TEXT: Titus 3:9-11

SUBJECT: Harold Camping is a Heretic

Fifteen years ago, someone asked me to preach a sermon against Harold Camping’s hermeneutic or principles of interpretation. Although I strongly disagreed with the way he interpreted the Bible, I thought attacking a good man from the pulpit would do more harm than good. I said nothing.

Seven years ago, someone asked me to attack Mr. Camping’s book, 1994. I told him 1995 would refute the book far powerfully than I could and so I’d wait him out and let God prove he was wrong. Again, I said nothing.

But now, I have to speak out against the man. Not the man himself, necessarily, but his present view of the Church. If you listened to Open Forum last Tuesday night, you heard him say that the Church Age ended in 1994 and that every church is now under the judgment of God. This means that true believers ought to leave their churches and get out the Gospel in another way—for example on Family Radio. This is not an exact quote, of course, but it’s what he said. And, after listening to the long explanation that followed, it seems clear to me, it’s what he means.

Tuesday morning I talked to the wife of a man who goes to Mr. Camping’s church and she told me that he wants to disband the church, because God is no longer with His Church or using it for His glory. Monday morning, Bill Patton talked to a very close follower of Mr. Camping, and he said pretty much the same thing.

Also, in The New Life Digest, there’s an article—not by Mr. Camping himself, but with his approval, it seems, making the same point.

If this is what he now teaches, I can tell you without fear of slandering the man, Harold Camping is a heretic.

By "heretic", I don’t mean he is wrong on some minor points—no one is perfect in his understanding of God’s Word or the application of it. I mean his teaching is sinful and that following it will lead you into sin.

In our English Bibles, the word, heretic is found in only one place, Titus 3:10. The word itself means something like choosy. That seems awfully strange. What does choosy mean? Discerning? Careful? The kind of person who takes his time and thinks before he acts?

If that’s what it means, you have to wonder why Paul says to "Reject" such a person. Does the Apostle want us to be impulsive, to leap before we look? Of course not. The commentators explain what kind of choice the heretic makes. The two I found most helpful are D. Edmond Hiebert and Homer A. Kent. I’ll quote them in that order. The heretic has…

In short, a heretic is not only a false teacher, but the kind of man who believes he alone has the truth, who won’t listen to others, and who, if he’s gifted enough, gets people to leave their churches and to follow him and his unique doctrines.

That’s what a heretic is. And it’s precisely what Harold Camping is urging believers to do—to leave the churches, to not listen to their pastors, and to disregard the whole teaching of the Church, both past and present. He says he wants them to follow God’s Word only, but what he clearly means is to follow his unique interpretation of it.

That’s heresy.

Now, every teacher, (including me) has peculiarities—things we care about very much and sometimes add on to the teaching of the Bible. Mine is "The TV Thing". If you’ve been here a while, you know I denounce TV as often as possible. That’s my peculiarity. But what if you took it for God’s Word? And what if—under my preaching—you got rid of your set and never looked at the tube again?

Would you be sinning? No, you wouldn’t. Getting rid of the TV, though not commanded by God, would not cause you to sin.

Thus, even if I taught "No Christian ought to have a TV", it wouldn’t be a heresy, but only a mistake.

The same cannot be said of Mr. Camping’s doctrine. If you do what he tells you to, you will break the Law of God. For example, if there is no more church, then there is also no more baptism, Lord’s Supper, or elders. Thus, you cannot obey Acts 2:38 (which commands you to be baptized) or Luke 22:19 (which commands you to take the Lord’s Supper till He comes) or Hebrews 13:17 (which commands you to obey your elders).

You also break Hebrews 10:25—"Not forsaking the assembling of yourselves…" which is plainly in the context of the Church.

These are real violations of God’s Word. And to permit them, you must prove—not just say—they no longer apply. By citing Hebrews 9:10, I can prove to you that the ceremonial washings of the Old Covenant are repealed in this Age. But what verse really teaches that the Lord’s Supper, baptism, church attendance, and so on, have been done away with?

Mr. Camping’s doctrine, not only makes a believer break the Law of God, but it also tends to pride and contempt. Pride, in that his group alone has the Truth. And contempt, in that, it makes other professed Christians into fools (for staying in the Church) or hypocrites (men who were never saved in the first place, since, after all the Whole Church is under the Judgment of God).

In another connection, Paul asks the Corinthians, "Do you despise the Church of God"? That is exactly what Mr. Camping’s doctrine must lead to if followed consistently.

Mr. Camping’s doctrine, therefore, is more than a peculiarity—stupid, but pretty much harmless. It’s heresy.

How did Mr. Camping come up with his doctrine? He would say—and I believe him—that he got it from his study of the Bible. If he has taught anything at all over the years, it is The Bible alone and in its entirety is the Word of God. I have never heard him cite a creed or a confession of faith, a catechism or any human document as his authority. And no one would accuse him of saying, "God told me" or "I had a dream"! It is always The Bible.

The source of his authority, therefore, is not the problem. No, it’s his interpretation of the Bible that has led the poor man into heresy. As far as I can tell, he mis-interprets the Bible for two main reasons.

The first is he believes The whole Bible is a parable.

A parable, you might say, is a material story with a spiritual meaning. For example, in the Parable of the Sower (cf. Matthew 13), the good seed stands for the Word of God, the soil is like the souls of men, the birds that snatch away the seed are compared to Satan who gets the Word out of your mind, and so on. The words are literal, but the meaning is figurative. Mr. Camping would say spiritual.

Common sense would say this is not the way to interpret the Bible, but Mr. Camping has a text to prove his case. It is Mark 4:33-34a. It says,

Don’t you see? "Without a parable, He did not speak to them". Therefore, everything He said was a parable. And since our Lord is the Author of the whole Bible, the whole Bible is a parable.

The problem with this take, however, lies in the second half of Mark 4:34. The first part says,

But the second half says,

This means our Lord spoke figuratively to unbelievers, but to His people, He made it plain! John 16:29 backs this up,

The whole Bible is not a parable. That means every verse does not have a double-meaning—one literal and the other figurative (or, he would say, spiritual). That means, if you say a verse has a deeper meaning than the obvious one, you’ve got to prove it. If, as he says, feeding the hungry really means preaching the Gospel to them, you’ve got to prove the meaning from the context! And not by showing how in one place "bread" means "Word of God" and in some other place the"hunger" men felt was "spiritual" and so on.

This "double-meaning" of the Bible allows him to make the Bible say whatever him want it to say. Now, I do not believe Mr. Camping wants to distort the Word of God! But it’s easy find what you’re looking for.

That’s the first problem

The second is bizarre interest in and use of numbers. This is hard to explain, but an example may be helpful. Acts 27:37 says 276 men were on board the ship with Paul that foundered near Malta. In some way or other, Mr. Camping tied that in to his doctrine that the world would probably end in 1994. I’m not sure I can tell you why Luke gave us the exact number. But I can say he didn’t do it to predict the end of the world. How do I know that? Because there’s nothing in the context to indicate it.

Did Mr. Camping get his new doctrine from the Bible? He did not. He got it from studying the Bible. Wrongly!

By sticking to the plain sense of the Bible, you’ll miss a deep thing now and then. But you’ll never end up in heresy!

How should we respond to the new teaching of Harold Camping?

In the first place, we should pray for the man. We should pray that God would show him the error of his ways and that he would publicly repent of his heresy.

In the second place, we should pray for his followers, that God would show them the error of their ways and that they, too would escape the heresy they’re now in.

In the third place, if you see Mr. Camping, you ought to do everything you can to talk him out of his heresy. Rebuke him, instruct him, warn him, whatever it takes to bring him to repentance.

In the fourth place, until he repents, you should not listen to him. I Corinthians 15:33.

In the fifth place, you should not support Family Radio. He has said the changes in the programming with be small. That’s good. The music is edifying; the Bible-reading is good; I’ve been blessed by the book-reading and other things too. If James Montgomery Boice stays on the air, listen to him. The same with Donald Grey Barnhouse and most of the speakers on Conference Echoes. But listening to the other programming is one things, supporting the station is another.

Mr. Camping is both the President and the person most often on the air. Supporting the station, therefore, means you support his heresy and contribute to the further dividing of God’s people.

In the sixth place, watch and pray. Mr. Camping has served the Lord all his life (and he’s now in his eighties, I think). Yet even he—a man devoted to the Gospel, has fallen into heresy. If it can happen to him, it can happen to you and me as well.

Finally, always treat him and his followers with Christian love and humility. Just because they’re wrong, doesn’t mean you can mistreat them or look down your nose at them.