Why I Don’t Accept Rick Warren As An Orthodox, Biblically-Sound, Legitimate Christian Preacher
Trackposted to Blog @ MoreWhat.com, Mark My Words, Take Our Country Back, Rosemary’s Thoughts, third world county, DragonLady’s World, Shadowscope, The Pink Flamingo, Cao’s Blog, MacBros’ Place, Wolf Pangloss, CORSARI D’ITALIA, Democrat=Socialist, and Right Voices. Also, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.
October 1st, 2008 at 4:21 pm
Well, yes and no. Warren’s “Just show up” is screwy, but the “entry point” he mentions is accurate, as far as it goes. Yes, Jesus did indeed tell some disciples of John, “Come and see,”
So, Warren’s initial takeoff isn’t bad. Indeed, Jesus Himself both modeled and (didactically) taught a “show and tell” gospel–and commanded us to do the same (check the Greek and a couple of decent translations of Matt 28:19-20, for example).
But.
Where Warren and others screw up is in attempting to make the Gospel relevant to people’s felt needs.
*feh*
Still, even a blind pig finds the ocassional acorn, and Warren isn’t entirely off base in all his remarks. The rroubling thing is that he doesn’t seem to be able to distinguish between bright, shiny distractions and eternal truths. What we’d be better to aim for is praying for him to meet a blinding light on his own Damascus road… *heh*
(BTW, for an interesting take on the mega-church with little or no connection to a biblical foundation, see the wry treatment at Evangellyfish. It’s in “blogological order” so page on down to the bottom for chapter 1. (So far, Doug Wilson’s gotten 12 chapters out–trying to keep his schedule at one a week. It’s not modeled after any particular mega-church, but it does touch a number of sore points many of them have rubbed raw over the years. I find it’s easier to just subscribe to the newsfeed so I always have the next chapter up front. You might also want to check Doug’s blog and Credenda Agenda. You’ll likely find some things to argue with, but they’ll be worth your time, IMO. You can find the links on my right sidebar–one under Credenda Agenda and the other under Blog and Mablog.)
October 1st, 2008 at 8:08 pm
David, the audio/video presentation and refutation from Todd Friel isn’t the sole reason why I do not accept Warren as a legitimate Christian preacher but it does illustrates many problems fairly well. There are more.
October 2nd, 2008 at 4:43 pm
“…illustrates many problems fairly well. There are more.”
Yes, there are. And I very much agree with your general statement that he doesn’t qualify as a “legitimate Christian preacher”. Just wanted to point out the first point objected to in the video was not entirely legit, either. We need to watch ourselves when critiquing preachers that we don’t err, either (we will, of course, cos we’re not yet perfect either, but some of the ilk of Warren–who’s at least not quite as bad as Joel Osteen, though that’s damning with faint praise indeed!–make it hard to come up with anything to say in their defense, eh? *heh*
October 2nd, 2008 at 5:59 pm
Point taken, David.