Theological Literacy in Today's Church - Are You a Good Berean?

This past weekend I was at a friends house and we were watching the "The Late Great Planet Church" available at http://nicenecouncil.com/. To give you a little background, I purchased the DVD in an effort to understand dispensationalism from an opposing viewpoint. My friend, an avid dispensationalist, had some issues with their portrayal of dispensationalism. One point that we discussed was the state of literacy within the church.

There are many in the Church which are biblically literate, in the sense that they can quote from scripture, however many in Church do not know the first thing about theology. I have come to believe that ones theology does matter. If one believes wrong, not by mere mistake or misunderstanding, very likely are headed down a dangerous path or can be lead in the wrong direction.

This can be seen with current controversy over Rob Bell and his new book. His theology is nothing new. It is simply nothing more than liberal theology repackaged for a modern audience. When one has a proper theological understanding it is harder to pull the sheep away from the herd.

There are several things that have crept into evangelicalism that I believe have lead to this:

• A focus on ancillary issues such as end time prophecies, political activism, and social justice. 
• An unhealthy drive towards ecumenism.
• The exchanging of Gospel centered Biblical preaching for man centered pop psychology. 

Over the next several weeks I will explore these issues and offer some suggestions from my perspective. For those that have read my blog and continue to read it, I thank you and hope that you will find this series engaging.