Mark Driscoll and his Strange Claims

WARNING:  The video clip you’ll watch deals with sexual abuse and adultery.  So know that before you watch it. I believe it is important to watch to understand why folks like myself are often critical of folks like Mark Driscoll.  Some may watch this and say they believe such things are possible.  I’ll confess this is bizarre and I do not see much Biblical in it or helpful.

Shocked?  First, realize if you have not heard of Mark Driscoll that this is the pastor of a mega church with thousands who gather to listen to his sermons.  He is a best selling author.  He is a leader of a major church planning network called Acts 29.  He is loved by many, many young 20 somethings who are in ministry.  He is not Baptist but is shaping the Southern Baptist Convention as it moves to Calvinism.  Driscoll is one of those up and coming Calvinists who is very influential.  Yet the clip above has nothing at all to do with Calvinism.  It shows yet another side to Driscoll’s theology.  I doubt John Calvin would have agreed with what Driscoll claims in this clip!  I doubt most Calvinists would!  Driscoll seems to be blending Calvinism and Charismatic ideas into his theology.  The clip is from a sermon you can still find on his church web site from 2008.  It’s part of a four part sermon series on spiritual warfare.  I do not agree with Calvinism and I have argued against Driscoll’s views on that subject.  I do not like his crass and sexual language from the pulpit (if you don’t believe me his Song of Songs sermon series also for public viewing is shocking to say the least).  He uses cursing, sexual jokes, and cruel remarks often.  But this is over the top!   Consider what he is saying and the implications.

1.  He is claiming to have some pretty powerful super powers.  Imagine having a pastor who looks out and sees your secret sins and crimes that happened against you!  If you believed that and attended his church you would not want to make this guy angry!   He has just created a very god like power- TV visions replaying intimate details is an amazing claim and I don’t believe one word of it.

2.  If you are more Charismatic then me and believe this happens then there are other problems.

a.  Does he go to the police over these crimes?

b.  Doesn’t he put the woman in danger by confronting a husband who threatens murder?

c.  Doesn’t he seem to enjoy describing that adultery scene a bit too much? In typical Driscoll fashion he likes to talk about sex.

d.  Why does God only show him sexual pasts?  No other sins?

e.  Why doesn’t God show him nice visions about good things?

This video is making its way on various blogs I’ve seen.  FBC JAX WATCHDOG and others have it posted and they too are asking similar questions I just posted.

I find his counseling and pastoral skills abilities to be pathetic.  I also think if he is going to come across as Johnny from the Dead Zone he should not wear a Mickey Mouse shirt!  As others have hinted if he has this ability he really got become a crime solver.  Get on TV with Adam Walsh and find missing people or do one of those TV shows where psychics help people.

Supporters will argue that folks like myself are limiting God’s power and denying spiritual warfare, etc.  I’m sorry but I don’t buy Driscoll’s claims.  I just don’t.  If your pastor stood in your pulpit and said these things how would your congregation react?  If he/she stood up and said that he/she saw rape and acts of child abuse out in spiritual tv screens above people’s heads don’t you think there would be a deacon’s meeting immediately after worship to either fire or send the pastor to professional help?

Mega pastors are becoming super celebrities.  Some are making claims that are over the top and the Christian church needs to call it for what it is.  We’ve seen wild stuff from folks like Benny Hinn for years (he is the guy who said God was going to give him a Holy Ghost machine gun to blow away his enemies) and this is just another version of sensationalism.  Some mega pastors are abusing their power and authority.  Several are using spiritual threats to push giving in their church.  I’ve heard some say that if you don’t tithe the rest of the money you have becomes cursed money and veiled threats of what that is going to do in your life!  Fear and intimidation is not the gospel.  Jesus didn’t do this.  He didn’t tolerate spiritual abuse or misuse in his ministry nor should we.

Feel free to disagree and comment on this blog if you do!  If you agree with me please comment.  What did you honestly think when you saw this video?

W.H. Witsitt- A Real Baptist Hero

I just finished reading “W.H. Witsitt:  The Man and the Controversy” by James H. Slatton.  What a book!  The year I attended Southern Seminary (before leaving to attend the Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond) there was a hall in our dorm building named after him.  Witsitt was a professor at Southern Seminary who became the 3rd president of that seminary (late 1800s).  He was a church history scholar who was forced out due to his beliefs that Baptist origins date to the 1600s.  This of course is actual fact!  But due to the Landmark movement of his day there were Baptists who believed that Baptists go back to NT times (though with different names) in an unbroken lineage.  These Landmark folks believe only Baptists are the one and true church and all others are not.   Their influence was strong in the SBC of the day and when Witsitt pointed out actual history they didn’t like it.  Witsitt also observed that baptism by immersion for Baptists began several decades after our movement began.  What we mainly worried about was ‘believer’s baptism’ and not the amount of water.  We were concerned that a person accept Christ then be baptized after the fact and not by infant baptism.  We poured water at first.  But in time immersion became the model.  While I appreciate and like immersion and only do immersion I realize that it is a symbol and the main thing for Baptists was the believer’s baptism issue.  Critics blasted Witsitt and said he was claiming that Baptists invented immersion which is not what he said.  He believed it was a biblical model and not unique to just us but he was only teaching the facts (history).

In time the heat got so hot that he eventually resigned rather than continual controversy that might cost his seminary.  Witsitt went on to serve at the University of Richmond.  His private diaries were sealed for 100 years.

In the 21st century few would disagree with Witsitt’s beliefs today.  There are still those who are “Landmark” but the prevailing historical understanding is what Witsitt taught.  Conservatives and moderate scholars alike would agree that Baptists began in England in 1609.  History shows that Baptists did not immerse immediately.  This is factual truth.

While previous groups influenced the Baptist movement we are not the one true church!  Such a narrow understanding of one’s heritage is arrogant and dangerous.  Yet we can be proud of who we are without demeaning others.  We can study our heritage and appreciate others who came before.  We didn’t ‘invent’ believers baptism but we have been strong proponents of it.  There is much to be proud of in the Baptist story.  I am proud of our style of church that promotes freedom.  We have stressed religious liberty and that has been a contribution that we have given to this country.  Our focus on believer’s baptism has been so that each individual would choose freely to follow Christ.  Baptists promote church/state separation, Christ centered faith, non-creedal, autonomous church government, and strong lay leadership in the local church (among just a few strengths).  At the same time Baptists can and should learn from other church traditions.

Witsitt was and is a model of a hero.  He was someone who taught what was theologically true and responsible and was willing to face the heat.  There were many who knew he was right but who were silent because they did not want to pay the price.

I once slept in a dorm building with a hall named after this man.  I wonder how he would have felt considering what eventually happened to the seminary he strived to protect and lead.  Immediately after he left another great hero took leadership- E.Y. Mullins.  Despite those who sought to harm the seminary the school prevailed and moved forward.  Mullins agreed with Witsitt on his teachings.  The school continued to be a place of integrity and respect for many years.  Then in the late 20th century the battles raged again and many other Witsitts were forced out.   Great professors and scholars who taught their convictions and had theological responsibility.  I wonder if 100 plus years from now whether Southern Baptists will read about those days and have a different understand that the SBC leadership does today?  Will women be apologized too as African Americans have been already?  Time will only tell.  Of course in 100 plus years there may not be a Southern Baptist Convention!   I do believe that there will be a Baptist tribe(s) and that the tribe or tribes will look back on these later controversies much differently then we do today.