Often bloggers can do no better service than to point their readers to someone who has written an important article better than they can do.
With that in mind, please go to Kevin McCullough's article at Townhall.com entitled "Why is Obama's Evil in Rick Warren's Pulpit?" The gist is that Warren has invited Illinois Senator Barak Obama, whose public stance on marriage, abortion, and homosexuality runs contrary to the Scriptures Warren claims to belief, to speak at his Saddleback Church on World AIDS Day on December 1
Admittedly, pastors of small churches such as myself criticizing leaders of megachurches can come across like a guy sucking sour lemons. Yet McCullough's article points out how the fellowship of light and darkness undermines the faith, which is already doctrinally compromised within the megachurch movement. He is seeking to get people to call or e-mail Saddleback. Stay tuned to see if there is any response to this by the church.
All of which goes to remind us: When you start standing up for everything, you end up standing for nothing.
2 comments:
Megachurches often don't see themselves as political (despite any evidence you might show them to the contrary). I'm less sure on Saddleback than on Willow Creek, but certainly Hybels has said that he doesn't see political involvement as the goal of his church. At Willow Creek, they may speak out on AIDS or poverty or abortion, but it's always in the context of the individual, not the community. The church, as a whole, works pretty hard to remain politically neutral, and, with people filling the seats from every political spectrum, that's a necessary position if they want to remain "mega."
What you're seeing is an outgrowth of the megachurch's marketing orientation. Market often trumps Scripture in a fair fight, because marketing strategies bring in the people. I would guess that, if Saddleback does respond to criticism on this issue, they would defend their position by arguing (correctly of course) that Obama will bring in people, and that some of these people will have a chance to hear the gospel who might never have heard it otherwise. Everything else is, for them, secondary.
Joseph Farah has been taking Warren to task for Warren's recent trip to Syria and some of the things he said while there. Check out at www.worldnetdaily.com
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