Comment By “Anodos” Is Indicative Of Sonship’s Dark Spirit
All false doctrine has its consequences. It’s difficult to write about what one encounters personally with those who propagate Sonship Theology and its offspring, Gospel Sanctification, but a recent comment by “Anodos” on the Tchividjian post is telling. He commented as follows:
“The Pharisees had their doctrine nailed down – they had studied scriptures and worked on it for hundreds of years. Jesus was crucified over a doctrinal issue. The Pharisees’ understanding of that doctrine was correct, but they did not know their God even when He stood face to face with them.
Why?
You have your orthodoxy all worked out, but your spirit is the same as the Pharisee. The next time you stand face to face with Christ, the tables will be turned. It will be He who says, “I do not know you, depart from me you worker of iniquity.”
Repent. Humble yourself and admit that you might not know all that you think you know. Come to Jesus and ask Him to reveal Himself to you. He will come to those who are spiritually impoverished, to those who are broken hearted and mourn.
Jesus is not a fact. He is a person. Eternal life is not knowing about Jesus, it is knowing Jesus. Your entrance into heaven will not be based on your works or your doctrine, but on whether Jesus knows you. This is a relationship, not a quiz.”
This statement is very, very Sonshippy, and characteristic of the mentality among Sonship’s Koolaid drinking faithful. First, we see the misrepresentation of the Pharisees as a device for promoting their false doctrine. Supposedly, the Pharisees were really, really good at keeping the law and had a laser focus on correct doctrine, but missed the whole point of salvation which has nothing to do with truth, and everything to do with knowing Christ as a “person.” Only problem is—that’s not true.
Anodos’ contention that the Pharisees had Jesus crucified over correct doctrine is a classic GS proposition, but doesn’t square with what Scripture states. Just imagine how intimidating this is to those who are under it; your best intentions in regard to following the truth could result in you being a Pharisee without realizing it. Moreover, since a relationship with Christ has nothing to do with the truth (“Jesus is not a fact. He is a person”), you wouldn’t dare go to the Scriptures and make your own assessment because that is truth-based / doctrine oriented. Therefore, you must be able ascertain what the Scriptures are teaching you about Jesus’ personhood for relationship purposes, and not knowledge. Since you wouldn’t normally try that at home—yep, you guessed it—better depend on those who are really, really good with the Redemptive-Historical Hermeneutic. Do you think that I am insinuating that GS doctrine (which is based on Jesus as a “person [a no-brainer]—not a cognitive concept that we apply to life.” [Paul Tripp]) relegates GS followers to a Pope-like dependence on their leaders for understanding the Scriptures? Absolutely.
The fact is: the Pharisees were the sultans of false doctrine and lawlessness. All of the trials leading up to Jesus’ execution were completely unlawful. Jesus made it clear that they changed the law and replaced it with their traditions. In fact, Jesus accused them of nullifying the law and making it “void” (Matthew 15:16). Since law (Scripture: see Matthew 5:18) determines doctrine, the Pharisees didn’t have correct doctrine. Obviously.
Hence, the idea heard constantly among the GS crowd: those who form their beliefs from biblical facts make the same mistake the Pharisees supposedly made. I have heard this from GS leaders firsthand. Only the gospel, as seen in the Scriptures, is “Spirit”; “facts” are the “letter” of the law –not the Spirit. Therefore, supposedly, the “letter kills, but the Spirit gives life,” and they cite 2Corinthians 3:6 accordingly. Can I emphasize enough how dangerous this teaching is?
Secondly, this is postmodern thought. The following are statements by John MacArthur Jr. in “Truth War” concerning the Emergent Church and Postmodern thought. See if you can detect the parallels between GS hermeneutics / Anodos’ comments, and what MacArthur writes as follows:
“Uncertainty is the new truth. Doubt and skepticism have been canonized as a form of humility” (page 16).
“Even some professing Christians nowadays argue along these lines: ‘If truth is personal, it cannot be propositional. If truth is embodied in the person of Christ [my emphasis], then the form of a proposition can’t possibly express authentic truth. That is why most of Scripture is told to us in narrative form-as a story-not as a set of propositions” (Page 14, emphasis added).
“Propositions force us to face facts and either affirm or deny them, and that kind of clarity simply does not play well in a postmodern culture” (Page 16).
Quoting John Armstrong, a proponent of the Emerging Church: “Theology must be a humble human attempt to ‘hear him’ – never about rational [again, my emphasis] approaches to text” (page 21).
Thirdly, Anodos displays a common propensity among GS advocates to proclaim dissenters as unregenerate. Notice that Anodos, like most GS advocates, base this on my exegetical view of Scripture. Anodos might note in the verse that he uses to condemn me that the word for “iniquity” is “anomia” which means “anti-law” (negative article “a” and “nomia” [law]). That sounds more like the GS crowd than me.
Lastly, Anodos’ comment is indicative of GS/Sonship’s inadequacy in presenting the gospel. “Come to Jesus and ask Him to reveal Himself to you,” is not how one gets saved. I was involved in a situation where I was asked to counsel an individual who was living in unspeakable sin. Later, we became disassociated with each other when he started counseling with a GS / Sonship “elder.” Some time later, I was informed that the counselee spent hours on his knees begging God to save him, and to no avail. Why? Apparently, the counselee had been taught by the GS counselor that before he could be saved, God had to show him his salvation as a “treasure chest of joy.”
Anodos, that’s why you and your GS cohorts are wicked false teachers. And frankly, I don’t care if your names are Anodos, John Piper, Tim Keller, David Powlison, Paul Tripp, Francis Chan, etc, etc, etc. I don’t care how well any of you speak, how well you dress, how many followers you have, or even how good you smell. Your vile doctrine is ruining people’s lives and I will contend against it until God gives me my last breath.
paul
The Bridgers of Confusion County and Another Short Narrative
What’s going on? Christians are becoming confused, if not frustrated. Starting with me. I finally gave in and read a John Piper book some years ago because he was, and still is, all the rave in Reformed circles. The perplexity started on page 16 of “The Pleasures of God” where he writes the following: “The worth and excellency of God’s soul is to be measured by the object of his love.” Huh? But, he loves us! Man is the measure of God’s soul?! “Certainly, I am missing something,” I thought, so I read additional books written by him. I found them nebulous, ambiguous, subjective, non-applicable to real life, grandeurus, nonsensical, to name but a few descriptors. Adding to my perplexity was the fact that John MacArthur Jr. wrote a glowing forward in one of his books.
Then Steve Camp wrote an adorable piece projecting all kinds of frustration and confusion over Piper inviting Paul David Tripp to one of his conferences. Paul Tripp behaved badly at the conference by bragging about having a “S” word contest with his children. Many also found Piper’s relationship with “Mark the cussing pastor” confusing as well. Remember the sixties song, “Buttercup”? It was about a girl that just builds you up to let you down. Could we make that work? “Johnny-cup, (Johnny-cup baby), you build me up (build me up) just to let me down (let me down), and worst of all (worst of all), we even (we even) wrote a book of essays about you (about you) Johnny-cup (Johnny-cup) baby….”
Anyway, Johnny-cup, or the first Pope of New Calvinism, further dismayed many by inviting Rick Warren to his 2010 Desiring God conference. But it gets even worse. I was recently invited to “chime in” on the recent controversy surrounding Michael Horton posing with Rick Warren in a photo op. I clicked on the link and did some snooping around. Apparently, a discernment blogger by the name of Ingrid Schlueter posted on the controversy and drew heavy fire as a result, probably along the lines of what I get for criticizing guys who know how to measure the excellency of God’s soul. How dare me. In the process, I learned a new term: “Bridger.” Apparently, it refers to someone who builds bridges between Reformed purity and others like Warren. MacArthur has a huge problem with Warren, but he loves Piper, who loves Warren, and…., uh, anyway, it would appear that Schlueter threw up her arms in disgust and canceled her discernment blog—not a good thing in our day because intestinal fortitude in regard to defending the truth is in short supply; we can make necessary adjustments later. Also, it would appear that her critics disingenuously presented her protest as her having a problem with Horton merely being photographed with Warren, but it was really much more than that. Furthermore, I perused one blog that seems to be one of her critics that also promotes Paul Washer—a GS hack. Is Ingrid another victim of the silent killer? So, here is part one of my contribution (“chime”): she needs to dust herself off and remember that those who defend the truth will always be in the minority. We don’t need fewer defenders right now.
Now about the photograph. Horton is posing with Warren who MacArthur says preaches a false gospel, but Horton and MacArthur like each other and have done at least one conference together, and Horton has also been critical of him in the past although he also admires him for many reasons (Warren, not MacArthur), and…. anyway, here is why the photo is such a big deal: Horton is not only in a frame with Warren, the photo projects—bosom buddy; long lost friend; top dawg; thinkin’ of makin’ him leader of my posse (Horton, not Warren); etc. And get this, because it’s just too rich: even though Horton has accused Warren of being an Arminian in the past, there in the picture between them, is a bust of John Calvin! Ingrid, Ingrid, Ingrid; c’mon girl, you gotta learn to laugh about it sometimes. God allows satire.
This brings me to the second tone of my chime. What’s really going on here? Answer: first gospel wave, postmodernism, second gospel wave, or Gospel Sanctification / Sonship theology. In all of the aforementioned events that I cite, folks are just spearing the symptoms. As far back as 1992, I remember a young pastor saying, “My generation is comfortable with contradictions”(if something’s good, it’s “bad” etc.). Right, that’s postmodernism. John MacArthur, who associates with those who hold to postmodern-like thinking, wrote an excellent expose on postmodernism in “The Truth War.” I recommend the book, not his friends. Confused?
Starting in the fifties, a member of the largest denomination in the world, Billy Graham, started the first gospel wave. Basically, all that mattered/matters is getting people saved. Even as a young Southern Baptist, just beginning to learn God’s word in 1983, I perceived the constant preaching of the gospel at church as antithetical to the Scriptures. A plenary gospel concern clearly replaced discipleship. This led to an all but total inability on the part of Christians to take the word of God and help people with real-life problems—which led to pastors (at least in SB circles) to farm-out counseling to schools of thought conceived by those who admitted that they hated God. When Dave Hunt shook Christianity with “The Seduction of Christianity,” decrying the integration of Psychology and Christian truth, it addressed a symptom and offered no solution, except “stop it.”
The solution came via Dr. Jay E. Adams’ biblical counseling model. I think the fact that Jay Adams is known as “the father of biblical counseling,” and his ministry started with the book “Competent to Counsel” (1972?) should make my point here: 1972 is a long way from Pentecost which demands some sort of explanation as to why anybody would be called such a thing. An experience I had recently might help to answer that question. I was at a pastor’s conference about eight months ago and witnessed the following firsthand: pastors bragging that they “didn’t allow counseling to distract them from ‘the gahhhhsssfull’” The gospel? I was an elder in a church where twelve people were saved in one year through its counseling program that was based on the biblical model propagated by Adams. When you show people that God knows what He’s talking about, they will also tend to look to Him for salvation as well. Personally, the model had radically changed my own life prior to that.
Nevertheless, this first gospel wave primed the church to fill the void (caused by a limited repertoire of spiritual weapons) with not only psychology, but postmodernism, which rejects propositional truth. The “Christian” form of postmodernism holds to something like this:
“Even some professing Christians nowadays argue along these lines: ‘If truth is personal, it cannot be propositional. If truth is embodied in the person of Christ [my emphasis], then the form of a proposition can’t possibly express authentic truth. That is why most of Scripture is told to us in narrative form-as a story-not as a set of propositions” (Page 14, “The Truth War” J. MacArthur, emphasis added).
The combination of the first wave and postmodern thought also primed the church for the second gospel wave, Gospel Sanctifcation / Sonship theology. The fist wave emphasized the gospel, or salvation, to the exclusion of sanctification. The second wave said: “Hey, not only is sanctification not important, it’s the same thing as justification” (gospel salvation). Hence, “We must preach the gospel to ourselves everyday” (Jack Miller / Jerry Bridges), and “The same gospel that saved you, also sanctifies you.” The second wave also borrowed the Christian Postmodern[ism] hermeneutic to make this approach plausable: “The Bible is about the person of Jesus Christ, it is His story, not a cognitive concept that we apply to life.” “The word of God is a person.” The GS/Sonship hermeneutic serves the same purpose as Christian Postmodernism; it’s used to put ourselves into the “gospel narrative,” ie., the Bible. In fact, Michael Horton’s teachings are often flavored with this idea of “entering the gospel drama.” Once the prism from which we interpret the Bible is narrowed to the single theme of the gospel, from there, anything goes. Open your Bible and randomly put your finger anywhere; unless it happens to be a passage that is gospel specific, and if a gospel message must be forced upon that passage, twenty different people will yield twenty different interpretations of that text. But that’s ok, because all twenty interpretations are about the gospel! Follow? You can’t go wrong if your take is “gospel centered.” Final equation: objective ideas that can be drawn from the text are OUT—the “objective” gospel that yields subjective truth about the “personhood of Christ” as opposed to what he objectively commands are IN.
Therefore, regardless of the radical results yielded by the Adams model, his objective approach drew much intense fire from a church already deeply entrenched in schools of thought hostile to propositional truth and imperative-driven behavior. I firmly believe that this simple, contemporary historical perspective forms much of the confused landscape we see today. For sure, doctrine is secondary to Gospel Sanctification. That’s why Charismatics like CJ Mahaney, a GS proponent, are welcomed into the New Calvinist camp with open arms, with many scratching their heads regarding the new label: “Reformed Charsimatic.” As far as the rest mugging together in photo ops and conferences—particular truth held by others is just simply not that important—other things are, while the confused laity are still primarily looking for leaders to stand on particular truth and shun those who don’t.
But if the laity is waiting, they better not hold their breath while doing so. And really, is a whole bunch of this really about selling books? New ideas sell books. I am reading “The Story of the Church” by Charles M. Jacobs—an oldie, but goodie. He talks about how the first century church rejected academia all together, as Jesus did to a great degree. It’s obvious that the elite, religious academians controlled the information when Jesus came onto the scene—this is a constant theme throughout the New Testament. According to Jacobs, until the second century, the educated elite were barred from eldership. Sometimes, I wonder if the laity in this country will ever tire of being led around by the nose via the who’s who of the evangelical world. But at the very least, leaders should be held to biblical standards and boycotted when they don’t measure up. As Jesus said, “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees.”
And p.s.—Ingrid, pray about putting you blog back up.
paul
Ice Skates in Hell and MacArthur’s White Witches
Has there ever been a bigger fan of John MacArthur Jr. than myself?
….I doubt it, but I guess we all have our Achilles heel, and with MacArthur it has been a serious lack of discernment over the years. Seems unbelievable when you consider his gargantuan contribution to Christianity. That’s why I didn’t believe what I heard in 1986 when I discovered, after just finishing “Inside Out” by Dr. Larry Crabb, that disciples of Crabb were running MacArthur’s counseling program at Grace Community Church. Crabb’s utter disdain for a literal approach to the Scriptures was evident in IO, comparing Scripture reading to a form of escapism “[like] masturbation” (p. 74: but Crabb also wrote statements concerning the inability of God’s word to effect “real change” on pages, 14, 15, 24 twice, 34, 37, 41, 43, 45 twice, 48, 89, 103, 120, 153, 157, 160, 177, 193, and 195). A former close friend of mine who was well acquainted with Mac told me sometime in 1988 that Mac had informed him that Grace Community Church had been “de-Crabbed.” I thought, “Ah, that explains it. GCC is a big church and he was probably busy writing a book or something; but boy, when he found out, those guy’s were outta there!” Not exactly; in fact, MacArthur and his staff had been repeatedly warned about Crabb’s theology, but apparently esteemed the protestants as less credible than Baalam’s donkey.
That brings me to the post someone sent me yesterday comparing Mac to the standard for solid evangelicalism. Ironically, the post was a contention concerning John Piper, a well documented close friend of Mac:
“Do you think there’s any chance whatsoever that the aforementioned Dr. John MacArthur would ever find himself listed there; [among heretics quoted favorably by Piper and endorsed by him] well, maybe about the time ice skates become standard issue in Hell.”
http://apprising.org/2010/06/16/questions-concerning-dr-john-piper/
Well my friend, then that would be the case. Despite outrageous, grossly unorthodox statements made by Piper and documented by men like Craig W. Booth ( http://thefaithfulword.org/wakeupcall.html ), MacArthur goes out of his way to grant Piper creditability at every turn. Unbelievably, Mac wrote the glowing forward to Piper’s theological Alice in Wonderland, “Desiring God,” and quotes Piper at least twice in his latest book, “Slave.” MacArthur also quotes Douglas Moo on page 142 who is one of the fathers of New Covenant Theology. A group of Master’s Seminary professors did a “Hey, NCT is kinda wrong but its propagators are really nice guys” series in, um, “contention” against NCT. Mac also quotes (in “Slave”) gospel sanctification guru Wayne Grudem.
Also, apparently skate-bent on getting a heretic for a keynote speaker at the 2007 Shepard’s conference, MacArthur invited CJ Mahaney, a (are you ready for this?) “Reformed Charismatic” to speak in Piper’s place. Also apparent is that CJ must not be like those wicked Charismatics Mac wrote about in “Charismatic Chaos,” but must be one of the good Charismatics running about. It reminds me of a blind date my step-son Ben had. Upon arrival, she introduced herself as a witch, but told him not to worry for she was a “white witch” (the good ones), not a “black witch”(the bad ones). Ben, not even a graduate of Master’s, didn’t buy it and soon left after some cordial conversation.
Also treading ice to replace the Crabb fiasco is the recently installed “Resolve” conferences which are part of the ministry repertoire at GCC. Here is what Dr. Peter Masters thinks of it:
“ Resolved is the brainchild of a member of Dr John MacArthur’s pastoral staff, [Rick Holland] gathering thousands of young people annually, and featuring the usual mix of Calvinism and extreme charismatic-style worship….[regarding a fixture / speaker at Resolved conferences (every year thus far),CJ Mahaney]….Charismatic in belief and practice, he appears to be wholly accepted by the other big names who feature at the ‘new Calvinist’ conferences, such as John Piper, John MacArthur, Mark Dever, and Al Mohler. Evidently an extremely personable, friendly man, C J Mahaney is the founder of a group of churches blending Calvinism with charismatic ideas, and is reputed to have influenced many Calvinists to throw aside cessationist views.”
Masters also commented on “Together for the Gospel” (T4G) which MacArthur also indorses:
“A final sad spectacle reported with enthusiasm in the book [Masters used information from Young, Restless, Reformed, by Collin Hansen] is the Together for the Gospel conference, running from 2006. A more adult affair convened by respected Calvinists, this nevertheless brings together cessationists and non-cessationists, traditional and contemporary worship exponents, and while maintaining sound preaching, it conditions all who attend to relax on these controversial matters, and learn to accept every point of view. In other words, the ministry of warning is killed off, so that every -error of the new scene may race ahead unchecked. These are tragic days for authentic spiritual faithfulness, worship and piety.”
Masters also comments on a prevalent mentality within the movement:
“The author of the book is a young man (around 26 when he wrote it) who grew up in a Christian family and trained in secular journalism. We are indebted to him for the readable and wide-reaching survey he gives of this new phenomenon, [neo-Calvinism] but the scene is certainly not a happy one…. Collin Hansen contends that American Calvinism collapsed at the end of the nineteenth century and was maintained by only a handful of people until this great youth revival, but his historical scenario is, frankly, preposterous. “
And Masters, in part, concludes with this: “The new Calvinism is not a resurgence but an entirely novel formula which strips the doctrine of its historic practice, and unites it with the world.”
MacArthur’s list of white witches is getting longer every year, and it seems to be effecting his theology as well. Mac has always taught with a superb balance of the vertical and horizontal, but in recent years, his teachings have become overly vertical, following in the way of John Piper who’s teachings offer little, or no practical application of the Scriptures. It’s all about “beholding as a way of becoming.” Notice in his book, “Slave” that he masterfully articulates what it is to be a slave to Christ, (what it looks like) but includes very little biblical information on how to apply that reality to our lives. However, admittedly, it could be my own incorrect interpretation because I no longer trust Mac because of his associations. There is just too much creepiness in all of this, like the syrupy interview conducted by antinomian / mystic Justin Taylor who interviewed Mac and Piper regarding how they became friends. It was a shameless, “see—Piper is orthodox” infomercial conducted by an individual (Taylor) who had a book of essays written and published to praise Piper. Of course, a team of wild horses could not have pulled Mac away from contributing to the book.
So, does Mac think his legacy is safe? Yes, maybe he has accomplished so much that he can now let his guard down. But what about Jimmy Swaggart? Unfair Comparison? I don’t know; compromise with a harlot, or compromising the truth from a lofty position given by the Lord, which is worse? Hmmmm. Oh, hold on, my phone is ringing: “Hi Ben! Your kidding? No, he is happily married. Ok, I’ll hold…. Uh, ok, hmmm, gee, I don’t know, I will try to find out. Ok, bye.”
It was Ben. The white witch called him. She wants to know if Rick Holland is married.
paul
Betrayed: Notable Evangelicals are Indifferent to the Laity’s Love for the Truth
It was 1983 and I was basking in the joy of my new-found faith in Jesus Christ. Wide-eyed, zealous, and naive. My thirst to learn truth was insatiable, but in my quest, I could have never imagined what I would endure. I went to seminary in less than one year from the time I was saved, and as one pastor told me, “’Seminary’ can end-up being ‘cemetery.’” True, but I survived it. However, the biggest roadblock was the Charismatic movement which was experiencing huge growth during that same year. In my zeal I thought, “Wow, if there is a deeper way to experience God, I certainly don’t want to miss it!” So, can I now tell you about the knowledgeable Berean / brother who took me aside and taught me the real role of the Holy Spirit in the New Covenant, and thereby reducing this challenge to a mere bump in the road? Not.
Their arguments seemed impressive and the isolated verses they used seemed to be pretty clear, and I have never been one to disregard an argument out-of-hand because it bears a different label. I researched, visited Charismatic churches, and read several books. By the time I drove an unequivocal stake three years later, I was not amused to find the doctrine wanting. Besides, we had lost several members to Robert Tilton’s 8,000 member “Word of Faith Family Church,” and at least one young couple who left our church lost everything they owned as a result of giving it all to Tilton’s ministry. When they appealed to Word of Faith for help, they were turned away. Eventually, “Primetime Live” did an expose on Tilton when a homeless shelter noticed an unusually high percentage of their recipients were former members at Word of Faith.
Then it happened. During an evening service at Word of Faith, two well known evangelicals arrived and spoke to the congregation about unity and gave the church their blessings. The two men were my contemporary heroes in the faith, WA Criswell (longtime pastor of First Baptist Church of Dallas) and Bill Webber (former pastor of mega-church Prestonwood Baptist). I was devastated. How could this be? But there was still hope. I was a student at WA Criswell for Biblical Studies. Surely, I would arrive at school Monday morning and the outcry would be heard as I drove into the parking lot! Not.
I found myself thinking, “What does this all mean?” And, “Is God’s truth really that important?” “If the particulars of the faith aren’t that important, why did God write the whole Bible?” By the grace of God I got past it. I guess that’s one good thing about it all; if I was looking for an excuse not to persevere, there it was.
Apart from that, the beat goes on. Notable evangelicals continue to build years of trust among the laity, seemingly, if you didn’t know better, for the purpose of a grand disillusionment. However, with each one that contradicts their own supposed convictions they sold you in book form, the pain gives way to the sweetness of knowing that Christ will never let us down in that way. Still, it’s annoying, but I think I have been completely cured of taking this phenomenon too hard with the latest evangelical rock star to follow suit, John MacArthur Jr. First, he writes a book entitled “Charismatic Chaos,” then he invites CJ Mahaney to speak at a Shepard’s Conference at Grace Community Church. One blogger who couldn’t make it to the conference commented as follows: “To see Mahaney and the author of the book Charismatic Chaos sharing the same stage would have been interesting.” Interesting? What about, “sickening.” Moreover, this occurred in the same year that “The Truth War” was published, a book also written by MacArthur. In that book, he mercilessly berates postmodernism, but Mahaney was a stand-in for John Piper at the same conference who holds to beliefs eerily similar to postmodernism, and is a quintessential Christian mystic.
I wonder if many Christians are starting to think like I am. Enough already concerning the who’s who of evangelicalism, it’s becoming a sideshow anyway. All they do is write books, speak at conferences, and create a bunch of confusion. Certainly, they have lost touch with how doctrine effects real life in the trenches. This is difficult to comprehend because, in just this one example, the human misery caused by Charismatic Theology over the past forty years is well documented. Don’t they care? Apparently not. Doesn’t the finer points of God’s truth matter to them? Apparently not.
paul
If Space Aliens Visited Westminster Seminary
I don’t know what’s wrong with me this morning. I sang to PJ and Phillip while taking them to school this morning: “Let the sunshine in, face it with a grin, frowner’s never win…….” Too much coffee or something. Then I guess I made the mistake of checking my FB wall before getting to work. One of my friends posted an item concerning an apparent, or possible paranormal event concerning the pale horse of the apocalypse. At first, my comment was serious:
“ Interesting. It could be paranormal – that does happen. But for Christians the question is always, “So what?” Or, Objective verses subjective. Like when lightning struck the giant image of Jesus here in Ohio: objective; God doesn’t like idols so He struck it with lightning. This [note] is more in the realm of subjective. Subjective paranormal events are sometimes a judgment because they are often a form of idol worship. People like idols because they can draw any truth they want from them; like the giant Jesus here in Ohio – it meant many different things to many different people. Likewise, people can draw all kinds of different “conclusions” from subjective paranormal activity. The apostle Paul said that in the end times God will send “delusions” as a judgment and Christ said they will be so deceptive that they could potentially deceive the elect “if that were possible.” I believe that as the time draws near we will see strong delusions, and Katie bar the door, if the likes of John Piper can fool people, one can only imagine the wholesale plunge into deeper error.”
Then something happened. You see, I have been in a cage while writing the second edition of “Another Gospel” because I made Susan the chief editor of the book. Her credentials for such a task are over the top, and it has been brutal: no sarcasm, no unprofessional statements, no unnecessary statements that don’t contribute to the main point, etc., etc., etc., and etc. Do you know what I mean? Do you hear me knocking? “No, this won’t work,” she says, “the blog is informal [my translation: fun!], this is serious business.” So, I made a second comment to the note on FB that was in jest – something about an end-time delusion concerning space aliens visiting Southern Theological Seminary and presenting a false gospel. Then I thought, “Hey, that would make a good post!”
But then I thought (Susan never lets me start a sentence with “but”), “It wouldn’t be fair to use Southern since they are primarily influenced by Westminster these days, so I will use Westminster for the imaginary scenario instead. So, imagine with me, the spaceship lands on the front lawn of Westminster Seminary, the aliens emerge, and say, “Take us to your leader.” Undoubtedly, since this would be a counseling situation, and even a possible alien abduction (I could only wish), they would summon profs from CCEF, the counseling wing of Westminster. After listening to the new gospel presented by the aliens, one can only assume they would respond this way:
“No, no, we have a much better gospel than that. We believe in change at the ‘heart level.’ You see, we don’t need to evolve, the church has always had the truth, but then it forgot a bunch of stuff. We realized the church did so when we observed people who hate us developing theories of change based on an ‘inside life.’ Unfortunately, first generation versions of ourselves deny this ‘inside life’ because they are obsessed with what can be known objectively. It is important to overcome that because even though we have recovered truth forgotten by the church, ‘it’s different because it’s always in a different socio-cultural-historical movement, and different forces are at work’ ( see David Powlison interview with 9 Marks Blog). However, this shouldn’t bother our first generation friends because the Bible is not a book of objective truth anyway, it’s a gospel narrative.
Now, on Earth we have flowers called the daisy, and if you just cut down a daisy, it will grow back again because what you need to do is get to the roots and dig them up. Likewise, idols in the heart must be found and destroyed by deep repentance. When we do that, change is just a ‘mere natural flow’ via new obedience. Now, idols in our heart take our desires captive, so we locate the idols by asking ourselves x-ray questions, which will identify desires that have been disoriented / misplaced by the idols. This is very important because like Sigmund Freud, we believe ‘Everything we do is shaped and controlled by what our hearts desire’ (How People Change, p.17). Furthermore, we like to quote a great teacher of the past who said: ‘The heart is an idol factory.’ So, as our nasty hearts continue to create these idols, we must eradicate them by deep repentance.”
At this point, the aliens have a question: “So, your gospel is a gospel that teaches a constant cycle of new idols being created in the heart and the cutting down thereof ?” Answer: “Precisely! Because when we sin, it keeps us humble and prevents self righteousness. But when we obey, it’s not really us obeying; when the idol is eradicated, the void is filled by Christ and he obeys for us. So really, it’s a constant cycle of humbleness and rejoicing in what Jesus is doing, not anything we do. This is much better than the first generation of putting off the old self and putting on the full righteousness of Christ granted to us at salvation.”
Aliens: “But isn’t that what Ephesians 4:20-24 says to do? And isn’t it more objective than idol hunting?” Answer: “That’s first generation thinking. We thought you guys are supposed to be more highly evolved than us. The Bible is a gospel narrative, and ‘Christ is a person, not a cognitive concept we insert into a new formula for life’ (How People Change, p.27). The Bible is a big picture model / story of every believers life, and we are invited to enter into the plot ( How People Change p.94).”
Aliens: “Your concept: the Bible is personal truth embodied in a person [Christ] and expressed in a narrative; therefore, it cannot be applicable truth; isn’t that postmodernism? Another one of your earthly leaders says it is (John MacArthur, Truth War pages 12-14).” Answer: “Guilt by association! Are you guys really blogwatchers posing as aliens?!”
To conclude my narrative, one of the aliens keys his communicator and says the following: “Ground to command, beam us up, there’s no intelligent life down here.”
And once again, CCEF’s research and development team has saved planet Earth!
The end.
(Don’t tell Susan I wrote this).
paul
Paul's Passing Thoughts 
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