Unfortunately evangelicalism would make the foolish decision to embrace of the sinfully ecumenical neo-liberal cult of the Emergent Church, with leaders e.g. like the unholy 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.

As a result Apprising Ministries continues following our mission to document the falling away of the evangelical community. A case in point would be the warped and toxic teachings of the Emerging Church rock star pastor Rob Bell, co-teaching pastor at Mars Hill Bible Church along with his good friend Shane Hipps. Bell is openly spewing critical thinking skills-numbing corrupt Contemplative Spirituality/Mysticism (CSM), such as that taught by Living Spiritual Teacher and Quaker mystic Richard Foster along with his spiritual twin and Southern Baptist minister Dallas Willard.

I’ve told you before that the crown jewel of this spurious CSM is a form of meditation in an altered state of consciousness commonly known as Contemplative/Centering Prayer (CCP) and these neo-Gnostics who are pushing their TM-lite CCP know that there’s a very real “transformation” which occurs after its prolonged practice. This approach to spiritually flowered within the antibiblical monastic traditions of apostate Roman Catholicism and would eventually lead to the now all but forgotten Protestant Refomation in the first place.

You may recall from The Emerging Church Hijacking Evangelicalism I showed you that Dr. Walter Martin (1928-1989) told us exactly how Satan injected his poison into the mainline of the visible church:

There is a progression that takes place in liberal theology: It begins with a corrupt bibliology, a corrupt view of the nature and the inspiration of Scripture. They have a corrupt theology because once you are picking and choosing from the Bible what you want, your theology has to suffer from it, because your human reason is corrupt… every major theological seminary that has turned from orthodox Christianity began with disbelief of Biblical doctrine. There wasn’t a single exception.

This corrupt Bibliology then lead them to the next step. Their theology began to be touched by it, their view of the Cross, the Virgin Birth were both immediately questioned; then came the miracles of Christ… And finally they had emptied the Gospel of all its content; they were simply using the outward shell so that they go on collecting money from the people and the churches; because they knew that if the people in the pew knew that they were apostate, they’d throw them out. So the strategy was hang on to the trust funds; hang on to the money we’ve got; hang on the properties we control, and we will gradually educate the laymen into this new approach to theology.

And then finally we will take control of everything. The gradual process of feeding you theological poison until you become immunized enough so that you don’t know what’s happening to you. And when you wake up to what’s happening to you, it’s too late they’ve got everything. That is not a baseless charge, I stand prepared to prove that the Cult of Liberal Theology in the United States has deliberately and consistently followed this methodology to entrap, control and dominate the denominations and the churches of the United States and our educational institutions. (The Cult of Liberalism, available from Walter Martin Religious InfoNet)

It’s critical that you recognize that for years now postmodern progressive liberal leaders in the Emerging Church have been using the exact same strategies to take over the younger sectors of mainstream evangelicalism. This is the proper backdrop to consider New Zondervan CEO Scott Macdonald says he’s a fan of Rob Bell:

Scott Macdonald’s two-month stint as head of Christian publishing house Zondervan has been made permanent.

Macdonald was appointed interim president in March after Zondervan declined to renew the contract of CEO Maureen “Moe” Girkins, who made Zondervan history as the company’s first female chief executive…

On his book shelves at home are several Rob Bell works including his best-selling Nooma DVD series.

Macdonald says he is a fan of Bell’s — at least his earlier work.

“We are really pleased with the stuff we have done with Rob and continue to stand by it,” said Macdonald. “I found everything that I’ve read and absorbed by Rob Bell to be very valuable. It’s all stuff that Rob put together when he was working with Zondervan.”

Macdonald says he doesn’t know whether Zondervan will publish another Bell book. The Grandville pastor’s bestselling and controversial book “Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived” was published by HarperOne, a division of Zondervan’s parent company HarperCollins.

CNN reported Zondervan passed on publishing the book, which challenged traditional views of hell and heaven. But a Zondervan spokeswoman has said the publisher didn’t receive the proposal. (Online source)

See also:

JOHN MACARTHUR ON EPIC HERESY OF ROB BELL

ROB BELL DEFENDING LOVE WINS MYTHOLOGY

APPRISING MINISTRIES: ROB BELL RESOURCES