Bob WeathersThings have changed a lot for Bishop Carlton Pearson.
Not long ago, Pearson was an escalating star among African-American evangelical Christians. A graduate of Oral Roberts University, in 1981 Pearson founded Higher Dimensions Family Church in Tulsa, Okla. The church exploded to 5,000 members, and Pearson’s fame spread.
But in the last four years, 90 percent of Pearson’s congregation walked away and the property went into foreclosure. ORU denounced him, as did most of his peers. Now he shepherds a remnant of his former congregation, called New Dimensions Worship Center (NDWC).
What happened? Pearson began preaching a “gospel of inclusion.” According to the NDWC web site, Pearson now maintains that all people, of all religions and beliefs – Christians, Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, atheists, or agnostics – will “all be reunited with God (saved, redeemed, go to heaven).” While Pearson favors the term “inclusion,” the old word for this is universalism, the belief that God just loves people too much not to let them into heaven. So, he says, to preach that Jesus died for all people means that Jesus has already saved all people.
True. God loves all people. True. Jesus died for all people. But do we extend that to say that, therefore, all people, whether in this life they reject Jesus or not, will go to heaven? No, because Jesus himself erased that option. “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life,” He said. “No one comes to the Father but through me” (John 14:6). That doesn’t sound very inclusive, does it?
Why? Because the death and resurrection of Jesus require that we decide to believe. Paul, a Jew, realized that all of Christ’s exclusive claims pivoted on the resurrection. So, he declared, for eternal life people must believe that “Christ died for our sins, according to the scriptures – and that he was raised on the third day, according to the scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:3-4).
Sorry, Bishop Pearson. No wonder your people left. Some things are just not negotiable.