A church in Virginia planted by the New City Network–a partnership funded by NAMB and McLean Bible Church promotes the use of the Enneagram in its new member training class.
Conservative Christian experts warn of the dangers of the Enneagram.
SBC Presidential candidate Willy Rice is vice chairman of the NAMB trustees charged with oversight of NAMB.
A Falls Church, Virginia church planted by the North American Mission Board (NAMB) in partnership with the New City Network uses the Enneagram as part of its ministry training program. CityLight Church’s Basic Training Manual includes a section on Spiritual Gifts and personality—it is in this section of the booklet that the church promotes the Enneagram.
According to the booklet, there are nine Enneagram personality types including: the perfectionist, the helper, the performer, the romantic, the investigator, the loyalist, the enthusiast, the challenger and the peacemaker.
The section on personality concludes by saying, “We will be sending you an invitation (by email) to take an enneagram test to help identify your type.”
Conservative evangelicals warn that the Enneagram is unreliable and invokes a spirituality incompatible with Christianity.
Dr. Rhenn Cherry explains in a podcast on the Enneagram, “The symbol that is currently identified as the 9-point Enneagram was brought to the Western world by a mystic named G.I. Gurdjieff in the early 1900s. Few people would dispute that he’s credited with bringing the symbol to the Western world. For those who don’t know, let’s not skip over this word mystic. It’s someone who claims two main things: First, a mystic claims to have attained a level of divine insight or understanding that transcends ordinary human knowledge.”
Cherry has also written a book on the dangers of the Enneagram.
Southern Evangelical Seminary warns that the Enneagram is often presented with Christian origins; however, this has been debunked. According to SES, “Since the Enneagram is false in nature, it means that Christians who recommend it are promoting a false idea and a false method for self-evaluation. How can Christians proclaim the truth of Jesus Christ while accepting a false tool?”
Kevin DeYoung writes, “The Enneagram presents an approach to spirituality that is alien to, and often at odds with, the language and contours of Scripture…If the Enneagram were another version of What Color Is Your Parachute? or Strengths Finder, that would be fine. But it has been, from its inception (whenever that was), infused with spiritual significance. And therein lies the danger.”
The Basic Training booklet promoting the Enneagram is part of the four-week new member program at the church.
CityLight Church began September 15, 2019, as part of the New City Network—a church planting organization now at the center of dispute at McLean Bible Church.
According to New City Network’s website, “New City Network was established in 2016 as the church planting ministry of McLean Bible Church in an effort to carry out the vision of ‘multiplying churches among all nations beginning in greater Washington, DC.’ In 2022, New City Network will grow into its next chapter and re-launch as an independent nonprofit ministry focused on church planting in the Washington, DC area. McLean Bible Church has been an amazing place for this network to grow and send planters and we are very thankful for their incredible partnership over the years.”
The spinoff of New City Network from McLean Bible Church is a story itself. The church planting arm was the center of a major dispute among MBC members and leadership. MBC joined the Southern Baptist Convention despite a prohibition on MBC joining any denomination. This sparked accusations against David Platt and MBC elders.
Platt admitted that the church partnered with the Southern Baptist Convention to plant churches in the DC metro area. According to Platt as of June 2021 MBC and NAMB planted 43 churches in partnership.
Platt said, “I’m not sure, I’m honestly not sure how else to answer your question. Like, if what you mean by affiliation is, or if what I mean, if what anyone means by affiliation is working together with other churches to plant 43 churches in metro DC, uh, to send missionaries, including some from our church family overseas to support disaster relief in response to hurricanes, to support Yemeni refugees, then the answer is yes. If you or anyone else, or I, by affiliation in thinking we are submissive to a denominational structure, that we are helping direct and guide, the answer is no.”
So, David Platt along with McLean Bible Church and the Southern Baptist Convention via its North American Mission Board supported this New City Network church plant that promotes the Enneagram to its new church members.
You might recall a host of issues involving NAMB’s oversight of church plants it funded. In the last year, revelations that NAMB funded church plants with women co-pastors and even a church with its own private label beer.
Oh, and do you know who is a NAMB trustee?
Willy Rice. Yes, that Willy Rice nominated by the Woke establishment segment of the Southern Baptist Convention. The Willy Rice who mysteriously deleted a blog post calling Trump supporters idolaters. That Willy Rice is Vice Chairman of the NAMB trustees—the group supposedly charged with oversight of this fiasco. As we’ve said before, you can’t trust the trustees. The SBC is a huge swamp that must be drained.
It was not without reason that the Chairman of Albert Mohler’s trustee board nominated the Vice Chairman of Kevin Ezell’s board of trustees. This is a bid by the SBC swamp for power.