Perhaps the best and fuller explanation of McLaren's view on Christianity and other religions is in his book A Generous Orthodoxy. By undermining an exclusive gospel, a just God, and a judgment that separates the goats from the sheep (Matthew 25) in the afterlife, McLaren is left with a social gospel that must seek the aide of other religions (and the non religious) to help him in his quest to bringing the Utopian Kingdom of God to Earth.
Christians are called to inclusivism and thus must be open to the hurting, the pained, the broken hearted, the poor, the forgotten, the marginalized, and those of other faiths. Christians ought to bring peace, not a sword (even though Jesus Himself said that He came to bring a sword and not peace).
McLaren sets up his straw man at the beginning of the chapter painting exclusive, fundamentalist Christians as arrogant, bigotted, and violent. He writes:
If we want to get on the right side of the life-and-death divide, we need to start with some sober, serious, old-fashioned repentance, starting with this admission: Christianity has a nauseating, infuriating, depressing record when it comes to encountering people of other religions . . . It's unpleasant to have to say this, because most of us Christians are nice enough folks, and we would never even think of forcing conversions at sword point, ghettoizing unbelievers, or in any way shunning or victimizing the religiously other, much less of engaging in pogroms, genocides, torture, or execution for religious infidelity. But these things have been done, and not just a few times.
Every time I read these words, I find myself shaking my head confused as to what world does McLaren live in. As a pastor who has been a Christian and grew up in a Christian home surrounded by Christians my entire life, I have never witnessed, endorsed, or ever tortured or executed anybody for their religious infidelity or for any other reason. Does McLaren really believe that Christians today, right now, are doing these things?
Certainly Christians have their own history of sins (who doesn't?), but certainly Christians do not support any of the accusations that McLaren charges Christians. We can debate politics and natural security issues, but to accuse Christians of practicing torture or genocide is simply not true.
But which exclusive, intolerant, hateful religion do these things right now? Radical Islam. Nowhere does McLaren condemn terrorism or raadical Islam which is doing all of the things he is accusing Christians of doing. Furthermore, he says nothing of the long history of persecution against Christians. Instead, McLaren seems to act as if Christians bring such hatred upon themselves for their intolerant bigotry. Christians have been beheaded, tortured, burned, turned into candles, fed to wild animals, and wiped out and yet McLaren says nothing.
McLaren is quick to condemned Christians for their intolerance and completely neglects others of their equal intolerance.
The reason McLaren has become so head strong on this issue of pluralism is because his understanding of the gospel has nothing to do with salvation from sin (but in systemic sin) and nothing to do with judgment before God after death. McLaren needs peace here and now and realizes that without the help of everybody, it can't happen. Postmodernism, relativism, and tolerance has made the gospel obsolete and has been replaced with a message where differences don't matter and what does matter has nothing to do with the message of Jesus.
Instead of breaking down McLaren's entire argument, I want to show that the Jesus McLaren offers is not the Jesus of the Gospels. McLaren likes to point out that Jesus was inclusive, but He forgets that His eating with sinners always followed repentance. Take Matthew for example. Once Matthew, a tax collector, repented and invited Jesus to a meal with other tax collectors for the purpose of evangelism, Jesus included them. But repentance was always the issue.
Has it never occurred to the Emerging Church that Jesus was a preacher, not a conservationists. Jesus never went back and forth with anyone interchanging ideas and learning from His experiences. Jesus was straightforward and honest. He corrected wrongs, condemned unrighteousness, called for repentance, demanded obedience, and was murdered for it all. He got angry, He got upset, He got vocal. Jesus is not the lovable fuzz-ball that many Emergent liberals make Him out to be.
Jesus was not tolerant of false beliefs and neither was His followers. Once false teaching entered into the Church, the apostles were quick to condemn it. Entire books of the New Testament deal with the subject of false religion and heresy writing them off already condemned by God for spreading their lies. There is no tolerance in Jude or 2 Peter. Paul tells the Galatians that if anyone preaches another gospel (and by gospel Paul does not have McLaren's understanding of the gospel in mind) let them be accursed by God. Again, no tolerance. No openness. No call for pluralism.
By undermining the foundations of the Christians faith like Scripture, the character and holiness of God, the meaning and results of sin, Jesus Christ and His purpose for dying and being raised from the dead, and the gospel, McLaren is able to condemn us "fundamentalists" (the name of his straw man) all the while perpetuating heresy and false doctrine. The strong language from Jesus and the apostles in the New Testament regarding false teaching is reserved for persons like McLaren.
He promotes a false religion, a false gospel, a false Jesus, a false message, a false god, and a false kingdom and he expects us to follow him. Southern Seminary was right, this book should be called "An Old Kind of Heresy."
For more:
Theology - A New Kind of Christianity . . . Indeed: The Narrative Question - Part 1
Theology - A New Kind of Christianity . . . Indeed: The Authority Question - Part 2
Theology - A New Kind of Christianity . . . Indeed: The God Question - Part 3
Theology - A New Kind of Christianity . . . Indeed: The Jesus Question - Part 4
Theology - A New Kind of Christianity . . . Indeed: The Gospel Question - Part 5
Theology - A New Kind of Christianity . . . Indeed: The Church Question - Part 6
Theology - A New Kind of Christianity . . . Indeed: The Sex Question - Part 7
Theology - A New Kind of Christianity . . . Indeed: The Future Question - Part 8
Commentary - Jesus is Into Offending People: Its Time for Christians to Admit the Obvious and Proclaim with Boldness
0 comments:
Post a Comment