Tuesday, January 20, 2009
And Now, the Prayer Everyone Has Been Talking About...
Two points jumped out at me when I first heard Rick Warren's prayer. First, he was certain that Martin Luther King Jr. was shouting for joy in Heaven. I'm no expert on Dr. King, but based on what I've read about the man, that seems like a somewhat tenuous assumption.
Secondly, Warren closed his prayer "in the name of the one who changed my life." Isn't Jesus King of kings and Lord of all regardless of our own personal experiences?
What did you think of Rick Warren's inauguration prayer?
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6 comments:
Two thoughts:
1. Warren erroneously admitted to the Father that one day, all nations would stand before Him and be held accountable. That is wrong. One day, all the nations will be gathered before JESUS CHRIST. But I guess that truth would have been too divisive for Warren to have said.
2. Warren erroneously said that Jesus taught "us" to pray, and then he went into what is known as the Lord's Prayer. Jesus taught His disciples to pray in that way, not everyone. That is why it is rightly called the disciple's prayer.
It was a pathetically generic, benign prayer.
Warren's prayer is a prayer to a God that isn't the God of the bible. His Jesus is some different Jesus than that of the Bible. It is the Jesus of Islam and ecumenicalism. And easy-believe-ism, I forget the technical term for that, it was pathetic.
Not the biggest Warren fan, but to say his God isn't the God of the Bible? The prayer was fine. Sure, we could nitpick it to death, but I think we have to be very careful in doing that. There are a lot of things about today to quibble about, Warren's prayer is not one of them.
I am not a Rick Warren fan at all, but I will not pick apart his prayer. I am sure he could have put "Jesus" in the prayer more, but I have not seen many that have prayed at other inaugurations that have done much better. Let us continue to fight the good fight in faith that God is the one who sets kings on their thrones and Presidents in office, for His purposes and His purposes alone. The next 4 yrs will be trying on each of us. Pray for the strength and wisdom to endure it.
I think Warren's prayer is exactly what most of us expected. We don't need to pick it apart, but I think it's worthy of comment given that he's "America's Pastor." His involvement in the inauguration as an evangelical Christian was utterly pointless, and I think his prayer demonstrated that.
Blasphemy and inclusive. Who has to pick it apart? People will be this man's apologist no matter what. I understand using Jesus in other cultures, I'm from Orange County too, BTW and every educated christian preacher knows no matter what language they use "Messiah" is the qualifier. Again, I grew up in Orange County and lived around every culture there as well and each christian in those cultures will tell you there must be a quailifier of Christ or Messiah even their language as christians, otherwise you don't have Jesus of the Bible.
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