McLaren versus the Bible

You have to pity Brian McLaren. His latest internet push for book sales shows just how little he really understands or how incredibly dishonest he is.

He starts out wondering why people don’t like him, specifically evangelicals. He then goes on to say that evangelicals are trained to punish people who are different. Ignoring the obvious insult for a second, I want to continue with what McLaren is actually arguing for a minute. McLaren claims that his conscious is tormented by a few things that the “religious authorities” teach, and he has the courage to question it. That is why he is hated. He gives a few examples, but if you want them all you need to buy his new book. Clearly one example is that God sends unbelievers to hell. The idea that God sends people to hell torments McLaren and he is question that. Apparently also Global warming, evolution, homosexuality, and women not being allowed as ministers also keeps McLaren questioning those means spirited religious leaders. McLaren makes sure that we know he is a good guy. "I love God, Jesus, the Bible, prayer, worship, serving others -- the whole package." This is where McLaren is either being totally dishonest or just does not get what he is actually saying.

McLaren rejects the idea of hell. Yet, passages from the Bible abound about hell. The “lake of fire” in Revelation for example. Jesus himself tells a parable about Lazarus and the rich man, who is in hell. McLaren thinks homosexuality is okay, but the Bible states clearly that it is unnatural, sinful, and originally a death penalty crime in God’s Judicial Law. McLaren likes evolution despite passages like Romans 5:12f that specifically state that death did not enter the world until Adam sinned. That sort of rules out evolution. And I am not even going to go into Genesis 1. So McLaren has only two options.

One, he blames religious leaders for making all of this stuff up despite it all being easily located in the Bible. This means the Bible is not the infallible rule for life, it is his tormented conscious. That puts McLaren in the role of God deciding what is and is not true Christianity.

Two, he is lying when he says that he loves the Bible (at the very least). McLaren’s real problem is not with religious leaders. It is with God’s own Holy Word. He does not like hell. That means he has to not like all of the talk of Jesus about separating the sheep from the goats (Matt 25), and the weeping and nashing of teeth (Matt 22). McLaren likes homosexuality or finds it okay in God’s sight. That means he has to reject and hate Romans 1, Levitcus 19, and the story of Sodom and Gomorrah and Ham in Genesis. He can’t have it both ways. He cannot accept the doctrines condemned in the Bible and still accept the Bible.

Either option he takes, it is not the religious leaders that torment McLaren, it is Jesus of the Bible that torments McLaren.