we have a major problem of mental pollution of negative thinking do you know why possibility thinking works wonders when you start with something like tithing for instance possibility thinking we call it oh boy does it work you want self-esteem of course the secret open this brain for God's ideas to come through the first thing God will tell you is you have it all inside of you friend you've got it you may not believe that you've got it but that doesn't keep you from having it now a long time before William James ever wrote there was a man named Ralph Waldo Try he wrote a book called In Tune with the Infinite it's one of the classic books ever produced in this country on the human mind i've been reading it for years and I find new wisdom in it every time I open the pages success doesn't come the way you think success comes from the way you think why should we do anything to encourage people to become lovers of themselves if Paul in fact warned Timothy that that would be the state of godlessness in the last days i hope you don't preach this i hope you don't preach it i don't think you do text no no no what you're just what you're feeding into that microphone now just because it's in the Bible doesn't mean you should preach it 31 years ago this man at my side asked me if I'd start a church here in Garden Grove this is perhaps the grandest church in the United States positive thinking works wonders you know the Crystal Cathedral the iconic building of the Hour of Power but in his last few years he lost it and there's infighting and the uh bankruptcy and all of that within the congregation will that be a part of his legacy or or in time will that be forgotten even if you've never heard of him Robert H schuler's influence has a long shadow that reaches into some of the most influential and popular pullpits today if you guys have read my book Happy Lies about the new thought movement my entire chapter 10 is primarily about him and the seeker sensitive movement it was by far the hardest chapter to write i had the most stress writing that particular chapter because it had to be rewritten multiple times for the sake of clarity fairness and accuracy and there was a lot that I wanted to add in that chapter that I decided to put aside as not to derail from my main point so this video will be covering some of the information that's already there but this video will also be a satisfying extension and I will add all the sweet nothings that I didn't add there i do think that out of all of the deep dives I've done so far this one might just be the most controversial but I'm going to do my best to give the information with grace but also to be thorough i'm not backing down from what I consider to be major issues that need to be put on the table for discussion also when I do these deep dives sometimes I ask you guys for input and I want to thank everyone who wrote in with information and some of you shared your experience at the Crystal Cathedral and with Robert Schuler directly so thank you for that a lot of it was very helpful this video will be broken up into three parts false it is in five parts i do not know why I said this part one will be who is Robert Schuler if you guys have seen my deep dives you know the drill this will be a short biography an introduction to who Robert Scheler even is what his accomplishments were and what he taught why is this guy even important and why am I making a deep dive about him part two is the secret theology is what I'm going to call this i will specifically go into his theology and the influence of new thought in what he taught this is sort of laying the foundation for his motives in church growth part three is about the seeker sensitive movement here I will go over the part he played in the seeker sensitive movement or otherwise known as the church growth movement sometimes they're used interchangeably even though they are a little different i will go over the brief history of the seeker sensitive movement the major players in it and the influence that Robert Schuler had and how we see this manifested today part four is the influence here I will specifically go over the prominent pastors and leaders who Robert Schuler has directly mentored and influenced and why this is problematic but also why it's sort of not all right part five is the pros and cons of the seeker movement here I'm going to be very mindful and give what I would consider to be firm but fair insights on the seeker sensitive movement then in my conclusion I'll give my overall thoughts and share some of my surprise for Robert Scheler's legacy robert Harold Schuler was a well-known American pastor author and televangelist who is best known for being the pastor of the famous or infamous Crystal Cathedral in California he has authored more than 30 books six of them yes is that true yeah six of them wow made the New York Times bestselling list apparently he was born in 1926 in Iowa and from what I've read he had pretty humble beginnings his family were Dutch immigrants and he was the youngest of five kids he was also very smart he was a really dynamic speaker and he had a lot of drive he basically grew up like a farm kid and he had a lot of grit and discipline now the Scheler family were apparently adherent of the Dutch Reformed Church the oldest Protestant denomination in North America robert knew from the age of four that he wanted to be a minister of the church after high school he went to college where he majored in history and after receiving his bachelor of arts degree in 1947 he entered Western Theological Seminary which is a reformed seminary in 1950 he received a master of divinity degree and was ordained as a minister in the reformed church in America or otherwise known as the RCA so sometimes people will refer to him as Dr scheler because he received an honorary doctorate from some institutions but he did not officially get his doctorate so I will not be referring to him as Dr scheler just so you know now after this he then got married to a woman named Arvella Dehan I believe I'm pronouncing that correctly and they had five kids one son and four daughters their son Robert Anthony Schuler was born in 1954 and ended up becoming a pastor and televangelist just like his dad the daughters are named Sheila Gianne Carol and Gretchen now early in his marriage I didn't realize that he actually went on to pastor a very small reformed congregation of about 30 to 40 people he was there for about 5 years and when he left the congregation was at over 400 so this guy really knew how to bring people to a church also a lot of this I'm getting from his biography just so you guys know just a heads up this is what's over here these I like source material okay that one of these books is his biography no I have not read the whole thing but it is really interesting to flip through and just know his early years what he did it was really interesting he did have an interesting life i will be referring to this later on in this deep dive so he's in this church he's growing it he's married he has like a million kids and everything changes in 1955 this is the trajectory of his legacy because the reformed church asked Schuler to move to Garden Grove California to start a new church and this is really where I try to give Scheler a break because he really had innovation it It's really interesting to read how his mind worked with certain things he had great ideas and really thought outside the box in a very interesting way i would say that it's even inspiring we see this within the Christian church as well and I actually love this when I come into contact with Christians who are like a breath of fresh air when it comes to being creative in ministry we see this on YouTube all the time with Christian content creators we make it our own we know what we're good at and we just go for it i think this is a very good thing and something we should embrace as people made in the image of God with gifts and talents so it's obvious that Scheler was a tremendously innovative and gifted speaker and visionary because what this man did with just $500 in the budget was incredible that's how much they gave him for this so for perspective this would be about $6,000 today and he did something revolutionary at the time he rented a drive-in movie theater for the first service a lot of people credit Robert Schuler as being the first one to invent this or the first one who thought of this to the idea of a drive-in church idea but according to his own biography Robert Schuler credited another pastor for this idea he got this idea from a pastor in Florida so he was not the first one to come up with this idea but was inspired by another pastor who had done it before this is kind of a pattern with Robert Schuler he's ethically inspired by other people and he kind of makes it his own so in this case he built his drive-in church in California and for the first service he preached to 100 people in about 30 cars the passage that he preached from was on Matthew 17:20 which talks about if you have faith the size of a mustard seed then you can move a mountain nothing will be impossible for you so it was a very uplifting message and the setting was very different so you can imagine how this caught people's attention and really grew this didn't come without its problems though because what he saw as innovative the RCA the reformed church saw it as undignified and unspiritual i believe in my opinion this is where the wedge might have started with Scheler and his reformed roots in one interview he's quoted saying "My denomination shunned me when they heard I was preaching in a drive-in theater." Personally I thought it was a great idea honestly as long as the message is sound as long as you are preaching the word of God then the location can be pretty irrelevant in my opinion but we shall soon find out that that is not the case with Robert Scheler he did not stick with his sound theology so this really took off word spread about this drive-in church but it was also a place where you could go and sit on the grass outside and listen to the services it was only a matter of time before it grew so large that people were outgrowing the space so Robert Schuler hired an architect to design a permanent space that still kept the same idea of a drive-in and also where people could come in person this was the beginning of Garden Grove Community Church this was built in 1961 and it was here that the famous and wildly popular Hour of Power on TV got started in 1970 but this was only the beginning in 1977 he decided he was going to build a bigger church a better church a more impressive church by this time his theology had shifted which we will get to in part two but he wanted an impressive symbol of spirituality and nature he still wanted it where you could experience being outside but you are inside all right so he hired another architect and here the idea for the design of the famous crystal cathedral was born it was finished in 1980 and it was enclosed entirely of glass and could hold about 2,700 people in it which was actually a lot of people at the time this became the ultimate stage for the Hour of Power i remember my mom watching him on TV as a kid and I always thought that the building looked like the Empress Palace on Never Ending Story so this building was a total flex what's interesting is that in 1980 when it was dedicated it was dedicated to the glory of man for the greater glory of God now this will make sense in part two as of today Robert Scheler's grandson Bobby Schuler still runs the hour of power now really quick I want to take a moment here to distinguish the Scheler men from each other because your mind will explode if I don't so we've been discussing Robert H schuler the focus of this deep dive robert H schuler very conveniently named his first son Robert as well his middle name is Anthony so he is known as Robert A schuler so now we have two Robert Schulers so Robert H schuler is the senior robert A schuler is his son the junior but we're not done we're going to make this about 20% more annoying and add yes you guessed it another Robert Schuler robert H schuler also had a son who decided to also name his son Robert but thank the good Lord above we don't have to rely on initials here because he goes by the name Bobby so Robert H schuler's grandson Bobby Schuler is the one who runs the hour of power today so we have Robert H schuler the father Robert A schuler the son and Robert who goes by Bobby Schuler the grandson i've never had to do so much math before that involved so many words so yeah Bobby Schuler still runs the Hour of Power today and though it's still around it's definitely not as popular i mean I didn't even know that it still existed until I did this research but Robert Scheler did something else really important in 1970 that is very significant to our story here which is he started the Institute for Successful Church Leadership this will come into play in part four fast forward to 2006 and Robert H schuler unfortunately is having some health issues dementia being among some of these health issues and he stepped down and allowed his son Robert A scheler to take over the Crystal Cathedral as his successor and here's where it gets kind of interesting because this is where the ultimate downfall of the Crystal Cathedral happened though it it began much earlier than that I would argue and I'm sure some others would argue that as well so the first thing is that there was a lot of sibling rivalry with this whole thing and it's blamed on some level for some of the downfall that happened after this but second even though his son Robert A scheler took over in 2006 Scheler senior removed him from leadership in 2008 only a few short years later now this gets a little messy but basically there was a lot of personal internal issues going on within the Scheler family behind the scenes but this wasn't just about money or power or prestige this was about theological differences between Robert H schuler and his son Robert A scheler scheler senior said they parted ways because of a quote lack of shared vision but really it it had a lot to do with the lack of shared theology i'm going to read to you from an LA Times article from 2008 about this very issue i'm quoting here it says "The schism between Reverend Robert H scheler and his son at Orange County's Crystal Cathedral arose over a disagreement about broadening the church's longrunning television show Hour of Power beyond a single personality which was another issue they had a move opposed by the younger Schuler pastors involved in the matter said Sunday okay so that's one issue but here's where it gets really interesting in the report scheler built his worldwide ministry over a half century on the psychology of positive thinking and appealing to people turned off by the formality of traditional faiths in contrast his son Robert A schuler his son's sermons have been full of direct references to the Bible i was called to start a mission not a church Scheler told his audience Sunday scheler Senior there's a difference you don't try to preach what is sin and what isn't sin a mission is a place where you ask non-believers to come and find faith and hope they feel love we're on a mission first a church second end quote i tried to reach out to Robert A schuler about this but I never heard back from him and in doing all the research for this video there's going to be later things that I share uh one particular debate or interview that Robert Schuler had that really helped me understand how and why Robert H schuler would really dig his heels in on this he would get very frustrated at the idea of bringing anything negative on that pull pit so if Robert Schuler Robert H schuler saw something negative being preached from his pull pit I can really I can see that being a trigger for him especially after understanding his perspective of theology so take from that what you will i'm kind of setting the stage right now for what I'm going to share later in this video now I I don't want to get ahead of myself and derail right now and go into a lot of the theology issues that we're talking about here because we'll get into that later but for now let me just say that father and son were having strong theological disagreements which didn't help in the overall downfall of the Crystal Cathedral the bottom line is that Schuler senior wanted a self-esteem positive thinking legacy of theology and Scheler Jr actually wanted to teach the Bible what a concept for a church am I right it's interesting because no wonder that Robert H wanted to be a mission and not a church in 2009 Scheler senior stayed on as chairman of the Crystal Cathedral board and announced that the church's leadership would go to his daughter Roberta i'm just kidding her name was Sheila but I mean don't you think there's a missed opportunity there i mean Roberta anyway Sheila Scheler Coleman took over as senior pastor and the next year in 2010 Robert H schuler announced his retirement and it was in 2010 that his daughter Sheila announced that the Crystal Cathedral was seeking Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection the Crystal Cathedral was millions of dollars in debt the 2008 recession didn't help the donations were very down people weren't watching the Hour of Power as much and the lavish production the large staff it didn't help the Bills either then of course you had the whole internal conflict going on with the family that didn't help anything and I'm sure that wonderful financial decisions were being made at that point as well they were also in the middle of a theological identity crisis as well and nobody really knew what direction to go to to make matters worse in 2011 Robert H schuler was kicked out of his own church ministry board so everything was falling apart at this point they officially filed for bankruptcy and in 2012 the official end of the Crystal Cathedral came when the building sold to the Roman Catholic Dascese for $57 million robert H schuler passed away in 2015 at the age of 88 and it seems like what once was this big dream really has turned into a cautionary tale and in my opinion the Crystal Cathedral fell for multiple reasons but probably the best most thorough research I've seen on the rise and fall of the Crystal Cathedral is a book I discovered called The Glass Church by Mark Moulder and I think I'm pronouncing his name correctly Gerardo Marty it's basically a historical account of Robert Scheler in the Crystal Cathedral now I also got a lot of information from the internet articles Schuler's own biography written biography and the internet archives which by the way let me just say here let me put a little side note on this i want to spotlight the internet articles for just a second because there's a lot of old dusty history books that I'm able to get a hold of because of this internet archive and once I discovered it I was like a kid in a candy shop it keeps track of a lot of the internet history and has a massive library of books that I personally consider crucial for this type of research so I just want to give them credit uh because they've been very helpful and not only in writing my book but in putting together videos like this so that's the biography and legacy of Robert H scheler but we're going to segue into what I consider to be maybe uh the most controversial and hidden part of his legacy we're going to get into Robert Schuler's new thought theology this goes beyond somebody who is just trying to bring people to church and teach them about the Bible i'm sure guys I'm sure that Robert Scheler was a really nice guy like a carbon copy of Joel Ostein probably someone you would really enjoy a cup of coffee with and probably had some nice things to say but this is intertwined all of this with his theology and his theology informed a lot of his methodologies which we will get into in part three so let's get into that theology now again I mentioned this but a lot of this is in chapter 10 of my book and arguably there are more statistics but I will be adding some important information because I don't need to worry about word counts when making a video i guess publishers frown on that or something but what a lot of people don't realize about Robert Scheler is that yeah he was a part of the RCA the Reformed Church in America which is historically known as like a nononsense denomination but Robert Scheler's theology was full of new thought nopey nonsense how do they circle that square i I will unpack this RCA and new thought contradiction later but let's start first with Robert Schuler's theological beliefs let's start with his Dutch reformed beliefs so we went over in his biography that Robert Schuler had a deeply theological reformed foundation if you're watching this and you have no idea what I mean when I say reformed beliefs the other name that you might recognize this as is Calvinism a Calvinist this is a denomination that believes the five points of Calvinism which are otherwise known as tulip uh T for total depravity U for unconditional election L for limited atonement I for irresistible grace P perseverance of the saints and like I said before this is typically a nononsense denomination now I myself am not reformed i'm not Calvinist but I have a lot of deep respect for a lot of reformed teachers some well-known reformed leaders are Vodie Bacham Costy Hen Charles Spurgeon Albert Mohler just to name a few so this should give you a feel of reformed theology and there's a lot more to it guys but I'm just giving you a really brief overview here of what is typically expected from this denomination now there are people out there of course that do not agree with reformed theology but I'm I'm just here to tell you guys my personal opinion of this denomination is that it's pretty well respected when it comes to how it handles uh the Bible they they they would never put up with the theology of Robert Schuler but that this is not the video to get into that debate the reason why I'm bringing this up is because this is important to understand where we are going to go later because I think a lot of people just scratch their heads at how someone like Robert Scheler just kind of flew under the radar and how and why so many respected theologians and pastors did ministry with him so to think that Schuler came from the RCA denomination should give us a little bit of whiplash like what happened to the guy well there was a turning point that happened and I'm going to read it to you from his own biography in his own words also this is also why I always give a biography before I get into the details because it really helps us understand how and why and when these things happened so we went over how the RCA wanted him to take over this really tiny church of about 40 people and Scheler's freshly married and he just found out that his wife is pregnant this is the setting for where I'm reading right now also there's a lot of pictures in here it's very very interesting i love it when biographies and history books put this stuff in there okay anyway I had to figure out how to deal with my bickering parishioners i had to learn how to build respect trust and affection with the non-religious people in my community and most of all to survive I had to recruit new members even in seminary I'd never been taught any principles relating to how to win the respect of people who aren't at all religious it was just a big list of pious dos and don'ts so what worked in the classroom failed miserably in the pullpit while I'd still been in seminary a best-selling book called How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie who is a New Thought author by the way had hit the market students at Western had talked about it with disdain me included though I hadn't read it and professional religious educators had scoffed and sneered academic arrogance in the centers of the great universities all over the country had snobbishly put down this book by Dale Carnegie as it would the power of positive thinking by Norman Vincent Peele a few years later huge new thought pastor we will get more into him later though but within these two books I would find the practical advice that I so desperately needed if I was to become not a pontipical preacher that's a that's a fancy word for just saying very religious what an obnoxious word okay let me start that again i would find the practical advice that I so desperately needed if I was to become not a pontipal a religious preacher but a still a but still a respected communicator one day when I was sharing my struggle with Dr beckering one of his mentors I believe he directed me to Carnegie's book humbled by my respected mentors accolades I set aside my seminary prejudices and began to read from its pages I began to learn how to treat people beautifully even if they didn't agree with my views that's ironic considering something we'll get into later "don't argue just share honestly humbly and politely," Carnegie instructed i did my best to put his advice into practice and I found that it improved my interactions with unchurched people meanwhile somehow I had been put on Norman Vincent Peele's mailing list when a flyer appeared in my mailbox I decided to try again with a little reluctance to discount the naysayers my own self-inccluded and give this Peele guy a try i desperately needed help and the flyer suggested that he might have the answer i took a chance and bought his new book The Power of Positive Thinking the effect of Peels and Carneg's theories on my theology and methodology of church work would prove nothing short of amazing what these books presented was as different as night and day from the academic world I'd been living in what a contrast between the professors and Peele it seems like he needed both but anyway one more thing and then we're done here and I'll give some commentary i began to read about how to preach positive and I decided to put Peele's practice to the test i would stop preaching heavy sermons i would listen to Peele's advice and to what my wife had been telling me since day one as I began reading the Gospels of Jesus Christ with my new approach in mind I discovered that Jesus himself had also favored a positive style how more on this later don't derail Melissa don't do it in the pool pit I began to witness the power of positive believing the congregation began to grow because people could hear and see what I was trying to communicate which wasn't the gospel anyway moving on they connected with my new style of real and comprehensible communication i absorbed these new concepts like an eager student with the help of my two new professors Carnegie and Peele and using their books as my scholastic resources I embarked on my own customized personal course the emotional infrastructure was being laid in my subconscious for the building of self-esteem theology you know um there's a lot to go off on here but one thing I want to say that even as I read this and I'm frustrated with it what I'm more frustrated with is I kind of see what he's saying i understand why he would be frustrated this is where the heart and the mind we need to have a conversation about because you can have a lot of preaching from the pull pit that might be theologically sound but you sound like a bully saying it i'll get into more later about how legalism paid a part in Robert Scheler's derail from good theology but the other thing I want to point out and it seems like this book comes up a lot is Greg Kokal's book Tactics would have been a phenomenal read for somebody like Robert Schuler because he's wanting that that practical advice on how to talk to people how to reach them and he needs those people skills he needs critical thinking is what he needs he needs to be able to know how to talk to people but also stick with good theology while doing it and I I can't recommend that book enough by the way I'll leave a link to it in the description but if you struggle with that right if you feel why Robert Scheler might have been frustrated that there are Christians out there that do kind of seem maybe a little bit more legalistic in their theology but they really don't know how to talk to people like they they have the head knowledge but they lack the ability to reach people the ability to communicate effectively because maybe they think of it as oh I'm uh compromising my beliefs if I'm nice i I don't get that but I I do recommend that book i think it's it's very good very practical so just letting you know but there's something else here that I really want to bring up with everything that I just read about his perspective here you guys have heard me talk about this before but I call this the it works trap i think that Robert Schuler is after doing this research I think he is one of the best examples of the it works trap this is one of the main dangers of pragmatism which is basically the idea that if it works then it's good and if it works then it's true it's a way of judging reality and what's undeniably clear here is that Robert Schuler had a problem that needed to be fixed and what ended up fixing his problem was something that was probably really practical and needed but it came with a spirituality and philosophy that he ended up adopting and implementing in his teachings and theology so the idea is that because something worked we tend to take our guard down when it comes to discerning what else comes with that bait that we took so for example if Norman Vincent Peele in other words claims to be a Christian which he did of course and is teaching this positive type of Christianity and it really works and it really draws in a crowd well then God must be blessing him it's working so then what else does Norman Vincent Peele have to teach me about theology because this thing he said worked therefore the rest of what he teaches must be good and true we see this with teachers and preachers all the time if they draw us in if they help us in some way if they played a part in any sort of emotional mental physical healing well what else are they teaching that might be good for me they they must be good and true norman Vincent Peele his theology and philosophy is not neutral it came packaged with a biblical worldview and spirituality of new thought just because something works doesn't mean it's true and just because it feels powerful doesn't mean it's from God and the psychology and spirituality behind the it works trap is both fascinating and disturbing let's take something like skinincare for example let's say you try a new face cream and it actually works your skin clears up your wrinkles disappear the redness fades and you're thrilled because it solved a real problem but now you're more likely to trust everything the brand says so when they tell you to buy the serum you do when they say "Hey their lip gloss will raise your vibration and balance your chakras," you believe them when they say that their $300 collagen elixir can help you manifest and boost your cellular frequency whatever that means you don't even question it because you've already bought it so you've made the leap from saying that it benefited you to now adopting pseudocientific spiritual claims because it worked but you don't realize that the solution came tied to a larger belief system and undergirling worldview that you didn't realize you were adopting this is like Deuteronomy 13 stuff i think that's like the earliest version of the it works trap that I could even think of god is saying "Hey if a teacher or prophet comes along does a sign wonder miracle gives you an oil that clears up your rash or your boils or whatever but they lead you after other gods they lead you after an idol they make you follow a false god then don't believe them." And that's the idea it's the idea is knowing what's a true God and a false god and we can't know that unless we know scripture unless we know theology and how God has revealed himself to us so it worked for you but along with it you adopt that worldview that you really didn't realize you were doing so there's compromise in your theology and worldviews when this happens and I believe that this is what happened to Robert Schuler on many levels this is how he in essence became a new thought preacher who remained in the RCA but why would someone like Norman Vincent Peele or Dale Carnegie be so problematic because I'm here to tell you I I actually do believe that there are things that they have taught and written that are objectively good same with people like Napoleon Hill but why would somebody like Norman Vincent Peele or Dale Carnegie be so problematic in order to understand Robert Scheler's beliefs we need to briefly discuss Norman Vincent Peele we can't talk about Robert Scheler's theology or methodologies without bringing up his mentor Norman Vincent Peele because no other New Thought pastor had more of a profound effect on on Schuler's methods and theology than Peele now I've mentioned the word new thought a few times and I have been very annoyingly outspoken about new thought over the last year wrote a whole book about it i can't always assume even though I've done all that I can't always assume that everybody that watches my videos knows what that even means people think might think it's new age but I'm not going to rehash everything that I've gone over in past videos because that would be very redundant um and if you want to know more about this there will be more in the description you can also get my book i've made videos there's much more information out there however I am briefly going to go over a few things about new thought in case you're new here and you've never even heard the term before I I find it necessary to briefly go over as to give you a backdrop to why I'm even mentioning it and why it's problematic uh so the first thing is new thought should not be confused with new age robert Scheler was not a newager norman Vincent Peele was not a newager new thought is unique because it looks and sounds Christian and think of it as this is the short way I like to put it the positive thinking movement in America with Jesus as its mascot it's mind power thoughts are things it's metaphysical Christianity in a word actually in a name I will say it's Oprah Winfrey a lot of people know her she says "Oh I'm a Christian." Blah blah blah no no she's a new thought uh but she's the best example I could think of that's the simplest way I can briefly define new thought in a few sentences there's a whole history behind this movement and what makes it particularly problematic is that it's super positive super spiritual metaphysical type of Christianity that uses a lot of Christian language but it's basically a cultic in origin the movement and its leaders and teachers are really big about spiritual self-help practices the foundation of the self-help movement was built by new thought authors like Dale Carnegie and Norman Vincent Peele the idea is that the power is within you and there's this untapped spiritual potential in all of humanity you just have to tap into it uh sin and hell are are not just downplayed they are fundamentally redefined under a positive and loving lens and scripture is also reinterpreted now Norman Vincent Peele was highly influenced by Ernest Holmes who I mentioned in my book and he is the founder of religious science which is a large new thought denomination today it's known as the center for spiritual living ernest Holmes is the guy we credit for affirmations in the form in which we understand them i am affirmations are new thought prayers we can thank Ernest Holmes for that and it also had affirmations by the way also had a profound effect on Norman Vincent Peele and Robert Scheler so the baton just keeps getting handed peele was also deeply influenced by EMTT Fox another very popular new thought author practically speaking Peele's philosophy centered on the belief that a positive mental attitude could lead to success health and happiness and I'm not even here to say that that's not entirely untrue of course there's wisdom in controlling what we're thinking about but oh no he takes it to a whole other level remember the it works trap it's it's going to play a part in everything moving forward because you have these good and true things that are sold to you but along with it you're also being sold this other stuff this other pseudocientific pseudospiritual stuff that's how it works so for him Christianity was not a religion or a creed that's very important it was a power to be tapped into this is where the whole premise of his book The Power of Positive Thinking comes from that's where people would recognize Norman Vincent Peele from it was a phenomenally popular book it's still around today it's not just about not being a cynical and negative person he's actually talking about manifesting your reality with the power of your mind your thoughts are things and you can actually create your reality it will bring you health and prosperity and happiness and to Peel God was bigger than a person he was this energy that we could tap into while at the same time being personal because God always wanted you to be happy healthy and wealthy that was the idea that that was the the presuppositional idea of who God was in New Thought god is in all of humanity and if God is in all of humanity then we all must be good so this idea that we're all terrible sinners is bad for our self-esteem it's bad for our psyche it's bad for our mental health so what people like Robert Scheler and Norman Vincent Peele wanted to do is to show you your potential to show you how good you are you're not this horrible person this is completely opposite to what the Bible teaches that we are not all born children of God we become children of God we are all made in the image of God that does not then equal that God lives in all of us that has to be a choice upon the believer that has to be something you become you're adopted into the family of God the the idea is is that you didn't belong to God to begin with why did you have to be adopted into his family so there's theological issues there the way that they get around it is well just redefine scripture when it's convenient and discard the stuff that you disagree with wash rinse repeat a fun fact about the power of positive thinking i remember reading this as a teenager and being absolutely enamored with it i had grown up with these spiritual concepts being taught to me but there was something so fascinating about these metaphysical principles that he taught that your mind could have power and it's really all about framing your mind in a positive way to manifest that power your world is more mental than material is kind of the idea that Peele would give and he taught that our deepest problem is a lack of belief in ourselves and that our salvation comes with a simple shift in our thinking classic new thought to Norman Vincent Peele faith is seen as a power prayer affirmations are the way to pray because you declare what you want you don't want for anything you don't ask for anything you claim it you affirm it because God always wants you to have it he always wants good for you and he's always there giving giving giving giving giving you just have to know how to take it god always wants you to be healthy prosperous and happy i mentioned that before that's a very fundamental belief not just a new thought but with preachers like Robert Schuler and Norman Vincent Peele but it is up to you to change your thinking in order to make it happen therefore there's power in your positive thinking have this mind in you which was in Christ Jesus our Lord it says the Bible what kind of a mind was in Jesus no hate no dirt no negativism no failure no sickness if if we've got people sitting out here that aren't happy or healthy it could just be that you got something sour in your mind i think that should give you not only an idea of what new thought is but what Norman Vincent Peele's beliefs are peele was one of the most wildly popular New Thought pastors of his time but everybody thought he was just a positive pastor i would like to do a whole deep dive just on him one day because his influence has reached very far and wide not just Robert Schuler but people like the the Trump family fun fact uh Norman Vincent Peele was also a part of the RCA i'm just trolling my reformed friends at this point uh more on this again later so Robert Schuler credits Peele and his beliefs which are new thought so let me rephrase this robert Schuler is crediting Norman Vincent Peele's new thought beliefs as the core reason for his success when Scheler's relationship started growing with Peele the less Scheler credited the RCA denomination or even associated himself with the theology scheler reading new thought material was the turning point in his theology and methodologies everything really started changing after Schuler read Peele's book also it's not like these men were all new thought in their beliefs uh there's a spectrum with with new thought i was on that spectrum but I would have been more Christiany sounding what I am saying is that the partial adoption of new thought ideas can still distort Christianity especially when those ideas are are blended into mainstream theology that's part of what makes it so deceptive you don't have to buy into the whole movement like the law of attraction or preach full-blown Christ consciousness for example to be influenced by it the real danger is in the ideas that slide under the radar beliefs like some that we've already gone over like your thoughts becoming things your words can shape your reality uh your words have power and then using scripture to back that up uh you can manifest outcomes through intention and faith health and wealth prosperity teachings god is all love and light and never judgment and uh Jesus came to unleash divine potential and more he came to teach love and that's really what the gospel is about things like that these kinds of ideas rooted in new thought blend far more easily into Christianity than the more overtly mystical ones like mind vibrations or oneness with God and that's in my opinion why it's harder to spot like I said before you end up with a spectrum where some pastors might fully embrace the language of manifestation abundance things like that while others might simply preach positive thinking identity self-worth in a way that quietly echoes new thought and it's subtle and and that's really the point you don't have to agree with it all for it to affect everything else so where are we now all right here we are all right now with that in mind uh I want to talk about two of Robert Schuler's major areas of theology that have been very affected by new thought beliefs starting with self-esteem theology here we're going to get more into Robert Schuler's problematic theology now I've read some of his biography i've heard some of his sermons and he honestly reminds me a lot of Joel Ostein same with Norman Vincent Peele there are times that it sounds so biblical and correct and then other times it sounds like nonsense scheler sounded and looked very traditionally Christian a lot of times he wore a ministerial robe quoted scripture had traditional music it was played on this beautiful church organ many people who attended his church would think that they're basically hearing an uplifting Christian message his his messages were demonstrably focused on self-esteem the power of the mind positive thinking things like that rather than the gospel to him the gospel was offensive and you didn't want to offend anybody at least the way that the Bible describes it the way that Robert Schuler describes it anybody could believe that gospel he even wrote an entire book it's on the bottom of my pile called Self-Esteem the New Reformation that's a kick in the pants for the RCA huh let me share with you guys a few things from this book to give you an idea to give you an idea of what we're talking about here uh the first thing I'm going to read here is actually from the inner flap like explaining to you what the book's about it's really interesting you still have the the price tag on here it's $8.95 it's very overpriced robert Schuler is calling for nothing less than a new reformation in this book The Dynamic Possibility Thinking Pastor which we'll get into that later shows how the Protestant Reformation did not affirm the worth of persons as strongly as it should so that should give you an idea of how he feels about the RCA denomination but there's more here this is on page 14 so all right check this out this is exactly what I was just talking about i am convinced that the deepest of all human needs is salvation from sin and hell okay Robert Schuler all right i see sin as all pervasive inhumity infecting all human behavior and polluting the social institutions and systems at every level the result of sin is death and hell it sounds really biblical just just wait i perceive the agony of human distance from God and helplessness to be more profound than articulated by classical churchmen but now we have come to the problem of semantics what do I mean by sin answer any human condition or act that robs God of glory by stripping one of his children to their right to divine dignity i could offer another complimenting answer sin is that deep lack of trust that separates me from God and leaves me with a sense of shame and unworthiness i can offer still another answer sin is any act or thought that robs myself or another human being of his or her selfesteem so to Robert Schuler sin is having low self-esteem sin is so much worse than that but moving on there's more and what is hell it is the loss of pride pride it's the loss of pride that naturally follows separation from God the ultimate and unfeailing source of our soul's sense of selfrespect my God my God why hast thou forsaken me was Christ's encounter with hell in that hellish death our Lord experienced the ultimate horror humiliation shame and loss of pride as a human being a person is in hell when he has lost his self-esteem self-esteem now I'm I'm reading further down on the page here self-esteem is the human hunger for the divine dignity that God intended to be our emotional birthright as children created in his image this is on page 19 we're still in the introduction by the way this is just the introduction this is page 19 self-esteem then or pride in being a human being that's how he defines self-esteem it's your pride in being human okay is the single greatest need facing the human race today by the way this is classic new thought i would say that this is like a soft version of oneness the idea that you're not separate from God you just need to recognize it and if you can trust that you are with God that God is with you that you are his child that you're not separated from him then you will gain your self-esteem you will gain your self-worth it's soft oneness is basically how I see everything here now somebody who might not be familiar with Christianity might read this and or hear this and think "That sounds wonderful that sounds really good it sounds like he's trying to soften a lot of the harsher message of of Christianity maybe they're they're thinking that that sounds like not such a bad thing but here's the problem he's redefining fundamental Christian doctrine to make it softer and basically creating a different gospel because this is what this is what false gospels do this is what different gospels do is they make it so that it's unoffensive it makes it so it caters to your human desires and human nature and takes away the offense of the cross that's okay anyway I'm not even done yet we still have a few more things here and remember this is just to give you an idea from his own words what he believes this is on page 47 in the chapter lordship of Christ receive and enjoy the fruit of salvation self-esteem and self-worth hear God's call to you he would save you for high and holy service to be proud of who you are then stop putting yourself down start enjoying the dignity that is your God- intended destiny now a part of that I agree with okay okay like I understand that some of us can be real cynical and we can have this really bad self-image but but this is more psychology than than gospel you know what I mean if the gospel of Jesus Christ can be proclaimed as a theology of self-esteem imagine the health this could generate in society all right this is later on in on page 57 dare to be a possibility thinker do not fear pride the easiest job God has is to humble us god's almost impossible task is to keep us believing every hour of every day how great we are as his sons and daughters on planet Earth so what I want to emphasize with all of this that I'm reading is there's a pendulum swing here he's demoting God and elevating humanity and when you do that you get this inflated view of of your own self-worth of of humanity and you get this deflated view of God it messes everything up this one's going to put a twitch in my eye okay page 64 it is precisely at this point that classical theology has aired in its insistence that theology be God centered not man centered classical theology defines sin as rebellion against God mhm mhm the answer is not incorrect as much as it is shallow and insulting to the human being every person deserves to be treated with dignity even if he or she is a rebellious sinner which is true this is true this is not that that sentence is not at odds with Christianity i suggest that the problem stems from a failure in historical theology to make a distinction between Adam's sin and original sin adam was created in the image of God and enjoyed at the outset of his human life a fellowship with the father then sin that's what he says sin entered the scene what was the sin bruce Larson whoever that is has pointed out it was the absence of total trust somehow Adam did not trust God's promise for fulfillment enough to obediently abstain from the forbidden fruit and the immediate result of his disobedience was guilt and what is guilt but an ugly loss of self-esteem when God called Adam "Where are you?" Adam hid in the bushes while Adam was created in fellowship with God all of Adam's children were born detached from a trusting relationship with Heavenly Father the core of original sin that state in which we are all born is lack of trust you know and to top all things off one thing I've noticed is a disdain for certain parts of scripture and certain people that might say things that they don't entirely agree with which would be Paul there's a lot of disagreement maybe even disdain for Paul in a lot of progressive Christian circles and I find that same sentiment in Robert Scheler's writings where the Protestant Reformation was a reactionary movement the 20th century Reformation must be a reconciling movement luther and Calvin we know looked to the book of Romans in the Bible for their primary inspiration were they unknowingly possessed more by the spirit of St paul than the spirit of Jesus Christ he'd probably be one to say "Oh I just followed the red letters." And I'm like "Well who do you think wrote the red letters they're just as important as the black ones." You can't have the red letters without the black letters as we focus on Jesus Christ we shall discover a new theology one that offers salvation from shame to self-esteem we shall discover that self-esteem rooted in Christ's love finally satisfies every person's thirst for glory and the result will be a faith that will bring glory to the human race for the greater glory of God now watch this this is very interesting i want to read this and I want you to see how quickly he dances from one position to the other this is on page 45 shall we be satisfied with the traditional and predictable Protestant position the sacred scriptures are our infallible rule for faith and practice and we have insisted that in and through the Bible God's eternal truth is communicated we would all agree with this he's saying this out of one side of his mouth but can anything be above the scriptures yes the eternal word transcends the written word christ is the word made flesh christ is Lord over the scriptures the scriptures are not Lord over Christ so the Bible must not compete with the Lord for the seed of glory we are saved by the blood not by the book see it's this kind of stuff that puts a twitch in my eye because where does he think we learn about what Jesus taught where are his teachings if only there were some historical documents that we could know and learn what Jesus was trying to teach h if only somebody wrote down a biography somewhere that could tell us what it is that Christ our Lord would want for our life what were these doctrines what were these theologies that he speaks of i mean we're just totally left on our own to figure it out and I guess following our heart is the only answer if scripture is not sufficient to teach us theology and doctrines about who Jesus is and what he taught if scripture is not God breathed and should be the source that tells us who Jesus is what he said what he taught and how the Old Testament makes sense with the New Testament then the authority is us that's what happens this sounds like the same stuff that I hear progressive Christians say and I hear this all the time in new thought circles that the Holy Spirit in Christ speaks to you directly and the scriptures come second it sounds so lame and cliche but that's really what it is you are basically following your feelings you're following yourself and how do you test that because that's the whole problem with this you are basically listening to yourself this is a Jesus and a God made in your own image you have no objective way to test what you are feeling here's another telling quote uh I'm not sure if this is an article or a book but it's from 2005 called Affirm God's Love accept God's love and forgiveness don't keep on confessing your sins don't continue to tell God what a miserable person you are to continue to do so will only feed the negative self-image you have of yourself now is the time to stop repenting and start affirming "God loves me god loves me even though I'm not perfect god loves me even though I do not have the the faith that I ought to have." This must mean I am a wonderful person see this is sprinkled with truth and untruth he takes away the stumbling block to the gospel the fact that you are a sinner and that you're not enough he takes that away he tells you "You've always been enough you are enough that's not the God of the Bible that's a universalist God made up on paper by Robert Scheler slapped with Christian terminology and a few Bible scriptures so that's just a few things from his book uh to give you an idea of what we're dealing with here he has virtually redefined the basic and core beliefs of Christianity to appease the masses and attract people and it really worked one of Scheler's main beliefs was that virtually every problem a person has and every ill that plagues society all the sin all the evil in the world is a result of people having low self-esteem therefore our greatest need is to have our self-esteem increased it's not the gospel of Jesus Christ it's the gospel of self-esteem it's a false gospel one area that I see where Schuler really goes wrong is that he assumes that biblical Christianity somehow devalues the person now I can only assume that maybe it was certain reformed doctrines that he just could not accept like maybe the total depravity of humanity there's a fancy theological world called plagianism which was deemed heretical but it basically taught that all humans were born inherently good and that there is no original sin this was deemed heretical but the idea is that you are capable of perfection this is deeply instilled into new thought as well and this has a bunch of theological implications because if you are good then why do you need to hear about sin why do you need to hear about repentance about hell this is really where the emphasis on the positive Christianity comes from with Robert Scheler he only emphasizes the positive parts of Christianity that's it the negative stuff is seen as bad for your self-esteem where he really goes wrong and honestly he should have known better given his theological training is in the conclusions that he draws they're not just off they're theologically incorrect and incompatible with Christianity so to his credit at least he wrote a whole book claiming that we need to have a new reformation that he knew that what he was saying was not compatible with biblical Christianity on the other hand it also tells me that considering his background he knowingly suppressed what he was taught maybe out of a desire to please people rather than faithfully uphold sound doctrine it just sounds like to me the guy has been burned by legalism that's what it sounds like to me he thinks that if it's harmful to insist that you have sin and that you need a savior to forgive you and that sounds very familiar in today's religious landscape but I think he's making a caricature of it he should know better i completely agree that that harsh legalistic stances can be harmful 100% and I've talked about this many times i think of certain Christians and cults like the Jehovah's Witnesses for example who put such a burden of of works on you or other high control groups where mind control is established you feel shamed guilty and burdened every single day of your life and I think that what he has done is he has overcorrected from that harsh legalism it seems to me that Robert Scheler loved people more than he loved God and I think that's just the simplest way I can put it he didn't love both i mean you're talking about the greatest commandments to love God and people but to love him with your heart and your mind i mean the greatest commandments were to love God with your heart and your mind and to love God and to love people and it's like he's made an imbalance of of all of that so in regards to Robert Schuler's self-esteem book I like the way that Albert Mohler put it is that this book is basically his ministry manifesto if you want to know what Robert Schuler believes then read this book and it's bad you guys I've mentioned it before but just think about that he actually was implying a new church reformation around self-esteem around you not the gospel that is not a reformation that's like deconstruction reforming assumes that you are aiming to historic Orthodox Christian beliefs but that's not what he's doing here he might claim that that's what he's doing but you can demonstraably show that is not in scripture he's redefining basic theological definitions in order to do this in this way to me he's no different than a lot of progressive Christians where he believed he was improving Christianity not reforming it so I would say that this is only half of his ministry manifesto the other half comes with a teaching called possibility thinking so with the self-esteem aspect nailed down I want to cover more of a core teaching that Schuler had the possibility thinking aspect this was another book by the way uh with the same title that goes into the possibility thinking theology alongside his self-esteem theology possibility thinking was the foundation of his preaching books and leadership at the Crystal Cathedral it was framed as a Christian message but heavily influenced by Norman Vincent Peele's positive thinking and of course new thought ideas focusing your mental attitude visualization and personal potential rather than repentance sin or the sovereignty of God it was all about your human pride and potential and the possibilities that your thinking could lead you to because of that potential i am going to go over some of the basic beliefs of possibility thinking and I want to see if you guys can pick up on the new thought beliefs in each one of these first believe in yourself what Scheler taught with this is that that faith begins with your self-confidence not self-denial he said that the greatest sin is to think too little of yourself this redefined faith as believing in your own potential not as Christ and Savior just like what we went over with the self-esteem concept he demotes God and elevates man the second thing is you need to remove all negative thinking of course this one's a given you have to eliminate all negativity including thoughts of failure sin guilt weakness because in his view such thinking was not just unproductive it was spiritually damaging it was spiritual abuse and I see and what I still see and this is a pattern with a lot of these beliefs is that you also have to remove negative people in your life because they can be spiritually damaging too and I'm not talking about let me be clear here I always feel like I need to nuance this kind of stuff i am not talking about actually negative people like harmfully negative i'm in agreement with him when it comes to in a common sense way changing the way you think thinking more positive to make your life better there are all kinds of proverbs about this that's not what I'm talking about here the way that Robert Schuler frames negative thinking and negative people is if there's an offensive message if there's anything they say that's offensive to you and hurts your self-esteem then it's negative i'm actually going to show you an example of this later there's a debate that Robert Schuler was in with somebody and I think it just puts all of this into perspective practically speaking what this did with his messages is that it made sermons it led to sermons that intentionally avoided words like sin repentance or hell and if he did use those words as you can see he redefined them the third one is visualize success he promoted visualization encouraging people to see their goals in their mind's eye as already accomplished now that alone guys is not wrong i I think that when we plan things and we have goals we're thinking "Okay this is how it needs to be i'm I'm being responsible planning ahead i'm visualizing how I want it to be." But the way that Robert Schuler taught visualization wasn't just to be responsible in your organization he was teaching you a spiritual concept so sometimes yes it can be semantics i mean you'll hear somebody say that they're visualizing how they want it to be but they're okay if that's not what happens like they they can pivot they're content that's not what's happening here when you're visualizing something you are actually giving it power to be created that's very different now he got this form of visualization from Peele and this is basically new thought mental imaging or manifesting and this also really shuts down a lot of critical thinking because critical thinking is negative thinking you have to always imagine yourself being successful because that's what a possibility thinker does it goes beyond just being an optimist and a trailblazer you are actually choosing how your reality exists that's where it really crosses the line from being something practical to being something almost delusional all right the next one the fourth one is God wants you to succeed here Schuler believed that success like health achievement and happiness things like that was part of God's will for everyone i talked a lot about this before but he didn't necessarily preach prosperity just like televangelists do or prosperity preachers do today but it was a different type of prosperity he basically taught a therapeutic gospel where personal achievement equals spiritual growth the gospel that he wants to share with his unchurched audience is that they can do anything that they want to that that everything is possible for a possibility thinker he was there to motivate and uplift them the fifth one is problems are opportunities something that Robert Schuler is famous for quoting is "Tough times never last but tough people do." It's interesting because this quote is probably probably more well-known than Robert Schuler is right now his focus was on the positive how to overcome it but it was short changed because he never focused on why the suffering exists which if I'm honest is such a copout because this is a defective thing to tell someone especially when it comes to the Christian worldview robert Scheler took away the tears from Christianity because the answer to suffering is the cross a lot of people believe what they do because of pain and suffering and the answer that makes sense with reality is the cross it's what Jesus did it's the gospel it's the Christian worldview the whole Christian worldview and Schuler took that away from people he took the grit and tears from Christianity a lot of Christians have no resiliency because of self-esteem theology in my opinion so whenever they are challenged their spirituality might break because it's so fragile but moving on sixth is faith is possibility thinking now as we've gone over before he redefined biblical faith not as trust in God's promises or Christ's work but as inner confidence and imagination in other words faith meant refusing to accept limits even those that might be part of God's will because it's not part of God's will it's actually about your will this is actually a very new thought concept the idea that God always is just this positive thinking willing God it's power and the only thing you have to do is tap into that through your right thinking number seven is rebrand Christianity for self-esteem i won't say much on this we've already gone on to this and in a lot of detail but this is what Scheler would say he said that Jesus met needs before he preached sermons so he saw the church's job as healing emotional wounds especially low self-esteem and negative thinking so for him Christianity needed a new reformation centered on on your dignity and pride not your depravity and he famously said this "The most serious sin is the one that causes me to say I am unworthy." Uh this is also just as true for positive thinking he's on record saying this "I believe in positive thinking it is almost as important as the resurrection of Jesus Christ oh so bad those are the basic ideas of of possibility thinking and what's really disturbing here I'm sure a lot of you have picked up on this but uh what's particularly disturbing is that Robert Scheler is on record saying that he believes that possibility thinking not the gospel is why God put him on Earth to him the gospel was possibility thinking it was self-esteem like he went even as far as to create a Bible called the New Possibility Thinkers Bible now to be clear this is not like a new version of the Bible okay it's not like the Passion translation or the New World Translation it is uh a new King James version uh of the Bible but what makes it interesting okay there are certain highlighted passages that are considered special to help you pray with positive faith and claim the promises of God for your life what I found kind of hilarious though is that in in the Old Testament let me just show you guys okay so we're in 2 Samuel like there's one highlight in Leviticus there's almost none in Leviticus or Exodus or Genesis i'm sure there's some we can find one hold on stay with me oh we found one genesis 17 okay we found one okay I'm invested now let's see second Chronicles nothing there 2 Kings oh okay h first Kings oh there's one in chapter 17 okay so you get you get the idea there's not a lot highlighted in the Old Testament now compare that to the New Testament okay let's see okay this is Romans which is written by Paul oh there's more in Romans highlighted let's check out the Gospels i have a feeling that the Gospels are going to be really highlighted oh here's Luke here's first Corinthians uh it's hard to go a page without having something highlighted on in the New Testament what's funny is that in the Old Testament the Psalms and Proverbs are the most highlighted yeah i mean look at that you can't you can't go a page in the Psalms without half the page being highlighted but second Kings forget that nobody wants to know about that so you get the idea there's an overview of each book of the Bible and it adds additional commentary like encouraging commentary every so often within the book that you're reading that can sometimes be a little sketch like let me give you an example here we have Galatians which highlighted but here's what it says uh some encouraging commentary uh there's a whole thing here but I'm going to read to you a few sentences from this it says talking about Paul realized ized that Christ was the goal of the law he had been taught he had to unlearn all of the legalism of his upbringing with the Holy Spirit's guidance he filtered out the negative use this is the worst character to say this with he filtered out the negative use of doctrines which taught judgment and arguments and replace them with the fruit of the spirit if you change your thoughts you change your world this is what Paul taught us there's a lot to say there i'm sure you can sense the double-mindedness because he has animosity towards Paul yet he was apparently a possibility thinker obviously he didn't do something right though cuz I mean got himself killed and stuff amateur so the best news I can give you about everything I just went over is that none of it none of it is biblical everything I just told you has halftruths in it i always want to emphasize of of course it's so important to find value in every human being as we are all made in the image of God and I again I get how there have been legalistic groups that have been basically abusive in their theology when it comes to human worth i get that but this is a severe and unbiblical overcorrection both are false you don't you don't fix one false gospel by creating another one scheler's main goal was to present a positive Christianity which implies that there are positive aspects of Christianity of course but he leaves out all the stuff that you don't want to hear so this gives a distorted view of Christianity which is no Christianity at all a distorted gospel which is no gospel at all a simple reading of scripture shows that Scheler's version of Christianity is not only a contradiction to its teachings but fundamentally needs to either redefine scripture in order to make it work and either elevate humanity to God's position demote God to humanity's level and demote scripture and elevate your experience in order for it all to work that's exactly what Schuler does that's the only way any of this works and this is basically Satan's MMO from the beginning question God and give power wash rinse repeat this probably goes without saying but most of what I just went over was because of Norman Vincent Peele's influence and new thought theology when Robert Scheler was forming his beliefs him and Peele became very close those two went from a friend crush to an all-out bromance peele became very good friends with Robert Schuler and visited the Crystal Cathedral to preach very often and possibility thinking of course self-esteem as well were core preaching points so those are the beliefs now I want to talk about the principles how is this applied so you have this weird dance of his this very awkward dance of his reformed beliefs and this other new thought positive beliefs and he is creating his own type of Christianity through his self-esteem reformation and his possibility thinking gospel so keep in mind these are the doctrines that are informing his methods and intentions not not biblical Christianity it's new thought and now that we've gone over those doctrines and how new thought has helped inform them I'm going to share with you five basic principles that he taught from this spiritual perspective and how he applied this practically within a church setting and how he implemented these things to grow his church and then marketed it to other pastors but I'm getting ahead of myself the first principle is impress the unchurched robert Scheler believed that he was a missionary to reach those who didn't go to church for him he he was not necessarily there for the Christians his job was to love on the non-Christians the problem was that he didn't believe the way to do that was with the gospel not the biblical gospel anyway more on this later but the idea was to be non-traditional use marketing strategies have new shiny things like an impressive building maybe one looking like crystal you redefine sermons and now call them messages and the focus should not be on theology but on emotional felt needs and how God wants you to succeed and another thing he did is that he called the church a community church for the sake of seekers who didn't understand denominations the second application here is don't be controversial as we've gone over Scheler's focus was on the positive aspects of Christianity this is how he formed his sermons he didn't talk about sin hell wrath anything that was negative you should always focus on the positive many people are surprised to find out that Robert Scheler believed it was I'm quoting utterly ridiculous to ask someone to change their faith the next one is humans aren't rebellious we're just mistrusting we went over this a little bit before but this is a really big point he makes in his self-esteem book we read a little bit of it this places an extreme amount of innocence on human beings this is like the shack theology in a way and it's an overemphasis on God's love so not to sound repetitive but it is part of the application of how he would deliver his sermons i am going to read to you one little thing from his book self-esteem the new reformation uh because we're talking about application at this point but I think that this applies here this is one reason why he wouldn't talk a lot about sin and repentance this is what he believes about it essentially if Christianity is to succeed in the next millennium it must cease to be a negative religion which implies that it's a negative religion it's not anyway it must become positive negative thinking theologians looked at the doctrine of sin salvation and repentance yes even the incarnation crucifixion and to a degree the resurrection through distorted glasses tinted with a mortification mentality or negative thinking now here's here's the point here too many prayers of confession of sin and repentance have been destructive to the emotional health of Christians by feeding their sense of nonworth just a little bit of insight on why he wouldn't preach it from the platform which segus me into number four self-esteem messages what I want you to pay attention here with this one is how familiar it sounds because here we are talking about how this practically looked from the pull pit because teaching it is one thing but how did this look you got to work the emotions right this is the focus tell people they're awesome just the way they are this was by design you can be extroverted on the pullpit that's not the problem i'm assuming that people maybe have never listened to a Robert Scheler sermon or a Norman Vincent Peele sermon but sometimes it can get a little animated you develop the courage to respond to great ideas when you see them not as a threat but could crash your home tough times never last but tough people do success doesn't come the way you think it comes because of the way you think they made different commitments they made different decisions i mean you're not just using your personality up there this is a marketing feature you're using psychology mixed with new thought mind power uh optimism and then you implement this in your message this is kind of where in this perspective where Schuler kind of elevated himself a little bit he thought that this aspect of teaching gave him more insight into the human condition than theologians did like oh I know better than you guys i'm more spiritual if you guys have been around my channel any amount of time you'll know exactly what that means but the idea is that you have more spiritual insight than these close-minded fundamentalist Christians you know better and so it's kind of a sense of pride it's a type of pride cloaked in the language of humility it's really tricky i also think that it was a dig at his reformed roots it was basically self-help optimism in the name of Jesus uh basically I think of a Joel Osine message the trick of the enemy is to get you to go through life feeling inferior like you're not enough speaking negative i am with the zeal of a Steven Ferdick they're downloading the sermon uh-oh they're joining the gym uh-oh they're lacing their shoes uh-oh so it's not how much of his presence do you have it's how much of his power do you want the idea is to want people to feel good about themselves and keep them entertained and not feel like sinners now that we've gone over all of this I I really might have my mind explode if I do not finally briefly address this very ironic contradiction between Robert Schuler's reformed beliefs and his new thought beliefs okay how does he square that circle the answer is that he doesn't he just shoves that circle right into that square pretending that it fits out of one side of his mouth to one audience all right he's talking about total depravity you know he's he's talking about you know God's will God's sovereignty and then out of the other side of his mouth he's talking about how worthy you are and an undeniable message of self-esteem and inherent goodness and the answer came when I was reading the glass church and they actually talk about this very thing apparently as it turns out Robert Schuler denied that John Calvin ever taught reformed theology and this is totally going to sound familiar to some of you guys where where people make the same argument with Jesus right where it was his followers that actually changed the initial message of what Jesus was trying to say so John Calvin's followers according to Schuler distorted what John Calvin had to say just like Jesus had followers that distorted what Jesus was trying to say it's the same thing so it's up to us to discover and redefine that message so that's exactly what he did he reinterpreted John Calvin's teachings and he said that he found a theology of of hope and joy that liberates humanity from from shame and blame and gives them pride that's almost a quote in their book i mean it's apparent that Robert Scheler saw what he would consider rigid legalism in the RCA which I'm not going to lie that that is a danger that is a danger where one group might be more gullible and the other might be too mean but we're talking about extremes here okay uh from what I know about with a lot of my reformed friends is they don't they just don't mess with heretical beliefs they would never put up with this kind of stuff so knowing how someone like Norman Vincent Peele and Robert Schuler stayed in the RCA without getting kicked out is phenomenally interesting to me so I actually had a theory uh that I came up with that's very similar to the theory that the authors of the glass church had for why Robert Schuler and how Robert Schuler towed this line of being reformed and new thought and it's very simple and it's actually very smart of him manipulative but but smart because he's such a good marketer right the net remember the net it's because he can cater to both audiences he he chose the identity that was convenient for him at the time so if legitimate Christians questioned him then he would just throw out there that he's part of the reformed church he went to seminary he has all these fancy degrees and he could talk the talk so he must be legit right and then when it came to his other audience that he was trying to attract he was more than happy to put all of that away to appear attractive and inclusive to them like it if he was talking to someone like Albert Mohler for example he was talking about the Nyine creed right and confirms basic Christian Orthodoxy but if he's talking with someone like Larry King then he's basically a universalist and the Christian gospel can hurt self-esteem i mean the dude was just squishy he had absolutely no backbone when it came to the truth of the gospel he would not draw that line because I think he was so occupied with with wanting to attract everybody with what he was saying that he ended up becoming a hypocrite really and speaking out of both sides of his mouth i think this really helps explain how some Christians that we would consider respectable would have done ministry with him but I also think that it's abundantly clear where he really did stand when it came to his theology and doctrine hence his ministry confessional so hopefully that helps explain the RCA conundrum so this is the basic theology of Robert Schuler and in my opinion what few people have picked up on even back in Schuler's day was that the secret ingredient that fed him his diet of nopey nonsense theology was new thought and believe it or not this is only a fraction of of his stuff i always find it very interesting to know why someone believes what they do and usually what I find at the foundation of why they would do that and why they would believe what they do is pain i call this the pain point you guys might have heard me talk about this before but this is basically where somebody's theology and beliefs are not built through a lens of truth but through a lens of pain of some kind and in this case it would seem that Robert Scheler really seemed frustrated and burned out with what he would consider hard legalism in the church and I think it's through that lens that he created this new theology so I like to post online when I'm doing deep dives sometimes and I ask you guys to send me things share stories and one of you guys sent me a debate that Robert Scheler did with Michael Horton with uh what's called the White Horse in podcast honestly it was more of a conversation than anything but I was astounded at not only some of the claims that Schuler made but how frustrated he got when questioned he really wanted to make a point that he wanted to preach more like Jesus not Paul like they were at competition with each other like Jesus was somehow more loving than Paul or Paul was more harsh than Jesus and it's here where he expressed his frustration with rigid legalism he has expressed this throughout his writings and even from the pull pit but this is his pain point so it's very important in my opinion to understand this it's not an excuse for his theology but it is a reason but something else about this debate just left my jaw on the floor about 20 minutes in all Horton is doing all he's doing is asking Robert Schuler basic questions he's not being rude he's not being aggressive nothing i was absolutely stunned at how Schuler reacted to being questioned about his own theology and doctrines in my opinion listening to this conversation will really help you understand and give context to everything that we went over before how could the cross as you write sanctify the ego trip and make us proud in the light of passages that say "I hate pride and arrogance pride goes before destruction the Lord detests all the proud do not be proud love does not boast it is not proud in fact Paul warns Timothy that in the last days men will be lovers of themselves why should we as Christian ministers myself included why should we do anything to encourage people to become lovers of themselves if Paul in fact warned Timothy that that would be the state of godlessness in the last days i hope you don't preach this i hope you don't preach it i don't think you do text no no no what you're just what you're feeding into that microphone now because I hope you don't you can do a lot of damage to a lot of beautiful people if you but maybe if you preach it maybe you will demonstrate your knowledge of human relationships and maybe you'll demonstrate a sensitivity of caring about these pathetic pathetic people that are so so lost in pain and suffering because of their sinful condition and I think you'd want to save them i think you'd want to bring them to Jesus and so if you preach that text oh man I sure hope you give it the kind of interpretation that I do or I'll tell you you'll drive them farther away and they'll be madder than hell at you and they'll turn the Bible off and they'll switch you off and they'll turn on the rock music of Madonna that's where they're coming from so please that stuff in our Bible passages just because it's in the Bible doesn't mean you should preach it and if you do you have to say "Who's listening to me will they understand and will the love of Jesus come through my words and through my message as and through my personality and will it come through my spirit will I come across as a humble person or will I come across as a as a person that's kind of mean and know it all and I've got the answers and people like Schuler come along they're heretics so be careful so it's so difficult to preach some of those texts and not come across as lacking humility well one last question before we take our break dr schuler you write that the essence of sin is not thinking you're good enough and that the reason unsaved people reject the gospel is that they quote believe they're an unworthy sinner that the unsaved person cannot perceive himself as worthy of divine grace and hence rejects it but how could a person deserve undeserved favor yeah you give treat me fair give me the paper ah you know I didn't know you were going to hit this whole subject tonight i wouldn't have done it to a guest without advancing him and I'm not complaining about it you know not at all but when you rattle off a whole paragraph let me look at what question were you reading 10 11 12 and I'll I'll be very honest to approach it but uh question n you love so many words there uh nine you write that the essence of sin is not thinking you're good enough no I've never said that see somebody I don't I don't think you wrote this stuff i hope you didn't whoever put these words on paper before your eyeballs was not honest i didn't say that the essence of sin is not thinking you're good enough i never said that i know my words if I have misread that I give you my word i will send you a written apology and I will that's the quote I have that I took out if that's wrong it is it is absolutely wrong and that's about the second or third thing that you've said tonight reading from me saying "I said that i never said that." Let me tell you something you're a young man and you have read some of my work but you came into those books with your own paradigms your own concepts your own indoctrination and you have been educated but you've also been indoctrinated but isn't it the goodness of God that moved him to put Christ on the cross seeing our misery rather than God seeing something in us worth redeeming well I think that's I yes and yes yes and yes to that one okay ought we to pray our father in heaven honorable is our name uh I mean that's a legitimate question it may be a legitimate question but I think it's kind of a dumb question because I don't teach that ask somebody who teaches it you wrote it on page 69 of I'm tired now and this you're leaving laying so many heavy trips all of them are negative in from their assumptions every single one and that's a little too tiring dr scher I write books too and I have to take a better interviews well okay you write something then you're obligated to the church i've given you a half hour and I thank you very much oh 45 minutes I think not obligated to the people of God to tell them the truth sure I do that every day then why do you have why can't you take questions negative people that ask negative questions fatigue me i draw strength from the presence of God and I feel the presence of God when I hear him come to me through positive thoughts of trusting people who have who reflect his love and his grace and and this is a scene tonight that's just a little different so thank you very much and may I may I slip away if that's your if that's your choice i think so thank you for being with us thank you very much i don't know the difference cuz I don't know where you guys are at hidleberg Catechism oh I love that i know it by memory what is your only comfort in life and death what's the answer it's not enough to know it by memory but I Well you better don't hurt your back you don't agree with the theology i agree with it absolutely I do sure Jan i agree very much what two things are necessary to have salvation that's H Highleberg Catechism do you believe wait wait wait wait that's the question you dropped it come on what's the answer what's the question what two things are necessary i don't I don't presume to I'm a Presbyterian i don't presume to know the catechism by heart come on oh no you're backing out you're No tell me i'll tell you what I believe it's not about memorization it's about what we Let me ask you it's first is how great my sins and miseries are but you don't i do you don't hear me someday maybe you'll catch on lots of people are thank God i I let people know how great their sins and miseries are how do I do that i don't do that by standing in a pulpit and telling them they're sinners you know I don't do it that way so the way I preach sin is by calling to attention to people what it does to them here and now and their need for divine grace but what about what it does for them in eternity i mean isn't it eternity a matter of maybe so I don't deny hell i believe in heaven i believe in hell but I don't know what happens there but you say hell i don't take it literally that it's a place where the fire never stops burning and I can't help but notice the irony with it is that he is against legalism but from what I'm listening and hearing in this conversation he is the legalistic one he's the one shutting down critical thinking he's the one opposing any sort of disagreement with his doctrines i call this soft legalism where it's not as overt but you're putting just as much a burden on yourself and other people with your teachings it's just through this squishier lens than a than a hard one i highly recommend that you guys go listen to this whole interview and get the feel for it i'll leave a link in the description uh but Robert Schuler really had a hard time with anybody offering any sort of critical analysis of what he was saying even if it was done with genuine curiosity and in a good spirit which again is very hypocritical considering he read Dale Carnegiey's book if you want to talk with people and understand them and and reason with them that's exactly what Michael Horton was doing he wasn't even imposing anything he was just asking him uh trying to pin him down and so that's the part I found very hypocritical not only this but I kind of got the feel from Scheler that he's the type of guy that gets his way and he seems to be very dominant in these types of conversations i mean he raised his voice at one part in that conversation and it made me jump even if we were trusting the problem is is much more than not being trusting i say "Oh no you're wrong then you're wrong." And it's often very seldom do I use this language people who know me say Schuler never comes across as if he knows the answers and others don't it's not my style but I intuitively say to you you're wrong ultimate deepest most sinful problem that you can imagine is lack of trust hebrews 11:6 for without faith it is impossible to please God i found it hypocritical but also a little manipulative like he's not used to people challenging him or telling him no but more on this in the next part we have covered the theology and his perspective but there's also a more influential legacy that Robert Schuler is known for and that is his knack for growing a church which is me segueing into the second part of this video or is it the third yeah it's the third part of this video whether you realize it or not Robert Schuler has had a profound impact on how we do church today from Andy Stanley to Rick Warren to Joel Ostein to Steven Ferdick and beyond when you go to a seeker sensitive church you are partially seeing the legacy of Robert H schuler so we went over his theology which I believe is the hidden secret behind the seeker sensitive model because I am submitting that his theology informed his intentions and methods to grow a church and how to do it and I think it's from this posture that the part he played in the seeker sensitive movement is very crucial and we shouldn't overlook it we need to talk about this my argument is that Scheler's approach to church growth and what eventually became the seeker sensitive model was not primarily shaped by biblical theology but by his commitment to positive thinking and new thought principles these ideologies informed both his methods and his message leading him to prioritize attraction self-esteem and emotional comfort over biblical truth and gospel clarity basically in short I'm hoping to show that it was his philosophical framework not scripture that drove the model that he built now I want to unpack that and first thing we need to do is define the seeker movement what even is this some of you might have heard this term before uh for me personally the first time I had ever heard the term seeker church or seeker sensitive was in my seeker sensitive church so I'm assuming that most of you watching have heard the term before but basically the seeker sensitive movement or model is basically a change of attitude and perception in how we do church and how to grow your church and be more sensitive to the seeker however I kind of want to pause here because I actually think there's a better word for this um I actually got this from my friend Greg Kogal i mentioned him before uh but I think a better word for this what what we're talking about is called the seeker centered model or church so here's the thing being sensitive to new believers is not a bad thing it it doesn't matter the size of your church these pastors are aware that the Sunday service is mainly for Christians like how it should be but they understand that people new to the faith might be in attendance and they are sensitive to that right they make them feel welcome maybe give them a mug and a hug or something the pastor is wise to be mindful of complicated religious words that might make sense only to longtime Christians but that doesn't mean they avoid them uh a lot of times they'll use language that most people can understand but if they do use a complicated term they simply explain it they don't shy away from it but here's the fundamental difference okay here's the key the understanding is that the Sunday service is mainly for Christians they are the primary audience the unbeliever is the secondary audience non-christians are wanted and welcome but the focus remains on taking care of the Christian community's needs so basically I believe that this whole model and movement that we're talking about is more of a seeker centered approach but for the sake of clarity through this video when I say seeker sensitive I am really actually talking more in a seeker centered aspect um I think that this is a better way to define it because that's more appropriate for what this movement was really about so this whole seeker sensitive church became popular in the late 20th century this is a new thing and basically it's all about making church more welcome for people who are seekers the non-believer uh perhaps they aren't religious or have been turned off by traditional church experiences and instead of focusing heavily on deep theology and actually teaching the Bible these churches aim to feel more relaxed relatable casual modern parts of that I have no issue with my biggest aspect is the biblical aspect but we'll get to that more later but secret churches from the pool pit they'll focus more on like practical life application messages and overall friendly atmosphere the ultimate goal is to make it easier for newcomers or spiritual seekers to kind of come in and check things out without feeling overwhelmed or challenged and of course this comes with its criticisms more on this later so that's your basic definition of what the seeker sensitive movement is and there are some very important people who played a part in making this movement into what it is robert Scheler did not act alone in making this movement what it is there are three other players here peter Ducker who could be a whole other video um another is Donald McGavin and the last one is C peter Wagner who could be a whole other video i mean I'm going to be naming a lot of people in this video that could very easily be their own video but first let's start with Peter Ducker peter Ducker he really brought in more of the business aspect for how the church functions um like have you ever walked into a church or worked at a church or been involved and you walk out every day thinking like "Wow this feels more like a corporation than a church." Yeah I would say that's more of Peter Ducker's influence there's a whole marketing aspect behind it and it really really works now where Scheler comes in in my opinion is with the spiritual psychology of the seeker movement and what I mean by that is where Ducker might be more of the practical business aspect Schuler really affected the pull pit more than anything but the next person on our list is Donald McGavvern he's another piece of the church growth puzzle he was a missionary and it was his missionary background that shaped what I would consider to be the beginning of the church growth movement in 1965 he established what's called the school of world mission at Fuller Theological Seminary and this became a global center for church growth research and training and there's a lot of ideas that he promoted with this um one of them being including the concept of receptivity like focusing mission efforts on groups more open to the gospel um and what's called the homogeneous unit principle I think think I'm pronouncing that correctly which said that basically people are more likely to come to faith within communities of similar ethnicity culture or like a social background he also emphasized the importance of tracking data believing that numbers okay it was the numbers uh that reflected the effectiveness of disciplem and the advancement of God's mission next on our list is C peter Wagner who was really tight buds with McGavin and you might have heard Wagner's name before if you've learned about the New Apostolic Reformation or the NR because he's the one who coined that term wagner is very pivotal here because he brought in an aspect to church growth that went beyond what came before and instead what he did is he saw church growth as spiritual warfare and this had a lot to do with his esquetology which is called dominion theology this is the same esquetology as someone like Bill Johnson Sean Fo I think is how you pronounce his name uh Paula White and a lot of other hypercarismatic leaders because they believe that they need to take over what's called the seven areas of influence before Jesus returns or what some others might recognize as the seven mountain mandate these areas are business arts and entertainment media government education family and religion which includes churches the idea is that Satan has control of these areas and believers with authority need to take that dominion back i did a whole video on Bill Johnson's book When Heaven Invades Earth that really helps explain this theology and a big reason why you see a lot of this strange and odd behaviors in a lot of charismatic circles has a lot to do with this esquetology because they are on a mission i don't know how else to say it uh to basically take over the world they have to take back dominion from the devil and his minions this is a huge hot fascinating mess to look into so I highly suggest reading Holly Pivik and Doug Gvet's book on this called Counterfeit Kingdom but Wagner is really pivotal here because he reframed church growth as a spiritual battle it was it wasn't just like a strategy to grow your church anymore he took it from hey how do we attract people to how do we conquer spiritual realms this was much more aggressive because it went from just growing your church to influencing and ruling the culture and placing apostles and prophets into churches in order to take dominion so I would say his influence is huge in the hyper charismatic NR spaces and I'd say that there's a case to be made that it's actually maybe a deviation from the overall seeker sensitive church culture and instead has been more influential in Pentecostal and charismatic spaces so if I could put this in very basic terms this is kind of how I would put each one of these men donald McGavvern brought strategy okay he he was the missionoriented uh he brought more of a sociological blueprint to the movement uh Peter Ducker brought more structure he brought the organizational framework to make it run more like a business and Wagner brought the warfare and implemented this into his dominion theology into growing the church but most important in my opinion Schuler brought the spiritual and style it's like everyone else was the spear handle and Schuler was both the spearhead and the one who held it he gave the movement a voice he brought all of these methods together on some level maybe a little divorced from Wagner's spiritual beliefs but most importantly he's the one who marketed this and made it popular he's the one who really brought the psychology and the spirituality to the seeker sensitive model he's the one who modeled and and polished uh the the mediadriven seeker friendly approach that made church appealing to the masses he pioneered the the fusion of of pop psychology with theology framing the gospel around your emotional needs rather than the gospel rather than sin rather than repentance and he made it marketable he offered a lot of style but I would argue with a complete lack of substance there was an article that I cited in my book which said that what Schuler did for the church was basically what Disneyland did for amusement parks so that's kind of a brief breakdown of the background but I'm going to zone in on how Robert Schuler practically did this i want to bring up the book The Glass Church again here because they talk about this as well the authors also did an interview with Albert Mohler on this topic as well and I think they did a really good job of explaining a lot of things including how this basically new thought pastor was a part of the RCA but also that Scheler is not truly how you pronounce his name it's Scholar but they just changed the pronunciation but I like how they explain it in this book that Robert Schuler's gospel was like a gospel of growth it was the gospel of more and this was definitely his ecclesiastical approach or his approach to how the church should be done it was more people more buildings more audience more money and this became a characteristic of the church growth model today the worst part is that it's kind of a machine that has to constantly be growing in order to be sustainable again this is where the business aspect comes in so the objective then is to meet the felt needs of the congregation instead of their theological needs because there's so much diversity so your pastor has to have that charisma that's required for that expanding growth you have to have a wide net and people in marketing will understand this that whenever you have a product whenever you have something that you're trying to attract people to you have to see how you can appeal to the widest audience possible i call this the net how wide of a net can you throw to pull people in that's basically the concept there's a lot required to make that net large and of course along with growth comes a lot of money so more growth and more money then equals that God is blessing you it means that you are doing the right thing the prosperity that goes along with that at least from what I can see from Schuler's theology means that his possibility thinking and self-esteem messages were goddriven in Robert Scheler's philosophy either the church numbers grow or it dies the church dies so according to Schuler the church congregation should recognize itself as a business enterprise centered on gaining more people and it started with attracting their attention so basically you need customers not converts here is the argument that I am making here okay I am submitting that the new thought beliefs that Schuler adopted from Peele helped inform his understanding of how church should be conducted because look this was not simply about making church more accessible that's a good thing and I think that Christians naturally want to make church more accessible but this was different for Schuler it was about redefining what church is designed for based on a world view that prioritizes human potential self-worth and personal empowerment over repentance over surrender over reverence for God new thought philosophy emphasizes the opposite things like the divine potential within every person the goodness within every person the power of positive thinking the idea that your outer life is shaped by your inner beliefs that lens drastically reframes the purpose of the church rather than being a place to die to self to confront your sin to find salvation in Christ church then becomes a motivational environment designed to help people feel good to think positively and discover their untapped greatness scheler has openly said that the church needed to stop preaching about sin because it makes people feel bad instead preached self-esteem personal dignity emotional uplifting messages in his framework the role of the church wasn't to confront the human condition it was to affirm it and from that perspective he developed church growth strategies that centered around first and foremost making church fun taking away anything offensive which to him included the full gospel and this created a watered down version that was easier on the ears to the average person because yeah a Jesus that doesn't offend them a gospel that that uplifts you with self-esteem and positive thinking anybody can follow that Jesus anybody could follow that gospel that's a Jesus that they can understand and worship because the Jesus of the Bible that's the Jesus that the world has always hated that is the Jesus that the world has always rejected scheler's Jesus his his gospel that's a version of faith people can get behind because it asks nothing of them but to feel good and if we're going to assess this model honestly we have to trace it back to its roots and not just assume it grew from the Bible this is where in my opinion I see that new thought directly shaped intention scheler's seeker sensitive model didn't remove the offense of the gospel because it wanted to make room for the gospel it removed the offense because he believed that the offense was the problem that the gospel was the problem that's not a biblical Holy Spirit conviction that's a new thought self-spirit conviction it treats your discomfort as something inherently negative rather than something that God might use to bring conviction and transformation somebody might misinterpret the Holy Spirit convicting them as guilt and shame and therefore they reject it that's the Holy Spirit's job to convict the world but Robert Scheler is over here saying "Ah that's too negative." So there are some really hard questions we have to ask about this how much influence did new thought have on shaping this model what inspired Scheler's seeker methods was it the Bible was it the historic biblical Christian beliefs that talk about how church should be done what were his motives what beliefs were those motives grounded in when we look at the popularity of the seeker model today how much of this framework was adopted into the DNA of that church i see this as a form of the it works trap that I went over before because in order for the seeker model to work there are certain rules you have to play by not biblical rules all the time but marketing rules if numbers are the priority what's the danger of softening truth and theology to attract those numbers is there a danger of prioritizing spiritual experience over spiritual conviction because that's how the model was built that was the intention this is my overall argument but but is not it's not as black and white as this which I will get into in part five i understand that there's some grace there's some nuance to be given here these are just some questions some things to think about with this model and the intentions of its creation now I think that one reason why Schuler had the view of church that he did because remember what he said before about being a mission not a church his goal was not to please Christians right his eyes were unapologetically very clearly set on unpressing the unchurched the unbeliever the seeker and I believe that one reason why he wanted to call it a mission and not a church is because then he's not theologically accountable as a church here is an actual quote from Schuler about this you guys this is unbelievable that's the reason we have never been interested nor have we felt divinely called to create a place for a lot of Christians to get together and praise the Lord yeah how dare they how dare he as a pastor gather Christians together in a church to worship God but rather we are called according to Schuler to build a mission to impress the unchurched people with the reality of Christ's living love so his mission was to find the seeker grow the church because his gospel was one of self-esteem and it's really interesting how he did this practically so not only was his message attractive but being a savvy marketer Schuler went doortodoor asking unbelievers what they would want in a church he then took and gathered that information and created what we now know as the seeker centered model for church growth here's a quote from one of Schuler's closest friends and what he had to say about this schuler realized that giving Bible studies on Sunday morning during a worship service would turn off most of the unchurched people entirely then he asked the people what sort of church they would want to attend they wanted light beauty tranquility beautiful music friendly people programs that suited their needs sermons that weren't boring better yet sermons that weren't even sermons they wanted a place where they could feel comfortable he decided at that point that he would never again use his pull pit as a teaching platform i want to re-emphasize something here i don't think that there's anything wrong with wanting your church environment to be welcoming and healthy i think that goes without saying but sometimes some people just take what you say and they hear things that you never intended i just want to emphasize that okay there's value in that and something that we can learn from but that's not what's what's happening here scheler's theology of self-esteem what that did is it turned church into a mission to make everyone feel good about themselves right to feel like they were enough that they were loved that they were cared for which again I've already emphasized that that's not in and of itself wrong there's issues here um you don't challenge people right you affirm them you didn't confront sin you tolerate the beliefs and the choices and while some of that messaging does overlap with Christianity it's missing the core as we have gone over before it's basically a self-help church i mean if you've watched my video on Mel Robbins I did a book review of her book The Let Them Theory and I have a whole section where I talk about the shortchanged issues with the self-help movement with these messages you're not giving them an answer to anything you're giving them a bunch of rules to follow it's soft legalism you're basically telling them "Here here's how you can make your life better feel good about yourself." But you're dismissing and taking away the very answer to their issue you're taking away the bread of life you're taking away the living water in other words people didn't go to Scheler's church because they recognized their brokenness and their need for a savior they came because it met their preferences it was like a have it your way version of church they they felt better about themselves it was stripped of the hard truths that actually made Christianity what it even is so no wonder his congregation grew so we have gone over who Scheler is we've gone over his theology and we've gone over the part he has played in the development of the seeker sensitive movement and I I really wish I really wish I could just stop the video here i really do but I would not be doing my due diligence if I did not give you the full story and how and why this is more controversial than some might realize because the buck did not stop with Scheler it's not like he just grew a church and pieced out i mean no he marketed this he mentored other leaders and pastors and and with his teaching methods and even his theology and his influence in that way is still alive and well with some of the most popular pastors on the planet [Music] the influential chokeold that this man had on teachers and pastors is difficult to emphasize i'm going to read to you from the book The Glass Church about how Schuler was really the spearhead to show other pastors how to grow their church he considered himself a growth consultant scheler included growth consultation in his ministry portfolio he aggressively promoted his techniques and many followed his approach the Orange County minister's influence remained so pervasive that emulators continue to borrow from his established templates without realizing their source a 1997 article in Christianity Today's Leadership Journal summarized Scheler's pioneering influence asserting "It would not be overreaching to say that without Schuler and the Crystal Cathedral there would likely be no Willow Creek Community Church no Saddleback Community Church or the thousands of other seeker oriented churches around the country." Echoes of Scheler's legacy reverberate into 21st century American Christianity beyond the lineage of Bill Hibel's Willow Creek Church and Rick Warren's Saddleback Church a recent ethnographic study of a Hillsong congregation in Chicago revealed that the church imitates vodka advertisements to bait urban hipsters into worship greeters and ushers are expected to abide by the style packet that the leadership prescribes rather than focusing on modesty instructions highlight fashions seen in recent glossy magazines the young pastors of this downtown church view potential members as retail consumers relying on the church growth trail blazed by Schuler half a century earlier and when another Hillsong pastor from New York Carl Lent openly discusses his relationship with singers like Justin Bieber and professional athletes he taps into a form of charisma and proximity to celebrity that was practiced every Sunday for four decades by Schuler as a form of legitimation these pastors manage their images through social media projecting a sense of success and cultural awareness though they have traded Scheler's vestments for skinny jeans and t-shirts they stand on the shoulders of the Orange County minister i bet if you have never heard of Robert Schuler you've probably heard of a few names that I just mentioned and you've probably definitely heard of some of the pastors that he has directly mentored and this is where we talk about the infamous Robert H schuler Institute for Successful Church Leadership that he established in 1969 it was here at this institution that he shared the secrets to his success with decades of church leaders eager or desperate maybe to achieve results there were three students in particular who took Scheler's growth model and concepts and either accepted or adapted his methods they were Rick Warren Bill Hibls and John C maxwell and they were probably just the most well-known today they certainly weren't the only ones because Schuler he marketed his church growth methods to thousands of pastors so if Scheler was the visionary Bill Hibbels would probably be more of like the architect and Rick Warren would be more of the pragmatist and what they did these two men they took Scheler's growth church growth model and really made it into what we see today as far as scale and reach let's go over them and see how this happened let's start with Bill Hibbels bill Hibbels is the former pastor of Willow Creek Church which is one of the largest seeker sensitive churches in existence that came after the Crystal Cathedral he basically took the baton from Robert Scheler and ran with it in my opinion what Scheler did really really worked and it grew a church beautifully and at its peak Willow Creek was truly a monster mega church with like 25,000 people in attendance every weekend so how exactly did Hibbles do this how was he able to grow this church to such a crazy scale hm well to put it simply he was highly influenced by Scheler's methods and he was very verbal about this in fact there's another book do I have it i do because of course I do rediscovering church in this book he he followed Scheler's example of going doortodoor and asking people why they didn't go to church now again on the surface I'm not here to dog on that okay on the surface this is really smart you want to know your demographic you want to be aware of people's impressions of church i think this is wise and I also think it's a brave thing to do but the intention he did this with is to create a seeker-friendly church for the unbeliever to come through the doors so that they would feel welcome he wanted to know what would make them feel comfortable coming to church and then he removed anything that might make them feel uncomfortable uh for example crosses this is one reason why you don't see a lot of crosses in seeker churches anymore i mean to each their own but if you're removing it as to not offend people I I mean think of the symb symbolic nature of that you're removing the cross as not to offend people moving on and then it's all the other stuff that we've gone over before um not using theological language having an informal worship don't really talk too much about the Bible do topical sermons life application like how to be a better parent how to manage your money how to have better self-esteem how to manage your stress like your basic motivational life advice and then maybe sprinkle in the Bible here or there to make it seem like it's an actual service instead of a TED talk you know so it counts there are many instances in Hibbel's book where he speaks very highly of Schuler and in one section of his book he even explains that he feels like one particular meeting with Robert Schuler was a divine encounter to move forward about how to grow and build his church he credits Schuler multiple times in his book for being an inspiration and the inspiration now to be fair okay Bill Hibbels did add his own flare to the growth model uh he came up with other concepts that might be beneficial to your church like programs uh making sure there's things like child care and things like that which again there's no issue there's no issue there these things are good and fine and and great and even non-seeker friendly churches would implement those kinds of things i would also submit something else about the intention of Bill Hibbels because Bill Hibbels wasn't new thought you know he wasn't in agreement with a lot of Robert Scheler's theology though I don't think he knew that i do have questions on how so many of these pastors were around Robert Schuler knew that he wrote this book knew that he taught possibility thinking and none of them were like "hm something's off with this guy." Like not one maybe now they'll distance themselves from him but back then I'm shocked that people just turned a blind eye that they just let him preach this stuff but hey he taught him how to grow a church so I guess that just it makes all right my point is is that I I do want to give some grace here what I am saying is that he took Robert Scheler's growth model and he tried to have the best of intentions with it willow Creek historically speaking has been seen as like the the first model if you will like the first huge church uh to implement the seeker model but they really wanted to do it with good intention all right so I I think that that's worth mentioning that it's not like he was Robert Schuler 2.0 with this i think that his intentions were very different but on the flip side uh of course it's difficult to bring up Bill Hibbels without bringing up how uh he fell from grace pretty hard as he was accused of sexual misconduct and abuse of power but I'll get to more of this dilemma this power dynamic in part five the next stop on our list is Rick Warren arguably one of the most popular pastors on the planet he is the former pastor of Saddleback Church and he has said himself that he was profoundly influenced by his visit to Scheler's Institute in fact there's a Christianity Today article uh that mentions Robert Scheler's impact on Rick Warren this is Rick's wife speaking this is what it says during his last year in seminary he and Kay drove west to visit Robert Scheler's Institute for Church Growth we had a very stony ride out to the conference she says because such non-traditional ministry scared her to death schuler though won them over he had a profound influence on Rick kay says "We were captivated by his positive appeal to non-believers i never looked back." So just like Hibballs Warren took a lot of Scheler's methods and kind of put his own flare on it he basically created the manual for Scheler's methods like that's why I kind of see him as the the pragmatic one he was fascinated with church size and so wanting to imitate Scheler he did something that Bill Hibbles did as well just try to guess try to guess what he did to grow his church yeah he went door todo asking people what kept them from going to church and then he took the feedback and marketed a non-traditional church to them are we beginning to see a pattern here though again to be fair uh Rick Warren was just as much influenced by Peter Wagner as well as Scheler all of these men who went doortodoor asking people why they didn't go to church virtually got the same exact answers right right like that they they were bored they they didn't like to hear too much about the Bible it's too negative the music is boring whatever it was and then they modeled their services behind that and that's what Rick Warren did right center it around the seeker the positive messages take away anything offensive no deep theology from the pullpit blah blah blah blah blah same song second verse blah blah blah rick Warren wrote a book called Purpose-Driven Church it's on the bottom now that has been used by thousands of pastors for church growth which Robert Schuler happened to also endorse there are actually some really good things in this book that I agree with and think are really good practical advice for pastors and church leaders but there's also this this marketing feel to it um it feels off and his book I mean obviously contains a lot of of Scheler's strategies as well but what's odd is that um yeah it's true that it does contain some good and biblical content but the irony is that I think that Robert Scheler himself would disagree with some of Rick Warren's theological positions i mean let's be real he'd probably disagree with a lot of them what else is interesting is that a lot of pastors that have endorsed Rick Warren's books especially this one like pastors that have even endorsed this book would no longer be in agreement with him today on things like this they would stand in sharp disagreement with him today so just some interesting insight on that also a quick note here about Saddleback and Willow Creek i've never been to either one of these churches and I don't have an educated opinion one way or the other when it comes to how they function and this goes for most seeker churches again I am not slamming these pastors or churches or the congregants especially if you go to a seeker church and love it uh my my goal is to inform you and let you take it to the Lord assessing for yourself what is spiritually best for you and your family my point is that they're not the villains in the story here new thought is that's my axe to grind so I want to make a point to keep that in mind as I share all of this now the next person on our list is John C maxwell who is the former pastor of Skyline Church uh he is widely recognized for his leadership trainings books and seminars and this one really surprised me on so many levels uh first I had never actually even heard of John C maxwell until I started researching for my video on MLMs multi-level marketing companies that's when I realized his books and leadership materials are incredibly popular in both Christian circles and MLM culture and as I looked into him more I noticed that Maxwell blends he blends in a fair amount of self-help and new thought style methodology which immediately caught my attention so interestingly okay while I was writing my chapter on Robert Schuler I had already come across his name John Maxwell's name several times in connection with Schuler i just didn't recognize its significance at the time but once I had revisited my Schuler research after diving into the world of MLMs it hit me between the eyes suddenly it all came together on why Maxwell's popularity and MLMs made perfect sense because he carries the same blend of positive thinking leadership style leadership hype and soft spirituality that Scheler championed he's essentially Scheler on some levels repackaged for corporate motivation and that overlap is exactly why he's so influential in both spaces second he's probably the one person on this list who is mostly intertwined not only with Schuler's theology but with new thought self-help as well which explains his success in the business world his methods have been highly influential for pastors and church leaders encouraging them to use leadership and organizational growth principles to help expand their churches and businesses where he really comes in is teaching people how to be leaders and strategic growth managers his ideas have become a staple in church training programs i'm sure a lot of you are familiar with his work john Maxwell is a little bit more problematic where other pastors like Rick Warren and Bill Hibles seem to have tried to distance themselves from Robert Schuler John Maxwell is very open about Robert Scheler being one of his mentors and he's still very vocal about this today he often mentions Robert Scheler as a major influence in his life he was a mentor in his early days of his career and he gives Scheler direct credit for shaping his views on leadership and positive thinking as well as introducing him to possibility thinking and he's also very vocal about recommending the works of Napoleon Hill especially think and grow rich which I did a whole deep dive on Napoleon Hill maxwell has shared his concepts with millions of Christians including pastors through his books teachings seminars and I'm going to spend a little bit more time on Maxwell here because I find this so interesting how these kinds of things just kind of fly under the radar with so many Christians so I took a little fun trip to John Maxwell's website and I actually did a search for well-known New Thought authors and pastors because I'm weird and finding out how dead New Thought authors have influenced Christians today is what I like to do in my free time now here Maxwell is quoting none other than Norman Vincent Peele as a renowned author this is what it says renowned author Norman Vincent Peele said it this way positive thinking is how you think about a problem enthusiasm is how you feel about a problem the two together determine what you do about a problem so there's a lot of Peele's positive thinking concepts that are implemented in John Maxwell's teachings the second thing that I found particularly problematic is he has adopted and carried over into his teachings Robert Scheler's possibility thinking he has also carried this over into his church growth series now here's what it says on the blog uh which was not written that long ago this was written in 2019 this is possibility thinking part one that's right friends there are two parts this is just part one let me just read a little bit to this i'll leave all of this in the description if you guys want to check out all of this stuff i'm just going to read a little bit to you what would you do if you knew you wouldn't fail i read this question long ago in Robert Scheler's book Move Ahead with Possibility Thinking it resonated with me in a way I couldn't define you see growing up I was surrounded by a culture that thought about avoiding failure a community concerned with finding the safe roots to a safe life simply put possibility thinking is the willingness to see possibilities everywhere instead of limitations what three things does possibility thinking help you escape negative thinking a negative life stance dead ends and shame and under shame I was so surprised to see that he quotes Bnee Brown he says "This may be the deepest and most difficult trap to escape but possibility thinking makes it possible." Researcher and author Bnee Brown defines shame as the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging something we've experienced done or failed to do makes us unworthy of connection now again there's a psychological aspect to that that we need to talk about and define and get into but Bnee Brown is a progressive Christian she's right up there with Glennon Doyle she's been on Oprah i mean you're better than this Maxwell you're better than this uh I wish I was done but I'm not uh there's actually a lot more uh there's an article on his site where he says that one of his favorite books is As a Man Thinkketh by James Allen which is a classic new thought book and I was shookth to see that he also quotes EMTT Fox in the same article and that he actually quotes Emmett Fox quite often uh if you've forgotten I mentioned EMTT Fox before uh as one of Norman Vincent Peele's main influences fox is one of the most prolific deeply influential new thought teachers and authors of our time now not surprisingly one of Maxwell's biggest influences is none other than Napoleon Hill he quotes Hill numerous times on his blog and thinks that his book Think and Grow Rich is a book that every Christian needs to read speaking of Napoleon Hill unfortunately Maxwell does more than just quote him here and there and recommend his book his leadership DNA like Maxwell's leadership DNA is made up of Hill's leadership method called mastermind groups i cover this in depth in my Napoleon Hill deep dive and more than that in the Maxwell leadership certified teams they introduce Hill's book Think and Grow Rich as a model for this mindset now these are just a few examples all of this will be in the description for you to see it's not exhaustive it's just surprising to me that he knows and favors a lot of new thought material so this in my opinion is kind of where John Maxwell might be set apart uh because Hibbles and Warren just use Scheler's methods for the most part and steered away from his beliefs even though some of those methods are undergurtded with theology i've already been over that i digress but Maxwell seemed to steer towards both the beliefs and the methods i I mean the guy he currently has a seminar named 15 laws of growth for church boom it's only $200 so I know it might have seemed like I just gave John Maxwell a hard time even though I I would disagree i think I just am showing you what he's saying and believing and you already know why I would think that that is problematic and I'm not even going to sit here and pretend that just like with Napoleon Hill that there aren't good things that are helpful and useful that many Christians have used in their life but I can't change what this is uh there are hard and nuanced questions that we need to ask about these these kinds of things but there's a point that I want to make about the intentions of Schuler Warren and Hibbels when they went out and surveyed all these seekers to find out how to get them to come to church that in in and of itself is not inherently bad inviting people to church is a good thing but they were asking the wrong questions with the wrong goal in mind in my opinion they asked why don't you go to church instead of asking the deeper and more important question why don't you believe the gospel the assumption was that if they could just remove the things that people didn't like then people would come and and coming would somehow lead to believing and I'm not going to sit here and say that that hasn't worked on some level which I will get into later but I think it turns the entire mission upside down the goal can shift from proclaiming the gospel to preserving attendance and instead of making disciples you need to make a number goal my concern and critique with this is that they weren't really seeking the lost they were surveying disinterested people asking unbelievers how to make the message more comfortable instead of how to make it more understood i'll get more into this aspect in the next part of the video because there's a there's a real danger of making a lot of false converts and associating what's true about Christianity with the church building instead of what scripture teaches about Jesus okay I thought that I would mention this here in this section but among all the pastors who embraced this model and and even took it further there was one pastor who in my opinion embodies it perfectly and throughout my research his face kept coming up over and over again in my mind if I had to point to one person who took every major characteristic of a successful seeker-driven church the emphasis on attraction the emotional intensity the branding the shallow theology that is basically yelled at you the theatrics the life application and self-esteem preaching the seeker centered reach the multi-million dollar business corporation the style over the substance the preacher sneakers the the intense personalitydriven leadership that was a lot but if you fused them into one cohesive platform and a face appeared that face in my opinion would be Steven Ferdick you would think that it would be Joel Ostein and you would be close my friends but I would say that out of every pastor out there Joel Ostein is is probably Robert Schuler 2.0 however in my opinion it's Steven Ferdick who is like the ultimate final boss of the seeker sensitive model the grand result of the type of pastor that's produced from this model let let me try to explain this steven Ferdick of course did not invent the seeker sensitive model but he inherited it and he displayed the full potential of this model to its full extent in my opinion he took what Schuler Hibbles Warren what they built and filtered them all through the lens of of this celebrity culture in social media his sermons if anybody's ever listened to his sermons they're emotionally charged i mean you're talking Norman Vincent Peele on steroids he put my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand five he spoke peace to my storm now it's your turn you got a hand what did he do for you begin to lift your hands begin to lift your victories begin to report the open door he's heavy on self-empowerment he's light on biblical exposition but everybody in here has a Lazarus the Lazarus factor is the thing in your life that made the formula fall apart and they didn't have text messaging so when Martha sent the message to Jesus you need to get here quick she sent him a message and Jesus left Martha on red you ever been left on red hey Jesus the one you love is sick hey Jesus I'm depressed hey Jesus I can hardly breathe right now hey Jesus I feel all alone hey Jesus I need to know how to make this decision hey Jesus I need you to show my husband how to stop being crazy hey Jesus I need you to do for my kids what Prozac can't do and calm them down hey Jesus I need you to straighten this out and Jesus left Martha on red have you ever been left on red by God precisely because he knows how to speak to an audience raised on TikTok with these pitfalls the deeper issue is that theology then becomes a tool not a foundation so scripture is a prop and it's used to support the motivational message rather than shape it i do have a lot to say on this aspect in part five more of it anyway because it really was looking at Ferdick that helped me see the long-term effects of what can happen with this model so I'll expand more on this in part five but in short Ferdick is in my opinion the end result he is what you get when the seeds planted by Schuler and nurtured by Hibbels and Warren are fully grown in an era where emotional experience personal branding cultural relevance those things are the primary currencies of ministry he also reminds me a lot of Schuler with his preaching style on some levels his doctrine and even the seminary backgrounds they have and towing that line between two contradictory theological positions ferdick went to Southern Baptist Theological Seminary yet he preaches on the pull pit like he went to Oral Roberts University and graduated with honors so I think it's very clear that Maxwell Hibbels and Warren very successfully marketed these seeker ideas whether it's in seminars or books but they have influenced thousands of pastors and have been incorporated into mainstream churches both big and small but here's where I want to give some perspective and maybe some grace on all of this with everybody that I've mentioned so far because I mentioned a lot of names i always want to heir on the side of grace as much as I can but also be direct and unashamed in the firmness at the same time no matter what you do sometimes guys or how you say it or what you say people are going to hear what they want to hear and interpret these things how they are going to interpret it but for me I just want to be clear with my goals here because what I don't want people to hear is me saying that Rick Warren Bill Hibbels and John Maxwell are undercover new thought ninjas i'm not suggesting that i am also not suggesting that they didn't have other influences or mentors it's it's true that these men and thousands of other pastors were influenced by Schuler and implemented many of his strategies with success when other Christian pastors built on those seeker concepts to grow their churches the question that needs to be asked is did that shift did that foundation shift and if it did how because I think it's a fair observation that a lot of them took the seeker methods and built on them or adapted them but here's what I cannot say and I cannot make the case for i am not suggesting that they agreed or endorsed all of Scheler's beliefs i think arguably the person I could probably make the strongest case for uh in that regard would be John Maxwell but I certainly don't think at least at this point that I could make that case about Rick Warren and Bill Hibbles i simply don't have an educated opinion about it at this time however I know that there are some people out there that have some strong opinions some major issues with particularly Rick Warren this is not the video to address that i just just know that I am very much aware of it i'm not even talking about a salvific issue okay robert Scheler I think is a different story i think that he demonstrabably taught her beliefs he taught a false gospel and a false version of Jesus he shortch changed the gospel he shortch changed scripture that's really where my axe to grind is i'm also not saying that those who appreciated or respected Schuler were even aware of the new thought ideas they might have unknowingly bought into if anything I think it shows my overall point that new thought teachings masquerade as Christianity and can be difficult for Christians to know what this is and what they're dealing with unless they're properly prepared it's like a virus that you don't know you're spreading what I think is very clear here though is that Scheler's methods were adopted over his doctrines though again like I said it's hard to adopt a church growth model that really wasn't built on biblical principles but what I am saying is that their intent was to adopt the method i'm not over here trying to make audacious claims or slam these guys or even say that their salvation is in question people might have really been helped by by these men and I'm not even here to take that away from you uh but when we know better we do better and when we are educated about the bigger picture of what has influenced us it helps us to make wiser decisions in the future and to be more discerning that's ultimately my hope here my goal is to educate and hopes of bringing attention to the problematic theological positions of Robert Schuler and how they may have infected our perspective on things today now there is more on this but this brings me to the next part of this video because now that we've gone over all of this and I really need some water now that we know what we know I still believe that this is not as black and white as it might seem now what what should we do about this is the seeker sensitive model all bad what about the churches that that use this and really have seen fruit what if you've been saved in a seeker church and here is where I'm going to give some much needed perspective [Music] i'm sure that there are people out there that disagree with me on the whole seeker sensitive debate and even with some of the background that we went over uh the conversation about the seeker model is not black and white this is complicated and I even shared this part in my book explaining why this particular chapter was the hardest to write this is just my opinion but with things like this there's nuance that is needed and I find that when people handle this topic sometimes it's not looked at from both sides and I don't know why maybe there's a fear there maybe it's fear of our own tribe coming after us um maybe it's fear of endorsing something that maybe might not be good but I really do want to deal with this topic as fairly as I can while also being firm while at the same time giving my own thoughts about the matter because here's what I believe it comes down to one cheap shot is to say that the seeker churches and the seeker model they're entirely unbiblical and you should avoid them the other cheap shot is to argue that seeker churches are harmless and perfectly fine the way they are and neither is true and we need to be willing to ask hard questions no matter where we land on this issue are there potential benefits from the seeker model are there risks how does it impact long-term spiritual growth and disciplehip for both seekers and believers what happens when a church structure prioritizes attraction over theological depth this then brings us to deeper questions does methodology itself eventually shape theology when a model is born from influences like Robert Scheler's new thought infused optimism is there a risk of crosscontamination on some level do we dismiss the entire seeker movement as unbiblical greedy number obsessed and shallow reducing church to little more than motivational talks and teenage pizza parties and free coffee or do we evaluate each church each sermon each method individually through a biblical lens is this a salvation issue or an ecclesiological one these are fair questions and I've learned that there's really nothing I can say or do where somebody isn't going to call me a name like I'm being a legalistic Pharisee or that I'm being too soft i have no backbone and call me what you want i don't care as long as what I'm saying and doing is pleasing to God and in line with scripture and glorifies him with the fear of the Lord in my heart and love for my brethren i don't care i really do want to do the right thing by God's standards and I think this is the right thing with this in mind here's what I'm going to do okay i'm going to go over the pros and the cons the strengths and the challenges if you will of this movement and I want to stress that this is my opinion you don't have to agree with me i know the challenges but I also know that there are very good things that come from this model so let's start there what does this model look like in the best possible light many pastors maybe all pastors who use this model truly love God and they want to spread the gospel they want to help people and make them feel good and they think this is an effective way to help people be more receptive to hearing about Jesus in a way that maybe they've never heard before especially the younger crowd i say that their goal is actually very biblical to be wise in the way you act towards outsiders and make the most of every opportunity and to contextualize i think that this is something that they do as well they try to do to become all things to all people for the sake of the gospel they believe that this model helps them do that it might be just what someone needs at a particular time in their spiritual walk in many ways in many ways okay the topical sermons from these churches might be a great start for someone who's new to the faith and may have an emotional hurt to overcome before they can get anywhere else i personally have seen this numerous times and even experienced it myself where it was considered a refreshing change to go to a church where you felt like you could relax right have some coffee wear some pants then you hear a sermon that's very practical and useful in your life and helps you build back a self-concept that really is helpful and useful for you also many seeker churches tend to be larger not all but this usually means that there are more people right more people to help with community outreach and there really have been incredible and helpful events that can be prioritized to help the community and this goes handinhand with missions as well second church does not have to be boring um I think this is one of the things that secret churches do very well i think it's possible to have theological depth exeetical teaching and still have fun i say that as somebody who does satire uh paints does art and has a love for creativity and mediocre humor i really loved walking into church knowing there would be a variety of talents and gifts that you could express you want to incorporate some creativity with your song go for it you want to reenact a scene from the Bible on stage have fun it was also really fun to participate in the church events and be a part of a strong community there is a sense of being able to breathe in these spaces i I don't know how else to explain it but that's how I felt personally where you can really go in and not feel that everybody's just snubbing their nose at you like just judging you for existing i mentioned before about the legalism and the fact that secret churches tend to make people feel unpressured and they feel really relaxed and welcomed because for a lot of people this is actually a new concept they've never experienced that at a church before this is one reason why people really like seeker churches this is just my opinion okay but there's nothing wrong with playing drums on stage while the pastor is in jeans i like a physical Bible to take notes in and read plus it smells better but if you want to use your phone like a maniac and open the church app do it it's perfectly fine to have snacks in the hall let them have their crispy cream and coffee i say that one of the major draws to seeker churches is precisely because they represent the exact opposite experience of what someone would consider legalistic or spiritually abusive churches that they once knew i'm just being real here guys okay but I've seen cases where somebody could have deconstructed their Christian faith because of a bad church experience but then they entered a seeker church and it actually ended up being a remedy for them they're still Christians to this day ironically they don't go to a seeker church anymore but I digress but cases like this do happen when when someone has been wounded by harsh leadership rigid rules or a culture of fear or shame a seeker-friendly environment can feel like a breath of fresh air the atmosphere is warm it's welcoming and it's intentionally designed to be non-threatening so for them it's so far removed from their past experiences that it gives them time to process and feel safe in a church setting again and while that doesn't automatically mean the theology is solid or that long-term growth is guaranteed it's important to recognize that for some that gentler first step back into church community matters deeply the next thing we're going to talk about is they're speaking modern language now as we've seen this is kind of a staple of seeker churches the way that they're designed where they are very intentional about how they communicate and I've seen this myself as well many seeker pastors are gifted and engaging speakers they have the ability to take tough concepts and rework them for the average person to really understand in my opinion this is particularly helpful to the younger crowd or brand new believers who might have a difficult time understanding certain biblical teachings so there's a great audience awareness which is important for good communication lastly and most importantly in my opinion people really do get saved and again something I have experienced personally I've witnessed this time and time again many people have heard the gospel in seeker churches maybe for the first time and have experienced genuine salvific faith and are showing good fruit today look okay if God wants to get your attention he'll get it a drunk dude told me about Jesus when I was 16 and it changed my life and two Jehovah's Witnesses were the catalyst to get me out of new age and new thought and sparked my deep research into cults god can use a seeker church too when I mentioned that I was doing this research on social media I know that some people wrote in to me saying that Robert Schuler really played a part in their salvation and plenty of people can make that same claim about hearing the gospel when maybe they listened to Joel Ostein maybe in the early days of Saddleback or Willow Creek you got saved there maybe you heard Steven Ferdick and were convinced so my argument is not that people don't get saved now I know there's another side to this but we're not to the cons yet okay hold your horses also kind of a side note on this one but this also reaches into the topic of spiritual growth i think there should be some extension of grace given to the pastor when it comes to him doing all the theological heavy lifting we can acknowledge that God can use even imperfect vessels to reach people right we also need to remember that no church model can carry the full weight of spiritual growth alone especially not on the shoulders of one man church growth model or not this is what I mean okay pastors need to be shepherds and it is their job to teach the full council of scripture but he is only one person we should be intentional in our Bible reading and our Bible study and make sure that we have accountability and are being discipled but I think we need to have a realistic expectation of pastors even with a small congregation okay of maybe 200 people or even a fraction of that that's an insane amount of people to check up on often and and counsel or disciple personally especially if that pastor has a family so just some thoughts on that but that's what I think are probably some of the best things about seeker churches but there's a whole other side to this let's get to the challenges how is it that church growth is booming but statistically the number of people who identify as bibleelving Christians with a biblical worldview is shrinking and Christians with a biblical worldview are in the minority how can this be in my opinion I think the church growth model can be a part of this problem because this is the point of the seeker model to grow a church it's consumerdriven making disciples is secondary even if it's a priority at all you checked the membership box and you are now part of the number mill and as far as anyone knows all the checked boxes equals true converts from what I've seen and in my opinion seeker churches have a danger to tend to be full of baby Christians who stay babies until they really hunger for something more substantial and then they leave there's also a danger of creating a lot of false converts the secret church's front doors are just as big as their back doors this is one reason why Schuler was adamant about consistent growth because he said "If you're not growing you're dying." And interestingly in the book The Glass Church th this book is actually mainly about how the Crystal Cathedral imploded on itself because of its own growth model pressure they break down how that happened but there's a priority issue here it could be that the danger is that growing Christian spiritual maturity is not the priority attracting the unbeliever is and there's a domino effect with that there can be a lack of spiritual growth but there's numerical growth and this is interpreted as a good thing because under this model all numerical growth is good growth as we've gone over this means that God is blessing you and honestly in my opinion how a lot of shady choices can be justified because the problem is that when the goal is church growth at all costs that's what the churches will settle for the motivation to win converts is pure i'm not here to take that away but in order to cast the wide net remember the net they might be in danger of diluting the parts of the biblical message that offend possible converts it's almost like people can be baited with a very likable and lovable form of Jesus that when the tough stuff in scripture comes up that they need to learn and and grow in they have a hard time accepting it this is the problem when you create a church model that's resultsoriented because then you can have any pastor or preacher including sketchy ones who take those methods and grow their own churches with it okay and because because the model is hardwired to interpret growth as God's blessing those same pastors now have the perfect justification to preach shallow or even dangerous doctrine because look at the numbers god must be in this this is God's work but did anyone stop to ask what exactly are we building and why did no one think hey maybe scripture puts boundaries around these things for a reason what some sketchy preachers have done is they've taken a strategy a growth model that works and have rewarded bad theology but the church is applauding because the auditorium is full and here's where I want to pick up a little bit about the conversation with Steven Ferdick again because in my opinion Ferdick he gets this he understands that success in this model is measured by reach virality and personality not necessarily by faithfulness to sound doctrine i would argue that Mike Todd is another example of this too and because it works it's easy to miss what's being lost depth discernment with a biblical understanding of the gospel because your goal is a different goal because you're interpreting those numerical results as God's blessing so you keep doing it what this can do the danger is is that it forces it forces the theology to be an inch high and a mile wide the people might receive a valuable topical life application that they then yell at you with maybe a few scriptures sprinkled throughout but there's a danger that they might not fully grasp the depths of the gospel of the Christian message and like I've been saying before you you're forced you're forced in this position because the model demands a formula that you have to stick with in order to get results if you change the formula then growth can stagnate and people interpret that as missing out on their blessing from God that's what they're looking at though they're not looking at if their congregation is actually learning more that's not the test that's not what they're looking at that's not the priority and again this goes back to the it works trap the problem with many church growth models isn't that they don't work the problem is that they do but then you become forever intertwined with its limitations because now you're not just growing a church you're tasked with cultivating an expectation you need those numbers you're now tethered to a system that rewards the wrong thing theologically the seeker church can create a perpetual merge lane right people are always approaching but they never actually merge they don't actually grow this also reminds me of something that recently happened when Brandon Lake got some heat because of what he said in an interview uh he was saying that we shouldn't sing songs like Holy holy holy because Bubba the average churchgoer doesn't understand it i'd love to see more worship sets more churches like kind of keep Bubba in mind the guy who's like in the back of the room he got dragged there by his wife when your opening song or the most of your songs have so much Christianes Yeah language like when your first song is like holy holy holy is the Lord God Almighty i think he's going like what does holy mean holy like what obviously that's where we want to get to in a worship set but like give Bubba some language he can be like I find myself in that song i feel like that and hopefully that's what some of my music can continue to do and though I understand what he sings to a certain extent I do he's trying to reach the average person but at this moment I can think of no better example of what I'm talking about here of the seeker- centered perspective we can be so concerned about impressing and catering to the unbeliever that the ditch that you can get into with that is that's where you perpetually stay all the time it's very challenging to grow beyond that because what you want Bubba with is what you won Bubba to now that was a long one but it needed to be said especially considering all the background that we went over the next challenge is the wrong motives and money scheler's motivation to grow his church was based on pleasing people not on pleasing God scripture is clear you are not serving Jesus if you're trying to please man and it makes the church the vendor and the attendees the customer it panders to the felt needs of the congregation instead of focusing on and encouraging and equipping the saints i'm not suggesting that pastors are trying to please people okay i'm not suggesting that when they're trying to grow their churches but this is confusing when when they're using a church model that was specifically designed around pleasing people and they're expensive i mean really expensive we've already gone over the business aspect here okay where a lot of seeker churches have to run like a business in order to stay afloat a hard truth about the seeker model is in order to grow in numbers you also have to grow financially and many of these churches are ran like multi-million dollar corporations instead of churches now let me real quick say something maybe controversial about tithing remember this is all tied up with the formula okay the formula that all numerical growth is God's blessing so if God is blessing us then you need to give that's typically what you'll hear from the pullpit the way that a lot of these churches frame this is that you're not just giving to the church to pay the bills no no you're giving to God they equate the two they equivocate personally I've always been uncomfortable with that language i've never actually spoken about my stance on on tithing but I don't believe that we are required to tithe we should be cheerful givers and gladly give to our churches to support them maybe I'll cover this in a video at a later date but tithing in the Old Testament had a very crucial and fundamental framework that we don't do that today today I submit that it's more traditional to require your congregation to tithe than it is biblical but I do want to be clear about something though there's definitely nothing wrong if that's a standard that you've made okay if you decide hey man tithing 10% works for me do it that's fine but you are not required to do it so all of that to say that uh there's a type of obligation that a lot of seeker pastors will put on their congregation to consistently tithe to grow and support the church because it's framed as if God will bless them for it this is what a lot of prosperity preachers do who are also seeker sensitive are we in danger of prioritizing business principles over biblical ones because the hard truth is that a lot of times people might feel a sense of community and might be a member of this type of church but you're also a customer and a lot of reasons why people stay is because they've been marketed into the church and they have a hard time leaving even though they're not being biblically fed then there's the therapeutic theatrics picture it the pastor is charming funny and entertaining he uses overtly theatrical displays to entertain and excite you using life story after life story to get you in the fields to make his point you cringe at the secondhand embarrassment watching the preacher passionately shake his fist with tears in his eyes yelling at you that there's a Elijah or Mary or something inside of you somewhere deep within you to get you through your current situation i think a big argument can be made that in many seeker churches every Sunday people can be more entertained than edified and this can result in many attending church for superficial reasons without having to submit to God and I'm not saying that this doesn't happen in other churches okay but the model requires it there's pressure on pastors in seeker churches to be fickle with how they deal with clear biblical teaching that could be offensive and turn people away because the goal is say it with me growth numbers is a acceptable answer too but because that's the goal they are careful not to be too firm in biblical principles so as not to scare away their audience so you entertain you push the charisma now in the pros section I mentioned how it's perfectly possible to get saved in a lot of seeker churches and and even through a lot of theatrical and charming pastors but again the it works trap just because Jehovah's Witnesses were the catalyst that got me out of false teaching does not then mean I need to become a JDub and adopt their teachings god can use a crooked stick to draw a straight line but that doesn't mean we start copying the stick i think we misapply our devotion to the object that saved us right instead of to God himself like in other words your church didn't save you joel Ostein didn't save you steven Ferdick didn't save you mike Todd did not save you jesus did and maybe they helped you in some of your darkest hours and I'm not here to take that away from you but that's why I went over before the it works trap we need to be okay asking critical thinking questions critical questions about the theology over the experience because judging somebody by their fruit does not mean you're judging them by all the good that they're doing it that doesn't count that doesn't work otherwise everybody has good fruit the measure of good fruit is your theology and doctrine and your obedience to Christ it's not good works otherwise we're no better than the Pharisees now let me be clear are theatrical displays from the pullpit wrong no lots of people have passion and great speaking gifts but if this is used to entice you emotionally instead of biblically and scripture is taken out of context to do it then you're basically giving motivational speeches in a fancy theater with free donuts the next challenge is invitations to church equaling sharing the gospel a huge way that a lot of secret churches can grow their church is to overemphasize inviting people to church this one's a little tricky because there's absolutely nothing wrong with that we should do this but inviting someone to church does not equal obeying the great commission it's not the same thing as the gospel however it's a really great way to grow your church butts and seats as the saying goes what's odd about this sometimes is I've noticed that people who give testimonials right that they you think that they're going to give their testimony on how they got saved on how Jesus helped them and saved them but there's a twist to it it's always about how this church has helped them right or how they were lost until they found this church the focus is on the wrong thing but this is effective marketing some Christians think if they can get their friend to church then they'll fall in love with the environment and engaging topical sermons and sometimes it offers just enough scripture to qualify as a church but enough life coaching so that they won't be offended and they'll want to return also the pressure to invite people to church can also be a major issue from the pullpit in in my research not just for this video but as when I was writing my book as well I heard of and saw pastors get frustrated like deeply frustrated sometimes to the point of lecturing the congregation about their supposed apathetic attitude toward inviting people to church it's their fault for the empty seat next to them this is very manipulative the other question I would pose to these types of pastors is do they share that same passion with their congregation sharing the gospel also speaking of business models the next thing on our list is the obsession with excellence because the seeker model is in essence a business model it strives for success and excellence like a business from perfect branding to the latest technological advances things must run well now I did a lot of research in my book and I had a lot of personal conversations with people from multiple seeker churches and let me tell you a lot of them walk on eggshells like the staff they don't want to be the one to ruin everything and even worse because excellence is such a high priority staff members might not actually be Christians because hey if a non-believer is the best camera guy for the job you hire him they have pronouns in their bio but they have a great singing voice and stage presence give them a high five and a microphone if someone with sketchy theology but a high profile has an eye for fashion or maybe an aesthetic church look well just slap a church bumper sticker on their car sprinkle in a few Bible verses and call it a ministry you got to keep the machine running now this is just my opinion but the danger is okay the the danger is that the standards of excellence they become impossible to keep instead of feeling like you're in a ministry or have a job it's like a rigid legalistic routine that you have to follow out of fear staff and volunteers by the way both of them can feel like they're on a neverending hamster wheel of thankless service now this is not always the case i understand that people go they volunteer they work for their churches and they love it okay but I think I think a lot of people listening can understand what I'm talking about you're told that what you're doing is for God not the church so you feel guilty for wanting to say no you overwork yourself into oblivion thinking "Hey it's for the kingdom." But it's actually for the numbers there is nothing wrong with having a healthy standard of cleanliness or aesthetics in any church in fact I'm for this i think this is a good idea but when the focus is to look good in order to attract others what happens to the standard crucial bars are lowered to excel at being excellent it becomes style over substance next is personalitydriven leadership structures this one's tough in some seeker churches there's a divide between the peasants I mean congregants and the lead pastor and I get it if you're in a bigger church you're not always going to be able to have that one-on-one relationship i know but this goes beyond what I'm talking about here pastors they should be approachable and they should also have real accountability i brought up Bill Hibles before and his abuse of power and accusations of of sexual misconduct they're very disturbing but how many times have we seen this i'm not I'm let me be clear i am not specifically blaming the seeker model for any of this of course that would be silly but I I think an argument could be made that it can cultivate an environment where this type of stuff can thrive because this type of environment isn't exactly one that prioritizes biblical accountability and a group of elders keeping the pastors in line also on this note there was a really interesting article uh that one of you guys sent me about an incident that Robert Schuler was in that I think can maybe help give a picture to perhaps how he got used to being treated as a celebrity church pastor who isn't used to people telling him no or what he doesn't want to hear there was an incident on a plane ride that Robert Schuler was on and the attendant told him something that he didn't want to hear here's what it says according to reports the dispute started after the attendant refused to allow Schuler to hang his robes and then refused to serve him only fruit from a dessert plate the attendant claimed Schuler became enraged and questioned if he knew who he was referring to himself as the powerful Reverend Robert Schuler scheler's attorney stated the attendant had an attitude during the flight he then proceeded to aggressively grab the flight attendant and shook him now for context Robert Schuler I think he was on the on the way to a funeral right so I mean even if he wasn't in the right mind that doesn't give you permission to assault somebody also these are only the things we know about it makes me wonder how many times he and other pastors have acted out of line in Schuler's case I wonder how many times he's done something like this but it wasn't reported i think that sometimes with a lot of pastors when pastors become CEOs and celebrities instead of shepherds and preachers we lose something important pastors should have authority and that should be respected but it's authority that's rooted in God's word not in themselves so I know that was a lot but those are only some of the pros and the cons that I see with the Seeker model we have made it to the conclusion i'm hungry y'all i have one more section i find that there are two groups of people and maybe people all the way in between of people who are pro-seeker friendly and those who really see that there are issues with it but let's look at scripture about what the purpose of the church is because this is the bigger issue here scripturally speaking the purpose of the church is to first pray acts 2 displays this number two the purpose of the church is to teach biblical doctrine and equip the saints for ministry you're helping them discover and utilize their gifts for the body of Christ this is emphasized in Ephesians 4 11-2 third they provide a place of fellowship for believers to encourage and love one another this is in 1 Thessalonians 5 11 and also in 1 John 3 11 the fourth thing is to help those in need this is all over scripture james 1 27 is an example and the fifth thing and probably one of the most important is to spread the gospel the church is to spread the gospel in Matthew 28 19-20 we are given the famous great commission jesus instructed his followers to go and make disciples of all nations and teaching them to obey his commands robert Schuler claimed not to be any of this he didn't want to be the church what he tried to do was anti-biblical so these are only a few examples of what really the church is for and again this could also be its own video but basically I I say that we just we let the church be the church let the church do what it's designed to do and it will grow in God's timing and we should be content with this so I wanted to share this with you guys i shared this on social media back in January you guys don't know this but it took me forever to find this oh the magic of editing but I This is what I said your credibility as a pastor isn't measured by how packed your service is your credibility as a pastor is measured by whether you actually teach the word of God i think I think we need to get back to that instead of making an idol out of numbers for me personally I I want people to come to your church because it's biblically based and welcoming not just entertaining or really good at giving topical life application i believe guys I believe we can have both so maybe you're confused about this maybe you go to a secret church maybe you're offended maybe you're frustrated with this video and I want you to know that I know exactly that feeling i understand that i'm not even asking you to leave your church but I do think that we are under an obligation to assess what's being taught at the pull pit and addressing if there are issues with theological growth in these environments because that's really what it comes down to for me personally i don't care about your worship style i don't even care if you have cool lighting if if you're a bigger or smaller church or if you're modern i really don't care what I really care about is if the congregation is getting solid biblical teaching can you accurately explain the gospel does your church prioritize disciplehip and exogetical teaching can you accurately understand what you believe and why you believe it why are you staying are you staying at your church because of community or because of good theology because it needs to be both in my opinion these are very basic things to examine as far as priorities in a church willow Creek and Saddleback uh they were really the first churches to try to take a biblical approach to implementing these church growth strategies and the seeker sensitive model and I respect innovation this is one thing I respected about Robert Schuler in general is the way that he could have he could have had it different right he really could have been a really awesome trailblazer for new ideas undergarded with biblical principles i don't think that's what happened obviously but I do think that a lot of pastors had more of the intention to apply biblical principles than Scheler did i believe they were trying to be biblical with something that they saw that was very pragmatic and like I said I do believe that they evolved certain aspects of Scheler's mo model and his methods and I'm not even here to fault some of that as I said before but a long time has passed we can see the long-term effects of this model uh we can kind of look back with a bird's eye view and have some educated opinions and it this is just my opinion okay but I think that it's not sustainable i could be totally wrong and I hope I am but I would not be surprised that in the next 20 to 50 years maybe less we would start moving away from church growth strategies or or the other option and I again I hope this doesn't happen but the other thing that could happen is churches start imploding on themselves like the crystal cathedral did and theologically speaking I am already seeing such a shift of people who are just really disillusioned with the whole thing they're very very weary and it's almost like they crave more tradition but here's what it really comes down to for me personally when I see the hostility towards the Christian message and what Christians around the world really have had to deal with when it comes to standing up for their faith what martyrs of of the Christian faith have had to deal with does the environment that this model cultivates going to prepare us for spiritual war how much of this model was created with biblical foundations and how much of it was built on Schuler's new thought beliefs scheler focused so much on attracting unbelievers he forgot his biblical mandate to make disciples but when comfortable Christianity re replaces conviction and if persecution or challenges to your faith come it can collapse under the pressure and people end up trading the God who saved them for one that they made themselves now what I'll say here is I am absolutely amazed at how quickly Robert Schuler has been forgotten this is something that even the authors in the glass church say for example for insight on this take Napoleon Hill for example okay total scam artist total dirt bag but his book Think and Grow Rich is still on the bestsellers list in the self-help genre you could go buy his book right now in the bookstore but Robert Scheler's book Self-Esteem the New Reformation Possibility Thinking nobody's even heard of it before at one point Robert Schuler was reaching tens of millions of people his books were bestellers everywhere but on Amazon it it's like non-existent i mean look at look at this this is used i got it for like I don't know 8 cents or something like it's still overpriced but my point is is that it's not even like sold through these outlets it's out of print and his biography is like over 500 pages but nobody cares this is just my opinion but I I think that the pastors and leaders today that he mentored are embarrassed it's like they've tried to distance themselves from Schuler which is maybe why they haven't carried on his legacy or spoken about him in private circles with any sort of theological respect from where we're sitting today we remember a lot of Christian men and women and we quote them often and remember them fondly uh like CS Lewis RC Sproul Elizabeth Elliots Walter Martin like there's so many more and I think it's absolutely fascinating to be sitting here in 2025 only 10 years after he's passed away and most people have never even heard of Robert Scheler he has a legacy of theological beliefs and is largely responsible for a lot of the church growth movement but no Christian really even knows that i think it's a cautionary tale really i mean this man dedicated his entire life to this positive Christianity had a had a massive popularity and impact on a global level pioneered the church growth movement that has created the most wildly popular churches that we know today built one of the most impressive architectural buildings on the planet and nobody cares for as much as he talked about bringing glory to man his personal legacy died along with the impressive crystal cathedral i like to think of it as an allegory right the crystal cathedral wasn't made out of crystal or diamond it was made out of glass it looked pretty but it was fragile it was shallow scripture says that Jesus is the rock he is the foundation of our faith and when you build your faith out of glass it might look fancy and shiny and it might attract people but all it takes is just one hard truth one real rock to shatter the whole thing and Christ is that rock robert Schuler preferred glass over the rock he didn't have the rock as his firm foundation he had glass that's my allegory and that's my deep dive on Robert Schuler but what do you think do you agree do you disagree let me know in the comments below i'm going to go inside you guys and I'm going to get some dinner maybe I'll have dessert for dinner that sounds amazing thanks guys so much for watching