Apprising Ministries has been covering for you the latest apostasia-palooza thrown by the sinfully ecumenical [i.e. Reformation repudiating] Emergent Church aka the Emerging Church. You may recall that in articles like The Emerging Church On A Wild Goose Chase and The Wild Goose Of The Emerging Church Is Not The Holy Spirit I told you about the recently concluded interspiritual shindig, which they called the Wild Goose Festival (WGF).

It’s important for you to realize that this evil Emergent menace attacking the final authority of God’s Word has quite literally grown into a full-blown neo-liberal cult operating within evangelicalism; and it’s swallowing up large sections of the church visible.

This is leading to a real and present Progressive Degeneration Within Mainstream Evangelicalism; and the fact is, WGF was actually a way for the EC to more fully showcase its spiritual circus “big tent” Emergence Christianity, which is their Liberalism 2.0—a new postmodern quasi-universal form of Progressive Christianity. At its satanic core it carries the ne0-Gnostic mystic corruption Contemplative Spirituality/Mysticism(CSM)—a refried Roman Catholic mysticism, which was supposedly “discovered” by Living Spiritual Teacher and Quaker mystic Richard Foster.

With an able assist from his spiritual twin SBC minister Dallas Willard, this spurious CSM has been perpetrated as Spiritual Formation for years now, particularly in the younger sectors of the evangelical mainstream. Now, it’s critical to understand here that for CSM to thrive it has to destroy confidence in the proper Christian spirituality of sola Scriptura; here’s the critical point for you to get down, practitioners of this neo-Gnosticism depend upon highly subjective experience concerning what they think God has said, as opposed to objective experience found by looking in Scripture, where we know God has spoken.

Can you see what’s happened; the heart of the ostensibly Protestant Christian community is responsible for crippling its own future by handing their young to wolves like gay-affirming universalist Doug Pagitt, his progressive/liberal theologian in residence Tony Jones, two-thirds of the apostate EC trinity along with Living Spiritual Teacher and EC guru Brian McLaren. Because of their long-time practice of CSM and rejecting of sola Scriptura these leaders within the early EC have long ago left anything even remotely representing the historic orthodox Christian faith.

Each of them was involved with WGF, which is why I said that the wise Christian will have nothing to do with these neo-Gnostic fools who’ve unbuckled themselves from the Word of God and have embarked upon their Wild Goose Chase of subjective experience. Well, as we can see in Tony Jones Of The Emerging Church Shares About Ken Silva, apparently the truth hurts. Looking down on the battlefield from this vantage point let’s take a look at A broader church: Fun in the woods with gay, tattooed and generally liberal folk, which begins:

AT LEAST 25 Christian music festivals are held each summer in America, but they have never catered for theological liberals. Until this year, that is, when the Wild Goose Festival—named after a Celtic symbol for the Holy Spirit—kicked off on June 23rd…
(Online source)

That would depend upon how one defines liberal, but it’s interesting the author of this piece equates “theological liberals” with WGF. They are correct; as I just showed you in Brian McLaren Admits Ken Silva Was Right, guru McLaren is now out of his theological closet and openly refers to himself as a progressive Christian. The author is also right that WGF “was based on Britain’s Greenbelt Festival,” which I told you about in Greenbelt Festival A Peek At Future Inclusive Christianity. As I previously pointed out that it’s just more quasi-Christianity. A “have it your own way” Burger King faith for the postmodern set; and it’s not only gay affirming, but it’s also highly ecumenical and steeped in counter-Reformation spirituality.

Next we’re informed WGF was indeed as spiritually whacked as Greenbelt:

Instead of Bible studies, there were labyrinth walks. Instead of praise-and-worship music, there was hymn-singing in a beer garden and a bluegrass liturgy presided over by a tattooed female Lutheran minister. (Online source)

That “tattooed female Lutheran minister” would be heretical self-professed “queer inclusive” ELCA pastrix Nadia Bolz-Weber whom I introduced you to in Christianity 21 And Alleged Innovative Voices In The Faith: Nadia Bolz-Weber. Then we find out WGF is not interested in advancing the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but rather ala 2 Timothy 3:2 it’s really a celebration of the self:

Lecture topics ranged from sex trafficking and social justice to authority in the church and interfaith relations. Visitors could learn from Tom Prasada-Rao, a singer, how to chant “Om” and “Hallelujah Hare Krishna”, or hear Paul Fromberg, a pastor from San Francisco, talking about his 2005 wedding to another man.

“God is changing the church through the bodies of gay men,” Mr Fromberg told a packed session on human sexuality. Also under discussion was “religious multiple belonging”—in other words, belonging to a clutch of different faiths at once. (Online source)

A genuine Christian would be grieved by those caught in the idolatry of Hinduism, not encouraging people to learn how to practice it. It’s one thing to be interested in people of other faiths, which as someone dealing in Comparative Religions I am; however, it’s quite another to join them in pagan worship of demons (cf. 1 Corinthians 10:20-21). As far as the fantasy of Fromberg is concerned, there actually is an element of truth in what he said. Sadly, using these emerging fools, the god of this age is changing the church visible through the bodies of gay men. You can also see we’re off-roading again into wasted Wonderland of Humpty Dumpty language with “religious multiple belonging.” This has zero to do with Christianity; God hates idolatry.

The writer of the report then introduces us to an old friend as we’re told that gay affirming “pastor” Jay Bakker who leads a sad church social club by the name of Revolution:NYC was at WGF to give “meandering talks on growing up fundamentalist.” I’ve told you in pieces like Jay Bakker, Homosexuality, And Gospel Reductionism that Bakker also heads up a group of largely biblically illiterate, and I say a rather rapscallion bunch spiritually, who anointed themselves Outlaw Preachers (OPs) and have galvanized around him. Another part of Bakker’s legacy figures for him to be tip-of-the-spear for the EC’s pushing for acceptance within evangelicalism that the deviant and sinful lifestyle of having sexual relations with another of the same sex, i.e homosexuality, is a viable one for the regenerated Christian.

Later we’re given the following fable:

We’re a laboratory for justice, spirituality and art in the way of Jesus,” explained Gareth Higgins, the festival director and a peace activist from Belfast who has worked with Greenbelt and now lives in North Carolina. He and other organisers managed, miraculously, to recruit 150 musicians and speakers, none of whom charged for their services. They hope that the emergent cohort will rise from the ashes of an evangelicalism ruined by right-wing politics. (Online source)

No, this is not the way of the actual Jesus, nor is it Protestant evangelicalism at all. As I said before this is a Wild Goose Chase after another Jesus than the one we’ve always proclaimed, and to receive a different spirit from the one we received, and to accept a different gospel from the one we’ve always accepted (cf. 2 Corinthians 11:4) because their mystic mush god with a man-shaped hole in his/her/it’s heart has issued them a new command: “You shall shut off your mind and love mankind, whom you worship, with all of your heart and all of your true self and all of your strength in your nonduality.” We’re also told that the Empress of Emergence Phyllis Tickle was  there at WGF and said, “‘We’re at the start of a 500-year upheaval in culture and the church.’” 

I’m not sure if it’ll last 500-years, but these Emergent neo-Gnostic apostates do figure to cause the same upheaval within the mainstream of evangelicalism that their evil forebears in the original cult of liberalism did in the mainline denominations. It doesn’t figure to be too long before a known evangelical figure announces themselves a homosexual, which will then detonate the very same debate now ripping apart the mortally wounded mainline. So it should come as no surprise that:

Mainline Protestants, however, seemed delighted by the festival, and may well latch on to the emergents to shore up their shrinking numbers. Buoyed by their success, Wild Goose’s organisers are planning to repeat the festival next year in the same bucolic place.
(Online source)

Tragically, such as these can’t see that they’re only merging onto the broad path which Jesus said:

leads to destruction (Matthew 7:13).

See also:

TOXIC THEOLOGY OF DOUG PAGITT

TONY JONES, THE EMERGING CHURCH AND PROGRESSIVE CHRISTIANITY

BRIAN MCLAREN SPEAKS AS A UNIVERSALIST

ROB BELL AND POSTMODERN NEO-LIBERALISM

BIG TENT PROGRESSIVE CHRISTIANITY AS LIBERALISM 2.0

THE EMERGING CHURCH AND THE NEW PROGRESSIVE THEOLOGY ON OTHER RELIGIONS

THE EMERGING CHURCH AND THE NEW PROGRESSIVE THEOLOGY ON CHRIST