"Therefore, we as South Carolina Baptists must publicly state and remove ourselves from these positions and problematic statements and call for NewSpring to correct these positions if it chooses to say that it affiliates with South Carolina Baptist churches."
A Statement From SCBC President Tom Kelly
When will some of us learn that bigger is definitely not better? One of the largest Protestant churches in America just got booted out of the South Carolina Baptist Convention. Some, including us, are asking — why did it take so long?
NewSpring Church, founded in January 2000 by Perry Noble, has grown to be a megachurch. In September 2013, the Baptist Press reported on the fastest growing and largest churches in the United States. Here is an excerpt from that article:
NewSpring Church in Anderson, S.C., tops SBC churches in both categories, ranking as the second fastest-growing and the fourth largest church in the nation among all denominations, Outreach reported in a special edition released in mid-September. With eight locations, NewSpring Church recorded an average 2012 attendance of 23,055. Its increase of 7,072 in attendance merited a growth rate of 44 percent.
Perhaps this phenomenal growth resulted in Southern Baptist leaders downplaying some serious problems at NewSpring Church. Dee wrote an eye-opening post several years ago entitled Perry Noble and His Pastor Fans Are Full of it! that addressed some of the awful things that occurred.
Here is an excerpt:
In the post, Tom [Rich] refers to a inactive blog, The Pajama Pages, written by Dr. James Duncan who attended Noble's NewSpring. What happened to him is beyond belief. Really, really, really despicable…
So that you will go to read the whole sordid story, here is a summary provided by Tom Rich… It is important to point out that there are far more incidents than this summary provides, including interference which prevented the Duncans from adopting a baby.
"One interesting twist in this story that I'll leave you with, and that you'll see: the anonymity in this case was NOT the blogger, but a man on the church's side, an employee of the church, who went after the blogger anonymously to teach him a lesson to try to get him fired by sending a phony resignation letter to his employer, to paint the blogger as a pervert, a homosexual, his kid as a cross dresser, and to make him fear for his family's life by actual threats against him…all in the name of God to punish the blogger for the audacity in criticizing a mega church pastor."
Dr. James Duncan, a professor at Anderson University, documented what happened to him and his wife as a result of his blogging about NewSpring Church. The lengthy account is called Holy Rage at the Spring, and we highly recommend that you read it. What happened to the Duncans is the most despicable account we have ever read!
Dr. Duncan has continued to keep up with NewSpring and its pastor, and earlier this week he published a post, which he has given us permission to share with our readers. Apparently, Southern Baptist leaders in South Carolina reached a tipping point with Noble and the church he founded, and they have decided to give NewSpring the left boot of fellowship.
Here is Dr. Duncan's explanation of what occurred…
Baptists' Message to NewSpring: You're not one of us
Dr. James Duncan
The South Carolina Baptist Convention has told Perry Noble and NewSpring that they must correct serious errors in their church before they can once again associate with the Convention. In a bold and praiseworthy statement, the president of the SCBC, Tommy Kelly, turned what has been general public criticism of NewSpring into official church discipline, though the public rebuke went much further than just the Ten Commandments sermon. Kelly condemned Noble’s pulpit profanity, his sloppy exegesis and preaching, his lack of accountability and inability to receive correction. It also criticized NewSpring’s regular use of anti-christian music in its services.
After Noble’s persistent defense of his error and his obvious antipathy towards the Baptist Convention, it’s hard to see this public rebuke making much difference inside the executive offices at NewSpring. Instead, this is really a warning for everyone else. Kelly instructed every Baptist church in South Carolina to publicly state the truth regarding Noble’s teaching and remove themselves from being associated with NewSpring.
The statement appears to concede that the Convention has already separated itself from NewSpring, and it demands that NewSpring must correct its positions on worship, doctrine, accountability and biblical scholarship before the church is again permitted to associate itself with the Convention. That the statement was made publicly suggests that Kelly doesn’t think it’s going to happen.
It’s highly unlikely that a denominational leader would publicly ambush one of his own churches with something so serious, so I think it’s certain that Kelly has already talked to Noble privately about the denomination’s concerns. For Kelly to have gone public suggests that Noble rejected his correction quickly and unequivocally, with Noble understanding that the consequences would be expulsion from the Convention. On Thursday afternoon Noble tweeted, “Pressure is nothing more than a call to humility!” The statement, which didn’t seem to fit any particular flow of thought in his Twitter feed, was likely his response to Kelly’s warnings. Noble and Kelly probably spoke for the last time on Thursday afternoon. Kelly’s announcement was published in the Convention’s official newspaper and website on Friday morning.
Over the last week, Noble’s Tweets have indicated that he is not willing to be corrected, and he resents it that other Christians are still criticizing him. Here’s a sequence from the last few days:
Sometimes “fighting the good fight” means knowing which fights to walk away from. (Jan 12)
Unless a person is willing to be misunderstood they will never make a difference. (Jan 13)
The world would be a good place if sinners repented of sin. The world would be an AMAZING place if religious people repented of religion! (Jan 14)
Get that? Religious people are more harmful to the world than sinners. If you didn’t know that his man was a pastor, would you assume he wanted to be identified as a member of Christ’s church?
I think Kelly knows in his heart that Noble is gone for good, so he’s doing the right thing as a faithful leader in God’s church to warn others not to associate with Noble or his church. Assuming the separation is a permanent one, how might this affect NewSpring?
NewSpringers
Many will be surprised that NewSpring is even associated with the Southern Baptists, so discovering that they’ve lost that affiliation won’t matter much. Though some have already left over the Commandments sermon, if they’ve stood with Noble through his obvious error, they’ll probably stand with him through a denominational rebuke, too.
Noble
Noble will probably be relieved to be done with the Baptists as a denomination, with whom his connection springs primarily from their $20,000 investment in NewSpring’s founding. Noble has announced that he has paid that investment back (with 3 percent annualized interested added), so he probably assumes he has no further obligation to them.
It’s possible this affects his future publishing efforts. In late December Noble announced that he submitted the manuscript for his third book, though it remains to be seen whether any publisher is willing to take a risk on him now that he has built a reputation for embracing obvious error to the point of being disavowed by his own denomination. Noble’s publisher, Tyndale House, is under intense pressure at the moment for knowingly publishing factually false and biblically unsound books. Mark Driscoll’s next book was put on indefinite hold by Tyndale when he was engulfed in scandal last year, so it’s not a stretch to see that happening to Noble as well. As NewSpring’s dependance on Result Source demonstrated, there’s not a huge market (that’s not on NewSpring’s payroll) that’s anxiously waiting for Noble’s next book.
NewSpring Staff
The example of Mark Driscoll’s departure from Mars Hill Church and its almost immediate implosion must have a few NewSpring staffers concerned. How long can Noble continue his duties as a pastor if he stubbornly clings to obvious heresy? How does NewSpring survive if he walks away? It would be reassuring to see a few staff leave as a matter of principle, though there might be a few who are seeing the writing on the wall and are quietly freshening their resumes.
Fuse
NewSpring’s mid-week youth ministry attracts many youth from other churches, even though they return to their parents’ church on Sundays. Once parents discover that NewSpring’s own denomination is warning people to stay away, will they continue to allow their children to be a part of it, especially if they attend SCBC churches on Sunday?
NewSpring College
The college promises to prepare its students for church work, and most probably plan to stay with NewSpring. Smart students should be tracking Noble’s recent doctrinal trajectory and thinking about where he’ll be (both doctrinally and physically) in two years. If they do stick it out, will other Baptist churches place much stock in a diploma from a church that has just been expelled from their denomination?
Clayton King
Best I can tell, NewSpring’s official teaching pastor has been silent on the controversy. Does he agree with his NewSpring boss? Dare he say anything if he doesn’t? King’s main vocation is as an itinerant preacher to small and mid-sized Baptist churches, many of which also send their young children and teens to his summer camps. Will parents balk at trusting their children’s spiritual growth to a leader who is so closely affiliated with Noble and NewSpring?
A denominational leader like Kelly, who is willing to defend biblical authority at the cost of losing the denomination’s largest church, is an admirable example of integrity and leadership.
Someone should offer him a book deal.
Lydia's Corner: Exodus 17:8-19:15 Matthew 22:34-23:12 Psalm 27:7-14 Proverbs 6:27-35
FIRST! !!
Silver place winner, Golden Eagle.
It’s nice to see the SBC kicking out a church for a legitimate reason for once! Until lately, it felt like you could get away with almost anything, including harboring child abusers, with impunity – except for hiring a female pastor or saying it was ok to disagree on what the scriptures say about LGBT people. So, props to you, SBC!
I don’t consider myself a fundamentalist, but I view what Mr. Noble did to the Ten Commandments as a sacrilege. From what I gather in the above blog the Ten Commandments issue may be the tip of the iceberg. I don’t agree with the Southern Baptist denomination on certain doctrinal issues but I agree with them regarding their discipline of Perry Noble and New Spring. Mr Perry is on a trajectory from what I consider sound theology. Some may disagree with me, but I draw the line on treating Scripture without respect which is how I view Mr. Nobles exegesis of the Ten Commandments. Also feeling good is not what Christianity is all about, and I perceived this is where Mr. Noble was going with his Ten Commandment catastrophe.
So what does kicking New Spring Church out of the Southern Baptist Convention do? Does it close the doors to the church or fire him as pastor?
Albuquerque Blue wrote:
SBC churches are autonomous. The SBC is not a denomination in the same sense that Presbyterians or Methodists or Anglicans are. It is a voluntary association of churches who share in common mission endeavors. Each church calls its own pastor who serves at the will of the congregation. The denomination does not own the property, so there won’t be fights like the denominational churches have had over property.
Certainly this is good news, even if a little late. Unfortunately, I have the feeling that Noble will exploit this and portray himself as the victim of SBC Pharisees and such. Considering how many people are still at Mars Hill or its derivative churches, people have a lot of inertia when it comes to their church. Why would anyone go there in the first place? Or Furtick’s church?
Gram3 wrote:
Yes, this is the million dollar question. Wish someone would answer it for us.
@ Eagle: Congrats!
@ Gram3:
Great response. Yes, this is what sets the SBC apart from other denominations like the PCA.
Gram3 wrote:
They put on a mighty fine show, and I assume that Scary Noble (srsly, look at that photo up top…) doesn’t say super stupid stuff every Sunday, and when he does, well, “that was probably just a rare slip up.” Until it happens again, and “I know he said something that seemed off a while ago, but I can’t remember; oh well, it’s probably nothing serious.”
This may be wishful thinking but I hope others, such as those mentioned, will be next.
Let me be very clear: I’m no fan of Perry Noble and I thought his Ten Commandments sermon was Noble’s attempt to be like Joel Osteen (and not terribly successfully). I’m not even going to go near his use of the N word, except to say that I said it once as a girl and I got to clamp a bar of orange Dial soap between my lips. (I can still taste it.)
That said, what disturbs me about this article showing up on The Wartburg Watch is that it’s essentially about a doctrinal issue. It looks more like heresy hunting.
Back when I first got involved in Scientology protesting two decades ago, there was one subset of people that I could not work with. Those were the people whose criticism of Scientology lay strictly in the fact that, “well, Scientology isn’t a Christian church, hence it’s a cult.” My criticism of Scientology lay in its practices–disconnection, the Rehabilitation Project Force, the endless shakedown of members in the cult’s quest for cash. The doctrine? As far as I was concerned, if you weren’t hurting someone, then believe in Xenu and volcanoes all you want. Knock yourself out.
I think there are legitimate things to criticize Perry Noble for, such as not being entirely candid about his depression, as well as his church’s actions towards James Duncan and his family. But the doctrinal stuff? That’s kind of a reach and really should be left to the heresy hunting blogs. It’s not what I expect when I come to the Wartburg Watch.
From what I saw Mr. Noble’s church made this mans, and his family’s life a nightmare. Of course, in my opinion, the doctrinal blabber is total nonsense to me but that is another post. Nobel was working the business and that is always good and always will be in the modern Christian industry. Cash is king, and yes it is, twice on Sunday. Dont believe me get in the way of the funding stream, even God wont have mercy. I watched a few of Mr. Nobel’s sermons the word tool came to mind, I was totally unimpressed. But I am well never mind. Dont get me wrong Mr. Noble is a member of the human family and in that I wish him the best. I just dont get his preaching style.
What bothers me is that so many just follow their pastors off the cliff. I just hate seeing followers and pastors hurt, it brakes my heart, this includes Mr. Noble, I wish all grace. Granted that makes me a degenerate even Satanic. I just had this dream that these people would come to healing and it would bring healing to all involved and show people the power of the Gospel. Of course that is totally pathetic, stupid, and disgusting and shows why I am unregenerate. Any true Christian would never wish such a thing. I never quite got that part of the Gospel.
Maybe I missed something, but I don’t think that the South Carolina Baptist Convention has yet removed New Spring. In a Baptist convention, or in a local association, the President by himself has no authority to remove a church from membership. Isn’t this something that the Convention as a whole would vote in a business meeting?
I do recognize that the criticism by the President is significant and serious.
mirele wrote:
No heresy hunting from us. We like to write about things happening in the evangelical firmament. Our beef with Noble is well spelled out in “Holy Rage at the Spring.” That is the amongst the worst accounts that I have ever, and I mean ever, read about a church going after someone. Yet Noble kept perking along. If I were in charge of the SBC, I would have booted him for what happened a long time ago to Dr Duncan.
Since the SBC seems to care more about doctrine as opposed to child sex abuse scandals, then I’ll take what I can get when it comes to getting him some needed negative attention.
Albuquerque Blue wrote:
Frankly, he can do whatever he darn well pleases. The interesting thing about this situation is the local SBC body said anything at all.
You are correct raswhiting, normally when fellowship is ended with a church in the SBC it happens at the associational level. In the SBC we have the national convention, state conventions and then local associations. These matters are normally handled locally. That said, I’ve never seen our state convention here come out with a statement like this in regards to a pastor or church. My guess is NewSpring will actually be the ones to dissolve the relationship with the SBC, which really is in name only anyway. The SBC provided funding when NewSpring started but really the church has never been involved with the convention on any level. Most NewSpringers don’t even know they are associated with the SBC. They will wear it as a badge of honor at some point and put on the persecution clothing claiming that just like Jesus, look at how the Pharisees are coming after us. The SBC has many issues, not the least of which is the still prominent focus on nickels and noses. Churches like NewSpring and Elevation with Furtick prop up the abysmal baptism and attendance numbers the SBC has had for several years now. So for a state convention president to make this statement is big, as he almost surely knows what the end will be. Still, it needed to be said
@ dee:
Yes. What is more amazing is that James Duncan’s account and evidence did not get New Spring booted back then. It was evidence (took a while) back then they are cruel evil little boys.
But these days more attention is given to doctrine than behavior. Go figure.
dee wrote:
Well, frankly, I wish there was a bright, incandescent light shone on Noble and New Spring over what was done to James Duncan! It’s ironic that the state SBC would go after Noble over a bad sermon (and yes, the double-down afterwards), but not do a **** thing about the very real harassment experienced by the Duncans.
mirele wrote:
TWW and FBC Jax have been amongst the few who have helped to expose the Duncan story. We have been delighted to correspond with Jim behind the scenes and have found his posts to be insightful. This is why we do reprints of his posts and will continue to do so.
Lydia wrote:
Gotta make sure that ESS/submission stuff gets out there. Keeps those women from thinking they can boss men around! That is the crucial element.
Who care about child sex abuse-its those women! That’s why the got rid of a church that ordained a women but turn a blind eye to churches which mishandle child sex abuse. They know what’s really important.
@ Jeff P:
Thank you for this insightful explanation and welcome to TWW!
Jeff P wrote:
Speaks volumes about the quality of the SBC’s religious judgment.
@ Jeff P:
A scary thought that the SBC provided start up funds for New Spring. And the 20,000 could possibly be a misnomer. That was the “payback” part?
@ mirele:
Absolutely agree! My guess is that the SBC leaders at the state level had issues with NewSpring beyond the doctrinal matter.
I highly recommend folks go read Holy Rage at the Spring. It comes off as evil nasty pranks from tech savvy mega church frat boys. However, ask yourself why these mega church “employees” have this much time and opportunity to engage so deeply in such an evil campaign. I can tell you why. It is like this in most mega churches. Too much time and money for the little boys running the place. If you read SGM wikileaks you get an inside peek into the same phenomenon.
They could not get by with it if people would stop giving them so much money.
@ Jeff P:
Thanks for your helpful comment. I'd love to know what was really discussed about NewSpring behind closed doors.
@ Lydia:
Yes, it's despicable! I'm grateful Dr. Duncan had the courage to share his horrific experiences.
If it were just a theological issue and the pastor and church didn't have reports of pastoral abuse problems, among them, such as the professor Duncan issue, we wouldn't be commenting on this. I hope the issue being brought up in the SCBC is about an out of control pastor/ staff, and not just a theological issue. I am uncertain if the potential action by a SBC state convention impacts NewSpring Church's affiliation. If you look at history, Frank Norris sat at the SBC annual meeting long after the Texas Baptists booted him out. NewSpring could also apply to a neighboring state convention or other affiliate , I believe, and actually being booted out of the SBC would have to be decided by the mother ship at the annual convention? I am sorry for comments I made earlier.
Who wants to bet $100 of 21st Century Currency that NewSpring will wear this as a badge of honor?
“Oh, the Southern Baptists kicked us out? Dang, we’re just heartbroken! Heartbroken, I tell you!!! We really wanted to be a part of a legalistic, controlling denomination!”
Unfortunately, this can really work in New Spring’s *favor*, depending on how they spin it. 🙁
Just a comment on the concept of “heresy hunting…” Unfortunately it has indeed become a favorite pastime, and most hunters are reminiscent of Dick Cheneys hunting infamy. However, it is also true that ideas have consequences, and some of those ideas, or doctrines, are more likely to lead to an abusive situation, hence its relevance at TWW. Case in point, there really is a connection between the sex abuse scandals in the RCC and the requirement of celibacy. It’s been 500 years in the making and really not all that unpredictable.
Any pastor who thinks he can rewrite the Word of God with impunity is removing from himself the ultimate check of his behavior, and as a sinner, if the checks are removed, the behavior will only worsen. So some of these things you can see coming, because the doctrine almost makes it inevitable. Rewriting the Ten Commandments and saying Gods not telling us to do or not do anything is a significant problem. There is a prohibitive aspect to them – and to deny that opens the doors to all sorts of problems.
So my take is, you don’t have to be a bonafide “heresy hunter” to have the instincts to say, “hey, tossing aside the clear Word of God is going to cause big problems.” It’s sort of like going in to see my doctor and his medical books are smoldering in the fireplace. I don’t need to be particularly intelligent to spot a problem, and have concerns for myself and also his other patients. If a doctor tossing aside the books that help make him who he is, what about a pastor who unilaterally rewrites the only Book that tells him what to teach? I’m no prognosticator or soothsayer, much less a certified heretic incinerator, but problems are coming!
It is interesting that NewSpring is also a multi-campus structure with similar authoritarian problems with Mars Hill (or “the church formerly known as Mars Hill”). I don’t believe there is any formal connection between NewSpring and Mars Hill or Acts 29. Is it possible that these multi-campus structures are prone to these kinds of problems?
Does this guy ever NOT look like he’s dying of terminal constipation?
(Either that or two seconds off from flying into a homicidal rage…)
mirele wrote:
Back when I got involved in an end-of-the-world cult in the Seventies, that was THE Party Line for all those Christianese Cult-Watch groups. They defined CULT entirely by theology, not repeat NOT by abusive control-freak behavior towards their people.
Re Scientology & similar, their M.O. in claiming “CULT!” was to wave their Bible around screaming chapter-and-verse. Which has absolutely NO authority outside other Bible-bangers.
But the most insidious were those “Aberrant Christian Fellowships(TM)” with Perfectly Correct Theology (coincidentally, the same as the Cult Watchers) yet abusive behavior. While the Cult Sniffers were parsing theology letter-by-letter, they got a free pass to abuse.
dee wrote:
Not “doctrine” —
Purity of Ideology.
Jeff P wrote:
Butts in Seats.
The same reason behind all those Pro Wrestling angles cataloged over at Wrestlecrap — including The Gobbledy Gooker, Cheatum the One-eyed Midget, I Choppy You Pee-Pee, and The Necrophilia Angle.
Former Fundy wrote:
There’s a very good interview/conversation between Warren Throckmorton and Luke Norsworthy which you can listen to at <a href="lukenorsworthy.com/2014/12/18/warren-throckmorton-lessons-from-mars-hill/" in which Norsworthy asks Throckmorton (who has diligently followed, and reported on, the Mars Hill fiasco for several years) exactly that question.
It’s worth listening to the whole interview – it’s around 30 minutes – but Throckmorton’s view is that multi-campus congregations do create a greater risk. I think it’s a fair précis of Throckmorton’s answer to say that this structure puts one man on a very high pedestal, and that it takes a rare kind of temperament not to become corrupted enough to believe one’s own hype. Though he adds that authoritarian leadership can develop in other settings as well.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Ideology indeed, but I think Dee was trying to be charitable. The fact is that the dominant voices in the SBC are driven by an ideology which they try to foist off as concern for sound doctrine. They are the ones who are equivocating on doctrine. But, hey, what else is new?
I wonder how many in the SBC find themselves unwilling shackled to this view? What does a pastor do when he (and they are all male) objects to the ideology? ISTM the ideological machine would chew him up or marginalize him, so then what?
The SBC has kicked folks ( churches) out for stuff I have questioned for years….this however I support.
I seriously am surprised that they did however…..there are not female deacons or ministers involved….and there is no speaking in unknown languages….
Now if they’ll just look at some of the other churches….like those who overlook child abusers.
Gram3 wrote:
What happened to those who objected to the Ideology in Stalin’s Russia and Mao’s China?
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
From Aw-Shucks Pastor to Medieval Pope?
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
Yield to the System or be destroyed by the System or, at best, be exiled and expelled from the System.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
Well, that html tag could’ve been better nested…
This article is seriously lacking in it’s understanding of Southern Baptist polity, which is a core issue in the story it’s trying to tell. That may not matter much on a muckraking site like this, but a legitimate news/commentary site would do it’s homework before publishing (or at least pull the piece until it can be corrected).
K.D. wrote:
Jesus is much more concerned about the gender of a PulpitPerson than he is about the abuse of little children. He said that people who ordain women would have been better off having a millstone tied around them and being tossed into the sea. See, you have to understand Jesus’ priorities.
Jesus also said that by our proper authority structures would people know that we are his disciples. That is another reason for disallowing wrong-gendered PulpitPersons and also for disallowing anything like charismatic expression which would distract from the centrality and unique authority of the correctly-gendered PulpitPerson.
Philip Miller wrote:
Dr james Duncan is a Professor of Communications at Anderson University. He is well equipped to offer the opinion that he did. You would do better to carefully make your argument as opposed to having a hissy fit.
K.D. wrote:
Absolutely!
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
I wish I had said this!
XianJaneway wrote:
The fact that Newspring (!) in the largest church in SC does not speak well to the sensibilities of that fair state.
dee wrote:
Don’t we all just love auto correct! 😉
Philip Miller wrote:
The only thing wrong in the article is the single statement that Newspring has already been booted out when, in fact, Newspring is currently on the road to being booted out if it doesn't change its ways. Funny you never bothered to mention any specific failings in the article, you just went off on a rant. BTW are you saying what you consider to be 'legitimate' news/commentary sites never make mistakes? And it's clear from the article that plenty of homework was done. But it seems clear from your post that your more interested in bashing TWW because you don't like it than in seeing that facts are accurate. TWW has a long track record of factual credibility- Just too bad their not perfect I guess.
Philip Miller wrote:
@Phillip,
Do you work for NewSpring and/or are you closely affiliated with someone there?
It’s odd to me that you claim that this website – The Wartburg Watch – is ‘a muckracking site’ for shining the light of day about churches and church leaderships that abuse good Christians.
If you have some important insight about SBC polity why haven’t you stated it here and shared your knowledge?
A legitimate abuse was brought up about the church in question and as Dee told you that Dr. James Duncan, who is a professor at a university.
Dee was spot-on in her response to you.
Bridget wrote:
This has been going on all day for me! What I really need is an autocorrect in my brain.
Philip Miller wrote:
Please tell us what the error is that you are alleging. I did not see anything in the story that misrepresents SBC polity. The President sternly warned NewSpring and exhorted his fellow SC Southern Baptists to distance themselves from NewSpring until NewSpring changes its positions and practices. Given that the SBC is a voluntary association, I don’t know what your objection is to the portrayal of SBC polity. Maybe you object to “booted out” but that is exactly the effect of Southern Baptists voluntarily disassociating with NewSpring. It need not mean what it might mean in another denominational context, say the PCA, for example.
@ Michaela:
Whenever we get a comment like that we realize that we have stepped on someone’s sacred cow. They do not know how to give a reason for their frustration so they write a whiney response. It is like a little kid stomping his foot when you tell them that they can’t have ice-cream until he eats his peas.
dee wrote:
@Dee,
Agreed. These ardent defenders of whatever abusive church/leadership remind me of codependents in an alcoholic family: Strident that the ‘no-talk rules’ remain in place and the drinking not be discussed.
Honestly, I don’t think “being booted out,” if that does happen, means a hill of beans to NewSpring. It sounds like most of their members don’t even know that they are affiliated with Baptists and don’t care. It doesn’t sound like the NewSpring leaders care to be affiliated with Baptists either. NewSpring can be free to continue in their cultish ways.
dee wrote:
Sacred Cow Tipping is one of my favorite pastimes.
Gram3 wrote:
LOL! Love that one!
People do need to unbunch their underwear before they post.
Chicken-fried Sacred Cow with cream gravy. With smashed tatties and neep greens, just for Nick and Beaker.
Gram3 wrote:
Yes, that was the point I was trying to make. 😉
Joe wrote:
Amen, Joe.
dee wrote:
I am tempted to adopt that as my new Twitter handle.
Gram3 wrote:
I live in a well-known cow tipping region.
Re his 1/23 Tweet: “Unless a person is willing to be misunderstood they will never make a difference.”
I left this response: “In other words: ‘All people who make a difference are likely to be misunderstood. I’m misunderstood, so I must be right.’ #nope”
I can’t claim it as an original thought, though. Paraphrased (read – “Stole”) the concept from C.S. Lewis’ “The Pilgrim’s Regress”.
Gram3 wrote:
And dessert?
Deb wrote:
That was obvious to me, but sometimes people won’t see what they don’t want to see. Or they’re just looking for something to pick at, not realizing how transparently trivial their Big Issue is.
Michaela wrote:
Sacred Cow Sundaes, of course. Religious Sacred Cows like to huddle in the barn on Sundays, so it is only appropriate.
Gram3 wrote:
@Gram3,
You are too much! LOL.
Gram3 wrote:
Quote of the day!
JeffT wrote:
I’m not perfect? Well darn!
dee wrote:
I know, darn shame isn’t it? 🙂
BTW My reply to him was from a nit-pickers POV looking for what he could possibly be whining about. But he wasn’t wasn’t interested facts or discussion – just a drive-by flame.
dee wrote:
I find the Marxspeak term to be much more direct.
As well as the secondary baggage it brings along.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
Thanks for the link, Nick. I’ll take a look at the interview.
The reason I didn’t go into greater detail about how this article demonstrates a lack of understanding concerning Baptist polity is that the essence had already been mentioned by others. I don’t know the exact specifics on the South Carolina state convention, but convention presidents don’t have the authority to unilaterally expel congregations. Nor do state association presidents have the the authority to instruct individual congregations to do anything. Given that each congregation is autonomous, the most they could do with authority is to advise and encourage. I attempted to reread the actual statement to see if that’s the actual language used, but I couldn’t get the links to work.
As to why I consider TWW to be a muckraking site is their tendency to paint and categorize individuals and organizations as either “all good guy” or “all bad guy”. The reality is very different. We are all both good guy and bad guy simultaneously. Any news/commentary site that cannot consistently reflect that reality is not a true news site or a trustworthy commentary site, in my estimation.
Philip Miller wrote:
That is exactly correct and that is exactly what the President did. The President’s statement was exhortation to other Southern Baptists in SC and warning to NewSpring and Noble. No one said a convention president has any binding authority. It is doubtful that he would have made such a strong statement without having taken counsel with a lot of others on the ground in SC.
Regarding muckraking, I believe that you are doing precisely what you want to pin on TWW and its commenters. Your objection is that we have a “tendency” to put persons in black or white boxes, and it is that “tendency” that makes TWW and its commenters muckrakers. So, by your own definition, are you not also a muckraker in that you slap a black/white label like “muckraker” on TWW and its comenters due to a “tendency” which you claim we have. “Tendency” is hardly a black/white term like “uniformly” or “universally” or such.
@ Gram3:
Well, that last sentence was not very clear, was it? The point is that it is hardly legitimate to make a universal black/white claim of muckraker based on an asserted mere tendency which, at the very least indicates a belief that TWW and its commenters do not universally or uniformly put persons in black/white boxes.
Philip Miller wrote:
You are attempting to define the mission of TWW to suit your purposes. There are plenty of commentary sites that do not claim to be or even attempt to portray all aspects of a given issue. My understanding of the core mission of TWW is to be a place where those whose voices have been silenced or muted or ignored by those with power can have a voice.
The fact of the matter is that those who are discussed as abusive on TWW are not abiding by your iron-clad rule of legitimacy. Try posting a dissenting view at places controlled by the Gospel Glitterati. This past week we have been discussing voices that have been silenced by people with very different theological views.
Why don’t you hop on over to Challies and post a comment like the one you posted here and see how long it stays up. Not to single Challies out for this honor, but he’s just the one I’m more familiar with.
Philip Miller wrote:
@Philip,
Perhaps you missed my earlier questions that I posted to you. So I will ask them again.
1. What is your affiliation with NewSpring church?
2. Why have you come here to defend NewSpring church?
3. Why have you dismissed the amount of abuse/terrorizing/stalking of the Duncan Family (the professor, his wife, and child)?
4. Would you want to be subjected to what the professor was subjected to by this church? Would you want your wife and child(ren) subjected to this? This is the Golden Rule. Treat other people as you would like to be treated. Walk a mile in their shoes.
5. Why have you minimized the seriousness of what was done to the Duncan Family and this campaign of terror against them with the anemic statement, “As to why I consider TWW to be a muckraking site is their tendency to paint and categorize individuals and organizations as either “all good guy” or “all bad guy”. The reality is very different. We are all both good guy and bad guy simultaneously…”
The fact of the matter is that the leadership of that church did have the responsibility to shut down that thuggish behavior and take action, and they didn’t. That speaks volumes. The buck does stop with them because it was going on during their watch.
Too bad you weren’t in my state – California. We send people to prison for what was done to the Duncan Family and award large monetary judgments in civil lawsuits for damages (emotional distress, punitive damages, etc.).
@Philip,
You wrote: “The reality is very different. We are all both good guy and bad guy simultaneously. Any news/commentary site that cannot consistently reflect that reality is not a true news site or a trustworthy commentary site, in my estimation.”
1. Did NewSpring church announce the ‘bad things’ they’ve done to people, not just the good?
2. I am not aware of news sites (Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and other top news organizations) that are reporting news (including bad news) and then cut to the positives of the organization. Can you cite the organizations of which you speak?
Whether it was Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme or predator priests in the Catholic Church, the news organizations that broke those stories didn’t wax poetic about Madoff’s virtues or those of the RCC.
__
“Re-Writing Da Finger Of God?”
“Epic Fail?”
hmmm…
@ Hey Philip,
—> 501(c)3 Religious Officals, Like All Public Servants, Are Accountable For Their Actions…
yup.
(Sometimes, they just need to be reminded, silly…)
Way To Go SBC !
Forget da heat coming off the church, all Wartburg wants to do is bring relief…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pw2EQi77DVs
🙂
Sopy
—
Michaela. The reason I didn’t comment on your questions about any connection to New Spring Church is because I have nothing to give you. I know very little about the church other than what gets reported in the media, which usually is the bad, seeing as how bad news sells.
As to what happened to Dr Duncan, yes that is most appalling and should be publicly repented of. I am in no way an apologetic for New Spring Church or her staff on this or any other matter. But neither am I an apologetic for TWW and its excesses.
The only reason I commented at all was because I’m familiar with SBC polity and found the article especially lacking in such. The homework was clearly not done. I pointed that out.
Also, I wouldn’t suggest that muckraking sites such as TWW are all bad, or serve no purpose. Otherwise I wouldn’t ever read them. But I would suggest that people take things here with a grain of salt, and a healthy dose of scepticism.
I was looking at statistics for the largest “mega churches” in the US. There is something interesting : Some of these churches have a large membership on the books, but not a very large weekly attendance. Now there can be a number of reasons for this: people aren’t taken off the rolls even though they have dropped out or are attending another church, which is an inflation of numbers, or it is a great place to be forgotten for those who want a church but are the two visits a year crowd; or these churches that have about a 25% weekly attendance are being honest. When I looked at Perry Nobles church his church membership was around 25000 and weekly attendance was about 27000, or about 2000 extra weekly visitors. Now either he and his staff really know how to pack the pews or there may be some inflation of numbers. I am just questioning the statistics.
Incidentally Mr. Nobles church is currently considered the largest SBC church:
http://thomrainer.com/2014/07/12/2014-update-largest-churches-southern-baptist-convention/
SBC polity issues aside, the reaction of the South Carolina Baptist Convention President, I think is a big deal, even if Newspring church isn’t denied seating at the annual meeting of the SCBC. Mr. Kelly is informing baptists that something isn’t quite right with Newspring church. If I were a pew sitting South Carolina baptist, I would heed his call. Honestly I am heeding his call though I don’t reside in South Carolina. I got to admire Mr. Kelly for calling out some possibly not very nice people.
Philip Miller wrote:
You keep saying that. What in the article is inaccurate in the least about SBC polity? You can’t call someone a muckraker and then not produce the goods. Either show your evidence or retract your statement.
Philip Miller wrote:
Point to something specific that raises your red flag of skepticism and brings out your salt shaker. You want to make vague and unsubstantiated charges and then just have people accept your judgment. It doesn’t work that way, Philip. You may be accustomed to silencing people, but that is not what happens here.
Philip Miller wrote:
@Philip, Thank you for responding to my questions. I don't expect a dissertation on SBC polity from The Wartburg Watch. SBC polity certainly wasn't the point of the article either. Rather the abuses of NewSpring church and the fact the SBC had finally taken action was the point. You made this statement: “The reality is very different. We are all both good guy and bad guy simultaneously. Any news/commentary site that cannot consistently reflect that reality is not a true news site or a trustworthy commentary site, in my estimation.” Can you name the news organizations that covers the good and the bad of an organization that are exposing? Wall Street Journal? New York Times? Any other? I can't think of one that follows the journalistic practice that you claim the 'trustworthy' ones do. Not even the SBC gave kudos to NewSpring church in the recent controversy.
Gram3 wrote:
Yes, Gram3.
Philip Miller wrote:
Prove that we are muckraking.
@ Philip Miller:
Phillip
You call TWW a ”muckraking site.”
Well – Before calling someone names…
You might want to check out the history of “Muckraking?”
You actually paid a compliment to TWW and the commenters here. 🙂
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muckraker
From Wikipedia…
The term “muckraker” refers to reform-minded journalists who wrote largely for all popular magazines and continued a tradition of investigative journalism reporting; **muckrakers often worked to expose social ills** and **corporate and political corruption.**
(And, there certainly is a lot of “corruption” today being “exposed” by TWW and the commenters here, in the 501 (c) 3, Non-Profit, Tax $ Deductible, Religious $ Corporation, the IRS calls church. And there self-appointed leaders.)
Muckraking magazines—notably McClure’s of publisher S. S. McClure—took on corporate monopolies and crooked political machines while raising public awareness of chronic urban poverty, unsafe working conditions, and social issues like child labor.
Yeah – Go figure – the muckrakers are the good guys… 🙂
Exposing the “Corruption” in the 501 c 3, IRS “Corporations.”
That the IRS calls church.
Philip Miller wrote:
Like Calvary Chapel? All “autonomous and independent pastors/fellowships”, but when Papa Chuck said “JUMP!” their only response was “HOW HIGH?”
Philip Miller wrote:
“How Dare You Point Fingers, because We Are ALL Totally Depraved Sinners”?
Where have we heard that one before? Dee? Deb?
Philip Miller wrote:
If it weren’t for muckrakers (Upton Sinclair comes to mind) we probably wouldn’t have gotten a pure food and drug act through Congress until the reign of FDR.
Muff Potter wrote:
Amen, Muff. I think I’ll celebrate with a homemade hamburger after my hike.
I agree with SBC “polity” of autonomous churches. I just don’t think most SBC leaders/pastors really agree with it in spirit or for the individual as they keep narrowing the parameters of what constitutes the “Gospel”.
I cannot begin to count the times I have been accused of being a “Lone Ranger” Christian on SBC pastor type blogs. Usually it is because I disagree or refuse to browbeaten into agreement or question the behavior coming from so many church leaders.
I am not so sure being a Lone Ranger Christian is a bad thing if it means not enabling so much of the evil we see out there in churches. Actually, I think we need more Lone Ranger Christians. But it certainly does not pay for the pastor.
@ Lydia:
Problem is that many people who are narrowed out of SBC are conservative Christians by any measure. An example is the pastor Wade Burleson. I have listened to the party line that he is a “liberal.” You have listened to his sermons and you can decide. People marginalized aren’t Harry Emerson Fosdick liberals. Their theology may be conservative except they may be egalitarian versus complementarian. Or they may be believers that there was an age gap in the Creation, or like the Godfather of inerrancy, Benjamin Warfield, they may believe in theistic evolution. These have become essential parameters of orthodoxy. And then there is an ostrich in sand mentality regarding child sex abuse or spiritual abuse or unethical preachers. In a pick and choose of what is viewed as essential the mother ship and leadership have chosen to view these as broaching church autonomy! But they have broached church autonomy before. Why the pick and choose mentality? Sorry for responding so much to all this. These are questions I have. I may care about answers to these questions, or are these unanswered questions that really don’t matter in the end? I just question where this will all lead.
Mark wrote:
It’s leading to lots of folks leaving SBC churches and a decline of church memberships because folks aren’t fools.
Mark wrote:
Because if they were consistent they could not have their cake and eat it too! Count me and Gramp3 in as very conservative Christians who cannot fellowship in most SBC churches because the subordination of women has been made into a primary, Gospel issue by the Gospel Glitterati who now are the de facto Vicars of Christ in the SBC.
We are considered liberal because we actually mean it when we say that the Bible is the inspired and infallible authority for us. We believe in Sola Scriptura rather than Soler Mohler. We are considered liberals because we believe that the Holy Spirit will guide believers into the Truth, as Jesus said, and that the believer’s conscience is not bound by the conscience of the Gospel Glitterati or the Pope or anyone else other than the Holy Spirit, including any of those who presume to claim that they hold The Keys of the Kingdom.
We are considered liberals because we believe that the Eternal Son really is equal in every way to the Eternal Father and is not subordinate to the Father. Rather we believe that the will of the Father and the will of the Son are one. We believe that the Son willingly laid down certain of his rights to redeem us, and he did so because he loved us and not because the Father ordered him to do so. We are considered liberal because we believe that believers are in Christ and are called to conform ourselves to his image. We are not in Grudem or Piper or any other human who demands that we be conformed into an image of their making.
We are considered liberal because we believe that Jesus meant it when he slammed the Pharisees for nullifying God’s Law, which he fulfilled, by adding their own laws to it, and because we refuse to be bound by the laws laid down by CBMW or any other human organization or person.
That is how ridiculous things have become in the SBC. The Gospel Glitterati are not conservatives by any measure except in the sense of desiring to conserve the power and privilege of some Christians over other Christians, something which the Lord himself commanded us not to do.
The end of this line of thinking is that in the SBC, as well as in other Gospel Glitterati circles of influence, it is better to be a Gender Hierarchicalist and cover up child abuse than it is to be a Gender Mutualist like we are who says child abuse should never be covered up, and pastors who do so without repentance are unfit to be elders. Their position and behavior in this matter is absurd when judged against what the Lord said on these matters, and even the world knows it is wrong to cover up these things.
The Gospel Glitterati currently in control of the SBC and other entities have shown by their actions what they value most, despite all of their words.
Well said, Gram3!
@ Gram3:
Amen!
@ Gram3:
+1
Now to me this whole thing is complete balderdash. I don’t know anything about SCBC, but I do know that the SBC not only hasn’t taken any steps to “disfellowship” churches or pastors involved in child sex abuse, some have actively pursued relationships with men like CJ Mahaney and ministries like SGM. These man have made it clear that money and worldly success are their God. I don’t listen to Mohler or the SBC not because they are wrong, but because they have exposed themselves and haven’t a moral leg to stand on. Ask yourself this – why have the last two ERLC meetings been about homosexuality and not child sex abuse? One is a sin, the other is a sin and a CRIME. The former hardly applies to SBC churches; the latter applies in spades. Blind leaders of the blind.
@ Nick Bulbeck:
I will try to listen to the interview tonight, but I was thinking about another problem with the mega church model. Our pastor considers Andy Stanley at NorthPoint a mentor and has a multi-site model. Even though he (our pastor) is doing everything right, and appreciate his openness and egalitarian nature; someday he will retire or may do what Francis Chan did, and I can see the membership dropping. For us, the benefit of a megachurch (over 500) was that as introverts new in town, we could find a church to unobtrusively melt into.
PS first post, came in reading about MD and now slogging through the archives.
PPS Full Disclosure: no longer attending said church due to current closet apostate status.
Gram3 wrote:
I wish I was there with you Gram3, I’d give you a hug….you’ve hit the nail on the head….( and I am not a hug type of person.)
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
@Dr. F.,
+100!
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
Seems now the focus is on “Integrated Churches.”
http://centurylink.net/news/read/category/General/article/the_associated_press-southern_baptist_leaders_call_for_integrated_churc-ap
The Rev. Russell Moore, who leads the Southern Baptist’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, is one of several white leaders calling for multiethnic congregations in the wake of the unrest spurred by the killings of black men by white police officers in Ferguson, Missouri, and New York City.
“In the church, a black Christian and a white Christian are brothers and sisters,” Moore wrote recently. “We care what happens to the other, because when one part of the Body hurts, the whole Body hurts. … When we know one another as brothers and sisters, we will start to stand up and speak up for one another.”
@ Victorious:
It is actually a clever move. If they are criticized, they can say “Don’t you care about race relations?”
Sidewalks wrote:
Sidewalks wrote:
Many people feel as you do in point 1. Why is your church “closet apostate.” That sounds interesting.
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
That is my position as well. How an they ignore the pain of children who have been molested? How can they have a good time with those who were involved in covering it up? See our post tomorrow.
Gram3 wrote:
You always make me smile!
I listened to the Ten Commandments sermon. I can see where this might have been a final straw for the Baptist Convention. Perry Noble said he wrote it in ten minutes and that’s exactly what it sounds like. It has this bizarre interpretation of the Ten Commandments interspersed with general weirdness. It has the feeling of “I didn’t do my homework but I have to say something and this sounds good.” My homiletecs teacher would not have graded this very highly. What could he have been thinking.
dee wrote:
More muckraking I assume? 🙂
__
“Eat This?”
hmmm…
When the writer of Hebrews wrote: do not forsake your gathering together, he said nothing about being a part of a 501(c)3 religious corporation operating as a private business with closely watched profit margins.
(sadface)
…but doing stuff like:
encouraging one another, and stimulate one another to love and good deeds, and taking care of kind folk in need as well, as we share Jesus N’ wait for Him to come…
The widow’s mite can go along way in the right hands…
ATB
Sopy
—
JeffT wrote:
I am proud to throw my lot in with muckrakers of history. From Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muckraker
“The term muckraker refers to reform-minded journalists who wrote largely for all popular magazines and continued a tradition of investigative journalism reporting; muckrakers often worked to expose social ills and corporate and political corruption. Muckraking magazines—notably McClure’s of publisher S. S. McClure—took on corporate monopolies and crooked political machines while raising public awareness of chronic urban poverty, unsafe working conditions, and social issues like child labor.
Before World War I, the term “muckraker” was used to refer in a general sense to a writer who investigates and publishes truthful reports to perform an auditing or watchdog function. In contemporary use, the term describes either a journalist who writes in the adversarial or alternative tradition, or a non-journalist whose purpose in publication is to advocate reform and change.[2] Investigative journalists view the muckrakers as early influences and a continuation of watchdog journalism.”
@ Gram3:
Well said. Totally agree.
Michaela wrote:
Actually Micheala, I hate to say it but there are mega churches full of folks who buy into doctrinal narrowing, culture wars, cult of personality, etc. Granted, there is constant recruitment. It is a whole other topic. I do think a lot of folks have left but (and I hate to say this) but the young are especially influenced by cult of personality and collectivist thinking. I am speaking in generalities but before you know it, a generation is lost into the void of authoritarian thinking. There are just too many looking to some authority or leader to tell them what to think and believe. Not enough critical thinking, individualism or independence out there.
__
“Reaching Out, Touching Life…”
hmmm…
When kind folk reach out to Dee N’ Deb of TWW they want to talk
about things in life that matter most to them, and
they want to know if Jesus can help…
The Wartburg Watch believes He can.
🙂
—
1 comment not approved
Sopwith wrote:
How kind.
Lydia wrote:
Granted, Lydia, that the mega$ churche$ are alway$ recruiting new folk$.
Mega$ are also imploding, thousands of churches in the US close every year,
and there is the rising population of The Dones (Christians who are fed up with the problems in formalized churches) in addition to a growing population of The Nones (did not believe).
Remember two names: Darrel Gilyard and John Langworthy. Remember two other names: Jack Graham and Paige Patterson. The former two are registered child molesters who aren’t in prison. Darrel Gilyard, in fact, is preaching at a Missionary baptist church in Florida. The later two are celebrities within the Southern Baptist Convention. They may have their stained glass windows in the SWBTS chapel. Now how did these luminaries, Graham and Patterson, get associated with the likes of these child molesters. Patterson shield Gilyard for four years even though he was aware of the charges made in muffled tones that Gilyard was a child molester. In fact he has informed Criswell College students ,who had brought the allegations to Pattersons attention, to remain silent. In the Prestonwood case, the church investigated the charges against Langworthy. Police were not involved, and Langworthy was released from his staff position so he could serve another baptist church. So there are two questions: did the baptist celebrities in these two cases not view child molestation as a crime? Did they not care enough about children to broadcast their concerns to other churches? The first question is the big question. The second question is if they don’t affirm the first question is whether they believe in the golden rule? They appear to have been very cold about the whole issue, and I hope and pray that insurance rates go up for baptist churches since they don’t seem to care. They say they do, but they don’t.
dee wrote:
Race Card, played off the bottom of the deck.
Victorious wrote:
This is a good example, IMO, of saying something that is true without saying all that it is true. Moore would rightly make application to racial reconciliation but at the same time adamantly deny reconciliation between husbands and wives. He would not be so foolish as to say that black men and white men could have fellowship and unity while one man is set over the other. That would be absurd and contrary to all logic and all human experience. But this same Moore would say that marriage, a one-flesh union and partnership, must have the husband set over the wife, the woman placed under the man’s dominion.
The Gospel makes reconciliation between all people who are in Christ possible. Finally, after such a long time and such a disgusting beginning to its history, the SBC is making racial reconciliation a priority. When will they do the same for women? When will they do the same thing for children they have tossed aside while they have shielded their buddies and protected their revenue streams?
Gram3 wrote:
Is this perhaps what’s called hypocrisy? 🙁
Lydia wrote:
A generation has been taught *not* to think and not to allow difficult questions or topics to be discussed. A generation has been spoon-fed curricula designed to shape their thinking to the thinking of the authors of the curricula while generating a lot of money for those authors. A generation has been taught what a few men think about the Bible but has not learned to study the Bible for themselves nor to rely on the Holy Spirit and other members of the Body besides the BigMan up front to teach them.
I do know that there are many like me who have walked away. Others have been pushed out, while still others are staying for various reasons. What will be interesting is what will happen in the next 10-20 years when the kids of all of these young folks become teenagers and college students. What then? They won’t have any spiritual skills or flexibility to figure out how to do life as a Christian. I don’t think the magic formulas will work, and I think a lot of husbands and wives are going to be looking at each other and wondering what happened? Why did I waste all those years? Why did I fall for this?
Victorious wrote:
Actually, it might be even worse than hypocrisy. It might be opportunism. Trying to catch the wave of popular opinion among the younger 20’s in the wake of Ferguson and Trayvon Martin. So it may go beyond hypocrisy regarding women and children and go to exploitation of racial tension. I pray that is not the case and that the leadership truly is repentant.
But honestly the arguments put forth by the apologists for slavery are very similar to the ones used to support female subordination. I pray that maybe some black women will begin to question the double standard. Why are they OK by racial standards, finally!, but still not OK by gender standards? Maybe they will start asking their white sisters in Christ why they put up with this and even approve of it.
@ dee:
Ha Ha. No. Sorry. I’m an apostate that’s also in the closet, especially where I live. So, since I’m no longer a Christian, I don’t go to church.
Gram3 wrote:
I hope that’s not their real intentions, because it must look like it is to many people (including me).
Deb and Dee, it is my understanding that at the Baptist Building here in SC after the Ten Commandments message their was quite a lot of response from people across the state. I have no doubt Noble was contacted privately as the bible instructs but would not back away from the message to the point the leadership here in SC were comfortable with. So then came the statement. NewSpring has still not responded to it. Chances are it will come in a Sunday message at some point. As for those questioning the SBC funding the startup, NewSpring began as a bible study in a dorm room at Anderson University. It quickly grew beyond the college to what is now the largest SBC church in the nation. I actually have a friend who was there when it started, and he insists it’s beginnings were nothing like it is now, and I believe him. My personal opinion is that Noble is just one of the many examples we see across the landscape of the church of a pastor who has grown so large and powerful that their can be no accountability if he will not allow it. Eventually, as we have seen recently, that will catch up with you.
Phillip Miller, Anderson University where Duncan works is funded by the South Carolina Baptist Convention. He is fully aware of Baptist polity
dee wrote:
Now this has got my imagination going. Rather than the non-descriptive Wartburg Watch, how about the more artistically creative:
MUCKRAKING MINISTRIES 2015*. Dissectng Christiam ponds.
501c3 tax exempt status. Incorporating Lifting Stone Outreach
I’ve even started writing promotional material for you (invoice is in the post)
A Ministry now in the making
And an honourable undertaking
For a nominal fee
You can hire Deb or Dee
If your pond needs a bit of muckraking.
* Date subject to change without prior notice, for which the proprietors accept no liability.
@ dee:
Hey, now you can add “muckraker” to your list of names people have called you.
Muckraking? Sounds like an insult, but what a compliment, Dee and Deb!
Even though this is a doctrinal issue, the doctrinal issue at play here is simply a symptom of the larger problem.
I’ve been to several Newspring events including a satellite campus and a few conferences. I was impressed that the church reached out to younger generations and seemed to have many people in church who didn’t necessarily look or appear like they had always gone to church.
Jeff P wrote:
And this is how I understand it as well. Even a couple years ago when I attended the church events, I could say that Perry already was going down this path of supposition about things. In other words, he’d create dialogues and stories from Bible events that may be a little off base, but didn’t seek to reinterpret entire major doctrines. I saw it as reasonable contextualization. In this case, he’s just gone further down the path of doing the same thing here, unfortunately he’s allowed his Messianic Jewish friend to do the interpretation.
At the end of the day, I am convinced that this problem is rooted in the fact that Perry’s sort of school of pastoring is very postmodern and jettisons the lessons of the past. He has become a sort of technocratic victim in the since that he’s trusting his entire church to this guy in Israel. He’s doing it precisely because the guy is Jewish, knows Hebrew and sounds spiritual in a Mr. Miyagi way.
The difference is, rather than this being a personal issue, this affects an entire church that happens to be one of the largest around.
Gram3–just to check this weekend I watched Moore on youtube, the sermon being about Ephesians, and husbands and wives. He presented a very cogent non oppressive of women way of interpreting the scripture. (With which we may or may not agree.) He was making a very unGrudem point that the teaching that a woman only had to submit to her own husband was very revolutionary in the culture in which it was given. That in the first place, for her to have the right to choose to submit or not choose to submit was very new. And in the second place, he was adamant that women in general are not to submit to men in general. And then he tackled the sinful reaction of men in wanting to be in dominion or domination, either one, over the women. What he taught was that the man is always and every time to put what is the best interest of his own wife over other considerations.
Now, I don’t say he will convince any egals to become comps. Don’t say his interpretation is right or wrong. Just saying that what he actually teaches is very different than what some egals SAY he teaches.
Worth a watch to better understand what he actually teaches.
@ linda:
Was that talk before or after his talk/paper (Henry Institute) that comps are wimps and we need more patriarchy?
He even lamented husbands who inquire with their wives about going away to a Promise Keepers event. Moore insisted the husbsnds “tell” their wives. She was not to have input.
I do think there is an effort to sort of rebrand themselves, depending on the audience. This often happens after a lot of push back or the money not flowing as easy. I am seeing snippets of it around the movement.
Will the real Russell Moore please come forward. :o)
@ linda:
Thanks for that information, but I am very familiar with the clever ways that Moore uses language and with what he teaches. Have you read his ETS paper where he maintains that he doesn’t like the word “complementarian” but rather prefers the word “patriarchy” to describe what he believes is true? He has also said that women do not portray the Gospel if they are not subordinate, and men do not display the Gospel if they are not ruling in their families. And he says that is true because he says they are denying the Fatherhood (Patriarchy) of God.
Some of us are quite accustomed to smooth words that mask the underlying issues. Of course he will put Masculinism Makeup on what he is teaching, because what he and the others are *really* teaching is so repugnant. The underlying issue is whether or not God has designed his creation such that one human or group of humans is ordained to rule over or take charge of or be in authority over another human or group of humans. This is the same underlying issue the SBC faced when it supported racism and before that slavery.
The issue of whether a wife’s submission is voluntary is a red herring. If God has ordained that a woman be subordinate, then the woman is sinning by expressing her own will when it conflicts with her husband’s or when she acts on her own initiative. That conclusion unavoidable follows from God ordaining the authority of the man over the woman. While she may submit voluntarily, that does not remove the problem of her agency as a human being revoked by this system.
They assert that the first sin was actually the Woman taking the initiative and usurping her husband’s authority. God never said anything about the Man being in authority, and God never rebuked the Woman for “usurping” the Man’s authority and acting on her own initiative. This is yet another instance of woman-blaming. The record we have shows that both sinned in the same way. They both disobeyed God.
So, submission can only always be voluntary as long as the woman is either willing to submerge her will totally and deny part of her personhood and dignity which God gave her, or she will voluntarily decide to sin whenever she voluntarily refuses to submit to husband. How does that choice make any sense from the Bible or common reason?
Smooth words do not cover that very ugly heart of this. It is a desire to preserve power and privilege over another human being, just as slavery and racism are. It is a means of using clever words to disguise what you are really teaching. That is what the serpent did. I am not equating these men with the serpent, but I do believe they have bought a lie and are spreading it.
Beyond that, however, the system binds women by saying that if they deny the subordination of women as part of God’s design, and with it the corollary Eternal Subordination of the Son, then those women are denying part of the Gospel and are impeding the spread of the Gospel by denying this doctrine. When you think about it, this is absolutely ridiculous. By this understanding, the Gospel to a woman in Lahore is more freeing by telling her that she is still subordinate, but that her unbelieving husband might be a nicer ruler if he were saved as well. Contrast that to the real Gospel which is that Christ came to save all, male and female, that all are one in Christ. There is no race or sex that is superior or designed by God to rule over the other. Our identity is not tied to any circumstance of birth but rather by our new birth in Christ by the power of the Spirit.
They are preaching a gendered gospel, just like the Galatians were preaching an ethnic gospel and the Corinthians were teaching a licentious gospel. None of these is the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and that is why we must oppose all of these if we are to proclaim the unadulterated Gospel. Ironic since they made a great show of proclaiming an “unadjusted Gospel” at T4g 2012.
lydia wrote:
Noooooooooooo. That can’t be right. That makes it sound like they are selling dog food that the dogs don’t want to eat and sales are down.
Surely these are well-studied and principled men of God who don’t change the message (capitulate to culture) to suit the audience!
@ linda:
If you would like to do so, I would love to hear from you or anyone else how this system actually works, either in the abstract or practically in a marriage. I cannot find a way to make it cohere with either the text of scripture or with common and sound reasoning.
Maybe you can fill in the gaps that I’m missing. I mean this sincerely because I believe that your comment was sincere. I just don’t see how the exegetical and logical math adds up.
@ Gram3:
I wonder if the apparent shift is due to his change in Role from Dean in the bubble at SBTS to head of the ERLC of the entire SBC. If Mohler wants to keep the non-Mohlerites in the SBC from open rebellion or passive resistance via shutting off the funding tap to the Cooperative Program, then Moore needs to moderate his message enough so that what he is really advocating will not be exposed. That seems like politics and not faith to me. It sounds like pragmatism instead of principle.
Gram3 wrote:
I think that is part of it. I cannot read minds but I can follow patterns. Part of the problem with this issue is that if folks like Linda above have not been following these guys pretty consistently, they miss the patterns. And I also think she is sincere but that is what makes all of this so frustrating. If Russ Moore has sincerely changed his view, he owes it to all the folks to whom he has taught and preached to be very direct that he softened his view on patriarchy. Has he? Will be specifically repudiate what he has taught in the past. It sounds to me if he is just redefining and hoping it will catch on. He still does not understand that believers submit to one another, obviously. He STILL misses the larger narrative of Christianity.
The pattern that I allude to with Moore is the same I have seen from quite a few Mohlerites after being put in positions of more power outside of SBTS try and win some of their own identity…. for obvious reasons. This is very common to the Mentor/Protege relationship. And of course it is subtle.
I don’t think there is any “big break” going on. Russ is simply on a national stage now, being quoted by the big boy media so he is rebranding himself to be more accepted. We are seeing it in race relations, too.
But if he and his colleagues were not concerned about partnering, protecting and promoting those who don’t think molesting children is a crime for the state, why should I believe him (or any of them) on race relations? He had his “leadership” opportunity to speak out on behalf of sgm victims that his boss was chiding and he chose not to. Prior to being positioned at ERLC, not only was he Dean but a pastor at Highview Baptist where Ezell, another installed Mohlerite at NAMB, was pastor. “Discover the networks” as David Horowitz likes to connect the dots.
Gram3 wrote:
I think so. When they tell it to the news media, and Moore’s office used to be quoted right much under the last guy to hold that job, the hard core language would give away the agenda. And that office is nothing if not political.
By the way, I don’t see the hierarchy agenda as limited to gender or race. That is just one avenue to follow for them. They can take the gender issue and utilize the opposition to women’s lib as a motivator, hoping to tap into the same old racial attitudes which have not exactly become extinct. But neither women (especially comp women) nor racial minorities control the most of the money, and I am thinking that the really big issue and motivator might be the call to ‘turn this nation around’ by having the ‘right’ people in charge of everybody else in every aspect of life. These people themselves, and those that agree with them being the ‘right’ people, of course. It looks like extreme right wing political thinking only barely disguised by the gender issue camo. Biblical adherence is not the real issue. This is about the kinds of things we have seen in nation after nation in the past. Whose boot will be in whose face, sort of thing.
@ Lydia:
Let us not forget Russ Moores new job at ERLC is all about promoting the culture war for the SBC. He wants to be the anti Richard Land. That also plays into the rebranding.
lydia wrote:
Sounds like Constipation Boy never outgrew that Little Rascals episode with the “He-Man Woman-Haters Club”.
DH wrote:
What sort of “Messianic Jew”?
Too many of them out here in Cali were basically Calvary Chapelites with Hebrew Buzzword Bingo and Kashrut — “Have You Accepted Yeshua ha-Moshiyah As Your Personal Adonai And Savior?????”
Gram3 wrote:
They’re not even selling dog food.
They’re selling dog turds and calling it New Improved Dog Food(TM).
Lydia wrote:
Discover the networks and probe the past. Mohler was a journalist for a denominational paper before he was recruited to re-engineer SBTS. Moore was a political aide. Is there some connection between those things? If what you know is shaping opinion with words and being a political operative, then that is what you know how to do, and so that is what you do.
Moore was making a blatant appeal to emotion in the remarks Linda cited. This isn’t about control or domination. This is about a call to service! Submission is voluntary! As long as you don’t mind sinning against God when you voluntarily decide on your own as a woman. These are very attractive if you don’t really think through what they are saying in the context of everything else they have said. I no longer trust their words.
Nancy wrote:
Totally agree with this. I think it is all about keeping the money flowing from those who are culture-warriors while also appealing to the sensibilities of the younger people. The thinking is right-wing in this instance and comes, IMO, from the echoes of the Coalition on Revival participants. However, this is the same kind of thing that drives political movements of any stripe, including the religious and political progressives, as we have seen with the Tony Jones debacle. Rules, like taxes, are for the little people, as Leona informed us. Power is for the elites. Of course, they only reluctantly take on that heavy burden for the good of the little people. Uh huh.
It is inherently worldly, and that is why it is so discouraging to see it take over the church.
Nancy wrote:
“Sergei Syoot Here.
Come Rewolution, Boxing Day will become Brezhnev Day!”
— Kenny Everett Video Show
(And this time we WILL achieve True Communism!)
“The Rule of The Party is FOREVER.”
— Comrade O’Brian, Inner Party
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
I think it can be safely said that Papa Chuck was the originator of more than one fundagelical fad out here in Southern Cal. He was sort of a Chairman Mao to many.
Muff Potter wrote:
No Skubalon. Calvary Chapel dominated the Christianse AM airwaves out here, and I’ve always had this “bad vibe” about them — nothing I could put my finger on, just a feeling of something wrong. Like they distilled down what could go wrong with new independent “Bible only” not-a-churches. And the Calvary Chapelites I ran into all too often seemed like Calvary Chapel-bots.
P.S. You’re SoCal, too? Whereabouts? I live in Anaheim and work near the El Toro Wye, both Behind the Orange Curtain.
Gram3 wrote:
Hi Gram, scripture never records Eve’s sin disobedience; only that she was deceived. Adam’s sin, on the other hand, is called disobedience and Job 31 says he tried to cover his transgression and hid iniquity in his heart.
That’s the difference imho between unintentional sin and deliberate, purposeful sin.
FWIW
Victorious wrote:
You make a good point about unintentional sin arising from deception and willful disobedience. But still, she ate from the tree, even though deceived, and God had told them not to do that. God did call her to account for doing what he had told her not to do (I am presuming that God told her although she may have heard the command from Adam.) So, to me it is clear that she sinned, though apparently God did not reckon her sin in the same way, if I am inferring correctly from the record. IIRC, the Mosaic code differentiated between those different kinds of sin they way you have, and there were different offerings for them. But I would need to skim Leviticus to check that. 😉
Gram3:
“They assert that the first sin was actually the Woman taking the initiative and usurping her husband’s authority.”
From my one year, chronological Bible in the NLT translation:
Genesis 3:16
Then He said to the woman, “I will sharpen the pain of your pregnancy, and in pain you will give birth. And you will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over you.*”
3:16 Or, And though you will have desire
Sheesh, I guess there are times I’ll have to revert to my copy of the original NIV or maybe my daughter’s ESV.
NJ wrote:
The NLT is clearly not translating but inserting a particular interpretation from Susan Foh into 3:16. It is disappointing and surprising that The NET Bible inserts Foh’s interpretation into the text as well. But the others translate it more correctly. Even the ESV! I like to read lots of translations and compare them to the interlinear as well.
The straightforward reading is that the Woman will turn toward her husband (in desire) just as she turned toward the serpent. The theme of turning is in Genesis 3, and that makes a lot more sense of the context. To get to Foh’s interpretation one must do some gymnastics.
There are articles online if you are interested in Foh’s reasoning and the rebuttals to her. It is amazing how her new interpretation has taken hold in the evangelical consciousness over the past 40-odd years. She was one of the founding persons of CBMW, IIRC. No agenda there.
@ Gram3:
Lev_4:27 (NASB) ‘Now if anyone of the common people sins unintentionally in doing any of the things which the LORD has commanded not to be done, and becomes guilty,
Num_15:27 (NASB) ‘Also if one person sins unintentionally, then he shall offer a one year old female goat for a sin offering
Jos_20:3 (NASB) that the manslayer who kills any person unintentionally, without premeditation, may flee there, and they shall become your refuge from the avenger of blood.
Joshua 20:3 that the manslayer who kills any person unintentionally, without premeditation, may flee there, and they shall become your refuge from the avenger of blood.
Heb 9:7 (EV)… but into the second only the high priest goes, and he but once a year, and not without taking blood, which he offers for himself and for the unintentional sins of the people.
@ NJ:
Oh, and I guess Susan Foh was usurping the authority of all the males who preceded her and did not see her interpretation in the text. And, isn’t she teaching the Bible authoritatively to all those men who have followed her novel interpretation? That is a clear violation of a very big CBMW commandment.
@ Victorious:
Thanks for those references! Seems to be a clear pattern.
God told the serpent, “Because” you have done this….
God told Adam, “Because” you have done this…
He never told Eve “Because” she had done anything. IMO it’s because she sinned unintentionally via deception. My own (reasonable) speculation is that satan pointed to the tree of life and as proof they would not die.
Nevertheless, 1 Timothy 2:14 specifically says she “fell” into the transgression. That confirms imo that it was unintentional as opposed to the deliberate, intentional disobedience of Adam.
Gen. 3:16 was God’s warning that if Eve “turned” toward Adam, he would rule over her. Katharine Bushnell clearly shows via diagram when the word “turning” toward was influenced by the Talmud in IIRC 300 B.C. and became “desire” with a sexual implication.
Victorious wrote:
And that vignette is also the beginning of an age old problem: why women can’t trust men.
@ Victorious:
Those are some more very good points. In 1 Timothy 2:14 Paul clearly says that she came into sin via deception while Adam sinned intentionally without being deceived. Interesting, isn’t it, that this is usually turned around to make her look worse, as one who is “prone to deception” while Adam is not portrayed as “prone to willful sin.”
The context of 1 Timothy is also interesting on this point. The purpose of the letter is obviously false teaching which has arisen via deception, and Paul cites his own story as an example of how those who are deceived and teaching false doctrine can nevertheless be redeemed. This purpose of the letter is usually ignored by the Comps who make it all about Church Order and the Order of Creation.
If we keep in mind that Eve is used by Paul in 2 Corinthians as a type of all who are deceived, then this reference in 1 Timothy makes a lot more sense. Teach those who are deceived the truth. If they repent of their false teaching, embrace the truth and continue in the true faith, they will be saved through The Childbearing (rather than through Artemis’ help in childbirth), which was the promise God made to the Woman and the Man in the garden. The false teachers at Ephesus, like Paul himself, will be saved in spite of their disobedient acts which they committed while they were deceived.
Thanks for highlighting the importance of understanding the relationship of Eve and deception in Genesis and in 1 Timothy. I haven’t read Bushnell, but it seems I should!
Tim wrote:
I think the lesson from Genesis is that our allegiance, trust, honor, and obedience is to be first to God rather than others who may try to persuade us to focus on them for whatever the reason.
Thanks for the link, Tim. Off to read….
Gram3 wrote:
And who mentored Foh? Grudem.
There is another part of the explanation you give above (turning makes more contextual sense) is that since Adam “named” the other created species he should have known there was a problem. That is something to ask if we read it literally.
As far as being deceived vs. knowing better, 1 Tim 1 touches on that, too. Paul even names names on those who know better but has mercy for those deceived. Which is ironic since the same theme is incorporated later in 1 Tim concerning Eve to make a larger point—a point that fits the historical context of Ephesus at the time.
Gram3 wrote:
Oh my, you should! You won’t agree with every jot & tittle but you cannot say she did not do her homework back in the day of slow mail and massive amounts of library time. Her scholarship is incredible. She was no shrinking violet. She went to medical school in a time it was very unusual for women and she was a medical missionary in China from which she draws interesting parallels to the sin of Patriarchy.
Gram3 wrote:
I got hold of her book “God’s Word to Women” back in the 70’s when it was re-published by a gentleman in upstate NY by the name of Ray B. Munson who sent it for an offering of $5.00.
Bushnell was a scholar of both Hebrew and Greek. God called her to be a missionary preacher and she gold Him that if He would prove to her that Paul was not against women preaching, she would obey.
The book is the result and IIRC, she went on to be a missionary preacher in China. The last publishing of her book was in 1923 before Munson began the reprint because he felt strongly women needed her scholarly work.
Victorious wrote:
That is an awesome summary, V. Nicely done.
Victorious wrote:
AMEN (and I am shouting)!
@ Gram3:
Another really good book on the subject is a recent one by Ziony Zevit, professor of Biblical Literature at American Jewish University calledWhat Really Happened in the Garden of Eden. It’s received a number of positive reviews in academia. I’ve just started getting into it, it’s witty and very readable, covering the context of the story along with historical interpretations as well his own.
Lydia wrote:
Now look, Lydia, if you are going to capitulate to cultural pressure by insisting we look at the larger context of the whole letter, including purpose statements, and historical cultural considerations, and comparing obscure references like the one Paul makes to Eve, then I just don’t know what to say. He makes a perfectly cogent ad hoc argument for male priority and the Order of Creation.
The parallels between Paul’s argument and the cultural setting in Ephesus are purely *coincidental* and the Artemis cult was no big deal. No big deal. I know that because Schreiner said so, IIRC. We need to read Paul in light of later revelation, i.e. Grudem, Kostenberger, etc. 😉
I’ll see if I can find a copy of Bushnell (maybe at the CBE site.) I haven’t read much egalitarian literature mainly because I didn’t embrace egalitarianism but rather rejected so-called Complementarianism because their arguments and exegesis are so ridiculous that I was truly stunned when I looked into the question. Actually, stunned does not capture the feeling which also included shame that I had been so ignorant.
@ Victorious:
Found it on Amazon and also on the GWTW website in case someone else is interested. Wonder if Amazon makes Piper uncomfortable. 😉
JeffT wrote:
In checking the book out on Amazon and reading the first page “The Fall in Interpretation,” the author states that the Genesis story instructs “wives to submit to the rule of their husbands.” 🙁
__
“Confidence This?”
“The law of their God is in their hearts; their feet do not slip…”
hmmm…
Those that don’t know the scriptures are easy prey for modern religious confidence men.
(sadface)
Lord, with all my heart I have sought You; Do not let me wander from Your commandments. Your word I have treasured in my heart, That I may not sin against You. Blessed are You, O LORD; Teach me Your statutes…
Sopy
—
@ Gram3:
Well…..if Grudem says so…..NOT!!!
On another note, I would not call Bushnell an egalitarian or her book egalitarian literature even if CBE sells it. (Do they?)
I totally get where you are coming from about egalitarian literature. I had the same feeling. but I kept running across older scholars who would never have described themselves in that way but would have been banished from SBTS because of their scholarship. My guess is that folks like CBE came across them, too.
I am one of those people who think women can be just as tyrannical as men.
I have never liked the term egalitarian. It has too much of a French Revolution feel to it for me.
Victorious wrote:
In that first paragraph, he’s describing the popular perception of the story, not his own analysis – it’s the setup for the rest of the book where he goes on to analyze where these perceptions came from and what he thinks the story really means based on his interpretation of the Hebrew and the context in which it was written.
Here’s a sample from the early pages of the book:
In an address to women, the church father Tertullian (160–220 CE) laid out the implications of the events in the Garden, allocating culpability in a form still quite recognizable in the twenty- first century:
I think … that you would have dressed in mourning garments and even neglected your exterior, acting the part of mourning and repentant Eve in order to expiate more fully by all sorts of penitential garb that which woman derives from Eve— the ignomy, I mean, of original sin and the odium of being the cause of the fall of the human race. In sorrow and anxiety, you will bring forth, O woman, and you are subject to your husband, and he is your master. Do you not believe that you are [each] an Eve?
The sentence of God on this sex of yours lives on even in our times and so it is necessary that the guilt should live on, also. You are the one who opened the door to the Devil … you are the one who persuaded he whom the Devil was not strong enough to attack. All too easily you destroyed the image of God, man.
While Tertullian’s analysis of the Garden story with its salty singling out of women shaped much in Christian thought for many centuries, his analysis was not uniquely Christian. It can be traced back to pre- Christian Jewish teachers who first faulted Adam as liable in the biblical story. Some spread the blame to include Hawwa [Eve] whereas others shifted it entirely to her. Tertullian reflects the latter position.
The reassignment of liability was due in part to Hellenistic attitudes toward women and in part to an evolving perception that some element of the punishment for the sin was transmitted biologically, like the spots on Jacob’s goats. Additionally, the science of the time accepted that heredity played an important role in establishing the character and nature of an individual, but was uncertain about which parent transmitted which traits to offspring. Consequently, once the Fall became associated with human character, science insisted that the imprint of fallenness had to be passed on from parents to offspring. Differing scientific views about which parent transmitted which characteristic to offspring explain the different assignations of liability, now to Adam and now to Hawwa.
JeffT wrote:
Ahhh…a good lesson for me in not jumping to conclusions too quickly! Thanks, Jeff!
Lastly, here’s a joke Zevit includes in the book:
One day in the Garden of Eden, Eve called to God, “Lord, I have a problem.”
“What’s your problem, Eve?”
“I know that you created me and put me in this lovely garden with all the animals. But I’m just not happy any more.”
“Why not, Eve? What’s gone wrong?”
“Well, Lord, I guess that I’m getting lonely. These animals don’t talk. And to tell you the truth, fresh apples just don’t do it for me any more.”
“Eve, I have a solution. I’ll create a man for you.”
“What’s a man, Lord?”
“Well, he’s a bit like you, but flawed. He’s tough and not easy to get along with. But he will be bigger and faster than you so he can help out when needed. But he’ll be a bit slower than you and you’ll have to help him figure out what to do.”
Eve thought for a few moments, scratched her head, and asked, “What’s the catch, Lord?”
“Well, there will be one condition attached.”
Eve smiled wisely and asked, “And what’s that, Lord?”
“You’ll have to let him think that I made him first.”
Lydia wrote:
Agreed. How about Complementary Mutualist? That seems to capture the spirit of life in Christ together. It also does not exclude males and females who do not fit into the tight gender roles of the Hierarchical Comps. Single men and women still complement one another, after all.
Back on the topic of the OP, do you think the SBC will follow the example set here with Furtick?
Gram3 wrote:
I like Mutualist myself. I could have liked Complementary because I believe that men and women do complement each other, BUT that word has been ruined for me 🙁
Gram3:
“Oh, and I guess Susan Foh was usurping the authority of all the males who preceded her and did not see her interpretation in the text. And, isn’t she teaching the Bible authoritatively to all those men who have followed her novel interpretation? That is a clear violation of a very big CBMW commandment.”
LOL…I was thinking this very thing earlier. Actually, I think the real issue is they’ll tolerate any woman who says the sort of things they already want to hear. I’ve seen that before in the manosphere, Baylyblog, certain antifeminist blogs, etc.
I’ve always interpreted Gen. 3:16 the same way you do. Now I’m not familiar with the hermeneutical history of Genesis, but quite a few theologians of the Church in previous centuries seemed to hold rather traditional views of women without resorting to the type of creativity that flowered from the 70s onward. Gothardism, Susan Foh, ESS, CBMW, and neopatriarchy have all seemed to come in reaction to women’s liberation, and not just the sexual revolution alone.
*************************************************************************************
I wonder if Mohler’s going to comment on the Newspring situation?
IF YOU ARE A FRIEND OF EAGLE’S… would you kindly go to the SGM survivor’s “open comments” thread, and…help take care of a troll? 😀 “JustSaying” has really crossed the line, and if I were Eagle, I would like some help in dealing w/ this comment.
Thanks so much. 🙂
http://www.sgmsurvivors.com/2014/09/19/free-discussion/comment-page-25/#comment-87625
NJ wrote:
I don’t think it was necessary before then, and the appeal to fear of culture would not have been as effective. Theolgians before the suffragists just assumed women were inferior, so there was no need for “equal in dignity, value, and worth” but “unequal in role.”
Women were denied roles back then because they were assumed to be incompetent. By the 70’s, that was demonstrably false, and women had demonstrated their capability wherever they were permitted to function, all other things being equal. Also, that is when the real pressure came to ordain women in the PCA and the OPC. They had to come up with another rationale for male priority and exclusivity. So George Knight, III came up with the novelty of gender “roles” that are assigned just because of gender but which are supposedly purely functional. Gender is purely functional! Who knew? It is truly difficult not to mock them for their inability to think logically.
But they also had to come up with a well-poisoining preemptive defense against female “intrusions” into the male domain. That preemptive defense was the female’s desire to usurp her husband’s authority, conveniently provided by Susan Foh and backed up with “arguments” from 1 Timothy 2. Presumably this desire-to-usurp resides somewhere on the X chromosome and requires a double dose for the trait to be expressed.
Therefore, every question raised by a woman about their illogical arguments or about their strained exegesis and prooftexting becomes evidence to prove their claim. She is just trying to usurp proper God-ordained authority and proving that she is a rebellious daughter of Eve! If she dares to question a man, then it proves she is desiring to exercise authority over him and teach him. It was a stroke of genius on Foh’s part, and I’m sure she was rewarded at WTS for discovering that.
It gives God the vapors when women teach men, apparently. Better for a man to remain in ignorance than learn something from a woman.
linda wrote:
@Linda,
I’ve been a Christian for about fifteen years. Perhaps one of the most disturbing things for me to learn about the proponents of this whole patriarchy idealogy (the biggest names behind it) is that these men are being accused right and left of sex crimes against children and some are being arrested and prosecuted. I call it what it is: “The doctrines of boundaryless sex offenders being shoved down our throats.”
Lydia wrote:
I don’t like the words egalitarian or complementarian. They are not in the bible. This labelling can be very inaccurate. In some ways I’m both, but I would never call myself egalitarian as it conjures up in my mind compromise of the RHE variety. Yet there is a huge area in the NT where men and women are ‘equal’.
In arguing for complementarianism as I see it and from my experience of it, it became clear very early on this is synonymous with hardline Patriarchy in some people’s minds who post here. I don’t think from what I have read that’s where I stand. And I don’t see this issue as primarily an authority/submission one, that is far too narrow.
The secret is to avoid extremes where a NT truth is taken beyond what is written, or to make one aspect of the NT negate another one. Both sides on this are liable to do this, and both sides can use intemperate language which in the end doesn’t help genuine communication.
Ken wrote:
I wouldn’t call myself an egalitarian either, but the fact of the matter is that the Patriarchists have hijacked a word and twisted it into a meaning which it did not previously have. That’s the reason we think “complementarianism” is patriarchy dressed up in an equality costume.
The Bible nowhere says that male and female are unequal. It does say that the woman is the counterpart (kenegdo)to the man. Right leg, left leg. Right brain, left brain. Right hand, left hand. They work together syngergistically to accomplish the mission. The problem is that the Patriarchists are locked into a zero-sum power struggle paradigm. That says a lot more about them than they want to say, IMO.
The Bible says that the man is the head of the woman. That is yet another word that has been hijacked and forced to mean something that it does not mean in the biblical text. Nowhere in the biblical text does “head” mean “boss” when the head/body metaphor is given the meaning it has in its context. Just because Grudem says it means “authority over” doesn’t make it so. Context determines meaning, right?
Ken wrote:
Can you be more specific? You have lost me. Being an egal means ones compromises like RHE did concerning abuse victims?
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Based on what Noble has said, he’s a mid-60s Israeli named Ari. He talks about him in at least one blog and has mentioned him in sermons before. Of course, this assumes that he indeed does exist, which I don’t see reason to question too much.
@ Lydia:
The word ‘comp’ usually entails visions of Patriarchal tyranny here. For me, the word egalitarian is associated with RHE and Willow Creek and the word compromise.
As far as RHE is concerned, from what I have read of her and about her (and please note this qualification) she is compromised on holding to scripture as the standard of faith and conduct. She tends strongly towards mockery (as does Dan Phillips whom I have spared with on the gifts of the Spirit). That is my perception of her. She also doesn’t seem to understand that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God.
It’s fascinating how much she needles American evangelicals.
Willow Creek, and it is hard to escape it here, is also compromised. It incorporates mysticism, psychobabble, a gospel confined to love, a watered down version of sin. With all that hanging round its neck, it then makes acceptance of egalitarianism a condition of membership. I’m not sure the local church here we don’t attend but sometimes consider going back to goes that far, but you would be very quickly silenced if you even hinted you have reservations about this, even if you were quoting scripture. I don’t think I am being unfair in saying that.
None of this determines what the bible says and how we are to understand it, but warning lights going on is not restricted to just one side of the debate!
Ken wrote:
Actually, I’m egalitarian because I refuse to compromise on what the Bible says about women and men.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
I’m in Corona (Inland Empire), happily retired after 30 some years in the aerospace industry as an NC Programmer.
Ken wrote:
You need to get out more. :o) I am quite familiar with Willow Creek as their “association” was a big vendor for many seeker mega’s back in the 90’s for sermon packages including drama skits, videos, etc. They seemed very shallow to me. More business than church.
What about folks like Gordon Fee, NT Wright, the Kroegers at Gordon Conwell, etc, etc,? There are some serious scholars out there that might surprise you. They come from many different denominations.
Tim wrote:
The entire comp/pat paradigm is a result of selling sin as a virtue. One cannot escape the mutuality of Christianity. The need for one adult by virtue of gender to be in charge of another adult by virtue of gender is from the fall. It was never God’s intention for His creation.
@ Lydia:
And – contrary to some who are blinded by their favorite doctrine – the comp/egal debate is so secondary to the gospel. These two bloggers (one comp, the other egal) do quite well at Putting The Comp/Egal Debate In Its Place.
@ Tim:
I don’t know, Tim. The debate isn’t what separates. The actual believers do the separating into their camps. I don’t think it should, but it does. Right off the bat the second responder to your question says this:
“2) While I value complementarianism and I find it important for worship, it is a secondary issue.”
Am I wrong in assuming that there are many places that this person would not worship alongside other believers?
I know this is an old post and not the topic here, but I had a much different response to reading that article than what you might have expected. The debate was not put in its place for me, and the entire “worship” issue IS THE big issue which is exactly how the woman with the comp perspective responded.
I also realize that the person from the egal perspective could feel the same way about worship and may limit herself in where she worships.
🙁
Lydia wrote:
Ditto that recommendation. Read Fee and then read any given “complementarian” and note the difference in tone and substance.
Tim wrote:
Gram3 wrote:
Gram3 wrote:
Gram3 wrote:
It certainly *should* be secondary or even tertiary. T4g and TgC include statements about gender roles which make it a gospel issue, whether we want it to be or not.
Tying it to the OP, the fact is that there is a gendered orthodoxy in the SBC. It has been made a first tier doctrine, to use Mohler’s triage. I certainly didn’t go looking for an issue. But it certainly found me some years ago, and the cancer has spread even further.
The fact of the matter is that a woman like me is considered more of a hindrance to the truth of scripture and the Gospel of Jesus Christ than Perry Noble or Steven Furtick. Those are the facts on the ground. How does that make any sense? God is more pleased by Perry Noble in a pulpit than he would be if I were teaching expositionally from the Bible which I consider inspired and infallible. Really, SBC leaders? Is that how God thinks? In the SBC today, the gender of the messenger *is* considered more crucial than either the faithfulness of the messenger or the truth of the message delivered.
I’m not an evangelist for egalitarianism, but I am an evangelist of the unadulterated Good News of Jesus Christ. What goes along with proclamation of the true gospel is refutation of all false gospels, including the gendered gospel of the Gospel Glitterati.
Deebs, please edit that last comment! Yikes! Don’t know what happened.
Bridget wrote:
I can safely say that Aimee Byrd would never consider the comp/egal debate to be a dividing line for who they fellowship with in the body of Christ. If you want proof, it’s in the writing/blogging relationship I’ve developed with Aimee over the years. We count on each other for good counsel and prayer support and encouragement in our writing and family things, and there is not one smidge of reluctance to do so as siblings in Christ.
Gram3 wrote:
Exactly. Defies logic and reason.
There was also no mention of gender roles in the BFM UNTIL It was added to the 2000 BFM when it became part of the “Gospel” creed.
Lydia wrote:
I have some friends that left a church in the 1970’s because the Pastor was teaching a series called “the bible according to the Peanuts (comic strip).” This is kind what the PerryNoble experiment reminded me of interms of disrespecting Scripture. Mr. Noble claims to believe in Biblical inerrancy, but what does this really mean? Biblical inerrancy was the rallying cry of some well meaning baptists who were concerned the Southern Baptist Convention was at risk of becoming irrelevant as an evangelical denomination. Now we see Mr. Noble and others claiming to believe in inerrancy but not really showing much respect for Scripture. So we will continue to see this no matter how many creeds and doctrinal declarations are made by the oligarchs who control the SBC. Incidentally infallibility is a stricter and more traditional view of Scripture than is inerrancy. I read Gram3 allude to it. I think it is the most “conservative” view of Scripture of all because it predates Princeton theology.
Mark wrote:
Don’t know the particulars of the Princeton definition, but I used the word “infallible” as it was traditionally used in the SBC until, as Nancy says, the SBC was resurged upon. I am very conservative and believe in the inerrancy of the original manuscripts. I acknowledge that is a theoretical and faith position since we don’t have the originals. Infallibility is also a faith position. I don’t see how anyone could be more conservative than I am and still be rational. We can’t prove matters of faith, but we have to put our benchmark somewhere, and that’s where I put mine.
Others don’t see it that way and put their faith benchmark someplace else, and that’s between them and God. The main problem I have is with those who trumpet their conservatism and how they are standing against the culture and then proceed to interpret the Bible in a way that violates every conservative rule of hermeneutics. I can have a rational discussion with someone who doesn’t share my view of inspiration. I can’t do that with someone who claims to be conservative and then goes rogue with the rules of interpretation.
As for Noble, it doesn’t matter how conservative your view of the Bible is if you twist it and change it to mean whatever you want it to mean. What’s the point of that? I’m happy they are calling him out. I’d just like somebody from the Conservative Resurgence Party to explain why God would rather have Noble in the pulpit than a great expositor who happens to be female.
@ Gram3:
Amen! I am one of those loud baptists who some pastors like and some ask to quell my enthusiasm. The SBC really lost out when they boxed out women from their service and calling, , and when they boxed in believers, and boxed out fine Christians.
Lydia wrote:
🙂
‘More business than church’ sadly just about sums up Willow Creek. It may have begun with the best of intentions, but I doubt if you will find many ‘unchurched’ whose felt need was the forgivenness of the sins they need to repent of. Nevertheless, trying to get Christians to see their churches and activities as outsiders see them is no bad thing. It can become a very inward looking club sometimes.
My excuse for not reading round too much egalitarian literature is a) the issue has not been one I have constantly been confronted with and b) it’s not so easy to get it when not living in England!
There is also the tension between always being willing to amend what you believe as you learn more and not always going over the same ground over and over again.