Sanctify them by the Truth; Your Word is Truth. (John 17:17, KJV)

Caution: Truth May Be Even Bigger Than You Believe

In his book A Theory of Everything  philosopher and quasi-Buddhist Ken Wilber, whose work is held in high regard by Emerging Church icon Rob Bell, explains:

In this Theory of Everything, I have one major rule: Everybody is right. More specifically, everybody—including me—has some important pieces of truth, and all of those pieces need to be honored, cherished, and included in a more gracious, spacious, and compassionate embrace, a genuine T.O.E. (140)

Unfortunately this pie-in-the-sky dream of some kind of human utopia—another Tower of Babel—hits a dead end in the Risen Christ Jesus of Nazareth. In what follows I’ll show you why these mystic dreamers are so desperately trying to get rid of the critical reasoning skills inherent within so often vilified “Western thought.”

The above is influenced by Dr. Clare Graves and is essentially a summation of Ken Wilber’s integral theory (IT) of mankind. IT is similar to the Spiral Dynamics of Don Beck—who told me personally in an email—that he “brought Graves to the attention of the world and wrote the book Spiral Dynamics which is based on Gravesian thought.” 

The basic idea at the core of this integral/spiral school of thought is to integrate i.e. bring together all of mankind by turning them from egocentric (self-centeredness) to global-centric (world-centeredness). You’ll even hear Bell talk about this in his October 18, 2008 sermon Beware the dogs:

Now, there is a…a school of thought called an “Integral Approach to Humanity”. It’s essentially taking psychology, sociology, um….a bit of economics, world religions, etc., and they are working to say, “Are there ways to synthesize human development?” Now, if you take the work of some of these folks…the Don Beck, Claire Graves, Ken Wilbur and you look at child development, you begin to see certain patterns that connect. Now, you can take this biblical pattern and you can actually see a larger trend…

[In time a] child moves from egocentric to tribal centric, but you also – as the days progress – you want to instill in this child the ability to sort through and the courage and the guts, when the tribe veers off course, to say, “Nah”; others call this pre-conventional wisdom, conventional wisdom and then post-conventional wisdom. What happens in Germany in 1938 when everybody’s part of the Nazi party?

At that point, you don’t want to be ethnocentric, you want people to be able to question the rules and rituals of the tribe; you’re hoping more and more people would move to world centric, ‘cause sometimes, what appears to be the ethnocentric party line is actually bad for the other tribes…as people become so enrapt within their tribal identity that when it is revealed to them that their tribes’ practices be it of consumption, destruction, etc., aren’t good for the rest of the world, they will continue to stand by their tribal identity at the cost of moving to a place of world centric understanding. Egocentric…tribal centric…world centric. (Online source)

But you see, the idea that “everybody is right” and everything (including all religions) “has some important pieces of truth” does appear true at first; and in a sense it is. However, be careful to stay off this rabbit trail: “So, as a Christian you are saying there’s no truth outside your religion and the Bible.” This is not what we’re saying at all.

Of course there are things outside the Bible that are true; certainly other religions have some teachings within them that are true, but as Christians we also know that everything in the Bible is true. And as such, all truth is to then be measured by what God as Creator has revealed in His Word (see—Acts 17:11; 1 Thessalonians 5:21).

Here’s where IT and its phony tolerance completely disintegrates. The Apostle John, an eyewitness, quotes Jesus of Nazareth as saying that Holy Scripture inspired as it is by God the Holy Spirit—His Word—is Truth. And in His Word we find John 14:6 where Jesus says —“I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.”

Note Jesus, as God in human flesh, proclaims that not only does He teach truth; Christ is, in very fact, the Truth in Person. And this is precisely why the genuine Christian can never agree with Wilber and his myth of some integral approach to mankind.

It is because only Christianity, which is not religion but rather a relationship with God in Christ, teaches that Jesus is the way and the truth and the life—and no one can have a relationship with God apart from Him—that it can never, ever, be integrated with the religions of mankind.

See also:

CROSSTALK RADIO: KEN SILVA ON ROB BELL AND WARNINGS ABOUT THE EMERGENT CHURCH MOVEMENT

ROB BELL RESOURCES FROM APPRISING MINISTRIES

IS ROB BELL EVANGELICAL?

ROB BELL CONTROVERSY OVER DOCTRINE

A LANE CHAPLIN PRODUCTION: CHRIS ROSEBROUGH AND KEN SILVA ON FIGHTING FOR THE FAITH PODCAST CONCERNING ROB BELL AND EASTERN-STYLE MYSTICISM

EMERGING EASTERN-STYLE MEDITATION FOR GLOBAL PEACE…AND WORSE…

WHO IS DR. MICHAEL ARMOUR AND WHY IS HE TEACHING SOUTHERN BAPTIST PASTORS?

ROB BELL: MYSTICS ARE THE ENLIGHTENED ONES