If you’ve had the opportunity to actually engage in dialogue with people in the Emergent Church you have undoubtedly come away a bit perplexed as your well-founded Biblical arguments concerning the historic orthodox Christian faith just bounce off them like the proverbial BB’s off a brick wall. You’re likely to get a response along the lines of: “How does anyone decide what is real Christian doctrine, and who’s interpretation of the Bible are we supposed to use?”

It is a very serious problem today and certainly we can be sure there are a lot of nice people with a lot of false religious ideas in the world today. The issue we need to help these people focus on however is how is it one becomes a Christian in the first place. We need to remind them of these chilling words from the Master Himself–Christ Jesus of Nazareth–Who tells us in Matthew 7:21-23:

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’”

The tragic fact is that if they do not get back to what the Bible says, this is exactly where those who are following these false prophets of the Emergent Church are going to end up. And none of the pseudo-philosophical mumbo jumbo espoused by Brian McLaren, or some alleged new perspective on Paul in N.T. Wright’s writings is ever going to change that. To the more spiritually astute you’ll notice that we’re watching more and more Emergents heading into the truth of these words of Holy Scripture:

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths (2 Timothy 4:3-4, NASB).

The Emperor’s Clothes

Can you see it now, myths like the need for some new “postapproach” to postmodern Christianity, and myths like some new perspective of Paul designed to try and harmonize the veracity of the Scriptures with our twenty-first century seeker sensitive biases. This really becomes pretty clear to those who will simply look objectively at what’s really going on here within the convoluted conversation. The Emergent Church is really nothing more than a revamped version of “The Emperor’s Clothes.” And it only takes one little voice to say “The Emperor doesn’t have any clothes on mommy.”

For here we have Brian McLaren, Walter Brueggeman, N.T. Wright, Leonard Sweet and others within the Emergent Church erecting this intricate system of postmodern “missional” mystical Christianity built on absolutely no Biblcal basis whatsoever. And please don’t fall for that argument about “whose interpretation of the Bible can we really trust.” If you are currently involved in the Emergent Church, or if you have been thinking about becoming part of this confused conversation, in a spirit of friendship I ask you to consider this. If God made man as a propositional being who can exchange ideas such as you and I are doing now, don’t you think He meant to do that so He would then be able to communicate with us in words we could understand?

Let me ask you to consider this: If we as mere creations of God can hold a conversation, then would it be too hard to see that our Lord–the very Creator Himself–would also be able to communicate with us with words that have actual meanings. And this really has to be the logical conclusion of the following statements by Jesus of Nazareth:

“And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” (John 8:32, KJV)

“But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.” (John 14:26)

“But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.” (John 16:13)

Do you see that these things would be impossible if we could not come to understand the language. And if you’ll think along with what I’m sharing with you, now what Paul writes in 1 Cor. 2 should make sense:

This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. (vv.13-14)

“For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ. (v.16)

My prayer is that you will be drawn closer to Jesus and that the Lord will help this to make sense to you so that you may then come away from the emerging and growing confusion…