My hope is, in a post like this, that I can model what it means to undermine false claims without it turning into a character attack. This approach is not the norm on the internet. I will end with some questions, but I want to leave them as that - questions. Rather than projecting intent on another, my hope is to correct the misinformation he is receiving.
These comments from MacArthur come from videos that he posted a long time ago now. I thought about responding to them a long time ago, but, to be honest, I just didn’t want to deal with the fallout at the time. My hope is that, now, with distance and a bit of charity, I can just point out a handful of problems with his critiques.
But first, let me allow MacArthur to give his own critique. He claims:
“It is critical that we avoid and understand the danger of false paradigms regarding sanctification; and, one of those that is very popular today is called spiritual formation. It is an imposing form of mysticism and self-help and spiritual intuition imposed upon the Bible. You can go back to many popular writers, not only in the modern time - Dallas Willard and Richard foster - but you can go way back to mystics, going way back into the Middle Ages, who espouse the idea that there is some mystical, intuitive capability within a person that causes him, if manipulated correctly, to rise in spiritual formation. This is not a biblical concept; and, in fact, the work of sanctification is entirely the work of the Spirit of God on us and does not rise from within our human nature. Spiritual formation is dangerous. The term has been borrowed and shifted even into evangelical settings, where perhaps it has been infused with some elements that are biblical, but it's still a term that reflects a non-biblical approach to sanctification. It comes mostly from mysticism. It has been embraced by the mystical side of Roman Catholicism, but it is not what the Bible teaches about sanctification.”
First, it is important to point out that MacArthur is certainly correct when he says that there is a real danger to false notions of sanctification. Second, however, is his misunderstanding of what the term “spiritual formation” signifies. Spiritual formation is the Spirit’s work to form us increasingly into the likeness of Jesus. Every Christian has an account of spiritual formation, including MacArthur. His mistake is to assume that “spiritual formation” is a specific view of sanctification, when it is a placeholder to specify the nature, task, and directives of sanctification. So it is not possible to say that the term “reflects a non-biblical approach to sanctification.” It would be better to critique the actual claims made by individuals, because there is not a view called “spiritual formation.”
One of the reasons that this is important is that you cannot simply say: “People who believe in spiritual formation believe in x.” For instance, my book Formed for the Glory of God: Learning from the Spiritual Practices of Jonathan Edwards exposits Jonathan Edwards’s view of spiritual formation.
Likewise, it strikes me as dangerous to throw around critiques like this without references. I don’t know anyone who thinks that we have an “intuitive capability within a person that causes him, if manipulated correctly, to rise in spiritual formation.” That would be absurd. If there is someone who says this, then they are offering a false notion of spiritual formation. We should just say that.
MacArthur makes a similar claim in a video against contemplative prayer, asserting,
“it’s sort of a “contemplating your navel,” intuitive spirituality, digging deep in to find your spiritual core in your spiritual center, which is nonsense; but, they throw Bible words at it, the words like Jesus, God, Holy Spirit.”
Again, if there are people saying these sorts of things, they are wrong. It is important to say that. And whatever else we might say, MacArthur hasn’t shied away from saying what he thinks is wrong, even when many of the people in his own circles roll their eyes at him. It was progressives and MacArthur, as I recall, who were the first to go after Driscoll, for instance. I remember seeing MacArthur attack Driscoll and feeling a twinge of pride. Too many balked when it came to Driscoll because he had such cultural power. I appreciated MacArthur’s voice in that. Protecting the church from false teachers is not something to take lightly, and MacArthur certainly doesn’t take that call lightly.
My worry though, is that by painting with such broad strokes, and attacking something as sub-Christian without actual reference points, leads people to attack fellow Christians as if they were apostate. I’ve had folks influenced by MacArthur attack me online for being a heretic and “New Age,” even when I’m articulating Jonathan Edwards’s view!
In one of the more comical moments, I’ve even had one person attack me online (and attack a church who invited me to speak), claiming that I was propagating “New Age” spirituality. Their evidence? They posted a picture of the table of contents to my book on Edwards (which is funny itself), where I used the word “spiritual disciplines” in a chapter title. They claimed that to talk about spiritual disciplines is evidence of a “New Age Spirituality.” The problem is that I was rejecting the term spiritual disciplines in that chapter, adopting instead for the more traditional term “means of grace.” They didn’t even bother to read the chapter they condemned me for writing, and they didn’t notice that the chapter, like the book, was on a figure who lived 300 years ago! Hardly New Age!
There are lots of questions and critiques we can level at the spiritual formation conversation, and there is nothing wrong with raising questions and critiques. Much of what I do here is exactly that. But we first need to gain understanding so that we are critiquing positions people actually hold, and are wrestling with what is really being said.
As another side, I worry about how folks have come to understand contemplative prayer, mostly because that terminology is based on a confusion. Here is a video with some of my own thoughts about “contemplative prayer.” I have also written on the topic here.
My own approach to these criticisms is to pause and consider them honestly. This might mean, as with the case of being attacked and being called a heretic, that the first thing to do is to take this to the Lord in prayer. Lord, I’m so angry that this person would do this. I can’t imagine attacking someone like that without even bothering to read what they said, or consider what they believe. Lord, all I can think about is taking them down, and publicly revealing how ignorant they are. Lord have mercy on me. It is not my calling to defend myself against every false attack. It is not my calling to make sure everyone respects my view. Lord, I don’t know why this person needs me to be a heretic. Open their hearts to you, Lord.
In terms of MacArthur, I understand his desire to protect his people from false views of sanctification. I understand his worry about contemplative prayer. But if you consider folks he does agree with, such as Richard Baxter, whose work A Christian Directory, MacArthur calls “a purely Biblical treatment of the spiritual ills and cures of men,” articulates a vision of contemplation and spiritual formation that is worth recovering. (Baxter himself, somewhat ironically, was converted through a Roman Catholic spiritual text republished by a spiritual formation movement that used to publish key texts under Puritan names.)
Spiritual formation is not new. It is what Edwards was doing when he wrote the Religious Affections. It is what Wesley was up to when he helped to construct “methodism,” which is a method of spiritual formation. The Puritans, as a whole, can be considered a movement of spiritual formation. Baxter is a great example of this. So, by all means, let’s talk about false ideas and notions of spiritual formation, but let’s remember that spiritual formation is not a view, but categorizes any view of being formed into the likeness of Jesus by the Spirit; or what we might just categorize as “spiritual growth.”
I said I would end with questions. My primary question has to do with bearing false witness. I don’t think MacArthur is necessarily doing that here. He seems to have been told secondhand what this whole “spiritual formation thing” is about. But as a church leader, who, as the book of James emphasizes, is judged by his words, it is important to pause and consider what it means to bear witness about others who have put their faith in Jesus, even if that faith ends up looking differently than your own. We don’t get to choose who we get to be one with, and who we stand in unity with - Christ does.
So how do we weigh the use of our language on social media? What does it look like in this age to be “slow to speak?” (Jas. 1:19). How do we hear the call from James not to speak evil against one another? (Jas. 4:11). Unity, if nothing else, is a refusal to bear false witness and to uphold your neighbor’s name (this was standard Puritan teaching based on giving false testimony against your neighbor). It is a bit too easy, in this social media age, to forget that this is a fundamental feature of biblical ethics. So how do we faithfully name errors and false teaching when we see it, while also refusing to bear false witness against each other?