I agree. I first became aware of Rick Warren when all of Houston, it seemed, was swept up in 40 days of madness 5 or 6 years ago. A raving Warren fanatic pushed a copy of “The Purpose Driven Life” into my hands - it was golden! 2 pastors at my church were big fans of Warren, so I read the book - and wept.
I wrote up a critique of it, at the request of a friend from another church nearby. http://menofhonorministry.org/Discipleship/ThePurposeDrivenLife.htm
I reviewed this with my pastor, who blew it off, saying it was “sloppy” because Rick had been teaching this stuff for 20 years and just threw the book together. At that time, it had sold 20 million copies. The publishing industry is pretty brutal. Sloppy doesn’t make 20 million pressings.
“The Purpose Driven Church”, he said, is “much more tightly written”. Rather than calling these books “biblically sound” or “theologically unsound”, he called them “sloppy” and “tight”. sigh
Took me a while to find a copy of PDC. It’s worse - in many ways - than PDL.
http://brogdensmuse.menofhonorministry.org/Apologetics/PDC.htm
I had the PDL review on the church men’s ministry site (http://menofhonorministry.org/) for a year, until I told to take it down by the pastors. But I was not asked to remove my critique of “Wild at Heart” http://menofhonorministry.org/Discipleship/WildatHeart.pdf
Warren needs to be protected. Those who protect him are complicit in Warrens “stealth network” attack on the church.
Thanks for the links to your reviews of PDL and Wild at Heart.
I read both books years ago.
PDL was difficult to navigate after the first nine or ten chapters. I never investigated why, just put the book aside. Something in my spirit did not agree. I’m glad you took the time to critique it. Your critique is quite good and well grounded in Scripture. It seems we have so many “success” books in Christian literature, that it is a mere reflection of the secular mania involving self help books.
As you say, God desires obedience more than anything. For only a person turned toward Him and saved by faith in Jesus Christ can do His will.
Years ago, my wife heard about Wild at Heart and got me a copy. She thought I would like it. I have to say, that is the worst book I have ever read in my life, and I read a lot!
I remember little now, but my disgust at the author’s tortured reasoning and stupid, vapid examples were palpable at the time. My wife was very surprised at my reaction. I told her—I never want to be like that “man”-the author.
That book was like being waterboarded—torture. No rhyme, no reason, just stupidity, chapter after chapter.
I have found that the Christian literature business of the last thirty years has been a source of major disappointment. Each author thinks that somehow they alone and their life experiences qualify them to tell everyone else how to live the Christian life. Quite frankly, few of these authors have suffered for Christ in any real way. Some of these authors have written 20,30,40 books! Good thing they were born, huh?
After almost forty years of following Christ, I value more the humble servant who in obedience lives out their daily lives as a testimony to who is their Lord, reflected in their speech and their actions. Those are the ones you can learn something from.
The self help wunderkind, I have no need for.
>[PDL]I reviewed this with my pastor, who blew it off, saying it was “sloppy” because Rick had been teaching this stuff for 20 years and just threw the book together.
>“The Purpose Driven Church”, he said, is “much more tightly written”.
That’s frightening. The PDC came off more obviously WRONG scripturally on first read than PDL did!
I want to see the article.
Perhaps it is defamatory and libelous. It’s hard to assess that without reading it.
There are libel laws.