How should Christians respond to Andy Stanley and other false teachers?
Before we begin Part II, the manner in which this writer and others are publicly and forcefully challenging Andy Stanley and his false teachings should be examined. Many Christians disagree with these actions and quickly quote Matthew 18:15-17 as the proper biblical way by which Christians ought to deal with such presumed errors.
If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over. But if they will not listen, take one or two others along, so that “every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.” If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector. [Matthew 18:15-17. NIV]
Matthew never meant these verses to be used in addressing and dealing with false teachers. First, these verses deal with fellow disciples (brothers and sisters in Christ). Second, these verses deal with personal offences, grievances, or misunderstandings between two Christians. Neither applies when dealing with false teachers.
False teachers are not brothers and sisters in Christ but wolves in sheep’s clothing, and the Bible is plain as to how these people are to be dealt with. The above verses are about personal disputes between two Christians, but false teachers attack the very Word of God with their teachings in the same way Satan deceived Eve in the Garden. The following verses should be applied when confronting false teachers.
But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let them be under God’s curse! [Galatians 1:8. NIV]
Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. [Ephesians 5:11. NIV]
If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not take them into your house or welcome them. Anyone who welcomes them shares in their wicked work. [2 John 1:10-11. NIV]
Jesus and His disciples dealt with heretics immediately, publicly, and severely. To do otherwise is to compromise the Word and accommodate the heretic and his teachings. Many in the modern evangelical church tolerate these false teachers and their work because they fly the flag of a false ecumenicalism. Therefore, false teachers are often accommodated and allowed to remain in the church.
Irresistible – Andy Stanley’s new covenant teachings[1]
Stanley spends the first thirteen chapters of his book denigrating the Old Testament and unhitching it from the New Testament.
Careless mixing and matching of old and new covenant values and imperatives make the current version of our faith unnecessarily resistible. This is why I insist that most of what makes us resistible are thing we should have been resisting all along. [p. 95] [emphasis in original]
According to Stanley, the rules and regulations (the Law and the Prophets) in the Old Testament are the things Christians must resist in order to make way for the irresistible Jesus of the New Testament. But Stanley also finds much in the New Testament that he thinks should be resisted.
He spends the last eleven chapters introducing “a new guiding ethical framework for the new covenant of Christ which has a new commandment that forms the new ethical framework for new covenant people. A framework that is far less complicated, but far more demanding.” [p. 170] [emphasis in original] Again, Stanley believes that those resistible parts of the Old Testament ways of doing things that have crept into the New Testament must be eliminated or at the least ignored.
Participants in the new covenant are not required to obey most of the commandments found in the first half of their Bibles (i.e., the Old Testament). Participants in the new covenant (i.e., the New Testament) are expected to obey the single command Jesus issued as part of his new covenant. Namely: As I have loved you, so you must love one another. [p. 196] [emphasis added]
Conspicuously absent from Jesus’ new-command instructions was an overt reference to his divine right to require such allegiance and obedience. [p. 198] [emphasis added]
Paraphrasing the words of another famous Church Growth movement leader,[2] Stanley is cutting the sinner some slack in the NT when it comes to that OT thing called sin. Stanley admits that Paul’s letters were often packed with exceedingly precise instructions as to how Christians should conduct themselves inside and outside the body of Christ, i.e., the Church. But according to Stanley, Paul explains away the importance of those instructions when writing to the Corinthian church. Paul supposedly admitted “that one of his applications is completely his idea. He goes out of his way to ensure nobody gives Jesus credit for what is his unique contribution.” [pp. 201-202] But Stanley’s interpretation is astounding when one considers the implications for the inerrancy of God’s Word. It would mean that Paul’s words in the NT have less standing than Christ’s words and needn’t be thought as constraining on the lifestyles of the Corinthians. Put another way, if the words of the NT are printed in red, they have greater authority and supposedly are more inspired than the words printed in black, especially if those words in black sound too much like those Old Testament “Thou shalt” and “thou shalt nots.”
Stanley’s justification of love over truth
Stanley justifies his teachings about the New Testament by calling Christians to a “horizontal morality” as opposed to the traditional “vertical morality.”
In the stream of Christianity I grew up in, sin avoidance was pretty much our guiding light…The whole thing was vertical. I was far more concerned about how my behavior affected my standing with God than I was about how my behavior affected anybody else. After all, the Bible says pleasing God is more important than pleasing people. [pp. 173-174]
At this point Stanley with a deft interpretational sleight of hand transforms the Old Testament vertical morality to a New Testament horizontal morality. He begins with Jesus’ discourse with the Pharisee regarding the greatest commandment.
One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” [Matthew 22:35-40. NIV]
Stanley explains that the second commandment was not subordinate to the first but merely second in sequence. He says that for first century Jews loving God meant obeying his commands, but in the new covenant, loving Jesus is loving your neighbor. He has essentially shifted vertical morality to horizontal morality. [pp. 182-183] However, in doing so, Stanley sweeps aside many of the moral attributes of God.
We get a better insight into the meaning of Stanley’s substitution of horizontal morality for vertical morality by understanding that morality is more than a list of do’s and don’ts. A few synonyms are helpful in understanding the meaning of morality: principles, standards, goodness, decency, honesty, integrity, virtue, and perhaps most important, godliness or godlikeness. Has Stanley’s shift from vertical morality to horizontal morality redefined the meaning of morality itself? In a word, yes. Quoting Stanley, “Jesus issued his new commandment as a replacement for everything in the existing list. Including the Big Ten. Just as his new covenant fulfilled and replaced the old covenant, Jesus’ new commandment fulfills and replaces the old commandments.” [p. 196] [emphasis in original]
Essentially, Stanley is saying that those Old Testament definitions of morality that reflect the nature of God are no longer valid and therefore God must have changed. However, James tells us that God is unchangeable with regard to His attributes, His perfection, or His purpose for humankind. “ Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” [James 1:17. NIV] [emphasis added]
To summarize, Stanley’s New Testament theology places love above truth and virtually everything else in the New Testament. To prove his point Stanley quotes 1 John 2:10 but let’s also include the preceding verse.
Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates a brother or sister is still in the darkness. Anyone who loves their brother and sister lives in the light, and there is nothing in them to make them stumble. [1 John 2:9-10. NIV]
Based on this verse Stanley says, “That is remarkable. According to John, who got it straight from Jesus, if we love well, all is well. Period. That’s it. Love well and you’re in the light.” [p. 227] But Stanley’s “Period” is misplaced. It dismisses or ignores verses 15 through17 which commands his disciples to not love the world.
Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them. For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever. [1 John 2:15-17. NIV] [emphasis added]
A complete reading of the 1 John 2 refutes Stanley’s statement that if Christians love well, all is well. The remaining verses of 1 John 2 show that other requirements (i.e., not loving the world) must be met in order to be in the light. Even though Christians love well, if they love the world the Father is not in them, they are not in the light, and all is not well. Once again Andy Stanley is revealed as being a false teacher.
Stanley’s gospel of cheap grace
Stanley’s dismisses vertical morality, but also substantially dismisses horizontal morality except for a Christian loving others well. Recall the excerpt from Stanley’s book quoted in Part I: “The new covenant would fulfill and replace the behavioral, sacrifice-based systems reflected in just about every religion of the ancient world. His new command would serve as the governing behavioral ethic for members of his new movement.” [p. 24] [emphasis added]
What is this new behavioral ethic? Stanley wrote that “Participants in the new covenant are expected to obey the single command Jesus issued as part of his new covenant. Namely: As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” [p. 196] [emphasis in original] Stanley is saying that love is of sole importance, but this essentially sweeps away all other behavioral admonishments found in both the OT and NT and replaces them with “if we love well, all is well. Period.” When one reads Stanley’s book from cover to cover, it is plain to see that his new covenant model is not new but merely the latest and most virulent mutation of cheap grace that substantially eliminates all of the “behavioral” commandments found in the New Testament.
In America many evangelical churches have become apostate by abandoning any pretense of adherence to the gospel message. Biblical truths are twisted, mocked, or dismissed altogether. Others champion a social gospel or preach a gospel of health, wealth, happiness, harmony, and cheap grace in place of the cross and death to self. Eighty years ago, Bonhoeffer described “cheap grace.”
Cheap grace is the deadly enemy of our Church…In such a Church the world finds a cheap covering for its sins; no contrition is required, still less any real desire to be delivered from sin…Cheap grace means the justification of sin without the justification of the sinner…Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.[3]
Anyone who turns from his sinful way at the word of proclamation and repents, receives forgiveness. Anyone who perseveres in his sin receives judgment. The church cannot loose the penitent from sin without arresting and binding the impenitent in sin…For its own sake, for the sake of the sinner, and for the sake of the community, the Holy is to be protected from cheap surrender. The Gospel is protected by the preaching of repentance which calls sin sin and declares the sinner guilty…The preaching of grace can only be protected by the preaching of repentance.[4]
Cheap grace is the end product of preaching the world’s definition of nonjudgmental love which attempts to redefine, hide, or deny sin but does not eradicate it. Rather, it makes a mockery of Christ’s death on the cross to purchase forgiveness for mankind’s sin. Cheap grace makes the shedding of Christ’s blood at Calvary irrelevant for man’s redemption.
The preaching of nonjudgmental love occurs because the world’s definitions of love and tolerance have invaded the church and compromised the gospel message. As a result, the message of many churches is that God’s nonjudgmental love is so vast that he will overlook sin for a season if not altogether ignore it if one will only acknowledge Him. The new definitions of love and tolerance require unconditional acceptance of the sinner and is presumed superior to the biblical approach that requires repentance and turning from sin.[5]
But the world’s definitions of love and tolerance are contrary to the very nature of God because he cannot tolerate sin. God is both loving and just, and if His love is conformed to the world’s definition of nonjudgmental love and tolerance, then he is cannot be both loving and just.
In this article the writer has attempted to expose Andy Stanley’s false teaching. If what has been written is correct, then Christians must follow Paul’s command written to the Ephesians and have nothing to do with his “fruitless deeds of darkness.” [Ephesians 5:11. NIV]
Larry G. Johnson
Sources
[1] All page numbers in this article refer to Andy Stanley’s book: Andy Stanley, Irresistible – Reclaiming the New that Jesus Unleashed for the World, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2018).
[2] Rick Warren, The Purpose Driven Church, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 1995), p. 216.
[3] Erwin W. Lutzer, When a Nation Forgets God, (Chicago, Illinois: Moody Publishers, 2010), pp. 117- 118.
[4] Eric Metaxas, Bonhoeffer, (Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson, 2010), pp. 292-293.
[5] Larry G. Johnson, “Strange Fire – The Church’s quest for cultural relevance – Part IV,” January 9, 2015, culturewarrior.net
Who is Andy Stanley?
Andy Stanley is the east coast representative of the American Church Growth trifecta whose other two representatives are Rick Warren (Saddleback Church on the west coast) and Bill Hybels (Willow Creek Church in the central U.S. until his recent forced retirement). Stanley’s personal website outlines his background and extensive influence on the American church and culture at large.
Communicator, author, and pastor, Andy Stanley founded Atlanta-based North Point Ministries in 1995. Today, NPM is comprised of six churches in the Atlanta area and a network of more than 70 churches around the globe that collectively serve nearly 118,000 people weekly. A survey of U.S. pastors in Outreach Magazine identified Andy Stanley as one of the top 10 most influential living pastors in America.
In the digital world, his success reaches well beyond the Atlanta area. Over 1.8 million of his messages, leadership videos, and podcasts are accessed from North Point’s website monthly.
In 2012, Your Move with Andy Stanley premiered on NBC after Saturday Night Live and on CBS after The Late, Late Show with James Corden in 2017, giving him an even wider audience with which to share his culturally relevant, practical insights for life and leadership. Currently, over seven million episodes are consumed each month through television and podcasts, underscoring his impact not only as a communicator but also as an influencer of culture.[1]
If the title of this article is correct, then he also qualifies as one of the top ten false teachers in America.
Irresistible – Reclaiming the New that Jesus Unleashed for the World[2]
In September 2018 Stanley published the above titled book. It is the culmination of his Church Growth, seeker-friendly journey that has led him and millions of Americans to the door of the post-modern apostate emergent church. The response to Stanley’s book has been swift from both his defenders and those that who recognize the heresy in his teachings. Two admirers of his book among others described their favorable impressions of Irresistible on the flyleaf endorsements at the beginning of the book.
John Maxwell – Writer, speaker and author of The 360 Degree Leader.
This book challenged me to rethink my thoughts about the Old Testament, discuss with fellow believers what I was learning, do more connecting and less correcting of others, and be salt and light, making things better and brighter. I love how Andy loves people…ALL of them.[3]
In Irresistible, Maxwell appears to have mistaken Stanley’s salt-free and light (i.e., lightweight) brand of Christianity for the real salt and light that Christians must be to the world.
Kara Powell, PhD. – Executive director of the Fuller Youth Institute and coauthor of Growing Young.
More than any other book I’ve read in years, Irresistible has stretched my view of Scripture. I can’t hear or read a passage from the Old or New Testaments without thinking about Andy’s provocative insights. If you and I take this book seriously, our lives and our churches will never be the same.[4]
I agree with Dr. Powell’s assessment that if people take this book seriously, the lives of Christians and their churches will never be the same…but not in the good way she meant.
It is difficult to respond to every error written and promoted in the 334 pages of Stanley’s book, but in this response to Stanley’s aberrant theology an attempt will be made to fairly present the essence of Stanley’s teachings by using his own words. This will be followed by a refutation of his false teachings through reliance on God’s inerrant Word and other scholarly resources.
Stanley relegates the Old Testament to being old wine-skins of Judaism and paganism
The following are excerpts from Stanley’s book:
Churches gravitate toward the people who are already there. From day one I’ve insisted that reaching people far from God is more important than keeping folks who have already crossed the line of faith. [p. 9]
Jesus stepped into history to introduce something new. He didn’t come to Jerusalem offering a new version or an update to an existing thing. He didn’t come to make something better. Jesus was sent by the Father to introduce something entirely new. [p. 20] [emphasis in original]
Jesus was new wine. Judaism and paganism were old wine-skins. The new Jesus offered was a departure from the traditions of both…Specifically, Jesus came to establish a new covenant, a new command and a new movement. His new movement would be international. The new covenant would fulfill and replace the behavioral, sacrifice-based systems reflected in just about every religion of the ancient world. His new command would serve as the governing behavioral ethic for members of his new movement. [pp. 23-24] [emphasis in original] [Note the word “behavioral” mentioned twice in this quotation. Its importance will become evident in Part II.]
…we find the people of Israel camping at the foot of Mount Sinai watching Moses descend with God’s instructions for the nation. We call it the Ten Commandments. But before it was over, it was more like the 600 commandments. Those famous first ten functioned a bit like the table of contents–the Cliff Notes version. [p. 29] [emphasis in original]
Careless mixing and matching of old and new covenant values and imperatives make the current version of our faith unnecessarily resistible. This is why I insist that most of what makes us resistible are things we should have been resisting all along…While Jesus was foreshadowed in the old covenant, he did not come to extend it. He came to fulfill it, put a bow on it, and establish something new. [pp. 95-96]
According to Paul (referring to Romans 7:4), Jesus followers are dead to the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments have no authority over you. None. To be clear: Thou shalt not obey the Ten Commandments. If that makes you uncomfortable, it’s because you have unwittingly embraced the version of Christianity the Jerusalem Council declared unnecessary—the version Paul spent his ministry warning against. You are attempting to straddle two incompatible covenants…The Ten Commandments didn’t even offer to rent you, much less buy you. The Ten Commandments never lifted a finger to help you. Worse, the Ten Commandments sat back and waited for you to screw up. And when you did, they finally spoke up not to defend you but to condemn you. [p.136] [emphasis added]
Last I Googled, there were 929 chapters in our English Old Testament. Abraham shows up in chapter eleven and the rest is history—Jewish history. The Old Testament is not a comprehensive book about God. The Old Testament does not tell us everything God was doing everywhere in the world. It’s not a biography of God’s early years. The Jewish Scriptures describe God’s activity in connection to one particular people group. [pp. 160-161]
The Old Testament is great for inspiration but not application. Don‘t do anything the Old Testament tells you to do because someone in the Old Testament tells you to do it or because they did it themselves. [pp. 166-167]
…I’m not sitting around and praying for revival either. I grew up in the pray for revival culture. It’s often a cover for an unwillingness to put the low rungs back on the ladder. Instead of doing what needs to be done, the revival crowd prays for God to do what he’s already done. First-century Christians prayed for boldness, not revival. [p.275] [emphasis in original] [5]
These quotations exemplify Stanley’s total rejection of the Old Testament’s importance in knowing God. However, the grand meta-narrative of the Bible encompasses the creation of the universe and all therein, the Fall, and the means of man’s redemption. Stanley’s blithe dismissal of the Old Testament eviscerates much of God’s revelation to mankind by rejection of the creation story and the fall of mankind as being immaterial to redemption and the faith walk of Christians. Stanley may believe he has effectively placed the Old Testament into a religious dumpster along with paganism and other ancient religions, but Isaiah wrote the real end of the story, “The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever.” [Isaiah 40:8. NIV]
J. I. Packer asked a question and then answered it with regard to the purpose of mankind: “What were we made for? To know God.”[6] John the Apostle gives the answer as to “why” knowing God is the most important quest of one’s life. “And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.” [John 17:3. KJV] It is through both the Old and New Testaments and the continuing work of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of men that we can know God.
In rebutting Stanley’s false teaching we turn to Paul’s second letter to Timothy.
But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. [2 Timothy 3:14-17. NIV] [emphasis added]
In his commentary, Donald Stamps states that 2 Timothy 2:15 refers primarily to the Old Testament but at that same time there were some New Testament writings that were viewed as inspired by which is meant that those writings were given directly by God to people through inspiration by the Holy Spirit.[7]
For us today, Scripture refers to the authoritative (i.e., completely reliable, supported by solid evidence and established authority) writings of both the OT and NT (i.e., “the Bible”). They are God’s original message to humanity and the only infallible (i.e. incapable of mistake, never wrong, completely true and certain not to fail in its teaching) revelation of himself and his saving activity for all people.[8]
Stanley attempts to divert the meaning of these plain-spoken words by saying that Paul used the Jewish Scriptures to teach, rebuke, correct, and train but that he “never sets his application ball on an old covenant tee. When it comes to how believers are to live, he was quick to point to Jesus as the standard.” [p. 168] However, Stanley’s argument makes no sense. Why teach something if it is not applicable to one’s life, either as a warning to refrain/avoid or an encouragement to imitate? Why would Paul use the Old Testament as a means to teach, rebuke, correct, and train if it was not to be applied to the Christian’s life in light of the redeeming work of Christ on the cross? The only credible answer is that Paul wouldn’t.
But it gets worse. Recall Stanley’s words from above. “The Ten Commandments have no authority over you. None. To be clear: Thou shalt not obey the Ten Commandments.” [p. 136] If Stanley’s teaching is true, we must ask two obvious questions. When did the once inspired Old Testament become uninspired? When did truth become untruth?
Exodus 20:1 says that “God spoke all these words” which were followed by God’s spoken delivery of the Ten Commandments over the next sixteen verses. God not only spoke the Ten Commandments recorded in Exodus, Deuteronomy 5:6-20 repeats what God said and then follows in verse 21 by stating that He also wrote them on two stone tablets which He then gave to Moses. Did God change His mind and no longer consider the Ten Commandments a reflection of His divine character after Christ’s death on the cross, burial, and resurrection?
Stanley cannot deny that his teaching say that the revelation of God in the Old Testament is no longer God’s inspired Word and that it somehow had become dis-inspired, relegated to being called the “Jewish Scriptures,” and placed on a level with paganism? This is blatant false teaching of the highest magnitude and fails on a number of levels. Donald Stamps explains why Stanley’s teaching about the Old Testament is false.
• In both the Old and New Testaments, keeping God’s commands was a matter of trusting him, taking him as his word and loving him…
• The law emphasized the eternal truth that obeying God out of love results in a fulfilling life with blessing from the Lord.
• The law expressed God’s character, including his love, goodness, justice, and hatred of evil…
• Salvation in the OT was never based on the ability to keep all the commandments perfectly. That is why part of God’s relationship with Israel involved a system of sacrifices that provided a means of forgiveness for those who broke the law but sincerely repented and trusted God to have mercy on them.
• The law and covenant of the Old Testament were not complete in themselves or intended to be permanent. Rather, the old law temporarily guided and protected God’s people until Christ came and the old covenant was fulfilled by the new covenant. Through this new “agreement,” God has fully revealed his plan of salvation—to rescue people from the ultimate destruction of sin and restore them to a personal relationship with himself. This does not mean that the moral principles of the law are no longer necessary or important for us today. God’s standards of moral purity and truth still apply, and God’s Spirit now helps us live by these standards in a way we never could have done without him. Under the new covenant, God promised to put his laws in his people’s minds and hearts…[9] [emphasis added]
Not only does Stanley reject the relevance of the Old Testament to New Testament Christianity, his teaching of the New Testament is fundamentally-flawed because it follows the Church Growth, seeker-friendly model of Christianity which will be examined in Part II.
Larry G. Johnson
Sources:
[1] “Communicator, Author, and Pastor,” Andy Stanley. https://andystanley.com/about/ (accessed November 13, 2018).
[2] All page numbers in this article refer to Andy Stanley’s book: Andy Stanley, Irresistible – Reclaiming the New that Jesus Unleashed for the World, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2018).
[3] Ibid., flyleaf endorsements.
[4] Ibid., See page numbers referenced.
[5] J. I. Packer, Knowing God, (Downers Grove, Illinois: IVP Books, 1973), p. 33.
[6] Donald C. Stamps, “The Inspiration and Authority of Scripture,” Fire Bible: Global Study Edition, New International Version, ed. Donald C. Stamps, (Springfield, Missouri: Life Publishers International, 1990), p. 2360.
[7] Ibid.
[8] Donald C. Stamps, “The Old Testament Law,” Fire Bible: Global Study Edition, New International Version, ed. Donald C. Stamps, (Springfield, Missouri: Life Publishers International, 1990), pp. 160-161.
On Tuesday, June 26, 2018, 56%+ of Oklahoma voters approved State Question No. 788 which legalized the licensed use, sale, and growth of marijuana in Oklahoma. Although described as allowing marijuana to be used for medical purposes, it is being called the most liberal state law in the nation in legalizing marijuana and is effectively an open door for recreational marijuana usage.
According to one news report, approval by the voters occurred in spite of intense opposition from Oklahoma politicians, law enforcement officials, and churches. There was intense political opposition to the proposed law from such people as U.S. Senator James Langford and from law enforcement personnel who deal with the consequences of the drug crisis every day of the week. Although there were officials from the heads of various Oklahoma denominations including the Assemblies of God, various Baptist denominations, and the Catholic Church that spoke out against State Question 788, it is very apparent that concerted opposition to the new marijuana law did not come from the rank and file pastors and congregations within those Oklahoma churches.
The fallout from this horrible law will be enormous as families are damaged or destroyed as well as the loss of many innocent lives on the state’s highways. The substantial margin of approval of State Question No. 788 is unequivocal evidence that the great majority of evangelical pastors and congregations were silent about their opposition if not secretly supportive of the law legalizing marijuana in Oklahoma.
When did the day arrive that Christian pastors and other Christian leadership no longer stand up in the church and in the community to speak God’s truth without worrying that secular listeners (and many congregation members) may not agree with even our most basic Christian beliefs?
For decades the American Evangelical church has been silent not only in the public square but in the churches themselves about societal, moral, and political issues. The truth of this observation is confirmed by an article from Christian News in August 2014 which reported the results of a survey conducted by George Barna.
Barna’s organization asked pastors across the country about their beliefs regarding the relevancy of Scripture to societal, moral and political issues, and the content of their sermons in light of their beliefs.
“What we’re finding is that when we ask them about all the key issues of the day, [90 percent of them are] telling us, ‘Yes, the Bible speaks to every one of these issues,’” Barna explained. “Then we ask them: ‘Well, are you teaching your people what the Bible says about those issues?’ and the numbers drop…to less than 10 percent of pastors who say they will speak to it.”
Barna’s group also polled pastors about what factors they use to gauge whether or not a church is successful. “There are five factors that the vast majority of pastors turn to…Attendance, giving, number of programs, number of staff, and square footage. What I’m suggesting is [those pastors] won’t probably get involved in politics because it’s very controversial. Controversy keeps people from being in the seats, controversy keeps people from giving money, from attending programs,” Barna said.[1]
Pastor Chuck Baldwin, a radio broadcaster and former presidential candidate, wrote about the results of the Barna survey in an article titled “Odds Are that Your Pastor is Keeping the Truth from You Instead of Preaching It.” Baldwin said that Barna’s research shows that most pastors deliberately refrain from speaking on the issues of the day even when they understand that Bible plainly addresses these social, moral, and political issues.
“That 90% of America’s pastors are not addressing any of the salient issues affecting Christian people’s political or societal lives should surprise no one,” Baldwin wrote. “It has been decades since even a sizable minority of pastors have bothered to educate and inform their congregations as to the Biblical principles relating to America’s political, cultural, and societal lives.”
“Please understand this: America’s malaise is directly due to the deliberate disobedience of America’s pastors—and the willingness of the Christians in the pews to tolerate the disobedience of their pastor. Nothing more! Nothing less!” Baldwin continued. “When Paul wrote his own epitaph, it read, ‘I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.’ (II Timothy 4:7) He didn’t say, ‘I had a large congregation, we had big offerings, we had a lot of programs, I had a large staff, and we had large facilities.’”
“It is time for Christians to acknowledge that these ministers are not pastors; they are CEOs. They are not Bible teachers; they are performers. They are not shepherds; they are hirelings,” he said. “It is also time for Christians to be honest with themselves: do they want a pastor who desires to be faithful to the Scriptures, or do they want a pastor who is simply trying to be ‘successful?’”[2]
These articles were written four years ago. Given that the evangelical church continues to be powerless and weak-kneed in defending the faith in the culture, I can’t help but feel the results of a new Barna’s survey would be even worse as the morality of American culture continues to spiral downward and anti-Christian sentiment grows.
The Bible is very explicit about a Christian’s duty to warn the transgressor.
When I say to a wicked person, ‘You will surely die,’ and you do not warn them or speak out to dissuade them from their evil ways in order to save their life, that wicked person will die for their sin, and I will hold you accountable for their blood. But if you do warn the wicked person and they do not turn from their wickedness or from their evil ways, they will die for their sin; but you will have saved yourself. [Ezekiel 3:18-19. NIV]
Donald Stamps wrote about these two verses in his commentary, “Those who fail to warn the unfaithful will themselves be accountable to God for people’s spiritual destruction.”[3]
When pastors and other church leaders are silent, they erroneously separate the gospel from the kingdom and culture, whether intentional or not. When Pastors and other church leaders remain silent, we have left the nation’s culture to be framed without the influence of a biblical pattern, and whatever area the church does not influence will soon try to destroy the church. Put in modern terms, speaking warnings to the people is not about winning but being obedient to God for the victory is His. Christians are called to the battle regardless of the outcome of the battle while on this earth.
There are no neutral places where Christianity and the world can peacefully co-exist amidst the raging culture wars. Yet, many churches seek to cultivate great reputations and be highly esteemed in the community because they erroneously believe they will be a more effective influence for Christ. But most of the time the price of this nebulous influence and esteem is compromise and accommodation. Writing six decades ago, A. W. Tozer describes the eventual outcome of this style of seeking influence and esteem in the community.
The Christian faith, based upon the New Testament, teaches the complete antithesis between the Church and the world…It is no more than a religious platitude to say that the trouble with us today is that we have tried to bridge the gulf between two opposites, the world and the Church, and have performed an illicit marriage for which there is no biblical authority. Actually, there is no real union…When the Church joins up with the world it is the true Church no longer but only a pitiful hybrid thing, an object of smiling contempt to the world and an abomination to the Lord…
Christianity is so entangled with the spirit of the world that millions never guess how radically they have missed the New Testament pattern. Compromise is everywhere. The world is whitewashed just enough to pass inspection by blind men posing as believers, and those same believers are everlastingly seeking to gain acceptance with the world. By mutual concessions men who call themselves Christians manage to get on with men who have for the things of God nothing but contempt.[4]
Without question it is easier to keep silent and avoid controversy, but there is a price to pay for being silent just as there is a price to pay when one speaks out. Silence is complicity and complicity is the path of the coward. Pastors, church boards, and other church leadership who are silent about social, moral, and political issues of the day speak volumes to people both inside and outside the church because people will think the church has nothing to say about life beyond the church doors. Jesus was never silent but stood up to the Pharisees (whom he called a brood of vipers), the government, and even his own disciples.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German theologian and martyr for the faith during World War II and was executed in April 1945 on the direct order of Adolph Hitler. Bonhoeffer knew well the cost of silence in the church when faced with evil in the public square. He called it what it was…sin.
Silence in the face of evil is itself evil, God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.[5]
We have been silent witness of evil deeds; we have been drenched by many storms; we have learnt the arts of equivocation and pretense; experience has made us suspicious of others and kept us from being truthful and open…Will our inward power of resistance be strong enough, and our honesty with ourselves remorseless enough, for us to find our way back to simplicity and straightforwardness?[6]
So where does the evangelical church in Oklahoma and across America go from here? A good place to begin would be the upcoming election season which culminates in the first week of November, and this includes the primary run-off elections to be decided over the next several weeks.
In today’s pervasive culture wars, every political race is critical from the national level down to the local community including school boards and city governments. On the national level, it appears that Christians have an opportunity to have one or two more Constitutional originalists nominated to the Supreme Court if conservatives hold the Senate. These nominees will largely decide the course of the nation over the next several decades.
The first step for church leaders is to gather and disseminate information about upcoming elections, candidates, and issues. Find out about the candidates backgrounds and beliefs, talk about the issues, and encourage people to vote their Christian values. Forget about who might be offended. Speak the truth. These actions must not be confined to just a bland one-Sunday announcement from the pulpit a week before the election. Rather, it must be a constant flow of information to the congregation and reminder of the importance of the elections. These efforts and actions should start immediately with the primary runoff elections and should start 60 to 90 days prior to the general election in November (late August or early September).
But church leaders’ efforts to educate their congregations about social, moral, and political issues of the times and to encourage them to speak and act accordingly within the culture do not end in November 2018. It must be an ongoing effort in which every church leader and congregation member become watchmen on the wall.
Larry G. Johnson
Sources:
[1] Heather Clark, “Study Reveals Most American Pastors Silent on Current Issues, Christian News, August 12, 2014. https://christiannews.net/2014/08/12/study-reveals-most-american-pastors-silent-on-current-issues-despite-biblical-beliefs (accessed June 27, 2018).
[2] Ibid.
[3] Donald Stamps, Commentary – Ezekiel 3:18-19, Fire Bible – Global Study Edition, New International Version,
Gen. Ed. Donald C. Stamps, (Springfield, Missouri: Life Publishers, 2009), p. 1397.
[4] A. W. Tozer, God’s Pursuit of Man, (Camp Hill, Pennsylvania: WingSpread Publishers, 1950, 1978), pp. 115-116.
[5] “20 Influential Quotes by Dietrich Bonhoeffer,” Crosswalk.com. https://www.crosswalk.com/faith/spiritual-life/inspiring-quotes/20-influential-quotes-by-dietrich-bonhoeffer.html (accessed June 29, 2018).
[6] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, “Letters and Papers from Prison Quotes,” goodreads. https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/1153999-widerstand-und-ergebung-briefe-und-aufzeichnungen-aus-der-haft (accessed June 29, 2018).
Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones was one of the most gifted preachers of the twentieth century. In addition to preaching as the minister of Westminster Chapel in London for twenty-five years, he preached extensively in Europe and the United States. In 1959, Dr. Lloyd-Jones preached a series of sermons commemorating the one hundredth anniversary of the Welsh Revival of 1859 which had a powerful and profound impact on Wales, England, the United States, and other parts of the world as well. He did so because he saw the appalling condition of the church of his day and the need for revival as exceedingly urgent. These sermons eventually became a widely acclaimed book titled Revival.[1]
Dr. Jones saw a profound and perilous difference between the conditions of the church in 1959 England and America than that which existed one hundred years earlier. The kinds of problems facing the church in 1959 were far deeper and more desperate. The problems in 1859 were not ones of general denial of the Christian truth but of apathy toward Christ and the church. Correction was a matter of awakening and arousing the church from their lethargy. But in 1959, the moral and spiritual landscape had dramatically changed. Dr. Lloyd-Jones saw the modern-day problems as not just apathy but a “complete unawareness, even a denial of the spiritual altogether…the whole notion of the spiritual has gone. The very belief in God has virtually gone.”[2]
It has been fifty-eight years since Lloyd-Jones preached those sermons at a time when the Christian nations and individual Christians were far more sensitive, agreeable, and desirous of a divine move of the Holy Spirit in their midst, that is, a quickening divine visitation. Now, the church is in far more serious condition than that of Dr. Lloyd-Jones’ day. Many church leaders and their congregants are oblivious to their great spiritual sickness and disastrous departures from biblical truth, doctrines, and holy lifestyles. The church has become acclimatized to the rising tide of secularism and humanism that has inundated the Western world.
As the spirit of the world invaded the church over the last six decades, there has been a corresponding displacement of the irreplaceable power and presence of the Holy Spirit within the church. Without the centrality of the Holy Spirit, the efforts, actions, and programs of the church are merely be a form of godliness but which denies the power thereof. Rev. Pierre Bynum has stated that because of the rebellion of the church, America is ripe for destruction.
The Evangelical Movement in this country is characterized by an arrogance that is almost beyond belief. The neglect of prayer, the involvement in Philistine methodology, the moral evils, the doctrinal corruptions that characterize the Movement are sufficient to cause the people of Sodom to wonder at God’s justice in destroying their city while sparing the United States.[3]
Conditions that demand revival of the church
Revival is the only event that can avert spiritual disaster for the church and turn a nation back to God. But God always sends men and women to warn of these approaching disasters. These modern-day watchmen on the wall are godly leaders and faithful intercessors who recognize the signs of the times and are calling attention to the woeful condition of both the church and the nation. They have sounded the alarm since the end of World War II to the present day. Here we quote just a few of these watchmen and their warnings that span the last seven decades.
…without revival in the church there is really no hope for the Western world at all.[4] [J. I. Packer summarizing the thrust of Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones in his series of sermons in 1959 marking the 100th anniversary of the Welsh revival.]
Jesus Christ has today almost no authority at all among the groups that call themselves by His name. By these I mean not the Roman Catholics nor the liberals, nor the various quasi-Christian cults. I do mean Protestant churches generally, and I include those that protest the loudest that they are in spiritual descent from our Lord and His apostles, namely the evangelicals.[5] [A. W. Tozer, The Waning Authority of Christ in the Churches, 1963.]
However much opinions of the realities involved may differ, no one can deny that there is widespread discussion of the decline of Western culture.[6] [Richard M. Weaver, Visions of Order – The Cultural Crisis of Our Time, 1964.]
Imperceptibly, through decades of gradual erosion, the meaning of life in the West has ceased to be seen as anything more lofty than the “pursuit of happiness… the West’s own historical evolution has been such that today it too is experiencing a drying up of religious consciousness…Here again we witness the single outcome of a worldwide process, with East and West yielding the same results, and once again for the same reason: Men have forgotten God.[7] [Nobel laureate, Orthodox Christian author, and Russian dissident Alexandr Solzhenitsyn in his address, given when he received the Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion in May of 1983, in which he explained the process of alienation of the people of God and traditional Christian morality and beliefs through secularism and humanism.]
Truth demands confrontation. It must be loving confrontation, but there must be confrontation nevertheless…Here is the great evangelical disaster—the failure of the evangelical world to stand for truth as truth. There is only one word for this—namely accommodation: the evangelical church has accommodated to the world spirit of the age.[8] [Francis A. Schaeffer, The Great Evangelical Disaster, 1984.] [emphasis in original]
Conformity to the spirit of the times appears to characterize the clergy as well as the laity…religion is declining because those identified with it do not actually believe in it…It is difficult to say that religion even exists if it keeps giving up its tenets to appease its members and critics…The first question, then, is why belief evaporated, why the West has become so rapidly secularized.[9] [Robert H. Bork, Slouching Toward Gomorrah, 1996.]
After two hundred years of earnest dedication to reinventing the faith and the church and to being more relevant in the world, we are confronted by an embarrassing fact: Never have Christians pursued relevance more strenuously; never have Christians been more irrelevant.[10] [Os Guinness, Prophetic Untimeliness, 2003.]
Western civilization is over. Everybody knows it…Following centuries of pride, schism, compromise, synthesis with humanism, and general hard-heartedness, God may be withdrawing His grace from the Western nations—at least for the time being. Nevertheless, there is always mercy for those who seek and those who are humbled before the almighty God. (Romans 11:20).[11] [Kevin Swanson, Apostate – The Men who Destroyed the Christian West, 2013.]
Rebellion, decline, and renewal of God’s people in the Bible
The pattern of sin and falling away from God followed by repentance, revival, and restoration of His people is a recurrent theme in the history of God’s dealings with the Israelites. In the Old Testament there were at least twelve instances of revival,[12] and seven of these cycles are found in the first sixteen chapters of Judges. Preceding each of these revivals there were at least four common elements present:
• A spiritual decline among God’s people.
• A righteous judgement from God – While varying from revival to revival, God’s judgement led to prayer, brokenness, repentance, and a desperate seeking of God’s face. Sometimes God’s judgement led to the deaths of the wicked.
• The raising up of an immensely burdened leader or leaders who had a heavy burden of the moral and spiritual needs of God’s people and the nation.
• Extraordinary actions were taken, the most common of which was a call for a Solemn Assembly of the people who humbled themselves, sought the Lord, wept, fasted, mourned, prayed, confessed and repented of their individual and national sins, and who committed themselves to leading a Godly life and separation from all unrighteousness of the nations.[13]
Revival – The only hope for the church and America
Revivals have been the sustaining lifeblood of the Protestant evangelical churches since they emerged just prior to and during America’s First Great Awakening in the early 1700s. The quest for revival was discarded by the liberal churches more than one hundred years ago, and revival most certainly was never sought after or tolerated in the Roman Catholic Church. Nevertheless, revivals remained the central source of renewal and power of evangelical churches through the early 1960s and for some churches into the 1980s.
Beginning in the 1960s, the leadership in evangelical churches, seminaries, and other Christian organizations increasingly appear to have ignored the lessons of the Israelites’ rebellion, decline, and renewal in the Old Testament and have relegated revival to the dusty and forgotten shelves of church history. America’s pulpits became noticeably silent on matters of revival, and revivals virtually disappeared from the evangelical landscape along with the itinerant evangelists that held one and two-week revival meetings (longer if the Holy Spirit was moving upon the hearts and lives of those attending). As a result most of the laity under the age of fifty have little remembrance of revival meetings or have never experienced an extraordinary powerful outpouring of the Holy Spirit in a local church.
Revival – Two opinions
One of the reasons for the absence of revivals is that they are controversial. Revivals are a supernatural work of the Spirit of God, and this supernatural aspect instills fear in the hearts of many Christians. Some claim revivals are “of the devil” or a form of mass hysteria. Others fear the supernatural manifestations of revival. Still others are opposed to revivals because they fear loss of control over the church life. That occurs because revivals are a supernatural work of the Holy Spirit and cannot be controlled or directed by men. Revivals always challenge the status quo, upset the comfortable forms of godliness, and shine the light of God’s Word into the dark corners of the church where the spirit of the world often resides.
Others dismiss talk of revival and revival meetings as not being relevant to the needs of the church or compatible with the popular methods and techniques of doing church in these modern times. For most American evangelical pastors, revival is passé, out-of-date, archaic, unfashionable, obsolete, and an inconvenience in our fast-paced modern lives. It would be safe to say that the vast majority of evangelical churches haven’t sought revival or held a revival meeting in a quarter of a century. Revivals have been replaced by new ways of doing church. We are told that the modern Christian does not have the patience, time, or inclination to attend revival meetings. As previously stated, the subject of revival is missing from the preaching of most evangelical pastors in America. The focus has switched from revival to building the church through Church Growth methods and techniques that are seeker-friendly.
But there is another group. They are the contrite and lowly in spirit. It is to them that God said, “I live in a high and holy place, but also with him who is contrite and lowly in spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite.” [Isaiah 57:15. NIV] [emphasis added] These Christians are in great sorrow as a result of the vapid fare that now passes for Christianity in many churches. They are distraught by the casualness and carelessness with which many Christians approach church life and the things of God. They are crushed by the reality of a spiritually bankrupted nation that is being sucked into the vortex of a moral cesspool that threatens to engulf their children, friends, neighbors, and co-workers. They are the spiritually hungry and know that God has more for them than what they are receiving from the great majority of evangelical churches today. They want more than just programs, entertainment, activities, and playing church. They hunger for more of God—a life-changing, soul-drenching deluge of the manifest presence of God. What they seek is God’s promise of revival!
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The purpose of this book is to call the leadership of America’s evangelical churches to teach, preach, and seek revival in their churches. Lay men and women are called to pray unceasingly for a divine manifestation of God’s presence in their midst. Given the significant ignorance of revivals and matters pertaining thereto among both pastors and the laity, many aspects of revival will be examined and considered in this book. These include:
• Need for revival
• History of revivals and awakenings since the early 1700s
• Meaning of revival
• Purposes of revival
• Hindrances to revival
• Characteristics and happenings in revival
• Prerequisites for revival
• Seeking revival
______
It has been over one hundred years since the last significant revival of the American evangelical church followed by a general moral and spiritual awakening in America. The condition of the Western church is vastly more spiritually barren and destitute than any time since immediately before the Reformation. As a consequence, a large part of the American evangelical church is sick, and without a course correction very soon it may be a sickness unto death. The symptoms are many—powerlessness, apathy, worldliness, biblical ignorance, false teachers, false doctrine, rebellion, and apostasy to name just a few. Yet, the majority of its pastors and congregations are oblivious to their spiritual condition and imminent peril.
America’s only hope is the church, and the only hope for the church is revival. But before revival will come, the church must recognize its spiritual barrenness, its great need of revival, and the necessary prerequisites that make revival possible.
Larry G. Johnson
Sources:
[1] Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Revival, (Wheaton, Illinois: Crossway Books, 1987), pp. iv-v.
[2] Ibid., p. 13.
[3] Rev. Pierre Bynum, Family Research Council Prayer Team, April 19, 2017.
http://www.frc.org/prayerteam/prayer-targets-rev-ro-roberts-the-solemn-assembly-national-day-of-prayer-may-4-2017 (accessed April 20, 2017).
[4] Lloyd-Jones, Revival, p. vi.
[5] A. W. Tozer. The Waning Authority of Christ in the Churches, (Nyack, New York: Christian and Missionary Alliance, 1963), pp. 4-5.
[6] Richard M. Weaver, Visions of Order – The Cultural Crisis of Our Time, (Wilmington, Delaware: Intercollegiate Studies Institute, 1964), p. 3.
[7] Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, “Men have forgotten God” – The Templeton Address, May 1983, The Voice Crying in the Wilderness, July 5, 2011. http://orthodoxnet.com/blog/2011/07/men-have-forgotten-god-alexander-solzhenitsyn/ (accessed October 13, 2017).
[8] Francis A. Schaeffer, The Great Evangelical Disaster, (Arcadia, California: Focus on the Family, 1984), p. 27.
[9] Robert H. Bork,Slouching Towards Gomorrah, (New York: Regan Books, 1996), pp. 280-281.
[10] Os Guinness, Prophetic Untimeliness, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 2003), p. 12.
[11] Kevin Swanson, Apostate – The Men who Destroyed the Christian West, (Parker, Colorado: Generations with Vision, 2013), pp. 13, 19.
[12] Bynum, Family Research Council Prayer Team, April 19, 2017.
[13] Ibid.
