Andy Stanley's vision. . .

Andy Stanley, son of the famous Southern Baptist pastor and past president Charles Stanley, has always had an uneasy relationship with his dad but it is clear that it was also an uneasy relationship with his dad's church.  Nowhere is that more telling than the way Andy Stanley has approached the great divide between New Testament Christianity and the cultural appropriation of same sex marriage and the gender identity business.  According to one author, Stanley has decided that it is better to accommodate the culture on this issue than it is to confront it.  He was not shy in saying he would encourage any gay couples in his congregation to commit to each other and could envision himself presiding at such a "wedding" -- especially if it was for a family member.  Celibacy would be unfair, according to Stanley.  "I know I shouldn’t let experience dictate my theology, but I have. Maybe I’m wrong,"said Stanley.

As uncomfortable as that makes some, it does expose the soft underbelly of entrepreneurial Evangelicalism -- something Stanley seems to be very good at.  In the greater Atlanta area, some 31,000 folks attend one of the Stanley franchises and his influence has extended across America in print, as mentor, and as influencer over megachurches and pastors everywhere.  While the battle lines have been drawn over these issues for some time, it is clear that Evangelicalism is less a confession of faith or truth than it is a practical approach to being church and becoming a big one at that.  Stanley has clearly decided that it is impossible to maintain Biblical integrity with the church growth mentality for which he has become famous.  It is, in his mind, better to find a way to accommodate the culture than risk shrinking as you stand in opposition to that culture.

You will recall that Saddleback and Rick Warren, two famous icons of Evangelicalism, decided that the Southern Baptist Convention was wrong on the issue of women's ordination and chose to go with the change rather than the tradition.  Those chosen to replace Warren as the faces of Saddleback have a history of a somewhat muddled position on these issues of sexual desire and gender identity.  It can be said with some certainty that Saddleback is moving and its theological direction looks very much like what you see with North Point and Stanley.  In fact, there is a somewhat hidden organization designed to aid and assist such changes across the Evangelical landscape.  Pastors in Process is a somewhat confidential program to train pastors to more stealthily “move the conversation on LGBTQ inclusion forward in [their] congregation[s].”  Ambiguity and the back door are the preferred means of effecting change in churches.  Clearly that is the pattern here.  Without a denominational structure, order, and confession, Evangelicals are more prone to this kind of devolution of doctrine than other churches -- though even these can be ignored in favor of heresy.  This is one more reason why Lutherans should not be watching or learning from Evangelicals -- unless the goal is to end up like one!