Jesus came to be an amusement park so you can be entertained

[photo: your youth at Centrifuge]

Last year, kids came back from centrifuge wearing orange robes and chanting mantras in what has been called “fugegate”. (ok, they didn’t have orange robes, but really how long before the emergers start doing that?)

Stephen U. has been preparing to teach at [insert whatever cool name it is being called now] and had to beg the leadership to ad in some of the gospel cause there wasn’t any. He documents this year’s heresies from Lifeway:

“In this lesson, we will see that Jesus is the most entertaining and thrilling ride we could ever choose.”

“Its basic goal is to make our park visit memorable and enjoyable.”

“Are you allowing Jesus to thrill and wow you? How can we limit the mundane, confusing, uncomfortable, overbearing challenges that come along in this life?

Not being from an SBC background and having no emotional attachments to our schizophrenic institutions with funny names, my favorite Canadian, Guillaume is able to see right through the behemoth that is Lifeway and asks, "Would we tolerate it if our pastors got up to the pulpit on Sunday and read off a sermon that had been mailed to him a few months earlier from a Lifeway office in Nashville?"

It seems like all I ever hear about our denominational institutions is how they are dominated by mean conservatives and how liberal-phobic they are and they fire people at the drop of a hat for doing anything out of the ordinary. If you don’t get a pink slip for preaching Buddhism or this Jesus roller coaster nonsense, really, how far do you have to go to get in trouble at Lifeway?

A lot of people are asking if Thom Rainer, the new president of Lifeway, is going to clean things up and are generally curious about what he believes. According to the Biblical Recorder, he is a three-pointer. This is a pretty negative piece which unfairly compares Rainer with James Frey, the Oprah book club guy whose book is basically a lie except for the ISBN number but I reference it because it records Rainer's response to the Calviphobia question.

Unless they get Stephen as their teacher at Centrifuge, your youth are going to spend a week being indoctrinated with this "Jesus died for your sins for fun" stuff.

There is an alternative though. Founders usually hosts several youth conferences during the summer.

Try to ignore the excessive use of some really hideous Microsoft word art in that flyer. I’ll take Founder’s sound teaching in word art rather than glossy heresies from Lifeway any day.

These are exciting times we live in where the little guy can say the emperor has no clothes and question mighty lifeway. Apparently Dr. Ascol reads our blogs because Founders picked this up and ran with it. By one blog post, people are being made aware and taking Lifeway to task. You can literally see the reformation happening before you very eyes!

You might drop by Stephen's blog to give him a word of encouragement and thank him for having the guts to confront the leadership and speak out about this. I imagine people don't like being told by seminary students that they are teaching children heresies and he's probably trying to decide what he's going to do about all of this.