NEW AGE BIBLE ERRORS

2008-07-02T06:21:00.001-07:00

2008-04-30T08:45:00.000-07:00

The Bible that is all the rage today is The Living Bible. It is available in many different forms and editions, e.g., Reach Out, The Greatest is Love, The Way, Living Letters, etc. But they are all the same Bible. The Living Bible is Kenneth Taylor's paraphrase of Scripture, published by Tyndale House, distributed widely by the World Home Bible League, and on sale everywhere. It is at once the worst and the most popular of all the modern versions of the Bible.

The Living Bible is, inherently, an attack upon, indeed it makes a mockery of, the doctrine of Scripture's infallible, verbal inspiration by the Holy Spirit. It purports to be the Bible, in fact, arrogantly, it claims to be a LIVING Bible in distinction from the other versions which presumably are then DEAD ones, and it is being received and used as the Bible. However, it is a paraphrase, i.e., it gives what the author conceives to be the sense of a passage, and it gives the sense of the passage in the author's words quite in disregard of the words which the Spirit inspired. It is not faithful to God's Word; it replaces God's Word with the words of man. If such a "Bible" is acceptable, infallible, verbal inspiration is a farce.

The Living Bible is filled with false doctrine. Genesis 6:2 solemnly tells us that "beings from the spirit world looked upon the beautiful earth women and took any they desired to be their wives," and verse 4 says that "evil beings from the spirit world were sexually involved with human women," introducing the nonsense of Greek mythology into Scripture a teaching as foolish as it is erroneous. We will bypass other, similar errors, for the main evil of The Living Bible is that it is an all-out attack on the Christian faith - it is the Bible of Arminianism, the gospel of man's free will.

Acts 13:48 reads: "and as many as wanted eternal life, believed."

Romans 8:28 reads: "And we know that all that happens to us is working for our good if we love God and are fitting into His plans" - a rendering which, if correct, would have been enough to have routed the entire Synod of Dordt.

Romans 9 cannot be recognized: "This proves that God was doing what He had decided from the beginning; it was not because of what the children did but because of what God wanted and chose" (vs. 11); "I chose to bless Jacob, but not Esau" (vs. 13); "God's blessings are not given just because someone decides to have them . . ." (vs. 16); "God told him (Pharaoh) He had given him the kingdom of Egypt for the very purpose of displaying the awesome power of God against him" (vs. 17); "fit only for destruction" (vs. 22); etc.

One only needs to compare these verses with the correct translation in the King James Version to see that The Living Bible has gone through the Scriptures replacing the testimony of the sovereignty of grace with the message of the dependency of salvation upon the will of man. This is every bit as serious as the denial of the Deity of Christ.

In addition, The Living Bible represents and promotes the religious movement that downgrades doctrine, preaching, and the instituted Church of Christ and substitutes feeling, experience, and individualism. As such, it serves as a powerful instrument of the ecumenical movement. Most significant is the introduction - by a Roman Catholic priest - to The Way, the Roman Catholic edition of The Living Bible. Concerning The Living Bible, which he heartily recommends, the priest states: "This present volume departs radically from (the) history of Scriptural translations . . . Perhaps more than other translations, this translation cannot be used as a basis for Doctrinal or traditional disputes. More than other English versions of the Bible, this one freely departs from a literal translation from the original languages . . . Most readers of the Bible who choose this translation will not be interested in such technical, theological considerations. They will be looking for spirit and life from the Word of God. We rejoice in our chance to encourage and help those who approach the Scriptures for this reason. We caution those who wish to engage in theological disputes not to use this volume."

A genuine Protestant, much less a Reformed man, needs to hear no more.

To this "Bible," we are totally and unalterably opposed. If it should prevail among us, the biblical faith would be destroyed. It may not be the Bible that we use at home, in school, in our personal study, or in any aspect of the life of the Church. Our young people must be aware that it is another arm of the power of the lie that we fight as Reformed saints. It is a wicked effort to destroy God's Word, as wicked as Jehoiakim's burning of the Scriptures that he disliked, or Thomas Jefferson's whittling down the Bible to the sermon on the mount. That Reformed people and Reformed institutions can smile on it only shows how little knowledge of and love for the true biblical faith there is today.

By David J. Engelsma

2006-11-06T04:44:00.000-08:00

What kind of message is The Message?

The Message DELETES the reference to God's holy name, ADDS requests not voiced by Jesus, and changes the meaning of other verses. Follow the link and learn more about the phrase, "As above, so below."

Matthew 6:9-13
"Our Father in heaven,Hallowed be Your name.Your kingdom come.Your will be doneOn earth as it is in heaven.Give us this day our daily bread.And forgive us our debts,As we forgive our debtors.And do not lead us into temptation,But deliver us from the evil one.For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

The Message:
"Our Father in heaven,
Reveal who you are.
Set the world right;
Do what's best -
As above, so below.
Keep us alive with three square meals.
Keep us forgiven with you
and forgiving others.
Keep us safe
from ourselves and the Devil.
You're in charge!

The Message distorts the relationship between God the Father and Jesus the Son:

John 10:30
"I and the Father are one."

The Message:
"I and the Father are one heart and mind."

John 14:28
"...The Father is greater than I."

The Message:
"The Father is the goal and purpose of my life."

Riding a spreading tide of publicity and enthusiasm, Eugene Peterson's The Message is sweeping into Christian bookstores, homes and churches from coast to coast. In the first four months after its mid-July 1993 lease, 100,000 copies of this "New Testament in contemporary English" were printed by NavPress. Seventy thousand books were sold. Thousands were either donated or distributed at reduced prices to youth leaders, Young Life staff, and pastors who could share Peterson's message with their followers. Apparently, most readers were delighted. "The Message is so good it leaves me breathless," writes popular author Madeleine L'Engle in her endorsement.

Considering this ground-swell of acceptance, we do well to ponder the question: What is Peterson's Message?

"The Message is the boldest and most provocative rendering of the New Testament I've ever read," writes Dr. Warren W. Wiersbe, general director of "Back to the Bible" broadcast and former pastor of Moody Bible Church.

"The Message is certainly destined to become a devotional classic - not to mention a powerful pastoral tool," adds pastor Jack W. Hayford.

What does Eugene Peterson himself say? In his introduction to The Message, he tells us that "This version of the New Testament in a contemporary idiom keeps the language of the Message and fresh and understandable in the same language in which we do our shopping, talk with our friends, worry about world affairs, and teach our children their table manners...."

This sounds like a good idea, but what if essential Biblical concepts are not part of our everyday conversation? Should we then rewrite God's holy Scriptures to fit today's more shallow and worldly communications?

Remember, we are dealing with God's holy unchangeable Word - not an ordinary book. God owns His message, we don't. Only His own, well-guarded words can be presented as absolute truth. Yet, readers who trust NavPress and the endorsement of Christian leaders such Warren Wiersbe and J. I. Packer view this book as an authentic translation of the Bible rather than as Peterson's personal, politically correct interpretation.

Throughout both Old and New Testaments, God forbids us to distort His Word. Additions and deletions are strictly forbidden in Scriptures like Deuteronomy 4:2 and 12:32, Proverbs 30:6, Galatians 1:8-9 and Revelation 22:19. Acts 17:11 exhorts us to learn from the Bereans who "examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true."
Eugene Peterson would probably agree. His own interpretation of 2 Corinthians 4:2 holds him accountable to this timeless standard:
"We don't maneuver and manipulate behind the scenes. And we don't twist God's Word to suit ourselves. Rather we keep everything we do and say out in the open, the whole truth on display, so that those who want to can see and judge for themselves in the presence of God."
While the above verse corresponds to the original Greek, many other passages do just what The Message promises not to do: they "twist God's word to suit" human inclinations. In fact, the very next sentence (verses 3-4), fails the test. It does not "keep... the whole truth on display." Instead, it deletes the original references both to "those who are perishing" and to the glory of "Christ, who is the image of God."

It doesn't take a Greek scholar to recognize the appalling distortions of God's holy Word. Any Bible student willing to compare Peterson's Message with a Greek/English Interlinear Lexicon and take time to look up key words in a credible New Testament Bible dictionary will discover alarming deletions, distortions and additions to the original text. If Peterson is right, then all our other Bibles - the KJV, NASV, NIV, Greek-English interlinear Bibles - are false.

See for yourself. We have compared quotes from The Message with corresponding Scriptures in Bible version generally considered "authoritative." Most of the time, we have used the New International Version -- not because we like the NIV or use it ourselves (we don't), but because, in all fairness, we wanted to choose a standard version that would come closest to Eugene Peterson goal of an "understandable" language. Please check the difference yourself by comparing the passages below from The Message with your own Bible.
To emphasize differences, corresponding words and phrases are underlined. Please pray for discernment as you check the following additions and deletions:
* 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."

[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 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 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.]
*Adds horoscope, as if this timeless tool of occultism is similar to a telescope.

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..." (Emphasis added)

* 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...." [Emphasis added]

* 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), 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."

[One could conclude that "commitment and intimacy" or "becoming one", not marriage, set the boundaries for acceptable sex.]
* 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. 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.
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."

* Deletes references to submission. Adds marital equality:
1 Peter 3:1, 7:
"Wives, in the same way be submissive to your husbands...
Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life..."

The Message:
"The same goes for you wives: Be good wives to your husbands, responsive to their needs...
The same goes for you husbands: Be good husbands to your wives. Honor them, delight in them. As women they lack some of your advantages. But in the new life of God's grace, you're equals. Treat your wives, then, as equals...."

* Deletes references to sexual immorality, repentance, tolerating sin, the God who searches hearts and minds...

Revelation 2:22:
"I have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess. By her teaching she misleads my servants into sexual immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols. I have given her time to repent of her immorality, but she is unwilling. so I will cast her on a bed of suffering, and I will make those who commit adultery with her suffer intensely, unless they repent of her ways. I will strike her children dead. Then all the churches will know that I am he who searches hearts and minds..."

The Message:
"But why do you let that Jezebel who calls herself a prophet mislead my dear servants into Cross-denying, self-indulging religion? I gave her a chance to change her ways, but she has not intention of giving up a career in the god-business. I'm about to lay her low, along with her partners, as they play their sex-and-religion games. The bastard offspring of their idol-whoring I'll kill. Then every church will know that appearances don't impress me."

* Misleading emphasis:

Romans 15:4-5.
"For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures, we might have hope. May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity among yourselves as you follow Christ Jesus, so that with one heart and mouth you may glorify the God..."

The Message:
"Even if it was written in Scripture long ago, you can be sure it's written for us. God wants the combination of his steady, constant calling and warm, personal counsel in Scripture to come to characterize us, keeping us alert for whatever he will do next. May our dependably steady and warmly personal God develop maturity in you so that you get along with each other as well as Jesus gets along with us all. Then we'll be a choir... our very lives singing in harmony in a stunning anthem to the God..."

[No mention of endurance and hope - which implies triumph in the midst of suffering, as we remain confident that God will do all He has promised. In light of Peterson's tendency to minimize the disciplining side of God, his emphasis on a warm, feel-good God seems to distort God's revelation of Himself. Notice, "follow Christ Jesus" is replaced by a Jesus who "gets along with us."]
* 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 seems 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" (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."

Since Julian of Norwich is a spiritual model to the man who has interpreted God's Word for today, let's take a look at what she believed. Indeed, her teachings seem to echo some of the cultural biases that thread through The Message. They also fit today's uncritical search for experiential, feeling-centered spirituality. In his book, Soul Friend, Kenneth Leech describes some of her convictions:

"Because she held strongly this belief in the closeness of man and God, Julian has an optimistic assessment of man and the universe, and a belief that sin is relatively unimportant... Moreover she claims that 'God showed me that sin need be no shame to man but can even be worthwhile.' She seems to mean by this that sins are disguised virtues, for 'in heaven what sin typifies is turned into a thing of honor.'

" ...In Julian's theology, we find the fullest expression of the concept of the femininity of God. 'God is really our Mother as he is Father,' she says. 'Our precious Mother Jesus brings us to supernatural birth, nourishes and cherishes us by dying for us, giving us the sacrament.... Her mysticism brings tenderness and 'homeliness' to the understanding of God our Mother. (Emphasis added)

The same article introduces another spiritual model. Peterson writes that "Baron Friedrich von Hugel, a Roman Catholic layperson, was one of the most respected spiritual directors in England in the early years of this century." He devotes an entire paragraph to this leader whom the Encyclopedia Britannica describes as "the precursor of the realist revival in philosophy and of the theological study of religious feeling."

Like the culture around us, many churches today seem to emphasize good feelings and subjective experience rather than uncompromising faith based on God's revealed truth - the only foundation for a mature relationship with God. Peterson's definition for spirituality in his article seems to reflect this drift from solid rock to shifting sand - along with an alarming focus on self rather than God:
"Intimacy: we want to experience human love and trust and joy. Transcendence: we want to experience divine love and trust and joy... We hunger for divine meaning, someone who will bless us. And so spirituality, a fusion of intimacy and transcendence, overnight becomes a passion for millions of North Americans.... It is heartening that our continent is experiencing a recovery of desire to embrace intimacies and respond to transcendence...." (Emphasis added

Peterson rightly points out the need to discriminate "between the true and false" as people "ransack exotic cultures and esoteric groups in a search for wholeness."

But what does he mean when he tells his readers to acquire "a biblical imagination - entering into the vast world of the Bible and getting a feel for the territory, an instinct for reality." What part did his imagination play in the formation of The Message?

The inspired scribes of God's holy Word documented facts and observations. They were led by the Holy Spirit, not personal imagination. God was the Creator, not man. No one should know this better than J. I. Packer, the beloved author of Knowing God. Yet in his endorsement of The Message, he uses the same questionable terms -- words popularized by the New Age quest for personal empowerment and unbiblical energies. "In this crowded world of Bible versions," writes Packer, "Eugene Peterson's blend of accurate scholarship and vivid idiom make this rendering both distinctive and distinguished. The Message catches the logical flow, personal energy, and imaginative overtones of the original very well indeed."

What does Packer mean? Does the Bible really have imaginative overtones?
Peterson's introduction to Revelation gives that impression. He identifies John as a pastor on Patmos, who "is preeminently concerned with worship" -- not sharing God-given visions of end-time events. This first century pastor is also "a poet, fond of metaphor and symbol, image and allusion" who challenges "our intelligence and imagination."

Historical facts and absolute truth made the Bible unique among the world's religious documents. Pagan myths, on the other hand, spring from imagination, personal feelings and mystical experiences. Yet, the author of The Message repeatedly stresses the latter. He writes, "We are after what we came for in the first place: intimacy and transcendence, personal friends and a personal God, love and worship."

It seems paradoxical that someone who desires intimacy with God, would minimize or ignore the main obstacles to that intimacy: our sinful nature, our specific sins and our lack of submission and obedience to God. Could an answer to this paradox lie in the strange spirituality he propounds in his article?

I realize that Peterson's intent was "to recapture the tone" and subtleties of the Greek language. Whether or not he achieved that (personally I believe that his language reflects neither the heart of Jesus nor His followers' fiery devotion to a holy sovereign God and the integrity of His Word), this noble goal can never be an excuse for "dumbing-down" Scripture to match our culture's downward trends. The fact that essential Biblical terms are no longer part of our everyday conversation doesn't give us license to soften God's message. Shouldn't we rather aim to use Scriptures to lift our communications to the level where our language reflects the eternal perspective of God's revealed truth?

That seems to be the exhortation of Deuteronomy 6:4-7 and 2 Timothy 3:16. When we simplify Scripture by removing its mysteries, controversies and exhortations toward God's highest, we demean our Lord and misinform believers.
Some might ask, "Who are you to question the wisdom and scholarship of respected Church leaders?"

The sad fact is that shepherds and leaders throughout history have turned from truth to embrace "new" teachings. We are all called to "examine Scriptures" and test our leaders as did the Bereans and Ephesians.

Our ability to exercise this kind of discernment comes from the Holy Spirit - as God tells us in 2 Corinthians 3:5: "Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant." (NASV) Sad to say, Peterson deleted this wonderful promise of God's sufficiency for any task He assigns us.

"But isn't most of The Message accurate?" ask some. Probably. So is the Jehovah's Witnesses' Bible. However, it only takes the distortion of a few key passages to reflect an entirely different message. When any part -- even "the smallest letter" -- of God's Word is changed, the integrity of the whole is lost.

If The Message is accepted as Biblical truth, three distortions of New Testament teachings could spread and permeate the Church, conforming "truth" to popular consensus and false unity:
Since God is love, He wouldn't be so cruel as to cause someone to suffer, perish or burn in hell. So don't mention Biblical consequences or punishment.

Since God forgives, don't be too concerned about specific sins such as homosexuality or adultery. Jesus wouldn't want you to offend someone.
Since God is tolerant, don't correct others. Be tolerant of all, except those who criticize something you like. (This politically correct attitude censors much-needed rational, objective criticism as a corrective force.)

The consequences of twisting God's holy Word are devastating. Throughout history, whenever God's people followed distorted teaching and ignored genuine truth, they would compromise with popular culture and drift back to earth-centered spirituality. It's happening all around us today. The masks for timeless paganism - whether they are Babylonian, Canaanite, Roman or Native American - make little difference. All these polytheistic/pan-theistic/monistic belief systems mocked God and established deadly connection between gullible seekers and demonic spirits. Today's most seductive masks bear an alarming resemblance to Christianity. History documents the results - both personal and cultural: a tragic blend of plagues, drought, famine and wars. (I document these in Under the Spell of Mother Earth.) Humanism was often an intermediary step (see Psalm 12:4) and continues to provide an effective tool for banishing God until spiritual hunger draws people to all kinds of pagan, earth-centered alternatives. Romans 1 outlines this timeless slide.

The signs of compromise are multiplying - even in God's churches. Congregations have traded truth for myth and Mother Earth for God our Father. Sunday school curricula teach Native American shamanism and equate the Creator with the Great Spirit. Gay pastors teach spiritual guidelines, and children's pastors teach Bible "truths" through comical skits that mock God.
What we need is truth - the whole truth and nothing but. Yet Peterson, willing to use words like consecration and antithetical, refuses to use the word sanctification and deletes "holy is your name" from the Lord's prayer. How can we cry over sin and apostasy when the holiness of God is concealed from His Word?

As we face an explosion of false teachings and spiritual substitutes both in churches and in the world around us, we had better be faithful stewards. It's time to awaken all God's people to test, guard and follow the truth our King has committed to us. Therefore,
"Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." 2 Timothy 2:15

"I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ... Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry." 2 Timothy 4:1-5