Nice bit of research from Christian Research Service:
According to his January 2008 book, Journey Into The Miraculous, Todd Bentley claims to have been “ordained” through the Canadian-based Christian Ministers Association, and recognized as a “minister” through the World Ministry Fellowship here in the United States,
With its original roots in the Pentecostal movement, the Christian Ministers Association (CMA) is a “licensing body” that “provides a covering for those in need of meeting the requirements of Canadian Law concerning ordination of clergy,” and a “Canadian charter society registered with the Federal Government.”Â
But according to a top official from the Christian Ministers Association (CMA), Bentley is not ordained through the CMA, and has never been a member of that association.
Further, Christian Research Service has learned that while Todd Bentley was recognized as a minister through the World Ministry Fellowship (WMF), his membership “papers” have been removed, according to a top official.
Founded in 1963, the WMF is an outreach and fellowship of ministers worldwide that ” functions under the oversight of a 12 member Executive Board, a 21 member Advisory Board, and a 12 member Credentialing Committee”.
Once the WMF board learned the circumstances surrounding Bentley’s leaving the Lakeland revival and resignation from Fresh Fire Ministries, the WMF wasted no time and “moved-in quickly to take action,” a top official said.
Christian Research Service’s contact with the CMA and the WMFÂ was due to the claims made by Todd Bentley in Journey Into The Miraculous:Â
I thank God for my friendship with Patricia [King], and for how God used her as an instrument to ordain me into the ministry–but I always will know that the call came from God. I’ve since been ordained in Canada by my local church, and through the Christian Minister’s Association. In the U.S., I’m recognized as a minister of the Gospel through World Ministry Fellowship in Texas. [Todd Bentley, Journey Into The Miraculous, Destiny Image Publishers, January 2008, p. 162] Â
According to Bentley, “God” led him to write Journey Into The Miraculous (p. 22).
Why in the world would anyone write they are part of an overseeing agency here in Canada when they never were?
What, people wouldn’t notice?
When I first wrote about Todd Bentley nearly a year ago, I stopped counting mostly angry emails at around 900. Not comments, emails.
Lakeland and Bentley fans took the extra step of hitting the BDBO contact button and sending an email. I’ve often wondered if it was because they were concerned their comment might not be posted on what many Bentley followers perceived as a hostile site. I don’t know. I wondered if a link from this site wound up on a Lakeland forum somewhere, and people were asked or told to let me know how wrong they believed I was.
Many bloggers received floods of emails, and few comments. The pattern was the same.
Not all the emails were hostile, some would have been unprintable, but that doesn’t make the senders neo-charismatics, it just made what they had to say unprintable.
Many referred to Todd as Rev. Bentley.
Christian Research Net and World Ministry Fellowship have put that idea to bed, haven’t they?
For the record, a knighting, commissioning, false prophesying.unscriptural ceremony and show on a Lakeland stage, attended by C. Peter Wagner’s NAR members does not an ordination or calling make especially as Rick Heibert at the Western Standard The Shotgun points out Bentley rejects the idea and doesn’t see himself to those who comissioned him. Christian Research Service:
There is an old saying: “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.” Todd Bentley made choices. His actions will return to haunt him and those surrounding him. In the meantime, God warns those who continue to be fooled by the Todd Bentley’s of this world:
He who justifies the wicked and he who condemns the righteous, both of them alike are an abomination to the LORD (Proverbs 17:15).
Wow. He was NEVER a member of CMA?
How did this go unnoticed so long? Where was the oversight he was supposed to be under, and what are these overseers doing right now?
Those are very good questions.
I don’t know – while I received a lot of email calling Todd Rev. Bentley, I’m not going to pay money to read his books.
It takes pretty dedicated research to uncover these kinds of lies, and no doubt the publisher and Fresh Fire counted on that.
I wasn’t aware he claimed any oversite from anyone, and for his fans why would it matter?
Why would anyone in the CMA read his books either?
I’m not being sarcastic, I honestly don’t know. He has lied about so many big things, I guess another whopper slid right under everyone’s radar.
“Those are very good questions.”
Yes, they are very good questions indeed. Why not just go and ask CMA for yourself and see what kind of answer you get?
For example, go and use some of the email addresses listed at the CMA website. What I don’t understand is why journalist Rick Hiebert, who’s been reporting a lot about Bentley and who has brought up the issue of Bentley’s claim of ordination, hasn’t gone and gotten an answer from the omphalos itself. It’s not like the CMA is sequestered under a rock in faraway Nunavut.
So if you do try to ask CMA (which is apparently HQ’ed in Chilliwack BC), please get back to everybody on what you find out. You may find experience to be quite interesting.
Hi Oengus:
I did. No response. Did you write? Any response?
I am loath within the limited confines of a comment section to go into lots of details about what happened. I have written a little about the experience on my blog. However, after going through some (in my opinion unnecessary) beating around the bush, rigamarole, and folderol, I did eventually get an answer: CMA did not ordain Bentley. That’s how it stands, apparently.
Thanks.
I’m glad you pursued your curiousity.
Read your posts.
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