Friday, March 30, 2012

Trevin Wax and Counterfeit Gospels

Before all the posts start going live, I thought I would mention a little more about the author and book that made me think of this assignment.Trevin Wax received his bachelor's degree from Emanuel University in Romania (he was a missionary there for several years). He received his M.Div. from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. His first book is called Holy Subversion (2010). He works at LifeWay Christian Resources as the managing editor of The Gospel Project, a curriculum designed to focus on the grand narrative of Scripture and how the gospel transforms lives. I check out his blog, Kingdom People, AT LEAST five days a week. Here is a short video clip of Trevin summarizing his book:


Thursday, March 29, 2012

The Purpose of this Blog

The purpose of this blog is to fulfill a class assignment. Students were asked to read Trevin Wax's Counterfeit Gospels book and to find "gospel presentations" on YouTube that qualify as "counterfeits". The goal is not to mock, ridicule, or name call, but to teach the students to apply critical thinking skills in seeing the faults in gospel presentations.

The inclusion of a video clip on this blog is NOT meant to label anyone a "heretic" ... I know many great friends and preachers who have presented the gospel at times in less than a complete fashion, sometimes accidentally distorting what the gospel is!

Here is Wax's list of counterfeit gospels:
1) The Therapeutic Gospel
2) The Judgmentless Gospel
3) The Moralistic Gospel
4) The Quietist Gospel
5) The Activist Gospel
6) The Churchless Gospel

So my question for you, the reader, is this: what do you think of these analyses? Do you think these presentations are lacking or are they complete? Do you think the critiques missed something that the preacher actually did say ... or did the critique actually miss something else that was left out or distorted? What are your thoughts? Are any of these actually correct presentations?

About four posts will be published per day, starting on April 2, 2012.