The famous Rick Warren of Saddleback Church gets the Skull and Crossbones Award for teaching a license for immorality. His congregation is massive with approximately
20,000 people attending weekly, and his book, The Purpose Driven Life, is the bestselling hardback in American history! Over 30 million copies have been sold worldwide. His religious influence is gargantuan, yet he teaches the heresy (once saved always saved) in various ways and has certainly jeopardized many SOULS by doing so. Somehow the devil has even gotten his popular book into congregations, which are supposed to reject that artificial grace message.
On Rick Warren’s website (http://www.saddleback.com), he is very open and bold about this shameful belief. Under the section on Eternal Security, we read this:
Because God gives man eternal life through Jesus Christ, the believer is secure in salvation for eternity. (emphasis mine)
That single sentence speaks volumes about the faulty and dangerous doctrinal views of Rick Warren on sin, salvation, grace, the Christian life, etc., but there is sadly much more. Getting back to his famous book, The Purpose Driven Life (2002 edition), we read:
Of course, God hadn’t really left David, and he doesn’t leave you. He has promised repeatedly, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” (page 108, bold emphasis mine)
Being consistent with once saved always saved, Rick Warren will downplay the seriousness of any sin, including David's adultery and murder. Though he didn’t touch on it, he would categorically deny that David died spiritually during that time, even though Scripture is clear:
If a righteous man turns from his righteousness and does evil, he will die for it. (Ezek 33:18)
Portraying David’s wickedness unlike how it actually was, Rick Warren says God hadn’t really left David. Then Rich Warren makes a blanket statement about all people who have ever been saved. That statement was, he doesn’t leave you. Rick Warren’s theology screams out that no sin can cause God to leave Christians, since they are saved and will always remain saved. Perhaps he doesn’t know the Spirit of the Lord left Saul:
Now the Spirit of the LORD had departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the LORD tormented him. (1 Sam 16:14)
The never leave or forsake verse in Hebrews refers back to Deut. 31, where we read this:
And the LORD said to Moses: “You are going to rest with your fathers, and these people will soon prostitute themselves to the foreign gods of the land they are entering. They will forsake me and break the covenant I made with them. On that day I will become angry with them and forsake them; I will hide my face from them, and they will be destroyed. Many disasters and difficulties will come upon them, and on that day they will ask, ‘Have not these disasters come upon us because our God is not with us?’” (Deut 31:16,17)
Elsewhere we read this:
He went out to meet Asa and said to him, “Listen to me, Asa and all Judah and Benjamin. The LORD is with you when you are with him. If you seek him, he will be found by you, but if you forsake him, he will forsake you.” (2 Chron. 15:2)
Rick Warren interprets the Bible differently because he views Scripture as though eternal
security was true rather than a widespread heresy which Christians need to fight against. Hence, he has read once saved always saved into the never leave or forsake verse when it is not there! The real truth is, God has NEVER said he would at no time forsake the unfaithful. The truth is, God will not forsake the faithful:
For the LORD loves the just and will not forsake his faithful ones. (Psa 37:28)
Rick Warren also wants us also to believe:
We grieve God’s Spirit and quench our fellowship with him by disobedience, conflict with others, busyness, friendship with the world, and other sins. (ibid., page 109, emphasis mine)
According to Rick Warren, the spiritual damage created by disobedience (sin) is only our fellowship with God, when it is much worse. This is easy to prove since he mentioned friendship with the world, and other sins.
QUESTION: How serious is it to be a friend of this world? James 4:4 is clear:
You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.
It seems as though that James 4:4 Scripture could be personalized for Rick Warren into this:
[Rick Warren], don’t you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.
To be a friend of the world is to also be an enemy of God. So how bad is that?
... raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. (Heb 10:27)
Enemies of God will go to raging fire, that is, as in the fiery furnace! Hence, what eternal security teacher Rick Warren has taught in his book, The Purpose Driven Life, is not only wrong, but much worse, and millions have been exposed to it!
Getting back to Rick Warren’s last cited quote, he also said, and other sins. That takes in any type of sin, especially since once saved always saved people think all sins are of the same degree. Thus, Rick Warren is subtly declaring that only a Christian’s fellowship is endangered by murder, sodomy, theft, lust, idolatry, slander, swindling, hate, witchcraft, taking the mark of the beast, etc. Without question 1 Cor. 6:9,10; Rev. 21:8 and other passages explicitly say such people will not inherit God's kingdom and will be thrown into the lake of fire. That means Rick Warren is assuring people on the road to damnation (and fiery torment) they are instead on an irrevocable road to heaven (and Paradise)! The seriousness of that is obvious.
Both popular Rick Warren and his book, The Purpose Driven Life, are dangerous snares to SOULS by teaching as he does. Remember that and warn others. God bless you.
OTHER TOPICS:
Skull And Crossbones Awards For False Prophets And False Teachers
Form Of Godliness (The Social Gospel)
Scapular: Why Do Catholics Wear The Brown Scapular?
Is The BTK Serial Murderer a Christian?
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