The potency of the article “THE” in “thePLAN”; Part 1

Words have an uncanny potency. Even the three letter word “the” can sway your heart and mind from one paradigm to another in a matter of seconds. No wonder the Bible warns us to weigh our words carefully because in the day of judgment we are going to give an account of every single word we speak for it is by our words that we shall be justified or condemned (Matthew 12:36 and 37). The little word or article “the,” when it stands alone, doesn’t mean a thing. But you know that, don’t you? So why am I telling you something you already know? You know perfectly well that when you prefix a word like for instance “PLAN” with the article “the” it becomes “THE PLAN” which immediately imprints on it a sense of authority, finality, conclusiveness, irrevocability and indefeasibility. “A PLAN” is just another plan amongst many others and will not necessarily captivate your mind, but when it is “THE PLAN” you inadvertently begin to realize that you cannot argue against it. For all practical reasons “THE PLAN” is the ultimate plan, the plan of all plans and must therefore be endorsed and accepted at all cost. It suggests that all the other plans which are merely “A PLAN” have failed and that this plan, “THE PLAN,” is the answer to all the failures that have gone before: this, my friend, is “THEEEEE PLAN.” Please bear my latter statement in mind because in due course I will show you how “THE PLAN” has superseded even God’s plan despite the fact that it is called God’s plan.

Be that as it may, let’s make it a bit more interesting by removing the space between the article “the” and the word “plan.” It then becomes “thePLAN” which brings us a little closer to the real reason for the title of my comment “The potency of the article “THE.” You may  already have come across “thePLAN” (Afrikaans: “diePlan”) on the internet. For those of you who understand Afrikaans I have embedded the following video so that you may become better acquainted with “thePLAN.”

“thePLAN” Promotional Video by Frans Hancke

In his promotional video “thePlan, the SECRET of a church (congregation) that makes a DIFFERENCE in the world” Dr. Frans Hancke reveals the secret of a missional or sent-out church. He has been involved in several South African and overseas church congregations for more than twenty years and in all of those years the question “What is the secret of a church that makes a difference in the world” has been bugging him. He began to wonder why some parishes have managed to make a distinct difference in the world out there while others have been struggling to make any significant difference at all. He began to wonder what God’s purpose is for his church; how would God want the difference to look like which his people, the church, are supposed to make in the world out there? His quest for an answer led him to the University of the Free State where he started his research. Of course, the obvious thing to do was to first study the Bible to learn what it has to say about a transformational or transformative church. The second thing he ventured to do was to visit several congregations and to determine what it was they were doing that enabled them to make a difference in the world out there. And thirdly, he began to study the available literature on transformational churches to see what some of the other theologians and researches have written on the subject. The most unsettling thing that emerged in their research was that only 10% of the churches in the world, of God’s people in the world, were missionally involved in God’s plan. In other words, only 10% of the churches in the world were actively making a difference in the world out there. The research he has been doing ever since has not only gained credence in South Africa but also abroad and eventually it gave birth to “thePLAN,” an organization that assists congregations to become more missional in their approach to evangelism and to make a greater difference in the world out there. Those of you who would like to know more about Dr. Fans Hancke and his unique “thePlan” will find the following information interesting.

Let’s do a quick MissioMatrix check on some of the things Dr. Frans Hancke says in his promotional video.

1. The pad from which he launched his “thePLAN” was the Bible in order to see what it has to say about transformational churches. THAT’S JUST GREAT! The infallible, inerrant and eternally immutable Word of God should always be a light unto our feet and to our path (Psalm 119: 105).
2. His endeavors to encourage churches to reach out to the world out there is JUST GREAT. Jesus Christ Himself commanded his disciples to go into all the world and to make disciples of all the nations, teaching them to observe everything He taught us (Matthew 28: 19 and 20). THAT’S JUST GREAT!
3. His endeavors to encourage churches to go out there where the tyre meets the road and to make a difference in the world out there, is JUST GREAT. Christians everywhere should hanker for peace, justice and righteousness. They should lend a helping hand to alleviate the suffering of the poor, the downtrodden and the outcasts. THAST’S JUST GREAT. James, the brother of Jesus, said: “If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit? (James 2:15-16).
4. His endeavors to provide the churches he visits with material such as DVD’s brochures, books, publications, Bible studies etc. to assist hem in their missional outreach is JUST GREAT.

BUT and this is a huge BUT:

As soon as you compromise the Word of God to accommodate your particular “thePLAN” your missional strategies and methodologies breed arrogance and even animosity against God and his Word. But in what way is Frans Hancke compromising the Word of God whilst he boldly asserts that “thePLAN” is God’s plan for the church and its people and that he derived his “thePLAN” directly from the Word of God? To find out we must allow him to speak for himself. He said the following in a paper he presented at an international conference hosted by the Department of Theology of the University of the Free State. entitled “The Impact of Emerging Global Missional Paradigms  on the Perspective of the Relationship between Mission and Conversion.”

How clear is the Bible on the concepts of Mission and Conversion? I ask that because if the Biblical perspective is evident, unambiguous, unmistakable – if it is apparent, if it is rigid – there is no need for us to discuss our perspectives on this matter. Because in such a case our perspective becomes, in a sense, irrelevant. Then we should concur with this apparent Biblical perspective of mission and conversion and it would be needless and invalid to allow for a changing point of view or even to allow for the influence of changing paradigms.

But I believe that most Bible scholars will agree that defining these concepts is much more complex than that. There are far too many diverse perspectives in the global church on the subject of mission and conversion to support a clear mono-Biblical point of departure. There are so many interpretations of Scripture. There are so many variables we face. The fact that we have conferences on this subject, accentuates the fact that there are different perspectives and orientations in church and theological circles. The fact is – the Bible is not so clear on these concepts and therefore does not allow for a universal understanding and acceptance of mission and conversion. We do not have a narrow, clear, simple Biblical definition of mission and conversion – and even if there were such undebatable descriptions, we probably would have find reasons to differ about it. But that is not the only reason why perspectives of mission and conversion differ. Our perspectives vary because of differences in:

• context;
• Theological traditions and backgrounds;
• interpretation of current Theological paradigms; and
• because of personal experience,

Why do I stress the difference in perspective? Because we will never be completely in accordance when we think and speak and write about mission and conversion. We must accept variances in our perspectives and recognize that this will ultimately determine our view on the content of, and the relationship between mission and conversion. (Emphasis added).

In effect our esteemed Dr. Frans Hancke from the equally esteemed University of the Free State says the following:

“thePlan” would never have been a crucial necessity for the church if the Bible had been absolutely clear on the subject of Mission and Conversion. The realities, however, are that the Bible is NOT so evident, unambiguous, unmistakable and rigid in its treatment of this matter. In fact, we must allow our perspectives with regard to Mission and Conversion to be formed and molded by the many diverse perspectives in the global church (including the perspectives of the Roman Catholic Church) which do NOT support a clear mono-Biblical point of departure. We must realize that the post modernistic and humanistic approach to biblical truths are flooded with paradoxes and we dare not compromise any of these paradoxes. There are no longer such a thing as untruths or lies and no longer an “either/or” paradigm in the global church. Both, EITHER the traditionally accepted truth AND the apparent contradiction of that truth, are true. These paradoxes should guide our perspectives on Mission and Conversion and NOT the ambiguities, uncertainties, vagueness and opacity of the Bible.

Why do I stress the difference in perspective? Because we will never be completely in accordance when we think and speak and write about mission and conversion (from a biblical perspective of the meaning of Mission and Conversion). We must discard a mono-biblical point of departure and accept variances in our perspectives and recognize that this will ultimately determine our view on the content of, and the relationship between mission and conversion, even if we have to alter, change, refurbish, re-interpret, or renounce Jesus Christ’s own take on Mission and Conversion.

From this we can easily draw a table of distinction between “thePLAN” and the “theBIBLE.” Guess which one of the two is going to come up tops?

“thePLAN”	“theBIBLE”
Lucid, clear, clear-cut, unambiguous, straightforward,  articulate, coherent, plain, unmistakable, transparent, entirely intelligible, precise, unequivocal, explicit, decided, JUST GREAT. etc. etc. etc.	Confused, irrational, ambiguous, unclear, not so straightforward, complicated, devious, incoherent, mistakable, inarticulate, unintelligible, equivocal, undecided, NOT SO GREAT etc. etc. etc.

Now, just fancy that! Here is a man with a doctorate in theology who has the audacity to claim that he has found the key to unlock the secret of how to nurture a successful missional church because the centuries old biblical missionary paradigm is unclear. He has simply taken the many interpretations of Scripture and the many diverse perspectives of Mission and Conversion in the global church, cast it into one big pot, stirred it with his magical wand and voila – out came the new wonderful plan, called “thePLAN” (not “aPLAN” but “theeeeePLAN”) that surpasses all the other plans. Isn’t that just perfectly kosher? He condenses all the many perspectives in the global church into ONE UNIFIED and globally ACCEPTED PLAN, seals it with a new and singularly authoritative perspective of Mission and Conversion and claims that this IS the ultimate unambiguous and unmistakably and internationally clear-cut Magna Carte of missional churches which strive to make a difference in the world out there.

If Mission and Conversion are the two most important doctrines in the Bible, it becomes extremely difficult to understand why anyone would want to ascribe ambiguity and indistinctness or unclearness to what the Bible has to say about it. Surely, if Mission and Conversion are the two most important doctrines in the Bible, the God of the Bible would never have allowed the Holy Spirit (the Author of God’s Word according to 2 Timothy 3:16 and 17) to inspire men of God into being unclear, ambiguous, fickle, inconsistent and capricious. Indeed, it is so breathtakingly important that He would have his Spirit make it so abundantly clear, so genuinely unambiguous and so rigidly comprehensible that even a child may understand it (Psalm 119: 9).

IS THE MISSIONAL EFFORT TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE IN THE WORLD OR TO MAKE A BETTER PLACE OF THE WORLD A BIBLICAL CONCEPT?

The post modernists are working overtime to reinterpret the major doctrines in the Bible. Here are a few examples of their undying efforts to refurbish the entire Bible.

CONVERSION/REPENTANCE

One of todays most esteemed transformational architects, Dr. Ron Martoia. has the following to say about repentance (Metanoia). I dare to call it Martoia’s Metanoia or is it “Martenoia?”. You can find it here.

Jesus said I have come to give you full life, abundant (perissos) life, over the top life.

I want to suggest that Jesus came for the express purpose of helping us shift our perspective so we can experience this transformative life.

Think about Jesus’ opening sermon picked up from John the Baptist…

Reorient your lives (repent, some have suggested “move beyond your mind”) the Kingdom of God is the framework you need to see right now!

(Metanoia in the context of theological discussion, where it is often used, is usually interpreted to mean repentance. However, some people argue that the word should be interpreted more literally to denote changing one’s mind, in the sense of embracing thoughts beyond its present limitations or thought patterns (an interpretation which is compatible with the denotative meaning of repentance but replaces its negative connotation with a positive one, focusing on the superior state being approached rather than the inferior prior state being departed from).

The word “metanoia” does indeed mean “to change your mind for the better” but Martoia, like so many other emergent scholars and preachers, deliberately dissect it from the biblical reasoning that man needs to escape his lost and sinful status (and the righteous judgments of God) by a voluntary and intentional adjustment of his mind with regard to his understanding of who God is and who he (mankind) is in the light of God’s Word. A biblical knowledge of God (i.e. God’s own revelation of his character, i.e. his holiness, divine love, goodness, mercy, and his righteous judgments and man’s fallen nature) form the basis for true repentance and salvation. Hence Jesus’ words in John 17:3:

John 17:3 And this is eternal life: [it means] to know (to perceive, recognize, become acquainted with, and understand) You, the only true and real God, and [likewise] to know Him, Jesus [as the] Christ (the Anointed One, the Messiah), Whom You have sent. (Emphasis added).

Nonetheless, how can you know and understand the true meaning of repentance and conversion when you pin a tag of ambiguity and indistinctness on the Bible? It is impossible! The inevitable result is that you will want to invent a new plan of Mission and Conversion and that’s exactly what Dr. Frans Hancke together with the Department of Theology at the University of the Free State have done. They have replaced the Bible’s perspective on Mission and Conversion with a hodgepodge of various divergent perspectives on Mission and Conversion now prevalent in the global church (which, God have mercy, includes the Roman Catholic Church and its particular doctrines on Mission and Conversion). Conversion in the post modernist’s mind is not an escape from God’s righteous judgments through his Son Jesus Christ but involves a paradigm shift whereby your mind is brought into tune with the bigger picture, embedded in the vast diversity of the global church whose missional journey it is to make a difference in the world and to make it a better place to live in. In essence, their transformational agenda is nothing more and nothing less than an offshoot of the dominionist faith paradigm – the notion that the global church must usher in the Kingdom of God on earth here and now. Dr Frans Hancke and professor Pieter Verster, co-writers of an article, entitled “THE COMMON CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS DETERMINING THE MISSION IMPACT OF THE LOCAL CHURCH, Results from an analytical study” quote Edward R & David A Fraser who said the following:

The Church is a participant in, and a result of the mission of God. It is both a result of and a co-partner with God in the process of effecting the Kingdom of God here on earth (Dayton, Edward R & Fraser, David A. “Mission and the Church” in Winter & Hawthorne, D17-D25). [As quoted

MISSION / MISSIONAL

Jesus Christ never commanded his followers to make the world a better place or to make a difference in the world. He commanded them to go into all the regions of the world (countries, islands and lands) and to make disciples of all the nations, teaching them to observe everything He has commanded his followers (Matthew 28:19 and 20). Imagine for one moment a follower of Jesus being sent to a particular nation and trying to teach them to observe everything Jesus taught whilst the follower defines the Bible as being ambiguous, indistinct, unclear and inarticulate on lifesaving matters such as mission and conversion. Is he going to make disciples who learn to observe and obey everything Jesus taught? You must be joking! But rest assured, Frans Hancke and the Department of Theology at the University of the Free State will immediately come to the rescue with their brilliant plan “thePLAN” that is definitely NOT ambiguous, indiscreet, indistinct, unclear and inarticulate in their perspectives on Mission and Conversion.

How can you make a better place of the world or make a difference in the world when it lies in the control of the evil one? (1 John 5:19). In fact, this is precisely the reason why the world hated Jesus first and continues to hate his true followers. The true followers of Jesus who proclaim the unadulterated Gospel of Jesus Christ and refuse to soften up or water down the stumbling properties of his cross will be hated, persecuted and even put to death. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 4:13 that the true followers of Christ are defamed because they are the filth of the world and the off-scouring of all things unto this day. Do the post modern change agents really think the world will allow it to be changed into something supposedly better when it regards God’s true followers as the filth of the world and the off-scouring of all things? In fact, the Psalmist declared many centuries ago that the world is bent on casting off God’s and his Son’s authority and the restraints imposed on them by their authority (Psalm 2). It is the will of God that mankind as a whole willingly and obediently subject itself to His authority by being yoked to his beloved Son (Matthew 11:29), but in stead of doing just that it vomits out hatred and animosity against God and his Son by shouting: “Let us break Their bands [of restraint] asunder and cast Their cords [of control] from us.”

Any person, no matter what his/her rank and position is in this world (King, Queen, Doctor, Professor, General, Mr. Mrs. Miss or Me.), is deceived when he/she thinks they can make a difference in the world or make a better place of the world by compromising the Word of God. As a matter of fact they are not making a difference in the world but are aiding and abetting it in its maddening hatred of God and his restraining authority. They are actually siding with the world against God and his Son, Jesus Christ. They are NOT influencing the world for the better in any way; the world is influencing the church.

I am not suggesting that the followers of Jesus Christ should refrain from doing good to others by trying to alleviate their poverty and ill-begotten circumstances. What I do say is that we cannot transform the world by doing wonderful things. Genuine transformation can only come about when individuals are touched by the wonderful, unambiguous and supremely articulate Gospel of Jesus Christ, when they believe this Gospel and repent of their evil ways by being born anew from above. Without this you will only end-up with a Mother-Teresian kind of Gospel that tends to the needs of the poor, the sick and the destitute but are careless about their final destiny after death because they have never been taught to repent and believe the Gospel for their redemption. Making a better place of the world or making a difference in the world is in fact a Christless Gospel that cannot save. It is merely a do-goody-goody social Gospel that supposedly wants to usher in the Kingdom of God here and now without having to teach the nations to observe everything Jesus teaches us in his Word. In a recent article which you can read here, Richard Nathan MA defines the Social Gospel as follows:

What I call the First Great Evangelical Meltdown occurred in the early 1900s in contrast to the First Great Awakening in the 1700s. It was widely accepted in the early 1900s that Evangelical and Reformed thinkers and preachers were promoting the true Gospel. They also had strong intellectual backing through schools like Princeton Theological Seminary, which was considered a bastion of Evangelical orthodoxy. However, heretical and unbiblical views of Christianity began entering the Church around that time, especially through the seminaries and universities. These assaults focused particularly on the authority of the Bible.

The two main assaults were,

• first, a philosophy of naturalistic science that claimed the biblical picture of the origin of the universe was an archaic myth and that science trumped the Bible; and,
• second, an attack on the Bible itself that came mainly from German theological schools steeped in Enlightenment Rationalism and German Romanticism . . . .

These schools claimed that they could tell what was “really true” in the Bible and what was “myth.” One of the “myths” that they claimed was just superstitious thinking was the Resurrection of Christ. They also taught that Moses didn’t write the first five books of the Old Testament. These heresies took the American seminaries and universities by storm, and later the denominations. Unfortunately, the churches were vulnerable partly because they wanted to be academically “relevant” to “modern people.”

Another factor that contributed to the First Great Meltdown was the rise of the social gospel around the beginning of the 20th century.

Promoters of the social gospel assumed that the biblical Gospel wasn’t really true because “of course Jesus didn’t really rise from the dead.” Therefore, the only thing left for people who wanted to affect society was to do good, because of course Christ talked about being helpful to the poor and the sick, the alienated, and so forth. And since there was no longer a Gospel of grace and salvation to believe in, they said that what we have left is the social gospel: “Go into all the world and do social good works.” In other words, “deeds not creeds.”

Many came to see this as the mission of the Church. The world missionary movement that had flourished just before this controversy arose changed its basic focus from bringing the Gospel to the nations to going to the nations “recognizing” that the “hidden Christ in all nations” was already there. This became the theology of the World Council of Churches.

This truth gap in the mission of the Church left a big hole, and into that hole poured Marxist thinking, which agreed with liberal theology that all that mattered was to “do good to people.” The Marxists believed that capitalism was the great cause of suffering, war, and poverty, and as the liberal theologians gradually embraced Marxism, the Marxists were happy to use the churches for their own purposes.

During this process, almost every mainline church either capitulated or split due to the terrible conflict. The groups called Fundamentalist united on the fundamental truths of Scripture that the liberal churches denied (more about that below). The liberal churches focused on the social gospel and gradually turned away more and more from biblical preaching, teaching, and eventually even from biblical morality. In many circles psychological methods replaced biblical sanctification in the search for the transformation of the inner man.

This situation has continued up through today and, if anything, is snowballing. The mainline churches are continuing in their liberalism and are moving more and more towards Marxism. The Fundamentalist churches are now moving more and more into the syncretism that they abhorred during the first Great Meltdown. In addition, the following influences in Evangelicalism are very strong:

• The marriage of psychology and mysticism;
• Compromises with Roman Catholicism in the political arena;
• The popularity and spread of the spiritual formation / contemplative prayer movement and Romanticism; and
• Literary apologetics and an undiscerning embrace of culture, especially through the popularity and influence of such writers as C. S. Lewis and the Inklings and the compromising Anglican style.

In part 2 of my comment on “thePLAN” I will be focusing on a phenomenon called “INCARNATIONAL SPIRITUALITY” that is taking the church by storm.

For those of you who want to study the ascending GLOBAL CHURCH or EMERGENT CHURCH in more detail the following reading matter may interest you.

http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/globalchurch.htm

http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/05/peace-un.htm

http://life.nationalpost.com/2010/10/09/the-role-of-middle-east-christians-in-the-global-church/

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