott and Arthur Pink
that “which art in heaven”,
suggests that we as mortal beings
should reverence God with holy awe,
even though He is our loving and caring Father.
In a sermon, Pastor Jason Lim said;
Please click here to view the 3-minute video:
“It’s very encouraging that Jesus tells us that when we pray to God,
we are praying to Father, Daddy, Abba.
That means Jesus is telling us we pray to someone who really cares for us.
But this is a big deal.
This is a revolutionary term if you were living in the times of Jesus
because, as far as we know in the Bible,
in the entire Old Testament,
there’s no individual, there’s no individual,
who will call God my Father.
The nation as a whole will call God as their Father,
but no one would dare say in his own prayer
for himself, by himself, Father. No one.
But when Jesus came into this world,
He now teaches His disciples;
He says you can now pray our Father. Wow!
So, our Father (together) in heaven.
Now, when you talk about in heaven,
this is to lift our view, to lift our view to a high view
because when we talk about Father,
sometimes, we may have this wrong attitude of flippancy before God.
We become too casual with God.
We take God for granted.
So, there’s a perfect balance in that a Father is very intimate,
and in heaven reminds you of the greatness of God.
So, when we say our Father in heaven,
we are saying He’s great, majestic, glorious and supreme.
He is all powerful.
So, in case we slip into a kind of flippant, Bo Chap, casual spirit
towards approaching God,
Jesus reminds us He’s our Father in heaven.
So, the word heaven here warns us against a kind of a flippancy
because the word heaven
is communicating the transcendence of God.
Now, the word transcendence means He is high.
He’s so high. That’s the idea.
Whereas the word our Father communicates,
this is a theological term, the immanence of God.
Immanence means the nearness of God.
Alright, that’s all it means.
Immanence means God is very near to us.
He’s our Father, very near to us.
A loving Father who comes around us
But in God, we have both immanence and transcendence.
God is great, but God is also near.”
George Ong’s comments:
I was looking for a video regarding Matthew 6:9
that could communicate the immanence and transcendence of God.
I was glad that I found it in Pastor Jason Lim’s video.
What Pastor Jason Lim explained,
has demolished Joseph Prince’s weird exegesis
that the 2 words in (‘Our Father) in heaven’
means there is a distance
between the one who prays on earth
and God, who is listening in heaven.
Neither does Joseph Prince say that ‘Our Father’
represents the immanence of God.
Nor did he say that ‘in heaven’
typifies the transcendence of God.
This ought to be the correct exegesis
which Martyn Lloyd-Jones, John Stott, Arthur Pink,
Charles Spurgeon and DA Carson (see below) all held to.
In ‘Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount And His Confrontation with the World,’
DA Carson wrote:
“We must, moreover, observe
that God is our Father “in heaven.”
That is the third observation about this designation.
The Jews of Jesus’s day were inclined, on the whole,
to conceive of God as so exalted
that personal relationships with him
could scarcely be imagined.
He was so transcendent
that the richness of personality was frequently lost to view.
By contrast, much modern evangelicalism
tends to portray him as exclusively personal and warm.
Somehow his sovereignty and exalted transcendence disappear.
If you enter certain American churches,
you will hear the enthusiastic singing of some such ditty (I can scarcely grace it with “chorus”)
as “He’s a great big wonderful God.”
Regrettably, I never fail to think of a great big wonderful teddy bear.
Such “choruses” are not quite heretical,
not quite blasphemous.
I sometimes wish they were,
for then they could be readily condemned for specific evil.
They are something much worse than isolated blasphemy and heresy.
They constitute part of a pattern of irreverence,
shallow theology, and experience-dominated religious criteria,
which has eviscerated a terribly high proportion of evangelical strength in the Western world.
This does not contradict my earlier comments concerning the personal nature of God
as portrayed by the designation “our Father.”
When Jesus taught his disciples to pray in this fashion,
he was addressing men
who were already convinced of the awesomeness of God’s transcendence,
the grandeur of God’s ineffable exaltation.
When they first timidly prayed,
“Our Father in heaven,”
no doubt they deeply felt the tremendous privilege of approaching this marvelous God
in so personal and intimate a fashion.
But today, those who have lost sight of God’s transcendence
can no longer cherish the sheer privilege of addressing him as Father.”
George Ong’s comments:
DA Carson bemoaned the state of the modern church
that has lost the reverence of the transcendent God.
Carson considered such irreverence
to be close to heresy and blasphemy.
This is the state of New Creation Church,
as they roared with laughter and enjoyed the entertainment.
as Joseph Prince mocked God and Jesus
in the Lord’s prayer.
Watch a 20-second video
of how Joseph Prince mocked God and Jesus in the Lord’s Prayer
as New Creation Church
roared with laughter and enjoyed the entertainment.
My Parting Shot to Joseph Prince:
“Hey Joe,
Li Bo Bin Liao Lah (you have lost your dignity).
Where are you going to hide your face?
With 5 heavy weights in theology:
Martyn, John, Arthur, Carson & Charles including Jason,
all coming down hard on you;
that for any person to back you
and say you are right,
that person must have the screws in his or her brain checked.
You also got insulted by Arthur,
who say you lacked spiritual intelligence.
If you are lacking spiritual intelligence,
can you explain how you can become world famous?
I scratch and scratch my head
but still cannot find the answer.
With so many world-famous people speaking against you,
don’t use me as a scapegoat, ah,
and say I jealous you or I character assassinate you.
I think it’s time for you to close shop,
and do something else.
Stern Warning:
Make sure you do a thorough clearing of your rubbish
in your sermons in your next preaching.
Why you leave so much rubbish to me?
Free, one, ah.
So, take advantage, is it?”
Rev George Ong