Posted on 07/07/2018 8:00:03 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
I heard a tragic story recently, some of the very bad fruit coming from Rob Bell's book Love Wins. (This was Bell's hell-denying book in which he effectively announced his apostasy from evangelical faith.) In light of a growing epidemic of deception in the Church today, a deception that is making people deaf to divine warnings, it seemed that now was a good time to share the story.
Earlier this year, a university student was responding to my lecture on God's love for the LGBT community during a time of Q&A. He tried to undermine the authority of the Scriptures and accused me of using violent language. To him, any form of justice or judgment was inherently violent, and he would have none of it as a professed atheist.
I subsequently learned that, just a few years earlier, he was planning to go into the ministry. He was an avid reader of the Bible. Then he read Love Wins, and it was downhill ever since. (This was according to a report from his roommate at that time.)
It would have been far better (and far more biblically accurate) if Bell had written a book titled Love Warns. That would have been in greater harmony with the truth. (Click here for my 2015 article titled "Love Warns.")
But we don't want to hear warnings today. We only want positive words. Words that make us feel better about ourselves. Words that increase our self-esteem and enhance our self-image. Anything negative will be rejected out of hand.
Don't tell me I'm on the wrong path. Don't tell me there's danger ahead. By all means, do not warn!
Everybody has to win these days. There can be no losers.
Every path is valid and every perception has truth.
Correction is a micro-aggression. Reproof is for our grandparents' generation. Rebuke is tantamount to assault.
Yes, that's the world we live in today. And I don't just mean in the secular, non-religious society. I mean in the Church. Preachers, do not warn!
On a daily (sometimes hourly basis, sometimes by the minute), we receive angry comments to our video "Can You Be Gay and Christian?" (Apparently, it continues to circulate on LGBT social media outlets, getting new viewers all the time who are furious with the biblical content.)
One viewer wrote, "Reported this as a hate video," which is the expected response these days. Telling the truth, even with love and grace, is branded "hate." Truth has become toxic.
This reminds me of a quote from the Christian musician and singer Keith Green (who died in 1982). He said, "I'd rather have people hate me with the knowledge that I tried to save them." Do we have any excuse for not trying?
Others viewers of our video were outraged that I would have the temerity to state that the Bible was God's Word and that it was still relevant.
Still others were shocked to hear me say that there is a right way and a wrong way. That we were created and designed by God with specific, moral intent. How dare I speak such things!
But it's not just here, in this controversial area of LGBT issues, that we find resistance. For years now, right within the Church, there's been a growing tide of no-judgment preaching.
We're only allowed to say nice things, to encourage. We're not allowed to plead with tears, to warn of coming danger, to urge our listeners to flee from impending judgment, be it in this world or the world to come.
Not a chance. Such preaching is dubbed "Old Testament" (as if the New Testament wasn't filled with warnings). Such preaching is called legalism and going back under the law (as if grace didn't plead and admonish). Such preaching is deemed out of style, inappropriate for our enlightened age.
As a result of this growing trend, rather than the flock being awakened, the congregants go like fattened sheep to the slaughter. Who will sound the alarm?
By all means, we should encourage. By all means, we should lift up. We should preach with love, preach compassion, preach mercy, preach longsuffering.
But we should warn our hearers and viewers of the consequences of rejecting that love and compassion and mercy and longsuffering. We should, in Paul's words, present (and consider) both the kindness and the severity of God (Romans 11:22). Both are essential to our right understanding of the nature and character of our Lord.
Decades ago, George Orwell famously wrote, "In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act."
Today, more than ever, we need to engage in this revolutionary act of telling the truth. If we who claim to know the Lord don't do it, who will?
Michael Brown holds a Ph.D. in Near Eastern Languages and Literatures from New York University and has served as a professor at a number of seminaries. He is the author of 25 books and hosts the nationally syndicated, daily talk radio show, the Line of Fire.
Our most rapid church growth was in the days when “hellfire and brimstone” were being preached.
And there’s no call for holy righteous living.
That is also called legalism.
So people to not confess and repent of their sin but continue in it blissfully ignorant that they are not living a life pleasing to God and yet totally convinced that He’s happy with them just as they are and don’t care if they sin. (Professed believers have said that to me about God not caring if they sin.)
raiderboy is pot stirring as usual.
Check out his posting history.
It’s SOP.
Matthew 7:21-23 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’
Saving faith results in a life that shows it, a life lived in increasing holiness and Christlikeness.
If that's not there, thre's plenty of reason to suspect that the profession is lip service only.
Problem we have today is few wants to admit they are sinful in need of overcoming their sinfulness. It’s the “I’m OK, your OK” mentality.
We are approaching the very last days.
“Two chapters earlier in John...3:18...he who does not believe is already condemned.”
Yes, I agree with you. I was pointing out to the other person that Jesus did speak of judgment.
Thanks for sharing that article. As someone who has spent time talking with many peers from all over.... I can attest that this is a real issue. Unfortunately many more people seem to be set on deceiving and being deceived.... so that they can practice their desired sin.
I’m sorry, but I find what you’re saying to be absurd.
You’re basically saying sin doesn’t matter at all. You can do anything...rape, kill, steal, torture, never repent of any of it, like the BTK killer who tortured all this girls to death and was never remorseful, and if you believe Jesus died for your sins (which demons believe, also...and tremble) then you’re going straight to Heaven.
Why did Paul say Heaven is not for murderers, homosexuals, drunkards, etc., if nothing you do matters?
And why did God take Annanias and Saphira’s life when they they lied about money they were holding back.
There’s something amiss with your theology.
No . That is exactly what I am saying or Christ died for nothing. How could he have atoned for our sins but not atoned for our sins? Give us a list of sins that are atoned for and then a list of nonatoned sins. Start with “1.” and go numerically.
Are we not taught to accept the whole counsel of God? But you’re going to accept one Scripture as the total truth of God? What of the rest of Scripture, such as those that have been quoted to you here, by other FReepers?
You must be born again. John 3:16 tells you how to do that. But the majority of the REST of the New Testament, tells us how to live, AFTER we have received Jesus. Paul speaks of baby Christians, and differentiates between them and mature Christians, in how they receive the meat of the Word, not just the milk of the Word that a new Christian knows.
You are absolutely not “ born sgain”. That is another horrible, and I intentional ,mistranslation in the “king James”. 1600 years after the resurrection. The original true words of God” we’re “ born from above”. Look it up. When you believe in Jesus as the Son of God , you are born from above.— spiritually. Automatically. We are badly misled from salvation on purpose
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