Excerpts from Rick Warren’s The Purpose-Driven Life

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[HarleyD]

Yes, I think we are talking past each other. I'm not saying one should not be out there "fighting the good fight". I'm simply saying that just because YOU may think "exponentially" doesn't make that God's desire.

I remember reading about a missionary who was led to go to Southeast Asia in the early 1900s. He sold everything and headed out with his wife and two young boys. Because of the primative conditions his two sons and eventually his wife succumb to disease and died. He was beaten and tortured for his work by the rulers. After 19 years he never saw one convert come to our Lord Jesus or never planted a church. He had nothing to show for his work when he passed on.

Under your definition this man's life's work was a failure. I'd call it a success.

[blue-duncan]

No, I would call him a success. Look at Adonirum Judson or William Carey. "Exponential thinking" is just another way of seeing things as God sees them, not as we do since our view is limited by our finiteness. "Exponential thinking" is "I being in the way, the Lord lead me to the house..". I think it varies with the gifts and offices given and the desire and faithfulness to do the work of the Lord. When the Lord commands eleven to go into all the world and preach the gospel, and to look unto the fields that are white unto harvest and to the 150, that they shall be witnesses unto Jerusalem, all of Judea, Samaria and to the uttermost part of the earth, we had better be thinking beyond ourselves (i.e. His thoughts) or we will, on His return, just dig up the one buried talent.

[ij2873]

Interesting. This whole thing is sweeping the nation, but the numbers overall don't seem to show it having any effect, other than simply teaching the Bible.

During the last 70 years, the percentage of this country’s population attending church has been relatively constant at about 43 percent. A spike of 49 percent in 1991 (years prior to today’s initial seeker-sensitive enthusiasm) gradually declined, returning to 42 percent in 2002 (www.barna.org). It's respective to population, so no, no dramatic revival. People getting saved the same ways they always did, by people sharing the Word with them. The seeker sensitive movement, no effect.

Furthermore one of the major seeker sensitive churches determined (they know this because they love statistics, that's how they know this), that only 10 to 15% of the congregation is made up of the so-called "unchurched harry or mary". So much for revival due to the seeker sensitive
methods.

It's a failure compared to the simple teaching of the Bible, the Word of God.

[blue-duncan]

Welcome to the forum. That is what the Purpose Driven method is, another method of Bible teaching, i.e. small groups rather than the more traditional Sunday school, although it can be used in that setting. I don't know what effect it is having on other churches, but I do know the method has helped my church in getting better and more enthusiastic participation in Bible studies from the more mature Christians. We have found we are more likely to invite our unsaved relatives and friends to the small group studies and then to the worship services and the invitation is more readily received. These invitees find a more intimate atmosphere in which to ask questions and experience the love and concern of the body of Christ than in the larger setting of the worship service. At least, that is my experience. I don't know about large revivals in any other church. What I do know is what it has done for my church and it works.

[ij2873]

Thank you for the welcome to the forum. The point I was really driving to make was, that it isn't having a nationwide effect in terms of revival in this country. The same number of people that were so-called "churched" (a ridiculous designation that didn't exist before this fad, instead just call them unsaved), was at 43%, 70 years ago. Today it is still 43%, after 10 years of the "seeker" movement.

Yes, it will undoubtedly be helpful, because it is sharing that Jesus died for sins and rose again. God will use any system that is sharing that. But the methods used to bring the people in, aren't making people pour in from all over the country, any more or less than any other church system. That was my point. And you see that is true, because the numbers remain the same after 10 years of "seeker" services.

Revivals don't take 10 years to occur. They just happen. Rick Warren calls himself the "inventor of perpetual revival", but if so, where is the revival? Why are things worse morally in this country, than 10 years ago?

Those are the questions he can't answer. He's just a Bible teacher. If your unsaved friends weren't coming into a "seeker" atmosphere, then they'd be coming in some other way.

[blue-duncan]

"If your unsaved friends weren't coming into a "seeker" atmosphere, then they'd be coming in some other way." I know, but it's more fun to ask them and see them come. It was like when Evangelism Explosion began. It was a method that gave timid people like me a tool to use to witness to people. The structure gave confidence that one was covering all the basis during the excitement of witnessing and you were a vital part of the purposes of God. This does not discount the activity of the Holy Spirit in all of this, it's just that some of us "shy" Christians need a little more help in reaching the lost than the more aggressive, confident Christians.

As far as numbers are concerned, God has them already and I don't think He wants us to keep score. As far as "perpetual revival" is concerned, I just had a call from a liberal church that heard about our experience with Purpose Driven Life and they want me to help them implement their program. You never know. Seems our job is to pray for this "wave" until God plays it out and brings another.

[ij2873]

<> Tell that to Rick Warren who sounds at times like there was no Christianity before he came along. In reality, I'm all for things that promote and spread the Gospel. But I'm not for the milky propagation of believers done in the seeker churches. I've tried it, and it strangled me with milk. Now I'm attending a Calvary Chapel that teaches the whole Word. I'm timid like you, but being filled with the whole counsel of God gave me boldness that I didn't have before. The schemes of man are temporary and will burn, but God's Word stands forever. As far as "waves", it's a goofy thing to begin with. This isn't a revival, that was my point in all this. There is no wave. It's the Gospel being presented to the lost world. But it isn't changing the country, it's simply doing what it was supposed to do starting 2000 years ago. As far as the accusation that some make, that the "mature" Christians prefer meat, in reality as Christians we're all instructed to get into meat (Hebrews 5 and 6). I don't see Rick Warren doing that.

[blue-duncan]

You know, we are all gifted in different areas. Some are Pastors, some Evangelists, some Teachers and some helpers.
Warren, I understand, is gifted as an Evangelist and has passed on to the churches some of the ways, the Lord has seen fit, in His plan, to lead him. As someone, previously in this thread has pointed out, some plant, some water but God gives the increase. Warren plants as an Evangelist and others water, teaching, and God gives the increase and the glory. Samuel Shoemaker wrote a poem that sums up Warren's position well:

[I Stand by the Door
by Sam Shoemaker

I stand by the door.
I neither go too far in, nor stay too far out,
The door is the most important door in the world-
It is the door through which people walk when they find God.
There's no use my going way inside, and staying there,
When so many are still outside and they, as much as I,
Crave to know where the door is.
And all that so many ever find
Is only the wall where a door ought to be.
They creep along the wall like blind people,
With outstretched, groping hands.
Feeling for a door, knowing there must be a door,
Yet they never find it ...
So I stand by the door.
The most tremendous thing in the world
Is for people to find that door--the door to God.
The most important thing any person can do
Is to take hold of one of those blind, groping hands,
And put it on the latch--the latch that only clicks
And opens to the person's own touch.
People die outside that door, as starving beggars die
On cold nights in cruel cities in the dead of winter—
Die for want of what is within their grasp.
They live, on the other side of it--live because they have not found it.
Nothing else matters compared to helping them find it,
And open it, and walk in, and find Him ...
So I stand by the door.

Go in, great saints, go all the way in--
Go way down into the cavernous cellars,
And way up into the spacious attics--
It is a vast roomy house, this house where God is.
Go into the deepest of hidden casements,
Of withdrawal, of silence, of sainthood.
Some must inhabit those inner rooms.
And know the depths and heights of God,
And call outside to the rest of us how wonderful it is.
Sometimes I take a deeper look in,
Sometimes venture in a little farther;
But my place seems closer to the opening ...
So I stand by the door.

There is another reason why I stand there.
Some people get part way in and become afraid
Lest God and the zeal of His house devour them
For God is so very great, and asks all of us.
And these people feel a cosmic claustrophobia,
And want to get out. "Let me out!" they cry,
And the people way inside only terrify, them more.
Somebody must be by the door to tell them that they are spoiled
For the old life, they have seen too much:
Once taste God, and nothing but God will do any more.
Somebody must be watching for the frightened
Who seek to sneak out just where they came in,
To tell them how much better it is inside.
The people too far in do not see how near these are
To leaving--preoccupied with the wonder of it all.
Somebody must watch for those who have entered the door,
But would like to run away. So for them, too,
I stand by the door.

I admire the people who go way in.
But I wish they would not forget how it was
Before they got in. Then they would be able to help
The people who have not, yet even found the door,
Or the people who want to run away again from God,
You can go in too deeply, and stay in too long,
And forget the people outside the door.
As for me, I shall take my old accustomed place,
Near enough to God to hear Him, and know He is there,
But not so far from people as not to hear them,
And remember they are there, too.
Where? Outside the door--
Thousands of them, millions of them.
But--more important for me--
One of them, two of them, ten of them,
Whose hands I am intended to put on the latch.
So I shall stand by the door and wait
For those who seek it.
"I had rather be a door-keeper ..."
So I stand by the door.

Sam Shoemaker, founder of Faith At Work at Calvary Episcopal

God hasn't given us all the same talents, gifts vision for the church or all of His plans. If He did He wouldn't need (if you can say God needs anything) all of us with such varied characteristics. Some have to stand in the shallows and give a hand to those wounded, wary, timid and fearful individuals or even those who think they are self sufficient until they come face to face with the disarming presence of God in the face of some who dare to be transparent in a small group. I think that is the burden Warren is sharing with us and I thank God for his generous spirit.

[ij2873]

I don't really see Warren as a very good evangelist at all if he teaches that it's better to fill out a card that you accept Jesus than to make a public confession (even though Jesus Himself spoke of public confessions). Warren thinks they're too "threatening" for the so-called seeker.

It's watered-down pablum, and, at least for me, I personally believe that a lot of it is going to burn or be proven to have not played by God's rules (2 Timothy 2).

You can't treat God's truth as if it is just another part of the world. Friendship with the world is enmity with God. Especially when Warren goes on television to explain how he rejects the use of the "h-word" HELL and too much mention of sin.

I guess then Jesus was a really bad minister, huh?

Warren is a flake. But the Lord is gracious and uses it, and all of us.

[Buggman]

Exactly. I personally don't have much use for PDL, because I already know my purpose and calling and my theology is pretty far along. But for many Christians, who have never gotten past the basics, it may well be useful. I don't see anything substansively wrong in what I've read or hear of Warren's work, so I'm not going to condemn it.

It seems that even if the book is flawed (and what book outside of sacred Scripture isn't?), neither it nor Warren deserve the level of venom that gets spewed in their direction.