Unknown to his supporters, the respected pastor of Moody Church in Chicago, Dr. Erwin W. Lutzer, annuls key biblical texts with strange, unorthodox interpretations. By doing so, this modern evangelical icon promises paradise to the unrepentant and flatly opposes Moody founder Dwight Lyman Moody on the ABC’s of salvation.

Thousands of faithful believers who appreciate much of Dr. Lutzer’s inspirational teaching do not know that their beloved pastor and leader (as well as his publisher Moody Press) has strayed from the basic, salvation doctrines of their founders. When these Christians accept Erwin Lutzer’s teaching they think they are in line with scripture as well as D. L. Moody, but is this assumption true? Consider Paul’s warning to the Galatians:

Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. (Gal 5:19-21).

These verses are surely simple enough without interpretation, but I must ask: What message is Paul trying to convey in this passage? What does the phrase, “shall not inherit” actually mean? “For if ye live after the flesh,” warns Paul in another verse, “ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.” True to generations of history, Paul issues a manifest warning about the dangers of not entering the eternal kingdom of God for those who refuse to repent.

Commenting on these seemingly unmistakable passages Dr. Lutzer, the learned teacher of hundreds of thousands insists, “Paul speaks of those who will forfeit certain kingdom privileges because of their sinful lifestyles….Those who practice such sins will not be barred from entering the kingdom, but will be barred from inheriting it” ( Lutzer, Your Eternal Reward, p. 70). As shocking as such might be, Erwin W. Lutzer promises paradise to those who practice and are even characterized by immorality, impurity, idolatry, sorcery or drunkenness!

“If one or more of these sins characterizes their Christian lives, and they refuse to judge the evil, they will forfeit the honor of kingdom rule” (Lutzer, Your Eternal Reward, p. 70).

Refuses to judge the evil? Characterizes? To characterize, says Webster, is to be the distinctive character trait, or the distinguishing feature. Friend, may drunkenness be the distinguishing feature of a Christian inevitably bound for paradise? May the drunkard staggering from the local bar night after night be a Christian destined for an eternity in the holy kingdom of God? Dwight L. Moody, the man under whose name Dr. Lutzer’s egregious notions are propagated, did not think so! Consider:

I pity any alleged Christians who rent their property for drinking saloons; I pity them with all of my heart. If you ever want to inherit the kingdom of God, give it up. This notion that all is well, and that all are going into the kingdom of God, whether they repent or not, isn’t taught anywhere in the Scriptures (D. L. Moody, Sermon: Heaven, Its Inhabitants).

D. L. Moody believed and taught, along with Paul and historic Christianity, that if we do not inherit the kingdom that we certainly do not enter it. Not only has Dr. Erwin W. Lutzer’s strange interpretation of Paul’s warning to the Galatians comforted the unrepentant, it has abandoned the views of the D. L. Moody on the basics. Erwin Lutzer plainly contradicts D. L. Moody on this foundational point of the Christian faith. Erwin W. Lutzer never responded to obvious contractions between the doctrine of himself and D. L. Moody though it was addressed in our correspondence.