I started writing a post last spring when Warren Wiersbe and Rachel Held Evans died within a few days of each other. To say their lives ended up being radically different is not an overstatement. I wrote a bit and then set it aside since I did not think it was the right time. Generally when this happens I discover later there is a reason. I think that reason is because there was more to say, but we hadn’t gotten there yet.

But now I do have some thoughts to share about not only Wiersbe and Evans but also some of the other Famous Christians who have announced with great public fanfare that they are no longer Christians or have radically changed their views to put them outside of historic orthodox Christianity.

There has been a steady trickle of them, but I’m not going to address each one individually because of time and space constraints. However, I do think they all have a few things in common. For this post, I’m going to focus on Wiersbe and Evans because I think they give a good example of what is happening.

Warren Wiersbe’s Lifelong Faith

Warren Wiersbe died two weeks short of his 90th birthday. He was a pastor, seminary professor, and prolific author. If you’ve ever been in a Christian church that teaches the Bible, you’ve probably been influenced by him many times. His books on the Scriptures are widely used by Bible-believing pastors, Bible study leaders. etc. I have some in my personal library that I’ve used when teaching Bible studies.

Wiersbe committed his life to understanding the Bible and helping others do the same. After he passed away, I saw nothing negative written about him – and I looked. By all accounts he was a kind man who loved Jesus, loved people, and loved writing about the Bible and Christian faith. His entire life was spent pointing people to the Bible and Jesus.

When I read about Wiersbe’s death, my first thought was, “Oh, it’s too bad he didn’t make it to 90!” My next thought was of how he had run the race, used his gifts, and was now able to rest from his work. From all I can observe, there was nothing complicated or concerning about his legacy. This summary of Wiersbe’s life (with some great stories from his life) shows that he followed Jesus, preached repentance and salvation from sin available in Christ, and taught the Bible. He was committed to giving God the glory.

Wiersbe finished well, something I have thought a great deal about in recent years.

Rachel Held Evans’ Deconstruction

Rachel Held Evans is a bit more challenging to describe. She was raised an evangelical and her father is a well-liked Christian professor. She was in her mid-thirties, from all accounts happily married to a good man, and the mother of two small children. (Her daughter was less than a year old when Evans died.) Her death was tragic, in part, because she was relatively young and left behind a husband and children.

Her death was also tragic because she leaves behind a confusing and troubling legacy. Evans’ legacy as a leading and vocal Progressive Christian is sobering. Instead of calling people to repentance from sin and salvation in Jesus according to the teachings of the Scriptures as Wiersbe did, she spent much time and energy calling the Scriptures into doubt.

Evans started out a number of years ago asking valid questions about things that many Christians through the centuries have wrestled with. But over time the questions became less and less about understanding the Bible and her faith and instead about leading people down the path to rejecting the authority of the Scriptures, doubting the goodness of God based on things in the Bible she did not like, and, ultimately, pointing people to a version of what she would call Progressive Christianity that does not fit the historical orthodox faith. Her books will stand as a lasting testament of her journey to deconstruct and remake her faith into something more comfortable.

When she died, there was a tremendous amount written about her – including her eternal state. I have no idea the state of her salvation and that’s way above my paygrade (and everyone else’s, for that matter). What I can see is what she wrote, what she did, what she rejected, what she embraced, and her willingness to embrace a view of Christianity that does leave me sincerely concerned regarding not only her eternal state, but the eternal state of those she claimed to try to reach with what she claimed was love compelled by her faith.

Unlike Wiersbe, I personally cannot write that Evans finished well. As a Christian, I find her legacy confusing, sad, and concerning regarding what she left her followers with in terms of her teaching. I wonder that if she knew that one of her tweets (for she was a prolific tweeter) was going to be one of her last if she would have chosen to implore people to repent of their sins and come to Christ instead of fretting about missing Game of Thrones. We will never know. Some people have an opportunity to leave the world with a last message. She did not.

The Public Response to Their Deaths

The reactions to the death of Wiersbe and Evans were interesting because there was a huge outpouring of grief and angst over Evans’ passing and barely a mention of Wiersbe. Now some of the grief over Evans was certainly warranted. It is tragic when a young mother dies, period. By comparison, Wiersbe had lived a full life span and so his passing seems less tragic despite the fact that it, too, is a loss to his family and loved ones.

But the online responses regarding Evans were honestly kind of crazy. Her followers were angry and vicious toward anyone who said anything that wasn’t 100% praise. They pressured a prominent Christian magazine to remove an online article written by someone who knew her because it wasn’t full of effusive praise and had the audacity to suggest that Evans wasn’t perfect. Even U.S. presidents have lengthy articles written when they die that point out their successes and failures. This was not to be with Evans. She was made a saint almost instantly. Her followers told people to “keep her name out of your mouth” if you don’t know her personally or don’t have anything positive to say. The responses to her death by both those who claim Christ and those who freely declare themselves non-believers, atheists, and many other things would make a fascinating psychological study. It was almost cultish in some ways and I don’t use that term lightly.

The coverage was also ironic given their status as authors. Evans received so much coverage at her passing because she was a prominent New York Times best-selling author and darling of the media due to her willingness to speak against traditional and orthodox Christianity. However, I’m confident that Wiersbe probably sold many, many more books than Evans ever came close to selling.

When Christians Cross the Line Into Error

I wrote A Wise Woman Builds Her Home on my other website several weeks before Wiersbe and Evans died. In that post I was reflecting on how people who get so much right about the Christian faith end up going so wrong in the end. I wrote:

It was when I realized that, far more often than not, women who allow their spiritual pain or abuse they suffer(ed) to significantly impact their beliefs almost always end up going wrong theologically.

I also realized that far more often than not, people who obsess about their sin almost always end up going wrong theologically.

There is a line a person crosses where they allow the event, abuse, or pain to become greater than the truth of the Bible. They view everything through a lens of abuse or pain instead of viewing their pain through the lens of Scriptural truth. For others, they view the Christian faith through the eyes of a prominent speaker or pastor who betrays their trust in him/her. When that line is crossed regarding the event, abuse, or pain, all bets are off as to how far the person will fall into error.

There is also something about living constantly in the thoughts of sin that warps a person’s theology and seems to make them open to other errors that our culture is rife with right now.

This is where I believe people are getting it wrong, especially those who claim to be “deconstructing their faith” as a way to become what they think is a more enlightened Christian.

This is where I believe Wiersbe got it right and Evans got it wrong.

A Christian must start with the Scriptures and the faith handed down through the centuries. Then you try to understand your life and your situation through the truth that our brothers and sisters in Christ have faithfully passed down through the ages. If you start with your pain and try to cram the faith into your life around your pain, you will eventually go wrong.

Wiersbe studied the Scriptures and tried to help people understand them and follow them.

Evans was seemingly increasingly consumed with the things in the Bible she found uncomfortable and the tragic stories of broken people, especially those who had been hurt by those who claimed to be Christians. In the process, I believe she tried to remake the Scriptures into something that made her feel comfortable. That truly is Progressive Christianity in a nutshell.

Truth and Love, Brutality and Hypocrisy

In closing, consider this well-known Warren Wiersbe quote:

“Truth without love is brutality, and love without truth is hypocrisy.”

Progressive Christians like Rachel Held Evans like to point out the failing of Bible-believing conservative Christians to love well. It is a constant refrain from Progressive Christians like Evans that other Christians are too full of legalistic rules and hate. Too much focus on sin and not enough love. Well, we do fail to love consistently. I’ve been on the receiving end of some massive failures to love by churches, church leaders, and other Christians. I’ve failed people as well. But it’s not as bad as Evans wanted us to believe. And it certainly doesn’t mean I walk away from Jesus. Humans will always fail us. The truth of the faith will not. A Christian or church failing to love well will never be a valid excuse for anyone choosing to reject Christ.

But loving without truth? Is it right for Christians to “love” people and not tell them the truth? Wiersbe called it hypocrisy. If you love someone, you will tell them the truth. This is what troubles me about Evans. She thought she was loving everyone, but I’m not convinced she told them the truth. Reading the tributes to her by atheist publications and reading tweets about how Evans basically freed people to continue to live unrepentant lives or even live confidently completely without Christ is deeply troubling. Will I call her a hypocrite? No, because I think her intentions were good. But I think she was wrong. If she was wrong, she was dead wrong in terms of failing to preach biblical repentance to her followers and leading them away from a true saving knowledge of Christ.

If I’m going to pattern my life after someone, it will be Wiersbe – loving Christ, loving people, and teaching people the amazing message of freedom from sin and redemption in Christ found in God’s Word.

May the Lord give you courage and wisdom as you follow Him.