The Emergent Church leaders like Doug Pagitt are truly quite excited about discovering God in “the Other” and his pal Rob Bell, the Elvis of Emerging, is preaching the need to become globalcentric because God is bigger than any of “our tribes.” My question is: If existential feeling is our criterion for accepting the subjective experiences of God working in the lives of others, then why be so quick to dismiss something like the second video below from their brother Benny Hinn?

I mean we aren’t supposed to believe that these so erudite Emerging spiritual hippies, supposedly such bastions of proper Christian tolerance and respect for other “traditions,” are really simply picking and choosing the experiences they like, are we? Nah, these who dare demonstrate true Christian love like Tony Jones wouldn’t simply dismiss Hinn’s experiences but then choose to be politically correct and accept that of unrepentant practicing homosexuals, would they?

Or how about the the first video clip below? We’re told by an eyewitness of the event I believe named Naqshbandi Haqqani aka sufi92:

Shaykh Hisham Kabbani and the Naqshbandi Ensemble visted the city of Montreal in Canada, where over 500 Naqshbandi students live. Most of the students in Montreal are converts, The Haqqani foundation of Montreal is very active promoting Islam through the zikr and whirling. At this interfaith event we visited the Sivananda Ashram Yoga Center in Montreal.

What!? And they didn’t invite Rob and Doug or their interspiritual compassionate companion Dalai Lama!? Now you may recall that Tony Campolo, our Emerging Church social justice advocate extraodinare, once wrote:

a theology of mysticism provides some hope for common ground between Christianity and Islam. Both religions have within their histories examples of ecstatic union with God, which seem at odds with their own spiritual traditions but have much in common with each other…

I don’t know what to make of the Muslim mystics, especially those who have come to be known as the Sufis. What do they experience in their mystic experiences? Could they have encountered the same God we do in our Christian mysticism?… The founder of this movement was Hasan Al Basri (A.D. 642-728)… [Basri’s] attempt to bring about religious reform very much paralleled the path of Francis [of Assisi], both in style and spiritual direction. Both men sensed a sacred presence in everything and claimed to have experienced a mystical union with God. (Speaking My Mind, 149, 150)

Well, as one who adheres to Sola Scripture and as such judges all spiritual experiences by the Bible—and never the reverse—I say they are most definitely worshiping the demon, or legion, posing as the mush god of mysticism, which apparently Tony Campolo is so taken with, but it most assuredly isn’t the one true and living God of the Bible. God has quite specifically told us — the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons (1 Corinthians 10:20), which clearly answers Campolo’s questions.

But as food for thought, if there are any left who will think anymore; for those who consider the testimony of their feelings as valid then who are they to write off Hinn’s own experience where he alleges “the Holy Spirit touched every person in the building.” And after all, he says in his experience “no one [was] left standing” after God “touched” these people. So, if the Emerging Church really is consistent with their existential philosophy then why aren’t they publicly and openly rejoicing as God supposedly works in Benny Hinn; who in our mind is about as “the Other” as one can get.

Yeah, as in so far out in some “Other” world we can’t even get a radar fix on his position.

Shaykh Hisham Kabbani and the Naqshbandi Ensemble

 Word Faith preacher Benny Hinn’s testimony

See also:

THE EMERGING CHURCH, DOCTRINES OF DEMONS AND THEIR “OPEN CHRISTIANITY”

THE CULT OF LIBERAL THEOLOGY ROTTEN ROOT OF THE POSTLIBERAL EMERGING CHURCH

EMERGENT CHURCH THEOLOGIAN TONY JONES AND HIS UNREPENTANT HOMOSEXUAL CHRISTIANS

TODD FRIEL: A MATTER OF TIME BEFORE ROB BELL SAYS PUBLICLY PRACTICING HOMOSEXUALITY IS OK FOR CHRISTIANS