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Church Growth Gone Mad
...Well, a man that was greatly influenced by Robert Schuller is Bill Hybels, again, as we are moving closer and closer in time to where we're at today. And in 1972 Bill Hybels in the Chicago area launched a ministry to high school students called "Son life." As the group grew the students in the group complained that there were several hindrances to them bringing their friends. Some of these hindrances were the meeting environment, the music, and the teaching. As a result of these complaints, and as a result of his working with the youth in this Son life he started something called 'Son City' in 1973. Son City began as an outreach program to unbelieving youth. What happened was, over time, the message, music, and environment, and teaching were all adapted to the audience, and it was filled up with unbelievers. Then sadly what happened was that Son City became Willow Creek Community Church. In essence what Willow Creek Community Church is, it's a youth ministry that morphed into a church In essence what Willow Creek Community Church is, it's a youth ministry that morphed into a church ...

...Here's a quote from Bill Hybels, "If they'll sustain that kind of all out effort, they're going to break through all the barriers keeping them from belief." That's scary! That's saying that an unsaved person is going to break through the barriers that will take them towards belief - that's as man centered as you can get! We saw the quote before. "Assist the unbeliever in a cost-benefit analysis." Here's a quote from Rick Warren, "There are some types of people that your church will never reach because they require a completely different style of ministry than you can provide." Another quote, "Explosive growth only occurs when the type of people in the community match the type of people that are already in the church and they both match the type of person the pastor is..."

...Here's another quote from Robert Schuller, "I don't think anything has been done in the name of Christ and under the banner of Christianity that has proven more destructive to human personality and hence counterproductive to the evangelistic enterprise than the unchristian, uncouth strategy of attempting to make people aware of their lost and sinful condition. Classical reformed theology has erred in its insistence that theology be God centered not man centered." ...

...Let's turn to 1 Corinthians 1 - look at a couple of passages. First Corinthians one and two, by themselves, those two chapters should drive a stake in the heart of any kind of thinking of the church growth movement. Consider verse seventeen chapter one: "Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel - and watch this - not in cleverness of speech, that the cross of Christ should not be made void." And brothers, when we add our cleverness of speech, when we try to remarket, when we try to improve on the clear message of God, on the clear means of communicating that message, we're running the risk of making the cross of Christ void. Or chapter two verses four and five, "My message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and of power that your faith should not rest on the wisdom on men, but on the power of God." If we are using our persuasive words of wisdom, that's the risk we're running - that the faith of our congregation - the faith of the unsaved people would not be resting on the wisdom of God but would be resting on the wisdom of man....