Presupposition Seven: If It Is Working, It Must be Good
The problem with this faulty presupposition is it fails to define what "working" means. If "working" means it is attracting a large number of people, Roman Catholicism is "good," Islam is "good," porn sites on the internet are, "good," and we could go on and on.
The Bible does not measure success this way. Instead, the biblical writers describe success in terms to faithfulness to the revealed will of God. If we are disobedient to God, we have failed, even if thousands applaud our disobedience.
Presupposition Eight: Conversion, in the Biblical Sense, Is Unimportant
It is altogether likely the leaders of this movement would be strident in their denial of this presupposition. They would insist they believe that at some point the unconverted need to become Christians. Yet, the emphasis of their ministry seems to be radically different from that of biblical Christianity. It seems the plan of operation is to teach the unconverted how to handle relationship issues and other matters in a Christian fashion in the hope that they will gradually embrace the Christian faith. Anyone who has read, The Purpose Driven Life, by Pastor Rick Warren, will surely recognize that he consistently addresses his readers as though they are believers. There is one brief passage in which he superficially alludes to a person’s need to become a Christian, but it is a far cry from the kind of conversion demanded by the Scriptures.
I recently heard a sermon series entitled "Extreme Makeover" preached by a pastor who calls himself "seeker-sensitive." He spoke about the need for an alteration of a number of our body parts due to the practice of Christian duties. For example, he spoke about having rough knees because we have been involved in prayer.
But there was one that was missing from this series that you might have thought would be in the series, the one missing was a message on the sinner’s need of a heart transplant. Nothing less than that kind of radical change is demanded by the gospel.
The gospel doesn’t demand that we repeat a prayer, walk an aisle, or sign a card; it demands a radical change of heart that is above our feeble power to perform.
It has now been almost half a century since James Packer penned his Introduction to The Death of Death in the Death of Christ by John Owen. In that brief introductory essay, he warned that Evangelicalism was loosing its grip on the biblical gospel. We should have listened. The following is an excerpt from that introduction.
"There is no doubt that Evangelicalism today is in a state of perplexity and unsettlement. In such matters as the practice of evangelism, the teaching of holiness, the building up of local church life, the pastor’s dealing with souls and the exercise of discipline, there is evidence of widespread dissatisfaction with things as they are and of equally widespread uncertainty as to the road ahead.
This is a complex phenomenon, to which many factors have contributed; but if we go to the root of the matter, we shall find that these perplexities are all ultimately due to our having lost our grip on the biblical gospel.
Without realizing it, we have during the past century bartered that gospel for a substitute product which, though it looks similar enough in points of detail, is as a whole a decidedly different thing.
Hence our troubles; for the substitute product does not answer the ends for which the authentic gospel has in past days proved itself so mighty.
The new gospel conspicuously fails to produce deep reverence, deep repentance, deep humility, a spirit of worship, a concern for the church. Why? We would suggest that the reason lies in its own character and content.
It fails to make man God-centered in their thoughts and God-fearing in their hearts because this is not primarily what it is trying to do. One way of stating the difference between it and the old gospel is to say that it is too exclusively concerned to be "helpful" to man to bring peace, comfort, happiness, satisfaction and too little concerned to glorify God.
The old gospel was "helpful" too more so, indeed, than is the new but (so to speak) incidentally, for its first concern was always to give glory to God. It was always and essentially a proclamation of Divine sovereignty in mercy and judgment, a summons to bow down and worship the mighty Lord on whom man depends for all good, both in nature and in grace. Its center of reference was unambiguously God. But in the new gospel the center of reference is man. This is to say that the old gospel was religious in a way that the new gospel is not.
Whereas the chief aim of the old was to teach men to worship God, the concern of the new seems limited to making them feel better. The subject of the old gospel was God and His ways with men; the subject of the new is man and the help God gives him. There is a world of difference. The whole perspective and emphasis of gospel preaching has changed."
This is a complex phenomenon, to which many factors have contributed; but if we go to the root of the matter, we shall find that these perplexities are all ultimately due to our having lost our grip on the biblical gospel.
Without realizing it, we have during the past century bartered that gospel for a substitute product which, though it looks similar enough in points of detail, is as a whole a decidedly different thing.
Hence our troubles; for the substitute product does not answer the ends for which the authentic gospel has in past days proved itself so mighty.
The new gospel conspicuously fails to produce deep reverence, deep repentance, deep humility, a spirit of worship, a concern for the church. Why? We would suggest that the reason lies in its own character and content.
It fails to make man God-centered in their thoughts and God-fearing in their hearts because this is not primarily what it is trying to do. One way of stating the difference between it and the old gospel is to say that it is too exclusively concerned to be "helpful" to man to bring peace, comfort, happiness, satisfaction and too little concerned to glorify God.
The old gospel was "helpful" too more so, indeed, than is the new but (so to speak) incidentally, for its first concern was always to give glory to God. It was always and essentially a proclamation of Divine sovereignty in mercy and judgment, a summons to bow down and worship the mighty Lord on whom man depends for all good, both in nature and in grace. Its center of reference was unambiguously God. But in the new gospel the center of reference is man. This is to say that the old gospel was religious in a way that the new gospel is not.
Whereas the chief aim of the old was to teach men to worship God, the concern of the new seems limited to making them feel better. The subject of the old gospel was God and His ways with men; the subject of the new is man and the help God gives him. There is a world of difference. The whole perspective and emphasis of gospel preaching has changed."
One reason the seeker-sensitive movement is so easily accepted by the average church member is that it is not really wholly new. It is simply another step on the slippery slope away from the biblical gospel that has been occurring for decades.
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