Now this is one of the times I feel it necessary to speak on a particular subject and, while I am sure it sparks some debate from well meaning Believers, obviously that has never stopped me before. Now before I go into this blog, I must make a disclaimer: I am not a fan of Rick Warren – I appreciate some of the things that he has done, and have read some of his books. I do not see Pastor Warren as an adversary to the true Gospel, the way I see Joel Osteen as one, but I do see him as a man who misses the biblical idea of church and handles scripture “fast and loose.” But to review all the “Purpose Driven ________” books is certainly not my purpose here. If you want a very good review on it, here is a link: http://www.biblebb.com/files/tonyqa/tc03-148.htm . But, regardless of what one may believe about his books, his church and so on, one can not deny the problem with Pastor Warren attempting to withdraw his support from Proposition 8. I admired his stand in the face adversity on marriage and I thought he did an incredible job interviewing the Presidential Candidates - but he is allowing society to dictate how the Church should respond, and that is far from what we are called to do as believers!
If you will read this http://www.onenewsnow.com/Culture/Default.aspx?id=481280 you will find Pastor Warren expresses regret concerning his backing on Prop 8. If we as God’s people can’t be crystal clear on what is wrong, we can’t be clear on what is right! For us to not stand by the biblical definition of marriage, is to give a message of doctrinal heresy. Marriage was God’s idea - all one has to do is look at Ephesians 5 and they will see that it is a picture of the relationship Christ has with His Church. For us to not clearly stand on the biblical concept of marriage is to in many ways deny the relationship God has with His Church. If a Pastor does not have the back bone to speak clearly where the Bible speaks, then how can we speak clearly on anything? Pastor Warren says that he didn’t want to “comment or criticize” the Iowa Supreme Court Decision to legalize same sex marriages because it was “not his agenda” - to that I say, what should our agenda be? If we are to be light, we should take a stand where Scripture is clear - we should do this with love, we should do this trumpeting the Gospel, we should do this with the goal of seeing people come to Christ, but WE MUST DO THIS!
The Word of God makes it clear that real love should hope the best. To hope the best or believe the best about Pastor Warren I guess would say that his desire was to appear humble before people, but humility never compromises the Word of God it submits. I have found recently that this tactic is now the major attack from those seemingly ignorant or disobedient to the Word of God. I googled the word “arrogant” with men like Mac Brunson, Mark Dever, John Piper, John MacArthur and several other strong biblically based men and of course each of them were accused in that way. I was amazed, then I began to read and realized that what Mark Dever said is true: "God's been really clear in the Bible. So for us to be vague on something God has been clear about, that's not humble. That's arrogant. It's arrogant of us to put our own ideas as if they're better than God's... Really believing the truth is humble of us, it's surrendering ourselves to Him." Most “church people” will not argue with Scripture, they will attack the man that is holding to Scripture. They will throw accusations, all the while he is upholding truth. We must humbly hold to truth, and only God knows our heart. But we must boldly proclaim truth- I have come to the conclusion that in a lost world with many lost church members, many had rather be popular than stand on truth. I believe this will be the trend in the days ahead by countless churches and pastors, but let me assure you that we will speak where the Bible speaks and we stand because we love regardless of the consequences. Rest assured we serve a Savior who will judge. That my friend should encourage everyone of us to HOLD TO TRUTH!
So, should it be our agenda to speak for the unborn? To stand against adultery? (Many in churches disagree with this), To allow unhealthy senior adults to be killed when they are deemed no longer useful to society? To stand for a marriage between a woman and a man for a lifetime? I ask for you to think - I ask Pastor Warren to think, that if this is not important enough to be part of our “agenda,” what is? If we do not speak on this matter, then we must be silent on all matters. I implore you Believer, to stand where the Word of God stands. You may be a fan of Pastor Warren, but you cannot have biblical convictions if you are a fan of where he now stands! This is not even close to an area of preference, this is a commitment to the Word!
4 comments:
I wouldn't mind seeing the wording in that letter of apology that RW sent to his gay leader friends.
It would be interesting to see R.W's letter of apology to his gay leader friends.
You've written some great posts but this one is my favorite to date. I was saddened by Rick's apology but I cannot say I was surprised.
I couldn't agree more with this post. I had the great privilege to witness the baptism of my in-laws on Easter Sunday, and I had an eye/ear full at their church. They began the service by playing what I can only describe as heavy metal music with the name of Jesus thrown in a few times (presumably to turn it into a praise and worship song.) They then announced that Easter is a party to celebrate Jesus, and threw out beach balls into the congregation to bat around during the next three "hymns."
As a 29 year old, it seems that I am often expected to want this kind of odd behavior in a worship service. The sad reality of the contemporary church movement, however, is that authenticity is often sacrificed. Who cares if we get some extra people in the pews from a half-hearted apologies to gays? Those people we are apologizing to are bound to realize over time that we are not being real to them. Same goes with the way churches are now bending over backwards to try to change things to "attract" my age group. If the Holy Spirit is working on the lives of my age group, they will come to church in God's time. It is the church's job to present a real worship experience on God's terms when they get there. Not gen Xers, or baby boomers, or anyone else's terms. God's terms. It is really amazing the way that Satan has assaulted our church in a new way during this "post-modern" era.
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