Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’” (John 3:1-7)

Wallis Adheres To Big Tent Progressive Christianity Advanced By The Emerging Church

As Apprising Ministries covers issues within the visible church, while a tsunami of apostasy approaches, I’ve told you that evangelicalism made a horrible mistake when it embraced the sinfully ecumenical neo-liberal cult of the Emerging Church—a veritable Trojan Horse full of heresy—headed by, among others, the unholy Emergent Church trinity of apostates, Living Spiritual Teacher and EC guru Brian McLaren, universalist Emerging Church pastor Doug Pagitt, and his friend Tony Jones, the progressive “theologian in residence” at Solomon’s Porch.

However, it’s also important you understand that among the corrupt theologians greatly influencing this spiritually motley crew in the upgraded Emering Church 2.0 is uber-liberal theologian Harvey Cox, who’s also very instrumental in assisting progressive Christian theologian Philip Clayton. Together they, and others of like darkened mind, continue cobbling together this new postmodern form of “big tent” Progressive Christianity—a Liberalism 2.0—sometimes referred to by these rebels against the final authority of God’s Word as Emergence Christianity.

You might remember that I showed you something, which is very important to this particular discussion, in Big Tent Christianity Is A Postmodern Progressive Liberalism when I pointed you to Dr. Mike Wittmer, Professor of Systematic and Historical Theology at Grand Rapids Theological Seminary, and his blog post Brian McLaren, A New Kind of Christianity, Introduction. There Dr. Wittmer wondered:

why doesn’t Brian want me to know and believe the truth about Jesus?  He says that his new kind of Christianity is led by Doug Pagitt, who isn’t sure that Jesus is God; Marcus Borg, who argues that Jesus is dead; and Harvey Cox, a Harvard Divinity professor who wants to blow the whole thing up and construct a new view of God that will connect with our secular age.

Brian says that Cox’s new book, The Future of Faith, divides church history into the Age of Faith (pre-Constantine), the Age of Belief (from Constantine until today), and the Age of the Spirit (yeah!  That’s us!).  This tripartite division of history sounds similar to the system taught by Joachim of Fiore (a medieval Jack Van Impe), except that Joachim said that the Age of the Spirit would climax around 1260 (about 700 years before Jack’s first miss).

The benefit for Brian is that Cox’s model enables him to dismiss everything from Constantine until now—ecumenical creeds, councils, Augustine, Anselm, Aquinas, Luther, Calvin, Edwards, and Piper—as belonging to an imperialistic Age of Belief when doctrine was used to “burn and banish heretics.”  We now live in the fresh air of the Spirit, who frees us from our confining and mean-spirited, doctrinaire past.
(Online source, emphasis mine)

Now following below are the endorsements of The Future of Faith by Harvey Cox, cited above by Dr. Wittmer; and notice that one of them happens to be Jim Wallis, who is also a fellow Red Letter Christian with both progressive historian Diana Butler Bass and Living Spiritual Teacher and EC guru Brian McLaren:

Harvey Cox is the most important liberal theologian of the last half century because he could see around corners…. The Future of Faith is, quite simply, a beautiful book and a Cox classic.
—E. J. Dionne Jr., author of Souled Out

The Future of Faith is insightful, provocative, and inspiring—I found myself uttering a hearty evangelical ‘Amen’ at many points!
—Richard Mouw, president of Fuller Theological Seminary and author of Calvinism in the Las Vegas Airport

This important book has not only helped me understand the past, present, future of this amazing phenomenon called Christianity . . . it has also motivated me to keep working to help make actual the possible future Cox envisions.
—Brian McLaren, author of A New Kind of Christian

The Future of Faith is a tour de force. As passionate and challenging as his classic, The Secular City, Cox’s new book invites the faithful, the skeptical, and the fearful into a spirit-filled version of Christianity that can renew a hurting world.
—Diana Butler Bass, author of A People’s History of Christianity

Cox brings the eye of an historian and the heart of a theologian to explain where we’ve come from and where we’re going. The Future of Faith is an essential guide to that future.
—Jim Wallis, president of Sojourners and author of The Great Awakening

Harvey Cox has been a voice of both reason and faith in our cynical times. Now, he offers a fresh vision for the resurrection of a new global Christianity that will restore our faith both in ourselves and in the divine.
—Deepak Chopra, author of Jesus: A Story of Enlightenment [1]

There are too many bending over backward trying to give Wallis a pass when he claims to be a “progressive evangelical”; but we’d need to pack our bags and head deep into the postmodern Wonderland of Humpty Dumpty language to believe that an actual evangelical would say, “The Future of Faith is an essential guide to” the “future” of this “new global Christianity.” The truth is, it’s not Christianity at all; but rather, a global religion that even a pantheist proponent of New Spirituality aka New Age like Deepak Chopra can sign onto—progressive, you betcha; evangelical, not in any real sense, which you’ll come to see below.

The Mythology Of The Mystic Mush god With A Man-Shaped Hole In Its Heart

Previously, I showed you that Reverend Jim Wallis Practices Corrupt Contemplative Spirituality, which has now become the hottest fad of pretending to be Protestant evangelicalism under the guise of so-called Spiritual Formation ala Living Spiritual Teacher and Quaker mystic Richard Foster and his trusty spiritual twin Dallas Willard. Following is a quote from Wallis’ book The Great Awakening: Seven Ways To Change The World (TGA) where he’ll tell you that he practices a form of meditation in an altered state of consciousness known as Contemplative/Centering Prayer:

I pray, but there are many understandings about prayer. For many, prayer is talking to God, sometimes a great list of requests and needs—sort of like a child’s Christmas list mailed to Santa Claus. But at least for me, prayer is becoming a time of listening rather than talking. There is so much noise in our world and our lives (much of our own making); prayer becomes a quiet space that enables us to stop talking long enough to see what God might be trying to say to us.

The disciplines of prayer, silence, and contemplation as practiced by the monastics and mystics are precisely that—stopping the noise, slowing down, and becoming still so that God can break through all our activity and noise to speak to us. Prayer serves to put all parts of our lives in God’s presence, reminding us how holy our humanity really is.[2]

Wha, hold the presses! “Holy” humanity Batman; but just like the caped crusader, that’s a fantasy. It is, however, classic mystic-speak. Here’s high priestess of New Spirituality Marriane Williamson, as quoted by rock star Emerging Church pastor Rob Bell:

I love how Nelson Mandela puts it in one of his writings. He says, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.” And then he concludes by saying, “Your playing small doesn’t serve the world.” We were born to manifest the glory—put on display, to show—the glory of God that is within us.” He says, “you may be a dirt clod, but there is greatness and power and glory that resides in every singe human being.”

You’re right; Bell did say Nelson Mandela, but following you’ll see that the quote is actually from Williamson’s A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of “A Course in Miracles”, which is an ode to the occult classic A Course in Miracles:

‘our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond all measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us the most.’ We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, famous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world.

There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just some of us; it’s in everyone. And, as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. And as we’re liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.[3]

Guilt by association you say; you betcha, all of these people are guilty of associating themselves with the practice of transcendental meditation in an altered state of consciousness, which is why they have become lovers of themselves (c.f. 2 Timothy 3:2); but Jesus tells us what’s really in the heart of mankind:

“What comes out of a person is what defiles him. For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.” (Mark 7:20-23)

Next from TGA you’ll see evidence from Jim Wallis that his wrong view of the Kingdom of God is exactly the same e.g. as McLaren and Bell’s:

I cannot count the number of times I’ve been faced with mistranslations or misunderstandings of Jesus’ words [N.T.] Wright refers to, “My kingdom is not of this world.” That statement has been used to justify every manner of withdrawal from the world of politics and, often transparently, a Christian acceptance of the political status quo. Of course, Jesus’ kingdom is not “of” this world, in the sense of being “from” this world, as Wright says. Jesus’ kingdom is not like the other kingdoms of the world, and that’s the point.

It’s a different kind of kingdom than the worldly kingdoms based on money, power, violence, and sex. The kingdom of God, which Jesus came to inaugurate, is meant to create an alternate reality in this world, and ultimately to transform the kingdoms of this world. Inagurated by Jesus, but not yet brought to its fulfillment, it is always a kingdom that is “already” but “not yet.”[4]

Finally as I close this, for now, let me show you that under the subheading The kingdom of God is a new order Wallis warbles:

Jesus proclaimed in the Gospel of Matthew, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” The word he used was metanoia, which in the Greek literally means transformation, from the root of the word metamorphosis. He is saying that a whole new order is about to enter history and, if you want to be part of it, you will need a change so fundamental that the Gospel of John would later refer to it as a new birth.

Being born again was not meant to be a private religious experience that is hard to communicate to others, but rather the prerequisite for joining a new and very public movement—the Jesus and kingdom of God movement.” It is an invitation to a whole new form and way of living, a transformation as radical as a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. It is far more than a call to a new inner life, or a rescue operation for heaven.[5]

So you see, Wallis believes a different gospel; one which is the same as Katharine Jefferts Schori, the progressive/liberal Jezebel who heads the Episcopal Church, which I discussed in Katharine Jefferts Schori Calls Individual Salvation Heresy/Idolatry. My opening text above sheds additional light here that we’re not preaching the same Gospel, which is individual repentance and forgiveness of sins in Jesus’ Name. That God the Holy Spirit is showing us in this text that a given individual must respond to the Gospel couldn’t be clearer as He inspires His Apostle John to include this private conversation between Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, and Jesus.

Notice Jesus tells him—personally — “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3). In closing this out, for now, the following from Dr. Edwin Blum is helpful in showing that Wallis et al have a false gospel and misunderstanding of the Kingdom of God:

Jesus was not on the same level with Nicodemus. He is “from above” (anothen; v.31), therefore Nicodemus must be born “from above” (v.3, NIV marg. anothen). To be born again or born “from above” ( anothen has both meanings; e.g., “from above” in 19:11 and Gal. 4:9) is to have a spiritual transformation which takes a person out of king of darkness into the kingdom of God (cf. Col. 1:13).

The kingdom is the sphere or realm of God’s authority and blessing which is now invisible but will be manifested on (Matt. 6:10).[6]

_________________________________________________________________________
Endnotes:

[1] Harvey Cox, The Future Of Faith [New York: HarperOne, 2010], back cover.

[2] Jim Wallis, The Great Awakening: Seven Ways To Change The World [New York: Harper Collins, 2008], 290, emphasis mine.

[3] Marianne Williamson, A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of “A Course in Miracles” [New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1992], 190, 191, emphasis mine.

[4] Wallis, op. cit., 56.

[5] Ibid., 60.

[6] John F. Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck, eds. The Bible Knowledge Commentary, 2 Vols [Colorado Springs: Cook Communications Ministries, 2000] , 281.

See also:

JIM WALLIS ADMITS TO SOROS FUNDING

JIM WALLIS AND SOJOURNERS WHINE ABOUT CIVILITY FOR THOSE HIJACKING CHRISTIANITY

BRIAN MCLAREN SPEAKS AS A UNIVERSALIST

DIANA BUTLER BASS ON CHRIS ROSEBROUGH, INGRID SCHLUETER, AND KEN SILVA IN SIN

BIG TENT CHRISTIANITY IS A POSTMODERN PROGRESSIVE LIBERALISM

THE EMERGING CHURCH AND THE NEW PROGRESSIVE THEOLOGY ON OTHER RELIGIONS

THE EMERGING CHURCH AND THE NEW PROGRESSIVE THEOLOGY ON CHRIST