Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.

The Virgin Birth Is A Non-Negotiable Doctrine Of The Faith Once For All Delivered

Let me briefly show you what is at stake concerning this issue of the Virgin Birth of Christ. First, our Creator God decided to come into this cursed creation because of our blatant sin and rebellion against Him to provide the way of salvation for His Own. We’re accustomed to liberals denying this cardinal doctrine of the historic orthodox faith. In his classic work Christianity & Liberalism J. Gresham Machen explains that “the deity of our Lord, in any real sense of the word ‘deity,’ is of course denied by modern liberalism. According to the modern liberal Church, Jesus differs from the rest of men only in degree and not in kind; He can be divine only if all men are divine”[1]; you’ve likely heard this expressed today as “the divine spark” supposedly within all men.

For example, in his book Velvet Elvis (VE) rock star pastor Rob Bell, über -popular communicator in the sinfully ecumenical neo-liberal cult of the Emergent Church aka the Emerging Church, recommends via footnote[2] the book The Heart of Christianity:Rediscovering A Life Of Faith (HC) by Progessive Christian scholar Marcus Borg. A more correct title would be The Corrupt Heart Of Pseudo-Christianity: Reinterpreting A Life Of Another Faith Entirely as Borg begins by taking is into postmodern Humpty Dumpty language telling us that the “emerging paradigm” uses an “historical, metaphorical, and sacramental approach.” In other words Borg refers to their use of mysticism in order to turn Bible passages into allegory; translation: When we see things in history with which we don’t agree we just make up other ways to interpret them.

In fact this is encompassed in HC when Borg muses that “the Bible,” and “all of the enduring religions” supposedly “affirm” that there is a “More”; and further, Borg tells us there “is a ‘More’ to the language”[4] he uses, i.e. meanings beyond the plain sense of the words used. Bell tells us in VE that Borg means e.g. there’s “the more-than-literal truth of the Bible.”[5] Interestingly enough Borg’s concept of  this “more” is exactly what Bell recommends we check out; because whenever the text gets in the way of their mystic quest to harmonize Christian truths with other religions who reject them the neo-Gnostics simply go into this supposed More. Since it’s not the subject of this article, suffice to say this is why Bell et al in the EC push, and practice, corrupt Contemplative Spirituality/Mysticism.

While encouraging us to use “metaphorical language” to bend and shape the meanings of words like child does with Play-Doh; i.e. just make stuff up, concerning the non-negotiable doctrine of the Virgin Birth Borg dreams:

The stories of Jesus’ birth in Matthew and Luke provide a second illustration of the truth of metaphor. Like the Genesis stories of creation, they have been a source of conflict among Christians. Some Christians insist that they are and must be seen as factual narratives:…[but] emphasizing the historical factuality of the stories distract from their meaning… When this happens, the rich, more-than-literal meanings are most often lost.[6]

The above now sheds light upon the Virgin Birth denial-lite suggested by Rob Bell in his VE; you may recall Bell offered:

What if tomorrow someone digs up definitive proof that Jesus had a real, earthly, biological father named Larry, and archeologists find Larry’s tomb and do DNA samples and prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the virgin birth was really just a bit of mythologizing the Gospel writers threw in to appeal to the followers of the Mithra and Dionysian religious cults that were hugely popular at the time of Jesus, whose gods had virgin births?

But what if, as you study the origin of the word “virgin” you discover that the word “virgin” in the gospel of Matthew actually comes from the book of Isaiah, and then you find out that in the Hebrew language at that time, the word “virgin” could mean several things. And what if you discover that in the first century being “born of a virgin” also referred to a child whose mother became pregnant the first time she had intercourse?[7]

Leaving aside that the above would mean Holy Scripture wasn’t completely inspired by God, Bell’s liberalism-lite has a few deadly seriously flaws; and it has no business being used in the Young Adult and Youth ministries of mainstream evangelical churches. Far from being cutting edge, it’s rehashed liberal arguments that I would see as I began ministry in the late 80′s long ago debunked by Christian apologists. For example, while discussing the Mormon doctrine espoused by Brigham Young that God the Father had sexual relations with Mary to conceive Christ Jesus of Nazareth, in his classic textbook The Kingdom of the Cults Dr. Walter Martin (1928-1989) brings out:

According to the revelation of the Virgin Birth as recorded within the Scripture, our Lord was conceived by a direct act of God the Holy Spirit, wholly apart human agency.[8]

I have news for Messrs Bell and Borg, there is no more-than-literal meaning than when the Bible clearly says Jesus was conceived by a direct act of God the Holy Spirit, wholly apart human agency; and yes Rob Bell, the true Christian will exhibit righteous indignation at you even suggesting that the Virgin Birth of Christ Jesus of Nazareth isn’t of prime importance. Bell also errs when he suggests there’s any way around this by resorting to playing word games with the word virgin; in fact, Bell actually blows up his own argument when he admits “the word ‘virgin’ in the gospel of Matthew actually comes from the book of Isaiah. He’s right, it does — Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel (Isaiah 7:14), which Matthew explained means — God with us (cf. Matthew 1:23).

Noted theologian Dr. Robert Reymond now explains that “the original LXX translator,” LXX stands for the Septuagint Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament, just “doing his work one to two centuries before the birth of Christ” and “knowing nothing” of any supposed “pre-Christian Jewish interpretation” of this verse, translated the Hebrew word almah using the Greek word parthenos specifically:

because he was attempting to deliver a competent translation. Cyrus H. Gordon, one of the most knowledgeable Jewish scholars in Mediterranean studies in his generation, acknowleged as much: The commonly held view that “virgin” is Christian, whereas “young woman” is Jewish is not quite true. The fact is that the Septuagint, which is the Jewish translation made in pre-Christian Alexandria, takes almah to mean “virgin” here. Accordingly, the New Testament follows the Jewish interpretation in Isaiah 7:14…[9]

Finally, Dr Martin again:

One of the great doctrines of the Bible, which is uniquely related to the supreme earthly manifestation of the Eternal God, is the doctrine of the Virgin Birth of Jesus Christ. In one very real sense, this doctrine is indissolably linked with that of the Incarnation, being, so to speak, the agency or instrument whereby God chose to manifest himself.[10]

All of this is just more rancid fruit produced by evangelicalism’s spiritually adulterous embrace of the Emerging Church, which had CSM as a core doctrine aimed at kicking out the proper Christian spirituality of sola Scriptura. Now you should be able to see how foolish it has been to allow the warped and toxic teachings of leading EC voices like Rob Bell to pollute its own young for at least this past decade; all the while recommending the work of unbelievers like Marcus Borg and encouraging the questioning of things which need not be questioned by Bible-believing Christians. How tragic that formally conservative evangelicals, apparently desperate for bodies in a building, would set aside proper doctrine and have alternative services that were actually helping to develop a postmodern liberbalism.

Why expose your young to deceptive statements like “in the Hebrew language at that time, the word ‘virgin’ could mean several things”; we’ve just seen the proper translation actually is virgin. In addition, the inspired text of Matthew is in the Greek language. You see, the absolute truth is that the text of the Bible is fully inspired in all of its parts e.g. right down to the very tenses of the Greek verbs, which God the Holy Spirit would move upon His chosen vessels to use. The New Testament wasn’t written in Hebrew, so while Rob Bell apparently wows those who really don’t know any better, the fact is that the Greek does clearly reveal the crucial Christian doctrine of the Virgin Birth of Jesus Christ.

In closing this, for now, we also consider that the Apostle John tells us in John 1:14 that Jesus is — the only Son from the Father (monogenes para Patros) and in John 1:18 — God; the only God (Theon monogenes theos). And if Jesus of Nazareth is not fully God and fully Man by means of Mary being found to be with child from the Holy Spirit (Matthew 1:18, Greek) then we only have a human man with a sinful human nature just the same as everyone else. Not only that, but Jesus wouldn’t have been able to die for the sins of anyone else because another Jesus (cf. 2 Corinthians 11:4) would only have been a human sinner himself. In addition to this, a human man could not possibly die for the sins for another because by definition sin is committed against God; so only God Himself could die for the forgiveness of tresspasses having been committed against Him.

Take away the Virgin Birth so that we no longer have Jesus as the monogenes para Patros being Theon monogenes theos and we end up with simply a mere mortal man with his own sin nature who could never have saved anybody. So you tell me, how could a real pastor-teacher actually sent by our Lord ever even think of demeaning Christ Jesus in such a way? Answer: He couldn’t. And how can someone who knowingly denies the Virgin Birth of Jesus be a Christian; he can’t, which is why Dr. Al Mohler sums this all up very well when he says:

Can a true Christian deny the virgin birth? The answer to that question must be a decisive No. Those who deny the virgin birth reject the authority of Scripture, deny the supernatural birth of the Savior, undermine the very foundations of the Gospel, and have no way of explaining the deity of Christ. Anyone who claims that the virgin birth can be discarded even as the deity of Christ is affirmed is either intellectually dishonest or theological incompetent.

Several years ago, Cecil Sherman–then a Southern Baptist, but later the first coordinator of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship–stated: “A teacher who might also be led by the Scripture not to believe in the Virgin Birth should not be fired.” Consider the logic of that statement. A Christian can be led by the Bible to deny what the Bible teaches? This kind of logic is what has allowed those who deny the virgin birth to sit comfortably in liberal theological seminaries and to preach their reductionistic Christ from major pulpits.

Christians must face the fact that a denial of the virgin birth is a denial of Jesus as the Christ. The Savior who died for our sins was none other than the baby who was conceived of the Holy Spirit, and born of a virgin. The virgin birth does not stand alone as a biblical doctrine, it is an irreducible part of the biblical revelation about the person and work of Jesus Christ. With it, the Gospel stands or falls. (Online source)

Spiritual food well worthy of our meditations…

________________________________________________________________________________
Endnotes: 

[1] J. Gresham Machen, Christianity & Liberalism [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing, 2002], 108.

[2] Rob Bell, Velvet Elvis [Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005], endnotes: 1; 57.

[3] Marcus Borg, The Heart of Christianity [New York: Harper Collins, 2003] , 81.

[4] Ibid., 37.

[5] Bell, op. cit., 61.

[6] Borg, op. cit., 52, 53, 54.

[7] Bell, op. cit., 26.

[8] Walter Martin, The Kingdom of the Cults, Ravi Zacharias, Gen. Ed. (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 2005), 246.

[9] Robert L. Reymond, Jesus Divine Messiah: The New and Old Testament Witness [Geanies House: Mentor, 2003], 93, 94.

[10] Martin op. cit., 244.

See also:

THE NEW DOWNGRADE AND ITS APOSTLES OF UNBELIEF

MARCUS BORG AND CHRISTIANS WHO DON’T BELIEVE IN JESUS

IS ROB BELL EVANGELICAL?

THE EMERGING CHURCH SOWING ITS NEO-ORTHODOX CONFUSION ON SCRIPTURE

THE EMERGENT CHURCH CULT OF POSTMODERN LIBERAL THEOLOGY

DID JESUS ARGUE DOCTRINE?

JOHN MACARTHUR: BIBLICAL WARNING ABOUT FALSE TEACHERS

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First, it is necessary to understand what sola Scriptura does and does not assert. The Reformation principle of sola Scriptura has to do with the sufficiency of Scripture as our supreme authority in all spiritual matters. Sola Scriptura simply means that all truth necessary for our salvation and spiritual life is taught either explicitly or implicitly in Scripture.

It is not a claim that all truth of every kind is found in Scripture. The most ardent defender of sola Scriptura will concede, for example, that Scripture has little or nothing to say about DNA structures, microbiology, the rules of Chinese grammar, or rocket science. 

This or that “scientific truth” for example, may or may not be actually true, whether or not it can be supported by Scripture—but Scripture is a “more sure Word,” standing above all other truth in its authority and certainty. It is “more sure,” according to the apostle Peter, than the data we gather firsthand through our own senses (2 Pet. 1:19). Therefore Scripture is the highest and supreme authority on any matter to which it speaks. But there are many important questions on which Scripture is silent. Sola Scriptura makes no claim to the contrary.

Nor does sola Scriptura claim that everything Jesus or the apostles ever taught is preserved in Scripture.  It only means that everything necessary, everything binding on our consciences, and everything God requires of us is given to us in Scripture.

Furthermore, we are forbidden to add to or take way from Scripture (cf. Deut. 4:2; 12:32, cf. Rev. 22:18-19). To do so is to lay on people’s shoulders a burden that God Himself does not intend for them to bear (cf. Matt. 23:4).

Scripture is therefore the perfect and only standard of spiritual truth, revealing infallibly all that we must believe in order to be saved, and all that we must do in order to glorify God. That—no more, no less—is what sola Scriptura means.

The Westminster Confession of Faith defines the sufficiency of Scripture like this:

The whole counsel of God, concerning all things necessary for his own glory, man’s salvation, faith, and life, is either expressly set down in scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelations of the Spirit, or traditions of men (1:6).

The Thirty-nine Articles of the Anglican Church include this statement on sola Scriptura:

Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation: so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the Faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation (article 6).

So sola Scriptura simply means that Scripture is sufficient. The fact that Jesus did and taught many things not recorded in Scripture (Jn. 20:30; 21:25) is wholly irrelevant to the principle of sola Scriptura. The fact that most of the apostles’ actual sermons in the early churches were not written down and preserved for us does not diminish the truth of biblical sufficiency one bit. What is certain is that all that is necessary is in Scripture—and we are forbidden “to exceed what is written” (1 Cor. 4:6).

Scripture clearly claims for itself this sufficiency—and nowhere more clearly that 2 Timothy 3:15-17. A brief summary of that passage is perhaps appropriate here as well. In short, verse 15 affirms that Scripture is sufficient for salvation: “The sacred writings . . . are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.” Verse 16 affirms the absolute authority of Scripture, which is “God-breathed” (Gk. theopneustos) and profitable for our instruction. And verse 17 states that Scripture is able to equip the man of God “for every good work.” 

So the assertion that the Bible itself does not teach sola Scriptura is simply wrong. (Scripture, Tradition, and Rome, Part 2)

John MacArthur

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HT: Email Brigade

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In fact, the term big tent itself really concerns the universalism forming the rotten core of this pseudo-Christian neo-liberalism—Liberalism 2.0—now being spread by an upgraded Emerging Church 2.0 throughout the mainstream of evangelicalism. At this point it’s important to remind you again that we are not just talking here about a universalism teaching men will be saved regardless of their religious convictions. Rather what’s under discussion is a Christian Universalism (CU), which does generally see Jesus Christ as the only way that all men will eventually be saved. There are various views but this CU is based upon some type of a universal atonement of Christ on the Cross that sounds a lot like the following from Rob Bell, the Elvis-like rock star pastor of the Emergent Church rebellion against the authority of the Bible:

So this is reality, this forgiveness, this reconciliation, is true for everybody. Paul insisted that when Jesus died on the cross, he was reconciling “all things, in heaven and on earth, to God.” All things, everywhere. This reality then isn’t something we make come true about ourselves by doing something. It is already true. Our choice is to live in this new reality or cling to a reality of our own making.[1]

During this past year in articles like The Emerging Church And The New Progressive Theology On Other Religions I’ve been giving you some glimpses at a few of the sources this Liberalism 2.0 is drawing from, as well as, some of what comprises its spiritually bankrupt theology. For example, Philip Clayton’s current book Transforming Christian Theology cites Hal Taussig, “New Testament professor” at Union Theological Seminary, whom he says gives a “beautiful summary” of this “progressive Christianity”[2]; and here’s what Taussig tells us about this progressive neo-liberal de-formation of the Christian faith in his Grassroots Progressive Christianity: A Quiet Revolution:

4. The belief that Christianity can be vital without claiming to be the best or the only true religion. In contrast to mainstream Christianity’s lukewarm “tolerance” of other religions, progressive Christianity pro-actively asserts that it is not the best or the only. Progressive Christians take pains to simultaneously their own Christian faith and their support of the complete validity of other religions.[3] 

The pious statement likely draws applause, and will certainly please the world, but the problem is the historic, orthodox, Christian faith has never taught “the complete validity of other religions.” I began studying liberal theology many years ago, but as I began to see the EC drifting toward universalism—particularly with the unholy Emergent trinity of Pagitt, Jones, and EC guru Brian McLaren—I began to study the works of more recent progressive Christians such as Marcus Borg and Diana Butler Bass. Bascially I simply followed the interlocking concentric circles closing all around Brian Mclaren, who’s always been the EC’s tip-of-the-spear advancing postmodern progressive Christianity.

You may recall that not too long ago McLaren even embarked on a speaking tour with both Borg and Butler Bass, with whom he is good friends. In fact, Diana Butler Bass is also associated with McLaren, his friend Tony Campolo, and new Obama spiritual advisor Jim Wallis in something called Red Letter Christians (RLC). It’s also important for you to know that a founding member of RLC just happens to be Roman Catholic mystic and Christian universalist Richard Rohr, who’s also a Franciscan priest as well as founder of the interspiritual blackhole called Center for Action and Contemplation. And this past year or so Rohr’s really become quite active around EC sectors.[4]

As we watch the development of this Liberalism 2.0 advanced by the EC it’s important that you begin to recognize the names of some of the major proponents; you may rest assured they have an agenda to take over the visible church with A New Kind of Christianity, which is what McLaren’s latest book was about. Now if these people do believe in “the complete validity of other religions,” then quite obviously, we have some form of universalism being taught. Now I’d like to draw your attention to a book, which gives us a glimpse at what this man-centered Liberalism 2.0 looks like; its by Dr. R. Scott Thornton, Director of Sacred Grounds Resource Center and is called Inclusive Christianity: A Progressive Look at Faith. Of this book Richard Rohr says emphatically:

This excellent book deserves a broad reading! Unless we bring R. Scott Thornton’s kind of faith-filled intelligent response to our Scriptures and practice, I see little ability for Christianity to heal, transform our world. With this kind of wisdom, which is merely Jesus’ wisdom, we can do just that![5]

Thorton’s supposedly “faith-filled” progessive Christianity involves universal pluralism as he explains:

Many paths lead people into relationship with God. If I grew up in Indoa, I’d probably be a Hindu; Saudi Arabia, Muslim; Israel, Jew. But I wasn’t. I was born into a Christian family…as I’ve committed more of my life to Christian discipleship, I’ve experienced a transformation that leads me to believe that “the way” taught and modeled by Jesus is a pure reflection of God’s intentional will for humankind. [6]

However, even though the progressive/liberal Christian believes that only they are living the “pure reflection” of the way God would have everyone live, still they acknowledge that there are other “paths” which can also take “into relationship with God.” From About Us—The 8 Points  at the website of The Center For Progressive Christianity:

Point 2: Pluralism
By calling ourselves progressive, we mean we are Christians who… Recognize the faithfulness of other people who have other names for the way to God’s realm, and acknowledge that their ways are true for them, as our ways are true for us.
(Online source, bold mine)

As such then, we’re not surprised that in Thornton’s sermon Grace, delivered at something called The Institute for Progressive Christianity, he takes a shot the doctrine of hell as he tells us we’ve set up bad rules like:

If you do not believe certain things about Jesus you are not “saved”. You are somehow condemned to an eternity of torment in a place called hell. We draw distinct lines in the sand and label some people good and some people evil and propose that those we have labeled evil must be destroyed. I’m sorry to say that if Jesus appeared today, he would have to once again rebel against these barriers in the same way that he did 2000 years ago.[7]

Well, if other paths also lead to God and if, as Philip Clayton puts it, we’re going to “rediscover a deep, vibrant form of incarnational Christian life and faith–one based not on an economy of exclusion but of embrace”[8] then we need to rethink the doctrine of hell now, wouldn’t we; and so they are as you can see e.g. in Razing Hell With Sharon Baker, who even comes highly recommended by EC guru Brian McLaren. You may also recall in Brian McLaren Attacks The Substitutionary Atonement I showed you he has said:

[T]he kingdom of God comes through suffering and willing, voluntary sacrifice, right? But in an ironic way, the doctrine of hell basically says, no, that that’s not really true. That in the end, God gets His way through coercion and violence and intimidation and domination, just like every other kingdom does. The cross isn’t the center then. The cross is almost a distraction and false advertising for God.

Baker puts it this way:

I’m even more concerned about remaining faithful to the God of love, who loves the worst of the worst, the world’s enemies, including, even, the Hitlers, the Idi Amins, and the Osama bin Ladens of the world. Our traditional views of hell as a place of eternal punishment where unbelievers dwell in undying flames contradict the image of God as merciful, forgiving, and compassionate. (Online source)

At this point, Baker’s postmodern opining deconstruction aside, I’ll remind you that the “traditional views of hell as a place of eternal punishment” is actually derived from God’s inerrant and infallible Word in the Bible so there’s no conflict at all concerning what He’s revealed about Himself and hell. Against this backdrop I’m pleased to bring your attention to the September/October 2010 e-Journal from 9 Marks that’s entitled Hell: Remembering the Awful Reality. Editor Jonathan Leeman tells us:

Wisdom so often in life prescribes moderation. It’s wise to eat with moderation, to speak with moderation, to feel with moderation, some would even say to believe with moderation.

But there’s absolutely nothing moderate about the doctrine of hell. It’s extreme in every way. It’s an extreme idea for the mind. It’s an extreme confrontation for the heart. And it blows against all the rules of social etiquette.

Embracing the reality of hell means setting aside moderation. It means admitting that our sin is dark and heinous to the point of eternal damnation; that the white light of God’s character and glory justly destroys those who have fallen short of his glory; and that that our non-Christians friends have nothing greater to fear. That’s tough to do when you have moderate views of your sin, your friend’s sin, and of God’s glory.

Embracing the reality of hell also means going against the fallen cultural structures and belief systems of this world, all of which conspire together with our own hearts to repeat the serpent’s promise of a moderate outcome, “You will surely not die.”

As hard as it is to stare at the doctrine of hell, surely it must be salubrious to our faith to do so from time to time. It forces us to once again reckon with who God is and who we are. We hope this issue of the 9Marks eJournal will help all of us to do just that. (Online source)

Among other articles in this timely e-Journal you’ll find Pastoral Fearmongering, Manipulation, and Hell by Mark Dever, How Does Hell Glorify God? from James M. Hamilton Jr., and Greg Gilbert‘s Why Hell Is Integral to the Gospel where he brings out what’s happened to those following the spiritual dead-end of progressive Christianity, which is neither progressive, nor Christian:

For some, the horror of the Christian doctrine of hell—that it is a place of eternal, conscious torment where God’s enemies are punished—has led them not just to avert their eyes and minds, but to deny it entirely. “Surely,” they say, “hell is a fictional construct used to oppress people with fear; a God of love would never allow such a place to really exist.” There’s an emotional power to this argument, to be sure. No one, certainly no Christian, likes the idea of hell.

At the same time, this doctrine isn’t just drapery on the side of the Christian worldview, something with no relevance to the structure of the faith itself. Nor is the doctrine of hell an embarrassing, unnecessary, primitive wart that we believe just because we’re told we have to.

On the contrary, the doctrine and reality of hell actually throws the glory of the gospel into sharp relief for us. It helps us to understand just how great God really is, how sinfully wretched we really are, and how unutterably amazing it is that he would show us grace at all. Moreover, the reality of hell—if we don’t push it out of our minds—will focus us, above all, on the task of proclaiming the gospel to those who are in danger of spending eternity there… (Online source)

Which is why I continue to warn such as these I’ve been discussing here; though the progressive/liberal Christians follow a Jesus, in actuality, their glorified social reformer is a phantom who’s essentially Gandhi with a beard. And, because they have gone through the gate [that] is wide out onto the way [which] is easy that leads to destruction (see—Matthew 7:13), a non-existent savior is powerless to help them. And so this is why, in the love of God, we will continue to pray for these deceived progressive/liberals—for whom Christ also died—because there’s still time for them to avoid hell and accept the good news of the glorious Gospel of repentance and the forgivness of sins in the Name of Jesus Christ.

________________________________________________________________________________

End notes:

[1] Rob Bell, Velvet Elvis [Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005], 146, emphasis mine.

[2] Philip Clayton, Transforming Christian Theology [Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2010], 120.

[3] Bold is his.

[4] Rohr is also a member of an important Emerging Church network I’ve discussed previously e.g. in Emerging Church TransFORM.

[5] R. Scott Thornton, Inclusive Christianity: A Progressive Look at Faith [Pasadena: Hope Publishing House, 2009], back cover.

[6] Ibid., 7.

[7] http://tiny.cc/ui70a, accessed 9/1/10.

[8] http://tiny.cc/w5wue, accessed 9/1/10.

See also:

THE EMERGING CHURCH AND THE NEW PROGRESSIVE THEOLOGY ON CHRIST 

CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE DOESN’T MATTER TO BRIAN MCLAREN

ROB BELL AND CHRISTIAN UNIVERSALISM

DOUG PAGITT AND CHRISTIAN UNIVERSALISM

THE NEW DOWNGRADE AND ITS APOSTLES OF UNBELIEF

SURPRISED BY GOD’S JUDGMENT

WHAT IS THE WORST THING ABOUT HELL?

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You need to understand that this spurious CSM—the refried Roman Catholic mysticism “discovered” by Living Spiritual Teacher and Quaker mystic Richard Foster, and now perpetrated within the mainstream of evangelicalism as supposed Spiritual Formation with an able assist from his spiritual twin SBC minister Dallas Willard, was a core doctrine in the EC right from its hatching in Hell. In Good Shepherd Church Going Ape…Almost I gave you another pathetic exhibit of how just how squishy—man-pleasing—evanjellyfish is becoming as a result of practicing this mysticism.

In The Gloves Must Come Off yesterday I told you that there will be nothing gained by foolish “conversation” with unregenerate Apostles of Unbelief in the EC; and among their number you’ll find mystics like rock star Emerging Church pastor Rob Bell and his good friend, heretical quasi-universalist Emerging Church pastor Doug Pagitt who heads the Emergent Solomon’s Porch where the equally heretical Tony Jones happens to be his “theologian in residence,” who’ve long been teaching counterfeit forms of Christianity to young mainstream evangelicals.

The quicker you come to understand that such as these long ago jettisoned the proper Christian spirituality of Sola Scriptura—of course we can experience God in His Word—for myth-based mysticism the better for you; for you see, their mentors like Living Spiritual Teacher and Roman Catholic mystic Richard Rohr along with his fellow Red Letter Christian pal Living Spiritual Teacher and leading Emergent Church guru Brian McLaren, are just as off spiritually as the original Gnostics, which were being roundly rebuked by the authors of the New Testament.

A couple of years ago in Contemplative Spirituality/Mysticism (CSM) Of Spiritual Formation Is Reckless Faith I pointed you to Reckless Faith: When The Church Loses Its Will To Discern , oft-overlooked 1994 book by Dr. John MacArthur. In this book, one of our Lord’s most trusted generals told you—three years before their even was any Emerging Church—why in this postmodern time these neo-Gnostics, who’re neo-orthodox in their theology (at best), would run to embrace mysticism:

Neo-orthodoxy is the term used to identify an existentialist variety of Christianity. Because it denies the essential objective basis of truth—the absolute truth and authority of Scripture—neo-orthodoxy must be understood as pseudo-Christianity… Neo-orthodoxy’s attitude toward Scripture is a microcosm of the entire existentialist philosophy: the Bible itself is not objectively the Word of God, but it becomes the Word of God when it speaks to me individually.

In neo-orthodoxy, that same subjectivism is imposed on all the doctrines of historic Christianity. Familiar terms are used, but are redefined or employed in such a way that is purposely vague—not to convey objective meaning, but to communicate a subjective symbolism… Thus while neo-orthodox theologians often sound as if they affirming traditional beliefs, their actual system differs radically from the historic understanding of the Christian faith. By denying the objectivity of truth, they relegate all theology to the realm of subjective relativism.

It is a theology perfectly suited for the age in which we live. And that is precisely why it is so deadly… [Contemplative Spirituality aka] Mysticism is perfectly suited for religious existentialism; indeed, it is the inevitable consequence. The mystic disdains rational understanding and seeks truth instead through the feelings, the imagination, personal visions, inner voices, private illumination, of other purely subjective means. Objective truth becomes practically superfluous.

Mysticial experiences are therefore self-authenticating; that is, they are not subject to any form of objective verification. They are unique to the person who experiences them. Since they do not arise from or depend upon any rational process, they are invulnerable to any refutation by rational means… Mysticism is therefore antithetical to discernment. It is an extreme form of reckless faith.[1]

Now I’ll be blunt; if you can’t see what MacArthur has just told you fits these Emerging Church mystics perfectly, then in my view it’s because you just don’t want to. Charles Spurgeon dealt with their fetid forebears in the original Cult of Liberalism; do you remember what it would cost him in the Downgrade Controversy? Too bad in this New Downgrade, while so many praise him, there doesn’t appear to be any Spurgeon on the immediate horizon. If there were, here’s what he’d be saying:

Beloved, your risen Lord wants you to be happy. When He was here on earth, He said, “Let not your heart be troubled”; He says just the same to you today. He takes no delight in the distresses of His people. He loves you to believe in Him and be at rest.

Find if you can, beloved, one occasion in which Jesus inculcated doubt or bade men dwell in uncertainty. The apostles of unbelief are everywhere today, and they imagine that they are doing God service by spreading what they call “honest doubt.” This is death to all joy! Poison to all peace! The Savior did not so…

I have not much patience with a certain class of Christians nowadays who will hear anybody preach so long as they can say, “He is very clever, a fine preacher, a man of genius, a born orator.” Is cleverness to make false doctrine palatable? Why, sirs, to me the ability of a man who preaches error is my sorrow rather than my admiration.

I cannot endure false doctrine, however neatly it may be put before me. Would you have me eat poisoned meat because the dish is of the choicest ware? It makes me indignant when I hear another gospel put before the people with enticing words, by men who would fain make merchandise of souls; and I marvel at those who have soft words for such deceivers.

“That is your bigotry,” says one. Call it so if you like, but it is the bigotry of the loving John who wrote—”If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed: for he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds.”

I would to God we had all more of such decision, for the lack of it is depriving our religious life of its backbone and substituting for honest manliness a mass of the tremulous jelly of mutual flattery.

He who does not hate the false does not love the true; and he to whom it is all the same whether it be God’s word or man’s, is himself unrenewed at heart. Oh, if some of you were like fathers you would not have tolerated in this age the wagon loads of trash under which the gospel has been of late buried by ministers of your own choosing. You would have hurled out of your pulpits the men who are enemies to the fundamental doctrines of your churches, and yet are crafty enough to become your pastors and undermine the faith of a fickle and superficial generation.

These men steal the pulpits of once orthodox churches, because otherwise they would have none at all. Their powerless theology cannot of itself arouse sufficient enthusiasm to enable them to build a mousetrap at the expense of their admirers, and therefore they profane the houses which your sires have built for the preaching of the gospel, and turn aside the organisations of once orthodox communities to help their infidelity: I call it by that name in plain English, for “modern thought” is not one whit better, and of the two evils I give infidelity the palm, for it is less deceptive.

I beg the Lord to give back to the churches such a love to his truth that they may discern the spirits, and cast out those which are not of God… (Online source)

________________________________________________________________________________
Endnotes:

[1] John MacArthur, Reckless Faith: When The Church Loses Its Will To Discern [Wheaton: Crossway Books, 1994], 27, 28.

See also:

DID JESUS ARGUE DOCTRINE?

THE EMERGING CHURCH SOWING ITS NEO-ORTHODOX CONFUSION ON SCRIPTURE

IS ROB BELL EVANGELICAL?

PD/SD PASTOR SCOTT HODGE AND THIS IS YOUR BRAIN ON MYSTICISM

SADDLEBACK CHURCH, RICK WARREN, AND SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINES

MARK DRISCOLL AND NEO-REFORMED NEW CALVINIST CONTEMPLATIVE SPIRITUALITY

THE PERILS OF ‘WANNABE MYSTIC’ CHRISTIANITY BRETT MCCRACKEN

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You need to understand that this Liberalism 2.0 is the theology EC guru Brian McLaren has begun to lay out in his latest book A New Kind of Christianity. If you wish to understand how the church visible has become so muddied then it’s also important for you understand that the Emerging Church was a Trojan Horse that unloaded corrupt Contemplative Spirituality/Mysticism (CSM) ala Living Spiritual Teacher and Quaker mystic Richard Foster, with an able assist from his spiritual twin Dallas Willard, within the mainstream of evangelicalism.

What has happened is that for a good fifteen years now evangelical churches have used their Young Adult and Youth ministries as spiritual guinea pigs in “alternative” worship services where the warped and toxic teachings of Emergent Church leaders have been used; e.g. mystics like EC rock star pastor Rob Bell and heretical quasi-universalist Emerging Church pastor Doug Pagitt who heads the Emergent Solomon’s Porch where the equally heretical Tony Jones happens to be his “theologian in residence.”

And this is the reason why I even have to cover messed up mystics like Mike Morrell and obvious unbelievers like Living Spiritual Teacher and Progessive Christian scholar Marcus Borg. I introduced you to Morrell previously in Mike Morrell On Matthew Fox, John Wimber, And The Emerging Church where I told you his Twitter bio explains that he’s:

Futurist @KedgeForward. Grad Fellow, Strategic Foresight MA @RegentU. Provocateur-In-Residence, David Group Int’l. Journalist. Nu-media publicist. Opti-mystic. (Online source)

Morrell is “Partner/Foresight Professional” for something called KedgeForward, whose KedgeForward blog, which I first cited in Richard Rohr And The Emerging Church As The Third Way; also a piece which ran in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in September of 2004 called Tie That Binds ‘Emergent’ Church informs us:

Michael Morrell keeps the emergent church network informed with a Web site that promises ‘the best Jesus-infused sites you never knew about.’…[and] has become one of the movement’s linchpins, connecting thousands of previously disconnected people and emergent groups through the Internet…

 As an editor for “the Ooze,” Morrell keeps in touch with the central people and ideas sparking the movement… (Online source)

The point being, Morrell is deeply involved with the leading voices within this neo-liberal Emergent cult, which often calls itself “the converstion”; however the truth is, it’s always only been their own monologue amongst the likeminded. And today Morrell wanted to make sure we knew as he asked:

(Online source)

The link takes us to the “official wbsite” of Marcus J. Borg, who is as Christian as I am Mormon; you see, like Marcus Borg, the faithful member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons) also uses the same words as those of us who’ve actually been regenerated and then hold the doctrines of the historic, orthodox, Christian faith. The problem is, the meanings of these words vary greatly for each; and no informed Mormon would ever make the mistake of considering me a member of their non-Christian cult.

Suddenly however, weak-kneed professing evangelicals appear unable to tell the difference between someone like myself and an apostate (at best) like Marcus Borg. Certainly, as you can see in Do We Believe In The Same Jesus Philip Clayton?, progressive/liberals such as EC guru Brian Mclaren’s “big tent” builder Clayton can’t. That’s why I asked him the following question on his blog, which as far as I know he has yet to answer:

To be clear, I said of a liberal/progressive like Marcus Borg: “We don’t believe in the same Jesus.” And you said, “I don’t think that would be the impression of the neutral observer on this site.”

So this neutral observer would think that someone like myself who holds to the full Deity of Jesus Christ, in addition to His full humanity, and Marcus Borg who believes Jesus was simply a man, believe in the same Jesus? (Online source)

As I showed you in Marcus Borg And Christians Who Don’t Believe In Jesus his doctrine concerning Christ Jesus of Nazareth—God Himself in human flesh—and for that matter, Borg’s heretical position concerning cardinal doctrines of Christianity in general, is crystal clear. What is not generally known, beyond those of us who’ve read many of his books, is how it is that Marcus Borg has come to believe what he believes, which is why I’ve brought these things to your attention in this post.

Due to my studies into Comparative Religion, and the mytic strains within them, Borg’s post Mystical Experiences of God intrigued me since it’s my contention that the practice of meditation in altered states of consciousness—transcendental i.e. transforming—is actually laying the foundation for a Global Religion, which will one day be headed by the Anti-Christ. That’s why I’ve been warning Christians to stay away from the growing fad of Contemplative/Centering Prayer, which is itself transcendental meditation-lite.

Courtesy of the unbelieving Marcus Borg, you’re about to see yet another example of the spiritual suicide one commits when they abandon the proper Christian spirituality of Sola Scriptura in favor of the deceiving spirituality of the self (see—2 Timothy 3:2). In this post, which originally ran on the website of  The Washington Post, Borg informs us:

My most formative religious experiences were a series of mystical experiences. They began to occur in my early thirties. They changed my understanding of the meaning of the word “God”-of what that word points to-and gave me an unshakable conviction that God (or “the sacred”) is real and can be experienced.

These experiences also convinced me that mystical forms of Christianity are true, and that the mystical forms of all the enduring religions of the world are true. (Online source)

Notice above that for Marcus Borg 1) “religious experiences” from “a series of mysticial experiences” were what changed his “understanding,” i.e. the source of his transformation, and 2) these “experiences” then caused him to believe “the mystical forms” of various pagan religions “are true.” I showed you in Through Rob Bell “The Great Enlightened Ones” Tell Us Man Has Divine Greatness that in his sermon I will say it again, and again, and again the Elvis of the Emerging Church put it this way:

When you read the great enlightened ones; meditation, centering prayer, reflection—in every tradition you can find the mystics—and what’s always at the heart of the spiritual lives, the everyday lives of the great ones was always a period of time.

Whether it’s prayers, chanting, meditation, reflection, study—whatever you call it—what is it essentially; it’s taking time to breathe. (On file at Apprising Ministries)

Like I said before, as far as I’m concerned, if one doesn’t recognize here that—along with Marcus Borg—Bell is praising “the mystics” for their supposedly superior spiritual understanding, which is but a reimagined Gnosticism, I personally believe it’s simply because they just do not wish to see. And this is precisely the problem: Mystical experiences are self-authenticating because there is no way to verify them outside of what mystics like Marcus Borg and Rob Bell tell us they, or outrightly pagan mystics, are allegedly experiencing.

In cloing this, for now, this is why I left the below comment in the combox of the aforementioned post by Marcus Borg; outside of here, it’s not likely to see the light of day:

(Online source)

See also:

SEDUCING SPIRITS SOUNDING THE SAME

TRANSFORMING CHRISTIANITY THROUGH EASTERN-STYLE MEDITATION

USING CONTEMPLATIVE/CENTERING PRAYER AS “CHRISTIAN” MEDITATION

THE “DEATH” OF THE EMERGING CHURCH AND BIG TENT CHRISTIANITY

PHILIP CLAYTON AND THE EMERGING CHURCH 2.0

LIBERALISM 2.0 THE NEW PROGRESSIVE CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY  

ACTS 29 NETWORK AND REFORMED COUNTER REFORMATION SPIRITUALITY?

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The PyroManiacs devote some space each weekend to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive. The following excerpt is from “Under Constraint,” a sermon preached Sunday morning 28 April 1878 at the Metropolitan Tabernacle in London:

I have not much patience with a certain class of Christians nowadays who will hear anybody preach so long as they can say, “He is very clever, a fine preacher, a man of genius, a born orator.” Is cleverness to make false doctrine palatable? Why, sirs, to me the ability of a man who preaches error is my sorrow rather than my admiration.

I cannot endure false doctrine, however neatly it may be put before me. Would you have me eat poisoned meat because the dish is of the choicest ware? It makes me indignant when I hear another gospel put before the people with enticing words, by men who would fain make merchandise of souls; and I marvel at those who have soft words for such deceivers.

“That is your bigotry,” says one. Call it so if you like, but it is the bigotry of the loving John who wrote—”If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed: for he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds.”

I would to God we had all more of such decision, for the lack of it is depriving our religious life of its backbone and substituting for honest manliness a mass of the tremulous jelly of mutual flattery.

He who does not hate the false does not love the true; and he to whom it is all the same whether it be God’s word or man’s, is himself unrenewed at heart. Oh, if some of you were like fathers you would not have tolerated in this age the wagon loads of trash under which the gospel has been of late buried by ministers of your own choosing. You would have hurled out of your pulpits the men who are enemies to the fundamental doctrines of your churches, and yet are crafty enough to become your pastors and undermine the faith of a fickle and superficial generation.

These men steal the pulpits of once orthodox churches, because otherwise they would have none at all. Their powerless theology cannot of itself arouse sufficient enthusiasm to enable them to build a mousetrap at the expense of their admirers, and therefore they profane the houses which your sires have built for the preaching of the gospel, and turn aside the organisations of once orthodox communities to help their infidelity: I call it by that name in plain English, for “modern thought” is not one whit better, and of the two evils I give infidelity the palm, for it is less deceptive.

I beg the Lord to give back to the churches such a love to his truth that they may discern the spirits, and cast out those which are not of God… (Online source)

Charles Spurgeon

You can read the rest of this sermon excerpt and join in the discussion right here.

See also:

DOUG PAGITT, JOHN PIPER, AND KARMA KICK-BACK

N.T. WRIGHT SPEAKING AT REDEEMER NYC OF TIM KELLER

JIM WALLIS AND SOJOURNERS WHINE ABOUT CIVILITY FOR THOSE HIJACKING CHRISTIANITY

JESUS, RECONSIDERED: BRIAN MCLAREN AND AL MOHLER ON NPR

BRIAN MCLAREN AND HIS NEW EMERGING PROGRESSIVE THEOLOGY

“CELEBRATION OF DISCIPLINE” BY RICHARD FOSTER AN ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THEOLOGICAL ERROR 

9 MARKS: INTERVARSITY PRESS SEEMS ADRIFT

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“I told you that you would die in your sins; if you do not believe that I am [the eternal God], you will indeed die in your sins.”

Christians Who Don’t Believe In Jesus?

In the earlier Apprising Ministries piece Ken Silva Answers Philip Clayton I told you that in his post SHOULD the church adapt to a post-Google world?, over at his personal blog Clayton’s Emergings, process/progressive theologian Dr. Philip Clayton had specifically discussed me as a critic of the recently concluded Emerging Church conference Theology After Google (TAG). You may know that Clayton is among those currently cobbling together a new upgraded version of Progressive Christianity—Liberalism 2.0—aka Emergence Christianity.

This new progressive Christian theology is what A New Kind of Christianity, the new book by Brian McLaren, begins to attempt to lay out systematically. TAG was the first major attempt to mobilize Emergent Church troops to start using new social media in an attempt to help with Clayton’s goal of Transforming Theology; in fact, Transforming Christian Theology (TCT) is the title of Clayton’s current book. Concerning Clayton’s work McLaren asks:

How can Philip Clayton make the idea of big-tent, progressive Christianity so believable and attractive that one can imagine Evangelicals, Charismatics, Mainliners, and Roman Catholics having a meal and joyfully discussing it together? (Online source)

As a matter of fact, the foreword to Clayton’s TCT was even written by Tony Jones, progressive theologian in residence at the Emerging Church of his universalist pastor Doug Pagitt. In that prior piece by Clayton, which I mentioned earlier, he begans by telling us “the big ‘Theology After Google’ event” has come to an end; but says Clayton, “this major conference wasn’t really about Google” nor in “one sense” was TAG “even about technology.” He saw it as being “about two questions: should the church adapt to the rapidly changing world around us? And, if so, what precisely should we do?”

Then Clayton continued:

Well, imagine the alternative. Indeed, there’s an easy way to see it up close and personal: just go to the websites of the critics of the Theology After Google (TAG) conference. Ken Silva called the TAG conference a “heresy fest” and, later, “nothing more than a warped and toxic twisting of the actual Christian faith.” You — each of you, each reader — has to decide for himself or herself. I encourage you to go to Ken’s blog and read it with an open mind. (Online source)

During an exchange in the combox, both of us doing theology while using some of the new social media, one of Clayton’s followers addressed me about “dominant emphases in evangelical vs. progressive theological reflection.” So I went to the heart as to why there can never be agreement between a Bible-believing Christian minister like myself and a progressive/liberal one like Clayton. In showing the contrast, I used Marcus Borg, whom I do respect for his willingness to go on record with his beliefs where so many others with similar views choose instead to use Humpty Dumpty Language.

As I pointed out at Clayton’s blog:

I guess what I’m trying to say is, a progressive e.g. like Marcus Borg, and one such as I who holds to the historic Christian faith I alluded to before, can never have unity. We don’t believe in the same Jesus; so as admirable as it is to try and make a “big tent” Christianity to include us both, in the end, it ceases to be Christian.

That said, there’s nothing even in Reformation theology that precludes caring for the good of our fellow man. Without arguing I’m simply stating that my point is, as I see it, we don’t need to jettison proper Christian doctrine even in an “after Google world.” (Online source)

Later, while speaking to another commenter, Clayton addresses my comment but doesn’t speak directly to me as he says:

In a sense, it’s MORE valuable because we are wrestling together with hard questions of what it means to be Christlike today, even though we don’t agree on all the details.

For this reason, it makes me sad to read above, “We don’t believe in the same Jesus; so as admirable as it is to try and make a ‘big tent’ Christianity to include us both, in the end, it ceases to be Christian.” I don’t think that would be the impression of the neutral observer on this site. (Online source)

This is when I asked Dr. Philip Clayton the following question, to which he’s never responded:

To be clear, I said of a liberal/progressive like Marcus Borg: “We don’t believe in the same Jesus.” And you said, “I don’t think that would be the impression of the neutral observer on this site.”

So this neutral observer would think that someone like myself who holds to the full Deity of Jesus Christ, in addition to His full humanity, and Marcus Borg who believes Jesus was simply a man, believe in the same Jesus? (Online source)

Attempting To Eradicate Who Jesus Actually Is For The Sake Of Pleasing Mankind

Since Clayton’s still not responded I feel led to use this issue as a teaching to further illustrate the futility of attempting to pass off as Christian this new version progressive theology, which Clayton and the Emerging Church 2.0 are now attempting to spread throughout mainstream evangelicalism. In the new articles The Emerging Church And The New Progressive Theology On Christ and The Emerging Church And The New Progressive Theology On Other Religions I’ve begun showing you that Liberalism 2.0 is virtually identical to the original Cult of Liberalism.

And now let’s look quickly at the “Jesus” in whom progressive theologian Marcus Borg believes. First we take Borg’s view that Jesus is a, but not the, “decisive revelation” of God: 

To be Christian means to find the decisive revelation of God in Jesus. To be Muslim means to find the decisive revelation of God in the Koran. To be Jewish means to find the decisive revelation of God in the Torah, and so forth. I don’t think that one of these is better than the other. You could even say they are all divinely given paths to the sacred. To be Christian in this kind of context means to be deeply committed to one’s own tradition, even as one recognizes the validity of other traditions. (Online source, emphasis in original) 

Borg begins by telling us at his website A Portrait of Jesus that Jesus never even said what I quoted above in the opening text; Borg believes that, “The titles of Jesus (son of God, messiah, light of the world, etc.) are not found in the earliest layer of tradition and are not part of self proclamation of Jesus.” [1]  Further for Borg, “Jesus is an epiphany of God, a manifestation of the sacred, the decisive disclosure of God.” [2] And finally in his book Jesus, while answering his own rhetorical question asking whether Jesus was “God,” Borg emphatically states, “No.” [3]

In an earlier piece called Will The Real Jesus Please Stand Up?, using the old TV game show To Tell The Truth as a backdrop, I personalized the “Jesus” of a number of non-Christian cults and religious traditions as if they were a guest signing in before the panel. Now I give you the ”Jesus” ala Marcus Borg and classic liberal/progressive theology as he introduces himself to you:

I am the Jesus of today’s liberal theology of inclusive, politically correct, universalism. I am only a human man. I was not born of a virgin, nor did I actually rise from the dead. Unfortunately as a Jewish Rabbi, I attracted such devoted followers that even after my death they wanted to keep my spirit alive so to speak. And so they went and built this elaborate theology around me, which is largely based on the writings of that rascal Paul. Sadly, they ended up making me into a god.

I taught that the most important thing we can do is to love one another. You see, that’s all that matters because we are the brotherhood of man. No one should ever criticize what another person honestly believes about God. After-all, we are all God’s children. And even though we may take different paths of religion in this life, as all religions please God if they are sincere, in the end we’ll all be with God because everyone is going to be saved. Man is too good to be condemned and God is too good to condemn him. As long as you love one another it really doesn’t matter to God what you believe about him. He’s just delighted if you believe in him.

And so, “don’t worry; be happy.” You need to feel good about yourself. Every religion reserves a place for me as I’m the most popular Jesus because I’m not going to make any demands of you. The only choice believing in me requires that if you are going to follow my teachings you will have to look at the Bible as being the same as all the other religious literature. You don’t really need to be any more concerned with the Bible than you would be with any other religious teachings. Although it does teach some truth about God, the Bible isn’t any more important than any of the other holy books of other cultures. I teach that all of them contain a way to God and that all religions eventually lead back to God; so, I’m not exactly clear on why I had to go to the cross.

Following is Christ Jesus of Nazareth of biblical revelation in whom I personally believe:

I am the Jesus of the historic, orthodox Christian Church, which I purchased with My Own blood. I Am the one true and eternal God incarnate—God the Son—second Person of the blessed and Holy Trinity. I am the very Creator of the entire universe and the only Savior of hopelessly lost mankind. There is never a time that I did not exist as I am the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world.

And in the fullness of time I was born of the Virgin Mary and clothed with human flesh. Then while on My planet I lived the sinless life necessary of you to come and be in the Presence of God the Father. In My Father’s will and for His glory, I willingly sacrificed My perfect life for yours, and shed My blood on the Cross as an offering for the sins of all who will be regenerated by God the Holy Spirit; who believe in Me.

I bore the wrath of Almighty God that you deserve and as I died in your place I said: “It is finished.” I was buried, but on the third day, I rose again from the dead in the same Body so that you could know that I am the One I claim to be. Now you can trust in Me because by My resurrection you know that I am able to save all those who by God’s grace alone, place their faith alone, in Me alone. I say that in all the universe there is only one God; you are not Him, nor will you ever be.”

In closing this out, for now, I am someone who believes that Jesus Christ is God the Son, at the same time fully God, and fully Man; and Marcus Borg is someone who believes Jesus was simply a man, albeit a son of God. And so, I now ask again; this time in public: Dr. Philip Clayton, do we believe in the same Jesus?  

________________________________________________________________________________
Endnotes: 

1. http://www.aportraitofjesus.org/lens.shtml, accessed 3/22/10.
2. http://www.aportraitofjesus.org/posteaster.shtml, accessed 3/22/10.
3. Marcus Borg, Jesus: Uncovering the Life, Teachings, and Relevance of a Religious Revolutionary [New York: HarperSanFrancisco, 2006], 136.

See also:

THE EMERGING CHURCH, PHILIP CLAYTON, AND NEW PROGRESSIVE THEOLOGY

MARCUS BORG AND ROB BELL: THE BIBLE IS NOT A DIVINE PRODUCT WITH DIVINE FINAL AUTHORITY?

LIBERALISM 2.0 THE NEW PROGRESSIVE CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY

THE NON-GOSPEL OF THE EMERGING CHURCH 2.0

YOU LOVE JESUS; GOOD FOR YOU, BUT WHICH ONE?

IF YOU TRULY LOVE “JESUS” THERE ARE NO BOUNDARIES FOR THE “CHRIST-FOLLOWERS”

THE NEW CHRISTIANITY OF BRIAN MCLAREN AND THE EMERGING CHURCH

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You may recall Bouma from Radio Interview With Jeremy Bouma The Insider Who Just Left The Emerging Church. Bouma’s timely post begins: 

In an address exploring the finality of Christ in a pluralist world on Tuesday, Dr Rowan Williams said people who believed in absolute truth were liable to be branded bigots or intolerant by those who felt that what was right for some was not necessarily right for others. 

“Belief in the uniqueness or finality of Christ is something that sits very badly indeed, not just with a plural society but with a society that regards itself as liberal or democratic,” he said. (Online source) 

And as I said in my comment to Jeremy concerning the phrase “affirming the uniqueness and finality of Christ”: 

As I see it, the issue is, what does one mean by those words? In my opinion, it’s time to ask some serious questions and get people to define their terms. 

One quick example; even Marcus Borg, who denies the Deity (uniqueness?) of Jesus on Nazareth, would agree that the “finality” of Christ is that “Christ” is the way Christians refer to the logos (spark of the divine) of God that’s in all of creation itself. 

Years ago in his classic textbook The Kingdom of the Cults Dr. Walter Martin (1928-1989) spoke of the importance of scaling the language barrier because: 

The well-trained cultist will carefully avoid definition of terms concerning cardinal doctrines such as the Trinity, the deity of Christ, the Atonement, the bodily resurrection of our Lord, the process of salvation by grace and justification by faith. If pressed in these areas, he will redefine the terms to fit the semantic framework of orthodoxy unless he is forced to define his terms explicitly. [1] 

How sad that I’m finding I now have to employ techniques that I once used for evangelizing non-Christian cultists with people who are associated e.g. with the Emerging Church and Brian McLaren. For example, in Brian McLaren Invites You On His Quest To Destroy Christianity I showed you that in his latest book A New Kind of Christianity McLaren confides there was a time when he “began losing faith” in the way he once read the Bible.  

But then he goes on to tell us that he was so fortunate to be able to learn a new way to approach the Scriptures “from Christian scholars” such as Roman “Catholics” like fellow Red Letter Christian “Richard Rohr” as well as “Protestants” like Progessive Christian scholar “Marcus Borg.” However, when we consider Borg’s testimony from the interspiritual website Explore Faith, where he’s on the Editorial Board along with Phyllis Tickle of Emergence Christianity [2], we encounter a very serious problem: 

To be Christian means to find the decisive revelation of God in Jesus. To be Muslim means to find the decisive revelation of God in the Koran. 

To be Jewish means to find the decisive revelation of God in the Torah, and so forth. I don’t think that one of these is better than the other. You could even say they are all divinely given paths to the sacred. To be Christian in this kind of context means to be deeply committed to one’s own tradition, even as one recognizes the validity of other traditions. (Online source, emphasis in original) 

A nice sentiment from Dr. Borg, but not a Christian view; and taken along with his denial of the Deity of Jesus Christ, I find myself asking: Can you actually be a Christian when you don’t even believe what Christians believe? Jesus Himself said to Jewish religious leaders—men every bit as pious as Marcus Borg — “I said therefore to you that you will die in the sins of you; for if you believe not that I Am [the eternal God], you will die in the sins of you” (John 8:24, literal Greek). 

The Good News of Christ Jesus is repentance and forgiveness of sins in His Name; in other words, the regenerated believer will not die in his sins. But Marcus Borg, by his own admission, does not believe Jesus is God in human flesh i.e. very God of very God; so by definition then, 1) this is a different Jesus (see—2 Corinthians11:4), and 2) Dr. Borg is in danger of dying in his sins. Therefore, if we love Marcus Borg, we won’t let him deceive himself into thinking he’s a Christian; no instead, we’ll pray for his repentance and preach the Gospel to him. 

________________________________________________________________________________
Endnotes:  

1. Walter Martin, The Kingdom of the Cults, Ravi Zacharias, Gen. Ed. (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 2005), 33.
2. http://www.explorefaith.org/about/editorial_board/index.php, accessed 3/7/10. 

See also: 

FOR BRIAN MCLAREN AND MARCUS BORG BEING “BORN AGAIN” IS REACHING “ENLIGHTENMENT”?

MARCUS BORG ON THE BIBLE AND HIS “JESUS”

MARCUS BORG: “NON-EXCLUSIVE” AND “PROGRESSIVE CHRISTIAN”

MARCUS BORG: BUDDHA WAS BORN AGAIN

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THE EMERGING CHURCH SOWING ITS NEO-ORTHODOX CONFUSION ON SCRIPTURE 

BOB DEWAAY: EMERGENT CHURCH ASKS “HAS GOD SAID?” 

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Under under Discipleship Resources of the State Board of Missions of the Alabama Baptist Convention one finds a “resource” from the Georgia Baptist Convention which encourages Southern Baptists to learn a practice of apostate Roman Catholicism called Lectio Divina from Tony Jones, a leading theologian in the egregiously ecumenical Emerging Church aka Emergent Church—morphing into Emergence Christianity.

Sadly, this is the exact same foolish progression which would eventually lead to the Protestant Reformation in the first place. And in this case it has opened the door into mainstream evangelicalism for mystics openly hostile to Sola Scriptura such as EC icon Rob Bell to sow their love of “mystery.” In addition, as more and more people begin thinking with their “heart” [read: emotions] we will watch the inevitable progession that previously took place within the nearly dead mainline “Protestant” denominations.

Roughly, and generally, it goes like this: Beginning with the spurious spirituality of CSM, next comes ecumenicism, which brings with it acceptance that the Roman Catholic Church as simply another “Christian faith tradition”; then ordination of women pastors, questioning the doctrine of Hell, inclusiveness—particularly of GLBTQs, and then the ordination of practicing homosexuals. Men like Jones are already helping to advance the notoriety of such “gay affirming pastors” as Nadia Bolz-Weber and Jay Bakker, who tells us he’s a friend of Jones.

If you’re brave enough, poll the Young Adult and Youth Groups at your local evangelical church and you’ll see just how far the above progression has already advanced within them after years of being used as spiritual guinea pigs trying out “alternative worship practices” [read: Emerging Church]. Well not trusting the Lord to add to His Church His way, the lust for numbers, and turning away from the all-sufficiency of Holy Scripture to the Church Growth Movement with its various forms of pragmatism has come with a cost.

Against this backdrop, over at Extreme Theology, fellow CRN contributor Chris Rosebrough of Pirate Christian Radio begins this in-depth article on a critical subject:

Modern and Post-Modern Liberals (Emergents) and their higher-critic and deconstructionist co-belligerents have an almost obsessive preoccupation with undermining, impugning, and maligning God’s Word. They incessantly attack the inerrancy, historicity and sufficiency of scripture and their attacks are getting bolder by the day. These people appear driven to reduce the Bible into a mere human product that is nothing more than man-made mythological narratives.

Stories of pristine gardens, Adam and Eve, forbidden fruit, a world-wide flood, the ark, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorra, and a prophet being swallowed by a big fish are too silly and childish to be believed as actual historical events by this growing Liberal resurgence. Before you fall for these so-called progressives and their post-modern re-imaginations of the scriptures you should consider Jesus’ opinion and views of the Bible.

As you will see, Jesus had much to say about the scriptures and anyone who calls themselves a Christ-follower would do well to consider Jesus’ views of God’s Word before they attack or impugn it… (Online source)

See also:

SBC PROTESTANT PASTOR RICK WARREN DOUBLE-MINDED ON THE REFORMATION AND ROMAN CATHOLICISM

THE NEW DOWNGRADE CREATES NO CONTROVERSY TODAY

JOHN MACARTHUR: SEEKER-FRIENDLY MOVEMENT IS THE NEW LIBERALISM

SOUTHERN BAPTIST PASTOR RICK WARREN AND SADDLEBACK CHURCH OPENLY RECOMMEND CONTEMPLATIVE SPIRITUALITY

RANK HERESY BEING PREACHED AT MHBC OF ROB BELL

IF YOU TRULY LOVE “JESUS” THERE ARE NO BOUNDARIES FOR THE “CHRIST-FOLLOWERS”

THE NEW CHRISTIANS WITH CHRISTIANITY WORTH BELIEVING—NO SOLA SCRIPTURA: YES, WOMEN PASTORS AND QUEER CHRISTIANS

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