The New "How To" Christianity - Genuine Help or White Witchcraft?

The New "How To" Christianity - Genuine Help or White Witchcraft? by Sandy Simpson You can read the original article here: http://www.deceptioninthechurch.com/neopragmatism.html "... the goal of Christian mission is not success, but faithful witness; not power, but proclamation; not technique, but truth; not method, but message." - Michael Horton, Power Religion, Moody Press, pg. 15 Apologetics Premise The apologetics premise I am using, indeed the apologetics premise all true believers in Christ use, is the Word of God, the Scriptures, sola Scriptura. The authority of Scriptures in the life of the believer cannot be superseded by anything else. Not by words of prophecy, not by signs and wonders, not by experience, and certainly not by pragmatic Christian "How To" manuals. Pragmatism is defined as: the doctrine that the meaning of an idea or a proposition lies in its observable practical consequences. One of the underlying beliefs of those who practice pragmatic Christianity is that the end justifies any means to get there. If the means is not getting you to the end, then the means are therefore not working and bad. C. Peter Wagner stated this in a book on Church Growth way back in 1976: "... we ought to see clearly that the end DOES justify the means. What else possible could justify the means? If the method I am using accomplishes the goal I am aiming at, it is for that reason a good method. If, on the other hand, my method is not accomplishing the goal, how can I be justified in continuing to use it?" (C. Peter Wagner, "Your Church Can Grow - Seven Vital Signs Of A Healthy Church", 1976, pg. 137. - emphasis in original) Yet we see by Biblical examples that the goal of the early church was not to grow huge churches but to be sure the Gospel and sound doctrine was preached. The Apostles were looking for quality, not quantity. But the Church Growth movement that is being taught by people like Rick Warren of Saddleback, Bill Hybels of Willow Creek, Robert Schuller of Crystal Cathedral, Paul Yonggi Cho and others is teaching much of the Church today to be more concerned with an end result of big numbers than an end result of mature Christians. So therefore the means used differ dramatically from the means of the Apostles in the first century church. Just to let you know the character of these men, Yonggi Cho was just here at the HIM conference as one of the keynote speakers. Many people liked what he said but they did not know that he lied. He said that in 45 years of ministry he has never had a vision or dream and does not promote them apart Christians are clearly commanded to follow the example of Paul and Apollos in not going beyond the written revelation of Scripture. You can get this on DVD here: http://www.deceptioninthechurch.com/neopragmatismDVD.html ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Apologetics Coordination Team FAIR USE DISCLAIMER This video is for educational purposes. In the Copyright Disclaimer under section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education and research. Fair use is a doctrine in the United States copyright law that allows limited use of copyrighted material without requiring permission from the rights holders, such as for commentary, criticism, news reporting, research, teaching or scholarship. It provides for the legal, non-licensed citation or incorporation of copyrighted material in another author’s work under a four-factor balancing test. The term “fair use” originated in the United States. A similar principle, fair dealing, exists in some other common law jurisdictions. Civil law jurisdictions have other limitations and exceptions to copyright. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use) The U.S. Copyright Office “Fair Use” definition can be found here: http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl102.html -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------