This past Spring, Ladies Home Journal hired Rick Warren to write a regular column entitled Purpose. While known over the years for its recipes faithfully clipped and saved by women everywhere, it has shown Rick Warren's deficient recipes for Christian living and provided sufficient evidence for Bible-believing pastors and people to reject his ministries, books and philosophy.
For example, in the March 2005 issue of the magazine, Warren writes the following:
"To truly love yourself, you need to know the five truths that form the basis of a healthy self-image...1. Accept yourself...God accepts us unconditionally...2.Love Yourself...3. Be true to yourself...consider your heart - what you love to do - as well as the strengths and weaknesses of your personality...Don't deny your weaknesses...be content with them...4. Forgive yourself...God doesn't expect perfection...5. Believe in yourself...The truth is God has created you with talents, abilities personality and background in a combination that is uniquely you...."
No, this wasn't written by Robert Schuller, but it could have been! The real problem, however, is that some of us have already opened the door to this questionable, if not dangerous, nonsense for our people; and the question is whether you have the courage to recall the programs you introduced or mark the man and his ministries as a hazard to the spiritual health of your people. While you may have thought you were able to ferret out the wheat from the chaff (a conclusion you might want to reconsider at this point), make no such presumption about your people who simply think that Rick Warren is OK with the pastor - no matter what he writes or where he speaks or what he does. Some of the less courageous among us will continue to use his materials and programs, convinced that such magazine articles are an anomaly compared to everything else Warren has written or done. Time will tell; but in the meantime, what damage has been done to the ministry of the church and the people of God?.
Dr. Charles L. Dear