Pensees: Still Talking About the Zichterman Conversion: How and Why I Intend to do it.

Still Talking About the Zichterman Conversion: How and Why I Intend to do it.

The beauty of the blog is that you don’t have to read it. People who do read it, read it voluntarily and therefore their interest or return prove the general interest, popularity, or concern of any number of people. It is also valuable because I can write about what I think is important to a particular niche of society and extend my opinions and influence to whoever may be interested. The results are in God’s hands. The blog is not a bully pulpit.

I have gone out of the way to show that I think Zichterman must be a nice person. I have acknowledged where he is on target. Many of his criticisms hit the mark, I think. But where he errs is far more serious and I have not pulled any punches. I think that the Zichterman story is interesting because it is revealing a profound lack of understanding about what really matters within the ranks of the so-called “young fundamentalists.”

Some have taken exception to the fact that I have called Zichterman a “false teacher.” He is wrong, they say, but I cannot treat him as if he is a false teacher.

I will grant that there is a difference between teaching falsely and being a false teacher. Human beings make mistakes. We sometimes have and teach wrong emphases. But to set one’s whole ministry on obvious error and to proclaim one’s self as a teacher of that error is to move from teaching falsely to being a false teacher. In that one lecture Dr. Zichterman endorsed Bill Hybels and Rick Warren in unqualified admiration and on his website he proudly identified himself as part of the Emergent Conversation. In his lecture he insinuated many of the driving mantras of the Emerging Church Movement, and he is explicitly clear that he hopes other people will have their own “Damascus Road experience.” That is teaching falsely. In his website/email he has declared this to be the “new direction” for his ministry. That is “false teaching.”

Here is my strategy.

1. I will write popularly. That’s my style anyway, but I want the many people who are not seminarians and pastors and had or have a great appreciation for Joe Zichterman to be able to think through this muddle with sharp clarity. I do not agree with the strategy of some leaders that the best thing to do is just to blow it off and pretend that he is a disgruntled nobody. They made him into somebody. They cannot say he is nobody now. The average guy in the pew thinks that is obvious.

2. I will write as if I am teaching the most theologically illiterate person in my church who wonders why a guy who wrote “A Passion for Thee” is someone that needs to be publicly rebuked as a false teacher. Therefore, some of my readers will find the theology basic and obvious. Sadly, however, I think this obvious theology is not so obvious even to some leaders.

3. I will name names. The truth war can never be fought without naming names. It is as simple as that and history shows that to be true. It is the technique of false teachers to insinuate. They do not name names because they do not have the courage to do it. We cannot fight them with their technique. I pray to God I will be fair, but I will be pointed. Philips Brookes famously said that preaching is “truth through personality.” I would add that false teaching is error through personality, especially when it is foisted upon you. Zichterman doesn’t just have a blog that people may go to at will. He penetrated thousands of inboxes.

4. I will try to write more short articles, bite-size analyses, rather than long “sermons” or “rants” as my detractors love to call them. These related articles will be classified under both “Zichterman’s New Direction” and “Emerging Church.”

There are several goals which I hope to attain by the writing of these articles.

1. First of all, since I have the fundamentalists of Zichterman’s former circle in mind, I want to show what his conversion is not. The goal here is to help people to understand the theological leap that Zichterman is making in relational terms. In other words, to whom does Zichterman relate?

2. Secondly, I want to highlight the core fundamental truth that is undermined by Zichterman’s beloved Church Growth Movement and the Emergent Conversation. The goal here is to boil the controversy down to a few non-negotiable Biblical truths which Zichterman is apparently willing to negotiate.

3. Thirdly, I want to prove that the Emergent Conversation, the Emerging Church, and/or the Emergent Church is, in fact, a new liberalism.

4. Fourthly, I will show that the test of whether young fundamentalists are really the “historical fundamentalists” that they love to claim to be is if they have the will and the courage to both discern the error and repudiate the proponents of what really is a historical problem. You cannot claim to be a historical fundamentalist if you are not willing to fight the historical enemy.

5. Fifthly (and I may break order here), I intend to write about the “Tyranny of Niceness” and prove that the very decided tone of “niceness” and the condescending reproaches of nice young fundamentalists on those of us who are willing to call a spade a spade is also a repetition of history and the “mood of niceness” has always resulted in the loss of truth.

6. Sixthly, (I may break order here as well) I hope to show by historical example how person to person conflict is the way the truth war is fought and that it is a wise Christian who learns from the past public personality conflicts of truth. To do this, I will call your attention to John Owen who entered a very public and harsh controversy with John Vincent Cane who, according to Owen, like all false teachers, knew when to strike the iron when it is hot. They know when there is an ear for their false proposals. Owen bemoaned the fact, however, that if people would only study the controversy between Celsius and Origen, imbibe Origen’s good refutation than he would not have to take on John Vincent Cane. Interestingly, I think that John Vincent Cane’s ideas in “Fiat Lux” (1661), though I have not read it, but only the refutation of it, propound ideas very similar to some strands of the Emergent Church. There are many similar controversies like this in the history of the church. There is nothing new under the sun.

7. Seventhly, I will secure a CD of Phil Johnson’s interview with John MacArthur on the Emerging Church for any person who has been brought into these tough questions by virtue of the fact that they know Zichterman and are sincerely looking for solid, biblical answers. I think it is that important. Just write me and explain yourself at pastor@wordcentered.org. I will see that you get that CD one way or another.

8. Finally, I will post an already written article that supports some of the criticism that Zichterman leveled against “high-control” groups (read “fundamentalism”). The title of that article is “Fundamentalism and the Legacy of Spiritual Abuse.”

These are my intentions, so help me God.