I’ve been reading an excellent book by Thomas Horn (Blood on the
Altar: The Coming War Between Christian vs. Christian). I sought
further help on one of his subjects, the Emerging Church, online. So I found an
interview between two opposing giants about the faith: John MacArthur
(Author of 150 books, pastor, radio preacher, president of Master’s Seminary in
Los Angeles) and Phil Johnson (Retired U.C.-Berkley law professor, father of
the “intelligent design movement.”) They’re both died, but their words—and type
of churches—live after them. I thought I would highlight part of their
interview here.
From the interview, I could see that one of the biggest threats to God's
church is, would you believe, a church movement called the
“Emerging Church.” So let’s start by defining it. Wikipedia said, 2 years ago,
that they are post-Protestant, post-evangelical, post-liberal,
post-conservative, and post-charismatic. Which is radical.
Some interesting facts: the Emerging movement hates preaching; they believe
instead on “conversation” with people. This is to emphasize its developing and
decentralized nature, its vast range of standpoints, and its commitment to
dialogue. There is no central creed in these churches. What those involved DO
mostly agree on, is their disillusionment with today's church--and they support
the deconstruction of modern Christian worship. They believe, instead, that
there are radically diverse "perspectives"
within Christianity that should be listened to--their litmus test is on social justice
and environmental stewardship of the earth (which are not emphasized
in the Bible). They say they are creating a “safe” environment for those with
opinions ordinarily rejected by modern conservative evangelism. They believe
that non-critical interfaith dialogue is preferred over
"dogmatically-driven" evangelism (i.e., they reject orthodoxy. They
believe that capitalism degrades society. Marxists love that
phrase. In the past, particularly with the Catholic missionaries, such
beliefs among priests had them hiding the leaders of militia gunmen to
overthrow the government.
In any event, the emerging church movement “went public” in November 2004,
when they were spotlighted in an article in Christianity Today.
(I'm not saying Christianity Today likes their stance). But they’ve been around
since at least 1996.
The second way to get to know the Emerging Church, is by a few relevant
quotes from their founding father, Brian McLaren. In a separate interview,
after he "mistakenly" spoke of God in the male gender, he had this to
confess: “This is as good a place as any to apologize for my use of masculine
pronouns for God…I avoid (their) use because they can give the false
impression…that the Christian God is a male deity.” On the subject of the
atonement, Jesus’ sacrifice for us, he calls it a “violent view,” because it
presents God as the “greatest existential threat to humanity.” This is what
God’s grace is called--allowing His Son to pay the price for our sin. A reader from Sweden, troubled by doubts, asked
him: “If Jesus isn’t coming back…what about judgment or the resurrection?” His
answer was psychobabble, but you can tell he's not disagreeing with the Swede's
idea that Jesus might not come back. Get this “answer”: “Jesus does say
‘I will come again.’…but I think it’s a mistake to assume that when he says
those things, he means what we mean…with all our dispensationalist,
premillennialist…or whatever categories. The hyperbolic imagery of the New
Testament, moon turning to blood, etc. is political language, signaling the
fall of powerful political luminaries. Also…Jesus didn’t come just to evacuate
us from earth to a future heaven but to show us how to live and make this world
more and more beautiful by following Jesus’ example which would eventually lead
to God’s “kingdom come on earth.”"
You can see the attack on foundational Scripture in those quotes. The single
Scriptural belief which is above all others, is the resurrection and His
promise to return.
On homosexuality, he believes there is "uncertainty" enough to
call for a new belief. (But see Romans 1:26-28, which seems rather
certain of God's stance). He twists fundamentalism (he calls it a “scatological
term”), calling conservative beliefs "fundasexuality." He also says
we have "heterophobia," a fear of people who are different.
Another event emphasized in Wikipedia makes us even more skeptical about
their belief in the validity of Scripture:
The TCPC website (the Center for Progressive Christianity, one of their
"tents") gives an analogy that symbolizes the methodology of the
Progressive Christianity movement. It involves a Sunday school teacher and a
class of 9 or 10-year-olds. Even at that age, some were skeptical of the
inerrancy of the Bible.
The teacher suggested that they read Charlotte's
Web . The class enjoyed the book. The teacher interjected the
thought that pigs and spiders cannot talk. The kids protested: "Well, it's
a story." The teacher asked whether the story was true. They decided that
it was sort of true. "In a way, it was true." So the teacher
suggested: "let's look at the Bible in the same way."
Another leader of the "Emerging" movement, Rob Bell, no longer a
pastor of his Mars Hill church since he no longer believes in hell (from his
book "Love Wins," 2011). He also attacks fundamental
doctrine; he doesn’t believe Scripture was inerrant when he mentions his
greatest “discovery”—he declares “The Bible is a human product.” In
summarizing the movement’s view, he says “This is not just the same old message
with new methods. We’re rediscovering Christianity as an Eastern religion…” Mr.
McLaren agrees; he believes in inclusivism--that other religions (i.e., those
that deny Christ as God) lead to salvation, too. For instance, he does not
think we should convert Buddhists to Christianity; we should leave them as
Buddhists who are followers of Jesus. But Buddhism is usually atheistic, so to
them, Jesus is not God, since there is no God; so really, a “Buddhist
Christian” is an oxymoron. They need to read Acts 4:12.
Now that we’ve read a bit of this unorthodox group, let’s let John MacArthur
tell what he thinks. He’s smarter than me anyway. He first distinguishes
the emerging church movement from Modernism. Modernism was a product of the
Enlightenment during the Renaissance in which they made human reason, not
Scripture, the determinant of ethics. He says “out of that came the
worship of the human mind, and (in effect, they were saying), “the mind trumps
God.” The Emerging Church, on the other hand, is post-modernism…In
both cases, they assault Scripture. (This movement) "is a denial of the
clarity of Scripture....they think we can’t really know what the Bible says.
Whether it’s about sin or virtue...they don’t like rules, so their ‘out’
is…(they say) “Well, it (Scripture) is not clear.” This is just another way to
set the Bible aside.
Scripture claims to be clear, however, and God holds us responsible: “A
wayfaring man though he be a fool need not err.” (Isaiah 35:8). Dr. MacArthur
also charges their leaders that “the reason they deny Scripture (by saying it
is vague) is that men loved darkness rather than light (John 3:19). The light
is there, they hate the light, they run from the light. The issue is not that
Scripture is not clear, it is crystal clear.” Dr. MacArthur charged them with
pushing heresy—which he says later on in the interview.
I would like to take the topic of homosexuality as an example of their
approach. It's part of their pride in inclusivism, not finding anything morally
wrong with homosexuals. Scripture, however, won’t let us do that. It’s
condemned in Leviticus 18:22, where God says to men:
You shall not lie with a male as with a woman. It is an abomination.
God does not change His mind in the New Testament. As Romans 1 points
out, it is among the worst deviations that men come down to, after God “gave
them up” in their insistence to defy Him.
Scripture is crystal clear on this subject, but not according to Emerging
Church leader Mr. MacLaren, who says: “Many of us don’t know what we should
think about homosexuality. We’ve heard all sides but no position has yet won
our confidence…that alienates us from both the liberals and conservatives who
seem to know exactly what we should think…the biblical arguments are nuanced
and multilayered, and the pastoral ramifications are staggeringly complex.” The
phrase that sticks in my craw--"no position has yet won our
confidence." Thus, they are saying, "Our judgment is the final
word." Their judgment trumps God's, evidently.
But Dr. MacArthur insists that it’s bad news for the practicing homosexual,
but it’s still the truth. He says, “the truth is what I will defend. It’s not
personal. I’m not mad at people. I’m not trying to protect my own little space.
That doesn’t make me popular in all circles, it creates just the opposite.” He
maintains that it’s impossible for Christians to agree with the latest world's
view: “there is no possible accommodation …Christianity would have to be
reinvented to accommodate itself to any pattern of (worldly) culture thinking.”
But Brian McLaren, a founding father of the Emerging movement doesn’t
believe MacArthur has good motives. "We fear that the whole issue
has been manipulated…by political parties…whatever we say gets sucked into a
vortex of politicized culture-wars rhetoric... I know what you guys'
motives are, and I condemn them." (If their motives are to defend
Scripture, that's reprehensible, I guess).
Really, a big question he touched on is, how do you evangelize the
homosexual? The Emerging Church has decided to, as Dr. MacArthur says,
"capture these people by “sanctifying the (gay) culture." But
the Bible doesn’t adapt to culture. It confronts culture. The Emerging Church,
on the other hand, wants to let the culture define what Christianity should be.
Dr. MacArthur then talks again about big non-Biblical movements in history.
He summarizes Pre-modernism: “there is truth and it comes from God; it has a
supernatural source…men believed in God or they believed in the gods.” What
follows is Modernism (which I’m figuring covers 1750-2000). He summarizes
it as: “there is truth and we can find it by human reason…not revelation from
God, not the Bible, but human reason.” But Modernism wasn’t a good idea in
practice: “the world got worse than it has ever been…the totalitarian
world…fascism, Nazism, Communism, and the massacre of millions and millions of
people in the name of human reason.” (For instance, most Lutherans didn’t have
any trouble using a gun to obey Hitler). Getting up-to-date, he says: “Now the
idea of post-modernism, which says, in effect, “We give up. There may be truth,
but we can’t know it. It may be from God, but we can’t know…so we embrace
mystery…you have your truth, I have my truth…truth is whatever you think it is,
whatever you want it to be, it’s intuitive, it’s experiential..but it’s not
universal and it’s not knowable, universally knowable.” The interviewer responds,
“That’s why these days the highest values, the sole remaining virtues, are
things like tolerance, ambiguity, mystery..” To me, calling this a “mystery” in
post-modernism opens the door to searching in the occult; people still want
plain answers to reach their loved ones who have died--but they're not getting
answers in this psychobabble of Mr. McLaren. Dr. MacArthur says, “Oh, Brian
McLaren says ambiguity is really a good thing (based on McLaren's quote, “Certainty
is overrated”)...it gives people a license to invent their own religion,
really…no one is permitted to challenge it…it is wonderful if you want to sin
without any guilt. And I think that’s at the bottom of this…they hate the light
because their deeds are evil.”
He also charges, “It’s not a theology; (they say they) don’t
"teach"…and the word “sermon” scares them… no, we want to have a
conversation. But the only part of the conversation they don’t like is when you
say, “That’s wrong. That’s sinful.” So their conversation...never has an
objective…that’s another way to negate the Word of God. I say, you can deny
that (the plain Word) is from God. But don’t tell me God has spoken, but unfortunately
He mumbled. The worst thing we could do would be to soften the edges of what
really is clear in Scripture.” (They claim) “the Bible is irrelevant, you can’t
stand up for an hour and exposit the Word of God, you’ve got to tell them
stories… To quote one of their leaders, “The bible (small “b,” to them) is no
longer a principal source of morality as a rulebook. The meaning of the Good
Samaritan is more important than the Ten Commandments —even assuming the latter
could be remembered in any detail by anyone…” By the way, some of the most
revealing McLaren quotes are on this website:
http://carm.org/brian-mclaren-quotes-ignorance-bliss-theology.
Dr. MacArthur feels that (they should say) “since we don’t know what it
means, why would we teach? Nobody has a right to impose on anybody else
their ideas.” They take a sort of reverse humility in confessing their
ignorance. To turn truth on its head, they believe that if someone claims to
know what Scripture means, they have committed an act
of pride. To quote MacArthur: “It is an attack on the clarity of Scripture
and they elevate themselves as if this is some noble reality…which they call
humility…(it’s) a celebration of ignorance.”
They also have this feature: “They’re really, really aggressive at tearing
down the church, tearing down historic theology...that have been a part of the
church’s life for centuries…but that’s the lowest level of assault there is.
Anybody can shred and destroy without having to build something back in its
place…(they) just shred what people believe and walk away, leaving chaos
everywhere…the egotism of it is pretty frightening. And the church is filled
with people who have no foundation.”
He gives a few words of warning to people out there looking for a church
home: "I don’t think a person should go to a church that isn’t answerable
to a doctrinal statement…(if you do), you need to get out of there because
you’re at the whim of a guy who can invent anything he wants any time. This
entrepreneurial approach to the church is a very serious breach…" (There)
“may be Christians who are seduced by this; in their ignorance they are the
children tossed to and fro, carried about by every blowing wind of doctrine.”
(Ephesians 4:14). The interviewer says “And every man does what’s right in his
own eyes.” (Judges 17:6). Dr. MacArthur maintains that young people from a
denominational church that often lacks life and fails to exposit Scripture,
these are the likely victims of this movement: “I don’t think (the Emerging
Church) is nearly as appealing to the non-churched people as to the marginally
churched young people." The young are attracted to Emerging
movement "are reacting to the superficiality and…the legalism of (their
church).”
Dr. MacArthur speaks again to the clarity of Scripture. (Jesus) “says things
to them in His day like this, ‘Have you not read? Have you not heard what
Scripture says?’ He didn’t say to them, “Oh, look, I know why you’re having a
tough time with Me, because the Old Testament is so hard to understand.” Then
he brings up the example of the Gentiles, who were totally ignorant of the Old
Testament…"Paul (who assumes the regular people are smart as he) builds
these massive cases of understanding the Christian gospel based on the
sacrificial system from the Old Testament…Thus, to come along and say that the
Bible is not clear is then to accuse God, and (accusing) the Scripture of
claiming something for itself that it can’t deliver. (Charging God like that
is) “pretty serious.”
**Note: Mars Hill Churches was the focus of the Emerging movement. But
Rob Bell was removed as senior pastor of his Mars Hill church in Michigan in
2011 after his beliefs were revealed in the book Love Wins.
But he has come back, preaching at sold-out conferences in the U.K. and Ireland
lately.
Another important name in the movement is Mark Driscoll. He was
removed from a separate Mars Hill pastorate in October 2014, most particularly
because he called women "penis homes" and other misogynist
remarks--plus, he's being charged with plagiarism. It was also revealed
that church money was used to pump up his book sales so he could make the NY
Times Bestseller List. But he has come back, after taking in $1.1 million in
donations in 2 years, he built a $1 million church in Phoenix, and has even
been called upon to evangelical conferences.
Brian McLaren is still going strong, too: His latest book, The Great
Spiritual Migration, includes the following crazy quote:
“Christianity, we
might say, is driving around with a loaded gun in its glove compartment, and
that loaded gun is its violent image of God. It’s driving around with a license
to kill, and that license is its Bible, read uncritically. Along with its loaded
gun and license to kill, it’s driving around with a sense of entitlement
derived from a set of beliefs with a long, ugly, and largely unacknowledged
history.”
So, let's ignore these guys. The feeling of freedom from sin and its
penalties beats whatever negative nonsense they come up with.
Acknowledgement: Thomas Horn, Blood on the Altar and Christianity
Today
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