In The Secret DVD, Lisa Nichols says to the listeners, “You are eternal. You’re source energy. You are God manifested in human form, made to perfection.” Unfortunately, many people have met this book with open arms. It’s even thrown some Christians into confusion. I’ve cringed to hear of some church small groups whose normal study of the Bible has been diverted to a study of Rhonda Byrne’s latest self-help best seller, The Secret.
So, I thought that I would include a brief response to this recent book craze by Hank Hanegraaff of the Christian Research Institute.
“Thoughts become things. If you believe, you will receive. Sound familiar? It ought to. These axioms of the self-help movement are just the latest repackaging of creative visualization techniques rooted in New Age / Eastern religious philosophy. But they are being masterfully marketed to a new generation through The Secret, the New York Times best seller that is rocking the professional world, influencing millions of people (perhaps some of your friends and neighbors), and even finding its way into the Church.
‘YOU WILL BECOME LIKE GOD’
Like the Positive Confession craze that is also confusing many Christians, The Secret argues that your thoughts have unlimited creative power. Author Rhonda Byrne, named one of the 100 Most Influential People in The World by Time magazine, writes of a ‘universal’ Law of Attraction that will grant you anything you desire. All you have to do is believe. The DVD edition of The Secret purports, ‘You are eternal life. You’re source energy. You are God manifested in human form, made to perfection.’
To discerning Christians, the error in such teaching is obvious. God alone is the Creator (John 1:1-3; Col. 1:16), and believers are commanded to seek His kingdom as their highest priority (Matt. 6:19-21, 33). Paul wrote that he had lost all things in order that he might win Christ’s approval (Phil 3:8), yet the false promise of every dream come true is a powerful draw today.
THE DARK SIDE
For some, this allure might even be enough to obscure the dark side of The Secret’s Law of Attraction—that those who suffer bring trouble on themselves.
When asked by Larry King if Jessica Lunsford (the nine-year-old from Florida who was brutally raped and murdered in 2005) had created this horror, Dr. Joe Vitale, a Secret contributing author, responded, ‘We attract everything to ourselves and there is no exception.’
Jesus sharply rebuked those who tried to pin human suffering on some fault of the sufferer (John 9). Numerous Scriptures teach that suffering primarily has two purposes: To make us more like Christ and to reveal the glory of God in us. The real secret to powerful living is found not in The Secret but in the Savior.”
At the request of the American Tract Society, Hank Hanegraaff has prepared a tract about The Secret called, “What is the Secret?” For more information go to CRI’s website (www.equip.org) or call 1-888-7000-CRI.
Don Whitney has also written a helpful review of The Secret on his website (click here).
4 Comments on ““The Secret” is nothing new”
The Secret also includes scientific sounding mumbo-jumbo, most notably the Law of Attraction. There is no Law of Attraction. It has no basis in science and there is no scientific research suggesting that it is true. The promoters, who include some physicists, also talk about quantum this and that, unified field theory, etc. in a manner that is totally disconnected from our scientific understanding of the world. They are speaking utter nonsense and should be ignored.
It is not at all difficult to see why they would do this. Science carries a great deal of credibility in our culture (with good reason). Claiming The Secret has a scientific foundation will trick people into believing (and buying). The Secret is hardly alone in this. For example, anti-fluoride and anti-vaccine activists like to quote scientific sounding statistics to give their silly ideas credibility. Three more organizations can be found on the sidebar of this blog under Links: Apologetics > Science. The Access Research Network, the Discovery Institute, and Reasons To Believe claim that Intelligent Design is based on science. However, like the Law of Attraction, Intelligent Design is just a new name for an old and scientifically discredited idea. (Hank Hanegraaff of the Christian Research Institute has provided a podium where Intelligent Design proponents can perpetrate this deceit.)
I often wonder if those who think Intelligent Design should be presented in schools as an alternative to evolution would pleased to see the Law of Attraction presented as an alternative to modern physics. Should we “teach the controversy” in both cases?
Gavin,
While I don’t necessarily agree with all the theories of macro-evolutionary scientists, I certainly don’t call them bad scientists. I recognize that they are engaging in scientific exploration while using certain philosophical presuppositions (naturalism). It is their philosophical underpinnings which I take exception with. However, what’s peculiar to me is why most of them (including you), resort to personal attacks—calling someone with solid scientific credentials a “pseudo-scientist.â€? Dialoging on this level, Gavin, doesn’t really deal with an idea someone is putting forth. Instead, it simply criticizes the person. Why is this the case?
Brent,
I’ve reread my post several times and cannot find the place where I “resort to personal attacks—calling someone with solid scientific credentials a ‘pseudo-scientist.’â€? Are you referring to an earlier comment by me? In this comment I did not criticize the person, I dealt with the idea they were putting forth by observing that the idea has no scientific research supporting it.
The ideas of intelligent design scientists are difficult to address directly because they have produced almost zero scientific work, but I will continue to try my best.
Thank you, I would love to receive all of your blogs Pastor Brent, Thank You, Linda Solberg