Christian Universalism

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   allows us access to your presence, your powerful and holy presence, God. That can transform us in a moment, that can refresh and renew and revive and convict and and bring to repentance and and reveal things and do everything that you need to do or want to do in our lives, God. We pray today, God, in in our lives, your kingdom come and your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. We pray today, God, give unto us the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of you, that the eyes of our understanding may be enlightened. God, give us, oh God, understanding and revelation, God, that we may know you and hear you and walk with you. More and more and more. We need a revival. We need a move of the Holy Ghost. We need an outpouring of the spirit in Auburn and Opelika, in the church world, across America. We need a revival of truth and the true power of God. Father, we pray for that this morning. Jesus. Jesus. Praise you, Jesus. Let's keep your head bowed and your eyes closed for a minute. Just just worship him. He's here this morning. His presence is here this morning. Lord, we pray that old prayer that Steve Hill used to get people to pray. Lord, Lord, speak to my heart. Change my life. Lord, speak to our hearts. Will everybody just pray that to him? Just say, "Lord, speak to my heart. Change my life." In Jesus' name. Oh God, speak. Speak through your word. Speak by your spirit. Speak to us, God. Move in mighty ways, God. Father, I cannot wait to go out into this community, to go out on the university, to go out on the street again and preach the gospel. I pray for your power to fall when we go. Jesus' name. Shoo. Hallelujah. Somebody say praise the Lord. My God. I just sense his presence. I know he's up to something. Amen. Hallelujah. Let me just say this. Um we're getting armed. We're getting armed with truth to go out. You know, the Bible says in Romans 1:16 that the gospel is the power of God.

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   And then I hear these preachers talk about the gospel as good news as if that's that's the simple defini- definition they try to throw out there. But the gospel is in its end good news if received, if obeyed, if walked out with Jesus. The gospel's bad news if you reject it. And that is I think what God's been doing with us is is equipping us with the truth. And very soon um we're going to be going out again to the campus, to the streets, door to door. We're going to do all kinds of evangelism. And I am looking forward to it, and I hope you are. Amen. All right. And I know don't don't let the devil speak this little voice in your head, "Well, Pastor Dean, you said that before, and we've only done a little bit, and then we stopped." Let me tell you, the time is now. And the only thing delaying me at this moment is the walking part. I got to get that completely healed, and then we will be going. But this morning I want to speak to you about is this message this morning is kind of a convergence of things that have happened this week. Now, there may be some things that you hear this morning that I've already said, you've heard me say before, um but there's going to be some things that you haven't because God's just given me some fresh things. But this week has been interesting, to say the least. Um uh of course, you know that I've mentioned the Pastor Rob Bell, who's the pastor of Mars Hill Church up in Grand Rapids, Michigan, 10,000 member church up there. Um he's one of the leaders of what's called the emerging church movement. And just it just in the last week or so, he's put out a new book entitled Love Wins, a book about heaven, hell, and the fate of every person who ever lived. Um pretty much everyone in in Christian circles has has already known that that Rob Bell is a heretic, that he doesn't believe that the the scriptures or all of the scriptures are inspired by God. And uh he has ideas, strange ideas, about hell and and things. But what this book is about, and I've got the title up here, Christian Universalism. And I put Christian in quotes uh because they you know, Universalism has been around a long time. Now, the definition of Universalism is really simple. Universalism believes that everyone will ultimately end up in heaven. That no matter what your religion or your beliefs or how you live your life that you will ultimately end up in heaven. And And true

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   universalism believes that there's no hell at all or no eternal punishment. Okay? Um And so anyway, this book came out and I knew I was going to have to address these issues. And then of course there's the book or the novel that sold millions upon millions of copies called The Shack by William P. Young. Now, both of these books I've I've I haven't read through Love Wins. I've read some quotes from Love Wins that I'm going to put up this morning uh from some pastors across the country who have done reviews on this book and they've put up quotes. Uh just a few I I you know, everyone already knows um that Rob Bell is a universalist. He was interviewed on MSNBC not not too long ago right after the book came out this couple of weeks ago. And and the it was amazing. The interviewer for MSNBC now, not a conservative uh television network or news network. This the the person that interviewed him would not let him off the hook and called him on the carpet. Would not let him dodge and and exposed him as the universalist that he is. Uh and just told him you're you're redefining the gospel. You've created a gospel now that the culture will accept. And he just nailed him and this you know, it was it's an awesome interview. You can look it up on on YouTube. But in in just this week um I was I noticed on Facebook and I'm going to name names this morning because this message is going to go out beyond here. And I'm sick of not naming some names. But I noticed on Facebook, um, earlier this week or a few days ago, that Justin Eldred, the leader of the A Hop or the Auburn House of Prayer, which is a branch of Mike Bickle's International House of Prayer out of Kansas City, um, put two posts up about The Shack and and actually said it was the best book that he ever read, that that he was encouraging everyone to, um, to read the book, and that he was talking about that there's some interview or a possibly a movie coming out, based on The Shack, that they're going to watch and he's encouraging everyone to watch. Well, immediately when I saw that, having read The Shack, I have a copy of it right here. Where is it? Somebody's got it this morning. But, I've read The Shack. And The Shack, um, is clearly a novel that does present theological truth in it or tries to present what it thinks is theological truth. I should say that. So, the the excuses that it's fiction or that it's a novel or that it's a metaphor and allegory doesn't hold wind when the guy is talks about God and Jesus and theological things about heaven and hell and and sin and and and where people will spend eternity. When you start talking about that stuff,

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   you've moved from metaphors and fiction to trying to teach, um, trying to teach Oh, yeah. Trying to teach theology, trying to teach Christianity. So, anyway, I when I saw that post on Facebook, I said I said, "Have you lost your mind? The Shack teaches universalism, that everyone is going to eventually go to heaven, no matter what they believe, no matter what sins they've committed, no matter how they've lived. And um and it presents that argument in a very subtle and twisted way, but it's very clearly in there in chapter 11 as a matter of fact. In chapter 11 entitled here come the judge is what it's what it's entitled and I and I actually pulled the book out while he and I started this debate back and forth on his Facebook post and I pulled it out and I said I'm holding the book in my hand and I am rereading chapter 11 and cuz he said basically that The Shack or William P. Young is not a universalist. He does not teach universalism. I said here it is right here. And I mean and what we're dealing with nowadays with when I turn Christian universalism is we're dealing with Christians who will say to you they will teach universalism that everyone will ultimately end up in heaven no matter whether they believed in Jesus or not and I'm going to show you their quotes in a minute. But but that they're going to end up in heaven whether they believe it but then they'll say the words out of their mouth I'm not a universalist. Now this is going back I shared this earlier with with Nick. I said this is going back to the Clinton days. It reminds me you know, did you have sex with that woman and he goes it depends on what the definition of is is. I mean do we really have to go down this road? You know, if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck and waddles like a duck and swims like a duck, it's probably a duck. Don't tell me it's a dog. Okay? I'm not stupid. We have definitions of words. We have definitions of theologies and beliefs, you know, how do we know what Buddhism is but what they believe? You say what they say they believe. You get what I'm saying? How do we know what Hinduism is or the New Age or anything out there? How do we know what Christianity is unless we can define clearly define words, right? So Rob Bell, William Young and a lot of these other emergent leaders like Brian McLaren and and on down on down the line even even Joel Osteen, Billy Graham, all of them are beginning to move into Christian universalism. Now, let me say this. The twist between Universalism and Christian Universalism is real simple. A Universalist will just say that all religions lead to God. Everyone's going to heaven or going to God when they die. It doesn't really matter. What the twist on Christian Universalism is they say that because Jesus died on the cross and shed his blood and became the atonement for all men's sin that all men, women, everybody, all men are forgiven whether they know Jesus or not,

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