Wrapping things up-The Business of Rick Warren

Two weeks ago we started this series of exposes' on Rick Warren and his new purpose driven religion.
In ending this I want to let Ricks own words expose this double minded false teacher.

This is how Rick Warren started out inventing his new religion that appeals to the flesh. Notice no mention of seeking God or searching the scriptures to see how to start a church.
Rather Slick Rick depended on the opinions of unsaved people.
(great business move though)

"And so I went out and for twelve weeks I went door to door, and I knocked on homes for about 12 weeks and just took an opinion poll. I had a survey with me. I just said, "My name is Rick Warren. I'm not here to sell you anything, I'm not here to convert you, I'm not here to witness to you. I just want to ask you three or four questions.(my emphasis)
Question number one: Are you an active member of a local church of any kind of religion synagogue, mosque, whatever?"
If they said yes, I said, "Great, God bless you, keep going," and I politely excused myself and went to the next home.
When I'd find somebody who'd say, "No, I don't go anywhere," I'd say, "Perfect; you're just the kind of guy I want to talk to. This is great, you don't go anywhere. So let me ask you a question. Why do you think most people don't attend church?" And I just wrote the answers down. I asked, "If you were looking for a church, what kind of things would you look for?" And I'd just list them. "What advice would you give to me as the pastor of a new church? How can I help you?" So they'd say, "I think churches exist for the community; not vice versa," and I'd write that down.

Now who do you think gave Rick Warren those marching orders?
I speak with authority when I say it was not The Holy Spirit directing Rick to do thid, and build his church this way.
Ricks method sounds more like this-

“The rank and file is usually much more primitive than we imagine. Propaganda must therefore always be essentially simple and repetitious. The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly... it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over.” Joseph Goebbels




Quotes from The Pew Forum made by Rick Warren-
"You know, I got invited to speak at this Aspen Ideas Institute. And I'm going, what's an evangelical pastor going to this for? Well, evidently somebody's not afraid of us anymore."

"When I went to Harvard a month ago, I honestly expected a pretty hostile audience – I'm an evangelical pastor and I'm going into Harvard. And I went in and I spoke four times and they gave me a standing ovation."

"And I came here because I only speak to influencers, and God has given you a degree of influence." (speaking to secular journalists)

"Just to be sitting up here with David Brooks, I feel like we ought to reverse this, let him talk and let me comment on him because I love reading his stuff. I read all of your stuff all of the time and I just wanted to start off by saying thank you. Thank you for helping me grow, helping me develop.

As a writer, you never know who is reading your stuff and so I just wanted you to know I am reading you. I read a book a day and I read tons of magazines, tons of articles, and I just devour enormous quantities of material, and thank God for the Internet. I get The New York Times and I get The Wall Street Journal, and I get the local papers in L.A., but the rest I have to read online or in the magazines that I subscribe to."

"I'm just saying that personally I've got a different agenda. My agenda is really of, in, for and through these millions and millions of churches that I now have technology to network together called the Internet, which allows me to sit in my bedroom and talk to guys in Brussels, and it allows me to influence any influencer. "

"You see, here's the problem. My book happened to be published by Zondervan, which is owned by Harper-Collins, which is owned by Newscorp, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch. So when the book hit 15 million, I called up Rupert Murdoch and I said, "What are you going to do to celebrate my book?" And he goes, "Well, what do you want to do?" I go, "I want you to throw a party and I want you to invite all your secular elite friends from Manhattan and let me talk to them." And he goes, "Okay." (Chuckles.) So he sends out a list, he invited 350 people, who's who in Manhattan to the top of the Rainbow Room, and I went up there and you know, I just started talking to them again, standing ovation."


Well enough of the Rick Warren usual brag fest lets see what Rick thinks about the church as a business.

From the Business Weeks article titled "Earthly Empires" and the links on its page.

Rick Warren-
"Our goal is not to turn the church into a business," insists Warren, the founder of Saddleback megachurch in Lake Forest, Calif."

To which I say WHAT??? Anybody thats involved in Purpose Driven or has had contact with it knows this is a lie from the pit.

Warren states in a article that was linked from this page.

"Q: Why do we see so much entrepreneurial activity among evangelicals?
A: We've always been entrepreneurial. But 50 years ago, most of the evangelical entrepreneurs went into organizations like the Campus Crusade for Christ, World Vision, etc. The spirit used to be that you had to leave the church [to accomplish something great]. But now all of the smart guys I know are going out to become pastors and starting churches. We've helped thousands of churches get started. I've trained more than 350,000 pastors."

The definition of entrepreneurs is " used to describe passionate business types that are prepared to go to the ends of the earth to make a business or project succeed."

Again from Pew Forum Rick Warren states-
"Now Drucker has said that at least six times. I happen to know because he's my mentor. I've spent 20 years under his tutelage learning about leadership from him, and he's written it in two or three books, and he says he think it's the only thing that really works in society."

From a article By Debbie O'Hara
November 16, 2003
NewsWithViews.com

"The modern Church Growth Movement is using modern marketing techniques, not the gospel of Christ to bring in large numbers of people. The church converts and disciples people through the use of these modern organizational management techniques (Total Quality Management style just like business) so that they can effect "change" in the community and the world. Peter Drucker tells us that "pastors are the most under rated "change" agents. He calls Rick Warren the "inventor of perpetual revival". Sounds like the dialectic doesn't it? We need to continually change until we finally reach perfection, which is of course a humanist philosophy.
Who is this Peter Drucker? He is called the "guru of modern management". It is his marketing techniques that are being used to grow the church. He has worked with large corporations, small entrepreneurs, U.S. government agencies and other free governments. According to Christianity Today, "Drucker is a Christian, a practicing Episcopalian, but from his writings it would be hard to say much more than that about his faith... Drucker's writings seem determined to keep his faith a secondary characteristic for his readers."

"I would trust a pastor or a rabbi of a synagogue or an imam of a Muslim mosque more then I would trust a government or NGO. (Can Rick Warren Change the World? Fox Video video time 2:15 Aug.19, 2006 Fox News)."

One more Rick Warren quote-
"If your church has been plateaued for six months, it might take six months to get it going again. If it's been plateaued a year, it might take a year. If it's been plateaued for 20 years, you've got to set in for the duration!

I'm saying some people are going to have to die or leave.
Second, you love everybody, but you move with the movers. Pastor everybody, hold everybody's hand, don't show partiality, and continue to care for everybody. But you move with the movers."

From The Nation posted August 25, 2005 (September 12, 2005 issue)
"Warren's success follows the trajectory enjoyed in recent years by other inspirational, religious or spiritual self-help authors, like Deepak Chopra, Marianne Williams, John Bradshaw and Robert Bly. What distinguishes these mega-successes from books in the same genre that enjoy respectable sales at best is often not content but timing, marketing and luck (if not God's will)."

I think this person acuratly linked Warren with birds of a feather.

So now folks you will have to decide where you want to stand.
With Rick Warren and his new religion?
Or Jesus Christ and The Bible.

Its up to you.