Brad Cecil presents nine pillars that the Emergent church is founded on. The pillars are cracked!
1. Post modern refers to the period after modernity. It appears to “us” that a significant epistemological shift is occurring – the likes of which we haven’t seen in 400 years.
Crack 1. Paul spoke about the present generation of vipers in 2nd Timothy 3. Note that they resist the truth and want to redefine God as being weak. They never come to the knowledge of the truth. They are reprobate concerning the faith.
This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;
Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away. For of this sort are they which creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts, Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith. But they shall proceed no further: for their folly shall be manifest unto all men, as theirs also was. (2Ti 3:1-9)
I don’t hear believers disputing the power of God, or being ashamed of biblical truth and faith. I hear practically nothing but those things from Emergers.
My experience in conversing with Emergers is that they refuse to read their Bibles in context. They push their Bibles aside and resort to pragmatism when I show them where they deal with the text deceitfully. They make self-refuting statements and get angry when I point out their error. And when their poor handling of scripture and their fallacious statements are exposed, then they claim that they are being slandered.
That kind of inability to read and process Scripture with integrity points to a corruption of their mind as the problem. The epistemological shift is one away from knowledge grounded in truth toward knowledge grounded in belief. In other words, opinion and pragmatism trump the Word of God. Postmodernism merely tries to validate that shift away from the Holy Bible (truth) as good and progressive. The Word of God says it is bad and regressive. I side with the Word of God, because postmodernism leads away from rationality and not toward it. That much is clear to me from my experience with Emergers.
