Motivational Posters:Index20K

Tony: I appreciate the gesrtue, but I don't think I've misunderstood the very direct and clear quotes above. I think if we get one fundamental thing right, this little joust will quickly fade into history because the moral outlines of the underlying issue will be clear. That thing is this: the emerging church movement is dangerous. It is not faithful to God, to Christ, or to the Bible. Yet it uses enough Christian language to deceive people both on the inside and outside into thinking you can be part of their movement and be faithful to God, and only right-wing caveman fundies would object. They are, as Johnson points out in his satire, unbelievably harsh and arrogant in their judgment of orthodox believers and those who defend biblical faith against their compromises (if you doubt this, listen to their podcast Johnson links to on the Pyro site where they respond to the posters), but when they are confronted on this, either propositionally or visually, seriously or satirically, they assume the posture of a victim and publish nice, sweet, soft, humanitarian pictures like the ones on the Emerging Grace site that make everyone feel guilty for having criticized them. The abandonment of the truth of God is bad enough, but the machinations and deceptions and soothing talk they use to attempt to cover their bad faith are what have drawn such strong words from the likes not just of Johnson, but Piper, MacArthur, Mohler, Sproul, and a bunch of other greats. Piper's verbal satire of the ECM I quote above is only different from Johnson's visual/verbal satire in its brevity. Life is too short and the faith too precious to go through it defending the bad guys and pillorying the good guys. Let's have some real discernment and stand with those who are faithful to God, and who, like Elijah, have no hesitation in using both proposition and satire to reveal the ugly truth about those who, with their religious waywardness, threaten the souls of men, women, churches, and nations.