Ranting for the gospel

Jared Wilson pulls no punches in defending the gospel against creeping idolatry of the cool, the prosperous, and the how-to. First, against the gospel of cool:

I just hate this stuff. I hate it. It reduces the glory of the Gospel to a marketing campaign based on who's cooler than whom. That works well when you're selling computers (or soft drinks or what-have-you). But it is flat-out anti-Christian when you're ridiculing other members of the Body to sell your spiritual product.

This is reverse pharisaism. It really is. "I thank you God that I'm not like that lame, religious retard over there."

This is just symptomatic of the consumerist, self-centered, behavioristic, culture-driven lunacy passing for ministry today. It is an anti-gospel, and it is the spirit of the anti-christ at work.

He also challenges the good-life gospel in all its forms:

And if you think this crap is limited to the name-it-claim-it crowd, you are mistaken. It has been creeping into our evangelical churches for years, and you see this discontentment with the Gospel every time you hear a message that treats the Bible like an advice column or a self-help quote book or that treats worship like a performance. Any time the purpose of worship is YOU, you might as well be getting the holy spirit pixie dust from Rod Parsley. It's the same false gospel, just packaged for a different crowd.

Jared has taken heat for the force of his argument, and for naming names. He defends his original article here.