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Heretic Erwin McManus
The CE (Church Executive) Interview: Erwin McManus, Senior Pastor, Mosaic Church, Los Angeles, CA |
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From Volume 2008, Issue 10 - 10 2008 |
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Erwin McManus, Senior Pastor, Mosaic Church, Los Angeles, CA |
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In a interview with Ronald Keener, McManus said this concerning some changes that he had made at the church since he had been there: "Mosaic has 50 ethnicities; it’s called one of the world’s most diverse congregations. When I came here 16 years ago the church had been plateaued for 15 years and declining for about four years. It had about 300 adults. It was a great church; it was kind of a blue collar family church but it was more known for what it was against — like the movie industry, it was hostile toward people with AIDS, it was hostile towards the gay community. Even though we and the Southern Baptists have the same high view of Scripture we probably have a very, very different posture toward the city. So while the Southern Baptists were boycotting Disney we were doing Bible studies in Disney. While the Baptists were boycotting Universal City, I ended up going over there and making friends with people in Universal City. Now we meet in a night club downtown called the Mayan, it’s a secular night club with thousands of pagan gods carved all over the place. We rent that place on Sunday."
Keener asked McManus, "After you left seminary what was your first assignment?" McManus said," I went to seminary for a semester and dropped out. It really seemed incredibly outdated and antiquated and irrelevant to the culture that I knew. Because of my faith I had such a high view of the Scripture, really the seminary didn’t have as high view of Scripture as I did. I’d been in a secular university studying the Bible under an orthodox Jewish professor who had a higher view of the Old Testament. So it was kind of a curious thing for me. I started multiple churches among the poor or homeless or prostitutes or drug dealers or drug addicts. So I spent my time reaching the community that I felt Jesus cared about."
McManus Unbiblical Conversion
"You didn’t grow up in the church. What’s your conversion story? Keener asked."
"I am from Central America, my grandmother was more Roman Catholic in her background, and my grandfather was more of a humanist. He also believed in reincarnation so he taught me reincarnation. I think maybe between the ages of birth and 18, I might have gone to Roman Catholic, pre-Vatican II Mass, where everything was in Latin, maybe three times in my life. Actually it was quite beautiful. I didn’t fully understand what was going on, but I was attracted to the spirituality of it and did have a clear sense of Jesus at the middle of the story. There was the huge symbol of Jesus being crucified, and the one thing I definitely got out of those two or three times I went to Catholic Mass was that Jesus had died for the sins of the world.
Then I went off to college and became a philosophy major. I was pretty much a mystic who probably from most people’s descriptions would not have a view of a personal God. I wasn’t anti-religious; I was oblivious to the existence of people who were religious. If you had asked me I would have told you that I was spiritual. If you had asked me about Jesus, I would have told you, you know, great guy. If you had asked me about Buddha, I would have told you the same thing. My roommate was a pretty devout Roman Catholic in college and he would go to these university-based events and I went a few times. But when a nun came up to me and asked me to hold the Bible, I told her to keep that book away from me, I wanted to have nothing to do with it."
Keener went on to aske McManus, "Your mother had an influence on your conversion?"
"During that time my mom became a pretty passionate follower of Christ; she called me up at college and said she’d become a Christian. I had no idea what she meant. I never heard that phrase in my whole life, but she seemed really happy, so I was happy for her. We’d been through a couple of family crises. My mom had been through two divorces, pretty painful, and so she was now going through this divorce and she was looking for some kind of meaning and peace in her life and stumbled into a Methodist church where there was a Baptist speaker. His name was Jim Henry and he was a pastor at that time at the First Baptist Church of Orlando, FL. She heard the message of Jesus in a way she’d never heard it. It was really compelling and at the age of 40 my mom became a follower of Christ.... I was a mystic who really was a humanitarian; I wanted to make the world a better place."
Keener asked, "And who was the major influence on these people?"
"My mom was saved first, and the person who led her to Christ was Jim Henry. But so many people from that church surrounded my family, they just loved us and cared for us all the time. They invited us to parties and events and they were fun. To be honest with you, they were the most enjoyable, likeable people we ever met in our lives. Not thinking of themselves, but thinking about others. We never experienced people like that. So I remember the evening, it was August 20, 1978, I just told God you know if this is real, if you can do something with me then I want to do it. It was one of those life-changing moments for me, where everything changed on a dime."
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Wrote the book called The Barbarian Way. It is full of heresies naturally because the author is an heretic.
McManus calls for Christians to stop following the Bible way and take up "the barbarian way." He says those who do are following the voice of Christ, but that voice is not necessarily found in the Bible (page 84).
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