The Purpose Driven blog post

There is an interesting article in Time magazine this week about Rick Warren. I bought it because I've always been sort of on the fence about him. I have a knee jerk reaction to the word "Evangelical." I have an even more vigorous response to the words "Conservative Christian". As clergy, we all must be "unified in the essentials" and support each other. So, I need to learn to be careful in my public comments about other pastors. We are all on the same team and each is doing God's work. I have a tendency to simply write off anyone who is a conservative. I need to learn to be a bit more open minded about them. I've read a lot about Warren but I've not read any of his stuff so I thought the Time interview with him would be a good opportunity to hear his "voice." Some of my opinions were affirmed some were slightly changed and some remain conflicted. I'm writing this to help to clarify some of those opinions.

First, I still disagree passionately with him on the so called "Life" issues. I remain steadfastly Pro-choice. (We can't know when life actually begins. As Barack Obama says, those questions are above my pay grade. What we do know is that we must protect the lives of those that are here. I'll stop here. Sometime I may further explore my opinions on these issues, but that would take up a whole post.) I'm also an unapologetic Liberal. I think Government can be a wonderful agent for social change. (Again, I'll stop here.) On just about every political issue, I disagree with the so-called "Evangelicals" (I even disagree with that name, but again, that's another post.) But, for the most part, that disagreement is passionate but respectful. (or, at the very least, it should be. I get a little out of hand some time!)

As for Warren himself, I've not read any of his books. (My father, I believe, has so sometime I look forward to his comments.) Warren views church growth as a business. He even compares new churches to McDonalds. That troubles me, I have concerns about that view. (But, if we did more of that, perhaps we wouldn't be in the trouble we are in.) The danger is pretty clear. When we run churches like businesses we lose sight of what is important. If we are overly concerned about growing our congregation, we forget that we exist for only two reasons: Worship and Evangelism.

Now, one might say that Warren is a great evangelist. However, evangelism should not simply be a head count. Many of the "Evangelicals" seem to think that getting people as many people as possible to proclaim "I Love Jesus and he is my Lord and Saviour!" is what it is all about. My initial opinion of Warren was that he was of that stripe. His "Purpose Driven (fill in the blank)" seemed a gimmick to start new congregations, sell books and ultimately, bring in more money. Now, after reading the article, I firmly believe that Warren's heart is in the right place; he wants to bring people to Christ. I'm just not convinced that his motives are completely pure and that his methods are correct. I don't think he is "using" Christianity as a get rich scheme, but perhaps his success has blinded him a bit.

Evangelism is about teaching people what Christ is about. To do that we must show that to people. We must model Christ- like behavior. We must be careful not lose our prophetic voice. We must "speak truth to power." We must to minister to the "least and the lost." Warren trying to do this. He has initiatives in place to provide relief in Africa. But, according to the Time article, there is debate about how well it is working. To me, it almost seems like Warren is more concerned about making the effort rather than those efforts' success. He is great at networking, creating consensus and getting funding for projects. The Time article indicates that Warren's success ends there.

The church should never be all things to all people. Time says his church has 23, 000 members. How do you have that many members without making someone angry? Christ made people angry and uncomfortable. Even, nay especially, The Twelve. I still believe, that despite his good intentions, Warren is overly concerned with a head count above anything else. I think that despite his good intentions and desire to follow Christ, he has gotten carried away with the details and lost sight of the mission. The church should make it's members uncomfortable about how they live their lives and then show a better way. Showing people a better way is the core of evangelism. The difficulty churches face is how to make people uncomfortable and then keep them coming back. There is a balance to be found and having 23,000 members tells me you may not be making enough people uncomfortable.

There are many things about Warren's ministry that are good. I could write about that but that's been pretty well covered elsewhere. I'm not an evangelist. My ministry is about bringing the church to the people. I've been taught to meet people "at the point of their need." Perhaps that colors how I see Warren. I don't think Warren's pre-packaged, franchised approach to Christianity is for me.