I pointed my browser over to see the latest self-esteem preaching coming from the Crystal Cathedral and found a video with Shirley Dobson. Mrs. Dobson was promoting the National Day of Prayer and was a guest on the Hour of Power this past weekend. Robert Schuller asked her a few questions and she explained how she became the chairperson of the National Day of Prayer. As they ended the interview Mrs. Dobson said, “Thank you, thank you, Dr. Schuller, God bless you for the wonderful work you are doing here.”
That last statement by Shirley Dobson shows the degree that she has sold out. In an effort to promote the National Day of Prayer, Mrs. Dobson stood in the same pulpit as The Heretic Robert Schuller. Robert Schuller claims to have started a New Reformation when he wrote his book many years ago entitled, Self Esteem: The New Reformation. Schuller has been on record for decades now with his false gospel of self-esteem. Schuller writes in his book:
- And what is hell? It is the loss of pride that naturally follows separation from God – the ultimate and unfailing source of our souls sense of self-respect (page 14)
- A person is in hell when he has lost his self-esteem (pages 14-15)
- Sin is any act or thought that robs myself or another human being of his or her self-esteem. (page 14)
- Once a person believes he is an ‘unworthy sinner,’ it is doubtful if he can really honestly accept the saving grace God offers in Jesus Christ (page 98)
Given the above quotes, there is no doubt that Shirley Dobson made a ROYAL mistake by being a guest on the Hour of Power and thinking that God would bless the work being done there. May the Christian church have nothing to do with self-esteem and instead “present our bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God” (Romans 12:1).
As if Shirley Dobson’s appearance with Robert Schuller wasn’t enough, the National Day of Prayer Task Force has turned toward ecumenism and seeks to join any and all that would seek to pray with them regardless of their beliefs. This video explains it well. (HT: Ingrid Schlueter at Slice of Laodicea)
{ 22 comments… read them below or add one }
I’ve read about this thing too over at Slice. The common thread I see between Robert Schuller and Shirely Dobson (and her hubby too) is PSYCHOHERESY.
Man-centered theology will always lead to other junk like that, and of course the cursed ecumenicism (Gal. 1:7-9). Perhaps ecuemenicism and psychoheresy are merely the practicle outworkings of man-centered doctrine.
Does God hear the prayers of the Mormons, Roman Catholics, Muslims, Hindus and the like? Can we all come together to pray for peace and protection from God? No.
Pro 15:29 The LORD is far from the wicked, BUT He hears the prayer of the righteous.
Joh 9:31 We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him.
See: Psa 66:18 If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.
Joh 14:13 Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.
1Jn 2:23 No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also.
Gal 1:9 As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.
Gal 1:10 For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.
They ought to rename it The National Day Of I Don’t Know What Kind Of Prayer.
It’s all part of the last days, it’s the apostate church.
Isnt Dr. Bobs new book about this, natural theology, and man centerd gosple?
I have always been sckeptical even when I was in sin during high school, they invited everyone that wanted to pray to pray around the glag pole on the NDOP. Im all for prayer I love talking and submitting to my God, but he needs to be feared not blasphemed by unbelievers.
Thanks for the scripture refrences, The Lord has no darkness to him, but dispells it by his glorious light.
I just recently had a conversation with a proffesing pagan, atleast thats what he said, but he was really (polytheist) and after talking to him for a while I came to the conclusion he wasnt even polytheists but a humanist everything from the gods started from withing his heart. That was where it ended but I was able to explain to him about Acts 17 and a little about the truths of the gosple, so I pray God would reveal himself to him.
This is not that surprising. Most evangelicals have turned towards ecumenism. IMHO, this is partially due to the watered down theology being taught at mega-churches. If you boil Scripture down to “God is Love” then you find yourself holding hands with all kinds of people pretending to be Christians.
Denise, what website is slice?
nevermind, I figured it out…a little slow today.
Drew, we need to pray for Ingrid. She looks like she’s getting steamrolled for her stance in God’s Truth! What a bold and courageous spirit God has given her. I thought of her as the video ended – she kept integrity. Praise God!
Ingrid: PRESS ON SISTER!
Agogley,
You said: “If you boil Scripture down to “God is Love…” Stop by tomorrow and check out my post for THEOTHURSDAYS. I briefly discuss how love must be constrained by knowledge and depth of insight or it turns into the humanistic sentimentalism that the world often confuses with love! But you have raised a really good point. Key word: “pretending.”
Thanks, brother!
Love & Hate
God only has agape love for the elect and righteous hate for the non-elect.
When the gospels talk about loving our neighbor, I would interpret this to mean fellow believers. I think the Old Testament verse for this is also only referring to the fellow believers/brothers within the nation of Israel. It obviously wasn’t talking about Egypt (see Geneva Study Bible notes of 1599 on Romans 9:17). Since it is within the Nation of Israel in the O.T. It would logically apply to the believers as related in the N.T. (Leviticus 19:18, Matthew 19:19, Romans 13:9-10)
It is absurd to say that we should love the non-elect whlie God hates the non-elect, especially when God tells us NOT to love the world (1st John 2:15) because He Himself Hates the reprobate (Psalm 11:5).
I have found very few people/churches who look at the text this way. Perhaps it is tradition. But this is an obvious exegetical conclusion if one spends time on these texts.
1) Why do so many people view neighbor to mean universally all humans?
2) Why do you view it differently (if you do)?
3) How is this concept (if hypothetically accepted as true) affect The National Day of Prayer Task Force and their mission with prayer?
Jean Cauvin
May God strengthen us as brothers and sisters who will never compromise the truth of Scripture, even unto death!
My wife came home and reported on the great teaching from Wednesday night! She was blessed by the solid teaching!
Then exactly how are we supposed to look at the “non-elect?” Are we supposed to hate unbelievers? If so, in what way or capacity?
1 John 2:15-17 15 Do not love the world nor the things in the world If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world. 17 The world is passing away, and also its lusts; but the one who does the will of God lives forever. (NAS)
I have always viewed verse 16 as saying not to love the ways of the world, i.e., lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. How does this relate to not loving the un-elect? Or am I missing something in this passage?
I have similar problems with NDoP as i do with Christmas. There is a big deal made out of it and peole think if they pray around the flagpole once a year, they are ok. I was listening to the Fish this morning (hey don’t give me a hard time…i like to listen to the radio in the morning, be it Fish, Star, or Radio Disney, etc.) and people were calling in their requests. They were praying for healing and stuff. Which isn’t bad as long as that is not the only reason they turn to God. Well, MY prayer is for a reformation.
Wayne – we aren’t to hate unbelievers. We love them in such a way that appropriate for them. We don’t love them the way we are to love our brothers, but if we hate them, there would be no window open to share the gospel. We don’t love their ways though. Love doesn’t mean pretending that they don’t need to repent. It’s the true meaning of love the sinner, hate the sin. That’s not how it is with God, but it is for us because we don’t know who the elect are. The friends we know as Christians now may turn out to be apostates while the humanstic agnostics we are acquainted with turn out to be the ones we are praising God side-by-side later. God works miracles and only He knows His will. Society seems to think that loving the sinner means accepting them as they are and condoning their sinful lifestyle. However, the true meaning is to act and speak in such a manner that says, “because i love you, i must urge you to repent.” So to “pray” with a Mormon or anyone else not profesing the true and living God is not loving them. It’s just encouraging their idolatry.
Becky said, “Love doesn’t mean pretending that they don’t need to repent.” I completely agree, thanks for the clarification. I volunteer in a prison ministry through my church here in Tulsa, and I make it clear to the inmates that say they want to receive salvation that this is very serious business. They need to repent of their sins and lay down their lives and follow Jesus. This is not an “I-got-saved-at-church-camp-because-the-pretty-girl-next-to-me-did-and-I-wanted-to-impress-her” kind of a thing.
I’ve had the privilege of ministering on death row, and some of those guys have more freedom in the Lord than I think I’ve ever seen anywhere else. It is awesome to see the joy that many of them exude week after week after week. There is not big car or new house in their future, yet they are not faking, they are for real and I am sometimes in absolute awe of how upbeat and joyful they are and how they light up when we talk about the Lord, compared to my showing up there having had a “bad day.”
And when we sing they sing at the top of their lungs. I was looking at those guys on Tuesday night and wondering what a church full of believers with that kind of committment level would be like. It is amazing to see the transformation that Jesus has done in the hearts of these men.
Wayne~
It is a great blessing to hear of your ministry in the prisons…how wonderful that our Lord has indeed prepared you to do good works before even the foundation of the world (Eph.2). Thank you for coming to our site and for such an uplifting tone!
God’s grace…
Wayne,
The problem with any passages with “love” and “world” is that you have to look a little deeper to find the meaning. I say I love ice cream that doesn’t mean I love it the same as I love my wife. I also refer to “world” even though I clearly don’t always mean the whole world. You have to study the verses and look at the full meaning, otherwise you get verse abuse.
To the others: People have odd concepts of love. I see parents that think they love their children by letting them do whatever the heck they want to do. Run around like wild animals in the store: “it’s ok.” Act like heathen in somebody else’s home: “oh, they’re just expressing themselves.” Love means giving them a paddling when they are disobedient.
Anyways, that’s my rant on “love.”
Wayne,
John says in 1st John 5:19 about the world being controled by the Evil One. This to be understood with the first world in 1st John 2:15.
In 1st John 2:15 there are two different worlds discussed. This is common of the Author John to act this way. For example, the word, world in the Gospel of John (1:10) has three worlds meaning three separate things.
The first world in 1st John 2:15 is antithetical to the world we find in John 3:16. This world is the reprobate and the things in the world flow from the worldly for even the creation suffers and groans (Romans 8:22, Romans 5:12-18).
Our word “secular” comes from the Latin, “seclorum” which means, worldly or of the world.
For since God hates the secular (seclorum) non-elect (reprobate), so should we.
We don’t know who is or who is not elect ultimately. But just as their are clues for a professing Christian of substance, so there are also clues to convey one who may or may not be God’s child (Galatians 5:21-22).
But this wan’t my direct point. My direct point was that Scripture does NOT command us as Christians to love the non-elect. The verses that discuss the love of our neighbor I believe is intended to mean the community of believers (Leviticus 19:18, Matthew 19:19, Romans 13:9-10). I would go as far as to say that if a Christian loves a non-christian via the ABOVE VERSES, he/she is in sin.
Thus, I do not love (or am I commanded to love), Jeremiah Wright, Clark Pinnock, or Greg Stafford. Though only God knows ultimately their fate, their fruits are so rotten, I would deem them as of now a rotting corpse.
Jean Cauvin
Jean,
How do you reconcile the apparent tension in your position with “loving your enemies” and “blessing those that persecute you?”
I’d like to jump in here and ask that comments be kept to the topic of the post. Whether God loves or hates the non-elect shouldn’t be discussed here. Instead, you can go this post:
http://biblicalthought.com/blog/does-god-love-everyone/
Thanks.
This comment has been moved – see link above
This comment has been moved – see link above
-Administrator
If the nation will not tolerate prayers in Jesus name for its help and blessing, all that is left is a certain doom. But those that see past the rebellion of the wicked to the present help available from God, will pray and will hold on.
Mal 3:13 Your words have been stout against me, saith the LORD. Yet ye say, What have we spoken so much against thee?
Mal 3:14 Ye have said, It is vain to serve God: and what profit is it that we have kept his ordinance, and that we have walked mournfully before the LORD of hosts?
Mal 3:15 And now we call the proud happy; yea, they that work wickedness are set up; yea, they that tempt God are even delivered.
Mal 3:16 Then they that feared the LORD spoke often one to another: and the LORD hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the LORD, and that thought upon his name.
Mal 3:17 And they shall be mine, saith the LORD of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him.
Mal 3:18 Then shall ye return, and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not.
The righteous are not so easily beset by the wicked not granting permission to pray as we ought. God will spare his jewels, we need to be faithful to preach and pray as Jesus would have us do.
John
Jean:
Its fair to wonder about how far to take our imitation of Christ. Jesus gave us this teaching on just how far we should go to imitate His Fathers character.
Luk 6:32 For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them.
Luk 6:33 And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same.
Luk 6:34 And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again.
Luk 6:35 But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil.
Luk 6:36 Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.
John