Firstly, whatever little gospel it preaches, it preaches a very faulty one. This should make even those churches which are Charismatic to stop using Alpha. The gospel which Alpha preaches is one that says “God loves each one of us so much and longs to be in relationship with us as a human father longs to be in relationship with each of his children.” Coupled with it, guests are told, man leads a meaningless and irrelevant life simply because he has no relationship with God. Now there are elements of truth in these, however what is astounding is not what Alpha is saying here, but what Alpha is not saying here. Through out the course material, there is no mention of God’s wrath hanging over unrepentant mankind. There is no mention of how we as sinners have incurred His wrath and how we need to seek peace with Him. Thus the problem to which the gospel is the answer in Alpha’s understanding is not God’s wrath against sinners. It is rather, poor human beings leading a meaningless life, when they can have fullness, significance and relevance if they have a relationship with God. This is a very faulty understanding of the character of God, the gospel and even man. God is not just love, He is also Holy. The gospel is not just satisfying to our hunger for meaning in life, but one which propitiates the wrath of God against us. Man is not just empty, but is in his very nature sinful and thus the object of God’s wrath. These fundamental truths of Christianity are never once taught by Alpha. Thus the gospel it preaches is a very faulty one. Alpha does not seems to be convinced that it is in light of God’s matchless holiness and furious wrath, that His free grace towards sinners in Christ is most loving, most satisfying and most meaningful. Indeed when God’s holiness is removed from our proclamation, we remove His love too.
Secondly, since God’s holy wrath is never taught as mankind’s biggest problem, Alpha teaches a Cross which lacks the full glory it deserves. The lack of teaching on penal substitution results in Alpha getting in a muddle at this stage. For it wants to teach that Christ died as substitute, and indeed does teach this, and yet because it is not taught that Jesus died as penal substitute, bearing upon himself the wrath of God, we are left without any understanding of why Jesus had to die at all. Thus the cross of Christ ends up being little more than a visual aid that proves that God is self-sacrificial and loving. As Hand says, 'Christ's work on the cross is demoted to being a rescue act to save us from our problems rather than fulfilling the righteous demands of the holy law and appeasing the wrath of God'. The death of Jesus is presented as an act of love but without any connection with the reality of God's holy anger. We are left thinking that Christ sacrificed Himself to rescue us from the consequences of sin because that was required by some impersonal and rather arbitrary justice system. [1]
Thirdly, for those who have no idea, from where Alpha is coming, its history need to be told. Alpha Course began in UK, when a member of Holy Trinity Brompton (HTB), Charles Marnham, set up an informal home group to present answers to basic gospel questions. Nicky Gumbel, HTB curate, transformed the course into what we see today. Holy Trinity Brompton is an exteremely Charismatic Anglican church, well known for importing the weird manifestations of the Toronto Blessings to the UK. For those who blindly give a green signal to the Alpha Course, not knowing from which camp it is coming, you need to watch the below clip, taken at the Toronto Blessing.
In the Alpha Course, substantial amount of time is spend on HTB's experiences of the Toronto Blessing and associated ministries, novel exegeses of various Biblical passages common amongst pro-Toronto preachers, calls for unity despite truth and an over-emphasis on the Holy Spirit, all of which are less than helpful, to say the least, to potential Christians. [2] Eleanor Mumford of the South-West London Vineyard church brought the Toronto Blessing from the Toronto Airport Vineyard church in Canada to HTB through Nicky Gumbel in May 1994. In video 3 and talk 9, Gumbel says, "Ellie Mumford told us a little bit of what she had seen in Toronto... .it was obvious that Ellie was just dying to pray for all of us.. then she said 'Now we'll invite the Holy Spirit to come.' and the moment she said that one of the people there was thrown, literally, across the room and was lying on the floor, just howling and laughing....making the most incredible noise....I experienced the power of the Spirit in a way I hadn't experienced for years, like massive electricity going through my body... One of the guys was prophesying. He was just lying there prophesying. . ." [3] Alpha participants are told all of this as the normative in Christianity, with no caution or warning to test the spirits and be discerning. Alpha, though claiming to be evangelistic spends less time on the gospel and more on such freaky manifestations of the Third Wave. The overtly Charismatic agenda of Alpha can be seen by comparing the amount of pages it has dedicated for each doctrine. It has one small paragraph on “Baptism”, two pages on "Holy Communion," eight pages on "speaking in tongues" and sixteen pages on "healing," [4]
Fourthly, after the initial two evangelistic session, Alpha considers most of its guests as Christians and changes the tone to that of discipleship. They are told to seek the Holy Spirit, speak in tongues, seek assurance etc without any careful examination of whether or not they are regenerate. The supposedly successful evangelistic tool produces testimonies like the ones below. The lack of focus on Jesus is seen very clearly in the testimonies people give, testimonies. which Alpha quotes with approval in its literature. The first of five main Alpha testimonies in Telling Others is particularly revealing. It reads:"The one thing that stuck in my mind was how the work of the Holy Spirit was described as of paramount importance. I knew in my heart I had to have this power in my life at any cost so I found out where the church was, enrolled on the course and focused on the weekend. I felt like a dying man waiting for a life-saving operation. Never mind the weeks o f pre-med, I just had to get into the operating theatre ... I looked at the order of play, saw that the third session (which I had identified as the main one) was at 4.3O pm and simply hung on like a marathon runner weaving his way up the final straight with nothing but the finishing tape as the focus of his attention. I'll never forget that session. I felt as though I was being torn in two. Halfway through I just couldn't stand it any more. The prize was so near but we were getting there so slowly! I literally wanted to scream out, 'Do it now! Do it know! I couldn't hold out any longer. I'm not exaggerating when I say I was in agony. Then God came and then came the relief'. Having no idea who this person is, we have to say that this is deeply troubling. They regard the talks on 'Who is Jesus?' and 'Why did Jesus die?' as 'pre-med'. The focus of their attention is specifically identified as being not the Lord Jesus, not the Cross, not even the Holy Spirit, but the third session, 'How can I be filled with the Spirit?' Sadly such a testimony is repeated again and again. This is hardly surprising given that guests are taught, 'Physical heat sometimes accompanies the filling of the Spirit and people experience it in their hands or some other part of their bodies. One person described a feeling of 'glowing all over'. Another said she experienced 'liquid heat'. Still another described 'burning in my arms when I was not hot'. Still another said, 'I didn't want to come to the weekend and I did. But I would call myself a Christian now. I would say that I felt the Holy Spirit. I was feeling I was loved. It was really a tremendous overwhelming feeling of love'. [5]
Thus Alpha teaches a God who has no wrath, a Jesus who simply dies to communicate how loved we are and a Spirit who gives a feeling of being loved. Whereas the Bible teaches God who is not just love, but Holy and Just, Whose righteous wrath against us was borne by the Son, Jesus to redeem us and the Spirit who comes to glorify the Son. How different a gospel and Christianity the Alpha breeds. The doctrine of freewill has lead many a ministers to seek man-made methods and manipulations in evangelism rather than simply trusting the efficacious working of the Holy Spirit through the preaching of the undiluted Word. Alpha is just another man-made alternative to the true Spirit-breathed evangelistic proclamation.
Listen to pastor Chris Hand of Crich Baptist Church, UK, for a more in-depth analysis of the Alpha Course. His address is very gracious, straight forward and illuminating.
Footnotes
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[1] BEC, The 'Alpha' and the 'Christianity Explored' Course, "Foundations", Issue no. 47 Autumn 2001 pp.36-44
[2] Tricia Tillin, Looking at - THE ALPHA COURSE, Banner Ministries
[3] Ibid
[4] Questions of Life, pp. 155-163; pp. 199-215.
[5] BEC, The 'Alpha' and the 'Christianity Explored' Course, "Foundations", Issue no. 47 Autumn 2001 pp.36-44
