A Critique of the Purpose-Driven Life, Part II — Personality Profiling -- By: James Sundquist

Journal: Conservative Theological Journal
Volume: CTJ 09:28 (Dec 2005)
Article: A Critique of the Purpose-Driven Life, Part II — Personality Profiling
Author: James Sundquist


A Critique of the Purpose-Driven Life,1
Part II — Personality Profiling

James Sundquist

In the first article the author exposed Rick Warren’s false teaching in general, Warren’s colossal blunders in his 40-Day examples he cites from Scripture, and his false teachings regarding covenants and oaths. In this article he addresses Warren’s “SHAPE” program, and Personality Profiling, where documentation is given of the tragic consequences to those Christians in Purpose-Driven churches throughout the U.S., and Canada who refused to sign Rick Warren’s forced covenants.

Introduction

The S in SHAPE refers to Spiritual Gifts that can only be possessed by a believer, as even Rick Warren asserts, meaning that only the ‘‘new man” can possess them. However, the Heart, Abilities, Personality, and Experience (the H,A,P,E in SHAPE) could apply to believers as well as non-believers. The impression is created that there is an attempt to combine the attributes of the new man (the S in SHAPE) and the old man (the H,A,P,E in SHAPE) in what Rick Warren describes as a “custom combination of capabilities.” When Jesus warned us against putting new wine into old wineskins (the old man). .. the wineskins did not burst right away, but after a season. Much, if not all, of Rick Warren’s SHAPE (HAPE) is the old wineskin. So the only thing that is going to happen is that eventually, Warren’s SHAPE wineskin is going to burst!

By now many of you must be asking, “If some of the teachings behind the other letters in Rick Warren’s SHAPE are faulty, then how can we trust the teaching behind the remaining letter (P”) in his SHAPE acronym?” Well you would be right! You can’t trust it. We will prove why Rick Warren’s teaching on Personality Theory is one of the most serious aberrations from orthodox Christianity. The individual letters of SHAPE as well as any value of combining all of the letters cannot be biblically defended. Even if four out of the five letters in SHAPE could be biblically defended, but one is in error, it corrupts the entire acronym. A little leaven leaveneth the entire lump. A little strychnine in the stew poisons the entire stew, no matter how excellent and fresh the meat, potatoes, and vegetables.

Once again I must point out that the actual personality profile questionnaire (the P in SHAPE) is not in Rick Warren’s Purpose Driven Life book. Rather he gives a general description of it. In order to obtain the actual personality profile questionnaire that you take and fill out (and determine your score), you must do the same thing you did to obtain the SHAPE questionnaire. The personality questionnaire is a questionnaire

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