ReformationUnderway

A friend recently sent me a link to a video on YouTube. In it, a preacher who sounds Australian (I later learned he is Australian, but lives in Denmark now) critiques a portion of one of Rob Bell's NOOMA videos. Here is the video:

If you look in the comments that have been posted to this video, you will see that Pastor Cameron has been ripped by many in the comments of that video for having the audacity to critique the teaching of another who claims the name of Christ. Why? Because judging anything or anyone is regarded as a serious affront in our contemporary western culture.

A few things to note:

1. Bell's teaching wasn't just a sermon which he preached to his congregation. Rather, Bell produced short films for the series, offered them for sale, and promoted them heavily. It was available for sale to Cameron's people (you can find the NOOMA videos in your local Borders, Barnes & Noble, many Christian bookstores in the U.S - apparently it's much the same in Europe as Cam says the videos have been used in some of the small groups in the church where he serves), and thus a pastoral concern for Cameron, who is charged with shepherding the people to whom he is preaching. Cameron did not go and seek out a sermon which Bell preached from his own pulpit (though I highly doubt there is a pulpit in Bell's church), take an excerpt from it, and bring it before his own congregation to slice and dice the theology. Rather, Bell sought to put his video before the believers whom Cameron shepherds, where Cameron is obligated to point out error in their understanding of their God.

2. Look at 1 Thessalonians 5:21 - "[B]ut test everything; hold fast what is good." (ESV) Test EVERYTHING! This charge was given by the apostle Paul to all those in the church at Thessalonica. As such, it was an instruction given not just to those who shepherded them, but to all who were believers in Christ. Paul commanded them to judge the ideas they encountered, the teaching they encountered. As a shepherd, the burden of this command is doubtless felt even more strongly by Cameron.

3. Am I alone in this interpretation of 1 Thess. 5:21? No, not by a long shot. To cite but one example, I encountered this quote today as I was reading a book by the 19th century Anglican bishop J.C. Ryle. (Light from Old Times, Moscow, ID: Charles Nolan Publishers, 2000)

The true Christian was intended by Christ to prove all things by the Word of God, all churches, all ministers, all teaching, all preaching, all doctrines, all sermons, all writings, all opinions, all practices. These are his marching orders. Prove all by the Word of God; measure all by the measure of the Bible; compare all with the standard of the Bible; weigh all with the balances of the Bible; examine all by the light of the Bible; test all in the crucible of the Bible. That which can abide the fire of the Bible, receive, hold, believe, and obey. That which cannot abide the fire of the Bible, reject, refuse, repudiate, and cast away. (p.23-24)

I pray this is what you (and I) will do: Test EVERYthing.