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AG's Griffith Speaks Out For Warren
AG Pastor, Griffith
to S.S 20070302
I have yet
to see you provide any specifics of the purported
doctrinal heresies that you supposedly find Brother
Warren teaching. Dr. Rick Warren is a graduate of
SWBTS in Fort Worth, TX. I know this because I
went to school with him. He received his D. Min
from Fuller and his M. Div. from SWBTS.
Show me
where Dr. Rick Warren denies the deity of Christ.
Show me where Dr. Rick Warren denies the inspiration of
Scripture. Show me where Dr. Rick Warren teaches
salvation by works. Show me where Dr. Rick Warren
denies salvation by grace through faith. You won't
be able to do that.
Show
me where Dr. Rick Warren has moral failure. You
won't be able to do that.
Show
me where Dr. Rick Warren has stepped on the toes of the
ecclesiastical elite. You will find plenty of
examples here, and you will also find the wellspring of
the false accusations of his supposed heresies. Someone
else's pet project got washed away in the flood of
support for Dr. Rick Warren's ministry, and now they
accuse him of heresy.
Sincerely,
Roger
Griffith
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S.S.
to Griffith 20070309
Mr Griffith
Do you agree that you could make the same
statements about the Pope as you have made about
Warren? There is more involved than simply not
denying these things. Statements of sound
doctrine can be made of none effect if things
are taught and emphasized that are contrary to
sound doctrine. Also, what
Church leaders teach publicly in books and
hugely exposed media events should match their
other confessions. Here is an excerpt
from
REDEFINING CHRISTIANITY,
by Bob DeWaay;
(Page 152) Another
example of this is what Warren has to say to his Ladies Home Journal
readers. In the March, 2005 issue, Warren offers
five “truths” that will supposedly boost a
person’s self-esteem. The first of these truths
is that we should accept ourselves because “God
accepts us unconditionally.”[i]
This again implies universalism. If there are no
conditions for God’s acceptance, then all people
are accepted whether or not they believe the
gospel. Why should anyone repent and believe the
gospel if they are already accepted by God
without doing so? The next point is that we need
to love ourselves; but the story he tells to
illustrate this “truth” is not about loving
one’s self at all, but about his wife learning
more about God’s love for her. That is not the
same as loving “self.” The next point is, “Be
true to yourself.” This is not a Biblical idea
at all, but is popular worldly wisdom. We do not
need to “get to know ourselves” as
Warren teaches;
we need to get to know God. “Self” is a sinful
rebel who refuses to submit to God.
Warren
never tells his Ladies Home Journal readers
about the sin nature.
The next point is, “forgive yourself.” This is
false teaching pure and simple. It leads people
away from facing their true need, which is God’s
forgiveness. It implies that “self” is a valid
court of judgment, and that “self” can appeal to
“self” for forgiveness. What we really need to
know is the terms whereby God is willing to
forgive us. He is the judge—we are not. Warren is leading his readers astray. The last
point in the article is the worst of all,
“believe in yourself.” Here is how he concludes:
“It’s your choice. You can believe in what
others say about you or you can believe in
yourself as does God, who says that you are
truly acceptable, lovable, valuable, and
capable.”[ii]
Think of the horrible role reversal
Warren proposes.
The truth is that as sinners we already trust
“self” which is precisely why we need to repent
and come to God on His terms. Warren has God believing in the sinner and the
sinner forgiving “self” as if the self was the
ultimate judge. The truth is we need to believe
in God and find His forgiveness through the
blood of Christ.
What is confusing is that Rick Warren is not a universalist; he teaches that there is a literal
heaven and hell. What he says in Ladies Home
Journal is at odds with what he teaches
elsewhere. Warren believes that we must have a
relationship with God through turning to Christ
to be saved. But his Ladies Home Journal
readers, most of whom are not Christian, get the
impression that everything is fine as it is.
According to Warren, God believes in them, God accepts them,
and they just need to bolster their self-esteem
using Warren’s methods. If they
take what he writes seriously, they have no
reason to think they need the gospel.
Rick Warren, in my opinion, presents a
disjunction between what he confesses privately
to evangelical Christians, and what he confesses
publicly to a worldly audience. Since I
published an article critical of Warren a couple
of years ago, I have received correspondence
from several people who are upset with me. Some
have said that if I would go to
Saddleback
Church and see what
Warren really
believes, I would know that he is an orthodox
Christian. Let us accept for the sake of
discussion that this is true. We still have a
problem. The problem is that the people who hear
Rick Warren on secular news programs, who read
him in Ladies Home Journal, and who read his
most popular book get one message; those who are
“insiders” at Saddleback get another message.
This is unacceptable, let me show you why.
Paul Publicly Rebukes Peter
In Galatians 2, Paul recounts an incident where
he publicly corrected Peter:
But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to
his face, because he stood condemned. For prior
to the coming of certain men from James, he used
to eat with the Gentiles; but when they came, he
began to withdraw and hold himself aloof,
fearing the party of the circumcision. And the
rest of the Jews joined him in hypocrisy, with
the result that even Barnabas was carried away
by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that they
were not straightforward about the truth of the
gospel, I said to Cephas in the presence of all,
“If you, being a Jew, live like the Gentiles and
not like the Jews, how is it that you compel the
Gentiles to live like Jews”? (Galatians
2:11-14)
Paul publicly rebuked Peter for publicly denying
in action what Paul knew Peter privately
believed. Paul called Peter’s actions, “[being]
not straightforward about the truth of the
gospel.” Peter’s actions implied that
Gentile Christians were still “unclean” unless
they submitted to Jewish food laws. This is a
denial of what was decided at the Jerusalem council in Acts 15. They had
determined there to not require that the
Gentiles follow the Law of Moses.
The irony is that Peter himself was the
spokesman who convinced the church that this was
right:
And after there had been much debate, Peter
stood up and said to them, ‘Brethren, you know
that in the early days God made a choice among
you, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear
the word of the gospel and believe. And God, who
knows the heart, bore witness to them, giving
them the Holy Spirit, just as He also did to us;
and He made no distinction between us and them,
cleansing their hearts by faith. Now therefore
why do you put God to the test by placing upon
the neck of the disciples a yoke which neither
our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But
we believe that we are saved through the grace
of the Lord Jesus, in the same way as they also
are.’ (Acts 15:7-11)
Paul knew that he and Peter believed the same
thing; they had both agreed to the decision of
the council. There was no reason to go to Peter
privately to correct his belief. Paul
immediately dealt with the issue publicly, “in
the presence of all.” Peter’s public
practice negated his private confession. Being
“straightforward about the gospel” means that
what we preach and practice in public must be
the same as the beliefs we hold privately. The
New Testament calls any disjuncture between the
two, “hypocrisy.”
[i]
Rick Warren, Learn to Love Yourself,
Ladies Home Journal, March 2005, 36.
[ii]
All citations from Ibid. 36.
What an opportunity was missed to present the
gospel in a straightforward manner. Will some of
those readers never hear the true gospel?
How many millions have had
the truth of the gospel withheld and instead
been given the Purpose Driven Doctrine?
You should have the information you requested by
now . Apparently you rebuffed my offer of the
books.
S.S.
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