Final Thoughts on the Brand: New Series

Andy Stanley concluded the Brand: New series this Sunday.  This will be my final post on the series, and probably my last post concerning Stanley for a while.  I was made aware of what he was teaching in the series when I came across an article from one of the Christian news sites.  It sounded like he was preparing to make a major announcement, and I thought would be his support of gay Christianity.  I am thankful he did not cross that bridge this month.

Stanley's big question for the series was, "What does love require of me?" He believes that for the Christian the entirety of the Old Testament and New is summed up in this question.  He even went so far as to say that both Testaments are simply commentary on how to answer that question.  Unfortunately that puts Stanley in the awkward position of disagreeing with both Jesus and Paul on the purpose of the Scriptures.  In Luke 24, where the passage the name of this blog is taken from is found, Jesus twice says that the Scriptures were given to reveal him as the Messiah, the Savior, who would suffer, die, and rise again to save people from their sins.  In 2 Timothy 3:14-16 Paul instructs Timothy to continue in what he has learned, "the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work."  Asking ourselves what love requires of us in every situation is a good question to ask, very good in fact, but the purpose and application of the Scriptures goes well beyond that question.  They are given to us first of all that we would know that Jesus is the promised Messiah of Israel, and after that, to instruct us on how to live as His people.  

He even went so far as to say that the early Christians didn't need a Bible or Bible study even though, as I've already pointed out, the historical evidence, not to mention Biblical record, shows that the early church most certainly did gather together around the Old Testament Scriptures and the teaching of the Apostles, who would later write their teaching in what would become the New Testament.  The very first thing Luke says about the very first church is that they were devoted to the Apostles’ teaching (Acts 2:42).

Stanley's idea is that if Christians study the Bible unbelievers won't want to join us, but if we love people won't be able to resist us.  Once again, Stanley puts himself at odds with Jesus when he says this.  In John 15:18-19 Jesus said to his disciples, and by extension all believers, "If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you." As loving as the early church was, and as much as the church grew, it was hated by the pagan world.  All of the Apostles met violent deaths, according to tradition. Early Christians were denied work, imprisoned, fed to lions, crucified, beheaded, burned at the stake, and used as human torches in Nero's garden.  The pagan world hated the church, and still does, because the unbelieving world hates our King.  People don't reject Christianity because of the church, they reject Christ because they are "...filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips,  slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them" (Romans 1:29-32). That is the condition of all humanity until God's elect are made alive together with Christ by grace through faith.

He concluded the series by exploring four terms he claims Jesus redefined that the church has gotten wrong.

Structure - the church is a body and not a kingdom

There wasn't much to disagree with here, except that Stanley perhaps wasn't strong enough in his insistence that every believer must be engaged in a local church body.  He presented it as not ideal, where the New Testament presents it as not an option. What was ironic was his attack on consumer Christianity, while he and North Point have spearheaded the consumer Christianity movement over the last 20 years.  He very much follows the model of finding out what the people want and giving it to them.  

Authority - authority is for the benefit of the led and not the leader

Again, this statement is correct.  His conclusion, though, remains in contradiction with Jesus's words in John 15. Stanley thinks that if Christian employers would lead this way unbelievers would want to work for us, but we don't see that happening in the real world even now.  By all accounts Chick-Fil-A and Hobby Lobby are exemplary employers, yet they're hated by many unbelievers who are hostile to God.

Then, after spending the whole series talking about the church, and telling the ladies to come and listen in week 5 of the series, he suddenly shifted from the church to marriage.  He did not endorse female leadership in the church, but presented a standard egalitarian argument from Ephesians 5:21-22. So it appears that for all his criticism of the church being controlled by sacred men, he still believes that the church should be led by men.  

Spirituality - spirituality is measured by how well one loves, not by how much he knows

The problem here is that Stanley tries to put these two against each other as if they're mutually exclusive. The New Testament model is know, then do.  The disciples followed Jesus and learned long before he sent them out.  We don't know what to do if we don't know what to do.  The Bible, and the Bible alone, instructs us on what true love for our neighbor looks like.  

For example, the world tells us to love them by affirming their behavior.  The Bible says love them by telling them that behavior will kill them.  The world says love me by allowing me to continue in my sin. The Bible says you cannot be in Christ and continue in sin.  We must know what the Bible says, or we are going to end up loving our neighbors in a way that is actually hate.  Hatred, because it leaves them condemned under the terrifying wrath of God while we tell them everything is okay.  

In all Stanley's talk about love in this series, it has always been about action. Demonstrating love by serving your neighbor.  There is also a command for Christians is to speak the truth in love, which means sometimes telling people things they don't want to hear because we love them.  This command in Ephesians 3 comes in the context of the church growing to maturity so that it will not be tossed to and fro by false doctrine.  Yes, part of Christian maturity, or spirituality, is growing in a knowledge of the truth.  Part of spirituality and loving our neighbors is speaking the truth when someone is believing the wrong things.  

Earlier in the same sermon Stanley talked about the church as a body.  Different parts of the body have different functions, an argument Paul makes in 1 Corinthians 12. Some Christians have gifts of teaching and discernment, gifts that are given for the edification of the body.  While people who possess those gifts are not excused from serving their neighbors in other ways that are needed, the primary way possessors of those gifts will serve the church, the primary way they will love their neighbors, is teaching sound doctrine and protecting the church from false doctrine.  Those gifts are just as valid as the gifts of mercy, compassion, and service.  In Stanley’s mind though, those people are haters for calling out false doctrine and need to be shaken off.  Funny, isn't it, that Stanley talks about loving neighbors while showing utter contempt for those who dare to compare what he is teaching to the written word of God.

Holiness - holiness in the Jesus movement is about being a part of, rather than setting oneself apart from

The overall message of this section was on target.  As Christians we’re not to simply huddle together as Christians and have nothing to do with the unbelievers.  We are to engage with them.  Yet, and this is where I think Stanley was incredibly sloppy, we are called to be holy and set apart in the midst of that engagement.  We don’t live like the world even as we engage with the world.  We live according to the commands of Jesus our King.  Jesus engaged with sinners, but he didn’t join them in their sin.  There’s a very important distinction that needs to be made.

It was interesting that Stanley brought up the Great Commission and the necessity of going and making disciples, but failed to mention that part of that same commission is teaching disciples to obey all that Jesus commanded.  That means that we need to obey the New Testament imperatives, all of them, that Stanley thinks are only examples of how to love our neighbors.  Jesus didn’t say to only love our neighbors through acts of service and kindness.  

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I really get the sense that Stanley believes the Bible itself will keep people from coming to Jesus.  I could be wrong, but it just seems that he's embarrassed by much of what the Bible says, and wants to present a Jesus and a faith that is more palatable to unbelievers than the Jesus and the message found in Scripture.  

Jesus' half-brother Jude wrote though, "Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. For certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ" (Jude 3-4).  There is one faith, and it has been delivered.  We're not permitted to change the message to make it more acceptable.  Jesus called sin sin, we must do so.  Jesus talked about future judgment and the fires of Hell, we must do so.  Jesus taught sound doctrine and warned against those who would teach falsely, we must do so.  

Jesus was the perfect embodiment of love, he poured himself out for the good of others, and in the end the people who willingly received his gifts demanded his crucifixion, spit on him, beat him, and mocked him when he claimed to be God and called them to repentance.  The world will love us as long we only do good deeds.  The minute we proclaim Jesus as King, confront people with their sinfulness, and call them to repentance and faith they will hate us, unless God in his mercy grants them repentance.  We cannot make the gospel more attractive to unregenerate sinners, only the Holy Spirit can awaken people to new life, give them eyes to see and ears to hear.  Our responsibility is only faithfulness to our King in all things, including the proclamation of the message he has given us.

The message is that all people are born dead in trespasses and sins.  We are born hating God and in rebellion against him.  But God, being rich in mercy, and because of his great love, sent his only Son, Jesus Christ, to live a life without sin.  Jesus was crucified, buried, and resurrected.  He is coming back to judge the world in righteousness.  All those who by God's grace through faith repent and believe in Jesus Christ will be forgiven of their sins, and on the last day resurrected to eternal life.    

Andy Stanley's Dishonest, Deceptive, and Dangerous Teaching

This past Sunday I stayed up late to watch North Point’s Sunday morning service online, and once again, I found Andy Stanley’s sermon to be so shockingly bad that I feel compelled to write about it.  I remain convinced that this particular sermon series is going to have long lasting effects on American evangelicalism.  Stanley is not just a local church pastor, or even just the leader of a network of churches.  He is an influencer of the influencers in American Evangelicalism.  I am certain that we are going to see the content of this sermon series being repeated by other pastors around the country in the months ahead.

Stanley’s contention is that the early church got off to a great start, but throughout the history of the church there has been a tendency to return to what he is calling the Temple Model, which is characterized by sacred places, sacred texts, sacred men, and sincere followers.  It is absolutely true that the visible church has been corrupted time and again through the history of the church.  The church has an enemy, and that enemy will attack the church from without, through persecution and pressure to conform to the world, and within, through false doctrine.  What’s fascinating is that as you look back over the history of the church, what you see is that the greater the persecution against the church, the purer the church tends to be.  The freer the church is, false doctrine and corruption abound.  

The church in America has been the most free church in the history of the world.  It’s not surprising that we’ve splintered into thousands of denominations, and have spun off countless theological cults.  The Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and the signs and wonders cults all originated in America.  There has been a backlash against this in recent years, but the problem is that people tend to correctly identify the problems and then offer unbiblical solutions.  The opposite error of an error is also an error.

With Stanley’s current sermon series, he has identified the wrong problems and is offering wrong solutions.  Some of those problems will be discussed below.

The Temple Model

The first problem is that Stanley has built his entire sermon series around combating something that he made up.  The Temple Model is not spoken of in Scripture.  In the history of the church, as far as I know, no one has ever identified the Temple Model as a threat or a corrupting influence on the church.  

It is particularly troubling that Stanley has repeatedly lumped the Jewish Temple system in with other pagan religions, as if there’s no difference.  I am certain that Stanley knows that God instituted the priestly system of Israel (sacred men), commanded Moses to build the Tabernacle and later allowed Solomon to build the Temple (sacred place), and instructed Moses to write down the Law and have it read to the people regularly (sacred text).  The people were commanded to obey all that God had instituted, which had they done so would have made them sincere followers.  The history of Israel is that for nearly 1000 years they disregarded almost everything God told them, and then after returning from exile the Pharisees developed over time and added to the Law, creating their own religious system in place of the instructions God had given them.  

So it is an egregious error for Stanley to present the Jewish religious system as something bad, or no different than Greek and Roman mythology and temples.  Hebrews tells us that the Tabernacle/Temple, priests, and sacrificial system were earthly copies and shadows of Heavenly things (Hebrews 8:5).  Jesus was the fulfillment of all those things.

What Jesus and the Apostles warned against was not a return to the Temple Model, but the leaven of the Pharisees.  Stanley said Sunday, “Paul said that a little bit of the Temple Model can ruin the whole thing.”  That’s false.  Entirely untrue.  Paul said nothing remotely like that. He did say a little leaven leavens the whole lump in Galatians 5:9, but the leaven he was referring to was not the Temple model, it was justification by keeping the Law as the Judaizers in Galatia were teaching. 

Where the Bible talks about sacred places, sacred texts, sacred men, and sincere followers, provided they are being obedient to what God has commanded, these things are always viewed in a very positive light.  

I don’t know why Stanley has chosen to present things this way.  I don’t know his heart motivations.  From where I’m sitting, it looks like he’s a man with an agenda, and that his agenda is not in line with God’s revealed will.

Church History

I’ve already written one post showing what the earliest non-Apostolic church fathers wrote to and about the early church.  Simply put, Stanley’s claims that the early church didn’t study the Bible are patently false.  He is not telling the truth, and he doesn’t even have to go outside the New Testament to know that the New Testament writings are important.  Peter wrote in 2 Peter 3:15-16 that Paul’s writings are Scripture and believers should draw their doctrine from them. 

Writing around the year 150, long before Constantine and Nicea, Justin Martyr described what happened on Sunday gatherings of Christians: the public reading of Scripture, an exhortation by the pastor to the congregation to obey what they had heard read, taking communion together, and the collection of money which the pastor distributed to those who had need.  People gathered in a sacred place, read from a sacred text, listened to a sermon by a sacred man, and the sincere followers took communion together.  

Almost everything Stanley has said about the early church in this series is directly contradicted by the writings of the church fathers.  

NT Imperatives

My jaw literally dropped Sunday night when Stanley said that the New Testament imperatives were not rules for Christians to follow, but examples of how to love our neighbors.  In all my studies I have never come across one scholar or teacher who has taught this.  Not one.  I reached out to Dan Philips on Twitter Monday and asked if he had ever heard anyone teach that, and he said no.  I even did a Google search to see if I could find someone else who has taught this and found nothing.  As best as I can tell, this is something new in the 2000 year history of the church.  Stanley is on an island with this one, and that is not a good place for a pastor to be.

The Nature of Sin

What troubled me most Sunday was Stanley’s claim that Christian sin has nothing to do with God, but only concern for other people.  This borders on blasphemy.  In Stanley’s eyes, lying isn’t wrong because it’s sin against God, it’s wrong because it hurts another person.  He flat out said, “The reason you don’t (shouldn’t) lie has nothing to do with God.”  Sexual sin, he said, isn’t wrong because it’s sin against God, it’s wrong because it harms another person.  There is an element of truth in those statements; our sins do hurt other people.  But for a Christian pastor to suggest that our sin doesn’t offend God but only hurts other people is astounding.  When David committed adultery with Bathsheba and murdered her husband what did he say?  “Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight” (Psalm 51:4a).  David basically forced himself on a married woman then had her husband murdered, and he said he sinned against God and God alone.  

Read what the author of Hebrews said about sin among professing Christians in Hebrews 10:23-31:

²³ Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. ²⁴ And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, ²⁵ not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. 

²⁶ For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, ²⁷ but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. ²⁸ Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. ²⁹ How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace? ³⁰ For we know him who said, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge his people.” ³¹ It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

We were made in the image of God.  Every sin is a cosmic act of treason.  It has everything to do with God.  Unbelievers will suffer the eternal, terrible wrath of God because of their sin against him.  For believers, Jesus suffered God’s wrath on the cross in our place.  For Stanley to then say that what Jesus suffered to atone for has nothing to do with God is absolutely untrue, and incredibly dangerous.  

I said last week that Stanley appears to be embracing theological liberalism, and this line of thinking is classic liberalism.   

Stanley's concluding point of the sermon Sunday was that the Jesus model is centered on the you beside you.  No.  The Jesus modeled is centered on Jesus.  He is the author and perfector of our faith.  He is the one who can save us from our sins.  Our keeping of the Law, and loving our neighbors is Law, cannot save us.  

It is looking more and more likely that Stanley is set to depart from orthodoxy and embrace an aberrant theology.  I continue to pray for his sake and the sake of the thousands he influences that this doesn’t happen.    

  

The Truth About Sacred Texts and Sacred Men in the Early Church

I mentioned in my last post that I've listened to Andy Stanley's most recent sermon, titled Recycled, three times.  One of the things I found so frustrating about the sermon, among many things I found frustrating, was his distorted presentation of church history.  It would be impossible to give a comprehensive treatment of the history of the church in 30 minutes, but Stanley made several statements that are demonstrably false.  

Particularly troubling was his insistence that for the first three hundred years of the church, sacred men and sacred texts were uninportant in the church. The truth is the opposite. In the earliest non-Scriptural writings, the church fathers repeatedly quoted and referenced the Scriptures, and directed Chrsitians to obey their pastors. 

I've been reading the church fathers this year, and below are some quotes from the very earliest non-Apostolic church fathers.  Though not inspired Scripture, these writings give us a clear picture of what the early church actually believed and practiced.  Included below are quotes from Clement of Rome in his epistle to the Corinthian church, "Mathetes" (a disciple) of the Apostles to Diognetus, Polycarp to the Philippians, and Ignatius to the Ephesians and Magnesians.

Clement of Rome to the Church in Corinth

These are only three brief quotes from a very long letter, but even in these few words we see Clement instructing the Corinthians to submit to the authority of the presbyters (pastors) and to look carefully into the Scriptures, which are true utterances of the Holy Spirit.  You can't read more than a few sentences of Clement without finding a direct quote of the Scriptures or a reference.

Mathetes to Diognetus

Notice the doctrinal richness? Although Mathetes is not quoting a passage of Scripture here, he is compiling numerous phrases that do come directly from the Scriptures, Old Testament and New.  For this anonymous disciple the faith was grounded not in loving actions, but in the truth drawn from  Scripture.

Polycarp to the Church in Philippi

Polycarp was a disciple of the Apostle John, the beloved disciple who wrote one of the gospels, three epistles, and the book of Revelation.  Notice that Polycarp directly quotes 1 John 4:2 as authoritative truth.  Notice that Polycarp, a disciple of one of Jesus' twelve, taught that were beliefs that a person must hold to in order to be Christian - among them humanity of Christ, the death and resurrection of Jesus, and the coming judgment (Hell).  

Ignatius to the Church in Ephesus

Ignatius to the Magnesians

Ignatius, like Polycarp, was a disciple of John.  He was only one person removed from the words of Jesus.  Ignatius taught a respect for and obedience to church leaders that far exceeds anything ever practiced in America.  The problem in the American church is not giving too much authority to and trust in men who have studied and shown themselves approved, we give too little respect and obedience compared with the early church.  We also see Ignatius teaching that both beliefs and actions are important in the life of a Christian.  

Putting it Together

These are just a few selected writings of the early church.  It is true that the early church was known by outsiders for their love.  I can't remember the source, but it was recorded by one outsider that the Christians not only cared for their own poor, but also the poor outside the church.  Inside though, the church was characterized by study and teaching of the Old Testament and New and leadership by faithful men who were given an elevated position of authority.

Sacred texts and sacred men are not a corruption of the true faith.  They have been the foundation of the church from the earliest days of its existence.

What Andy Stanley is Teaching This Month and Why it Matters

I’ve listened to Andy Stanley’s most recent Sunday sermon three times now.  I watched the 9:00 AM service live online.  I listened to the download made available by North Point Community Church, which came from the second service and contains a few minor differences compared to the sermon I watched live.  Finally, I listened to Chris Rosebrough’s review of the sermon in the February 16 edition of Fighting for the Faith.

Why? I think what’s happening at North Point this month is going to have long-lasting effects on American, and even global, Christianity.

Andy Stanley is easily one of the top five most influential pastors in America, and maybe top 2-3.  It’s impossible to quantify such things of course, but it is easily seen if you pay attention to the broad landscape of American Evangelicalism.  It’s no secret that pastors around the country duplicate Stanley’s sermons and series, and there have been documented cases of pastors plagiarizing Stanley word-for-word.  Thousands and thousands of pastors around America and around the world look to Stanley as a leader and follow his teaching and methods.

Stanley is currently teaching a five week series titled Brand: New.  Stanley’s assumption is that Christianity has been corrupted by “Temple Model” thinking since the days of Constantine.  He defines the Temple Model as being controlled by sacred places, sacred texts, sacred men, and sincere followers.  

His definition of the true Jesus religion comes from half a verse in Galatians.  In the ESV, Galatians 5:6 in its entirety reads, “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.”  In his sermon series, Stanley has repeatedly quoted the NIV’s translation of the second sentence of the verse which reads, “The only thing that matters is faith expressing itself through love.” 

Stanley is attempting to build a doctrine of Christianity on half of one verse.  And his version of Christianity is one in which it doesn’t matter what a person believes or does, as long as they love their neighbors.  

In other words, Stanley is embracing theological liberalism.  Actually it might be better to say he’s no longer hiding his theological liberalism.

Three years ago Al Mohler asked, following an Andy Stanley sermon, if the megachurch is the new liberalism.  In that sermon, Stanley told the story of two men in his church involved in a homosexual relationship.  One man was divorced, the other still married.  Stanley told the congregation that the men were forbidden from serving in the church, not because they were in a homosexual relationship, but because one was still married and therefore committing adultery.  Many people questioned at the time if Stanley was signaling his approval of gay Christianity - the idea that a person can be actively involved in a homosexual relationship and a Christian.  

When I first read about what Stanley was teaching in the Brand: New series I thought he was going to come out as gay affirming.  After listening to the first and third sermons in the series I’m not convinced he’s going to make that explicit at this time, but I do believe he is laying the groundwork to do this in the future.  Based on comments made this past Sunday, it does seem likely that Stanley is going to endorse female leadership in the church in week five of the series.

All of this is significant because of Stanley’s influence.

If Stanley openly embraces liberalism in the name of bringing more people to Jesus, thousands of others will follow. It should be noted that liberals have been making the same argument for more than two centuries, and that every church that has embraced liberalism is now dead or dying, but the arguments keep being made and people keep buying into them. 

Liberalism has always denied essential doctrines of the Christian faith in order to make the faith more palatable to unbelievers.  The problem is that if people don’t believe in the God who has revealed in Himself in Scripture, if they don’t believe in the Jesus revealed in Scripture, they are not in Christ, no matter what they call themselves.  

The seeker-sensitive movement, in which Stanley is a major player, seeks to make Christianity as accessible as possible to the largest number of people possible.  Up to now, most seeker-sensitive churches have remained theologically sound on paper while functioning as liberal churches.  They’ve managed to keep their feet in both worlds.  

I think that’s about to change.

Stanley has been always been zeroed in on what’s happening in the culture.  Twenty years ago when he started North Point in the heart of the Bible Belt, he could not have survived by openly embracing liberalism.  The Bible Belt culture simply would not have tolerated a pastor who openly endorsed homosexual Christianity, female pastors, a denial of the Biblical account of creation, or any of the other hot-button issues of our day.

Things have changed.  Even among professing Christians today, very few still hold to those positions.  Stanley now sees that it is more costly to deny that a homosexual can be involved in homosexual sin and be a Christian than it is to embrace gay Christianity.  Even in the Bible Belt, it will be more costly to deny evolution than embrace it.  

So, he will say that it doesn’t matter what a person believes as long as they love.  

It was very telling, and honestly shocking, that it in this past Sunday’s sermon he indicated that it didn’t matter that Arius believed Jesus wasn’t eternal.  For 1700 years virtually every branch of religion that calls itself Christian; Catholicism, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestantism has agreed that Arius was a heretic who was outside the Christian faith.  Stanley said Sunday that it was no big deal.  It doesn’t matter what a person believes, as long as they love.

The problem is that Jesus and the Apostles repeatedly warned against those who would proclaim a different gospel or a different Jesus.  A Jesus who is not eternally God, as Arius taught, is most certainly a different Jesus than the one revealed in Scripture.  The blood of a different Jesus can not atone for our sins.

I do believe that God’s grace is such that those who are unknowingly caught up in a false system can be saved in spite of what they’re being taught if they recognize their sinfulness and trust in Jesus for the forgiveness of their sins.  But woe to those who preach a different gospel.  It’s ironic that Stanley is using a verse from Galatians as the foundation for his series.  In Galatians 1:6-9 Paul wrote:

I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. 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. 

The immediate context of Paul’s letter to the Galatians was the Judaizers attempting to make circumcision a requirement for salvation.  Stanley is clearly not doing that.  But, in saying that the only thing that matters at the end of the day is how well we’ve loved our neighbors, he is coming dangerously close to preaching a different gospel and putting people back under the yoke of the Law, if he hasn’t crossed the line.  

The summary of the Law and the Prophets, according to Jesus in Matthew 22:37-40, is “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”  

Loving your neighbor as you love yourself is Law, and the Law cannot save you unless you keep it perfectly from the day you’re born until the day you die.  The problem?  We’re all born dead in trespasses and sins and cannot keep the Law.  We’re all guilty.  So telling people it doesn’t matter what they believe as long as they love others is actually putting people back under the yoke of the Law.

Should we love God? Absolutely! Should we love our neighbors? Absolutely!  But if we try to do so without being given new life by God’s grace through faith in the Jesus revealed to us in Scripture, we remain dead in our trespasses and sins and children of God’s wrath.  There is no salvation without repentance and faith in the true Jesus. 

I don’t yet know what Stanley is going to say in the final two sermons of this series.  I think we all need to be paying attention though.  Stanley’s influence is such that if he goes off the rails of orthodoxy and into apostasy, American Christianity as we know it will change forever.  I don’t think I’m exaggerating.