[CS-FSLUG] OT: Due Diligence

[Jon Glass]

On Tue, Feb 8, 2011 at 3:21 AM, Ed Hurst <ehurst at soulkiln.org> wrote:
>
> http://blog.beliefnet.com/cityofbrass/2009/07/transcript---pastor-rick-warre.html
>
> Rick Warren's speech at 2009 Islamic Society of North America conference;
> make of it what you will.

I know he's talking to non-Christians, but his "five big problems"--
conflict, corruption, poverty, disease and illiteracy--seem to be
lacking something. I know he's trying to avoid "conflict" here, but
none of these are the real problem. Every last one of them is a
symptom of the real problem... Trying to address these, together with
muslims, will never solve a single one of them.

I mean, what he's saying is great if you are after political power and
political solutions--now he says "faith-based", but since he is
calling for Christians and muslims, and other faiths to come together,
how can they work together unless they are politically agreed on some
things (politics means more than federal or state government--you
know, "church politics").

If we are Christians, I presume (and maybe wrongly so), that we agree
that all these problems represent the heart problem of sin. Every one
of these stems from the central sin problem in the
individual--self-centeredness. Some of these big five seem less
directly related, but they all come back to Adam's and our sins, but
playing out on a global level. Rick's motives may, for all I care, be
as pure as the wind-driven snow, but what he is doing will bear
consequences. And that fruit is already visible across the US, and
having its influence in churches in other countries as well... In some
ways, I think the false charges would be better, were they true,
because if so, what he were doing would be obvious. But the truth is
far more insidious, and far more likely to actually have major
consequences. That's my take on it.

-- 
 -Jon Glass
Krakow, Poland
<jonglass at usa.net>

"I don't believe in philosophies. I believe in fundamentals." --Jack Nicklaus