I went back and forth trying to decide whether or not to address this article. I almost mentioned it yesterday’s post A Couple of Important Links, and then decided that if I were to say anything it would warrant its own post.

I’ve mentioned here before that while not everything about the emerging church is helpful, one of the faults many of its critics have is their tendency to “throw the baby out with the bathwater.” In other words, because some things within the movement are bad, we should reject everything outright (or so they say).

Pastore Definitely Not Pastoral

Tom Ascol registers his concern with a recent article by California-based talk show host Frank Pastore. And Justin Taylor rightly categorizes the article as an embarrassment.

I call the article shameful and irresponsible and its premise absurd. Pastore has most (if not all) of his facts dead wrong and shows his complete lack of understanding of the emerging movement. It seems as though he is more interested in jumping on a bandwagon than he is showing wisdom and deference to brothers and sisters-in-Christ.

He Doesn’t Speak for All Christians

I am not a part of the emerging church or the more quasi-official emergent movement. But I’m familiar enough with it and have done enough of my own research to know that Pastore is simply doing more harm to the Kingdom than he believes he is doing good. There is room for criticism within the emerging movement (as there is with all movements/denominations) but there is much good with it, too. Pastore has done little more than give non-Christians another reason to marginalize believers as weirdos and nut cases.

This article is as wrong and ridiculous and hurtful and unhelpful as Dr. Ergun Caner’s statement that “Calvinists are worse than Muslims” (scroll to the bottom of the page, third from the last question). Certainly Pastore is allowed to hold his own beliefs. Unfortunately, he holds the Kingdom hostage with ideas like the one he espouses in his article.

UPDATE: The Internet Monk shares his insight into Pastore’s article as well. It’s the first segment in the podcast (which you can listen directly on the site–no need to download anything), so if you’re not up to listening to the whole thing–although you really should–you don’t have to guess when it’s coming.

Impacting the Kingdom through Worship,