What can I learn about Individual Growth, Evangelism and Church Growth...

To the Baptist Board:

My post above was written tongue-in-cheek in response to Joseph_Botwinick with the presupposition that he knew my position on Purpose-Driven and would easily recognize the PDL straw man I set up. I was wrong and he responded normally.

My intention was/is to point out what I believe to be dangerous and unbiblical practices of the PDM. It was my mistake, though uinintentional. I apologize to Joseph and the Board.

 

You are to be commended for standing firm, Joseph. God bless you for your courage. Many are standing firm against the odds and against the tidal wave of compromise.

There have been a number of instances where believers who have refused to 'change' have been 'ex-communicated' from the church. One confirmed instance was at a Baptist church where 165 minority memberships were revoked for taking a stand. It was reported that Rick Warren calls them "blessed subtractions". Scroll Halfway Down for a LINK to the Published Story

One UNCONFIRMED example is one I heard on the radio the other day where a couple was removed from the church by police for refusing to cease passing out literature that disagreed with the Purpose-Driven program. I believe they said it was a Calvary Chapel. The couple could have been disruptive or something, I don't know, there's probably more to the story - but it's still remarkable to think of it.

Undoubtedly, this is the beginning of the persecution of 'old-fashioned' Bible-believing Christians by their 'fellow' Christians. I have no doubt it will get much worse. Did the Purpose Driven program begin with your new pastor?

 

Joseph,

I wasn't impressed with PDL. There were better teachers of God's word in our own church. I thought it was a waste of time and money.

 

I'm neutral on the PDL/PDC subject to a point. I thought the PDL was a decent book, but I think the PDC has been pushed too much in some instances.

I'd rather not have to study the PDC at church. I'd rather study the Word of God verse by verse.

To answer the original post, it is my opinion that you're not going to learn anything new from the Purpose Driven Life that you can't find in God's Word. Like I said, the book was fine to me but I've heard toooooo much about it lately. I read devotionals all the time and it was sort of a devotional to me. However, I read the Bible alot more.

 

Excerpt from deceived on purpose by warren smith.


From Chapter 1 - The Purpose-Driven Life



...The first time I encountered Rick Warren was in the spring of 2002, in a book entitled From the Ashes: A Spiritual Response to the Attack on America. The book was a collection of articles, written by a wide variety of “spiritual leaders” and “extraordinary citizens,” published in response to the events of September 11, 2001. Proceeds from the book were to go to the families of the 9/11 victims. I remember being intrigued by the fact that Christian leaders found themselves included in a book that also featured many familiar New Age leaders. Articles by Billy Graham, Bruce Wilkinson, Charles Colson, Max Lucado, Bill Hybels, Jerry Jenkins, Bishop T.D. Jakes and others were side by side with articles written by prominent New Age leaders like Neale Donald Walsch, the Dalai Lama and Starhawk the witch. I was not familiar with the man simply listed as “Pastor Rick Warren.”...



New Age leader Neale Donald Walsch’s article appeared just pages from Bishop T.D. Jakes’ opening article. In his article, Walsch challenged religious leaders everywhere including Rick Warren, Billy Graham, and every Christian leader in the book—in light of the events of September 11th—to accept and preach the “new gospel” that “We are all one.” After erroneously claiming that the Bible supports the idea that “We are all one,” Walsch wrote:

"We must change ourselves. We must change the beliefs upon which our behaviors are based. We must create a different reality, build a new society…. We must do so with new spiritual truths. We must preach a new gospel, its healing message summarized in two sentences: We are all one. Ours is not a better way, ours is merely another way. This 15-word message, delivered from every lectern and pulpit, from every rostrum and platform, could change everything overnight. I challenge every priest, every minister, every rabbi and religious cleric to preach this."3

I remember reading this and realizing how brazen the New Age was getting, and how deceptively appealing the idea of “Oneness” must sound to a terrified humanity still wondering when the next disaster might strike. What a clever way to present New Age teachings to a vulnerable world.



But I was also thinking what a great opportunity it was for Christian leaders—particularly in this book—to contend for the faith by exposing the New Age teachings that were behind Walsch’s seemingly “positive” exhortation. In Walsch’s bestselling Conversations with God books, in which he purports to have actual “conversations with God,” Walsch’s “God” specifically defines what he means by the “new gospel” teaching that “We are all One.” “God” tells Walsch: God is creation."4 ...



But even with all of these open threats and challenges to biblical Christianity, most Christian leaders today continue to generally ignore almost anything having to do with New Age teachers and teachings. ...






From Chapter 3 - What Message?

“'As above, so below; as below, so above.' This maxim implies that the transcendent God beyond the physical universe and the immanent God within ourselves are one." 1 Ronald S. Miller and the editors of New Age Journal

As above, so below



Eugene Peterson’s The Message seems to be very important to Rick Warren. It is the first Bible version that he quotes in The Purpose-Driven Life. He cites it at the bottom of his dedication page. He cites it again on the page that precedes his first chapter. He uses quotes from The Message to open and close his first chapter. Five of the six Scriptures that Rick Warren cites in his first chapter all come from The Message. Even the title of the first chapter, “It All Starts with God,” is taken from The Message paraphrase of Colossians 1:16, which appears right under the chapter heading.

"For everything, absolutely everything, above and below, visible and invisible, …everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him."2

The King James translates Colossians 1:16 as follows: For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:



It wasn’t Peterson’s use of the phrase “got started” instead of “created,” or even the word “purpose,” that jumped out at me, as much as his use of the phrase “above and below” instead of “heaven and earth.” When I was in the New Age, it was well understood that the words “above and below” had metaphysical/New Age connotations and were routinely substituted for “heaven and earth.” In fact, the term “as above, so below” was a commonly accepted New Age phrase.



In reading through The Message, I discovered that Peterson had actually inserted the entire phrase “as above, so below” into his paraphrase of the Lord’s Prayer. I compared Peterson’s version of the Lord’s Prayer with the King James Version of that same prayer.



The Message: "Our Father in heaven, Reveal who you are. Set the world right; Do what’s best— as above, so below. Keep us alive with three square meals. Keep us forgiven with you and forgiving others. Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil. You’re in charge! You can do anything you want! You’re ablaze in beauty! Yes. Yes. Yes."3 [Emphasis added]



Peterson had deliberately substituted “as above, so below” in place of “in earth, as it is in heaven.”



In Colossians 1:16, Peterson again chose to use the terms “above” and “below” instead of the commonly accepted “heaven” and “earth” found in most Bible translations. The “above” and “below” in Colossians 1:16 is an obvious derivative form of the “as above, so below” he had used previously in his paraphrase of the Lord’s Prayer. This derivative form of the more complete phrase “as above, so below” is also common to the New Age. The fact that this whole “above” and “below” issue was presenting itself on the first page of the first chapter of Rick Warren’s book was unsettling. Was I reading too much into this? Was there some other reasonable explanation for Eugene Peterson’s use of the term “as above, so below” in the Lord’s Prayer and its derivative form in Colossians 1:16?



King James Bible: "Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen." [Emphasis added]



Ancient Egypt and Oneness



Right about the time I was looking into Eugene Peterson’s use of the term “as above, so below,” I was at a book sale at our local library. Almost lost amongst some cookbooks and business manuals was a book written and published by the editors of the New Age Journal. It was entitled As Above, So Below. I picked it up and began reading it. In the introduction the chief editor of the book, Ronald S. Miller, had written:

"Thousands of years ago in ancient Egypt, the great master alchemist Hermes Trismegistus, believed to be a contemporary of the Hebrew prophet Abraham, proclaimed this fundamental truth about the universe: “As above, so below; as below, so above.” This maxim implies that the transcendent God beyond the physical universe and the immanent God within ourselves are one. Heaven and Earth, spirit and matter, the invisible and the visible worlds form a unity to which we are intimately linked.4

He continued his explanation by quoting Sufi scholar Reshad Field.

…“‘As above, so below’ means that the two worlds are instantaneously seen to be one when we realize our essential unity with God…. The One and the many, time and eternity, are all One.”5

The New Age Journal editor went on to state that old forms of religion no longer serve people, and that the term “as above, so below” describes the “emerging spirituality” that is quickly moving onto the world’s scene. He concluded his introduction to As Above, So Below by writing: "The breadth of this exploration suggests that we are living in an age of spiritual reinvention, a transitional age that leaves the safety and security of the known to seek out the new, the untested, the possible."6



Moving from the library book sale to the Internet, I put “as above, so below” into the Google search engine to see what would come up. There were countless references. The very first reference listed by Google for “as above, so below” read:

"This phrase comes from the beginning of The Emerald Tablet and embraces the entire system of traditional and modern magic which was inscribed upon the tablet in cryptic wording by Hermes Trismegistus. The significance of this phrase is that it is believed to hold the key to all mysteries. All systems of magic are claimed to function by this formula. ‘That which is above is the same as that which is below’…. The universe is the same as God, God is the same as man….”7

As I checked out the most popular websites for “as above, so below” each one described the term as having the same mystical, eastern, New Age, esoteric and magical sources. One site stated:

This ancient phrase, “As above, so below” describes the Oneness of All That Is.8

The phrase “as above, so below” headlined a page from the Theosophical Society’s website containing the “esoteric” teachings of New Age matriarch Alice A. Bailey. A derivative form of the term—similar to Peterson’s abbreviated use of “above and below” in Colossians 1:16—appeared on the website in a quote from Theosophy founder Helena Blavatsky’s pioneering New Age work, The Secret Doctrine:

"Above, the Son is the whole KOSMOS; below, he is MANKIND." 9

To see if there was any other explanation for Peterson’s use of this mystical New Age phrase, I put the term “as above, so below,” along with the term “Christianity,” into the search engine of the computer I was using. There were only seven references. None of them had anything to do with biblical Christianity. The first reference was entitled “Mystical Christianity” and said:

"…to help the seeker of an inner spiritual path find resources to aid their spiritual journey towards a mystical and magickal Christianity."10

In all of my searching I could find no good reason for Peterson’s using “as above, so below” in his paraphrase of the Lord’s Prayer. Nor could I find any good reason for his use of the obvious “above and below” derivative, that appears in his Colossians 1:16 paraphrase, that Rick Warren used at the very beginning of his book to initiate his readers into The Purpose-Driven Life.



So what?



I guess if Rick Warren or anyone else says, “So what?” I would say, “So how come?” How come Eugene Peterson inserted a universally accepted, mystical New Age term right into the middle of the Lord’s Prayer? And why does a derivative of the saying show up in his paraphrase of Colossians 1:16?

Even if you thought there was some “good” reason for using the term “as above, so below,” why would you? Why would you choose a term that so clearly has its origins in the magic of ancient Egypt, and is so heavily identified today with the New Age and the New Spirituality?



“As above, so below” agrees with the “immanent” New Age view that God is not only outside of creation, but also within creation. It means that God is “in” everyone and everything. It perfectly denotes the New Age concept of “Oneness” and provides apparent support for the New Age contention that “We are all One.”



Seeker friendly?



I tried to imagine what it would be like for a confused New Ager today coming into a Purpose-Driven Church that uses The Message, and finding this popular New Age phrase right in the middle of the Lord’s Prayer. Or what it would be like for that person to be handed a copy of Rick Warren’s book, only to find an abbreviated form of this same New Age phrase as part of the lead-off Scripture introducing them to The Purpose-Driven Life. This hardly seemed to be the way to introduce the Gospel of Jesus Christ to an unbelieving New Ager.



Rick Warren’s reintroduction of The Message into my life only reinforced the concerns I had originally voiced on the radio when Peterson’s book first came out. Why was Rick Warren so drawn to The Message? The Message not only obscured prophetic Scriptures like Matthew 24:3–5, it also introduced paraphrased material like “as above, so below,” that made it appear that some of the teachings of the Bible were “at One” with the teachings of the New Age. In Reinventing Jesus Christ: The New Gospel, I had observed:

"And it is, indeed, very disturbing to see many Christian leaders today using many of the same words and expressions commonly used by their [New Age, ed.] 'new gospel' counterparts."11

Unfortunately, undiscerning Christian leaders have not adequately exposed these [New Age, ed.] “new gospel” teachings and, as a result, the spirit behind the “new gospel” has entered the Church.12




Posted with author's permission.

© 2004 by Warren Smith.

Second Edition; December 2004

Mountain Stream Press

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

First Edition: August 2004. Conscience Press

Scripture quotations unless otherwise indicated are taken from the Authorized King James Version Bible.

Cover design by Vernon Rousseau.

Printed in the United States of America.



To order please contact us at: Discernment Ministries, P.O. Box 2535, West Lafayette, IN 47996 or call 903–567–6423. or e-mail us at [email protected] Website: http://www.discernment-ministries.org



Individual copies $12.00 each plus $3.00 shipping and handling.



You may also order Reinventing Jesus Christ: The New Gospel by Warren Smith
Individual copies $7.00 each, plus $1.50 (shipping & handling)



Endnotes
Chapter 1
1. Rick Warren, The Purpose-Driven Life: What On Earth Am I Here For?
(Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2002), (dedication page).
2. Neale Donald Walsch, Conversations with God: an uncommon dialogue,
Book 2 (Charlottesville, Va.: Hampton Roads Publishing Company, Inc.,
1997), p. 1.
3. Beliefnet Editors, From the Ashes: A Spiritual Response to the Attack
on America (USA: Rodale Inc., 2001), p. 21.

Chapter 3
1. Ronald S. Miller and the Editors of New Age Journal, "As Above, So
Below: Paths to Spiritual Renewal in Daily Life" (Los Angeles: Jeremy P.
Tarcher, Inc., 1992), p. xi.
2. Rick Warren, The Purpose-Driven Life, p. 17, citing Eugene H. Peterson,
The Message, p. 415.
3. Eugene H, Peterson, The Message, p. 21–22.
4. Ronald S. Miller and the Editors of New Age Journal, As Above, So
Below, p. xi.
5. Ibid.
6. Ibid., p. xiv.
7. http://www.themystica.com/mystica/articles/a/below_above.html

8. http://www.mothermaryspeaks.com/as_above_so_below.htm, p. 1.
9. Helena Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine. p. i 60, quoted on http://theosophy.org/tlodocs/AsAboveSoBelow.htm

10.http://www.esotericchristian.com/home.html

11. Warren Smith, Reinventing Jesus Christ: The New Gospel, p. 68.
12. Ibid., p. 6.

 

I find the calvinists and huper calvinists are the ones who have the biggest problem with Warren and PDL.

Joseph, how exactly did you come to the "revelation" that calvinism is true? Was it Pink? Sproul? Macarthur? Piper? Or did you just automatically believe that "world" didn't really mean world, and "all" doesn't mean all when you began reading the Bible?

 

typo. "huper" should be "hyper": as in the way I type.

 

No hijacking or c/a debating, just curious as th which "reformer's" book you read that convinced you calvinism was true? You claim to read the (watch out now) BIBLE exclusively, but the average, uneducated person who reads the Bible exclusively believes John 3:16. Only after reading the works of a reformer, does calvinism become the "hidden truth" in the Bible.

So again, let me ask you. Which author was it? Calvin? Sproul? Piper? Pink? Macarthur?

I wouldn't be so quick to knock Rick Warren.

 

Great point here.

Consistency can be a bear.

 

Good note webdog concerning the "hidden truth" that calvinists find in the Bible. I tend to believe that election and free will both are in the Bible. The all out calvinist always sees something that the average joe just doesn't see.
I believe God wrote the Bible so that anybody can study it and understand it. There are no "deeper" meanings to the words like whosoever or all or world.
Yet, I do know this: I made a choice to accept Christ as my Savior.Yet, the moment conversion took place I realized it was God that brought me to himself. I just look at that as the "miracle of salvation" which will never be fully grasped except by faith until we get to heaven.

 

Point well taken, webdog, but just for the record I'm not a Calvinist and I have a HUGE problem with Rick Warren. Most of the people I know who have researched Warren and find him to be unbiblical are NOT Calvinists. That said, I can see why Calvinists in general are less likely to swallow his Purpose-Driven bait.

[BTW, I'm not Arminian, either.]

 

Nothing. But it summarizes some principles.
Do you own any commentaries, Bible dictionaries, or other Christian works other than the Bible?
Does Pilgrim's Progress teach us anything about the Christian life we cannot learn in the Bible?
No.

Karen