This is an update to a previous post.
I was hopeful to get a response from Pastor Driscoll telling me that I misunderstood him and that he does not really think that Joel Osteen is a true gospel preacher. Sadly, I did not get a response. I know that I'm insignificant and my email was way at the bottom of the list but I was hopeful nonetheless to get a response. I was hoping for a glimmer of hope that some of the new and upcoming preachers would stand firm on the gospel and would call out the wolves in sheep's clothing so as not to cloud the lines between truth and error.
I was also hopeful to hear a wonderful message from Pastor Driscoll at the Gospel Coalition Conference last week. I just listened to the message online and found my answer in another statement he made:
"I was talking to Rick Warren - I've said this before, some of you may have heard it - and he's an evangelical. So, I talk to him (back to my earlier point). And he was nice and he talked about Jesus. And he helped me. I appreciate that. And he said..." - Mark Driscoll's message on 2Tim 2:14-26 at about 46:07 into the message.
What was so disappointing about the message was not just the accolades given to Rick Warren (who does not preach God's sovereign grace but rather man's work), but that the work of Christ was not preached in the text.
"I hearkened and heard, but they spake not aright" - Jer 8:6
I am deeply saddened for our generation because the wolves preaching the works of man disguised in a Christian message (i.e. Rick Warren, Joel Osteen, etc.) are now being lauded by today's popular preachers in our own circles. May God have mercy on us by not taking the lamp of truth away!
P.S. If you have never done so, I recommend downloading and listening to some Osteen and Warren messages. I challenge you to find Christ preached and Him crucified and man's work placed in the proper biblical context of God's total sovereignty and man's utter depravity.
Friday, May 1, 2009
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2 comments:
Having attended Saddleback Church for 3 years, and having heard Joel Osteen in person, and on TV, I share your concern that any one would think of them a evangelists or Gospel preachers. Sadly they are not. They preach good feelings and salvation without repentance. May God open the eyes of true believers to see Rick and Joel as they truly are.
Most of the churches around the world are choosing to involve themselves with false religion, preaching Man’s works rather than the Efficacious Work of the Lord Jesus Christ. I believe that because of the orthodoxy they say they preach in their confession of faith, a portion of the false churches have been included with those that preach the Gospel of Grace. As a result, gullible Christians have taken as their favorite preachers and teachers men like Mark and others, that once in a while preach Christ and Him Crucified, but you couldn’t even fill a cup if you collected all the times they do it. I’m saddened that this is happening. We want to take for ourselves men who are in what we call the “Reformed Camp”, but we must always critique the sermons they preach on a daily basis, unless we find ourselves being led by a blind man….
“And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews. These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so. Therefore many of them believed; also of honourable women which were Greeks, and of men, not a few.” Acts 17:10-12
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