The Second Great Evangelical Meltdown

Introducing The Meltdown Series:
This article is the first in a series about ongoing sea changes in Evangelicalism today. The series will utilize Scripture and church history in an attempt to clarify those issues that are tending to weaken, break down, and misdirect Evangelicalism. Even though the effects are obvious, the forces behind these changes are not.

Part I

Introduction
and
The First Great Evangelical Meltdown

Many Christians today believe that Evangelicalism is becoming stronger and more influential due to the popularity of such high profile preachers as Billy Graham and Rick Warren—some even include Robert Schuller. These leaders are capturing headlines and talking about their influence in the White House and in Congress. Mega-churches are springing up with thousands of attendees, giving the impression of a kind of revival.

But such appearances are illusory.

From a biblical and historical point of view, it might rather be said that Evangelicalism is actually weakening and collapsing in the United States in a manner equivalent to a meltdown. And this meltdown is only equaled by another meltdown that took place in the early part of the 20th century called the “Liberal (or Modernist) / Fundamentalist controversy.” I will discuss this first meltdown in a few minutes for understanding it is very important in grasping what is occurring in the Church today.

Our present age uses the word Evangelicalism in many ways. I use the term to refer to a historical movement that had its roots in the 16th century Reformation and that gained great power during the 18th century revival in England and America, known in America as the First Great Awakening and in England as the Evangelical Revival. That type of Evangelicalism manifested two basic qualities:

(1) An enormous emphasis on the preaching of the Gospel of Jesus Christ—that Christ died to save sinners, and that this is the basic message of Christianity and of the Bible; and

(2) The certitude that the Bible is the very Word of God and that it is the greatest authority in and over the Church.

These Evangelicals accepted and embraced the historical creeds—the Nicean Creed, the Apostles Creed, and the Athanasian Creed. They did not see themselves as something new, but they harkened back to the roots of the Apostolic Church and differentiated themselves from Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy.

The Evangelical spirit in the United States has had a lot of ups and downs. One of the high points was the First Great Awakening, just mentioned. There was also a Second Great Awakening just before the Civil War, but it was much more of a mixture due to the introduction of the idea that human beings could generate revival by their own works. It was very clear that the First Great Awakening came by God alone, but it was not so clear in the Second Great Awakening who people believed was really in charge.

This next section is necessary to provide the groundwork for understanding the Second Great Evangelical Meltdown.

The First Great Evangelical Meltdown:

The Liberal (or Modernist) / Fundamentalist Controversy

What I call the First Great Evangelical Meltdown occurred in the early 1900s in contrast to the First Great Awakening in the 1700s. It was widely accepted in the early 1900s that Evangelical and Reformed thinkers and preachers were promoting the true Gospel. They also had strong intellectual backing through schools like Princeton Theological Seminary, which was considered a bastion of Evangelical orthodoxy. However, heretical and unbiblical views of Christianity began entering the Church around that time, especially through the seminaries and universities. These assaults focused particularly on the authority of the Bible.

The two main assaults were, first, a philosophy of naturalistic science that claimed the biblical picture of the origin of the universe was an archaic myth and that science trumped the Bible; and, second, an attack on the Bible itself that came mainly from German theological schools steeped in Enlightenment Rationalism and German Romanticism (more about that later). These schools claimed that they could tell what was “really true” in the Bible and what was “myth.” One of the “myths” that they claimed was just superstitious thinking was the Resurrection of Christ. They also taught that Moses didn’t write the first five books of the Old Testament. These heresies took the American seminaries and universities by storm, and later the denominations. Unfortunately, the churches were vulnerable partly because they wanted to be academically “relevant” to “modern people.”

Another factor that contributed to the First Great Meltdown was the rise of the social gospel around the beginning of the 20th century.

Promoters of the social gospel assumed that the biblical Gospel wasn’t really true because “of course Jesus didn’t really rise from the dead.” Therefore, the only thing left for people who wanted to affect society was to do good, because of course Christ talked about being helpful to the poor and the sick, the alienated, and so forth. And since there was no longer a Gospel of grace and salvation to believe in, they said that what we have left is the social gospel: “Go into all the world and do social good works.” In other words, “deeds not creeds.” Many came to see this as the mission of the Church. The world missionary movement that had flourished just before this controversy arose changed its basic focus from bringing the Gospel to the nations to going to the nations “recognizing” that the “hidden Christ in all nations” was already there. This became the theology of the World Council of Churches.

This truth gap in the mission of the Church left a big hole, and into that hole poured Marxist thinking, which agreed with liberal theology that all that mattered was to “do good to people.” The Marxists believed that capitalism was the great cause of suffering, war, and poverty, and as the liberal theologians gradually embraced Marxism, the Marxists were happy to use the churches for their own purposes. During this process, almost every mainline church either capitulated or split due to the terrible conflict. The groups called Fundamentalist united on the fundamental truths of Scripture that the liberal churches denied (more about that below). The liberal churches focused on the social gospel and gradually turned away more and more from biblical preaching, teaching, and eventually even from biblical morality. In many circles psychological methods replaced biblical sanctification in the search for the transformation of the inner man.

This situation has continued up through today and, if anything, is snowballing. The mainline churches are continuing in their liberalism and are moving more and more towards Marxism. The Fundamentalist churches are now moving more and more into the syncretism that they abhorred during the first Great Meltdown. In addition, the following influences in Evangelicalism are very strong:

• The marriage of psychology and mysticism;
• Compromises with Roman Catholicism in the political arena;
• The popularity and spread of the spiritual formation / contemplative prayer movement and Romanticism; and
• Literary apologetics and an undiscerning embrace of culture, especially through the popularity and influence of such writers as C. S. Lewis and the Inklings and the compromising Anglican style.

We will discuss these elements more in later sections.

What is fundamentalism? Understanding the word fundamentalism can be very confusing because the first manifestation of Christian fundamentalism was basically a movement uniting Evangelical churches in their stance against liberalism. A document called The Fundamentals promoted five basic biblical truths that defined the movement: the inerrancy of Scripture, Christ's virgin birth, the Substitutionary Atonement of Christ, Christ's bodily Resurrection, and the historicity of Christ's miracles.

The coalition included Reformed as well as dispensational theologies, and though they had theological differences they were united on the need to stem the tide of liberalism (Modernism). However, after the famous Scopes “Monkey” Trial (1925), a lot of the Reformed churches withdrew and the coalition broke down. Thus, what became Christian Fundamentalism as we know it today basically changed to reflect certain characteristics of dispensational thinking that were more central to dispensationalism than to early Fundamentalism.

The term fundamentalism has been misused in the media to mean “fanatical,” but originally Fundamentalism was a movement of conservative Evangelicalism. Until recently the conservative-fundamentalist element formed the main group of Evangelicals. The current movement though does not necessarily represent all of conservative Evangelicalism. For example, the Missouri Synod, a body of conservative Lutherans, agrees with all the basics of The Fundamentals, but they are not considered Fundamentalists today because they are not dispensational.

Basically, then, Evangelicalism became broken and fragmented, which is its condition today.

This, then, in very broad brushstrokes, is what I mean by the First Great Evangelical Meltdown. This first meltdown allowed for the flourishing of what I call the Second Great Evangelical Meltdown—a situation that is occurring all around us right now and that coming articles will discuss.

*

The next part of this series will focus on The Pied Piper of False Freedom and Clarifying the “Postmodern” Rhetoric. And then we will move into looking at the Second Great Evangelical Meltdown—what I see happening today in the churches and among Evangelical leadership as they attempt to deal with the increasing floods of compromise and deception.


I welcome your comments.

Recommended Resources
1. Machen, J. Gresham. 1923. Christianity and Liberalism. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.
2. Marsden, Charles. 1980. Fundamentalism and American Culture: The Shaping of Twentieth-Century Evangelicalism 1870–1925. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Note: Marsden has prejudices about Fundamentalism that sometimes come through in his work.
3. Packer, J. I. 1958. Fundamentalism and the Word of God. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.

What would it take to get you to go to church?

We got this response from a friend in southern California who is weary of looking for a church.

Stop with the ridiculous gimmickery, first and foremost. It only makes our faith appear superficial, trite, and totally lacking in life-transforming power.

Pastor, be a man of prayer! Elevate the Holy Scriptures once again and PREACH from them! Give it to us straight, challenge us to follow Christ without reserve, make it hard for us to NOT be convicted every time we come through those doors. Be kindly toward those of us who are struggling, but cause the blatant hypocrites, the lukewarm, and the unbelieving to squirm until they either leave and make room for the serious-minded disciples, or until they break and repent under the Holy Spirit's heavy hand of conviction. Stop caring if the Word of God offends people, and stop acting as if God needs you to apologize for His more "unflattering" attributes.

I don't care what the pastor looks like. I couldn't care less if he is considered hip or or if he's a total geek. I don't care if he's old or young, whether he wears a Hawaiian shirt or a suit and tie. As long as he understands the nature of his high calling, which is first and foremost to FEED THE SHEEP, not entertain the goats, as the saying goes. I'm not against humor in the right context, either, but pastors need to stop thinking that they've got to be stand-up comedians.

Seriously, if you were having a spiritual crisis and you needed to have a few of your more troubling questions answered before you surrendered your life to Christ, would you feel comfortable seeking answers from some buffoon who just made holy Messiah--the One who holds the keys to death and hell in His hands--sound like an everyday surfer dude in his sermon? Is THAT Jesus the one who is going to save me? Or would you call upon that same man to come to your bedside if you were dying of some incurable disease and you desperately wanted to get right with God? It's such a mockery, and I'm so sick to death of it.

I plead with God nearly on a daily basis for Him to have mercy on His American Church, to not leave us as sheep without shepherds, but to raise up many more courageous men of God who will preach the Gospel faithfully and who will not tolerate heresy in their churches.

I am so inspired by our Christian brothers and sisters overseas who are living out the book of Acts on a daily basis, literally risking their lives to bring the Gospel to the lost. Teach us to live THAT way, Mr. Preacher Man. All or nothing.

Kimberly

Book Contract Signed!

Great news!

We just signed a contract with Lighthouse Trails Publishing to publish our novel The Glittering Web, which is about spiritual deception. We're very pleased to be associated with this publisher that is fighting so hard to stand for biblical truth in this age of deception.

Have you checked out their research website?

Wonderments-- Strange Situations in the Modern Church

Some questions continually perplex me about the modern church.

There is as much warfare going on today as when the Church in the early 1900s broke up into liberalism and conservatism, turning many of the major denominations into shrinking mausoleums. Yet it seems like the vast majority of today’s leadership in evangelical and Reformed churches is blind to or unconcerned with some of the basic issues radically shaping our culture, Christian adults, and especially our children.

It's vitally important that the leadership in evangelical and Reformed circles face the spiritual situation and repent of the compromising spirit that has prevailed. If the leadership approves, the people follow.

Questions

1. Why is it that every church we encounter has some strong connection with or promotion of the works of C. S. Lewis? We've run into this phenomenon in numerous churches, new and old, contemporary and traditional, Reform and liberal, in a wide variety of denominations across the United States, not to mention in seminaries and Bible schools.

2. Hardly any evangelical Christian nowadays seems to question the benefit of indulging in mythological/fantasy thinking. Why? Fifty or sixty years ago, this type of thinking would have been anathema to most biblical churches.

3. Why are so many children raised in Christian families given, or are read to from, The Lord of the Rings and The Narnia Stories without any precautions or preparation for the very vivid paganism and occultism in them?

4. Why are Christian schools and universities promoting these works? Even very conservative schools.

5. While there are parts in Lewis's work that are totally pagan, such as the Great Dance that features Bacchus, Silenus, and other grossly pagan characters, there is never a word of warning to children, or adults, that there might be something wrong--and even dangerous--going on here. There seems to be an assumption that pagan mythology is totally harmless to modern children. Some Christians even argue that Harry Potter is harmless and actually beneficial for teaching Christian doctrine to children.

6. Why have I seen no concern about the lengthy passage in Lewis's book, Surprised by Joy, which many people have read, where he defends pedophilia? I quote: "If those of us who have known a school like Wyvern [which he attended as a youth] dare to speak the truth, we would have to say that pederasty, however great and evil in itself, was in that time and place the only foothold and cranny left for certain good things" (p. 105).

7. Why do Christians seem to overlook Lewis's promotion of Bacchus, Silenus and bacchanalian feasts? Bacchus was the mythological god of drunkenness and orgies. Berit Kjos has written an excellent in-depth article about this called "Narnia - Part 4 - A book review of Prince Caspian by C. S. Lewis 'Awakening Narnia with Bacchanalian Feasts" (May 11, 2008). See also "Blending Truth and Myth" by Berit Kjos (the other 3 parts of the series).

8. There is a strong connection between embracing Lewis's works and a lot of modern cultural thinking by Christians who want to embrace the culture, such as psychology, literature, cinematography, the emergent church movement, etc. Lewis was an artistic and literary intellectual. Why are evangelicals so enamored of this type of lifestyle? What makes many of them blind to the bad aspects of these cultural phenomena?

9. Why is it so widely assumed that C. S. Lewis was such a wonderful Christian when he actually promoted paganism? It's never questioned. (Or, if it is questioned, it's rationalized away: See http://thehogshead.org/bacchus-worship-and-the-chronicles-of-narnia-43/ It's kind of like, if C. S. Lewis does it, it can't be wrong. And even if he does it in excess, it still can't be wrong.

10. Why do some staunch Calvinists view G. K. Chesterton as a wise man? He had nothing but contempt for Calvinists and thought of Reformed life and theology as a perversion of a "healthy medieval" (i.e., Roman Catholic) way of life.

Why do so few seem to be noticing--or caring about--these issues?

Partial Answers

Anglicanism. There is a tremendous influence coming through Anglicanism, especially through the Inklings and through such well-known, highly respected Anglican intellectuals as:

• Os Guinness, a founder of the Veritas Forum, which features a combination of biblical and anti-biblical teachers, united only by their respect for academia;
• John Stott, probably the major figure leading the worldwide ecumenical movement that is trying to combine all sorts of contrary theological viewpoints in a syncretistic manner;
• J. I. Packer, a man known for endorsing almost anything, who combines a strange mixture of solid biblical theology with an openness to very weird, anti-biblical teachings and lifestyles;
• James Huston, founder of Regent College in Vancouver, B.C. and of the C. S. Lewis Institute, as well as a major promoter of the spiritual formation / contemplative prayer movement;
• Chuck Colson (who claims his conversion came after reading Mere Christianity). Many of Colson's teachings are laced with Lewis's influence and modeled after Lewis's apologetics and ecumenicalism, which attempts to dismiss the importance of the Reformation and blur its lines with Roman Catholicism. Some of Colson's associates also manifest these qualities.
• Nancy Pearcey is one of those associates. (See earlier blog entry on Colson and Pearcey.)

Schools and Ministries

Just about every major Christian college, seminary or graduate school, as well as many major Christian ministries, are drenched with Lewis. To mention a few: Wheaton College, Regent College in Vancouver, B.C., Fuller Theological Seminary, Westminster Seminary in California. Other groups include the Association of Confessing Evangelicals (ACE), The White Horse Inn, the Christian Research Institute (Walter Martin, founder) and especially Gretchen Passantino, the Spiritual Counterfeits Project, World Magazine, etc. All of these are connected with John Warwick Montgomery, who is probably the A, No. 1 living Lewis apologist. The original Bob Jones of the fundamentalist Bob Jones University was very enthusiastic about C.S. Lewis. And we heard from a student there that they are uncritically positive about his works and carry his books.

The hard thing is finding a Christian institution or ministry that isn’t in favor of Lewis. The fundamentalist Baptists seem to be the only major group I know of who aren’t enraptured with this image of Lewis. If you search the Internet, you will find just about only one or two apologetics ministries that don’t favor Lewis.

Neo-evangelicalism

All of the above is intimately connected with what is called Neo-evangelicalism, a great sea-change in traditional evangelicalism that occurred around 1950, though the roots of the change existed before then. Neo-evangelicalism has so transformed the face of traditional evangelicalism that it’s hardly recognizable today.


Traditional evangelicals: Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Charles Spurgeon, and Dwight Moody.


Neo-evangelicals: Billy Graham, John Stott, J.I. Packer, John Warwick Montgomery, Robert Schuller

Heirs of neo-evangelicals (basically those with the market-driven church / emergent church philosophies): Brian MacLaren, Tony Campolo, Shane Claiborne, Rob Bell, Rick Warren, Bill Hybels.

Only two major figures among 20th century traditional evangelicals were critical of C. S. Lewis. Those were Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones and Dr. Cornelius Van Til.

In conclusion, there is still a lot of mystery about the enormous, uncritical acceptance of the works of C. S. Lewis and the other Inklings by Christians.

There’s no doubt that C. S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien were world-class writers, but why should the content of their writings be so uncritically accepted when they have so much in them that should disturb a discerning Christian? Even secular people can see it, while many Christians are blind to it.

Why?

Why don’t you let me hear from you out there?

What do you think about these questions and issues?

Mythology and the Erosion of Inerrancy in Evangelicalism

I’ve been listening to the Albert Mohler Internet radio program for several years now and have always gotten a lot out of it. Albert Mohler is the president of Southern Baptist Seminary and a staunch defender of biblical inerrancy. I enthusiastically agree with much that he says. Recently though he featured two apparently inconsistent broadcasts, one promoting biblical inerrancy and the other promoting Romanticism. I noticed the inconsistency because I listened to them closely together on my MP3 player:

• 7/31/09 Storytelling and a Child’s Imagination
Guest Host: Dr. Russell Moore
Guest: Andrew Peterson

• 9/04/09 The Erosion of Inerrancy in Evangelicalism
Host: Dr. Albert Mohler
Guest: Dr. Gregory Beale

The one on storytelling is a celebration of mythology hosted by Dr. Russell Moore, the dean of the school of theology at Southern Baptist Seminary. Dr. Moore proudly explains how he incorporates the stories of J.R.R. Tolkien into his devotional times with his children. Unfortunately, I’m sure Dr. Moore doesn’t realize that what he’s giving to his children is mythology. Tolkien viewed it as mythology; Lewis viewed it as mythology; and both men considered mythology divine revelation.

Now, in the other program on the erosion of inerrancy in evangelicalism, Dr. Mohler bewails the intrusion of mythological thinking into current views of the Bible.

It seems apparent to me that the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing in these two programs. Or perhaps the right hand doesn’t recognize that the left hand is holding something destructive in it and that this destructive element is an enchantment with mythology.

Apparently some of those theologians and Bible scholars who were raised with Lewis and Tolkien are now carrying that love of mythology into their work, ignoring the Scriptural warnings against the love of mythology, and passing it onto their children.


I’ve spent many years studying the issue of Romantic religion (for background, see my article "’Christian’ Romanticism, the Inklings, and the Elevation of Mythology”).

R. J. Reilly’s book Romantic Religion: A study of Barfield, Lewis, Williams, and Tolkien originally inspired me to begin studying this topic. Since then I've come to see how this Romantic religion is not evangelical Christianity and, as a matter of fact, is quite opposed to it. Yet this Romantic religion in the form of the writings of — especially — C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien has swept through the evangelical world and been uncritically accepted as almost universally authoritative in many prominent Christian venues. I have also come to believe that there is a very strong connection between the attitude toward the inerrancy of Scripture that Dr. Mohler is so concerned about and the teachings of this Romantic religion, especially as it appears in the works of C.S. Lewis.

I just got a book called C. S. Lewis on Scripture by Michael C. Christensen (1979). The book is an apologetic for Lewis’s attitude toward Scripture, including his belief in purgatory and that the penal substitution is just one of many theories that can be put aside if found troublesome. That attitude is exactly the one that is appearing among these new “evangelical” scholars that Dr. Mohler is so disturbed about.

The Drucker-driven, Murdoch-driven Church

A lot has been written about problems with the Purpose-driven Church movement, but when a friend asked me for information about those problems it seemed a shame not to share this research on this blog. This is by no means comprehensive, but I think it covers the basic major areas of concern. Even if you're familiar with the topic, you may learn something new below.

A word about using discernment ministries and apologetics

Just a word about the different types of discernment ministries that are out there, our own approach, and why we recommend the articles we do. It seems good to clarify that there are a variety of approaches to discernment and apologetics. Just because someone does have discernment about a problem doesn’t mean that the person’s theology is necessarily solid, but also, just because someone’s theology is unbiblical or unbalanced doesn’t mean that the person’s discernment of a situation is wrong. A good example is the book Faith Undone by Roger Oakland, which is very discerning about problems with the Emergent Church, but the man himself is rigidly dispensational in his theology. Lighthouse Trails also has a dispensationalist background, but their research is excellent and well documented, as is the material by the Leslies (mentioned below). We are neither dispensationalists nor fundamentalists, but we do believe that the Bible is inerrant and can recognize good research backed by facts.

Some people are wary about some of the discernment ministries because of the continuing repercussions in the Church today from the fundamentalist-modernist controversy that occurred in the U.S. in the early 1920s. It’s a complex issue, and there is a lot of stereotyping that goes on, both in pro-fundamentalist and anti-fundamentalist writings. But there are other groups of apologists who aren’t dispensational at all, like the Extreme Theology website, overseen by a conservative Lutheran. There are also critiques of Rick Warren through the White Horse Inn website, which is a radio talk show sponsored by a coalition of conservative Reformed (Calvinist) thinkers and conservative Lutherans with a very high level of theological education. So, it’s a very wise approach not to use stereotypes when dealing with theological controversies. (Incidentally, we don’t believe you’re going to hell if you don’t use the King James Version; we use the NIV.)

Following are the major problems with Rick Warren’s approach that we have identified:

I. The Purpose-driven Church = The “Drucker-driven Church”

II. The Abandonment of Orthodox Theology

III. The Misuse of the Bible

IV. The Murdoch-driven Church

V. The use of pop psychology in the Purpose-driven Church movement

VI. Summary and Conclusion

______________________________________

I. The Purpose-driven Church =

The “Drucker Driven” Church

Management guru Peter Drucker is Warren’s mentor.

Rick Warren views Peter Drucker as his mentor.[1] Drucker’s vision for society combines government, business and the Church all under his master plan, which is a broad vision of social engineering. For an excellent and very comprehensive analysis of the problems with Druckerism and Rick Warren’s use of it, see “The Pied Pipers of Purpose” by Lynn D. Leslie, Sarah H. Leslie and Susan J. Conway.[2] According to this article, the latter part of Drucker’s life was devoted to targeting churches, parachurches and charities. Yet he left dealing with sin out of his calculations.

“Peter Drucker has exerted a considerable influence on Rick Warren. A December 24^th 2002 CNBC documentary about Peter Drucker (“Peter Drucker: An Intellectual Journey”) claimed that he is one of Rick Warren’s mentors and influenced the start and growth of Saddleback Church.”[3]

The Church is NOT a business.

Though this is too big an issue to go into in depth here, the Church is NOT a business—it’s Christ’s own Body and Christ’s means of salvation. To reduce it to a business model is to radically distort and debase it with human-centered techniques and teachings not based on the truth of the Word of God and the Holy Spirit.

“In my life, I've had at least three mentors: my father, Billy Graham, and Peter Drucker. They each taught me different things. Peter Drucker taught me about competence. I met him about 25 years ago. I was invited to a small seminar of CEOs, and Peter was there. As a young kid—I was about 25—began to call him up, write him, go see him. I still go sit at the feet of Peter Drucker on a regular basis. I could give you 100 one-liners that Peter has honed into me. One of them is that there's a difference between effectiveness and efficiency. Efficiency is doing things right, and effectiveness is doing the right thing. A lot of churches—not just churches, but businesses and other organizations—are efficient, but they are not effective.”[4]

This quote from “The Pied Pipers of Purpose” provides a solid overview of some basic problems with the way Warren has applied Drucker’s approach to the Church:

“All three of these men – Drucker, [David] Salamon and [LESTER] Hornbeck – have emphasized ‘human capital’ as foundational to the transformation of the private sector. Why would “human capital” be of relevance to the Purpose-Driven church?

II. This radical view of economic man is the chief cornerstone of all of Drucker’s management theories.

III. Drucker’s theories undergird the Purpose-Driven model.

IV. This philosophy has nothing in common with the traditional Christian doctrines about the nature of man.[55] The humanity of Man is markedly devalued.

V. These men believe that a man’s human worth and a church’s effectiveness can be “assessed” – measured by psycho-social instruments.

VI. Intangible matters of the spirit are codified into “results,” and “ineffective” ministries are cancelled (“abandoned”). This new criteria ensures that lost souls will begin to fall through the cracks.

VII. Profit-driven models are applied to matters of ministry of the Gospel, effectually degrading private acts of charity and compassion.

VIII. The Word of God becomes secondary to systems theory implementation.

IX. Disturbing questions are raised about those precious people in our lives who do not or can not possess ‘human capital’ or ‘knowledge capital’.”[5]

Some signs of Druckerism in the Purpose-driven church movement

1. The Church is viewed as a business model. The bottom line is that church growth means numbers. This is absolutely contrary to the Bible’s teaching. (See quote above.) See John 6, esp. vss. 60-66.

2. The movement “builds” churches with marketing surveys, e.g., “What music do people like?”

2 Timothy 4:3 NIV • “For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.”

3. The movement purports to get rid of anything that might interfere with the transition to the purpose-driven model, e.g., older members who don’t want to change. Numerous reports exist of this phenomenon. For one example, see the article “Spiritual Euthanasia,” which at the bottom lists numerous pastors and church members who were driven out by these changes, along with their phone numbers.[6]

4. Church leaders are viewed as “change agents” instead of as servant ministers of Christ. This fits in with Warren’s social engineering approach to the Church.

5. The movement constantly tests for results using humanistic psychological methods, e.g., Myers-Briggs, to fit people into slots (more on this in the section on psychology).

II. The Abandonment of Orthodox Theology

A business guide

Warren’s book The Purpose Driven Church is basically a business guide for pastors for growing the church numerically. He downplays the basics of true Christianity: the Cross, the wrath of God, the helplessness of humanity in the grip of sin and Satan; the devil; the atoning blood of Christ. These are God’s only way that we can be saved; and after we’re saved we still have to continually cope with the world, the sinful nature, and the devil, which we can only do by the continual recognition of the Gospel of grace—by grace we are saved, through faith in Christ alone (Ephesians 2).

“Deeds not creeds.”

Beware of Warren’s statements about a “new” Reformation of “deeds not creeds” for he totally ignores orthodox Christian theology, which countless Christians have died defending. Warren may claim to be loyal to the ancient creeds (the Apostle’s Creed, the Nicean Creed), but it doesn’t mean that in practice that’s what he preaches. For instance, he says that creeds (i.e., Christian doctrine) were important then but not now. Calling his approach a “new reformation” is sheer arrogance that matches that of one of his mentors, Robert Schuller. Schuller wrote a heretical book that he mailed out to pastors all over the U.S. called Self Esteem: The New Reformation.[7] Now Rick Warren has come out with his. But the Reformation has already taken place over 400 years ago, and the Bible holds true.

Abandonment of the true Reformation. Most people in the Church don’t realize how Warren’s approach is an abandonment of the good recovery of doctrine that took place in the Reformation during the 16^th century.

The Bible has both deeds and creeds (i.e., doctrine) as part of a balanced and powerful approach to living for Christ, whereas the idea of “deeds not creeds” is one of the main concepts in theological liberalism (Dr. Gresham Machen explains this well in his book, Christianity and Liberalism.)

A generic message

Warren shapes his message and his methods for “generic” religionists. His message could be given to Roman Catholics, Mormons, Jews, and perhaps even Muslims. And as of now he is making common cause with Islam—not just working with Muslims but partnering with them. One example is how he calls a valid call to ministry being a nun. With just a nod he includes Roman Catholicism in his sweep, saying nothing about them having another gospel and that they worship Mary as the Queen of Heaven, etc.[8] This makes sense in view of his abandonment of the true Reformation that had to do with pulling out of the morass of the Roman Catholic Church and recovering the clear Gospel of grace.[9] Although its official doctrine denies justification by grace alone a person can attend the Roman Catholic Church and still be saved (though not by its doctrines). Roman Catholicism is a church gone astray, whereas Islam and Mormonism were never part of the Christian Church.

Quotes:

“There are purpose driven congregations in more than 200 different denominations and associations. Our desire is to work with denominations to strengthen their churches. Each church can maintain its own heritage of doctrinal convictions while cooperating with others on accomplishing the five purposes.”[10]

The same article quotes from USA Today: “Warren’s pastor training program welcomes Catholics, Methodists, Mormons, Jews, and ordained women.”

The same article also quotes Rick Warren when asked about the problems of training Mormons, among others. He said: “I’m not going to get into a debate over the non-essentials. I won’t try to change other denominations. Why be divisive?” But Mormonism is not just another Christian denomination; it’s another religion, a pagan religion with a Christian veneer that doesn’t have the same Christ. Warren isn’t discerning.

Syncretism / idolatry

Rick Warren is basically a syncretist, someone who combines contrary religious ideas and practices. The whole Old Testament testifies from beginning to end that syncretism is an abomination to God—spiritual adultery, also called idolatry. That doesn’t mean that there can’t be genuine fellowship between Christians of different denominations when the foundation in Christ and the orthodox doctrine of the Gospel are prominent.

Robert Schuller. Warren has enjoyed an intimate relationship with the heretical Robert Schuller and lied outright denying it.[11] Robert Schuller is the man who said that Christians have to stop preaching what he calls “negative stuff”—like sin, judgment, the cross, wrath—and to substitute building self-esteem. (See Schuller’s book: Self-esteem: The New Reformation.)

Obama. Warren has embraced Obama, who supports abortion, and called him his “friend.”[12] And he spoke at Obama’s inaugural address, evidence of more than a casual relationship and immensely disturbing to many evangelicals.[13]

III. The Misuse of the Bible

Isogesis not exegesis

Many books address Warren’s misuse of the Bible. From the point of view of biblical theology he is practicing “isogesis” (or “proof texting”) – that is, reading into the Bible his own previously held doctrines. He does not do exegesis, i.e., looking at what the Bible says and taking doctrine from that. In other words, he shapes it his own way. A big example is that he first took his purpose-driven system from Drucker; then he hunted through the Scriptures and numerous versions of the Bible and its paraphrases and tried to make them support his system. (More about this a little later.) Examples re The Message:

Examples of Warren misusing The Message

In The Purpose Driven Life Warren says, “The Bible warns…” and then quotes from The Message.[14] The way he depends upon paraphrases so much shows that he is unwilling or afraid to deal directly with the text of Scripture. The Message is full of many very subjective and psychology-driven interpretations. A paraphrase is really a commentary, and to quote from it as if it is a true translation is a poor or dishonest practice.

Warren grasps onto translations that say what he wants them to say, which shows that he is stretching the translations to reinforce his Drucker-generated theories. The book Who’s Driving the Purpose Driven Church[15] deals with this in detail.

IV. The Murdoch-driven Church

Rupert Murdoch

Warren allows this obviously sinful and unrepentant worldly and wealthy person to support him and to be a member of his congregation without publicly correcting him. Murdoch is widely known in many countries as the world’s biggest pornographer. (See “Purpose-Driven Pornography.”[16]) Murdoch owns Zondervan Publishing as well many trashy newspapers and the Fox Channel. Murdoch has contributed millions to Warren’s P.E.A.C.E. Plan and backed his books in a major way, a support that Warren covets. (Zondervan is also a big supporter of the Emergent Church gurus, such as Brian MacLaren, etc.)

When challenged about having this active pornographer in his congregation at Saddleback, Warren said only that he could work with anyone on common good goals. In other words, he didn’t want to deal with the fact that a member of his congregation and a personal supporter was sinning mightily against the Lord. You might almost say that it appears that Warren is in Rupert Murdoch’s pocket.

V. The use of Pop Psychology in the

Purpose-driven Church movement

This is too large a subject for our purposes, although it needs to be addressed. Unfortunately it isn’t unique to Saddleback for we live in a society focused on therapy and self-help. Propagating a “gospel of psychology” is a growing phenomenon in all mainline churches and in what used to be called evangelical churches. (If you want to know more about this, we can deal with it in another “brief” analysis.) The Leslies’ article points out how Warren believes that psychosocial instruments can assess a man’s human worth and a church’s effectiveness.

VI. Summary and Conclusion

Rick Warren is moving the evangelical church in a very negative direction, a direction that strongly resembles the way liberalism swept into the evangelical churches in the early 1900s. This had the devastating result of tremendously weakening them and making them extremely vulnerable to Marxism and all kinds of vain philosophies so they could not stand against abortion, the elevation of the homosexual lifestyle, and leftist politics that emerged later.

As someone who has worked with thousands of mental patients over the years, I (Richard) have to say that I think Warren exhibits a grandiosity that seems terribly inappropriate for a Christian minister. For one thing, he claims that he will unite two billion Christians around his plan to deal with the “giants” of poverty, etc., but somehow he doesn’t include the giants of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Nor does he mention salvation through Christ. Where’s humility? Where’s the Gospel? Where’s the Cross? Where’s the Lordship of Christ?

The above are only a few of the numerous reasons why many Christians today have a problem with Rick Warren. We are among them because, in addition to the above, we have personally been in churches where the purpose-driven approach has swept through and wreaked havoc.

¹⁸For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. ¹⁹For it is written:
"I will destroy the wisdom of the wise;
the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate."

²⁰Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? ²¹For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. ²²Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, ²³but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, ²⁴but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. ²⁵For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.

1 Corinthians 1:18–25 (NIV)

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[1] See Time magazine article (first paragraph) at http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1830147-2,00.html

[2] http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/04/pied_pipers_of_purpose.htm

[3] Leslies, et al., Section 1.4.

[4] Quote from Rick Warren at http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2005/03/21/8254830/index.htm

[5] Section 5, “The Pied Pipers of Purpose.”

[6] See http://www.cephas-library.com/purposedriven/purposedriven_spirutal_euthanasia.html

[7] http://cicministry.org/commentary/issue18.htm

[8] The Purpose Driven Life, 229.

[9] If you’re interested in this subject, Richard can point you to some books.

[10] From “Rick Warren ‘Works with’ and ‘Strengthens’ Mormon Churches and other non-Christian sects” at www.alittleleaven.com/2007/05/Rick_Warren_wor.html

[11] For details about his relationship with Schuller, see Lighthouse Trails research Website.

[12] A friend of an abortion promoter: http://www.christianpost.com/article/20090407/rick-warren-clarifies-relationship-with-obama/index.html

[13] “Why is Obama’s evil in Rick Warren’s pulpit?” by Kevin McCullough, Nov. 17, 2006. World Net Daily at http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID+52998

[14] P. 77.

[15] Who’s Driving the Purpose-driven Church: A documentary on the teachings of Rick Warren by James Sundquist (Bible Belt Publishing, Oklahoma City, 2004). Sundquist is obviously very much in the fundamentalist camp, but he is only documenting what he has observed. Appendix C of his book contains a very good article by Rev. Ed Hurd (Anglican minister), “Carl Jung, Neo-Gnosticism, and the (MBTI).” [Meyers-Briggs Temperament Indicator]

[16] See “Purpose-driven Pornography” at http://www.extremetheology.com/2007/05/purposedriven_p.html