There are things that I wish I didn’t know, especially about people who have been one of my heroes. I remember the night that I watched the movie ’61 and had to face the real truth about how Mickey Mantle lived most of his life. I purposefully had never tried to find out before that night. Oh, I could have, but to be truthful I didn’t want to know. The truth ended up being that Mantle was a horrible womanizing husband, a totally neglectful father and a lifelong drunk. I do rejoice that before he died he surrendered to Jesus Christ as his Lord. But he isn’t one of my heroes any more.
Today I had a similar experience with another one of my heroes – Paul Harvey. I’ve never really checked out his life before, just admired his voice and his broadcasts. So many of his programs were full of stories that I loved. But a series of events today made me look a little closer and part of me wishes I hadn’t.
In June 1972 Paul Harvey shared the story of his baptism at a church in Arizona while he and his wife were vacationing. The Guidepost article was entitled “Submitting To God”. Everything you would want a person to say about that Christian experience is in that article. To be honest I wish I didn’t know any more about his faith. Everything on those pages support Harvey as a real deal Christian.
However, on March 7 and again on May 16 of 1998 (about 10 years before his death) Paul Harvey broadcast one of his most famous programs entitled: A Letter From God. I actually hadn’t heard about it until this morning. Again part of me wishes I hadn’t listened to it.
In that letter he makes God out to be an endorser of Darwinian evolution, not the Creator God of Genesis 1.
He portrays God as having many special children on par with Jesus, like Buddha, Mohammed, Krishna and others. In fact God even says that they all live in the same special place, in the heart of God.
In this letter God disassociates Himself from all of the sacred writings in all of the religions, including the Bible. God says that He never wrote anything and that He made sure that all of the bibles of all of the religions were full of mistakes so that we wouldn’t trust in any of them as His word.
He has God endorse every religion equally; saying that Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity all lead to the same place just in different ways.
And if you should think that I am making all of this up, check it out on YouTube at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhCG0Nt7wXs
So now I have one less hero than I began the day with. I’ll still love his voice and I’ll still share some of his programs with others. (with a warning) But I will not be thrilled anymore when I listen. Paul Harvey was a man who should have known better than to swallow and then distribute the poisons of theistic evolution and universalism. And worst of all, as a professing baptized Christian, if he did not repent between 1998 and 2009, he will stand before Jehovah God Almighty as a heretic and false teacher in his denial of the deity of Jesus Christ.
If what Paul Harvey says in A Letter From God is true, then Jesus Christ is the biggest liar the world has ever known. John 14:6 And Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me.” God bless. Mike
