Melissa Dougherty on the Origins of the Word of Faith (My Response)

Recently Melissa Dougherty, a former New Ager who is now an aspiring Christian apologist, claimed that the Word of Faith came from New Thought via E. W. Kenyon. This is my factual response.

My apologies for the focus problems. I'm still trying to get this new camera figured out. I have solved the lighting and color issues however, so thank God for that.

Also, sorry again for the repetitive information. Unfortunately it's necessary as long as people keep spreading misinformation. I'll be moving on to some new subjects very soon so stay tuned.

Kenyon's thoughts on New Thought

Robert Bowman Jr. on Kenyon's influences "aking a more scientific approach than McConnell and Hanegraaff, Bowman lists and compares 23 standard New Thought concepts with Christian Science and Kenyon. From this statistical analysis, he concludes that while there is much in common between Christian Science and New Thought, there is “little resemblance” between Kenyon and New Thought. Further, he concludes that Kenyon is “far closer to orthodoxy than is Christian Science” (p. 46). Kenyon may share some similarity with metaphysical thought, but his views are “fundamentally different” (p. 48). He demonstrates that McConnell’s methodology is faulty, and thus his conclusions regarding Kenyon’s connections with metaphysical New Thought are deeply flawed. While there may have been some metaphysical influence, Kenyon’s views are more unlike such concepts than like."

The Roots of the Word of Faith:

My book on Word of Faith apologetics

I may have misspoken in this video because Justin Peters wasn't the only one to charge that the WoF came from Quimby. I forgot that GotQuestions said that, too. So maybe Melissa took it from them, but since they're also terribly misinformed my comments could also apply to them.