Incredible Ignorance

Rom.16:17, 18 - Now I beseech you brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which you have learned and avoid them. For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.

There exists within the evangelical church in America a spirit of ignorance, in fact, incredible ignorance. You have churches contouring their services to identify with certain portions of the community and culture at the expense of solid Biblical teaching. Beds and cars and other objects have made their way to the stage and are visuals for the preacher as he gives “good advice” messages that many times could be delivered by Dr. Phil or Dr. Laura. It sometimes goes beyond the bizarre.

Some time ago well meaning Christians began a church called XXX church and was focused on reaching men especially who had fallen into pornography. Their motives aside, their method is unbiblical. These men did not fall into pornography because there was no XXX church to strengthen them, no, they went into sin because they were unsaved, or because of their shallow devotional life, the surface teaching at their church, or their lack of wisdom and accountability. The elephant in the room is that the church that these men now attend is not sufficient to help them into repentance and victory, and the evidence for that is well documented.

But this church has produced a wicked video that has a puppet, yes I said puppet, who tells kids who probably know nothing about pornography to stay away from pornography complete with a cameo appearance from an unsaved male adult film "star" who takes a position that sex is between consenting adults and not children. How wonderful to teach our children. And of course many emergent types hail this type of straight forward talk, but would they still preach its praises if the puppet said to stay away from homosexuality? Alcohol? Cigarettes? Soap operas? R rated movies (which I consider mostly pornography)? There are many people who are overcoming some addictions through the power of human organization and education and not the power of God. And the Scriptures never give any indication that churches should cull out one particular sin and make it the church moniker.

The church has been called to lift high the Lord Jesus Christ and preach His gospel. We have not been called to extricate sinners from pornography or drugs or alcohol or any other sin, no, our mission is to bring the salvation that only comes through Jesus to a lost and dying world and let Christ do the rest. A cleaned up life is a result of salvation not the goal. There is no such thing as the xxxchurch or the Budweiser church or the cocaine church, only the church of Jesus Christ. It is and always will be heaven or hell, that is our message through Christ and as articulated by the words of our Lord in Jn.3:16. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shall be saved. There are many well intentioned ideas that are not from God but many have lost the discernment to recognize the subtle counterfeits.

Once you become untethered from God’s Word you can create many religious looking institutions and movements that unsuspecting people see as helpful but in reality they are small, medium, and giant steps toward apostasy. If a rifle is moved one degree off its target it will be 1 ½ feet off target every mile and it will continue to become more and more off target as the bullet continues to travel. So it is with Biblical issues, when they begin with significant error they do not just continue with that degree of error, no, they continue to get worse. Now all that is compounded when the target is wrong to begin with, such is the nature of deception. The deceived person is ignorant, sometimes willingly and sometimes not, of his ignorance.

And so this incredible ignorance presses on, collecting followers as it goes, and if it cannot convert people it will at least waste the time of true believers through useless, meaningless, and pointless dialogue. How many of you waste your time discoursing with believers in the health and wealth movement? Not many and what is the reason? Because not only is it a waste of time, but the theology is so off base that it cannot be given any legitimacy at all. So must now the emergent movement be viewed. We should know by now that the entire movement is heading the wrong way and as of yet I have seen very few repent and return to solid Biblical theology.

Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears. It is over. What is over, you ask. Let me explain. I have a saying that reveals my feelings about certain things when they get so out of bounds they no longer deserve the energy it takes to search for any good. The saying is “It’s like looking for a nickel in a spittoon”. I apply that saying in all seriousness as it applies to the emerging/emergent church movement. But what about men like Kimball and Driscoll and others whose professed theology seems within acceptable parameters? Sadly, those men might just be the most dangerous of all since it is they who offer cover and some credibility to the others. The question must be asked if those men really believe what they say they do then why do they allow themselves to be yoked in any way with men like MacLaren, Bell, and Pagitt, all of whom are heretics according to me?

These are dark days for the church of Jesus Christ and millions are being systematically deceived by many mediums and the strength of men’s personalities. And what a clever and insidious deception it is, I mean who can argue with feeding the poor, ministering to the sick, and standing for social justice? The devil has ingenuously made it seem like those of us who believe that the work of Christ was completely an atonement are against such acts of love. But we must remain faithful to God’s Word while at the same time recognizing with sincerity that we ourselves are in desperate need of a revival. The absolute worst thing that can ever happen is that we get puffed up and self righteous as we warn others, God’s Spirit is not in that spirit. In my humble opinion it would do us well if we withdraw from conversing or dialoging with the emergent crowd, especially those who are entrenched. Back and forth confrontation serves little if any purpose and a much more productive journey is to seek Christ and His face while not being ignorant of these deceptions. Surely it is a delicate balance.

Like Gideon’s men, we must never become so absorbed in watching for the enemy that we quit drinking the living water. Defending Christ must not become our obsession but Christ Himself must be our living obsession. The times will get worse and as a matter of fact they are much worse than you or I actually realize. Apostasy is much more rampant than we know and like lava it captures more and more territory every moment. Good people, believers that are truly saved, have been captured by this deception and are now defenders of the new and detractors of the old. Truth transcends tense. Let not your hearts be troubled my brothers and sisters, God has already prevailed. Do not rub your hands in worry or let doubt arise in your hearts, it is still a privileged joy to serve the Risen Christ and the Father God.

Seek His face, raise His banner, and let us go without the camp, bearing His reproach, and heralding the same good news that delivered us from the kingdom of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of God’s Dear Son!!