By Reese Currie, Compass Distributors

After having The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren recommended to me by two different people I know and respect, I warily picked up a copy. I say "warily" because I know, from long experience, that these courses typically contain loads of false doctrines that lead people astray. Unfortunately, The Purpose Driven Life is no different.

Rick Warren’s errors stem for the most part from two sources, unquestioned church tradition and excessive open-mindedness toward the church traditions of others. These are two things a disciple must get past to have the fullest understanding of the Scriptures. It is not to ignore the teaching of the church, but not to accept anything taught by men uncritically and to ensure that every belief is compared to Scripture.

My comments will refer to page numbers in the paperback edition.

This is the most serious problem any book purporting to teach the Bible can have—the promulgation of a false gospel message. As is extremely common, this book proclaims a repentance-free gospel. To quote Rick Warren (p. 58), "If you are not sure you have done this, all you need to do is receive and believe. The Bible promises, "To all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to be the children of God." Will you accept God’s offer? First, believe. … Second, receive."

How different from the gospel of the Bible, which is, "repent and believe." As Paul said, "…I did not shrink from declaring to you anything that was profitable, and teaching you publicly and from house to house, solemnly testifying to both Jews and Greeks of repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ" (Acts 20:20b-21, NASB).

Rick Warren shrinks from preaching repentance toward God, and that’s a shame. Warren also, in his Bible quotation above, cuts off the writer (John) in mid-sentence. John’s words continued, "who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God" (John 1:13, NASB).

What John is saying here is that, all those who have received Jesus and believed in His name were first born of God! How did they become born of God prior to believing? They repented. First, God led them to repentance. "Or do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and tolerance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?" (Romans 2:4, NASB). Then, when they repented, belief in Jesus Christ naturally followed as a gift from God.

It is amazing how many times the gospel is proclaimed in the New Testament without even the mention of belief, but only repentance, for instance, Matthew 4:17; Mark 6:12; Luke 5:32; 13:3,5; 15:7, 10; 24:47; Acts 2:38; 3:19; 11:18; 17:30; 26:20; 2 Corinthians 7:10; 2 Peter 2:9.

Why are we at points commanded to repent, but not to believe? The reason is belief follows naturally from repentance. 2 Timothy 2:25 says, "…with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth…" (NASB). Repentance leads to the knowledge of the truth, which naturally leads to faith.

What a shame that Rick Warren and others like him fail to preach a Biblical salvation message! It would have been better to leave it out than to proclaim a false message like this.

If you were looking for an easy way to know if someone is trying to dupe you, see if they can explain their teaching to you using only one or at most two Bible versions. If they do use more than one, check out why they used the other version. It was either "more accurate" to the Greek, in which case, the teacher has done you a favor, or it was "less accurate" and the teacher is trying to deceive you by using a bad translation that supports his or her erroneous views.

Sometimes even a good Bible version may have an inaccurate translation on a verse here and there, and you want to give a more accurate quotation. We have done this many times ourselves, for instance, if NKJV has a not-so-good translation we might quote KJV, as is the case with Matthew 7:12.

I have noted, though, that some false teachers, like Henry Blackaby, will sometimes opt for a less accurate translation that supports their teachings better than an accurate translation would. For instance, in his course Fresh Encounter, Blackaby used mainly the NKJV, except in cases where the NKJV’s accurate translations did not support his ecumenical views, in which case he would opt for less accurate translations from NIV.

Blackaby, however, is a minor offender in this regard when compared to Rick Warren, who quotes repeatedly from at least 15 Bible versions, all but three of which are either inaccurate paraphrases or dynamic equivalency versions.

The first example of this occurs in the introduction. There, Rick Warren takes advantage of an utterly horrible translation from Eugene Petersen’s paraphrase, The Message, to take a shot at "self-help" books. I was surprised to read that the Bible taught against self-help books, since these only began to exist in the 20^th century.

To quote Warren (p. 19), "You need more than self-help advice. The Bible says, "Self help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self." This is not a self-help book."

Where on earth does the Bible supposedly say that? In Matthew 16:25, which in a decent translation reads, "For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it" (NASB). I can’t pick out even one concept expressed by The Message in an accurate translation of this verse.

Warren does not use this devious technique of supporting his teaching with inaccurate Scripture once or twice. I counted the verses he quoted from each version in his footnote pages and found these results:

There is apparently also a quotation somewhere in the book from the Roman Catholic New American Bible but it didn’t appear in the footnotes. Of the above versions, I would personally consider only the King James Version and the New American Standard Bible to be translated with a high level of accuracy; the New International Version I would consider "borderline acceptable, but should be compared to a more accurate version". All other translations on the list I would not recommend at all.

The worst thing about the usage of so many inaccurate Bible paraphrases is that, when Rick Warren says "The Bible says," frankly, it probably doesn’t really say that. It probably only says it in some horribly translated paraphrase.

Why on earth would a person need to quote from so many different Bible versions to get their points across? Because no one Bible version supports everything he is trying to say. But it is astonishing that so many different Bible versions are required so that a cross-section of mistranslations support Warren’s views. Something is really wrong there.

In Appendix 3, Warren answers the question, "Why Use So Many Translations?" While his answer sounds quite high minded, I think one of the major reasons isn’t there; inaccurate teachings require inaccurate Scriptures.

Quoting Warren (p. 34), "One day you will stand before God, and he will do an audit of your life, a final exam, before you enter eternity. … From the Bible we can surmise that God will ask us two crucial questions. First, "What did you do with my son, Jesus Christ?" God won’t ask about your religious background or doctrinal views. The only thing that will matter is, did you accept what Jesus did for you and did you learn to love and trust him?"

This common false teaching, that doctrine does not matter to God, contradicts Matthew 15:9, Mark 7:7, 1 Timothy 1:3; 4:1,6; 6:1-3; 2 Timothy 4:3; Titus 1:9; 2:1,7, among other verses.

These warnings about our doctrine are not to be taken lightly and certainly not ignored.

Purity in doctrine is important to God. Titus 2:7 says, "in all things show yourself to be an example of good deeds, {with} purity in doctrine, dignified…" (NASB). Titus 2:1 says, "But as for you, speak the things which are fitting for sound doctrine" (NASB).

Knowing sound doctrine is essential to being useful for God. Titus 1:9 says, "…holding fast the faithful word which is in accordance with the teaching, so that he will be able both to exhort in sound doctrine and to refute those who contradict" (NASB).

Promulgating false doctrine is an extremely serious offense in God’s sight. 1 Timothy 6:3-5 says, "If anyone advocates a different doctrine and does not agree with sound words, those of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the doctrine conforming to godliness, he is conceited {and} understands nothing; but he has a morbid interest in controversial questions and disputes about words, out of which arise envy, strife, abusive language, evil suspicions, and constant friction between men of depraved mind and deprived of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain" (NASB).

Incidentally, saying "doctrine doesn’t matter" contradicts the words of Jesus Christ Himself, who warned the Pharisees, quoting the Old Testament, "BUT IN VAIN DO THEY WORSHIP ME, TEACHING AS DOCTRINES THE PRECEPTS OF MEN.'" (Matthew 15:7, NASB).

Timothy was instructed to prevent people from teaching strange doctrines. Paul wrote to him, "As I urged you upon my departure for Macedonia, remain on at Ephesus so that you may instruct certain men not to teach strange doctrines, nor to pay attention to myths and endless genealogies, which give rise to mere speculation rather than {furthering} the administration of God which is by faith. But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. For some men, straying from these things, have turned aside to fruitless discussion, wanting to be teachers of the Law, even though they do not understand either what they are saying or the matters about which they make confident assertions" (1 Timothy 1:3-7, NASB).

Like the confident assertion that God is only going to ask you two questions at the judgment, and that your doctrine and religious background will not be brought up.

And here is one that addresses the followers of those who teach such things: "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but {wanting} to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires" (1 Timothy 4:3, NASB).

Warren writes (p. 72), "Often we try to offer God partial obedience. We want to pick and choose the commands we obey. We make a list of the commands we like and obey those while ignoring the ones we think are unreasonable, difficult, expensive, or unpopular. I’ll attend church but I won’t tithe. I’ll read my Bible but won’t forgive the person who hurt me. Yet partial obedience is disobedience."

We just wrote an article telling the truth about tithing. In brief, tithing made up for the fact that the Levites could not inherit land under the Law. God instituted a tithe and gave it to the Levites to compensate them for receiving no land (Numbers 18:21, 24). Eleven other tribes gave 10%, giving the Levites 110%. The Levites also tithed themselves (Numbers 18:26), taking them back down to 99% (10% of 110% is 11%), giving the Levites relative "income parity" with the rest of the tribes of Israel.

None of these conditions apply at all to the church. Pastors can own land. The average Levite-to-non-Levite ratio would have been approximately 1-to-11; the average pastor-to-parishioner ratio in the United States is 1-to-347. Evangelicals point to church expenses and building funds as justification for the tithe, but none of these were paid out of the tithe in the Bible. Temple expenses were actually paid with tax money, such as the "double-drachma" tax in NT times, tribute money in Solomon’s time, and the taxes of the whole region when Nehemiah rebuilt the temple.

It is very common for evangelicals to claim the tithe applies to Christians, but there is no honest comparison of the two situations that can yield this idea. This is not to say that Christians should not give to meet the church’s needs; it is to say that the tithe is an outdated artifact of a previous covenant.

As for not forgiving people who do not repent, this is the direct command of Christ and should be obeyed. Luke 17:3 says, "Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him" (NASB). We are not instructed to forgive those who do not repent. If a person asks our forgiveness "seventy times seven" times a day, we are to forgive them every time! But if they don’t ask forgiveness at all, Christ’s teaching is not that we forgive them. His teaching is, forgive them if they repent.

Warren teaches not to rebuke people and to forgive them if they don’t repent. On page 143, he writes, "Forgiveness must be immediate, whether or not a person asks for it." Well, it would seem that rebuke should be immediate, from Jesus’ teaching, so that one learns that they have sinned, and if they repent, then there should be immediate forgiveness, but without repentance, Jesus does not teach forgiveness.

Warren’s own teaching on this is somewhat inconsistent; on page 146, he says, "Most people have no one in their lives who loves them enough to tell them the truth (even when it’s painful), so they continue in self-destructive ways."

Automatically forgiving people without rebuking them and without their repentance encourages people to "continue in self-destructive ways." Such practices even form codependency, which is another pronounced and destructive feature of many of today’s evangelical churches.

On page 89, Warren says, "The Bible tells us to ‘pray all the time.’ How is it possible to do this? One way is to use ‘breath prayers’ throughout the day, as many Christians have done for centuries. You choose a brief sentence or a simple phrase to be repeated to Jesus in one breath: ‘You are with me.’ ‘I receive your grace.’ ‘I’m depending on you.’ ‘I want to know you.’ ‘I belong to you.’ ‘Help me trust you.’ You can also use a short phrase of Scripture: ‘For me to live is Christ.’ ‘You will never leave me.’ ‘You are my God.’ Pray it as often as possible so it is rooted deep in your heart."

To begin with, the Bible doesn’t tell us to pray all the time. That’s just the typically horrible translation in the garbage paraphrase, The Message. Paul says, "Rejoice always; pray without ceasing; in everything give thanks, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus" (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18, NASB). "Pray without ceasing" doesn’t mean to "pray all the time," it means "don’t stop praying", or "continue to pray."

To quote The Believer’s Study Bible note for 1 Thessalonians 5:17: "This frequently misunderstood verse does not mean that one is to be praying every minute, nor does it necessarily call for an individual’s maintaining always an attitude of prayer (cf. Luke 11:1). The verse does insist upon an uninterrupted practice of prayer regarding all matters. As one prays in this manner, the ability to fulfill the command of v. 18 is realized."

So, Warren is using a mistranslation to bolster a false teaching. What he is teaching is "vain repetition" in prayer. Jesus preaches against this in Matthew 6:7, "And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words" (NASB).

Why teach something that is contrary to Jesus’ teaching? In this case there are two possible reasons. One would be to promote Roman Catholic practices, which is a current evangelical hobbyhorse. Which "Christians" have been using "breath prayers" for centuries? Roman Catholics have, along with the rosary, another repetitive prayer practice. Rick Warren actually unmasks his promotion of Catholic practices two paragraphs down, when he writes, "Benedictine monks use the hourly chimes of a clock to remind them to pause and pray ‘the hour prayer.’ If you have a watch or cell phone with an alarm, you could do the same" (pg. 89).

The other possible reason is, one of Rick Warren’s ministry partners is a New-Ager named Ken Blanchard who promotes the adoption of several practices of Buddhism including using a mantra. Rick Warren is in essence teaching the use of a mantra.

What’s worse, Warren later goes on to redefine Matthew 6:7, to promote a view that Jesus’ teaching on "vain repetition" does not relate to prayer! Warren does this on page 103, where he writes, "If worship is mindless, it is meaningless. You must engage your mind. Jesus called thoughtless worship ‘vain repetitions.’"

Christ said, "And WHEN YOU ARE PRAYING, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do." Jesus is speaking of repetitious prayer, of the very nature that Rick Warren advocates 14 pages earlier, and Warren attempts to redefine Jesus’ teaching in a way that does not conflict with his own.

He writes, "Servants think about their work, not what others are doing. They don’t compare, criticize, or compete with other servants or ministries…There’s no place for jealousy between servants" (pg. 268).

Jesus was the ultimate servant, but He openly criticized the "ministries" of the Pharisees. For instance, He said, "But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut off the kingdom of heaven from people; for you do not enter in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in" (Matthew 23:13, NASB).

Paul was unquestionably a servant, but Paul consistently criticized all self-professing "Christian" servants who taught or did things contrary to the Christian faith. There are many examples of this. Sometimes he named specific people, for instance, as he named Hymenaeus and Alexander in 1 Timothy 1:20; sometimes he spoke generally against false religious teachers, as he did in Titus 1:10-16. Sometimes he criticized groups and specific individuals at the same time, as he criticized "men from James" as well as Peter and Barnabas for their actions in Galatians 2:10-14.

Paul did not do this for the motive of competition or jealousy, as Warren implies; he did it so that people would not be hurt by the doctrines of false teachers. It is also acceptable to criticize people’s reasons for causing problems; John criticized Diotrephes with these words, "I wrote something to the church; but Diotrephes, who loves to be first among them, does not accept what we say" (3 John 9, NASB).

I have criticized many, many false doctrines and the teachers of those doctrines over the years, and the motives of competition or jealousy have never entered my mind, either, only the concern that people are not hurt by following those things that people teach in error.

Since Rick Warren claimed that competition and jealousy were the reasons for criticism, I tried to understand why he would think that. Then I realized that Warren has sold over 20 million copies of "The Purpose Driven Life" at $17.50 Canadian. If Warren’s royalty is even 1%, that means a profit of $3,500,000 Canadian on this book alone, not counting "The Purpose Driven Church" or his various other books. Perhaps he thinks that others criticize him because he’s been so financially successful with his books. If so, he is in danger of being one of those "who suppose that godliness is a means of gain" (1 Timothy 6:5b, NASB).

Warren’s financial motives play a role in his teaching against criticism. Avoiding any criticism of false doctrine, for instance, keeps those who adhere to false doctrine buying his books. This should not exempt him from criticism. As Titus 1:10,11 says, "For there are many rebellious men, empty talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision, who must be silenced because they are upsetting whole families, teaching things they should not {teach} for the sake of sordid gain" (NASB).

Both Rick Warren and Henry Blackaby have teachings in their books forbidding criticism. Since Rick Warren makes a guess at the motives of his critics (jealousy and competition), I will make a guess at his motives and Blackaby’s. They don’t want you to listen to criticism so you will continue to buy their books, and accept their teachings as if they were as unadulterated as Scripture.

The apostles themselves heartily accepted and encouraged a critical examination of their teachings. Acts 17:11 says, "Now these were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily {to see} whether these things were so" (NASB).

They understood that not everyone who criticizes you is your enemy. Apollos knew the same thing. Acts 18:25,26 says, "This man [Apollos] had been instructed in the way of the Lord; and being fervent in spirit, he was speaking and teaching accurately the things concerning Jesus, being acquainted only with the baptism of John; and he began to speak out boldly in the synagogue. But when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately" (NASB).

Was he prideful or offended, or did he say Priscilla and Aquila should not be criticizing his teachings? No. The passage even says that Apollos was teaching accurately in the first place, but they stepped in to help his teachings be more accurate. And Apollos, like any true servant, appreciated constructive criticism that helped him preach a more accurate message.

On page 283, Warren writes, "In the Great Commission, Jesus said, "Go to all the people of all nations and make them my disciples. Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teach them to do everything I have told you." This commission was given to every follower of Jesus, not to pastors and missionaries alone. This is your commission from Jesus, and it is not optional. These words of Jesus are not the Great Suggestion. If you are part of God’s family, your mission is mandatory. To ignore it would be disobedience."

What is ignored here is that, before delivering this commission, Jesus made the apostles separate themselves from the other disciples and come to Him on a distant mountain. Matthew 28:16 says, "But the eleven disciples proceeded to Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had designated" (NASB).

Frankly, Jesus did not give this mission to pastors, whose positions did not yet exist in the Christian church, nor to missionaries which didn’t exist either. He gave this mission to apostles and apostles only. The apostles didn’t perform this mission all alone. Jesus built the church as the instrument through which they carried out the great commission. The great commission is carried out by the whole church as it has been equipped by Christ, not individually by every single believer in it.

To accept Warren’s teaching that the great commission applies to every single believer, you must accept all of the following rather ludicrous assertions:

1. Every Christian is equipped to be an evangelist.
2. Every Christian must personally go to all nations.
3. Every Christian must baptize.
4. Every Christian is equipped to be a teacher.

Paul wrote of the composition of the church, "And He gave some {as} apostles, and some {as} prophets, and some {as} evangelists, and some {as} pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ" (Ephesians 4:11-13, NASB).

As you can see from the above passage, it takes a number of different types of people, doing different jobs, to carry out the Great Commission. It is a task for the whole church, not for the individual believer, and certainly, not everyone in the church is personally called or equipped to be an evangelist, as Warren suggests.

If your church teaches that the Great Commission applies equally to all individual believers, ask yourself (or your pastor) if they would allow any member in the church to baptize. If not, then there is something wrong with their application of these verses to all believers. I was once a member of a Canadian Southern Baptist church in which the pastor, while preaching that these verses applied to all believers, would not even permit missionaries to baptize. Sunday after Sunday, he would roll out a teaching similar to Rick Warren’s that these verses applied to all of us directly, while holding in his own heart the belief that only ordained pastors could actually fulfill the passage.

Why is this inconsistent teaching necessary among evangelicals? The fact is, churches derive their authority for mission from the apostles, and since evangelical churches do not claim any historical link to the apostles, these verses are problematic for them. In the absence of a historical connection to the apostles, they put themselves in the place of the apostles as if Christ called them directly to that mountaintop. Because they also believe in the priesthood of all believers, they must also believe that all other evangelicals must also be in the place of the apostles, and so the Great Commission falls directly on all evangelicals as individuals. But this teaching makes no sense because it is impossible for any individual person to "fulfill" the Great Commission. It is perfectly reasonable, however, for the apostles to fulfill the Great Commission through the church.

There are all sorts of ways that churches try to justify their mission by linking themselves (sometimes in very dubious ways) to the apostles. The evangelical approach of ignoring the difference between the apostles and themselves, and pretending to take the place of the apostles, has to be the most easily disputed view there is.

The truth is, any church that is built on the teaching of the apostles, is in fact built on the apostles. No matter what dubious historical connection to the apostles any church claims, all churches that do not adhere to apostolic teaching are not apostolic in any sense. So, works salvation churches cannot be apostolic, churches that deny eternal security cannot be apostolic, churches that believe in baptismal regeneration cannot be apostolic, churches that have sacraments beyond baptism and the Lord’s Supper cannot be apostolic, etc. Churches that deviate from Biblical doctrine are not apostolic and cannot claim their authority from the apostles. The only churches that can claim authority from the apostles can do so because they teach the same things as the apostles, the things the apostles were given by inspiration from God.

I will leave it to your judgment to conclude whether or not you should bother with The Purpose Driven Life. Personally, I believe that the aforementioned flaws are extremely serious, and make any other teachings in the book extremely suspect.

What I most want to impress upon you is, no matter who is teaching you, and no matter how much they do not like their work to be criticized, compare what you are being taught with Scripture. This is not popular at all in churches, but it is necessary to your spiritual well being. I would say that no one should embark on a book like this without first being well grounded in Scripture. Unfortunately error-laden books like this are becoming substitutes for Scripture in many churches, and people deprive themselves of the fullest knowledge of God by wasting time on courses when they could be reading the Bible.

Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

The Purpose Driven Life is Copyright © 2002 by Rick Warren