Purpose Driven or God Led? A Follow Up!

I have received a lot of response to my blog on April 23 of this year entitled Purpose Driven or God Led? The two are not the same!, where I said that the Purpose Driven Life/Seeker Sensitive approach to church growth is not scriptural and that it’s prophets are false.

Most of the feedback was positive and in support of my comments. However the few readers who provided negative or critical responses have asked for more information supporting my views on the issue. While I do not plan on making it SOP to follow up or reply to every email, I will provide additional thought or, in this case,links for further resources.

One reader wrote, “After reading on Wicca for a half hour it was time to come up for a breath of fresh air. In my pursuit to come back to some acceptable teaching I stumbled upon this page. Currently I am reading PDL. I understand it is soft and mushy at best. Will some of you who condemn Warren as if he is Lucifer himself please provide me more detail into why he is misusing scripture and how ALL his philosophies are wrong? He waters down the gospel, but he actually makes great points on worship, fellowship, etc."

First of all. I disagree with this reader comment that just because SOME of Warren’s teachings are not in line, that we can take the “good points” from PDL. The Word of God says, “a little leaven leavens the whole lump.” I have always been told that half a truth is not the truth at all. The logic that we can accept part of a point, while other parts are in obvious error, is itself an error.

With that said, please allow me to offer you the following resources for further teaching and discussion as why the Purpose Driven/Seeker Sensitive church growth movements are erroneous.

I highly recommend the following books by Dr. John MacArthur: Hard to Believe, Ashamed of the Gospel and The Vanishing Conscience. These books are available at Dr. MacArthur’s website at www.gty.org. There are also many audio resources available as well, but I would especially recommend a discussion by Dr. MacArthur and Phil Johnson entitled Straight Talk about the Seeker Church Movement. It too is available from Grace to You

Paul Proctor has written numerous articles on the subject and his writings are absolutely scripturally sound and extremely poignant. Paul’s commentaries are available at www.NewswithViews.com.

Dr. Albert Mohler has discussed the church growth movements in great detail on his nationally syndicated radio show on the Salem Radio Network. In direct relation to the subject, Dr. Mohler has most recently had several programs dealing with biblical preaching and our need to return to the sufficiency of God’s Word. You can read many of Dr. Mohler’s commentaries as well as download MP3 copies of particular programs on his website at www.albertmohler.com.

James Sundquist has authored several books; one entitled Who’s Driving the Purpose Driven Church, as well as many great articles on the topic. James’ materials can be found at http://www.abrahamic-faith.com/index.html.

Warren Smith has written a wonderful book titled Deceived on Purpose that deals with the foundations and background of PDL. The book is very thorough and scipturally sound. You can find out more about Deceived on Purpose at http://www.lighthousetrails.com/index.html.

Lastly I would recommend you visit our radio program site at www.wqbc.net, and also our ministry website at www.mikecorley.org . We have interviews available that we did with Dr. John MacArthur, Dr. Albert Mohler, James Sundquist, Warren Smith and a lot more. You can also listen to our radio program live online at www.wqbc.net.


I believe once you read and listen to these resources in the light of scripture, you will discover that the Purpose Driven/Seeker Sensitive church growth movements are not only heretical, but also unnecessary. God alone is sufficient.

As always we welcome your comments.