by Dr. Robert Klenck
There is a phenomenon that is taking “mainstream
Christianity” by storm, however, it is by no means
Christian. Touted as church growth,
purpose- or mission-driven, disciplemaking churches,
cell – or meta-churches; a “new way of doing church”, and the 21st
Century church; this movement should be of deep concern to anyone who consider
themselves to be Christian.
This movement
can be defined as
The utilization of modern marketing techniques
by the church, in order to draw and hold large numbers of people (by meeting their
"felt needs").
The
church then “converts” them, and “disciples" them through the use of modern
organizational management [Total Quality Management-style] techniques, so that they
can effect "change" in the community, and the world.
The church members,
thus become agents of social change, or “change agents”. This treatise will reveal the origin and direction
of the “change” that the church is being taken through, and then replicating in
the community and the world.
“Pastors are probably the most underrated groups
of change agents today.” Rick Warren1
Most of these
type of churches are “planted” after a survey is taken
of the surrounding community. The “felt needs"
of the community are then compiled, and the church is tailored around meeting those
needs. Two of the most prominent proponents
of this style of church, the Rev. Bill Hybels, founder
of
Furthermore, are we to use worldly surveys and techniques to become more attractive
to the masses? [1 Cor
What else is seen
in these churches? Special
parking for first time visitors, and numerous “greeters” (a la Wal Mart). Why?
Because surveys have shown that people decide
in the first eight minutes, whether they will return to that church or not, so first
impressions become very important.
How about the presentation
and the message? The churches are often devoid
of any religious symbols, such as crosses, stained glass windows, and pews, so as
to make the unbelievers more comfortable, and the environment “less intimidating.”
Remember: the cross is an offense
[Galatians
He first considers: “To whom will I be preaching? … Then,
I consider what are their needs, hurts, and interests, and I ask a second question:
‘What does the Bible say about their needs?’”
… Once he examines what the Bible says about the subject, he asks himself: “What is the most practical way to say this? What is the most positive way to say this? What is the most encouraging way to say this? What is the simplest way to say this? What is the most personal way to say this? What is the most interesting way to say this?”
In other words, he puts his “spin” on the Blessed
Word of God in order to tickle the itching ears of his audience. This is a reversal
of God’s plan; His plan is to send His truth down to sinful man through His messengers
(pastors). The word pastor can also be translated
as messenger. The true pastor is to act as
a messenger from God, bringing God’s truth and message to the people, regardless
of whether it is what they want to hear.
The end result is
a watered-down message, with “feel good” half-truths, and no condemnation/conviction
of sin for the listeners. Those who “accept
Christ’ are not accepting the Christ revealed in the blessed Word of God, but rather
a false Christ, a Christ of grace and love, and not of judgment, who exists
to meet their needs and heal their hurts. Jesus becomes a servant of theirs, rather than
them becoming servants of Him.
Once someone professes
faith in Christ, and wants to become a member of one of these churches, they are
placed on a path of “discipleship.” Often,
the path has four stages 101, 201, 301, and 401. Usually a model consisting of concentric circles, or a baseball diamond are utilized. Covenants are signed at each level – signing covenants
is not Biblical [Matthew
“If you’re helping row the boat,
you don’t have time to rock it.”
-Rick Warren8
“Spiritual Gift Assessments”
are performed, which are nothing more than psychological profiling. Proponents Warren, Bob Buford (founder of the Leadership
Network), and Peter Drucker all believe that God uses
people in their areas of strength, so the idea is to identify strengths, and then
direct people into appropriate “ministries.”
“The
pastor, as manager, has to identify their strengths and specialization,
place them and equip them for service, and enable them to work in the harmonious
and productive whole known as the body of Christ.”
- Peter Drucker9
At best,
this is merely a matter of fitting people to the task, which is not led by the Holy
Spirit. At worst, it is manipulation. God uses people in their areas of weakness, not
strengths, that He might be glorified [1 Cor 12:8 – 10].
Church
members sign covenants requiring them to participate in small groups. Small group “Bible studies” are not didactic teaching
sessions with an instructor, but rather dialectic “facilitated meetings” in which
solid Biblical absolute truth becomes a casualty. This will be discussed further shortly.
There
are a couple of other phenomena that occur in the small groups. The first is bonding, so that people feel “plugged-in”
to these generally large or mega-churches.
“Small
groups are the most effective way of closing the back door of your church”
-Rick Warren10
Secondly,
participation in so-called “accountability” groups, is
often required by the signed covenants. The
regular, complete confession of all sins to an accountability leader or partner
has two effects: First, the temporal accountability to another man leads to a shift
in the thinking of the confessor away from the notion that he/she is in the constant
presence of God and is accountable to Him and Him alone, to concern about what the
accountability partner will think or say about any given thought or action. Secondly, there is a brainwashing that occurs with
confession, leading to submission on the part of the confessor.
“Something intrinsic in communism makes this confession
phenomenon indispensable to it; it can’t exist without it … The meaning in confession
then, as the Reds now use it, is agreement with the rules laid down and hence submission
to the existing hierarchy.”
- Edward Hunter11
In James
5:16, we are commanded to confess our faults one to another – in broken-heartedness,
admitting to our sinful nature, but we are not to confess all of our sins
on a regular basis to another man. “For there is one God, and one mediator between
God and men, the man Christ Jesus:[1Tim 2:5].”
Rick Warren admits that he has used his church as a human
research laboratory:
“Saddleback is kind of the Research and Development
department of the church at large. We’re
not afraid to fail. We’ve always tried more
things that didn’t work than did. Every once
in a while we find – usually by accident – something that works. Then we teach the seminars and pretend like we
planned it all along, when really it was just the result of trial and error. “(Laughter)12
The Leadership Network/Peter
Drucker
The
Leadership Network is a large church consulting firm which actively promotes the
“21st Century church.” Its founder
is Bob Buford, who also founded the Peter F. Drucker Foundation
for Nonprofit Management. Mr. Buford refers
to Peter Drucker as “the man who formed my mind.”13 Pastor Rick
Warren, in endorsing Buford’s book Halftime,
writes: “I want every man in my congregation
to read this inspiring story.”14 This “inspiring story” is about the “half-time”
of Mr. Buford’s life – sort of his mid-life crisis. In Chapter 5, Mr. Buford details how he, his wife,
and an atheist (Mike Kami) spent a weekend in a beach
house and how this atheist helped him to reorder his priorities so that he might
better spend the rest of his life serving the Lord. Halftime
is also endorsed by Steven Covey, a Mormon who organized the
The
The
Young Leader Networks, affiliated with the Leadership Network, under the heading
“People We Connect” state that they connect “Theologians who construct new theologies
that emerge out of practice.” and that “We need your help to move to this “new age”
of ministry built upon various experiences and expressions (emphasis added).” “Our vision is to contextualize our message…by
narrative preaching opposed to propositional. … within the framework
of relationship. We prefer the mediums
of art, expression, and experience opposed to a 95-point sermon used by generations
before us to communicate truth (emphasis added). “16
Peter
F. Drucker, who figures prominently in this movement,
claims to be an Espicopalian, but his views are clearly
more consistent with atheistic humanism. In Forbes Magazine, he stated:
“…a social discipline, such as management, deals with the
behavior of people and human institutions. The social universe has no "natural
laws" as the physical sciences do. It is thus subject to continuous change.
This means that assumptions that were valid yesterday can become invalid and, indeed,
totally misleading in no time at all."17
Thus,
he does not believe that there are any moral absolutes, and he states that anybody
who believes that there are moral absolutes may be misled. Dr. Drucker’s provost
at
"He (Drucker) believes in
human strengths to counter human weaknesses. The science of discovering those strengths, of
fitting them into a productive framework, is what Drucker
calls management."
-Christianity Today20
“So the nonprofit social sector
is where management is today most needed and where systematic, principled, theory-based
management can yield the greatest results fastest. Just think of the enormous problems
facing the world—poverty, health care, education, international tension—and the
need for managed solutions becomes loud and clear.”
- Peter Drucker21
Overall,
Dr. Drucker believes that Total Quality Management [TQM]
style organizational management techniques will solve the world’s problems (apart
from God).
Total Quality Management[TQM] and the Hegelian Dialectic
Total Quality Management
[TQM] is based upon the Hegelian dialectic, invented by Georg
Wilhelm Freidrich Hegel, a transformational Marxist social
psychologist.22 Briefly, the Hegelian
dialectic process works like this: a diverse
group of people (in the church, this is a mixture of believers (thesis) and unbelievers (antithesis), gather in a facilitated meeting
(with a trained facilitator/”teacher”/group leader/”change agent”), using group
dynamics (peer pressure), to discuss a social issue (or dialogue the Word of God),
and reach a pre-determined outcome (consensus, compromise, or synthesis). When the Word of God is dialogued (as opposed to
being taught didactically) between believers and unbelievers, with multiple Bible
versions utilized (with King James usage discouraged) and consensus is reached –
agreement that all are comfortable with – then the message of the Word of God has
been watered down ever so slightly, and the participants have been conditioned to
accept (and even celebrate) their compromise (synthesis). The new synthesis becomes the starting point (thesis)
for the next meeting, and the process of continual change (innovation) continues.
The fear of alienation from the group is
the pressure that prevents an individual from standing firm for the truth of the
Word of God, and such a one usually remains silent (self-editing). The fear of man (rejection) overrides the fear
of God. The end result is a “paradigm shift”
in how one processes factual information.
An example: Traditionally
thinking Christians, when proven wrong with factual information (i.e.-Biblical moral
absolutes), yield to the facts, and admit that they are wrong, and then align themselves
to those facts. They are brought back to accountability to higher authority (the
Word of God). Because Biblical moral absolutes
do not change, such traditional thinkers, who adhere to such unchanging absolutes
are labeled as "resistant to change,” by those promoting
this “new way of doing church.”
On the other hand,
transformational thinkers, having transitioned through this dialectic process, when
proven wrong with factual information, have been conditioned to process that information
differently - they automatically question the facts (what is) and dialogue them
within themselves; their (deceitful) hearts rebel against the facts; and then they
begin to justify (to themselves and others) why it is that they no longer have to
attend to the facts, or yield to higher authority. They process the facts away,
and their consciences become seared. This
is the natural result of the dialectic process – the searing of the conscience [1
Tim 4:1]
Transformational
thinkers are then able to justify to themselves why they are no longer bound to
Biblical moral absolutes. You see, people are saying that the Biblical message just
doesn't apply to today's (humanistic) culture – that it must be interpreted in light
of the culture of the day. [To some degree this is true – (i.e.-slavery was common
then, etc.).] However, this movement takes
it much further, and through the process of continual incremental “change” (using
the Hegelian dialectic over and over with the last synthesis becoming the new thesis
– the “new fact” base, or “new reality’), the Word of God is gradually/incrementally
changed from its original intent, and eventually it is interpreted to mean something
contrary to its original intent. This is
the process that all sinners use in attempting to justify their rebellion to themselves
and others. The rebellion is subtle at first
– simply moving away from the traditional way of “doing” church; later, the ordaining
of female “pastors”; and eventually it gets to the point of ordaining lesbian "pastors",
etc.. This is the
end result of the process of “continual change.” In
Where this Movement is Headed
In May, 1995, the
Leadership Network’s Compass Magazine
addressed the issue: “After Church Growth,
What?” Under this heading, the Network wrote:
“The next movement will grow partnerships, not properties.
Partnerships, alliances and collaboration
will become the norm, rather than the exception, and the relationships will be built
on new loyalties and a new common mission. … The next movement will grow
people, not parking lots. … These same people are in the congregations of the 21st
century and they are going to be the “point people” for the partnerships and alliances
that will achieve the vision beyond the property line (emphasis added).”
"The Church of the 21st
Century is reforming itself into a multi-faceted service operation."
-Bob Buford23
Compass continues on to say:
“The
Regarding the church, Peter Drucker
stated:
"The community … needs a community center… I'm not
talking religion now, I'm talking society. There is no other institution on the American community
that could be the center."24
So, what is the point
of all this? Sustainable
development. Outlined by Vice-President
Gore in his book Earth in the Balance,
the notions are that:
How?
These are the major
goals of the United Nations, with all power to enforce them given to the U.N..
So, how does the church fit in? First, there will be designated community centers,
which offer “one-stop shopping” (health care, food banks, education, and other governmental
social programs: i.e. welfare distribution). There must be a lot of these decentralized areas,
so that they are within walking/biking distances of peoples’ homes, diminishing
the need for automobiles. Some of these programs
are already being administered through fire stations (vaccinations), senior citizen
centers, and parks (free cheese giveaways, etc.).
Is the church really
participating in this? Compass continues:
Finally, Compass
states:
Summerhill Neighborhood,
Inc. in
Yes, the church is participating in the neo-pagan, earth-worshiping,
sustainable development touted by the United Nations, and both major American political
parties. Additionally, the rules that the
church must adhere to in administering governmental programs were recently laid
out by President Clinton.26 In this instance, the church is partnering
with the government in administering educational programs, and the rules are:
·
Ensure that all activities and programs provided by the groups are “purely” secular”
·
Selection of student participants without regard to their religion
·
Telling volunteers not to pray with students or preach about faith
·
Put a partnership agreement in writing
·
Make sure that any space used for teaching is free of religious symbols
It is interesting to note, that these churches often “sanitize”
their surroundings of religious symbols ostensibly to keep from offending unbelievers,
but that this “sanitization” also “happens” to bring them into compliance with partnership
agreements with the government. There are
approximately 100,000 schools entering into these partnerships with religious groups.
Summary
Firstly, churches are actually carrying out and
administering the U.N. global agenda. (For
further information, I recommend a search of the internet for the UN Agenda for
the 21st Century - “Agenda 21” – which lays out the entire blueprint
for global sustainable development).
Secondly, these churches are accomplishing, is the
“transformation” of the minds of the church membership and leadership to the transformational
mode of dealing with factual information. Once all people are involved in diaprax – the repeated practice of the Hegelian dialectic process
in all sectors of society (cradle to grave) in parenting classes, ready to
learn programs, education programs (OBE and STW), police work (DARE),
health care, business (TQM), religion, volunteerism, and even retired persons with
lifelong learning, then the global goal of unity can be accomplished, as all are
willing to lay aside their differences for the sake of the unity of humankind. All of the world’s problems can then be solved
by man – apart from God. This is the goal
of the Humanists, Peter Drucker, and the U.N.. The only people
hindering this utopian goal are those who refuse to lay aside their moral absolutes
for the sake of the world.
II Th 2:7 For the mystery of
iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth (restrains)
will let(restrain), until he be taken out of the way.(KJV)
Either by force, or by the LORD.
References
1.
http://www.emcced.ca/pdc.htm
2.
Willow Creek Seeker Services by G. A. Pritchard. Copyright © 1996 by G. A. Pritchard.
Baker Book, a division of Baker Book House,
3.
Taken from THE
4.
Ibid.
5.
Ibid
6.
Taken from HALFTIME by ROBERT P. BUFORD. Copyright © 1994 by Robert P.
Buford. Used by permission of Zondervan
Publishing House.
7.
http://ministryonline.com/churchgrowth/warren.htm
8.
9.
The Business of the Kingdom, Christianity
Today. Volume 43, No. 13,
10.
11.
Brainwashing: from Pavlov to Powers, Copyright
1960 by Edward Hunter. The Bookmailer, Inc.
12. http://www.christianitytoday.com/le/7l3/7l3022.html
13.
Buford, dedication of Halftime.
14.
Buford, endorsements.
15.
http://www.leadnet.org/bwhoweare.html
16. http://www.youngleader.org/People/people/htm
17. “Management’s New Paradigms,” Forbes,
18.
Daily Bulletin,
20.
The Business of
the Kingdom, Christianity Today. Volume 43,
No. 13,
21.
“Management’s New Paradigms,” Forbes,
22.
Gotcher, Dean: Traditional, Transitional, Transformational OBE
(Outcome-Based Education)/STW (School-to-Work)/TQM (Total Quality Management). Video - (626) 859-4073.
23.
Leadership Network, NEXT Dec. 1997.
24.
The Business of
the Kingdom, Christianity Today. Volume 43,
No. 13,
25.
www.un.org, link to non-governmental organizations [NGO’s], and the Department of
Public Information [DPI].
26.