The seduction of Christianity - Part 1: The rise of the emerging church May 18, 2009 - by Fred Hutchison, RenewAmerica analyst
Part 1 of this essay deals with the rise of the "emerging church," which is postmodern and heretical. As such, it is a double threat to doctrinally orthodox Christianity.
Part 2, which is coming soon, will describe the watering down of evangelicalism at the mega-churches in a way that has made many of their people worldly, soft, and vulnerable to the seductions of the emerging church. Parts 1 and 2 were originally written as one essay, because the rise of the emerging church cannot be correctly understood apart from the contemporary changes in evangelicalism.
Paving the way for the apostate church - In a period of 30 years (1960�1990) evangelicalism replaced the Protestant mainline denominations as the dominant spiritual force in America. The rapid decline of the mainline denominations and the rapid rise of evangelicalism was a net gain for the spiritual wellbeing of America, because evangelicalism was doctrinally orthodox and the mainline denominations were becoming increasingly modernist. Modernist churches are morally and spiritually worthless.
Just as modernism took over the mainline Protestant churches, postmodernism is now taking over evangelicalism. The evangelical Jonah might be swallowed up by the postmodern whale � that is, swallowed up by the "emerging church." All the gains of biblical doctrine from 1960 to 1990 might be lost.
For this reason, I do not think the apostate church of the end times will be liberal-modernist or backsliding evangelical. I now suspect that the great apostate church warned about in biblical prophecy will be a postmodern institution that grows from what we now know as the emerging church.
The Bible tells us that the apostate church will persecute the true believers in Christ. The emerging church accepts people of almost any religion or heresy, but rejects those who adhere strictly to the Bible and to doctrinal orthodoxy. In a few decades, the emerging church leviathan might persecute the shrunken remnants of doctrinally orthodox evangelicalism.
Seeker-sensitive church vs. emerging church
Friends sometimes ask me, "What is the difference between the 'seeker-sensitive movement' of evangelical mega-churches and 'The Emerging Church,' a.k.a. The 'Emergent' Church?"
I used to think that the emerging church was an extreme version of the seeker-sensitive movement. I now realize that "seeker-sensitive" and "emergent" are very different and that the inability to tell the difference between them is extremely dangerous.
Christians in seeker-sensitive churches have no defenses against the seductions of the emerging church. They are often tempted to read emerging church books. Some of these naive folks are being sucked into the emerging church and are therefore are at risk of becoming apostates and heretics. (More about this in part 2.)
The siren song of the emerging church is particularly strong for those in Generation X or Generation Y who have grown up in a postmodern world. Very strong winds of postmodern deception are blowing at the present time. The deception is spiritual, moral, political, and economic.
If the teachings of the emerging church were known up front, many Christians would run the other way, instead of being slowly seduced. This essay will provide a profile of the nature and teachings of the emerging church.
Local mushrooms - Every local emerging church community is unique. They grow from the grassroots like mushrooms in eccentric, highly individual ways. This means that there can be considerable variety and diversity from one emergent community to another. Some of the mushrooms will give you a belly ache. Some will kill you.
An emergent community at a college campus is bound to be far more radical in its postmodernism than an emergent community in a small town in Iowa.
For these reasons, the general statements I make in this essay about the emerging church refer to a range of behavior. In some cases, one may find only a tendency towards the traits that I describe. In other cases, the behavior and ideas might be far more extreme than what I describe.
The emerging churches lack internal brakes and boundaries. Therefore, they can fly from one extreme to another, and can mutate and metastasize quickly.
Defenseless marshmallows - In spite of the dramatic difference between seeker-sensitive churches and emerging churches, it can sometimes be extraordinarily difficult to tell the difference. In part 2, I will describe the mega-churches that have one foot in the seeker-sensitive movement and one foot in the emerging church.
This is worst of all possible worlds. Seeker-sensitive ministries turn people into defenseless marshmallows. The seduction of great numbers of marshmallow people by the emergent predators can easily take place among the teeming throngs of the mega-churches. This is why the swallowing up of the evangelical Jonah by the postmodern whale can happen within a short period of time.
Two ways to spiritual shipwreck - Those who are spiritually shipwrecked by the seeker-sensitive movement are like those who become obese from eating too much cotton candy. They get too fat to keep watch while steering their "ship," and they founder upon the rocks and shoals.
In contrast, those in the emerging church are like those who are bitten by a poisonous serpent, go blind from the poison, and founder on the rocks.
Postmodernism with a Christian wrapper -A friend said that the emerging church sounds to her like the liberal churches. My response was: "Liberal churches represent modernism with a Christian wrapper. Emerging churches represent postmodernism with a Christian wrapper."
Emerging churches are eager to proclaim that they practice "Christianity for a postmodern age." They are hostile to traditional evangelicalism, which they suppose to be the Christianity of modernism.
In this perception, they greatly err. Churches of liberal theology are modernist. Doctrinally orthodox evangelicals have been at war with modernism for at least a century and a half and have consistently disapproved of liberal modernist churches.
Furthermore, the emerging church is not the Christianity of postmodernism, because it is not Christian and it is not a church. It is a cult and is loaded with heresies. That is why I metaphorically called it a "poisonous serpent."
You don't have to be a Christian to join an emerging church. They are glad to fellowship with Muslims, Buddhists, Zoroastrians, New Agers, pagans, gays, witches, idol worshipers, nature worshipers, sex worshipers, and atheists. However, no doctrinally orthodox evangelicals need apply � unless they keep their mouth shut about biblical authority, and about truth and the moral laws.
Abomination - Leonard Sweet, a founding father of the emerging church, was deeply influenced by Matthew Fox's book The Cosmic Christ. This is Fox's "gospel":"Mother earth" is being "crucified."
The human psyche is being "resurrected" through mystical spirituality.
The "cosmic christ" is healing "mother earth."
The "messianic spirit" has come to transform mankind.
All religions will become one, as their common roots in the "cosmic christ" are revealed.
There will a one-world government, a utopia, and a sexual paradise on earth.
This blasphemous "gospel" panders to left-wing political agendas, but has nothing to say about the salvation of souls. Emergents are generally indifferent to the eternal salvation of individuals, but are deeply concerned about the redemption of society through the creation of postmodern communities, through Marxist class-warfare politics, and through a "one-world" utopia.
Emergent evangelism, missions, and worship - The "cosmic christ" is now an obsolete term. Some emergents might never have heard of the "cosmic christ." However, several elements of Matthew Fox's "cosmic christ" keep recurring in emergent literature, mainly through books written by the leaders of the movement.
In evangelism and missions, emergents do not tell people to change their religious affiliations or their doctrines. They tell them to adopt a "christ"-oriented "spirituality" through contemplation, meditation, and other spiritual exercises. They tell Muslims to remain Muslims in doctrine and practice, but to meditate on "christ." They make no effort to explain who Christ is according to the Bible. These false "missionaries" and "evangelists" say nothing about how Muslim doctrine might contradict who Jesus Christ is, what he did for our salvation, and what his teachings are. They say nothing about issues of good and evil, or right and wrong.
Emergent "evangelism" to Buddhists and Hindus is just the same. Stay as you are, but meditate on "christ." How about a goddess worshiper, a nature worshiper, an idol worshiper, or a sex worshiper? How about a witch, warlock, or satanist? It is just the same. Stay as you are, but just meditate on "christ," whatever that word may mean to you.
The typical form of "evangelism" practiced by American emergents is to invite the unbeliever to "worship." The unbeliever joins the worship of a "christ" that he does not know and that the emergents have not explained to him. The object is to draw the unbeliever into the emotional and sensory experience of worship, which hopefully will induce him to join the "emergent community." After joining, the new person will hopefully absorb vague impressions about the "christ" by osmosis.
Emerging churches do not teach doctrine, so there is no agreement among them about what they are worshiping when they worship "christ." Many of them reject the virgin birth, the incarnation, the deity of Christ, and the atonement of Christ through his work on the cross. Many of them do not believe in the resurrection of Christ and his ascension into glory. No two emergents seem to agree about what the Trinity is.
Emergents claim to have "christ-centered worship," but nothing could be further from the truth. When everyone invents their own "christ," people worship a shifting phantom. Some might worship the vile images of spiritual pornography.
We can only know Christ personally through the new birth. We can only understand who he is through the Bible, the creeds, the confessions, the systematic theology of orthodoxy, and good teaching. Once upon a time long ago, all the doctrines pertaining to Christ, his nature, and his works, were explained from the pulpit of evangelical churches. "Christ-centered worship" is the worship of the real Christ by those who know him through the new birth and who have a correct understanding about who he is.
Emergents who like metaphysics favor Ken Wilbur's far-fetched theory of how everything is gradually becoming one through mystical forces of "wholeness." One aspect of Wilbur's model is his thesis of a progressive historical increase in the "level of consciousness" and the increasing depth of spirituality throughout the world. However, a better case can be made that contemporary spirituality is shallow compared to ancient spirituality. Wilbur's theory flies in the face of the chronic spiritual shallowness of the New Age movement, over which he has had an influence. Rob Bell, an emergent leader and founding pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church, recommends Wilbur in his emergent book A Velvet Elvis.
Those who have a taste for legendary yarns, mysteries, and action thrillers might favor Dan Brown, the author of The da Vinci Code. Brown claims that Gnosticism was an ancient universal religion that preceded all other religions � and that the early church was gnostic. These assertions roll three lies into one.
1) Gnosticism was a religion for a small initiated elite and therefore could not have been a universal religion for the masses of people.
2) Manuscripts of a mature Gnosticism did not appear until the second century, long after all the books of the New Testament were written. Therefore, Gnosticism could not have preceded Christianity, Judaism, Zoroastrianism, or a half-dozen eastern religions.
3) Gnosticism was a second-century heresy against a well-established, doctrinally orthodox Christianity. Mr. Brown wants us to believe the exact opposite � that the doctrinal orthodoxy of the Nicene Creed (4th century) is a heretical revision of an original Gnostic Christianity. Preposterous. Only in a postmodern age that is ignorant of history and that reinvents its own history could such humbug pass the laugh test.
Emergents longing for utopia sometimes hate the Bible because it contradicts their hopeful historical myths and their one-world ecumenical hopes. The Bible describes a lost, fallen, and divided world filled with false "christs" and false religions that are leading the multitudes to destruction. The Bible proclaims that not only is the world not evolving towards a utopia, there will be spiritual apostasy, tribulation, and apocalypse at the end of the age.
Before we complete our consideration of the "cosmic christ" and emergent ecumenicism, let us take a quick look at the dangers from the occult.
Things that go bump in the night - What is to stop an emergent in worship or spiritual meditation from tapping into a false Christ? Nothing. What is to stop him from communing with a demon and thinking the demon is the spirit of Christ? Nothing.
The unchurched and the person of another religion are unlikely to have accurate knowledge of the real Christ. He does not have the Holy Spirit of Truth dwelling in him to keep him from danger, as a born-again Christian does. Therefore, there is a risk that emergent evangelism will destroy its converts by escorting them unprotected into a labyrinth of occult darkness.
Worship equals feelings - Emergents make the experience of worship central to their service. I agree that worship should have a more central place in Protestantism, but I disagree that the experience of worship should be central.
The emergents have emphasized the sensory aspect of worship with cantles, incense, beautiful colors, stained glass, beautiful music, etc. This sensory experience is enhanced by the drama and symbols of the liturgy. These are good things in themselves. I agree that emergent "worship" is aesthetically superior to the ugly and banal "seeker-sensitive" worship. However, the seeker-sensitives are worshiping God. The emergents are not.
The pursuit of aesthetic and sensory experience need not have anything to do with worshiping God. When I go to an art museum and a symphony orchestra, and round out the day with a meal at a gourmet restaurant, I have enjoyed aesthetic and sensory experience. But it has little to do with worship.
PART 2, The seduction of Christianity - Part 1: The rise of the emerging church May 18, 2009 - by Fred Hutchison, RenewAmerica analyst
Emergents and left-wing politics - According to Matthew Fox, Jesus of Nazareth was not "The Christ," but a man who possessed the "cosmic christ." He tells us that Buddha, Confucius, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King had the "cosmic christ." Oprah Winfrey thinks that Barack Obama is "the one" � i.e., he has the "cosmic christ." The "cosmic christs" of the 21st century are all destined to be left of center politically, because most emergents are politically left-wing.
All men everywhere have a little of the "cosmic christ," or so we are told. Through spiritual exercises and mystical spirituality, anyone can obtain "christ consciousness" and tap into this deep current of spirituality that supposedly underlies all religions.
Although contemporary emergents no longer use the words "cosmic christ" and "christ consciousness," they do a lot of contemplation, meditation, and mystical spiritual exercises to come into an experience with an undefined, but universal "christ."
Every time you hear a putative evangelical leader making left-wing statements, do some research to find out if they consort with emergent leaders. The names Tony Campolo, Jim Wallis, and Richard Foster come immediately to mind. The painful reality is that a number of evangelical leaders who are not the leaders of the emerging church have been substantially influenced by emergent ideas. Doctrinal orthodoxy conflicts with some of the political and moral stances of such men. If you hear one of them talking about "social justice," an idea that came from Marxism, or if you see one adopt a pro-gay or pro-feminist stance, it is not because they are going modernist like the liberal churches � it is because they are going post-modern and emergent.
Is the emerging church pagan? The emerging church welcomes pagans. In addition, it has a few characteristics that are reminiscent of paganism.
What a local emerging church community believes might shift from month to month and year to year. All the emergents emphasize that they must change with the times. At the same time, they insist, like good postmoderns, that they will not be subject to any authority outside their emergent community concerning Truth and Morality. They will not tolerate evangelicals saying that certain things are sinful based on biblical authority.
However, they do seek for a contingent, temporary, and contemporary "truth" from their local emergent community. In like manner, tribal pagan religion emanates from the campfires of the tribe. Both paganism and the emerging church are grassroots, bottom-up affairs.
Through a process of conversation and consensus-building, each emergent church community decides what is to be true for them � at least, what is true for this month. The process by which emergents use to find the truth of the month is very different from the process of pagan shamanism.
How do they do it? Give the devil his due. The process for reaching consensus in an emergent community is very sophisticated. It is no easy task for a community to take the place of God in determining what is right and wrong for the community. Therefore, they have a very ingenious way of playing God.
Emergent communities follow the brilliant techniques of the late M. Scott Peck for transforming informal groups into organic living entities. Every person in the group becomes an organic living part of the entity. Peck's organic entities are counterfeits for the "body of Christ" � which is to say, the church. That is why emergents insist on calling their local cults "emerging churches." However, Peck's techniques work fine with a group of atheists or a group of Satanists.
M. Scott Peck warns that one "evil" person in the group could scuttle the birth of the organic entity. How does he define "evil"? Such a person is "divisive" in the sense that he contradicts the core principles of the group which is in the process of formation. What if an outspoken, doctrinally orthodox Christian were in such a group? Would the others regard him as "divisive" � that is to say, "evil"? Yes. They would throw him out.
The historicity of emergent theology - The grassroots tribal approach for finding truth used by emerging communities has been translated into the historicism of doctrine by ostensibly evangelical scholars. Their misbegotten work has been accepted by purportedly evangelical seminaries and purportedly evangelical publishing houses. To make a long story short, the historicist scholars think that doctrines have welled up from local cultures at different times and places. Therefore, we are told that there is no unchanging doctrinal orthodoxy over the centuries. The doctrine of the atonement is currently under siege by scholars who assert that the meaning of the atonement has changed over time. I recently wrote an essay that demonstrated that the doctrine of the atonement has never changed. What the first century Jewish church believed about the atonement was identical to what the Greek and Roman fathers of the church believed. Starting with the Nicene Creed, all the great creeds and confessions affirmed the same truth.
The historicist "scholars" cherry picked the facts and played bait and switch games to support to their speculative conclusions. The played a con game. Yet they have fooled a handful of evangelical seminaries and publishing houses such as Intervarsity Press, Zondervan, and Christianity Today.
Prestigious evangelical leaders are every bit as vulnerable to seduction by the postmodern emergent movement as are ordinary Christians. The meltdown of evangelicalism is both top down and bottom up.
Contemplative prayer - One of the most amazing things about the emergents is that they have revived ancient spiritual exercises called "contemplative prayer" or "mystical prayer." I have read all the authors recommended by the emergents � namely, Thomas a Kempis, Meister Eckhart, John of the Cross, St. Theresa of Avila, Thomas Merton, and Thomas Aquinas. The objective of the contemplatives is "union with God," a goal with which I am in accord. However, I reject the Catholic contemplative idea of "deification," which is a heresy.
Contemplative prayer has been a blessing to me and was complementary to my doctrinally orthodox convictions. Then, to my horror, most of the folks I knew practicing contemplative prayer fell of the cliff into shocking heresies.
I have never been a Catholic, nor could ever be one on doctrinal grounds. However, I once had a considerable number of contemplative friends, most of whom happened to be Catholic. Most of these Catholic contemplatives went over the cliff to New Age heresy. Most of these practiced left-wing politics, some were pro-gay, and some were radical feminists of the kind who cannot accept a male gender for God.
Father Thomas Keating, a Trappist monk who was the national leader of the Catholic centering prayer movement, went over to New Age heresy and drew the entire American centering prayer movement with him. A Catholic contemplative prayer chat room I was part of went New Age and all of them accepted the heresy of "deification." They kicked me out because I remained doctrinally orthodox and pointedly said that "deification" is a heresy. However, they welcomed Buddhists and New Agers.
Until the Catholic church can distance itself from New Age follies that followed in the wake of Vatican II, I suggest to my Catholic friends that they avoid contemplative prayer.
Historical and modern vulnerabilities - Seeker-sensitive evangelicals are vulnerable to emergent mysticism for different reasons. Seeker-sensitive pandering breeds a fuzzy narcissism, and the mystical prayer of emergents puts the emphasis on feelings and sensory experiences. The feelings- oriented narcissist will turn contemplative prayer away from God and into spiritual navel-gazing.
Seeker-sensitives are often vague on doctrine, and are just as incompetent as post-Vatican II Catholics are in recognizing heresy. I therefore recommend that those going to seeker-sensitive churches abstain from contemplative prayer.
Narcissism and relativism - Narcissism and a relativism, are characteristic traits of postmodernism. If one is essentially postmodern at heart, he is an easy mark for the emergent church.
Postmodernism is essentially a rebellion against reason and transcendent truth. The two kinds of people who cannot be reached by reason are narcissists and a certain kind of radical relativist. The narcissist is too self-absorbed to rise up beyond himself into the sphere of reason. Postmodern relativism will require a little more explanation.
Doctrinally orthodox Christianity is realist on both vertical and horizontal axes. Reason cannot flourish apart from the same dual realism. Therefore, Christianity and reason are allies that are arrayed against postmodernism and irrationality.
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