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church debt (at my church) continues to get larger weekly, so does that also make it a target
for the Warren Consultants?
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Its not really the funding that Warran Consults are after, it seems. They use the
funding because it helps them go further in their "new theology"
goals. .Their goals are to
use the churches which subscribe to their views to change the core beliefs of
the congregation.
That would be very bold, but keep in mind that this [Purpose
Driven Church movement] started as a sociological
experiment with mass marketing techniques. In order to have a chance to alter
the beliefs of the congregation, they would first have to alter the beliefs of
the Pastor.
One of the most Un-Biblical beliefs is that the Size of a church is an
indication of spiritual growth, or that spiritual growth is to be measured by
numbers rather than by the spiritual knowledge that each person is attaining, in
their own relationship to God.
In other words, thanks to the message of "Church Growth = Large
Numbers" already supported by many evangelicals, the beliefs of that pastor
would not have to be altered much, since many pastors ALREADY [wrongly] believe this.
The next task - pushed and encouraged by the Warren Church Consultants - is for the Pastor to
agree to the concept of
NOT teaching either
1) any Major doctrine or 2) any point of controversy on Sundays in the main
service.
[That would be rather unfortunate if pastors Did agree to this, because it is
giving up one of the few times when people actually set time aside to come to
church to be instructed from God's Word. What people need is more instruction,
and more sound doctrine, not less. ]
But what is being called "Seeker-Friendly" actually is often being
interpreted by Warren Consultants & PDC Pastors as a willingness to Not make
any waves or say anything which is controversial.
It is not likeley that the Holy Spirit was consulted much on that decision. What
He says often can offend. It is God's truth that We must adjust to. Instead
- PDC
churches are trying to adjust their proclamations to man's truth. That is both
sad and an abandonment of the Pastoral Call to PROCLAIM the gospel.
It is the conviction of the Holy Spirit that often brings repentance. If church
attenders are not confronted with spiritual truth, then how will the Holy Spirit
be able to use that information that they will no longer be receiving ? Faith comes by
hearing, and hearing by the Word of God....
Warren Consultants will simply take advantage of the church's willingness to pay
them. How far they take this probably has to do with their demographic and
financial studies of each church. They can taylor packages to each church....
The question is who has authority over financial matters for the church. The
next question is who would either confront or stand up either to the Pastor or
to the consultants - IF confronting them was the right and Biblical thing to do.
But often, church financial matters are handled by accountants, and very few
people know the financial state of their own churches (though it is good where
this is NOT the case).
The churches that withstand or resist the process
are the churches that have the theologically conservative members in it.
Rick Warren Consultants - Church Tactics
But remember, Warren consultants usually establish two Church services.
They say
that this is to appeal to a younger crowd, but according to their own documents,
the true purpose is to compartmentalize and segregate the more
"fundamental" [Biblically literate] members of the church...into their own [traditional]
church service.
Those traditional people then are under the impression
that they are still part of the
church, because they still have a "church service". But what happens within a
matter of weeks is that the "traditional" church service is
discontinued,
especially where the majority of the church has made the
transition
to the newer "seeker-friendly" church
service.
The "traditional" church service is then discontinued, and then the
traditional church members have nowhere left to go. They are then further
marginalized and ignored. The goal of the process is not only to alter the
church, and its theology but also to do all of this with the least amount of
resistance and confrontation possible.
What is really going on is that the traditionalists are being outmaneuvered by
the Warren consultants, and traditionalists do not resist the process, because
they do not know what is going on nor how to confront what is taking place.
We can only hope and pray that many more people will wake up to the dangers of the Purpose Driven life Model. We would encourage you to visit our webpage to learn how you can contribute to this discussion by sharing your stories and experiences with us at this page.
For any questions or comments, please do not hesitate to contact us at xofcbooks@yahoo.com .
http://simplyagape.blogspot.com/2005_09_01_simplyagape_archive.html
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