SERIOUS Concerns With Craig Groeschel's Teaching!

Hey guys, Colin here, and welcome back to the channel where the Bible and critical thinking meet to give you real Christian commentary about the things that matter. Thanks so much for watching, let's get into the video.

Craig Groeschel’s Influence and the Problem of Shallow Teaching

So Craig Gruschell is the pastor of Life .Church, which I believe is the single largest church in America. They have an extensive online viewership, and Craig is the founder of the YouVersion app, which is the single most popular Bible app in the entire world.

So I'm going to give the app a little bit of criticism today, but I'm not criticizing the people who have downloaded the app or who use it to read the Bible. This is not what the video is about. The decisions that Craig makes with this app are sinful and directly support false teachers and spread their heresy.

That's my point. But more on that in a moment. Craig is in many ways one of the pioneers of the seeker-sensitive movement, which is a movement that seeks to make the local church gathering as fun, entertaining, interesting, and modern as possible in order to appeal to a wider secular audience and get their foot in the door, so to speak, with the secular world.

Craig seems to be, on all accounts, a very humble and kind man who genuinely feels some level of affection for the people he's talking to. I will recognize that in this video. But don't let this fool you.

Craig is still a very dangerous false teacher, and there's no getting around that. Today, in this video, I'm going to give you a few clear, undeniable Biblical reasons to stay away from Craig and from Life .Church and to encourage everyone you know to do the same.

Why Shallow Teaching Fails to Mature Christians

So let's get into it. The first reason that you should stay away from Craig is that his teaching is weak sauce. His theology is about as strong and robust as a five-year-old girl skipping through a field of daisies humming a little tune in her head.

Any discerning Christian should listen to Craig and teachers like him and simply come away wanting more. If you feel nourished spiritually by this kind of dull and basic sermon that he gives, chances are it's because you're either a baby Christian or not a Christian at all, and I sincerely hope that it's the former option.

But there's a problem when pastors preach only baby Christian messages, and that is that the Apostle Paul directly commands against this in Holy Scripture. First Corinthians 3, 1 -3 says,. But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ.

I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are still not ready, for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh, and behaving only in a human way?

So you see, there is a time and place for milk teaching rather than solid food teaching. But a Christian who does not graduate to the level of solid food is not doing what they ought to do. They are fleshly, as Paul says.

They are being bogged down by the things of this world. They're like a teenager who still drinks baby formula. It makes no sense. Our goal as Christians is to grow up into spiritual maturity and to be ready to receive strong, robust theological teaching.

And Paul says that as a leader in the church, that is his goal. To bring people into this, Paul wants to give them solid food, and he's disappointed that he can't. The goal of discipling people is not to give them shallow messages permanently, but that is precisely what teachers like Craig Rochelle do.

Every message is about the most basic theological truths that everyone should largely already know. If you are a Christian, God loves you. If you're a Christian, God has a plan for you. If you're a Christian, Jesus died for your sins.

If you're a Christian, you have the Holy Spirit who will empower you in your walk with God. If you preach these kinds of basic messages for years and years as a pastor, without going any deeper than that, without getting into any specifics, you are simply not doing your job.

Craig's job as a pastor biblically is to bring his people from shallow to deep. But he has demonstrated over the course of his entire ministry that his teaching will permanently be shallow. There's nothing more that he has to offer.

He seems to have no intention of bringing these people into any kind of depth whatsoever. Now, if you read a theologically deep book like Romans, for instance, you will quickly see that Craig's teaching for decades has hardly scratched the surface of the theologically robust teaching of the apostles.

The point I have here is that Craig Rochelle's teaching is self-evidently different from the teaching of Scripture. And that alone is enough to make him a teacher who I do not recommend under any circumstances.

Jesus Calls Us to Be Both Right and Loving

But there's even more to the story. What's even worse than the fact that Craig's teaching is so basic is the fact that sometimes his teaching is so basic that it even becomes confusing and unbiblical.

For instance, Craig posted the following statement on Facebook, which says, quote, Jesus didn't tell us to be right. He told us to be loving, end quote. This statement seems super fair, super charitable on the surface, but it's actually dead wrong.

Jesus told us to be right and to be loving, not to be only one or the other. In John 8, 32, Jesus says, quote, and you will know the truth and the truth will set you free, end quote. So if Christians know the truth and have been set free by the truth, will that result in them being right or wrong?

Of course, someone who knows the truth will be correct, they'll be right. They will not necessarily be right about everything they claim in their life, but they will, to a certain degree, be right because they have the truth.

A person who says that the God of the Bible is the one true God is, by definition, right. More than this, the whole process of doing theology, of designing a sermon, of practicing apologetics or doing any kind of Bible study properly necessitates that we strive to be correct, not just that we strive to be loving.

If someone stands up at the pulpit and says a bunch of untrue and unbiblical things, but they're very kind and sweet and charitable in their demeanor, is that person doing what Jesus commands? No, not at all.

Part of being loving is telling the truth. There's no getting away from this. Second Timothy 2 .5 says, quote, Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth, end quote.

If you are to rightly handle the word of truth, then you must not just strive to be loving, you must also strive to be right. You must strive to be correct. To suggest, as Craig does, that Jesus does not call us to be right is absolutely unbiblical.

It's not true. Jesus calls us to tell the truth and to come to right conclusions about his word. We are called to be loving as well, though. First John 4 .19 says, quote, We love because he first loved us, end quote.

But loving others does not negate the command to be right. Let me ask a question that Craig would have a very hard time answering if he sticks to this argument. If someone spreads the gospel of Christ to someone, is that person right or are they loving?

Those are the only two options, aren't they? Well, if you believe the gospel is true, and I believe Craig does, then that person is right by definition, not just loving. And if they give them the gospel, of course that is loving as well.

So when Jesus calls you as a Christian to spread his gospel, and he does, is he calling you to be right or to be loving? Well, of course, he's calling you to be both. So again, to say that Jesus has not in any way commanded his followers to be right is absolutely false and unbiblical.

But teachers like Craig think in such basic binary theological categories that they have to turn everything into a false dichotomy. You can either be obedient or have a good heart. You can either be correct or you can be loving.

You can either have sound doctrine or you can have a real passion for helping people in the real world. Have you heard these before? These are all dichotomies that Craig and teachers like him present all the time.

And this Facebook post is just one small example of that larger pattern. The point I'm trying to make here is that Craig's teaching is basic. There's no attempt to teach mature Christians about deep concepts.

There is only an attempt to entertain weak Christians with shallow concepts. So if you want more evidence of Craig's direct false teaching, I would highly recommend the work of Chris Rosenborough and Stephen Kozar on the topic, some of which I will link in the description.

Why a Pastor Must Protect the Church from False Teachers

But behind all of this, Craig also actively partners with and endorses false teachers. He does this both through his church and through his app, YouVersion. In order to understand why this is wrong, we must first review a passage about what the job of a pastor is in the first place.

In Acts 20, 28 -30, Paul says this, Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, that is, pastors, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.

I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. And from among your own cells will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after them.

So part of the job of a pastor is to protect his church from those that twist Scripture and teach false things. These people are called wolves, and the shepherd, the pastor, must protect their flock, the church, from these wolves.

Now let us come back to the example of Craig Grishel. Craig has invited several false teachers to speak to his church as a pattern of his ministry for years. Brian Houston is the pastor of Hillsong Church, for instance, and he preaches the Prosperity Gospel along with a whole host of other false teachings, and Craig has invited Brian to speak at his church conferences several times.

Christine Cain is another example. She is a false teacher who breaks God's command by preaching to men and women as a female Bible teacher, while 1 Timothy 2 .12 forbids this. Cain was invited to speak to his congregation as recently as 2018.

Stephen Furtick is another example. He is a false teacher and the pastor of Elevation Church in North Carolina, and Furtick regularly preaches falsehood from the pulpit and aligns himself with other false teachers as well, just like Craig does.

Furtick was called by Grishel in a podcast a great friend and a great pastor. I will also mention that Craig has directly endorsed Joel Osteen as well, who is one of the most recognizable false teachers in America today.

I could go on and on with more names and more examples, but you get the point. The question I have now is this. If, according to the passage we read in Acts, pastors are supposed to protect their church from false teachers, how then can Craig Grishel be considered a good pastor when he invites false teachers to speak to his church?

By the Biblical standard, how can someone be a good shepherd if they openly invite wolves to play with their sheep? I'll answer that question for you. Such a person cannot be considered a good pastor at all.

In fact, they're a bad pastor. They're a horrible pastor. That kind of person is a bad shepherd and really unqualified for their position. And this brings me to my final example. As far as I know, YouVersion is still owned by Life .Church and Craig, and he has some level of authority over it.

If you take a quick spin through the devotionals on the YouVersion app, you will quickly see heretics like Joyce Meyer, T .D. Jakes, Joel Osteen, Kenneth Copeland, Stephen Furtick, and all the rest of them.

You will quickly see female preachers and pastors who disobey God's Word in 1 Timothy 2 .12, as we've already mentioned, when he says that the church's women should not teach or exercise authority over the church's men.

It's clear as day. Craig either directly encourages people to break God's command by listening to these people, in which case he is a false teacher himself, or he does not approve of them and still remains silent, letting his own church participate in sin by endorsing these people, in which case he is also a false teacher.

Keep in mind, Craig did not merely preach at a conference with these people and refuse to say yea or nay about their doctrine and teaching. That would be bad enough. No, he has directly affirmed their teaching and encouraged other Christians to listen to it and to accept it as true.

In other words, he did not merely watch these people rob the spiritual bank. He was their spiritual getaway driver while they did it. No matter which way you slice this, Craig Richelle is a false teacher and unqualified to be a pastor in every way.

You should steer clear of people like him and call them to repentance. In fact, the Word of God gives you no other option. Romans 16, 17 says, I appeal to you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught.

Avoid them. When people teach false doctrine unrepentantly and encourage you to listen to people who do that, your responsibility as a good Christian is to avoid that person until they repent. What a sad state we're in, in the American church, that the most popular pastor in our country promotes heretical teaching.

Final Warning to Avoid Craig Groeschel and Seek Better Teachers

So stay away from Craig Richelle and from his Life .Church. If he's a shepherd, then he's just about the worst kind of shepherd a good sheep could have. His teaching is about as shallow as a kiddie pool, and I'm warning you, if you dive into it head first in full force, you're going to break your neck.

Find better, deeper, more sound Bible teachers of God's Word who actually have a doctrinal backbone, ten of whom are listed in the description. And please pray for Craig that he would repent of this falsehood and turn to the truth of God's Word.

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