Acts 15:1-5, “And certain men which came down from Judaea taught the brethren, and said, Except ye be circumcised after the manner of Moses, ye cannot be saved. When therefore Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and disputation with them, they determined that Paul and Barnabas, and certain other of them, should go up to Jerusalem unto the apostles and elders about this question. And being brought on their way by the church, they passed through Phenice and Samaria, declaring the conversion of the Gentiles: and they caused great joy unto all the brethren. And when they were come to Jerusalem, they were received of the church, and of the apostles and elders, and they declared all things that God had done with them. But there rose up certain of the sect of the Pharisees which believed, saying, That it was needful to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses.”
I love this helpful passage of Scripture. In verse one we read about an unsaved group of false prophets. They plainly added works to grace, teaching that Except ye be circumcised after the manner of Moses, ye cannot be saved” (Acts 15:1b). We know of a surety that they could not have been saved, because they clearly taught partial faith in Christ plus works to get to Heaven.
In verse five we have a different group of false prophets, but they the Bible says “believed,” that is, they are saved. Acts 15:5, “But there rose up certain of the sect of the Pharisees which believed, saying, That it was needful to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses.” These false prophets were teaching the Gentiles (non Jewish) that because they were saved they had keep Jewish customs. In verse 24 the Apostle James refutes this heresy and clarifies the matter, saying “Forasmuch as we have heard, that certain which went out from us have troubled you with words, subverting your souls, saying, Ye must be circumcised, and keep the law: to whom we gave no such commandment:” (Acts 15:24).
Having said that as introduction, let me now refute Jack Chick's counterfeit Gospel. The following is the same back page that appears on all ONE BILLION Chick Tracts that have been sold over the past 63 years since Jack Chick published his first cartoon tract in 1960. ...
A WARNING About Chick Tracts!
Jack Chick's Counterfeit Plan Of Salvation
Carefully notice in the above back page portion of every Chick Tract, that Jack Chick requires MORE to be saved than simply admitting you are a sinner. In addition to step 1, he also requires in step 2 that you: “Be willing to turn from sin,” which he errantly misunderstands to be the biblical meaning of the word “repent.” Folks, this is damnable heresy! RIGHT DOCTRINE MATTERS!!!
Someone recently felt compelled to let me know that they disagree with me, that Chick Tracts are bad. The man said that when he got saved years ago, he never felt the impression from Chick Tracts that he had to turn away from his sinful behavior to get to Heaven. I am glad for his sake; however, I have also received comments from others, who said that except it were for the grace of God, they might have split Hell wide open because of being misled by Jack Chick's religious tracts.
One man in particular, confided in me that he had been living in fornication with his girlfriend at the time, and after reading a Chick Tract was deceived to think that God wouldn't save him unless he first abandoned his sinful lifestyle, which he wasn't willing to do. He told me that if he had died during that time, he would have went to Hell forever because of Jack Chick.
Dear reader, the way that we present the Gospel is a critically important matter. There are not different variations of the Gospel. I keep hearing foolish neo-evangelical preachers,
like Kevin Bauder, who claims that a free grace Gospel and Lordship Salvationists all fall within the realm of orthodox Christian theology. No, they do not!!! Lordship Salvation is a perversion of the Gospel. The inspired King James Bible teaches a free grace Gospel, by faith alone in Christ.
You cannot show me anywhere in the inspired King James Bible where it says to be willing to forsake a lifestyle of sinning to get to Heaven. What saith the Scripture? ...
Romans 3:19-21, “ Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets;”
The only thing that God requires to be saved is to admit you are a guilty sinner. You've got to know what you're being saved from. We are all guilty sinners in God's sight, who all deserve to burn in the fires of Hell forever (Revelation 20:11-15; 21:8). That is the Bad News! The Good News (or Gospel) is that God sent His only begotten Son into the world to die on a cross in our place, to pay for our debt of sins with His precious blood. Jesus died on the cross, was buried and resurrected three days later (1st Corinthians 15:1-6). This is THE GOSPEL, not turning away from your sinful ways, following Jesus as the 'Lord' of your life, inviting Christ into your life, letting God take control of the steering wheel, giving up the old ways, nor any other theological junk that is being preached everywhere in apostate churches and Bible colleges today.
Chick Tracts Preach Another Gospel
Chick Tracts seem to have a different answer than the Bible to the question:
"What must I do to be saved?"
"And brought them out, and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house." —Acts 16:30, 31
On their website's statement of faith at Chick.com, they state concerning salvation:
"Salvation is the gift of God and includes the forgiveness of sins, the imputation of the Righteousness of Jesus Christ, and the gift of eternal life. Union with the triune God provides all blessings in this life and the life hereafter. Salvation is received by faith alone, apart from all good works and merit."
SOURCE: http://www.chick.com/information/general/statementoffaith.asp
Bravo! That's correct. Now if only they stuck to it! You'd think that Chick Tracts were published by complete strangers in a different religion. How can their website by so right, but their tracts be so bad? It is my humbly belief that Jack Chick knew he was wrong in his theology, but after printing and selling 800,000,000 of his cartoon tracts, he was reluctant to change his plan of salvation 60 years later. Why else would Jack Chick have a double standard? His Statement of Faith is correct, but his religious Chick Tracts are corrupt. That speaks volumes!
Evangelist Jack Chick
One thing is 100% certain, and that is that Chick Tracts preach 'another gospel' that cannot produce the new spiritual birth. ...
2nd Corinthians 11:3-4, “But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him.”
Here is a helpful Gospel tract by Pastor Harry Ironside (1876-1951) titled, what else: 'ANOTHER GOSPEL.' You cannot be saved by placing your trust in ANOTHER GOSPEL. This is how I KNOW that Dr. Kevin Bauder and other heretics like him, are wrong to claim that there can be more than one Gospel. Lordship Salvation is another gospel. Either you must turn away from your sinful bad habits, or you do not to get to Heaven, but it absolutely cannot be BOTH! Romans 11:6, “And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.” If you attempt to clean up your life to be saved, you don't get grace!
The sole purpose of the Old Testament LAW of Moses is to show humanity our sinnership and bring us to Christ to be saved by grace through faith alone. Galatians 3:24-26, “Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.” God never intended for man to try to keep the law as a prerequisite to saving faith. This is the damnable heresy that John MacArthur, John Piper, Paul Washer, Ray Comfort, Kirk Cameron, Steve Pettit, Marty Herron, John Lewis, Sam Horn, Billy and Franklin Graham, Rick Warren, Pat Robertson, Joel Osteen, Beth Moore, Joyce Meyer and all the rest of today's hellbound neo-evangelicals are all preaching—ANOHER GOSPEL of partial faith in Christ plus works (i.e., turning away from your sinful ways, which is equivalent to keeping the Mosaic law).
Whether giving up your BAD WORKS, or starting to do GOOD WORKS, either way you are adding WORKS to God's saving grace, which is a perversion of the Gospel. Hebrews 6:1-2, “Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, Of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment.” As we just read, the Bible speaks of repentance from “DEAD WORKS,” which includes repentance from BAD WORKS and GOOD WORKS alike. One of my favorite sermons by Pastor Jack Hyles is titled: 'HE DIED FOR YOUR RIGHTEOUSNESS TOO.'
The Devil's Modern Bibles Contain Another Gospel
The Devil's new modern Bible revisions woefully misinterpret the Word of God, changing the truth of God into a lie (Romans 1:25). Look for yourself how some of the Devil's new Bible perversions corrupt God's Word...
KING JAMES BIBLE (KJB) - Hebrews 6:1, “Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works,”
EASY-TO-READ VERSION (ERV) - Hebrews 6:1, “So we should be finished with the beginning lessons about Christ. We should not have to keep going back to where we started. We began our new life by turning away from the evil we did in the past and by believing in God.”
Do you see the night and day difference between the accurate King James Bible and the Satanic corrupted Easy-To-Read Version? To be saved we repent (change our mind) from what we think we must do to get to Heaven, to what God's Word says we must do to get to Heaven. We must change our mind about trusting in DEAD WORKS (which includes all works, both good and bad), and REST only in Jesus Christ (Hebrews 4:10-11). The ERV is wrong!
The ERV errantly reads that you must forsake your BAD WORKS, which is in itself a form of GOOD WORKS. The King James Bible tells us to abandon DEAD WORKS. That is, we must change our mind about trying to get to Heaven by doing (or not doing) any type of WORKS.
The Big Problem With 'CHICK TRACTS'
Sadly, the big issue with Jack Chick's tracts is that he requires MORE to get to Heaven than God does. Christ came into the world to take away our sins, not demand that we attempt to forsake them as a prerequisite to saving faith.
“It is 'Good News' if no one must have good works before salvation, or after salvation. For salvation to truly be by grace, it must not have any stipulations of any kind at any time. Works before, during or after; works cannot be evidence of my salvation.” —Pastor Ralph Yankee Arnold, “Does Calvinism Change The Gospel?”
Good works are not the payment for sin, the payment for sin is death. That is why Christ died for our sins. Salvation is not a reward for the righteous, it is a gift for the guilty! Salvation is not doing your best, it is having Christ's best put to your account through receiving Him by faith. Turning away from sinful ways would be a work. Faith puts all of the merit where it belongs, on the object of our faith, Jesus and His work.
If to “repent” means to forsake our sinful ways TO BE SAVED, but Jesus already paid for our sins by dying on the cross, then what are we repenting from? The true Gospel always points you to CHRIST; a false gospel always points to YOU. We must stay true to the simplicity of the Gospel. Repentance regarding salvation is a change of mind from unbelief to belief. We must earnestly contend for the faith once delivered unto the saints (Jude 1:3).
If you pay close attention to the theology of Jack Chick, as taught on the back page of every Chick Tract, you cannot get saved. No one has ever been born-again who thinks they must continually make an effort to turn away from their sinful ways to get to Heaven, because that is works. Jack Chick plainly teaches that it is NOT enough to merely admit being a sinner, to be saved. In addition, he perversely teaches that you must have a desire to forsake your sinful lifestyle, or else you are not ready to be saved. That is damnable heresy! Nowhere in the Holy Bible can you show me where it says we must be willing to stop committing sin to get to Heaven. That is 100% self-righteousness, not the free grace of God by faith alone.
And let me make clear that Jack Chick is clearly trying to force lost sinners to reform in order to be saved. To merely say that a person must “be willing” to turn from their sins is effectively the same as demanding it of them. If I agree to let you drive my car with the stipulation that you first “be willing” to return it with a full tank of gas, I have made it very clear that I expect you to fuel the tank with gas before you bring the car back to me. Likewise, to require of a lost sinner that they first “be willing” to turn away from sin to be saved, is the same as demanding it of them. The implication is abundantly plain to see. Therefore, we can only logically conclude that Jack Chick is demanding that lost sinners first commit to reform as a prerequisite to putting their faith in Jesus Christ, which is another gospel accursed by God (Galatians 1:6-9).
Kindly, Jack Chick has it all backwards. Jesus Christ went to the cross to pay our massive debt of sin, not demand that we ourselves commit to reform as a requirement to receive that free gift of God. Jesus saved us unto good works (Ephesians 2:10), but it is not required of saints to be saved, nor to maintain or prove that we are saved. The true Gospel always points you to CHRIST; a false gospel always points to YOU. Salvation is not doing your best, it is having Christ's best put to your account through receiving Him by faith. Any admitted guilty sinner who receives Christ's sacrifice on the cross as payment for his or her sins, believing that Jesus was buried but then physically resurrected three days later, is saved. This is 'the Gospel,' the GOOD NEWS of Jesus crucified, buried and risen. All who BELIEVE IT are saved!
Chick Tracts are confusing. They embellish and obscure God's simple plan of salvation, tossing a monkey wrench into the Gospel. This may seem like an insignificant thing to you dear friend, but I assure you on the authority of God's inspired Word that it is not a trifle matter. RIGHT DOCTRINE MATTERS! Nowhere in the inspired Word of God are we taught to give up sinning to be saved. Salvation is a TAKE proposition, not a GIVE proposition.
It ought to bother any and every redeemed Christian, who understands the Gospel by which we were saved, to see anyone change and corrupt that simplicity which is in Christ. The simplicity that is in Christ is none other than, 'THE GOSPEL.' Even a small impressionable child, with limited understanding can be saved by simple childlike faith in the 'GOOD NEWS' (Gospel) that Jesus is the Christ—the only begotten Son of God—who died on a cross to pay for their sins, was buried and bodily resurrected from the dead the third day. There is no requirement anywhere taught in the inspired Scriptures, that you must be willing to try to stop sinning to get to Heaven. In his sincere but woeful ignorance, Jack Chick wickedly added that extra requirement to God's simple plan of salvation.
It is more than a big deal friend. Read for yourself the entire Gospel of John, which is God's Gospel tract according to John 20:31, “But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.” We find example after example in the Holy Bible about how to be saved...
John 6:28-29, “Then said they unto him, What shall we do, that we might work the works of God? Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.”
John 6:40, “And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.”
Acts 16:30-31, “And brought them out, and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.”
1st Corinthians 15:1-4, “Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:”
In the preceding four Scripture passages on how to be saved, nothing is even remotely mentioned about turning away from one's sins, nor even being willing to do so. So where in the world does Jack Chick get the heretical idea that to be saved a lost sinner must first be willing to clean up their life and reform to get to Heaven? It is damnable heresy! Like I said, I do believe that Jack Chick went to Heaven, but I also think he felt convicted by the Holy Spirit about the poor choice of words (which is blatant false doctrine) in all of his tracts. You cannot merely sweep this matter under the table and assume that lost sinners will get the picture. I think some do, but others don't. It all depends on their previous knowledge of the Bible.
When I was a child and teenager, I read every Chick Tract that I could get my hands on. I never noticed his false doctrine at the time, because I didn't know enough to see the harm in it. I just looked at the cartoon pictures and was mesmerized by them, as are millions of people. There's not a man alive in this world who has made such an impact upon the churches as has Jack Chick. They've sold over ONE BILLION Chick Tracts since 1960. But dear reader, that is what makes Chick Tracts all that much more dangerous, because they mislead people concerning what they must DO to get to Heaven.
Nowhere in the inspired Word of God are we taught that we must forsake a lifestyle of sinning, or be willing to do so, to be saved. Jack Chick no doubt heard some other preacher teach this misunderstood repentance heresy, and so he adopted it also. The only sin which can keep a person out of Heaven is unbelief. Therefore, the only sin that one must repent (change their mind) about is unbelief. Repentance is when a person has a change of mind to agree with God that they are a guilty sinner, and they have no hope of going to Heaven of their own power. Therefore, they are saved when they turn to God by believing the GOSPEL that Jesus is the only begotten Son of God, the Christ, who died on a cross in our place, was buried and physically resurrected from the dead three days later. That is the 'GOOD NEWS,' by which all who BELIEVE IT are saved immediately, irrevocably and permanently.
I keep meeting stubborn ignorant pastors and churchgoers, who are insistent that there is nothing wrong with Chick Tracts. They are either willfully blind or woefully ignorant. Let me say it again, Jack Chick's first step to be saved is to admit you are a sinner, which is correct; but then he adds a second step, to be willing to turn away from your sinning, which is incorrect. It is not a small matter to change God's plan of salvation. Proverbs 30:5-6, “Every word of God is pure: he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him. Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou be found a liar.” The plain truth is that Jack Chick's plan of salvation does not match up to Christ's plan of salvation in the Bible.
Matthew 7:21-23, “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.”
The $64,000 question is: How much can a man embellish the Gospel and still be saved?
Can a man add water baptism to the Gospel and still be saved? No, he cannot.
Can a man add keeping sacraments to the Gospel and still be saved? No, he cannot.
Can a man add doing good deeds to the Gospel and still be saved? No, he cannot.
Can a man add following Jesus as the 'Lord' of his life and still be saved? No, he cannot, as evidenced in Matthew 7:21-23. They called Him “Lord, Lord,” but Jesus denied knowing them. Partial faith in Christ plus something else cannot produce the new spiritual birth. The truth is that you cannot add anything for the Gospel to still be valid. Even if you just add clipping your toe nails once every million years, you have perverted the grace of God.
So, can Jack Chick add being willing to give up your sinning and still be saved? No, he does not have that right. Jack Chick has perverted the Words of the living God. If you want to take your chances by altering God's simple plan of salvation, then do so at your own risk, but you have kindly been warned. I humbly reject Jack Chick's counterfeit plan of salvation. If ungodly people want to defend Mr. Chick's lies in his poorly written tracts, then that is on you. The plain truth is that Jack Chick's plan of salvation does not match up to Christ's plan of salvation in the Bible. John 6:47, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.”
I applaud Christian author Michael Patrick Bowen for getting it right...
Here is the gospel: God says that we are sinners and that no amount of good works or behavioral changes on our part could ever make us holy enough to enter Heaven. God sent His Son to pay for all of our sins. Jesus paid for our crimes by dying on the cross for us all. His dead body was buried in a grave. On the third day, Jesus arose from the dead.
The instant you believe this, He knows it and He saves you. “Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on Me hath everlasting life” (John 6:47). The free gift is based solely upon your trust in what Jesus did for you and has nothing at all to do with what you do for Him. “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9). ~Michael P. Bowen, "I NEVER KNEW YOU"
