The Growing In Grace Cult

HereticJust when I thought I’d seen it all, I am astounded once again. I got an e-mail the other from a friend of mine with a link to the web­site of Dr. Jose Luis de Jesus Miranda who the leader of Cre­ciendo en Gracia or Grow­ing In Grace min­istry. I am, to say the least, absolutely appalled at this teach­ing; so I’m am riled to defend our Lord against this heretic. Let’s first review some of his claims, and then I’ll turn to a swift apolo­getic destroy­ing his ministry.

The “Conversion Experience” of Miranda

Every cult leader has an expe­ri­ence where they are “told by Jesus” (Joseph Smith, Muham­mad, etc.) that they are His chosen instru­ment to “save the church” from apos­tasy. Well, Miranda’s story is inter­est­ing, because he doesn’t just believe Christ talked to him but that he became Christ. Here is an excerpt of his testimony:

“De Jesus’s gospel flows from an expe­ri­ence he had in Decem­ber 1976…Then one frosty Decem­ber night, he says he awoke to find him­self flanked by two brawny men with stern expres­sions who told him: ‘The King of Kings is coming to anoint you.’ Before he knew it, he was stand­ing in a lumi­nous marble cor­ri­dor where trum­pets blared and a spec­tral figure crept toward him. Then the appari­tion merged with him, and he began to hear a man’s voice in his head…’He said, “Open your Bible,”‘ De Jesus recalls. ‘So I opened to Romans 6. And he said, “Read that … that means you’re dead to sin; sin can’t reign in your life.”‘ The expe­ri­ence left De Jesus trans­formed. “Ever since that day, I can’t learn from any­body ‘ and I mean no one,” he says. He now believes that was the night of Christ’s second coming.”

Wild huh? Now, let’s look at more of this man’s hereti­cal teaching.

The Claims of Miranda

  • He believes he is Christ Him­self; the last man­i­fes­ta­tion of God on earth.
  • He claims that Romans 16:25 con­firms that he is God.
  • He believes, not only that he doesn’t sin, but that sin no longer exists.
  • He claims that every reli­gion: Catholics, Protes­tants, Jews, etc. all have the wrong reli­gion (and he appar­ently has the right one).
  • Only his fol­low­ers are the “true race.”
  • He believes he has come to estab­lish the “Government of God” on earth.
  • Oh wait, he also claims that the devil doesn’t exist; he is only a fab­ri­ca­tion of other religions.

What Shall We Make of Miranda?

What is inter­est­ing is that in 1988 he announced that he was the rein­car­nated Paul, and changed in 1999 to “the Other” who paved the way for Christ’s coming, but why stop there? He then decided to go all the way in 2004 to claim­ing to be Christ and the sole “intepreter of the gospel” (Source).

Let’s eval­u­ate the teach­ings he has given. It’s inter­est­ing that he doesn’t claim any extra writ­ten rev­e­la­tion out­side of the Bible which will make this task all the more swift and easy. I shall eval­u­ate his claims through the very Bible that he says, “If this is true, then I am the son of God.”

Is Sin Gone?

I’ll start the apolo­getic with a few of his points. By demon­strat­ing that his claims are false Bib­li­cally, then his unique claim to deity will be under­mined and dis­proved. First, the apos­tle John warns us in his first epis­tle that “If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiv­ing our­selves and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8), and he ends that very chap­ter with “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us” (1 John 10). Inter­est­ing. It is also inter­est­ing that this man, instead of being sin­less, is actu­ally com­mit­ting the very first sin: “For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, know­ing good and evil” (Gen 3:5).

Does Romans 16.25 Val­i­date his Claims?

Now to Him who is able to estab­lish you accord­ing to my gospel and the preach­ing of Jesus Christ, accord­ing to the rev­e­la­tion of the mys­tery which has been kept secret for long ages past,
Romans 16:25

Does this pas­sage con­firm the teach­ing of Miranda? Well, if he says he’s Jesus then of course he could; but it should be noted that I could say that I’m Jesus but that doesn’t make it true. It’s inter­est­ing in the next verse Paul says that the Gospel “has been made known to all the nations, lead­ing to obe­di­ence of faith” (vs. 26). In other words, the Gospel has been made known, revealed, and ver­i­fied by God Him­self in Paul’s day. Jesus came once to verify Him­self and His mis­sion, and when He comes back it will be the con­sum­ma­tion of history.

Does the Devil Exist?

Is the devil really a fab­ri­ca­tion of reli­gious zealots, or is the devil a real person por­trayed in the very Scrip­tures Miranda claims to ful­fill? First off, it’s inter­est­ing that Jesus Him­self was tempted by the devil and rebuked him (Mat 4). Through the res­ur­rec­tion, an angel “laid hold of the dragon, the ser­pent of old, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thou­sand years” (Rev 20:5), and after the final judge­ment Satan and his fol­low­ers are to be “thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone” (Rev 20:10). Fur­ther, Paul claims that there really is a “prince of the power of the air” (Eph 2:2), and Peter tells us to “[b]e of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adver­sary, the devil, prowls around like a roar­ing lion, seek­ing some­one to devour” (1 Pet 5:8). And I could go on with the Garden of Eden nar­ra­tive, Job, and many other instances of this figure.

What About his “Government of God?”

He claims that he came to build the offi­cial gov­ern­ment of God. He claims the following:

“We’re the gov­ern­ment of God on Earth,” explains De Jesus. “We will spread all over and rule the world. We will con­trol the church, the econ­omy, soci­ety, edu­ca­tion, pol­i­tics, tech­nol­ogy. There will be no war, no cor­rup­tion. I mean, if a lie can change the world, why can’t the truth do it?”

It’s inter­est­ing that Jesus Him­self rebuked His fol­low­ers and others for their mis­con­cep­tion that He was to set up a polit­i­cal king­dom (Acts 1:6-8). Jesus told us that “My king­dom is not of this world” (Joh 18:36). The next time we will see a theo­cratic nation is when Jesus truly comes back to con­sum­mate time.

What About his Apologetic?

Miranda actu­ally on the front page of his web­site pro­vides the fol­low­ing apolo­getic to the ques­tion: “Could Dr Jose Luis de Jesus Miranda be another False Christ?”

“Notice how this verse [Mat 24:24; Mar 13:32] states that the false Christs will come per­form­ing what? signs and won­ders, The Apos­tle Jose Luis De Jesus Miranda has not appeared to per­form signs and won­ders, He has arisen to reveal spe­cific infor­ma­tion of the authen­tic gospel…We hope that the eyes of your under­stand­ing will be enlight­ened to dis­cover that the Lord Jesus Christ has returned.”

John Gill com­ments that the signs and won­ders “make an appear­ance of doing them, though they really did them not.” Jesus is saying that some claim­ing to be mes­siah (”Christs”) will per­form signs and won­ders, but not all have to by this verse. Fur­ther, Jesus is not address­ing those claim­ing to be Jesus Him­self just as a messiah.

Is he Jesus?

In this we have to only turn to the teach­ing of the New Tes­ta­ment when Jesus will return. Jesus tells us that His return will not happen until “This gospel of the king­dom shall be preached in the whole world as a tes­ti­mony to all the nations, and then the end will come” (Mat 24:14). Con­sid­er­ing that half of the world still has no access to the Gospel, I highly doubt that this has been ful­filled. Paul also describes a mass con­ver­sion of ethnic Jews before the return of Christ (Rom 11:25-26).

One of his fol­low­ers, in an inter­view, claims that Jesus will return the same way He came the first time (i.e. through a mother). This is inter­est­ing, because Miranda doesn’t claim a virgin birth; and he claims his “becoming Christ” occurred later in life. In other words, his sup­posed birth is not the same as Christ’s. Christ described His own return by saying that “lightning comes from the east and flashes even to the west, so will the coming of the Son of Man be” (Mat 24:27), and Paul describes Christ’s return as “the Lord Him­self will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trum­pet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first” (1 Thess 4:16) which cor­re­sponds to his teach­ing of a bodily res­ur­rec­tion at Christ’s return in 1 Cor 15. Fur­ther, Jesus’ own depar­ture from earth was bodily (Acts 1:9); and that is the way that we will see Christ for all eter­nity start­ing at His return. Lastly, we know that Jesus’ return will be fol­lowed by a final judg­ment fol­lowed by the eter­nal state as described in Rev 20.

Con­clu­sion

The teach­ings of this man are un-​Biblical, hereti­cal, dan­ger­ous, and false. Chris­tians need to pray for his repen­tance as well as his fol­low­ers. He is dan­ger­ous, and he is pray­ing on the money of inno­cent people to build his empire and his sup­posed “government.” Let God on high grant him repen­tance or strike him dead.

Activity

47 total comments, leave your comment.
  1. Perry
    Sep 7th 2006

    Pastor Paul made the point once that we, at seri­ous and rare times, should pray that God would either save some people or get them out of the way (stike them dead). I would like to see him repent but being stuck dead is a viable option too.

  2. Chris
    Sep 7th 2006

    Thanks for that Perry. I actu­ally just erased that “strike him dead” part for fear of being to harsh, but with your com­ment I added it back in. This is espe­cially true in light of the Impre­ca­tory Psalms.

  3. Sarah
    Sep 11th 2006

    Wow. I’m amazed that people actu­ally follow this guy. Well, maybe I shouldn’t be amazed. There are a lot of nutty people in this world…or people who are ill informed and easily swayed. I’m going to have to look at his site!

  4. van.diesel
    Sep 11th 2006

    Thanks for this post – it’s a great sum­mary and walk­through of Miranda’s claims. Keep watchin’ that life and doc­trine, friend.

  5. Steve
    Sep 11th 2006

    I think you forgot one thing…Jesus is sup­posed to rap­ture the church at his lit­eral second coming. It the Bible it states that he will come in the clouds, but never says that he was be in “man-like” or even ON THE EARTH until the church is rap­tured. AND his real name is GOD!

  6. L. Ngamboi
    Sep 12th 2006

    I wonder the Lord Jeus had come only in the USA ! not for the whole world ? !

  7. Sergio Alvarez
    Sep 26th 2006

    Great writ­ing. I’ve been read­ing on this fellow for quite some time now, living in Miami, I recall hear­ing him and his “apostle” preach in a local radio sta­tion, and need­less to say, it was both sad and com­i­cal. It just shows us how easily unin­structed fol­low­ers will slip into, and even give their lives for utter non­sense. I have seen his fol­low­ers state the “he will not die” and with­out flut­ter, say that they would give up every­thing they hold dear for him in a heart­beat. The bible speaks SO clearly on false teach­ers, and if they would just study the scrip­tures like the Bere­ans did, this char­la­tan would prob­a­bly be flip­ping burg­ers. Their whole the­ol­ogy is rooted on Hebrews 6, …

    “Therefore leav­ing the ele­men­tary teach­ing about the Christ, let us press on to matu­rity, not laying again a foun­da­tion of repen­tance from dead works and of faith toward God, of instruc­tion about wash­ings and laying on of hands, and the res­ur­rec­tion of the dead and eter­nal judg­ment. And this we will do, if God per­mits.

    They take these verses out of con­text and say that it proves that every­thing that churches do are dead works, they state that the foun­da­tion of repen­tance and eter­nal judg­ment are un-​necessary. WOW! If we read the pre­text we can clearly see that the apos­tle was making the state­ment that they needed to leave the ele­men­tary teach­ings and to on to solid food. It is so impor­tant to cor­rectly teach the word, the results of not doing so are seen in this sad cult that is lit­er­ately send­ing people into damna­tion.

  8. Gene
    Oct 5th 2006

    I inter­viewd this guys spoke­seper­son on 10/04/2006. His name was Bishop Carlos Ces­tero. You listen to it in our pod­cast archive at Unchained Radio

  9. J.C.
    Oct 11th 2006

    ok…
    ok…
    ok…

    Ques­tion: In Jesus of Nazareth’s time, did people believe he was God or did they call him a blas­femous liar and cru­ci­fied him?

    Per­haps just once the world can finally sit down and anal­ize every­thing he says, not just watch to a 5 minute news broad­cast who focuses on the neg­a­tive fab­ri­cated facts to lure the view­ers and call him a liar.

    That’s clearly a sign of the lack of faith the bible says HE would find the second time he came…

  10. Chris
    Oct 11th 2006

    J.C.,

    I have done more than just watch that new­cast as you can see by the depth of this apolo­getic.

    Actu­ally, the Bible states that when He comes back there will be a final judge­ment and then the New Heavens/New Earth (Rev 20-22). Where’s the judg­ment? Jesus is not a Puerto Rican man who preys on the inno­cent lead­ing astray many. If any­thing, your leader has the signs of the man of sin.

  11. Rsquared
    Oct 12th 2006

    I just learned of this move­ment today and started doing research. It makes me glad that I’ve gorwn to a point where seeing and hear­ing things like this no longer dis­turb me. In actu­al­ity Jesus proph­e­sied that there would be many false Christs that would come in the world, Miranda is just another exam­ple (Matthew 24:4). Jesus also says that many would be deceived, and we see that being played out here as well. The truth is we are living in the last days and accord­ing to Bib­li­cal fore­tellings, we can expect to see more of this. We can also rest assured that when Christ does in fact return, he will be coming to rap­ture the Church, and no one in all the earth will be able to miss the sign of his coming.(Matthew 24:26-32)3

  12. Sergio
    Oct 16th 2006

    This sect is really pro­mot­ing them­selves in Miami, I just set up a site (cre​cien​doen​des​gra​cia.com) that will be for the sole pur­pose of bring to light the CLEAR and OBIV­I­OUS hereti­cal teach­ings of this man and his “bishop of bishops”. The Eng­lish trans­la­tion for my sites name is “growing in disgrace” if anyone wishes to con­tribute any­thing, please shoot me an e-amil. Also with this sites owner’s per­mis­sion, I would like to add a link to this page.

  13. J.C.
    Oct 16th 2006

    Hum….

    That’s true. The bible does say that in Matthew and there have been many people claim­ing to be God, but the thing is none of these self-​proclaimed mes­si­ahs have come preach­ing the gospel of Paul, which the bible states would be the one God would return preach­ing.

    Dr. Jose Luis de Jesus Miranda says what he says becuase he has bib­li­cal evi­dence of every­thing that comes out of his mouth. He has even said in his teach­ings, which he posts on his web­site, if I EVER say any­thing that is not within the let­ters of Paul I encour­age you to call me a liar. But, not once, in the many years he has been preach­ing has he stepped away from those boundries…

    Now, I have a ques­tion, what did Jesus die in the cross for? What did that sac­ri­fice achieve?

  14. macnos
    Oct 29th 2006

    This guy would have been in prison in my coun­try if he had formed such a cult. I’m from Zim­babwe which hap­pens to be a deeply Chris­t­ian coun­try. This is pure heracy but sadly it’s not against the law here in the US.

    Inci­dently does anyone remem­ber Jim Jones, he was the cult leader who believed he was the incar­na­tion of Jesus and God. He later went on to estab­lish a so called ‘Paradise’ in Guyana where his fol­low­ers were forced to work in Guyana. He even­tu­ally went on to con­vince more than 900 of his fol­low­ers to commit sui­cide. I won’t be sur­prised if De Jesus con­vinces his very gullible foll­w­ers to do the same.

  15. minin
    Nov 21st 2006

    Maybe this guy (Jose Luis De Jesus Miranda) is call­ing him­self Jesus because he is the antichrist who will come first. But….what hap­pened to the rap­ture? I’m get­ting scared for this world. Every­one will be losing their souls because they don’t really read into the Bible and God’s Word. They would rather beleive in some­one else because they can see them, it’s easier for them. May God pro­tect us all.

  16. Collin B. Kotlarz
    Jan 1st 2007

    Why do you think God allows this folly? As far as I am con­cerned he is either work­ing supreme glo­ri­fi­ca­tion for him­self in this man’s repen­tance or damna­tion. I am appalled that some­one would talk like this and then I am not. Human beings are stupid. They hate God and love sin. This man, unfor­tu­natly has choosen the wrong God to mock since my God lives in Heaven and does what he pleases.

  17. Becky
    Jan 8th 2007

    Dear J.C.

    Miranda con­tra­dicts him­self on a reg­u­lar basis. Just the other day, I was watch­ing a video of him and the exact words that came out of his mouth was that when preach­ers pray for some­one and the person falls back, that is power of God, but it is power that makes you con­fused. When was the last time time that God con­fused anyone???

    As far as him being called a liar, the dif­fer­ence between Miranda and the REAL Jesuschrist is that Jesus never got any­thing out of the people that he helped, while Miranda makes mil­lions of dol­lars a month, not to men­tion all the ridicu­lous gifts his ridicu­lous fol­low­ers give him.

    Jesuschrist died in the Cross to give us sal­va­tion. Before Jesus, God only had a pact with with the Jewish people. Jesus died to give EVERY­ONE a chance at sal­va­tion. When he died, the devil no longer had power over man. And if the devil or sin doesn’t exist, the what is the pur­pose of Miranda?

    If we are all PER­FECT and WITH­OUT sin, then why we need Miranda to tell us the real truth? Shouldn’t we just walk around doing as we please until we die or God comes gets us???

    Miranda is a liar and unfor­tu­nately there is no hope of sal­va­tion for him. In the video I watched he clearly made a mock­ery of and blas­phemed God and his Holy Spirit which is the only unfor­givev­able sin. My only hope is to keep pray­ing that some day soon, Miranda will be gone from this world and hope­fully his fol­low­ers will see the light and real­ized that they were just fooled by some self­ish jerk who let him­self be fooled by the devil.

  18. Patrice
    Jan 19th 2007

    So many une­d­u­cated and gullible people in this world. They have fallen for this… Truly must be demonic. Won’t his fol­low­ers feel so ashamed when he gets hit by a car or dies of an aneurism?… The devil is hard at work destroy­ing lives. We must edu­cate, evan­ge­lize, tes­tify so more are not fooled, God Bless.

  19. Matt
    Jan 28th 2007

    What is amaz­ing to me is that seem­ingly normal look­ing people give this man money so he can wear Rolex watches, live like a mil­lion­aire and bla­tantly abuse power in an exact con­tra­dic­tion to the life and teach­ings of the man who, coin­ci­den­tally, he pro­claims to BE. That he seems to be more of a stu­dent of Adolph Hitler’s tac­tics than the Bible is clear; ie: shut up the oppo­si­tion (break up their meet­ings), create a mythol­ogy, etc.
    I pity the people who follow him, as well as thier fam­i­lies, because they truly are hurt­ing so many others who love them. Incred­i­ble gulli­bil­ity notwith­stand­ing, those people (like JC) need help. I wonder if “the Christ” has paid any taxes on that money he’s received? Hmm…

  20. Donna
    Jan 30th 2007

    J.C.
    Please read Rev­e­la­tions. Since Mr. Miranda is not taking into account every­thing that this book says would happen before the coming of our true LORD comes.

  21. Krista
    Jan 31st 2007

    I never thought that this time period would come in my life­time. As soon as I read the msnbc.com news­page, I prayed hard for God’s pro­tec­tion for me and my family, and I prayed that God would keep my eyes open to Him and only Him. God bless every believer, and for you Un-​believers, may our sweet Lord open your eyes before it’s too late!

  22. mikey
    Feb 13th 2007

    I hope that we who have real honest belief in Jesus pray for this man!
    He is a lost man..
    He is only out to make finan­cial prof­its with­out really doing real labor!
    Think about this: Would Jesus take all kinds of money from his fol­low­ers and make a king­dom on earth????
    NO!
    This moron claims he is greater then Jesus!
    Haha­ha­ha­ha­haha!!!!
    When he is on his death bed, he will be surely repent­ing for what he is doing!
    Hope­fully God hears his cries!!

  23. Chris
    Feb 20th 2007

    God is in con­trol, even now. Does this verse apply to De Jesus?

    But I say unto you, Love your ene­mies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who insult you and per­se­cute you.

  24. Justin
    Feb 24th 2007

    He just claimed to be the anti-​christ and is having fol­low­ers get the tattoo 666 on their body.

    That is pretty scary.

  25. Bill
    Feb 25th 2007

    And every­body thought the church would be gone before we would see such things!!!!!!!!!!!!

  26. Barbara Gonz
    Mar 1st 2007

    SATAN IS STILL DECIEV­ING PEOPLE TODAY. THIS IS SO SAD, YET MANY WILL FOLLOW HIM TO BE LOST IN AN ETER­NAL HELL.

    The truth is, Satan is deceived, even as the bil­lions who follow him. He actu­ally believes that he will win in this con­flict. It is the most pro­found case of “unbelief ” in the his­tory of man, which has dragged down untold mil­lions, even bil­lions.
    (ISA. 14:12) “HOW ARE YOU FALLEN FROM HEAVEN, O LUCIFER, SON OF THE MORN­ING! HOW ARE YOU CUT DOWN TO THE GROUND, WHICH DID WEAKEN THE NATIONS!”
    “Lucifer” is the name of Satan. He is an Angel, orig­i­nally cre­ated by God, who, for an unde­ter­mined period of time, served God in Right­eous­ness and Holi­ness. There­fore, all the pain, suf­fer­ing, misery, heartache, death, and decep­tion that have ruled the nations from the very begin­ning until now have been caused by Satan. When Jesus comes back, Satan’s day will be over.This cre­ated being which the Bible refers to as “Lucifer” and then “Satan” is real. He heads up this rev­o­lu­tion against God, which has now lasted for many, thou­sands of years. it began long before Adam and Eve were cre­ated. Satan, then called “Lucifer,” attempted to over­throw the Will of God. Such has been man’s dis­po­si­tion ever since he made Satan his lord.Religious man is not sat­is­fied with God’s Will; he, there­fore, attempts to usurp author­ity over God in the name of reli­gion and often times in the name of God.

    There is a sin debt that hangs over the uni­verse — a debt caused by Satan and all who follow him. Every­one who knows the Bible knows that it was paid at the Cross of Cal­vary. When Jesus died on the Cross, He not only addressed the ter­ri­ble Fall of man,He also addressed Lucifer’s rev­o­lu­tion against God. how far-​reaching the Cross was, and is. As far-​reaching as were the results of the Fall, both of Lucifer and man. “Where sin abounded, Grace did much more abound: that as sin has reigned unto death, even so might Grace reign through Right­eous­ness unto Eter­nal Life by Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 5:20-21). At Calvary’s Cross, Jesus atoned for all sin, past, present, and future, again, for all who will believe (Jn. 3:16; Col. 2:14-15).

  27. BARBARA GONZ
    Mar 1st 2007

    The truth is, Satan is deceived, even as the bil­lions who follow him. He actu­ally believes that he will win in this con­flict. It is the most pro­found case of “unbelief ” in the his­tory of man, which has dragged down untold mil­lions, even bil­lions.

    (ISA. 14:12) “HOW ARE YOU FALLEN FROM HEAVEN, O LUCIFER, SON OF THE MORN­ING! HOW ARE YOU CUT DOWN TO THE GROUND, WHICH DID WEAKEN THE NATIONS!”

    “Lucifer” is the name of Satan. He is an Angel, orig­i­nally cre­ated by God, who, for an unde­ter­mined period of time, served God in Right­eous­ness and Holi­ness. There­fore, all the pain, suf­fer­ing, misery, heartache, death, and decep­tion that have ruled the nations from the very begin­ning until now have been caused by Satan. When Jesus comes back, Satan’s day will be over.This cre­ated being which the Bible refers to as “Lucifer” and then “Satan” is real. He heads up this rev­o­lu­tion against God, which has now lasted for many, thou­sands of years. it began long before Adam and Eve were cre­ated. How­ever, Satan’s days are num­bered. “Lucifer,” attempted to over­throw the Will of God. Such has been man’s dis­po­si­tion ever since he made Satan his lord.Religious man is not sat­is­fied with God’s Will; he, there­fore, attempts to usurp author­ity over God in the name of reli­gion and often times in the name of God. Satan had reason to believe, and still does believe, that he can actu­ally over­throw God and gain cre­ation. he thinks he can over­come God. Even unto this hour,Satan knows that God will work within a pre­scribed set of rules, rules which God Him­self has laid down.every single thing must be addressed from the posi­tion of Right­eous­ness. Satan does not hold to Right­eous­ness; he resorts to any and all deceit­ful means. Fur­ther, Satan knows that God will have no part of any­thing deceit­ful. He knows that if God desired to do so, He has the power to simply speak the Word and Satan and all his fallen angels would simply be no more; how­ever, he knows that the Lord will not do that, because the evil com­mit­ted against God must be addressed in the right way. It is some­what sim­i­lar to the nations of the world, at least those who hold to a sem­blance of law, which cannot dis­miss wrong­do­ing The wrong doing must be addressed and paid for in some way. There is a sin debt that hangs over the uni­verse — a debt caused by Satan and all who follow him. Every­one who knows the Bible knows that it was paid at the Cross of Cal­vary. When Jesus died on the Cross, He not only addressed the ter­ri­ble Fall of man,He also addressed Lucifer’s rev­o­lu­tion against God. how far-​reaching the Cross was, and is. As far-​reaching as were the results of the Fall, both of Lucifer and man. “Where sin abounded, Grace did much more abound: that as sin has reigned unto death, even so might Grace reign through Right­eous­ness unto Eter­nal Life by Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 5:20-21). At Calvary’s Cross, Jesus atoned for all sin, past, present, and future, again, for all who will believe (Jn. 3:16; Col. 2:14-15).

    no person has ever been saved except by the means of what Christ did at the Cross. How­ever, it doesn’t stop there. Once the person is saved, even Bap­tized with the Holy Spirit, still, his faith, with­out ques­tion or reser­va­tion, must always rest in Christ and the Cross. The Cross of Christ must ever be the Object of the Believer’s faith. (Taken from Jimmy Swag­gart Bible Com­men­tary, Isaiah, Chap­ter 14.)

  28. CaptPorridge
    Mar 2nd 2007

    Thanks for the blog entry Chris, I’m always inter­ested in (and astounded by) people who claim to be God and the cults they leave.

    Here’s another, a cult led by a Korean guy wanted for rape by Inter­pol:
    http://​www.​jmscult.com
    http://​www.​jungmyungseok.com

    Keep up the good work,

  29. JesusFreak
    Mar 3rd 2007

    The bible warns of false christs that will arise and deceive many. What I don’t under­stand though is why does he have so many fol­low­ers? All you have to do is open the bible and read it!!! It’s not like these people don’t know how to think for them­selves, many are pros­per­ous, intel­li­gent people!!! I will keep them all in my prayers and hope that they will see the truth as it is REALLY stated in God’s word.

  30. cryingross
    Mar 7th 2007

    This kind of hereti­cal prac­tice reminds us that we are to be rooted deeply in the Word of God and have a clear under­stand­ing of the scrip­tures or else we can be led astray by people like Miranda. My prayer is that God will con­vict this man of his gross sin and that he will repent and turn to the Living Christ of the Bible before he ends up in a lost eter­nity taking many deceived fol­low­ers with him.

  31. Alex
    Mar 7th 2007

    Broth­ers and Sis­ters

    First, I wish to thank you all for not lean­ing on you own under­stand­ing. We are pre­sented with an mes­sage con­trary to every­thing that Christ rep­re­sents and we turn to the only One with the answers we need. It is not dif­fi­cult to present scrip­ture that refutes this man.

    Hebrews 13:8
    “Jesus Christ is the same yes­ter­day and today and forever.”

    1 Tim­o­thy 6:3
    “If anyone teaches false doc­trines and does not agree to the sound instruc­tion of our Lord Jesus Christ and to godly teach­ing, he is con­ceited and under­stands noth­ing. He has an unhealthy inter­est in con­tro­ver­sies and quar­rels about words that result in envy, strife, mali­cious talk, evil sus­pi­cions and con­stant fric­tion between men of cor­rupt mind, who have been robbed of the truth and who think that god­li­ness is a means to finan­cial gain.”

    Luke 21:8/Mark 13:5
    “He replied:’Watch out that you are not deceived. For many will come in my name, claim­ing, “I am he,’ and ,”The time is near.’ Do not follow them.”

    Matthew 7:15
    “Watch out for false prophets. They come in sheep’s cloth­ing, but inwardly the are fero­cious wolves. By their fruits you will rec­og­nize them.

    There is much more, but I think you get my point. This man is not to be fol­lowed. If the return of the Mes­siah means he changes his mind on every­thing he says then I would wager one of these men is a liar.

    I have known my Lord only a short while but I have found Him com­pletely trust worthy. He was the only Man alive with the right to say “I AM”, but instead He said “you”. The essence of God pours from His lips. He is the most self­less Man the world will ever know.

    I do not know Mr. Miranda, but he offers a mes­sage of self grat­i­fi­ca­tion and indul­gence. He gives a mes­sage with­out sin, which means he has turned his back on the Father he held so dear. All I have read in the Old Tes­ta­ment declares God holds jus­tice close to his heart and Mr. Miranda gives you a life with­out con­se­quences of sin because sin no longer exists, which kills jus­tice. You no longer need to repent, one can sin his life away. And so Man suf­fered on the cross for me in vain. I will follow the Car­pen­ter, thank you.

    We must under­stand some­thing very impor­tant though, Mr. Miranda is like this because the Lord has allowed it. We cannot forget that our war is not with the flesh but the spir­i­tual forces which rule over them.(Eph 6:12) As fol­low­ers of Christ we cannot hate Mr. Miranda, he has been blinded by the one he thinks is church folk-​lore.
    Also all those who wor­ship him are in the same sit­u­a­tion. Satan is the king of lies and can give a very con­vinc­ing point, and any Chris­t­ian with­out his armor is an easy target. I have heard normal churches speak false doc­trines, so we cannot think that Mr. Miranda is the only blind man behind the pulpit.

    But we have a respon­si­bil­ity to the blind. We need to show them the Chris­tians main weapon and what we will be known by. Love. Each one of Mr. Miranda’s fol­low­ers is a mis­sion field just wait­ing for the light of Christ, and we must shine it gently.(2 Tim 2:25) We cannot bring any anger to the soul nego­ti­a­tion table, lest we lose any of them. Pull on the line to hard and your fish will be lost.

    When I hear of men like this I can only dream of how God will be glo­ri­fied. So I beg you Broth­ers and Sis­ters, don’t be afraid and don’t be angry. Be ready. These people need a loving hand to pull the blind­fold off. Yes, even Mr. Miranda. Him most of all, because he will wish he had a mill­stone com­pared to the jus­tice of an angry God.

    I appre­ci­ate your time and pray that God blesses your life.

  32. Chris
    Mar 7th 2007

    @Alex: That was a good, thought-​out response. Thanks!

  33. Donna Horace
    Mar 9th 2007

    False prophets have been revealed and exposed in the past. People who truely believe in Jesus and await his second coming shouldn’t be afraid of these people claim­ing such lies, but instead hold fast in their faith and read their Bibles which are the main instruc­tions that God gave us.

  34. Maegirl
    Mar 10th 2007

    I actu­ally know and work with two indi­vid­u­als who wor­ship this man! They actu­ally both went out and got 666 tat­toos.

    I just can’t help but think that one would have to be really empty inside to follow these lies.

  35. P
    Mar 15th 2007

    “The great­est trick the devil ever pulled was con­vinc­ing the world he did not exist”

  36. vaskar lama
    Mar 24th 2007

    u will realise when jesus comes back ..i would like to remem­ber your future ..
    this is then begin­ing of the second coming of christ.

  37. vaskar lama
    Mar 24th 2007

    man this guy is really going to pay one day ..
    remem­ber satan’s power increases for just small time ..this is yr time have great fun ..yr end will come soon ..
    i bind all yr evil desires in thy name jesus

  38. Jamie Gish
    Apr 11th 2007

    Now this man claims to be the anitchrist. I think that is closer to the truth!

    Pray for him sin­ners!

    JG
    1peter 3:8

  39. KJ
    Apr 18th 2007

    In a word, this guy is full of s@#$ !

  40. BlessedWarrior
    Apr 21st 2007

    I bear white­ness that none is worthy of wor­ship other than ALLAH alone. And i bear white­ness prophet Muham­mad is Allah’s last mes­sen­ger

  41. Chris
    Apr 21st 2007

    @Blessed­War­rior: I appre­ci­ate your desire to give feed­back although I must dis­agree with your truth claim. Jesus was the final prophet and rev­e­la­tion to God’s people. Anyone who believes in his death, burial, and res­ur­rec­tion will receive free­dom from sin and be with him for­ever.

  42. -Samek-
    Apr 21st 2007

    Hm… seems to me this guy just went from being a junkie in prison to becom­ing a bil­lion­aire through inge­nious thought. Heck, he’s making money… suf­fice at the loss of his ‘followers’. As far as him being a ‘false prophet’ I dont disagree… the guy’s an amaz­ing con who’s sell­ing a story to make people feel warm and fuzzy inside. More kudo’s to him. Now the real ques­tion comes: Are you mad at him because he’s making more worldly riches than you or do you have a true faith con­vic­tion against this man?

    If its the second option then I rec­om­mend you pity and pray for this man. Enough said.

    -Samek-

    p.s. – Oh and as far as Blessed Warrior’s belief’s go… More power to you and Allah. Believe what you will and believe with full con­vic­tion and faith. Better than the major­ity of Chris­tians who are luke warm fence sit­ters whom as Jesus said will ’spit out’ for they are nei­ther cold nor hot. :P

  43. -Samek-
    Apr 27th 2007

    Living4Today,

    You and I have the same feel­ings and thoughts con­cern­ing this. I’m glad I’m not alone in my view as reli­gion being cor­rupt and a crutch as a whole for man to base his wrong­do­ings and low self dis­ci­pline on.

    -Samek-

  44. Chris
    Apr 27th 2007

    @Samek: Have you had a bad expe­ri­ence with reli­gion?

  45. -Samek-
    Apr 28th 2007

    Yes I have Chris. That and I’m not going to be a robot and follow some­thing that isn’t “real” to me. So far any­thing I’ve tried has just seemed well… fake. If its real to you then more power to you.

  46. Chris
    Apr 28th 2007

    @Samek: I would chal­lenge you to think about the nature of truth. Don’t lay cap­tive to the phi­los­o­phy under­gird­ing post­moder­nity; truth is not and was never meant to be a sub­jec­tive claim.

  47. Rudolph A Cartassi Jr
    May 7th 2007

    Jose Luis de Jesus Miranda is wrong he is not GOD

    Reason why…

    # 1 Can he Part the SEA ???
    # 2 Can he Walk on Water ???
    # 3 He has body Guard HAHA HAHA ROFL HAHA HAHA

    You think God needs Body Guards LOL HAHA Listen up people God can do what­ever he wants when he wants under­stand he does not need anything… And u think he need to be pro­tected by mor­tals like us we are weak GOD IS STRONG… This guy will not share in the Tree of life he has mis used the holy word of GOD for that god will remove If from the tree of Life and he has added words to it so god will add him to the pleuges in the bible… Why does this man Fear death for if he walks with god you will not fear death or evil so why have body guards hmm… NO faith or wrong faith