But I am afraid
that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led
astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. For if
someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you
receive a different spirit from the one you received, or if you accept a
different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it readily enough.
- 2Corinthians 11: 3-4 (ESV)
With each passing day it seems Andy Stanley falls deeper and deeper into his heretical darkness, dragging his church with him. It was ten years ago when we started to see the cracks forming in his foundation. He was insisting that the term "shepherd" be stricken from the church landscape because it was no longer "culturally relevant"; ya know, the same argument used by worldly Christian sects looking to excuse their sin. The Gospel is no respecter of culture beloved. The truth is that Andy Stanley is a strict Warren adherent of the Purpose Driven Church model. As such he fancies himself a vision casting CEO instead of a shepherd so no wonder the word was bothering him. After this incident we started seeing compromise after compromise. Eventually, his worship band was singing Beatles melodies and 1990's boy band covers. Then came last year and the full free form belly flop off the theological cliff. Andy was upset because he found a large portion of his youth went off to college only to return as unbelieving as atheists. Thankfully Andy became introspective, prayerful and ok".I am just kidding -- he blamed the Bible! Yes it was our insistence that that Bible is inerrant that was causing all of his kids to come home as goats according to the mega-heretic. Never once did it occur to him to look in the mirror and assign correct blame. Instead he did a series on how we need to stop relying on Biblical inerrancy. That we instead needed to convince unbelievers by citing historical proof and rely on the eyewitness accounts. This is the end result of the purpose driven church rotting your brain. Beloved, we cannot convince anyone to be saved. The Bible is clear about that. We plant or water but God alone gives the increase! Only the Gospel has the power of God unto the salvation of men! What never occurred to Andy last year is that his kids were not saved to begin with. So let us reason again through his latest attack upon the Word of God, linked above. These are quotes from the Christian post, reporting on a recent Stanley sermon.
'North Point Community Church Senior Pastor Andy Stanley has stated that Christians need to "unhitch" the Old Testament from their faith. In the final part of a recent sermon series, Stanley explained that while he believes that the Old Testament is "divinely inspired," it should not be "the go-to source regarding any behavior in the church."' -- Christian Post
Unhitch the Old Testament from our faith? Seriously? Is Andy no longer aware that the entire Bible is one story, not two? So he claims to believe that God divinely inspired the Old Testament but we should not bother with it? God Himself breathed out the Old Testament and we should ignore it? Beloved, this is rank heresy. Do you know how you can tell this is ridiculous? Because Christ, and disciples and Paul all referred to the Old Testament! Jesus said not one tittle shall disappear from the Word and here is Stanley advocating the elimination of an entire Testament. Unreal.
'"To justify this, Stanley preached last month about Acts 15, which described how the early church decided that Gentile converts did not need to strictly observe Jewish law to become Christians. "[First century] Church leaders unhitched the church from the worldview, value system, and regulations of the Jewish scriptures," said Stanley. "Peter, James, Paul elected to unhitch the Christian faith from their Jewish scriptures, and my friends, we must as well." Stanley argued that it had to be done for the same reason the church in Acts 15 did so, which was so that "we must not make it difficult for those Gentiles who are turning to God."' -- Christian Post
Stanley is referring to the Jerusalem Council but he muddies the story to pretend it supports his nonsense. The problem the Jerusalem Council was facing was the same problem that was infecting the Galatian Church. A group of zealous Jews from the Pharisee party insisted that salvation required circumcision in addition to faith in Christ. There was a word for this that Stanley ought to know -- heresy. Circumcision was part of the Old Covenant and the Mosaic Law that Christ nailed to the cross. Galatians 5 makes it clear that if you insist on circumcision or any part of the law then you actually sever Jesus Christ from you! You render Him useless in your life! So, did Peter, James and Paul just decide to unhitch the Christian faith from the Jewish Scriptures? Absolutely not! Stanley is conflating two things -- the law and the Old Testament. The law leads to the New Testament. Peter, James and Paul had no power to "unhitch" the law of Almighty God and neither does Andy Stanley. Stanley however is not just talking about the law, which is only a couple of books in the Old Testament. He says ditch the entire Canon. Genesis and Exodus? Who needs Moses anyway? King David? He is so unworthy! All of the prophets? Why bother when we have the wisdom of Andy Stanley available to us?
