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| Picture by Melissa Tregilgas |
Part of the Emergent movement is developing a “new age” worldview
through Doug Pagitt, founder of Solomon’s Porch, Riley O’Brien Powell, theologian-in-residence of
Solomon’s Porch and Doug King president of Presence.tv.
The troubling religious ideas intertwined with this movement include
panentheism, a preterism that
denies bodily resurrection and the second coming of Christ, and the idea that true
spirituality is evolving beyond any form of any particular faith. I will look
at each one of these ideas.
I connect Doug King to Pagitt and Powell because of
their writing presence on King’s Presence site. Also their theological ideas
feed into the ideology that King is presenting. The information I am providing
comes from the Presence site, Powell’s blog, Living the Question, and Pagitt’s latest
book, Flipped: The Provocative Truth that
Changes Everything We Know About God.
Panentheism: Both in
his book and in an article on Presence, Pagitt states that God is not a
separate subject and that he is existence. In his web article, “Inside-Out God,” Pagitt writes:
“God is not a separate
subject that we talk about or relate to through belief, behavior, faith, or
practice. Much better than that, God is the very existence of all things. We
are called to live congruently within the existence that holds all things
together. This notion resonates with beauty, intrigue, majesty, and mystery.”
The quote is also in his
book. Pagitt also refers to this same idea as everything being in God. Putting the
two ideas together, being in God and God not being other but instead being
existence is a description of panentheism. Unlike pantheism, panentheism does
not hold that all of God is creation, but that a part of God is creation. God
is to creation as the head is to the body. This idea too often leads to other
unbiblical ideas about what Christian faith involves. This is so with Pagitt’s
ideas. He rejects the idea of sacrifice in Christianity and teaches that all
people since they are in God are already connected to God.
Pagitt rejects any kind of
religion that requires what he calls an adapter, that is, something (such as an
idol or good works) or somebody to connect another to God. Jesus rather than being the mediator between
God and humanity becomes an example of humanity in God. While it is important
to understand that there is no goodness of our own and certainly no idol that
can connect us to God, we are all in need of an adapter, that is, Jesus Christ
the redeemer.
Unable to see the symbol of
redemption found in the story of Abraham taking his son to the mountain to
sacrifice him to God, Pagitt believes that the first command came from the Canaanite
gods whom he calls Elohim. Yahweh came to the rescue, calling off the
sacrifice.
Panentheism also leads to
pluralism, the idea that all faiths are valid. Pagitt writes:
“With the life of faith, one
often feels that committing to one tradition requires closing our eyes to all
the stories and ways of others.
That is another reason why
the understanding of our Life in God is so powerful. We find crucial
connections where nothing is left out and no one is left behind. It is a faith
that beckons us to the big, open story of God.” (p146) (Pagitt always
capitalizes “Life in God.”)
Full Preterism: Full preterism has never been endorsed by the Church,
neither in its confessions or councils. It is not only the idea that Jesus came
in judgement in 70AD, doing away with the Jewish Temple, but also that event
includes the second coming of Christ and the resurrection. According to the
teaching of full preterism there is no bodily resurrection.
Powell, both in articles on
Presence, “The
Coming of God- War and Peace,” and her own blog, “What is a “Coming of God?”, promotes full Preterism. Among those who she notes hold
this view is R.C. Sproul, but Sproul does not hold to full preterism. He does
not reject the bodily resurrection nor the coming of Jesus Christ at the end of
time. Powell’s idea of the Kingdom of God, does not fall far from the utopias envisioned
by new age leaders—it is human centered. She writes:
“The empowerment in this
message is that we can be a part of God’s story of renewal and rebirth in the
world. God has chosen to work through us in the world, as co-creators of a
Great Kingdom.”
She adds:
“Jesus’ coming, therefore, is
not something that is going to happen “to us” in the future. Rather,
Jesus’ life, light, love and presence – revealing God as our All-in-all Source
– is coming into the world – through us, in us, and as us.”
In our contemporary world,
recently filled with so much tribulation, full preterism offers little hope.
Evolving spirituality: King steps beyond Powell and Pagitt suggesting that the
world’s faiths are evolving beyond themselves. In his article, “The
Spiral Axis of Interspirituality: Evolving Beyond Religion,” King writes, “Simply
put, the evidence has become overwhelming: Religion is evolving, and is
now poised for an evolutionary leap – transcending religion itself. Tracing
what he believes is the evolution of religion in general and Christianity in
particular King believes humanity will move into a formless spirituality. He
asks a question:
“Presence supports both
interfaith and interspiritual discussions and fellowships as a beautiful
movement from the violence, prejudice and even hatred that is the shadow of our
shared religious past. Even so, we ask: “What would identity look like in a
truly Integral setting, where all humans are simply spiritual offspring of
that which we understand as God?””
So called Christian organizations
cannot move away from the central teachings of Christianity, the Scripture, the
apostolic witness, the confessions of the church and continue on as Christian. None
of this is new, it is as ancient as the serpent’s words to Adam and Eve in the Garden
of Eden.
Leaving behind the biblical
understanding of God, the sacrifice of Jesus, the resurrection of the body and
the second coming of Christ empties any institution of the life giving power of
God’s work, promises and hope. We desperately need the righteousness of Christ,
the redeeming and transforming power of the resurrection, the final and
absolute revelation of God’s living Word and written word. May God preserve his
people in the midst of such blatant heresy.
