A Christianity Worth Believing by Doug Pagitt

I really only read this book for one purpose. In the past 6 months, my faith in Jesus Christ has been shocked to life so to speak. My wife and I felt led to leave the church we were attending and search for another congregation to become a part of. Part of this process brought me to go back to the beginning of my conversion to Christianity back in High School. My youth pastor at the church we attended was Doug Pagitt. His "talks" as we called them back then, were always very fundamentally evangelical in nature. He believed and preached salvation by grace alone and faith in Jesus Christ is the only way to receive that gift. I reviewed this book simply to understand based on my knowledge of Doug and who he was then, if that Doug still exists or if he has truly fallen into the heresy that I have read/heard about online.

Since leaving the church I attend with him as the youth pastor and moving into a leadership role in what now is being called the emergent church, I have been questioning what it is that he now believes and is it truly different than what he taught in HS, or is all the fuss about the emergent church blown out of proportion. I can say that yes, Doug has become a heretic in the biblical sense of the word. I now understand the futility of the discussions I have heard Doug have with evangelical leaders. There is now little to no common ground to walk along with between Doug and Biblical Christianity. From the sounds of it, those that have been posted with the emergent label are nearly all believe very similarly to Doug.

I can say with certainty that all disagreement between Doug/emergent types and Biblical Christians stem from the inerrant authority of all the scriptures, sola scriptura. Doug no longer believes in the inerrant authority of all the scriptures. This is a key component to the Christian faith. Without the Bible being the true words of God, what differentiates this faith from that of Hindu, Islam or Buddhism? Which is exactly the reason why Doug refuses to offer the idea of a hell anymore. If Christ died once for all, then that means any religion that promotes good living will get you a good life after death. The basis of the Christian faith is that Jesus Christ came to earth as the propitiation for our sin on this earth. It is also clear that this propitiation is for those who repent and believe in Jesus Christ and for no one else. I don't doubt that Doug believes that Jesus was the propitiation for our sin, however, I think he may add that he doesn't know whether that means it is for everyone unconditionally or whether it is for the select believers as written by greek influenced jews(aka the apostles of Christ).

Because Doug does not believe in the inerrant authority of all the scriptures, a discussion about anything in the faith with the emergents becomes futile.

Any further dissection of the problems with Dougs Biography/Story about a Christianity Worth Believing is not helpful when his baseline that we have as Christians is not regarded with the same authority as I have.

I pray that Doug is convicted back into the realization that the Gospel is all we have. Jesus told a story though the authors of the Bible. As 2 Tim 3:16 says, All scripture is God breathed(inspired) by God and useful for teaching, rebuking(reproof) and training in righteousness. Paul didn't write that some scripture is God breathed, but ALL of it is.

Will you read this book again? No.

Would you suggest this book be added to a personal library? Public Library

Reviewed By Mike W - Twin Cities, MN