A biblical look at the tenets of the heretical purpose driven paradigm that is crippling the church in America.

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And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers,to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ,so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. - Ephesians 4: 11-16 (ESV)

I have always said that no one has done more damage to modern Christianity than Rick Warren. His Purpose Driven Church model is the dominant church paradigm today. Many who would never quote Warren because they understand that he is a dominionist, ecumenical wolf will still adhere to the principles he has taught for decades regarding church organization and leadership. Here are the basic tenets of this destructive teaching with some commentary on each unbiblical point:

* The pastor is no longer a shepherd. He is instead a vision casting CEO who must always lead for the church that is coming instead of the church he has.

Seeker friendly pastor Andy Stanley is on record as saying that we should no longer use the world "shepherd" because it is not culturally relevant. This despite the fact that God uses it over and over again in the New Testament. The reality however is that the modern day pastor is no longer acting as a shepherd. They no longer cater to the flock. The sheep starve to death while a banquet of heretical pablum is served up each week to amuse the goats that are visiting. Christ is the CEO of the church beloved. The pastor is merely an under-shepherd, entrusted to watch over the flock.

Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after them. - Acts 20: 28-30 (ESV)

Nowhere in the Bible is there any mention of vision casting. It is a man made idea. We have a vision - it is called the Gospel. We have the vision caster - He is called Jesus.

* Language must always be tempered to not offend. The unsaved are now the unchurched. Thus the goal is to now "church" them, not save them.

I am not kidding. This term unchurched is routinely how Rick Warren and those who follow these leadership principles refer to the lost. It also gives serious insight into what the focus is really on. It is not about salvation. It is about churching. This is a perfect model for building a castle, but not the kingdom. Warren infamously wrote an article for pastors a couple years ago where in his advice for preaching on Easter he encouraged them to NOT preach the Gospel because they need to give their visitors a reason to come back next week! Because the model is to never offend the seeker, there can be no conversation about their state as a sinner and their need for repentance. Thus when the altar calls come it is designed to "invite Jesus into your heart" or "give Jesus a try." None of these alternatives actually lead to salvation because without repentance, there is no regeneration. All you have are goats who you try to teach to behave like sheep.

* You gear the church activities, worship, and sermons towards the unchurched, not the saved. It is the goats that matter - not the sheep.

In this year so far alone, we have seen during worship sets across the mega church landscape, Wrecking Ball by Miley Cyrus and the hit club song, "I like to Move It, Move It." We have seen one church put on a circus during service. Another had the pastor and his wife preaching via satellite from their kitchen about how to eat healthier. For Super Bowl Sunday one church had a mock Sportscenter Program and another preached on life lessons found in our favorite commercials. This is in less than six months and it only scratches the surface! There is seemingly no sense of crazy or level of irreverence churches are not willing to go to in order to appear relevant and convince those goats to come back next week.

It is not just worship either. The sermons in purpose driven churches are parodies of the Gospel at best. One mega church this year actually re-wrote the Ten Commandments so people would feel better about their sin. Another routinely preaches that we do not even have to worry about sin because God is never angry with us. We have seen sermon series ranging from your favorite super hero and how to spice up your sex life. The true sheep of God meanwhile are withering away on the vine. I have seen multiple purpose driven pastors insist that church is not for the sheep. That it is designed for the unchurched. That the moment you said amen to your altar call the church ceased to exist for you. I kid you not. Which leads us to our next point:

* Blessed subtraction is encouraged. This means anyone who complains is shown the door.

The term blessed subtraction is literally in the Purpose Driven Church, which all young gun pastors today read as their bible. The infamous sermon from Mars Hill Church, where Mark Driscoll gleefully refers to the sheep he has hurt as a "pile of dead bodies behind the Mars Hill bus" actually began with the statement that Driscoll is "all about blessed subtraction." If you do not believe me, here is the audio:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BfTmgPhmlto

Here is why this concept however contributes to building a castle and not the kingdom. The average time someone spends in a purpose driven mega church is less than three years. By that time, they see all the hypocrisy and figure out that they can get all of this worldliness in the world and do not need to wake up early on Sundays anymore. Not to mention the money they save from not tithing anymore. When they depart however, there is no shepherd anymore to leave the 99 and go find the one who has wandered off because the pastor thinks he is a CEO and not a shepherd! On top of that, he has been trained to believe that blessed subtraction is a good thing. The only thing he is focused on is the church that is coming next week. The next round of goats that he can convince to hang around for a couple of years. The end result is a perpetual cycling in and out of unsaved but fully churched goats who will discover on judgment day that they never actually knew Christ at all. The individual castle the CEO is building looks healthy because there are always huge amounts of people. The CEO and those around him all point to this as a sign of success or even divine favor so they never think anything is wrong. Meanwhile however the Christian landscape is dotted with these wandering goats and sheep who rarely return to organized church and become ripe for the devil to attack and bitterness to infect. The kingdom does not grow under the shadow of the mighty castle the CEO is building. The Tower of Babel in modern terms.

* The Bible and theology become man centered instead of God focused. Jesus is leveraged, not preached.

We see this every Sunday across America. The Bible is not preached it is used. Jesus is not preached, He is used. Used to prop up a failed theology or a topical sermon designed to tickle the ears and "church" the goats. Suddenly every story in the Bible is either about you or is used to better your temporal life. Peter didn't walk on water - you need to! David did not slay Goliath - you did! How often do we hear nonsense like this, "In the garden Eve encountered a snake. How many of you have snakes you encounter in your lives every day?" What??? The story of the fall of man has so many deep and profound theological implications and the best you can do is ask if they have snakes in their lives? The Bible is not about you beloved. It is not about me. It is about Jesus Christ. What this does is present the Bible as something that reveals what God can do for you instead of the account of what He has already done.

Why you may ask? Why does it have to be done this way in this model? Because if you were to actually preach the Gospel you must start and end at Calvary and there are implications from Calvary that have been deemed most seeker-unfriendly. You cannot speak about Calvary and not get to the cross. You cannot speak about the cross and not get to sin. You cannot speak about sin. Period. All topics must be pleasing to the seeker. No discussion of sin or repentance is allowed. Which leads us to the final tenet for today's discussion:

* In order to meet the seeker where they are at and seem relevant, the church must adapt to the culture.

Purpose driven pastors will all insist that they need to be relevant to the culture the unchurched are in. They ridiculously call it "reaching as many for Jesus as possible." This is why you see churches unapologetically using secular music during worship. The word religion becomes code-speak for placing God in a box. It becomes an archaic dirty word. The reality however is the box they are trying so desperately to avoid is known as the Bible. They do not like the Bible because it can be restrictive in terms of what we ought to be doing as the church. Paul recognized this when he was preaching:

And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling,and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God. - 1Corinthians 2: 1-5 (ESV)

The church toady does the opposite of this. It avoids discussing Jesus crucified as already outlined. Instead, the purpose driven church is built on nothing but the carnal wisdom of man. They seek out the most carnal of secular leaders for their leadership conferences. The CEO pastor model is built on a charismatic speaker full of lofty speech and wisdom. The end result is exactly what Paul is saying here we ought to avoid! The faith of the goats rests entirely upon the wisdom of men, specifically the CEO pastor. This is why there is so much church and pastor worship in these churches. It is not only taught but it is encouraged. Many purpose driven mega-churches indoctrinate the congregation and even the kids in kids church with the notion that God has given the vision to their pastor and they will defend it aggressively! This cult-like phenomena is how we ended up with a tragedy like Jonestown. Anyone who dares to point out the heresy is labeled as a "hater" who is "divisive." People who want to put "God in a box" with their "religion."

The model is simple. You preach about individual purpose. Your altar call is short and designed to effect maximum numbers. They get baptized quickly. They then get into membership and plugged into a ministry, IE - their purpose. They may last the full three years or they may not. It does not matter because the CEO is busy drawing more goats rather than shepherding the sheep. The individual castle grows and grows, while the kingdom of God does not. The problem of course is this is all entirely unbiblical. The key verses today outline the offices God designed for His church and more importantly, the reason why. The shepherds, teachers, evangelists, and even prophets and apostles had a design in the mind of God. They are supposed to build up the body of Christ. That means the saved. The fully churched. The sheep. This may comes as a shock to some but the church is not for the lost. It is for the saved. Now, if the lost come to church seeking God they should find Him in the preached Gospel. The Holy Spirit will draw that person based on the weight of their sins. They will either repent or they will not. Either way, the sheep are still being tended to and fed.

Why is this the model? The key verses teach us that it is so that the sheep can attain the unity of the faith. Not this farce that passes for unity today where we all sing Kumbaya while skipping down the broad path that leads to our destruction. No beloved. True unity is in the knowledge of the Son of God. So that we might mature to the fullness of Christ. What does that mean? According to the key verses it means that we will not be as spiritual infants - tossed about by every wave of doctrine. Did you ever wonder why so many self professing Christians fell for such nonsense like holy laughter or the preaching of such obvious wolves like Benny Hinn? Why do so many chase after false faith healers and hucksters selling clairvoyance with demons as "prophecy?" Because the new wave of heresy comes along and they are too spiritually immature to discern what is from God and what is from the devil! They continue to fall for human cunning and the schemes of deceitful men.

There is no growth in the love of Christ because there is no sound doctrine being preached! The body is diseased because there are too many infants being spiritually starved to death by men who were never genuinely called by God. They do not consider themselves shepherds because they have no intent to tend to the sheep of the Lord. They speak of a kingdom they know nothing about because they are not in the business of building the kingdom. Instead they are building their own castle. A Tower of Babel monument to their own greatness. One day they will answer for all of the sheep they have mangled in the name of human wisdom and carnal progress. Until then beloved, if you find yourself in these churches, I implore you as the Bible commands, to come out from among them.

Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial?Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, "I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you,and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty." - 2Corinthians 6: 14-18 (ESV)

Let us pray for the church Jesus Christ loves.

Reverend Anthony Wade - May 16, 2015

Authors Bio:
Credentialed Minister of the Gospel for the Assemblies of God. Owner and founder of 828 ministries. Vice President for Goodwill Industries. Always remember that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.