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A New Kind of Christianity
- 02/16/10
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Early in George Orwell’s iconic 1984 is a particularly haunting scene. Winston, the hero of the story, is confessing to his diary a sexual encounter with a prostitute. Though Big Brother rigidly controls even sexual union and though sex is viewed as “a slightly disgusting minor operation, like having an enema,” still Big Brother cannot remove from humanity the desire and the need for intimacy. One evening Winston spots a prostitute near a train station. “She had a young face,” he writes, “painted very thick. It was really the paint that appealed to me, the whiteness of it, like a mask, and the bright red lips. Party women never paint their faces.” In a society where abject fear and loneliness are the norm, Winston craves the intimacy of sex. But as he goes into this woman’s apartment and lies with her, he turns up a lamp, casting a bright light on her face. And immediately he sees that the appearance of beauty was a lie. “What he had suddenly seen in the lamplight was that the woman was old. The paint was plastered so thick on her face that it looked as though it might crack like a cardboard mask. There were streaks of white in her hair; but the truly dreadful detail was that her mouth had fallen a little open, revealing nothing except a cavernous blackness. She had no teeth at all.”
But, despite his horror, his revulsion, Winston continues. In his diary he writes “When I saw her in the light she was quite an old woman, fifty years old at least. But I went ahead and did it just the same.” Though the woman loses all sexual appeal, Winston continues in this act. He continues because, though his desire is quenched, still sex is an act of rebellion. By sleeping with this prostitute he is engaging in an act of heart-felt rebellion against Big Brother.
It wasn’t too long ago that I wrote about Brian McLaren and got in trouble. Reflecting on seeing him speak at a nearby church, I suggested that he appears to love Jesus but hate God. Based on immediate and furious reaction, I quickly retracted that statement. I should not have done so. I believed it then and I believe it now. And if it was true then, how much more true is it upon the release of his latest tome A New Kind of Christianity. In this book we finally see where McLaren’s journey has taken him; it has taken him into outright, rank, unapologetic apostasy. He hates God. Period.
“It’s time for a new quest,” write McLaren, “launched by new questions, a quest across denominations around the world, a quest for new ways to believe and new ways to live and serve faithfully in the way of Jesus, a quest for a new kind of Christian faith.” McLaren frames the book around “Ten Questions That Are Transforming the Faith.” They cut to the very heart of the faith, foundational in every way. He asks:
The narrative question: What is the overarching story line of the Bible?
The authority question: How should the Bible be understood?
The God question: Is God violent?
The Jesus question: Who is Jesus and why is he important?
The gospel question: What is the gospel?
The church question: What do we do about the church?
The sex question: Can we find a way to address human sexuality without fighting about it?
The future question: Can we find a better way of viewing the future?
The pluralism question: How should followers of Jesus relate to people of other religions?
The what-do-we-do-now question: How can we translate our quest into action?
His purpose, he insists, is not to answer the questions, but to provide responses to them. Answers indicate finality, responses indicate conversation and openness. “The responses I offer are not intended as a smash in tennis, delivered forcefully with a lot of topspin, in an effort to win the game and create a loser. Rather, they are offered as a gentle serve or lob; their primary goal is to start the interplay, to get things rolling, to invite your reply. Remember, our goal is not debate and division yielding hate or a new state, but rather questioning that leads to conversation and friendship on the new quest.” But that is mere semantics. Whether answering or responding (whether saying tomato or tomahto), what McLaren does through these ten questions is to completely rewrite the Christian faith. His “gentle lobs” rip the very heart out of the faith.
At the center of his remix of the faith is the claim that most Christians look at their faith through a flawed Platonic, Greco-Roman lens instead of through a biblical, Jewish lens. “God’s unfolding drama is not a narrative shaped by the six lines in the Greco-Roman scheme of perfection, fall, condemnation, salvation, and heavenly perfection or eternal perdition. It has a different story line entirely. It’s a story about the downside of ‘progress’—a story of human foolishness and God’s faithfulness, the human turn toward rebellion and God’s turn toward reconciliation, the human intention toward evil and God’s intention to overcome evil with good.” This Greco-Roman God, the one that most Christians believe in, is a “damnable idol … defended by many a well-meaning but misguided scholar and fire-breathing preacher.”
McLaren plays the all-too-typical “everyone else has it wrong” card. It turns out that most of us (all but a handful of enlightened intellectuals, as it happens) have been reading the Bible through the distorted lens of a Greco-Roman narrative. This narrative produced many false dualisms, an air of superiority and a false distinction between those who were “in” and those who were “out.” These three marks of false narrative have so impacted our faith that we can hardly see past them. But Brian is willing and eager to play Moses, leading us out of the Egypt of our own ignorance and into the Promised Land of the new Christianity.
It would take more time than I’d be willing to give it to offer a point-by-point explanation of what responses McLaren proposes for each of the ten questions or to document the ramifications of his new theology. He denies the Fall, he denies original sin, he denies human depravity, he denies hell. And that is just in the first few pages. Needless to say, all of this leads him to a radically unbiblical view of the cross and the purpose and work of Jesus. Though he insists that he considers the Bible “inspired” (though certainly not in a traditional sense) he also says that most Christians have read it wrong, having viewed it as a kind of constitution in which God gives Spirit-breathed, inerrant revelation of himself. “I’m recommending we read the Bible as an inspired library. This inspired library preserves, presents, and inspires an ongoing vigorous conversation with and about God, a living and vital civil argument into which we are all invited and through which God is revealed.” After all, “revelation doesn’t simply happen in statements. It happens in conversations and arguments that take place within and among communities of people who share the same essential questions across generations. Revelation accumulates in the relationships, interactions, and interplay between statements.”
What does the Bible accomplish then? What does it teach us about God? “Scripture faithfully reveals the evolution of our ancestors’ best attempts to communicate their successive best understandings of God. As human capacity grows to conceive of a higher and wiser view of God, each new vision is faithfully preserved in Scripture like fossils in layers of sediment.” The Bible is an ongoing conversation about God’s character in which humans come to progressively more accurate understandings of who he is. There is no reason to think that any of them actually had it right. His reinterpretations of Job and Romans are a sight to behold, so muddled and so fabricated that they become absolutely nonsensical. There is a deliberate ignorance at work here.
The arrogance of it all is stunning. McLaren is angrier than he has been before and more scornful. Still, though, he presents his ideas coated with the veneer of a false humility. But, handily, he builds into the book the means he will use to answer his critics. He will simply accuse his detractors of having this old Greco-Roman understanding of the faith. We poor fundamentalists cannot be among the new kind of Christian until we have been enlightened to understand the Bible through an entirely new narrative structure. Only then will this all become clear. Until then, more to be pitied are we than any men.
Here, in A New Kind of Christianity it’s as if McLaren is screaming “I hate God!” at the top of his lungs. And swarms of Christians are looking at him with admiration and saying, “See how that guy loves God?” I don’t know what McLaren could do to make the situation more clear. In fact, his book is nearly indistinguishable from many of the de-conversion narratives that are all the rage today. Compare it with Bart Ehrman’s God’s Problem and you’ll see many of the same arguments and the same misgivings; you’ll find, though, that Ehrman is at least more honest. He at least has the integrity to walk away from faith altogether rather than reinventing God in his own image.
McLaren says he would prefer atheism over belief in the God so many of us see in Scripture. Well, he is not far off. This new kind of Extreme Makeover: God Edition Christianity is no Christianity at all. It is not a faith made in the image of Jesus Christ, but a faith made in the image of a man who despises God and who is hell-bent on dragging others along with him as he becomes his own god.
As Winston turned up the light, he saw that prostitute for what she really was. Here McLaren turns up the light and we see what his faith, what his Christianity, really is. We see it in all its toothless, caked-on horror. This new kind of Christianity is simply paganism behind a thick coating of false humility and biblical language. It is an expression of rebellion against God far more than it is a pursuit of new intimacy with the Creator.
And like Orwell’s whore, many will go to this book seeking intimacy with God only to content themselves with rebellion against him. For each is satisfying in its own way.
I am a follower of Jesus Christ, a husband to Aileen and a father to three young children. I worship and serve as a pastor at 
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Comments (102)
Tim:
I thought you were being too hard on McLaren in 2006. However, you were right and I was wrong.
I’m grateful that McLaren has put his cards on the table, and very sad at the number of people defending this book. Whatever it is, it is far removed from Christian orthodoxy.
By the way, today’s post goes well yesterday’s on temptation. “And so Satan works through questioning, doubt, focusing on what is forbidden and finally on outright denial of the truth…”
I thought you were being too hard on McLaren in 2006. However, you were right and I was wrong.
I think tracking McLaren over the past few years has shown me the importance of trajectory. Four years ago when I heard McLaren talk, it would have been good for me to say “Here’s the trajectory I see.” At that time I was hard on him, but I think he still had some semblances of orthodoxy. It was obvious, though, where his trajectory would be taking him. So if I had to do it all again, I think the purpose of anything I’d write would be to say, “Here’s where he is, and here’s where I think he’s going to be a few years from now…”
It’s interesting to look back to 2006 to compare the trajectories of McLaren and Driscoll. Though at one time they seemed to be coming from the same position, they were on completely different trajectories (as is patently obvious today).
“At the center of his remix of the faith is the claim that most Christians look at their faith through a flawed Platonic, Greco-Roman lens instead of through a biblical, Jewish lens.”
Very similar to Rob Bell.
Rob’s mentor was Ray Vander Laan, another wanna-be rabbi. Vander Laan’s false teaching have infected many a church in the so-called “Bible belt” of West Michigan. Weirdly, Vander Laan advocates studying present day Judaism, as if that has anything to do with 1st century Jews!
Google “Ray Vander Laan” and “Rob Bell” to find out more about this thread of heresy…
Thanks for this Tim. Just underlines the importance of all Christians understanding orthodox doctrine. Scary how so many people will be pulled away from the one true God as a result of his work.
What Darryl said, Tim!
In Brian’s world it is again May 325, and this time he thinks he can insure that Arius’ understanding of the faith once delivered, triumphs in the first Council of Niceae. And I cannot tell you how sad this makes me - at so many levels.
Brian’s work is disturbing to say the least. And the number of pastors and followers who have latched onto this nonsense is staggering. We have an entire generation drinking the cool-aid o f this feel good, love the world, embrace culture at all costs theology.
It’s a path of destruction and good for you Tim to call it as you see it.
David, “salt and light”www.redletterBelievers.com
Thanks for the review, Tim.
It’s heartbreaking to consider your last two sentences (as well as the rest).
Thank you, Tim, on a number of levels. Thank you for your honesty in admitting a mistake in your earlier retraction. Thank you for your zeal for the truth. Thank you for being bold even though you know the backlash will, most likely, not lessen. It is high time for the Church to call heresy by its name and reveal it as such. Thank you for leading the way.
I am surprised it has taken many people this long to see the truth about McLaren. I guess he is the master of speaking out of both sides of his mouth. My knowledge of McLaren goes back a bit. I had a friend who was a calvinist and we lived together for a few years. Jobs eventually took us in two different directions. Some time later I got a actual snail mail letter from him. I guess he sent it to many of his acquaintances. It was basically his conversions story away from the cold God of calvinism to a new way of being Christian. He lauded this great new teacher and recommended everyone read the works of some guy name Brian McLaren. All this sounded very freaky to me but I wasn’t able to follow it up right then. I finally got around to reading some of his early works. Hmm. this all sounds very familiar. I am well versed in liberal theology and have been reading them most of my Christian life. And it was written clear on every page. McLaren was just another God hating liberal. Back then I started calling him Brian “Arch Heretic” McLaren. Each successive book has made it clearer and clearer. The man has systematically denied every Christian doctrine.
What happened to my friend? He’s now an agnostic. So I have some strong feelings toward the Arch Heretic and the damage he’s caused the Kingdom of God.
Maybe I’m just not reading closely, but how does McLaren define the damnable Greco-Roman God? His assertion that the Bible is nothing more than a collection of evolving opinions is quite disturbing, but I don’t think he’s wrong to say that the Bible portrays God’s desire to reconcile with the world. (Though it’s certainly not at odds with the supposed Greco-Roman “narrative” as he suggests.)
Tim.. great and helpful review. It would serve all of us well to be interacting with Brian’s thoughts in front of our people. We shy away from teaching hard and true doctrine because so many find it “irrelevant.” Never has it been more relevant. Satan has found another wolf to invade the herd; we need to shepherd carefully.
It’s particularly disheartening for me to read this, because McLaren’s first book, “Finding Faith” (inexplicably re-released by Zondervan as two separate books?!) was extremely helpful and influential in my early Christian life; I still think it’s generally a great book. After reading Finding Faith I quickly bought and read through A New Kind of Christian and, although I couldn’t articulate why at the time (I was still very new) I still knew that it wasn’t right.
I entirely agree with Tim’s appraisal, as sad as it is to think about. I hope that Brian will reconsider his views. I wonder, how can we seek to minister in a helpful way (the truth in love) to someone like McLaren who is likely to be closed off to the kind of (true) criticisms levied here?
It’s almost a form of gnosticism that sees the God of the Bible as a cruel demi-urge..
Reading “A Generous Orthodoxy” several years ago made me very concerned about the direction McLaren was heading. As with many emergent types, he does sometimes identify important questions that need to be asked. He even sometimes criticizes things that need to be criticized. But the answers/responses are devastating to biblical Christianity.
“History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.”
For those who might be interested in a more detailed critique, Mike Wittmer (Professor at Grand Rapids Theological Seminary) is doing a chapter by chapter analysis of the book. I have found it extremely helpful to see a response to each of McLaren’s questions. Wittmer and Tim are agreed on the trajectory of McLaren’s views.
Thanks for this review Tim. Though sure to receive some negative responses, we must always be willing to proclaim the truth in love. For it is love that compels us to speak the truth.
Leads me to consider my trajectory; so important to be rooted in the Gospel and believe in the inspired Word of God.
In this man, I see a disturbing likeness to Ayn Rand’s villains in her book “Atlas Shrugged.” Rand wasn’t anything close to a Christian person, but her characature of non-absolutism was on point. It’s horrible how avoiding certainty, being all-inclusive, has permeated everything in our world today.
Praise the Lord for his Absolute Message and for those he has set up to proclaim it without compromise. I believe you are one of those, Mr. Challies. Thanks.
Thanks Tim. Excellent post.
What staggers me the most about the stream that McLaren runs in is that their claim is taken seriously at all about this being the new emerging Church. (“All we learn from history is that we never learn from history”?) This junk is not “emergent” at all … it’s “regurgitant”. It’s nothing revolutionary - when you boil it all down it’s the same old tired heresy we’ve seen before. The only difference between this and the neo-orthodoxy that came from the German liberal theologians of the last century, for example, is that the older guys were at least readable … you could get a handle on what they were trying to say.
These recent liberals use language that is so ambiguous, it is designed to be the jello you can never nail to the wall. It’s an intentional strategy of constant “bait and switch”.
I share your frustration, Tim, when you say “handily, he builds into the book the means he will use to answer his critics.” McLaren and Co. say they understand this because THEY have accessed the new enlightenment, and when you challenge their ideas you are just showing the bias and ignorant niavete of the uninitiated. We need to call that what it is, folks: gnosticism.
Phil
“We need to call that what it is, folks: gnosticism.”
At what level do we find out that L. Ron Hubbard is “god” in McLaren’s new faith?
Or does McLaren now replace Hubbard in OT VI?
I am amazed (but I guess I should not be) at how so many who claim allegiance to Jesus Christ have such little biblical discernment. Thanks, Tim for raising the flag for biblical discernment in this day of such error and confusion (and promoted in the name of Jesus!).
J
@Scientologist - I was referring to gnosticism’s claim to esoteric knowledge. The Greek word “gnosis” means “to know”. Gnosticism was around in the 1st Century - waaaay before Hubbard. Not sure what he has to do with what I was saying. But maybe I missed your point.
Phil
Tim,
This is slightly off topic but I feel compelled to share it anyway. Oh, and many thanks for the heads-up about Mr. McLaren by the way.
Have you noticed how, in many corners, the essence of the words “orthodox” and “orthodoxy” has been tainted and redefined to have seriously negative connotations? When having a verbal exchange (you see I can’t use the word “argue” because it too has been re-defined) of ideas with members of certain churches that were founded in the mid-1800’s; the term “orthodoxy” is highly disdained and has been re-defined as being old, out of fashion, and irrelevant in the so-called modern mode of thought. To be “orthodox” is to be stuck in the mire of pre-enlightened theology and limited old-fashioned thinking. They are in essence saying: Don’t you see! We now know and understand scripture much better than even Paul, formerly known as Saul.
Back on topic. Mr. McLaren says: “…As human capacity grows to conceive of a higher and wiser view of God, each new vision is faithfully preserved in Scripture like fossils in layers of sediment.
There it is! It’s 1844 all over again and the old orthodox clods have had it wrong all this time! We (the enlightened) now have the true understanding of scripture!
Sadly, history is repeating itself in spades here and it’s infinite source of power is human pride…
Dan….
This needed to be said. Thank you for having the courage to do so.
Am I completely alone here?
I love everyone’s heart to hold to Truth/orthodoxy, but it seems that we are reading different books. I have found McClaren to be so helpful, especially “A Generous Orthodoxy”.
Bottom line for me is this: He affirms the Gospel, and build upon it. If this weren’t true, then I would be condemning his works as rigorously as you all. I just found so many things to be completely untrue in this article.
Again, I love Tim, and the readers here. I just have a deep appreciation for many opposing forces (i.e. Rob Bell vs. Mark Driscoll; Tim Challies vs. Brian McClaren). I love them all, and find truth in them all. That said, I find an equal amount of “bones” in them all.
I have no problem with spitting out bones. Why such a tremendous fear of bones here? Jesus has promised to pray for us, protect us (John 17), and said that His Spirit would lead us into all Truth.
That is my only problem with this community: that folks are wiling to divide over things other than the Gospel. If He denied Christ, or if He added to Christ, then I would be in your ranks. However, since He affirms orthodoxy - “generous” as it may be - He is our brother in Christ. Why such a vehement ferocity at a man who frequently admits his own incompleteness in his spiritual journey. Are we not each on a journey of our own? Why not journey with those who claim Christ, despite their own obscure-seeming takes of the faith?
@ http://jasonslajchert.bandcamp.com
Wow Tim:
That tater went clean over the left-field fence!
I see a phenomenon here where those who remain of the Emergents are altogether dropping their charade and we’re finding out who they really have been all along. Maybe those mean ol’ watchdog blogs were on to something after all.
One common trail to apostasy is to consistently elevate one’s wax-nose interpretations of narrative above clear didactic passages. Those who do this to rescue God’s reputation from those meanie Calvinists: are you paying attention?
McClaren is our brother in Omelet. So shut up!
You see, when I say “omelet” I mean “Christ” — expect when I don’t. It depends on the cultural context. Sometimes.
PS: Racist haters!!!!! :)
Thank you for reviewing and writing about this book and McLaren, Tim. Have you seen this movie now being promoted to evangelical churches: http://lordsaveusthemovie.com/ (“Lord Save Us From Your Followers”)? It may make the concept of the “conversation” finally mainstream.
1 Corinthians 3:18-20
Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is folly with God. For it is written, “He catches the wise in their craftiness,” 20 and again, “The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are futile.”
I will gladly be thought a foolish orthodox if it means staying true to the Word.
“Bottom line for me is this: He affirms the Gospel, and build upon it. If this weren’t true, then I would be condemning his works as rigorously as you all.”
Let’s see if I’ve got this straight: the fact that you are not “condemning his works” is all the proof we need that McLaren is OK. That is what you’ve written. You’ve offered no other evidence that he affirms the gospel, affirms orthodoxy, and does not deny Christ than your own word that he does. In other words, you’ve said nothing.
Jason (#25),
Read this blog post by Bill Kinnon then decide whether Brian McLaren actually holds to the gospel.
Ignore the comment about Paul replacing Judas as an apostle. Matthias always gets forgotten, the poor guy.
@JasonI’m not sure that you have read the same book that Tim has. You may have missed the title, A New Kind of Christianity. I think that he is addressing the thoughts that were presented in this book but that can be traced back through McClaren’s other books. Brian seems to be “evolving” in his “generous orthodoxy” and not progressing forward in his devotion to Jesus. Jesus was devoted to the Father and only did what he saw the Father doing and so by simply affirming Brian because he belives that Jesus died for our sin while neglecting to see Brian’s disdain for the Father and the Biblical view of God is illogical. If Brian McClaren’s view and love for God differ from his view and love for Jesus, then is he really believing in the Jesus who is both God and man?This has already been mentioned but gnosticism had many forms during the early Church. So would deny the deity of Christ and some would overemphasize his deity by denying his humanity. The major concern and problem I have seen with the “emergent” crowd is that they start out loving Jesus but then become more liberal in their view of him. The major battles in Christianity have always centered on who Jesus was and is. The major battle we face today is the same only now we have more within the Church challenging who Jesus was and is. One of the greatest doctrines that we do not emphasize as much as we should is the resurrection. I just read a few bits and pieces about Adrian Warnock’s recent book, “Raised with Christ: How the Resurrection Changes Everything”, and he talks about something that we seemingly take for granted. We focus so much of our efforts on the fact that Jesus died for our sin that we do not meditate on what was accomplished in his resurrection.
Whatever the case may be, we must fight for the Truth at all cost but we must do this in love. I think it’s pathetic how we have allowed heretics and non-Christians to scare us away from defending the Truth. I guess it has something to do with the way Jesus is portrayed. There aren’t many people who talk about how Jesus handled the situation in the temple. There aren’t many people who like to talk about how seemingly indignant and angry he would get in his replies to the religious leaders of his day. We must hate the sin but love the sinner. Hate is not always violent but it is always sincere. In our defense of the truth we must remember that we have been saved by God’s grace and not by our good works or intellectual capabilities.
Thanks for this post Tim!By God’s grace,J
Thanks Tim.
Well-written and gutsy, but appropriately so.
Can someone tell me what is the emergent/postmodern’s intentional end result of the conversation and openness? Is it truth or agreement?
OK, so he denies the Fall, he denies original sin, he denies human depravity, he denies hell - yet he affirms the Gospel??? If none of these things is true, what exactly do we need the Gospel for?
Apparently McLaren believes the Gospel is that God decided to save people who didn’t really need to be saved from something that doesn’t really exist.
“And like Orwell’s whore, many will go to this book seeking intimacy with God only to content themselves with rebellion against him. For each is satisfying in its own way.”
Brilliant :)
@Jason (#25):
Going to McLaren to find truth is like sipping at raw sewage to find tasty morsels.
Yup anyone that wrote a book like A Generous Orthodoxy deserved what you said back in 2006, I am glad you now realize that… don’t succumb to the pressure. There are still only four lights. ( a little Star Trek lingo for those that are unfamiliar.)
@Jason “am I completely alone here?”
I sure hope so.
I think it’s ironic that McLaren wants to label us all as Greco-Roman influenced Bible readers. The whole postmodern emergent ‘conversation’ is basically what the Classical Skeptics did. The wiki on skepticism defines them as ones who “asserted nothing but only opined”. That fits McLaren and his project perfectly. McLaren’s only problem is that skepticism is self-defeating because it is an orthodoxy in and of itself. An orthodoxy its not willing to be skeptical of.
Great post. Thanks for not micing words with unorthodoxy. We need to call it when we see it.
BEST POST EVER:
by “POSTMODERN”McClaren is our brother in Omelet. So shut up!
You see, when I say “omelet” I mean “Christ” — expect when I don’t. It depends on the cultural context. Sometimes.
PS: Racist haters!!!!! :)
Orwell and a critique of McLaren in the same post—brilliant. You should have the respect of many for “telling the truth like it is”. That, I think, is often a very hard thing to do, but necessary.
Okay fill me in here, what gives with the Driscoll and Mclaren comparision. I understand about the association several years back, is there more that meets the eye here?
I am reading James Denney’s ‘The Death of Christ’ and in the chapter on Paul, he deals with the objection that Paul’s teaching was an embellishment of the historical Jesus. Denney calls to mind Gal 1:4 and goes on to say about the gospel that truth is intolerant. It has to be! if the gospel wasn’t in some sense intolerant and exclusive, then everyone would believe it. Intolerance in the sense of the gospel has its counterpart in comprehension says Denney. Oh the lack of comprehension in MacLaren.
“Why such a vehement ferocity at a man who frequently admits his own incompleteness in his spiritual journey. Are we not each on a journey of our own? Why not journey with those who claim Christ, despite their own obscure-seeming takes of the faith?”
Jason, you’ve been drinking too much McLaren “Kool-aid”. Yours is precisely the kind of response McLaren wants to elicit, one that goes hand in hand with his postulation that we can’t really define what is true because we’re all on our own journey. Yet McLaren is making his own bold statements about what he thinks is true about Christianity and wants us all to have a nice dialogue about it.
But when one reads lies and deceptions about the gospel; lies that lead people away from the living Christ who alone can save them and leads them instead to a false Christ that cannot save; and when all of this is presented with a false veneer of humility (when actually it is full of arrogance as it casually dismisses the thinking of great thinkers in the Church who apparently for centuries got everything wrong), then one cannot help but scream out, stop the lies and “get thee behind me Satan”!
So thanks Tim for pointing out McLaren’s sophistry and for your boldness in confronting McLaren’s false teaching.
This post is filled under and tagged as a book review. Lets take a moment and consider this.
First, why are we subjected to pointless drivel about Orwell’s “1984”? I can’t for the life of me understand why this “review” spends any time whatsoever pushing a strained analogy instead of actually addressing the book it claims is so important to address.
Second, if Maclaren is supposedly being willfully ignorant - so much for ad hominem attacks - what is one to make of a review that actually fails to review any of the content? Apparently Maclaren’s arrogance and heresy are so evident that the reviewer feels no need to provide any sort of insight on the nature of this “apostasy”. Providing the table of contents and block quotes simply won’t do. Excerpts and exclamations are not the substance of a review. And we wouldn’t need a blow-by-low rebuttal either, simply a concerted engagement with the text. Instead we get sarcasm and counter-assertion. The claim Maclaren “hates God” is superbly supported by absolutely no evidence whatsoever. It strikes me as supremely ironic that someone championing “discernment” skills falls so woefully short of displaying them in a simple review post. This post is at best a comment, and at worse a misleading rant; it is not a book review.
Any yet this is not simply about a bad review. It should give us some pause when we consider that as evangelicals we are so disturbed by certain arguments, so captivated by a so-called “wordlview”, that we are incapable of responding with a modicum of sophistication, let alone charity. Where this “review” sees in Maclaren a slippery slope, I see in this “review” the “scandal of the evangelical mind”.
“scandal of the evangelical mind”.
Plus racism. And homophobia.
Yes Tim, by all means, you should really show a “modicum of sophistication”, and while your at it, throw in a little charity. (kns will light the way for you).
@kns
I suspect you aren’t really looking for any sort of dialogue (or is that ‘conversation’?), however two comments on what you’ve said here.
The first; I think it should be apparent that this isn’t an attempt at a detached review of McLaren’s (newest) book. Tim begins with an analogy I rather liked (though I’ll grant it’s some what strained, if you prefer) and then leads into an account of a personal encounter he had with McLaren (that should remove any indication that he’s trying to be detached, shouldn’t it?). Then, quite like I suspected, Tim ‘connects the dots’ and shows what all discerning people suspected all along—McLaren is something of a wolf (well, not something, is).
Secondly, even if we granted that Tim’s book review was inadequate, does that then mean that McLaren’s book is free of all charges? Knowing what McLaren has said and written in the past, I wouldn’t think so—in fact I highly doubt it. So you’re presenting something of a fallacy—liberating McLaren’s work by destroying Tim.
If we are going to talk about modicums of sophistication, let us then all around display such attributes. Declaring Tim to be flatly ignorant gives you no license to do the same.
Then again, have you read the book to show where Tim is wrong in his analysis?