Reasons why Eugene Peterson is way off The Mark of God~

[Jesus Is Real]

Reasons why Eugene Peterson's book is way off The Mark of God~

This is well documented you can get the [#] links here: http://www.crossroad.to/Bible_studies/Message.html


* Deletes words that imply occult spirituality. Substitutes more finite, human influences:

1 Timothy 4:1 "...in later times some will abandon the faith and follow seducing spirits and doctrines of demons." (KJV)

The Message: "...as time goes on, some are going to give up on the faith and chase after demonic illusions put forth by professional liars."

The Message implies: [We're not just dealing with illusions. Deceiving spirits and the timeless doctrines of demons are far more effective in deceiving people than illusions and professional liars.]


* Deletes reference to "the ruler of the kingdom of the air" and "sinful nature:"

Ephesians 2:1-3: "As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature[2] and following its desires and thoughts."

The Message: "It wasn't so long ago that you were mired in that old stagnant life of sin. You let the world, which doesn't know the first thing about living, tell you how to live. You filled your lungs with polluted unbelief, and then exhaled disobedience. We all did it, all of us doing what we felt like doing, when we felt like doing it, all of us in the same boat."


* minimizes occult dangers, Deletes consequences:

Thessalonians 2:9: "The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs, and wonders, and in every sort of evil that deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved."

The Message: "The Anarchist's[3] coming is all Satan's work. All his power and signs and miracles are fake, evil sleight of hand that plays to the gallery of those who hate the truth that could save them. And since they're so obsessed with evil, God rubs their noses in it - gives them what they want. Since they refuse to trust truth, they're banished to their chosen world of lies and illusions."

[Peterson's tendency to delete the supernatural and minimize the consequences of sin reminds me of Rom. 1:18 - "The wrath of God is being revealed...against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth..."]


* Deletes references to sinful nature and occult practices, minimizing Satan's power:

Galatians 5:19-21: "The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like."

The Message: "It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religions; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved.... ugly parodies of community. I could go on."

[Idolatry and witchcraft are not the same as trinket gods and magic-show religions! We're dealing with spiritual forces far greater than magical illusions.]


*Sounds like the song "Awaiting You All" by George Harrison (Beatles) through "chanting the names of the Lord:"

You don't need a horoscope or a microscope to see the mess that you're in
If you open up your heart You will know what I mean...
Now here's a way for you to get clean
By chanting the names of the lord and you'll be free
The lord is awaiting on you all to awaken and see.

Colossians 2:10: "...and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority."

The Message: "You don't need a telescope, a microscope, or a horoscope to realize the fullness of Christ, and the emptiness of the universe without him..."


* Deletes words like adulterers and homosexual which identify specific sins and Adds a politically correct reference to environmentalism.
(Recall the environmental terminology in Eph. 2:1-3, "filled your lungs with polluted unbelief...")

1 Corinthians 6:9-11: "Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders [sodomites] nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified..."

The Message: "Unjust people who don't care about God will not be joining in his kingdom. Those who use and abuse each other, use and abuse sex, use and abuse the earth and everything in it don't qualify as citizens in God's kingdom. A number of you know from experience what I'm talking about, for not so long ago you were on that list. Since then, you've been cleaned up and given a fresh start...."


* Deletes reference to obedience and to the grace of our Lord:

Romans 16:19-21: "Everyone has heard about your obedience [the Greek word consistently refers to obedience or obeying][4], so I am full of joy over you; but I want you to be wise about what is good, and innocent about what is evil. The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus be with you."

The Message: "And so while there has never been any question about your honesty in this matters - I couldn't be more proud of you! - I want you also to be smart, making sure every "good" thing is the real thing. Don't be gullible in regard to smooth-talking evil. Stay alert like this, and before you know it the God of peace will come down on Satan with both feet, stomping him into the dirt. Enjoy the best of Jesus!"


* Deletes "sexual immorality." Adds "avoids commitment and intimacy:"

1 Corinthians 6:18-20: "Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body."

The Message: "There's more to sex than mere skin on skin. Sex is as much a spiritual mystery as a physical fact. As written in Scripture, 'The two become one.' Since we want to become spiritually one with the Master, we must not pursue the kind of sex that avoids commitment and intimacy, leaving us more lonely than ever - the kind of sex that can never 'become one.' ....In sexual sin we violate the sacredness of our own bodies, these bodies that were made for God-given and God-modeled love, for 'becoming one' with another."[5]


* Adds words that qualify homosexuality, providing a loophole for committed homosexuals who "love" each other. Deletes "God gave them over...":

Romans 1:26-27: "Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion."

The Message: "Worse followed. Refusing to know God, they soon didn't know how to be human either - women didn't know how to be women, men didn't know how to be men. Sexually confused, they abused and defiled one another, women with women, men with men - all lust, no love. And then they paid for it, oh, how they paid for it - emptied of God and love, Godless and loveless wretcheds."

[This strange wording leaves a loophole for homosexuality to be permitted if it was an expression of love, not lust - which many gay couples claim today.(<------I use too also, until I repented of my sin before God. ~Jesus Is Real) In other words, lust becomes the sin, not the choice of a same-sex partner. The consequences of disobedience, "due penalty" seems broader than "emptied of God and love..." Historically it includes sexually transmitted diseases as well as spiritual death. That politically incorrect possibility is deleted here.]



* Distorts truth with a contemporary bias:

Romans 3:19-20: "Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. Therefore no one will be declared righteous in His sight by observing the law, rather through the law we become conscious of sin.

The Message: "This makes it clear, doesn't it, that whatever is written in these Scriptures is not what God says about others but to us to whom these Scriptures were addressed in the first place! and it's clear enough, isn't it, that we're sinners, every one of us, in the same sinking boat with everyone else? Our involvement with God's revelation doesn't put us right with God. What it does is force us to face our complicity in everyone else's sin."

[This interpretation endorses today's false standard of tolerance: Don't expose or criticize another person; just deal with your own sin. It defies God's guidelines concerning counseling, correction, restoration and accountability - and supports today's tendency to condone sin. See Romans 1:32 - but not in The Message. It deletes this important point.]



* Deletes "spiritual" - spiritual readiness to receive God's resources for ministry.[6] Substitutes "live creatively," usually a reference to human resources, not God's:

Galatians 6:1-2: "Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted."

The Message: "Live creatively, friends. If someone falls into sin, forgivingly restore him, saving your critical comments for yourself. You might be needing forgiveness before the day's out."


* Replaces "reconciliation" (a spiritual work based on the cross) with "friend."
Adds "drop their differences" (Could he be promoting a PC form of unity?):

2 Corinthians 5:20: "We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God."

The Message: "We're Christ's representatives. God uses us to persuade men and women to drop their differences and enter into God's work of making things right between them. We're speaking for Christ himself now: Become friends with God; he's already a friend with you."


* Adds a promise not found in the original Greek:

Romans 8:35-37: "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?"

The Message: "Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ's love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying threats, not backstabbing, not even the worst sins listed in Scripture:"

The last passage is consistent with Peterson's refusal to mention those "worst sins" in the various New Testament lists of fleshly expressions. It also helps explain his commendation of medieval mystic Julian of Norwich, whose teachings - often quoted by controversial priest Matthew Fox, founder of Creation Spirituality - fueled the fourteenth-century flowering of pantheistic mysticism. In his article titled "Spirit Quest"[7] (Christianity Today, 11-8-93), Peterson wrote, "Single-minded, persevering faithfulness confirms the authenticity of our spirituality. The ancestors we look to for encouragement in this business - Augustine of Hippo and Julian of Norwich, John Calvin.... Teresa of Avila - didn't flit. They stayed."

Can any one hear these things?



​

 

[1usul1]

Isn't this spamming?

 

[Svt4Him]

Do you want to open this up to debate?

 

[Jesus Is Real]

&#8220;The Message&#8221; reflects a New Age influence, and agenda.

&#8220;The Message&#8221; has drawn completely away from the truth of God's word by distorting and spreading &#8220;Deception in the Church&#8221;.

The Modernistic Emerging Church Movement have been bringing Christian doctrines into line with modern secularistic knowledge and concepts of what the world sees the nature of Man and the Universe in which he lives. The Christian doctrine today is being reconstructed into new age thinking, practicality and comfort zone that has mutilated and garbled the authorised version.

Hey Mate,

Yeah it really is mate. I have a book by Warren Smith who did a well documented book called "Deceived on Purpose" where he Christianly exposes the falseness of Rick and Eugene who are in spiritual deception together.

Smith use to be a New Ager. When he read Eugenes and Ricks books, this repentant x-New Ager (Smith) exposed all of the same wording and language that he learned in the New Age Movement right in those 2 books:
The Message
and Purpose Driven Life

It's so refreshing when an x-(gay, New Ager, etc) exposes the Devil and his schemes. I was the unrepentant x-gay, and I can tell you all about that as well.

&#8220;The Message&#8221; has drawn completely away from the truth of God's word by distorting and spreading &#8220;Deception in the Church&#8221;.

The Modernistic Emerging Church Movement have been bringing Christian doctrines into line with modern secularistic knowledge and concepts of what the world sees the nature of Man and the Universe in which he lives. The Christian doctrine today is being reconstructed into new age thinking, practicality and comfort zone that has mutilated and garbled the authorised version.

[/FONT]

Dr. Francis Schaeffer was also trying to tell the church this in the mid 80's, like my own last Pastor (Milton Green) but when flesh is loved to strife, pride, greed and debate is their legs they don't listen. All they know how to do is practice sin.

"Dr. Francis Schaeffer in his books (see Bibliography) tried to tell the evangelical community how humanism was influencing the Christian worldview in the early 1970&#8217;s, but few really listened or understood. Then in the mid 1980s in The Church Before the Watching World and The Great Evangelical Disaster he points out the failure of the Church to counter the encroaching modern theology (Neo-orthodoxy) in the Seminaries and main line denominations. It is no surprise that humanism continues to make gains in the Church! Unfortunately, there seems to be no one with the stature of Francis Schaeffer to stand up now and warn the Church of the heresies of modern theology." http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/006/smith/new_theology.htm

 

[SpiritPsalmist]

I find it interesting when all the "ex's" start exposing things in the church as evil when the evil initially took it from the church but in their distorting of it the "ex's" think they thought of it first.

Our adversary has not thought of one teeny tiny thing all on his own. he's stolen everything he uses from the church but he distorts it. Therefore, when some come along and try and take it back ya always got those who are screaming "evil". Oy, but the devil gets off on that too.....as long as he can keep people in bondage to something he's happy. Don't touch, don't eat....what was that Paul said about such?

 

[Alpine]

Do you have any thoughts or do you just copy and paste all your arguments?

 

[Elijah2]

I find it interesting when all the "ex's" start exposing things in the church as evil when the evil initially took it from the church but in their distorting of it the "ex's" think they thought of it first.

Our adversary has not thought of one teeny tiny thing all on his own. he's stolen everything he uses from the church but he distorts it. Therefore, when some come along and try and take it back ya always got those who are screaming "evil". Oy, but the devil gets off on that too.....as long as he can keep people in bondage to something he's happy. Don't touch, don't eat....what was that Paul said about such?

My dear sister if that is all you can pick out of the thread, then you have missed the complete picture of truth that you will know the truth that will set you free (John 8:32).

The main point of The Message is to cause division, double-mindedness, and strife, nothing more and nothing less. And it has caused just this.

Whatever JIR is trying to expose or bring to the attention of the Body of Christ is Holy Spirit leading.

Now, when I read The Message for the first time, all I saw was NEW AGE and the OCCULT.

I then became deeply grieved pastors began to teach from the pulpit from “The Message”. No doubt many needs to read what a real Bible translation has to say about “tying millstones around the necks” of His Sheep, and the warnings that are written.

It’s amazing how you hear some Christians say that they are bored with the same “tired old verses”, which always indicates that their “comfort zone” is being affected. Heavens above, God’s Word, tired and boring?

It's the deceptive, selfish human heart in our material, entertainment age that demands entertainment at the cost of real human souls, and if you speak out you are being accused of “fear-mongering”.

Watering down His Inspired Word to appeal to people who have the capacity for intelligence, but are too lazy to apply their intelligence to study and comprehend the TRUTH of His Word.

If His Sheep are having a hard time understanding His Word, His Disciples and pastors, then the time has come for those Sheep to ask themselves whether they are a wayside, stony, thorny, 30-fold, 60-fold or a 100-fold Christian. We ARE NOT all one, as the new age thinkers want us to be, such as one church, one religion.

Galatians 1:8

Did Eugene read this verse: “But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed.” (Gal. 1:8), and would he be gnashing his teeth on judgment day as our Lord Jesus Christ pronounced: “I never knew you. Depart from me you worker of iniquity.”

I am concerned for those teachers who follow in the footsteps of Eugene Peterson, who had added and subtracted from His Inspired Word.

“The Message” is filled to the brim and overflowing with New Age references, a politically correct agenda that is obscuring the True Message of salvation. We all know that if a Christian isn’t familiar with New Age terminology, as many Christians are not, then they are ripe for the picking.

Our Lord Jesus Christ is referred to as ‘the Master”, which is a new age expression. New Agers believe that many “enlightened masters” have come to planet earth, such as Buddha, Krishna, Mohamed and Jesus being a few. Christians know that our Lord Jesus Christ isn't merely an enlightened master, He is Lord, King, and Saviour and the only way to salvation. Even some Christians say that people who are not saved cannot say that our Lord Jesus Christ is Lord, and neither does “The Message” say it. So, what does that tell you?

Here is some comparisons of the NKJV version and “The Message”.

Romans 10:9-10 (NKJV): “that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”

Romans 10:9-10 (MSG): “Say the welcoming word to God--"Jesus is my Master"--embracing, body and soul, God's work of doing in us what he did in raising Jesus from the dead. That's it. You're not "doing" anything; you're simply calling out to God, trusting him to do it for you. That's salvation. With your whole being you embrace God setting things right, and then you say it, right out loud: "God has set everything right between him and me!”

Is the NKJV too complicated for anyone who comprehends English to understand it? But, we see “The Message” add many more words that complicates and obscures the REAL MESSAGE, NOT simplifying, as we are suppose to be led to believe is the purpose of “The Message”.

Why does Mr. Peterson feel it necessary to change the “Jesus is Lord” to “Jesus is my Master”? It doesn't clarify anything, and all that Eugene has done is to mistranslate; add and insert his own personal opinions (that he hasn’t marked as thus); and subtract and twist Scripture to his own desires and likings.

The Bible says that “Sexual immorality, adultery and homosexuality” are sins, but “The Message” removes these references in favour for Eugene’s comfort zone phrase of “sex without commitment and intimacy”, or “sex without love”. In other words, a non-discerning Christian would accept this “garbage” as truth and will be led to believe that sex is OK as long as they feel love, commitment and intimacy; whatever that means to them.

His Word is preparing the church for the “great apostasy” when so-called Christians will abandon real salvation for the one world religion, which is already an example in this watered-down version already.

Be blessed in Jesus' Name.

 

[Elijah2]

Do you have any thoughts or do you just copy and paste all your arguments?

Hi A, who are you talking to?

I'm not arguing, I'm just posting my thoughts on a very delicate subject.

I gather you are talking to JIR, is that correct?

Be blessed in Jesus' Name.

 

[SpiritPsalmist]

The main point of The Message is to cause division, double-mindedness, and strife, nothing more and nothing less. And it has caused just this.

Are you claiming to know the heart of the man? You know without certainty that his point in putting it together was to cause division, double-mindedness, and strife? If this is the case please explain how you know another man's heart when God claims that only HE know the heart of a man.

I don't have an issue with attacking a teaching....but judging a man's heart is another thing. If one does not like something that is fine, they should tell what they know (giving proof, not copy and pasted sermons from someone else) and then move on. Continuing to bang people over the head and insinuate they are spiritually deaf and blind just 'cause they don't believe what is being told them, is neither effective or lasting. It's all coming across like those street preachers who wear signs with more wording on it than anyone can read in passing, and they are yelling and screaming and waving a huge Bible in the air telling everyone they meet that they are going to hell.

I met a stranger on a bus several years ago. He was reading his Bible. I tried to strike up a conversation with him but he told me I was going to hell because I was wearing slacks Good thing he was wrong on that, since, his pronouncement surely did not make me want to come running to the God he was professing. That is unfortunately, how some of these posts are coming across to me. If we don't believe the way that is wanted then we are not hearing right. How about asking the Holy Spirit to open up what you perceive as blind eyes and deaf ears. I'm sure He can do the job better.