Record of Events - June 2006
Those who oppose the "program" are called leaders from hell.
The
phone calls and emails started coming in about three years ago.
Sometimes the caller was in his mid-eighties, sometimes the caller
was crying. But all of them had the same kind of story to tell
- when their churches decided to get involved with 40 Days of
Purpose, everything began changing and when they questioned these
changes, they each soon found themselves silenced, ostracized
and eventually without a church to attend. Now today, nearly five
years after Purpose Driven Life was released, thousands
of believers are scattered throughout the world, having been ridiculed
and demoralized for even just the slightest questioning of the
Purpose Driven program. In one email we received, the young man
was handed a letter from his pastor. The letter had been written
by a Saddleback field representative who told the pastor to do
what he had to do to get rid of those opposing the new program.
According
to Rick Warren, these people are resisters and are standing in
the way of Purpose Driven progress. In a June 14th article written
by Rick Warren on his website (What
Do You Do When Your Church Hits a Plateau? ), Warren told
pastors and church leaders not to be discouraged about slow change
in their churches. He told them it would take time ... and in
many cases it would take these resisters either leaving the church
or simply dying. Warren stated:
If
your church has been plateaued for six months, it might take
six months to get it going again. If it's been plateaued a year,
it might take a year. If it's been plateaued for 20 years, you've
got to set in for the duration! I'm saying some people are going
to have to die or leave.
Moses
had to wander around the desert for 40 years while God killed
off a million people before he let them go into the Promised
Land. That may be brutally blunt, but it's true. There may be
people in your church who love God sincerely, but who will never,
ever change.
For
Warren to couple his statement about dying or leaving with a statement
about God killing off a million people is ignorant at best, subliminal
at least. Coupled with his mention of 40 years in the desert and
Warren's teaching that God always did good things in numbers of
40, Warren's intention in this statement seems obvious. In addition,
the concept of get with the program, change or die is very
common in New Age circles, that those who don't get on board (or
ride the wave as Leonard
Sweet puts it), will have to die. Listen to the words of renown
New Ager Barbara
Marx Hubbard:
Christ-consciousness
and Christ-abilities are the natural inheritance of every human
being on Earth. When the word of this hope has reached the nations,
the end of this phase of evolution shall come. All will know
their choice. All will be required to choose.... All who choose
not to evolve will die off. (See The
Plan)
Furthermore,
Leonard Sweet, in his book, Soul Tsunami, says that:
A
sea change of transitions and transformations is birthing a
whole new world and a whole new set of ways of making our way
in the world.... It is time for a Postmodern Reformation ...
Reinvent yourself for the 21st century or die. Some would rather
die than change (pp. 17, 75).
Rick
Warren (whose endorsement sits on both the front and back covers
of Sweet's book) says that Soul Tsunami "shows us why these
are the greatest days for evangelism since the first century."
In an audio set done by Rick Warren and Leonard Sweet called Tides
of Change, the two men elaborate on this and make it clear
that those who don't ride this new wave will not make it.
One
of the tools
Rick Warren uses to help churches become Purpose Driven is
a book called Transitioning: Leading Your Church Through Change.
The book is sold on Rick Warren's website and is written by Dan
Southerland. According to pastors.com (Rick Warren's website to
pastors), Southerland is the director of "Church Transitions Inc.,
an organization that trains pastors and church leaders to effectively
manage major transitions. Southerland ... is the leading expert
on implementing the Purpose Driven paradigm in existing churches."
Chapter
six of Transitioning is called "Dealing with Opposition"
and is just one of many ways Rick Warren tries to convey the fact
that those who oppose him are less than desirable. Southerland
states:
We
have experienced two major sources of criticism during our transitions.
The first is Christians from more traditional backgrounds....
Not all of our traditional backgrounded Christians have been
critical - just the ornery ones. Our second source of criticism
is traditional church pastors. Again, not all traditional church
pastors - just the meaner ones (p. 116).
Southerland
tells readers that "some folks are going to get very angry." He
goes so far as to liken opposers of Purpose Driven to "leader[s]
from hell." He says:
If
you have read Nehemiah recently, you will remember that Sanballat
is Nehemiah's greatest critic and number one enemy. Let me put
it plainer than that. Sanballat is a leader from hell. We all
have some Sanballats in our churches. This is the guy who opposes
whatever you propose.... You cannot call this guy a leader from
hell to his face - but you could call him Sanballat (p. 115).
In
2003, during Saddleback's 25th anniversary, Rick Warren recited,
along with 30,000 participants, the Purpose
Driven Covenant. In that covenant he stated that he would
do "whatever it takes" to accomplish his goals. For us at Lighthouse
Trails it has become increasingly evident that he wasn't kidding
when he said that. Last year, as some of you may remember, we
issued a press release that showed the connection between Rick
Warren and Ken Blanchard. In Warren's own words, he acknowledged
that Blanchard, a New Age sympathizer, had "signed on" to help
implement Warren's global P.E.A.C.E. plan. Warren stated this
at a Saddleback service as well as at the 2003 Lead Like Jesus
conference in Alabama. However, a month after we issued the press
release, Lighthouse Trails received an email from Rick Warren.
The email was sent in the middle of the night, and by the following
morning, Warren had given permission to a colleague to post his
email online. We contacted Saddleback and confirmed this. Needless
to say, countless people found out about this email. However,
what most who read his email did not realize was that the majority
of the statements in his email were not true. We posted a public
response but knew that most people would either only read Warren's
email to us or refuse to believe that America's pastor was lying
and we were speaking the truth.
Lighthouse
Trails learned of Rick Warren's connection to Ken Blanchard through
a book called A Life With Purpose, written by Hollywood
biographer, George Mair. Ray Yungen discusses this in his book, A Time of Departing:
In
the spring of 2005, someone handed me a book called A Life
with Purpose by George Mair. The book is written as a positive
account of Rick Warren's life. In fact, the subtitle on the
front cover reads: America's Most Inspiring Pastor. It is clear
that the author had a great admiration for Warren. While Mair
wrote the book, he spent many Sunday mornings at Saddleback
church services, listening to Rick Warren and donating financially.
However, after Rick Warren found out about the book, he publicly
criticized it. In addition, Saddleback church sent out emails
to an undisclosed number of people, discrediting Mair's book.
I
personally believe Warren's effort to debunk the book was an
attempt to conceal some of its observations. What George Mair
didn't realize was that in his candid account of Warren, and
in his efforts to offer this testament of praise, some things
were revealed about the pastor that might have gone undetected
by the average person. For instance, Mair explains how New Age
prophet Norman Vincent Peale was at the foundation of the church-growth
movement and furthermore "many of Peale's uplifting affirmations
originated with an 'obscure teacher of occult science' named
Florence Scovel Shinn." Referring to many of the methods that
Peale taught and his "unification of psychology and religion,"
Mair says, "Saddleback distinctly bears the stamp of Reverend Norman
Vincent Peale."
In
November of 2003, Rick Warren announced to his Saddleback congregation
his global P.E.A.C.E. Plan. In the same sermon, Warren introduced
the congregation to Ken Blanchard, playing a video clip of Blanchard's
visit to Saddleback a few days earlier. Warren informed his
large congregation that Blanchard had:"... signed on to help
with the P.E.A.C.E. Plan, and he's going to be helping train
us in leadership and in how to train others to be leaders all
around the world."
In
light of the fact that Ken Blanchard has promoted Buddhism and
Eastern style meditation for over 20 years, it became very alarming
to know that Rick Warren was using Blanchard to train leaders
around the world.
The
weeks following Rick Warren's email to us, we received phone calls
and emails from different men from Saddleback, one of them telling
us to stop "lobbing dead cats [and grenades] over the wall." It
was confirmed also that an email was sent out from Saddleback
to an unknown number of people, discussing the Blanchard issue.
That email stated that Lighthouse Trails had lied and they should
not be listened to.
And
then in December of 2005 a very strange thing happened - a woman
sent us an email she had received from Rick Warren's personal
email address, which stated:
The
website you refer to [Lighthouse Trails] below is well-known
for publishing lies, which can easily be proven false.... The
Bible says "Satan is the father of lies", so those who intentionally
spread them are doing Satan's work for him. That is evil. We
suggest you avoid listening to evil people who have a habit
of lying about ministers of the Gospel. Study the Scriptures
every day and flee from those who make their reputation by lying.
We
contacted Saddleback about the email, and we received the following
reply, suggesting that the email had been written by a computer
hacker: "We are sorry that this public mailbox has been shut down
due to vandalism and stolen identity. Federal enforcement officers
are tracking down the source in either Africa or the Pacific Northwest."
At first, we thought this was a joke because we (who live in the
Pacific Northwest) had recently issued a
press release about an evangelist in Africa who had been opposing
Purpose Driven. Hearing that Federal officers had narrowed down
an investigation to either our location or the evangelist's location
seemed preposterous. We contacted Saddleback by phone requesting
the names of these Federal agents because of the threatening nature
of the "anonymous" email. A few days later a Saddleback staff
member called and told us that Federal agents were doing an investigation
on their web server being broken into and that Saddleback suspected
Lighthouse Trails. We again asked for the names of the Federal
agents as well as the Saddleback communications director that
was handling the case. However, we were told they would not give
us any names. We have not heard anything from Saddleback since.
We
testify of these things, not to distract you from the issues at
hand (of exposing contemplative and emerging spirituality within
the church), but rather to show that Rick Warren, as well as other
leaders, will go to great lengths to preserve their status and
to complete their tasks, even to the point of lying, threatening,
discrediting and deceiving. While we have postponed releasing
this information for several months, because of Rick Warren's
continuous brazen remarks against the body of Christ and because
Purpose Driven is an avenue through which the New Age is entering
the church, we believe it is of utmost importance to relay this
documentation to believers who are working so diligently to defend
the gospel message of Jesus Christ in a time when a great falling
away appears to be at hand.
The
question we must ask is just how far will Rick Warren go to help
rid churches of those they consider "leader[s] from hell," who
in reality may be part of the very Bride of Christ.
Special
Note (from 2006): Recently the Calvary Chapel movement (founded by Chuck
Smith, Sr.) made a bold declaration when they decided to reject
the emerging and contemplative prayer movements and to discontinue
their support and use of all Purpose Driven materials. Many applaud
this bold and sacrificial action. See our Special
Report.
UPDATED NOTE ( 2014): Unfortunately, over the past 8 years since the above "Special Note" was posted, there have been many Calvary Chapel churches that have not heeded the 2006 warnings by the now-late Chuck Smith, Sr. but have rather accepted, promoted, and even embraced emerging/contemplative and/or Purpose Driven beliefs.
For
important related information:
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