Without a sense of caring, there can be no sense of community. Anthony J. D'Angelo link
Last week, I wrote a post about my 14 year old small group fellowship. My goal was to help people who have had trouble forming small groups through their own churches or who do not have a church at this time. I wanted to show them that they, too, could form such a group.
I decided to bring this up last week because I have been involved in an offline conversation with a great guy who attends one of the well-known gospel™ churches and until recently was an appointed small group leader. (I so wish I could tell you the name of the church but there is a reason, for the moment, why I cannot do so.) This small group was made up of members of said church. The leader, however, did not follow the stilted and authoritative protocol on what had to be studied in the group. He actually used some judgment and directed the study to meet the questions and needs of the members. They really enjoyed their group.
So, in good Gospel™ fashion, the elders removed him from leadership since he didn't follow the program. They could not find anyone else to lead it so *Poof!* – no more small group. It was disbanded. Just in case you think this former leader was going off track and requiring the group to watch the last 5 years of The Duggar Family, I am here to disabuse you of that notion.
He was teaching within an orthodox Christian perspective but not rigidly following the approved church program. He now has plans to get together with the folks outside of the church structure. Unfortunately, that makes him a *freeloader* in the eyes of 9Marks. This is a term used by the very gospel™ 9Marks church membership czars.
9Marks' Jonathan *Keys* Leeman and church membership
Matt Smethurst of The Gospel Coalition interviewed Jonathan Leeman on various issues surrounding church membership in a post Hey Christian, Polity Matters! It is important to understand that Leeman loves all things which tie members to a local church. He is considered the guru of church discipline. Dee functions as the thorn in his side, consistently pointing out serious flaws in the application of his chosen membership/discipline rules.
The interview was based on Leeman's book Baptist Foundations: Church Government for an Anti-Institutional Age. They describe the book as:
Edited by Leeman and Mark Dever, this new volume brings together 11 contributors to mount an exegetical and theological case for elder-led, deacon-served, congregational church governance.
At first I thought this was going to be another interview in which he states that his sort of church holds the keys to the kingdom of authority. He uses this term so regularly in his posts that I have taken to calling him *Keys* Leeman. Here is a link to another article that we wrote on this subject. However, much to my surprise, he decided to ratchet up on the name-calling. He is asked this question.
You insist Christianity must be “congregationally shaped,” but what if I’ve found solid Christian community outside of a local church?
Christian who do not do it his way are *freeloaders*
Here is his full answer.
I’d say you’re a freeloader! You live in a world in which local churches still do the hard and biblical work of identifying people as Christians through baptism and the Lord’s Supper and then nourishing them through congregational and elder oversight. And then you’re taking all of this good fruit and nourishing your “fellowship” with it.
Without churches, in other words, how would you know your Christian fellowship is actually “Christian”? Imagine a world with no local churches. How would there be any accountability for who is and is not a Christian? Who would separate right teaching from wrong teaching, or call out the hypocrites and heretics?
I’m not denying that some confusion already exists in these matters, but take away churches and you would have complete gospel chaos—every man defining Jesus as seems right in his own eyes. Fellowship outside of a local church can be sweet, but it lacks the accountability structures that God intends to help that fellowship grow and remain faithful.
Just so we do not forget his ever present keys:
…It’s the governing structures of a local church that publicly declare who the Christians are and what the gospel they believe is. I’m not saying you cannot be a Christian or properly understand the gospel apart from a local church. Of course you can. I’m just saying your opinion of whether you’re a Christian or what the gospel is, is that and nothing more—your opinion
…..When these two or three or three thousand get together and agree they all believe in the same Jesus, his authority is present and they are a church, capable of exercising the keys. This protects the who and the what of the gospel. It doesn’t leave gospel accountability to every individual.
Let's take a look at his assumptions.
- The local church is working its proverbial fingers to the bone identifying who the real Christians are. Apparently, only the local church structure is equipped to do this.
- The elders and the congregation are killing themselves by nourishing the members and helping them grow.
- You, dear person, are utterly incapable of figuring out if your fellowship is really *Christian*.
- You are also too stupid to separate right teaching from wrong teaching.
- You cannot call out the hypocrite and heretics.
- Without accountability to men like those in 9Marks churches, there would be gospel chaos.
Gospel chaos? Good night! There are a gazillion churches and denominations and he thinks there isn't already chaos?
Thoughts
Abusive 9Marks' style church discipline overlooks the victims
9Marks has developed a system which I believe is ripe for abuse. And when abuse occurs, well, it was just a mistake. On June 11, 2015, Leeman wrote the following in Why Church Discipline Goes Awry and How to Avoid It.
I once had the opportunity to address a number of the elders of a church who handled a terribly complex case of church discipline piously but poorly. The media had picked up on the story, and a number of writers, Christian and non-Christian, charged the church with abusiveness. In fact, I know the church and its leaders, and it is a gospel-centered and healthy church. The brothers made a mistake in complicated situation, a mistake for which they quickly apologized and altered course.
Think carefully. Does this remind you about a major dustup during that time frame? If you guessed Karen Hinkley and The Village Church, you would be correct. Read it closely. Do you see one mention of the victim? Nope! 9Marks church discipline doesn't really care about the person hurt. They appear to only care about their system staying in place.
The freeloading bloggers cared for the victim of TVC's pious™ discipline
Leeman did not mention the victim in this situation. This pious™ church deeply hurt a woman, put their congregation at risk by giving lots of leeway to a pedophile, and made sure that thousands of members of the congregation were intimately informed of the victim's supposed *sin*.
Guess where Karen went for help? Not to the pious, keys holding church but to the freeloading bloggers. We supported her during her crisis. We made sure the world learned of her abuse at the hands of both a pedophile husband and the gospel™ church. Had she not received help from us freeloaders, that story would have been buried by the very pious™ TVC.
Yes, Jonathan, Karen was abused. I don't care if you *know* that church, which, by the way, practices your keys. I know the victim. I also care for other people who have been hurt by similar pious™ mistakes. I wish you would start to reflect that you get that in your writing. There have been one too many people hurt by exercising those supposedly God ordained keys in an unholy manner.
Hard working bloggers care for many who have received the left boot of fellowship by gospel™ claiming 9Marks' type churches
1. There was the story of Todd Wilhelm who was hurt by 9Marks UCCD. Leeman claims he doesn't remember anything about this, so I am including this link to refresh his memory. Doing the hard work in a church means keeping up with those who have been unnecessarily hurt by your methods.
There is this thing in medicine known as Morbidity and Mortality Rounds. The doctors attempt to see what happened that caused the patient to die. They do this to try to prevent it from happening again. The reason is that they actually care about the well being of the one patient who died. Have you ever considered doing the same for the victims of unjust church discipline? You should. It would be far more meaningful than saying "It was just a mistake but all is well." It isn't well. It will happen again as you will see.
Also, who did Todd come to discuss the pain he underwent at the church? You've got it. The hardworking women of this blog. He was believed. We even think he is a hero for caring about those children who were abused in SGM.
2. Within the next two weeks, we will be presenting another despicable case of church discipline which involves a church heavily aligned with 9Marks. This is going to be one more story that shows how the parameters put in place by Jonathan Leeman and Mark Dever can be dangerously applied.
- Guess how many hours I have spent on the phone with the victim?
- Guess how many hours a woman who was hurt by Mark Dever's BFF, CJ Mahaney, spent talking with her?
- Guess who is going to try to raise money for this woman who was ill-treated by a church?
The freeloading bloggers, that's who. The hard working churches are too busy trying to figure out who can and cannot receive communion. (Give me a call. I could clear that up quickly. It ain't rocket science.)
My stab at weeding out hypocrisy
Leeman seems to be concerned that non-church affiliated groups could fall prey to hypocrisy or heresy. However, even gospel™ centered churches have that problem. My guess is that my small group could weed out heresies and hypocrites quite well. I think many groups could do so.
Here is one example of our hypocrisy sniffing abilities. Remember the time that Mark Dever let CJ Mahaney deserted his local church and came to sit under the tutelage of Captain, oh my Captain? Not bad for not being under the care of the CHBC elders who might tell me to turn a blind eye, right?
9Marks and their view of the body of Christ: the sick cannot be given communion unless they come to church
Years ago, I worked in a nursing home. One of the most poignant moments I observed was watching the priests, pastors and other church members come to the home, pray for the individual, sing a few hymns and administer communion. Some of these dear people, many of whom had memory problems, would brighten up when they saw the pastor. They would repeat psalms and sing along with familiar hymns. However, the most moving time I noted was when they administered communion. I saw many patients with tears running down their cheeks. Many of them looked so peaceful after the visits and slept quietly during the night after the encounter.This meant something to them and gave them peace in their spirit.
However, Mark Dever does not believe this is kosher. If they don't come to church, they don't get communion. After all, it's some sort of divine corporate rule, right?
It’s a wonderful thing to remember those who are separated from us, especially by disability or age. Prayers, Scripture reading, visits, and encouragements of many kinds properly express Christ’s love and ours for such a brother or sister. But what about “taking them the Lord’s Supper”?
No, I don’t think you can serve the Lord’s Supper to one person alone any more than you can baptize an infant. It’s outside the definition of what the Lord Supper is by its very nature. In my mind, therefore, this question is comparable to the question of how we should think about baptizing someone unable to be baptized. In the case of both the person in the nursing home and the person who is unable to be baptized, their inability morally excuses them from the command. It’s the nature of the Lord’s Supper to be an expression of the unity of a congregation (1 Cor. 10:17).
While all members of a congregation may never be present, the public meeting should be one of which all members are welcome and most members usually are present. Someone’s inability to assemble with the congregation—we trust then—will be accompanied by God’s special provision for them during their trials or extended absence.”
Leeman believes that, in some limited circumstance, one could bring a group of members to a nursing home to give communion, but it cannot be done in small groups meetings, at weddings, or at summer camps because well…. hmmm…. I guess because they have the keys and say so.
On the day a church serves itself the Supper, I can see it sending a small group of representatives to the nursing home to extend that same corporate word of affirmation to the individual: “You are part of us, as we are covenantally united together in Christ.”
The principle here is the same as the principle for the idea of gathering. Gathering, too, is a necessary part of what makes a church a church and a member a member.
I wonder if this is why Leeman sees some of us as freeloaders. It is all about a corporation as opposed to being caring towards the individual members. A decision is made for the entity, and the individual is lost in the company known as church. It is a small gathering of believers who meet under one umbrella and follow all the peculiar rules and regulations of that group. There appears to be little room for people who do not fit into the system. The system is all. In the beginning were the keys…
I know of churches that do give communion to individuals. I know pastors who spend time visiting the sick and the lonely. I also know pastors who encourage small groups to share communion. These are pastors who seem to see beyond the rules into the heart of the matter. I've actually participated in these times of communion in small groups and have found them deeply meaningful. But, I guess I broke the rules and am now suspect…
No, Jonathan Leeman, we are not freeloaders. You and 9Marks are the ones who have chosen to overlook the hurting people in your incessant march towards perfect church polity. In the meantime, you sometimes step over or on the people Jesus hung out with – the ones who were hurt by a group of Pharisees who had the system down pat. We, on the other hand, support those who have left the church or are barely hanging on due to abuse from your pious™ BFFs.
Freeloaders? Not by a long shot.
First?
1st, again?
His whole premise that churches identify people through baptism and communion as belonging to Christ is wrong. The Holy Spirit seals people, not the church and its administration of ordinances.
Oh, so many thoughts.
#1: It is all about control. Leeman is panicking at the thought that people are choosing not to be bound by his controlling machinations. Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.
#2: “It’s the governing structures of a local church that publicly declare who the Christians are and what the gospel they believe is.”
Ummm … no. It’s far easier than that. “By their fruits you will know them.” Matthew 7:20.
#3: “It’s the governing structures of a local church that publicly declare who the Christians are and what the gospel they believe is.”
This so much brings to mind that junior high/high school game of, “Only the cool kids get to decide who else is cool.”
@ RollieB:
Gotta step up your game-2nd!
@ Leila:
You have the reflexes of a jaguar!
Leila wrote:
And this is really all it is. The powerful maintaining their power. They love to occupy the judgement seat. The problem is they are unworthy to judge others. They forget that there is a judge and Shepherd and he ain’t them.
The good news is that as much as they put this garbage out on the street, I don’t think anyone but their own followers find this stuff compelling.
Dee and Deb I saw this article the other day and was a flabbergasted as you, so glad you use this blog to speak truth to power. Thank you for your hard work and your care for the body of Christ.
Communion is not an "expression of unity." It is done to remember Christ– just like He said. Frankly, that verse seems to me to go the opposite direction of his argument. It would be easier to justify taking communion at every meal with it than to argue that the Lord's supper is dependent on numbers. It would still be silly, but it wouldn't be downright ignorant.
“…..When these two or three or three thousand get together and agree they all believe in the same Jesus, his authority is present and they are a church, capable of exercising the keys.”
This is a quote by Leeman, right?
If so, does he realize that he just seriously contradicted himself?
Someone being in a church does not necessarily mean that they are a real Christian, so I can’t fathom why the guy who wrote that post thinks that it is an indicator or a reliable gauge.
Jesus and Paul warned numerous times that there would be wolves in sheeps clothing and tares among the wheat among the real believers.
Some churches with strong authoritative governing bodies and views, such as TVC, were harboring a married pedo. While it’s possible that guy is “saved,” I have my reservations about that, personally.
So, how meaningful is it to have these structures in place, when the wolves and tares (and pedos) sneak in?
I think the actual believers in Christ are leaving local churches in droves.
They are leaving an ever more increasingly wayward church (brick building gather of believers) that doesn’t resemble the teachings of Christ.
I’ve read several people who seemed to be genuine believers say that if they had stayed in a brick building church their faith would have died – they had to leave the local church to keep the faith.
He said,
You don’t need to attend a local brick house to figure this out.
I have met Christians by volunteering at local charities, I bumped into one lady a few years ago while out shopping and found out she was a Christian.
There are internet sites set up for platonic socializing events, where you can set up dates to meet other Christians (or open to anyone), arranged around a share hobby or interest.
Deb and Dee from this blog have met several of this blog’s participants in real life at restaurants and other places. I think they all met here in this blog first, not at a church?
So you don’t really need a local church for to meet other Christians. It might expedite things, but I don’t see it as being necessary.
Agreed there is so much here, but I’ll start with this.
Leeman says:
So, which is it? Does a small group of two or three or a dozen who get together and agree that they all believe in the same Jesus have “his authority” present, and are they a church, and are they capable of “exercising the keys?” Or are they an illegitimate group of freeloaders who are not OK unless Leeman says they are OK and legitimate?
Jesus said that when two or three are gathered in his name, he is with them. Not “his authority” is with them. Leeman is making stuff up and calling it Bible.
I have been in Gospel Glitterati circles long enough to be fluent in GGspeak. I have no idea what “gospel accountabity” is. Given the Mahaney debacle with 9Marks violating every principle they enforce on the pewpeons, I think it is a bit rich for Jonathan to be talking about any kind of accountability. I do not think Jesus or the Holy Spirit need for Jonathan to protect the Gospel. He and the other Gospel Glitterati are the ones loading up “gospel” with foreign ideas and man-made laws. I don’t know who he thinks outside of the 9Marks system has the “who” and “what” of the Gospel confused. I think Jonathan is the one who has confused the Gospel with his gospel of law.
Gram3 wrote:
Nor do I know what “gospel accountability” is.
@ Kindakrunchy:
You beat me to it while typing!
Gram3 wrote:
Great minds…
I can’t even read the entire Article that prompted this post. I got to this-
“An underlying assumption of the “I don’t need a church” viewpoint is that all external authority is bad and that I will do best in the faith if governed entirely by myself. And I guess my question is, do I really need to explain how unChristian and anti-gospel this perspective is?”
His statement about being “governed entirely by myself” is a straw man argument. That is not what people are saying, but he then goes on to belittle people and call them unChristian and anti-Gospel.
He doesn’t care about people — he cares about authority. That is what I see in his writing.
Also, does he realize how American he sounds? How is a small group that meets in a home in the US different from a small group that meets in a home in China or North Korea? Is he willing to say those are not churches?
In Eastern Europe they don't always have a pastor. All the believer in a area just meet together once week.
This view is just so very narrow.
Bridget wrote:
You are not supposed to think about what he is saying. You are supposed to agree with him because he is the Authority and we are supposed to be swept up in his Big Idea. We are supposed to melt under his spiritual blackmail. Disagree with him and you are disagreeing with God himself. These guys are seriously getting out of control.
“I wonder if this is why Leeman sees some of us as freeloaders. It is all about a corporation as opposed to being caring towards the individual members. A decision is made for the entity and the individual is lost in the company known as church.”
This perfectly encapsulates their mindset. Get in line. Devote your whole life, all your decisions, to the local church. Actually, no, that’s not good enough. If your church doesn’t look like our version of the local church, then you’re not a part of a local church.
I try not to think the worst of these guys. I don’t. But his statements are infuriating and show a complete lack of respect for my standing before God as a Christian individual with the promised Holy Spirit. They show a complete lack of respect for the experiences of those hurt, either directly by the system or improperly cared for under the system.
Permission to swear, Dee? (All I can do is ask)
This guys are becoming more and more like the Roman Catholic Church.. What is next, that you have to go through the local church to have your sins really forgiven?
Oops, did not put my full name on previous post…. I try to make a point of using my full name…. I should not say it if I am not willing to put my name to it..
I apologize for the very horrible typos that I always seem to make.
Gram3 wrote:
Apparently, I have been suffering from this condition, thinking about what is actually being said, since I could talk (according to my mother). 🙂
The Lord’s Supper outside of the church building??? Blasphemy! The very first Lord’s supper was in a 9Marks church. Jesus wouldn’t have dared to do it in a nursing home, or a house, or, say, an upper room. Would He?
Analogy: Let’s see if I have this straight. Joining a church is like joining the army. The members eat, sleep and breathe church. They follow commands and adhere to regulations issued by higher. If they do anything churchy off church grounds, they are rogues (maybe even a terrorists) and should be thrown in the brink or given a dishonorable discharges. If they decide to leave without approval from higher, they’re AWOL and the MPs will come and get’em. Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase, “your mama wears army boots”.
Yeah, I think I’ll just join the army.
“Keys”? What “keys”? Who needs “keys”? One of these days, Jesus is gonna kick the door in and come’n get me. I don’t need “keys”!
Kindakrunchy wrote:
Hmmm ….. my bible says, “When two or three are gathered in my name….”
Wait, what? I guess it is a prerequisite for 9Marks stardom to fail logic, rhetoric, and critical thinking. I guess they want to ensure that no thinking or educated people ever join their
cultfellowship.And sure we are all freeloaders! — ugh! I was in church serving and tithing for over 30 years. And that was besides working, having children, raising children, and homeschooling for 12 years. But, hey, Leeman writes books and calls others freeloaders, so who am I?
Bridget wrote:
If you want to get technical, all Christians are freeloaders. Jesus paid our way.
“Imagine a world with no local churches. How would there be any accountability for who is and is not a Christian? Who would separate right teaching from wrong teaching, or call out the hypocrites and heretics?”
It’s sad that corporations, I mean “local churches”, have replaced Jesus and the wisdom of scripture.
Nancy2 wrote:
Well, I guess they better have a boss or they don’t count as a gathering.
I’ll leave Leeman to explain himself to Jesus, since he disagrees with Him. Leeman and Co. don’t seem to be able to hear anything but themselves.
Nancy2 wrote:
Yes, but Leeman isn’t being technical and I’m answering his absurdity with some of my own 🙂
“gospel chaos.”
This would be a great name for a band.
Kindakrunchy wrote:
This! Leeman, why don’t you try your “this is the only way church is done” overseas somewhere where meeting means you die?
Gah.
Their stuffy bureaucratic approach to church gives me a feeling similar to claustrophobia.
Nancy2 wrote:
Yes, but Leeman isn’t being technical and I’m answering his absurdity with some of my own 🙂Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
They are blinded by “authority.”
@ Bridget:
Wow! My comment to Nancy2 was already posted. The comment to Dr. FP attached to an already posted comment. Spooky.
But aren’t churches themselves defining Jesus as seems right in their own eyes? It’s almost as if they need… a Magisterium
@ Daisy:
I loved every word you wrote, Daisy, in your post at 8:34 p.m.
Thank you!
Gram3 wrote:
Your comments remind me of:
Is every issue a gospel issue?
http://peterlumpkins.typepad.com/peter_lumpkins/2015/04/check-out-the-latest-theological-journal-from-new-orleans-baptist-theological-seminary.html
Quoting someone named Newsom:
“If everything is the gospel, then nothing is the gospel”
Daisy wrote:
“A mouse in the cookie jar is not a cookie,” said Casper ten Boom and he spiritually thrived.
Kindakrunchy wrote:
I get what he did. He misplaced the decimal. The scripture says “For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.” (Matthew 18:20, ESV, their favored version)
He changed “two or three” to “two or three thousand” — easy math error, that any elementary school student might make.
Or is it a case of adding to the scripture? He added “thousand” to the verse. What’s that warning about adding to the scriptures?
As to the whole Lord’s Supper thing — I used to be in an Anglican church. First communion would be served to the congregation, and then the priest would pack up his communion kit and visit the various shut-ins, extending the congregational memorial meal to them. It was just a continuation, not a separate event, the way he did it…
I think he’s misinterpreting 1 Corinthians 11. If you read the entire chapter in context (after cross-referencing by reading the gospels — Luke 22 was what I read), Paul starts out by scolding the Corinthians because when they gather, some were being greedy and hogging all the bread and wine during communion, and some were getting drunk, and others were going hungry (because by the time the plate came around to them, I guess, all the bread was gone).
So he tells them to eat the main meal at home, before they gather, so that they’re not tempted to be greedy (like the first people through the potluck line, who load their plates so high that by the time the people in the middle of the line get to the table, things are running out?). He tells them, “When you gather to eat, you should all eat together.” I’d think one interpretation would be that everybody breaks off a piece of bread, maybe dips it in a cup, and when everybody has been served, they eat at the same time. I’ve been in churches that do this. I’ve also been in churches where you come up and kneel at a rail and have a wafer, dipped in wine, placed on your tongue, and then you go back to your seat. However, they never seemed to run out, so it seems like they didn’t need to hold back, make sure everyone got served, and then “all eat together.”
He seems to be making a completely different interpretation that doesn’t fit the spirit of the entire passage. The majority of the church needs to be gathered in one place, or they can’t even serve communion — they need a quorum?
I think he’s addressing the wrong problem.
As someone said, it’s all about control. If you can keep communion for just the “right” people, you’ll have desperate, starving (Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness sake) people clawing at your door, clamoring to get in. Think of it! They’ll have the lock on the Lord’s Supper (or do I mean “corner the market”) and once the people are in the door, they can be taught “right” doctrine!
A-a-a-a-all they have to do is convince the rest of the world to go along with it.
Disgusting.
Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:
Another prerequisite is that 9Marxist stardom fail at love. One of the saddest days at my former 9Marxist/NeoCal church (along with the excommunications of good and godly people for the slightest dissent) was that the pastors/elders banned an older, godly East Asian man from coming to church because he didn’t believe in church membership covenants and would not sign one. He had been coming to church for six years, gave of his time and treasure, read his Bible, loved God with all of his heart…and this. Banned.
We aren’t supposed to do this to “one another”.
Here is a post I did on why people get involved in questionable churches, sects and cults. The benefits of being involved in a cult, and how in the course of time you become “another brick in the wall.” Hope you guys like Pink Floyd. 😉
https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2015/09/01/why-do-people-get-involved-in-questionable-religious-groups-cults-and-sects/
The next post is going to be about a New Theological Cold War and Berlin Wall in Christianity. Having a blast reading about the Berlin Crisis in 1960! 🙂 One of these days you will see me outside CHBC re-doing Ronald Reagan’s speech at the Berlin Wall, except I’ll be saying, “Mr Leeman…tear down this wall!”
Nancy2 wrote:
Great comment!
GovPappy wrote:
I’m not sure there are any christians in those other countries. After all, “church” is defined by the number “two or three thousand” all gathered together.
/sarcasm
@ Gram3:
Let’s strip this down to the basics. When those two or three get together, does it have to be a permanent thing? Is it always the same two or three? Do they have to declare themselves a church? Do they have to have an elder? Do they have to pass an offering? Do they have to meet every Sunday? Do they have to agree in theology? Do they need to enter “covenant relationship”? Do they have to subscribe to a certain creed? And here’s the kicker: Can a woman speak?
If saying no to any of these makes us freeloaders, then sure. Call us damned freeloaders.
@ Gram3:
They’re all about ‘Power to the Steeple’ . . . and about micromanaging and controlling under the guise of ‘accountability’ . . . megalomania at its worst, frosted with ‘pride’ . . . as pure a form of Phariseeism as was seen two-thousand years ago, but THIS time they are involving Christ’s Name, which doesn’t make them smell any better, no . . .
when this kind of leadership shows that it has no humility and no respect for the personal dignity of Church members, then of course abuses will take root
The total arrogance of this statement is appaling:
With a few word changes I think I understand:
Without ME, in other words, how would you know your Christian fellowship is actually “Christian”? Imagine a world with no local churches I CONTROL. How CAN I ASSIGN who is and is not a Christian? HOW CAN I separate right teaching from wrong teaching, or call out the hypocrites and heretics?
Call out hypocrites and heretics? Look in the mirror.
If anyone wants to see this style of “high priest” governance on a blog go over to SBC Voices and look at the current IMB Threads. See what happens to the people who dare to ask questions. They are divisive, unethical, “how do you sleep at night” blah and blah. “Unity” is a buzzword that means don’t ever, EVER, question the elders. When Leeman/Dever say “elder led” they really mean elder rule and the congregation may be allowed to vote on a few things but no one is allowed to vote contrary to how the elders recommend they vote. Elders RULE absolutely.
Nancy2 wrote:
Not only that, but Jesus gave us the keys, which is the Gospel, and Jesus is the Door. Jonathan has dreamed up his imaginary authority keys.
And by the way with all the money I’ve given to local churches, that I now think was a bad investment, how can this guy who is on a church payroll call someone else a freeloader? Leeman can go get a real job somewhere, give 20% to support the local church and then, only then could he have some basis to make judgement. What a piece of work.
Bill M wrote:
Gram3 wrote:
According to my former NeoCal/9Marx pastors/elders (which they claimed they got from 9Marx), when two or three are gathered it is for the purpose of carrying out Church Discipline (Matt 18:15-17) and to excommunicate/shun someone.
^Correction: I don’t know why it quoted Bill M too, as I was answering Gram3. Oh well, howdy Bill!
Celia wrote:
Yes, it certainly is. But it is fine for them to run people off from their churches who dare to disagree with them. The IMB is an almost unbelievable mess created by church men who were unaccountable to anyone. The guys at Voices can’t reason, and they can’t do math, either, and if you challenge their math, then you are the one with the problem. I do know that these snowflakes could not function in the real world where budgets need to balance and all the wishful thinking and celebrity “leaders” does not matter. I think that the Voices guys are terrified that the pewpeons are going to find out about how their money has been wasted and act like prudent people would. The Entitlement mentality is on full display over there.
Nancy2 wrote:
ROFL.
Nancy2 wrote:
ROFL.
Bill M wrote:
Amen to that, but really, what can Jonathan do except parrot Mark Dever? And speaking of accountability and bad investments, when is Jonathan going to file a 990 for 9Marks? When is Jonathan going to insist that all the people in churches donating to 9Marks know how their money is being spent? Accountability is for the pewpeons, not the Anointed Ones.
@ Velour:
Thank you 🙂
Right on about the 20%.We gave more than than enough to the second church we joined after we left sgm.We were in top leadership when I developed a medical issue than required bed rest for two years.Do you think anybody gave me communion ? Maybe it was I did not show up at the actual building for such,maybe that is the reason no one called etc.I refuse to give a church my hard earned money again it is about the green stuff anyway.Oh come quickly Christ.
@ Gram3:
Dave Miller (and all these guys who set themselves up as high priests) lives in such a bubble that he has no clue that he comes across as hateful to those who ever dare disagree with him/them. And I think this point is relevent to this post – the reason Miller hates Rick Patrick so much is that Patrick and friends have a group which is doing exactly what the Founder’s have done for years except they’re nonCals. Miller and the other sycophants see this as a threat to the true Baptists and their High Priests so he attacks them as being “divisive” and “destructive” Never mind that nobody ever had a problem with the Calvinists who have operated in the same alledgedly “destructive” ways for the past 30 years. It’s only when not their tribe turns the tables that now we have to preach “unity” The SBC really is becoming more and more elder ruled.
Corbin wrote:
Amen, Corbin!
@ Gram3:
Of course Dever and Leeman would never dare go really “biblical” – Paul was a tentmaker. Can you imagine if someone like Leeman had to work a real job and do ministry? Life wouldn’t be so cushy.
Daisy wrote:
You are welcome! Have a great night, Daisy!
I find this growing opposition among Neo-Calvinists to taking communion to homebound elderly people/nursing home residents, disturbing. Esp. in light of statements from Driscoll to the effect of, evangelize the young men because only they matter. Their worship style is new and “relevant,” no clunky old hymns, and Mark Dever hates the organ because “it’s not in the Bible” (electric guitars and the computer he wrote his blog post on aren’t either, but who cares). So, what, the old folks don’t matter because they’re not young, hip and cool enough, so why should we bother taking them communion anyway?
Are we sure there’s not at least some subconscious ageism here? Ageism is rampant and often very vitriolic in CCM churches in my experience. It’s just an assumed part of the culture and usually a main reason why they switched to CCM in the first place. So is this now infecting the sacraments too? I guess Jesus doesn’t like old people.
So would Mark Dever be okay with his own church denying him communion when he’s old and bedridden in a nursing home?
You sort of got there before me. Was going to comment on the situation in China, and of course as you point out North Korea. And the Middle East too.
Don’t want to sound cynical but mega and controlling churches = lots of $£€¥
I’ve read some of the 9 Marks articles on their website. It’s all about control by a select few in the church. This is a desperate reaction by desperate men who are challenged by a society that has left them behind. They know they can’t win them all so instead they increase their control over those that they can (starting with their families). And so we have a chain of subjugation. God –> Pastor —> Elders —>Men —> Women/children. More and more people will be compelled to leave and the noose will get tighter and tighter on those who remain. 9Marks doesn’t want dialog, they want submission. There is no point in trying to change the churches infested with this poison. Let them whither and choke. Maybe it’s time to create new ones – provided there are any Christians left to attend them. Biggest threat to evangelical christianity going. Based on my experience there is a vast silent majority that does not agree with this line of thinking, but are loathe to criticize leaders. Many have been indoctrinated into the fallacy that leadership was placed above them by none other than God himself. There was an article on 9 Marks with steps for pastors to convince their congregations to submit to the “new culture”. Changing the church in about 5 years. Didn’t Kim Il Sung have a 5 year plan?
Hester wrote:
After my excommunication/shunning from my former Gulag NeoCal Church (for wanting our church’s children protected from the pastors/elders’ ex-con friend, a convicted Megan’s List sex offender they gave a leadership position to and latitude without telling all parents and members), I bought a nice bottle of red wine and matzoh crackers. I thought, “Why should I have to miss communion because of those hateful men?”
So I take some communion every now and again.
I need to invite others to partake of it, including the first man I saw get excommunicated/shunned first there: A godly doctor married to his wife for 45+ years, loving marriage, stand-up man, loving father to grown children. His crime? Disagreeing in private with the pastors/elders. (His excommunication/shunning outraged one of his long-time, close personal friends: the conservative Pastor John MacArthur of Grace Community Church in Southern California!)
Dee and Deb,
I have never had the church experiences that a lot of the commenters on here have. Right now, my little corner of the world is relatively safe. But, who knows for how long. Thank you for doing everything you can to get the facts out there to everyone you can, as well as for defending those who have been used and abused. Knowledge is power. Just maybe your work will help prevent a few churches from being infiltrated by certain kinds of “leaders”.
You aren’t just prayer warriors – you ladies are warriors on the front line!
Gram3 wrote:
This could be the title for this blog post. I love the perfect simplicity and truth.
@ Hester:
I think it’s pretty deliberate, Hester.
Daisy wrote:
These guys use the word *gospel* so often that it doesn’t even make sense after awhile. *gospel saturated this or that* *gospel marriage* *gospel accountability* *gospel thinking* ….they have turned a beautiful word into something to hit people over the head with.
Jack wrote:
The Soviet Union had a Five Year Plan.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_five-year_plan_(Soviet_Union)
Velour wrote:
This does appear to be what they view the church is about.
Does any one else think that “Freeloaders” is a great name for a new international church movement?
It does sum up the nature of the gospel rather well…
Great article. So on point.
Maybe someone mentioned this already but I couldn’t help but think for Jonathan Leeman and others of his ilk, the term “freeloader” means the same as “non-tither”. Amirite?
Unless you’re a paying for that seat you’re warming on Sunday as you watch one person function as the Body, guess you’re a just a “freeloader”. Because, you know, that guy up there is “called” so he has to do all the work, and your contribution is to support him, you poor secular slob.
Sure, sure Jonathan Fee-man. We all remember Jesus telling us our salvation was free, but that we’d be charged weekly for our membership in the church that’s run by professionals like him.
@ Jack:
Haha good comment. I’m with you there!
I’ve been picking on Leeman a great deal recently, so I thought I’d mention a hot-off-the -9Marx-press article by someone else.
http://9marks.org/article/a-sample-statement-on-regular-church-attendance/
It includes a number of reasons to “attend” faithfully, including, of course: 4. Faithful attenders comfort their leaders by their adherence to the truth, where non-attenders worry them. Heb 13:17 etc
But this one perplexes me: 7. Faithful attenders will be helped to persevere in faith, whereas non-attenders endanger their souls.
What’s this “endanger their souls” entail, and how does it fit in with being saved by grace through faith?
@ Mandavilla:
Glad to read you left SGM and sorry to hear of the troubles you faced. Hope you’re doing better.
@ Jack:
…..and they receive nice fat paychecks, with all the perks too.
75th.
That’s what happens when you’re UTC+1.
I was briefly in leadership in a local church, and therefore keeper of the keys. This was so I could let people in if they needed to use the facilities …
The local church consists of all genuine believers in a locality. They may or may not attend a building called a church, and the label on the door is irrelevant. However, not everyone who attends a building called a church is automatically an authentic Christian.
I was for a while in an Anglican church that had pretty liberal theology mixed with charismatic experience (renewal was the jargon in those days). This is a dangerous mixture, as the bible was ‘advice’ rather than a ‘canon’ to measure experience and doctrine by. This was the reason it gradually drifted away from renewal back into deadness, tradition reasserted itself, so in the end the whole youth group left it – no fuss and bother, quietly moved on. There wasn’t really much point in carrying on attending.
The group acted like a miniture local church after this, including taking communion. To do that means breaking away from the idea of an ‘official’ church, to see that Jesus is present when we gather in his name, and you don’t need anyone else’s approval. There isn’t a Higher Authority you need to consult. There are obvious dangers and pitfalls to this, but why on earth should we be expected to carry on attending a church that is, for example, authoritarian and in deception over this?
They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out, that it might be plain that they all are not of us from 1 John is often used against people who leave churches, but in reality those who leave can be the ‘church’ leaving an organisation that calls itself church, but in reality is nothing more than religion or a leadership’s personal fiefdom or an institution that abandonned the faith decades or more ago and is just going through the motions.
Christians who leave such churches need to be reassured that nothing dire is going to happen to them, and need to resist those in such churches who try to manipulate or indimidate them into continuing there. God never manipulates or intimidates, this never comes from him.
9Marks etc. take 2000+ years of church tradition, chuck out almost all of it (especially offering baptism and communion to the sick and imprisoned), appropriate the remnants as their own, and claim that they (and those who share their narrow view of church government) have exclusive rights to it.
Talk about freeloading…
@ numo:
Yeah, that’s what I’m afraid of too. Do these guys realize they will be the old and out-of-date ones someday?
Darlene wrote:
So true. They don’t define the true Gospel for me.
Bill M wrote:
He’s attempting to protect the brand.
GovPappy wrote:
Two or Three…not a always permanent thing…..that’s what I always thought and years ago at SBC seminary in Ft Worth I sometimes admit attending, we were taught by a wise now deceased professor or the Early Church. He use to walk through the class and pat us on the shoulder and say ” WE are the church…..wherever we are.”
@ Nancy2:
As time marches on, what you have shared appears to be true.
As 9Marks returns to Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary for its 7th annual conference, the topic will be (wait for it…)
CHURCH DISCIPLINE
These guys are on a power trip. And let's not forget who accompanied Mark Dever to the first 9Marks conference held at SEBTS — C.J. Mahaney. He discussed 'expository faithfulness'.
Hester wrote:
Oh, but they have the truth, they set the ” church ” on the right path again. They will be revered as beloved, older saints!
As for aged schmucks now, they can be disregarded as they didn’t hold true to the gospel.
@ Deb:
How fitting, DISCIPLINE. Couldn’t make this stuff up, if we tried to.
Mandavilla wrote:
See, it’s the things they don’t mention in their big blog posts that get me these days. This is why I read TWW. If I read 9marks and TGC posts regularly, I’d likely forget that there are real people who don’t and can’t fit the system, who would not be cared for, who would not be welcomed, and who would never enjoy true community under this brand of church. And you know what, that’s gonna happen at almost every church, because we’re not perfect, but the least someone on the outliers can ask for is to not have callous and uncaring Gospel™ behavior towards them be INSTITUTIONALIZED via church laws!
Sorry you had to deal with that. One shouldn’t have to beg for Communion.
Twice in my life I took communion on my own. The circumstances I was in at the time drew me to it. It was just myself, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit present. Once was when I was in a hospital, and once after going thru a hurricane. To me those 2 times meant so much to me. I was restored spiritually after having communion and spending time with God. So I don’t believe you have to be in church to take communion. (Shame on me). Wherever the need arises then communion is taken. People that don’t believe this are missing out on so many blessings.
I really don’t get this thing about not taking communion to the sick or elderly. Do they not count any more or something?
My dad who is now very old is given communion in his residential care home by his former neighbour, who happens to be an Anglican minister. My dad was never a member of his church, but that is irrelevant.
Perhaps ‘ordinary’ believers could arrange to give communion to the elderly. You don’t need a priest, minister or pastor to do this. The person administering it is not mentioned in the NT; any upstanding believer is eligible imo. Anything else is church tradition and not binding.
@ GovPappy:
A friend and I were talking recently about extroverts sometimes forgetting that introverts need space and trust, and being extra friendly and almost love-bomb-y towards them. As a hard-core introvert myself, I’ve been subject to over-eager extrovert love on many occasions and it bothers me, but I can live with it on an individual basis. They do it because they love, even if their methods need tweaking.
On the other hand, cults have encouraged and institutionalized this love that shows little to no regard for what the subject of their “love” actually wants or even needs, only what they can later bring up as some variation of “look what all we did for you!” Institutionalized Love™ is not love. Institutionalized Love let’s people slip through the cracks who don’t fit. Love is personal, individual. And it’s hard. You can’t mass produce it in a theological lab.
I’ve often thought it strange – and revealing – that out of nine so-called ‘marks of a healthy church’ not one of them is love.
Yet that is the only ‘mark’ that Jesus taught. ‘By this, they will know that you are my disciples: that you love one another’.
Bridget wrote:
Yep, that’s at the heart of it.
@ May:
Follow our 9marks to a healthy church completely, and a loving Gospel™ will be the result!
In other news, Communism has failed because it was never implemented perfectly!
Ken wrote:
Exactly. These kind of articles are designed to induce fear and force the pew-sitters into further submission.
A Christian radio station in the UK (can’t remember which one) does a weekly communion, inviting listeners, specifically those who cannot get to church, to share in an on-air communion. I’ve never partaken but sometimes listened in the car and been moved by it.
Gram3 wrote:
The latest “Smurf” or “Marclar”.
Darlene wrote:
Marclaring the Marclar of the Marclar…
Jack wrote:
The Great Chain of Being — the Lord in his Palace and the Serf in his mud hut, all ordained by God. Where getting Uppity is the Sin of Rebellion.
The communion thing is one of the ongoing issues I’ve had with the PCA. It’s not just the long term sick and elderly and imprisoned who are left out of this supposedly critical means of grace. If a person develops any kind of dementia, or was born with an intellectual disability that prevents them from being examined for a proper level of understanding to the elders’ normal satisfaction, they’ve got…what? The preaching of the Word, which they may or may not understand any better?
Because of the way Presbyterians interpret the verse about discerning the Lord’s body together with the warnings Paul gave about not doing so, everyone must be carefully examined before being granted membership and access to the Lord’s supper. I’ve wondered if there are any documented cases since the Reformation of protestant Christians actually becoming sick and/or dying as a result of misusing the Eucharist in some way. That seems to be the overriding concern.
As it is, a person could have lived as a faithful Christian in Reformed churches their whole life, and one day have the elders visit and decide the time had come to permanently withhold communion, because of deteriorating cognitive function. Even if there was never any sign of apostasy or of unconfessed gross sin.
I also don’t know at this point if my autistic son will ever be able to receive the Supper if we remain within the Reformed orbit.
Jeff wrote:
Exactly. And let me preface this remark in that I have a lot of respect for the RCC and mostly for individual catholics I have known over the years. But here is some of the thinking which I think Leeman et al are exhibiting.
We are the one true church. We teach the one true doctrine. Our elders are the one true elders. We control the sacraments. We say who is and who is not a part of the one true church. We make the rules of behavior and have the right to insistent on conformity up to and including excluding the non-compliant. Not to forget ‘the church is not a democracy’ and never think that any player in all this can exercise ‘cafeteria’ like selectivity of belief or practice based on individual conscience. And by the way, we interpret scripture correctly, and whatever does not agree with us is heresy. And already they apparently do determine what constitutes correct repentance and what does not.
Now, that is all well and good if somebody is actually the one true church. But ‘local’ however defined is not the one true church if for no other reason than that it lacks singularity as long as there is another ‘local’ church down the road or in the next town. I am not arguing that there is some organizational structure which is the one true church, I am only saying that if there is such a thing it does not define itself as ‘local.’ As long as Leeman says ‘local’ then he is not saying ‘one true church’ but rather ‘one of many true churches’ identified apparently as based on whether they agree with whatever doctrinal position du jour they happen to be pushing at the time. And as long as he only says that they are what they claim to be ‘because they said so’ without any further reason why the rest of us should take that seriously, that is a pitiful excuse for trying to back up some claim.
I can understand the arguments of the RCC in claiming to be ‘the’ church, though I do not think they are correct as they have defined it. I can understand the arguments of those who say that the true church is the church universal, the mystical body of christ, composed of all the redeemed. This is true, but I am not sure that it encompasses all that the word ‘church’ may actually mean. But I am convinced that just proclaiming one true church-ness for one’s own authority structure like Leeman is doing lacks a sound rationale.
“gospel chaos”
Gospel chaos?!! Good Lord! In my 60+ years as a Christian (Southern Baptist flavor), I’ve never seen the level of “gospel chaos” that these New Calvinists have brought into the church! To them, Calvinism = Gospel … and if you aren’t “reformed”, you have lost the true gospel. They are out and about to restore the gospel that the rest of us have lost … New Calvinism twists young minds into confusion and chaos.
Heaven is keeping a list of “freeloaders” … and at the top, are those who are merchandising the gospel by promoting Calvin over Christ.
I’ll tell you who the freeloaders are: Leeman and his ilk.
They take something that Jesus has given to all Christians (“where two or three are gathered in my name”), something that is open to all Christians, and want to make it proprietary (“It belongs to me, my church that pays me handsomely”), and share it only with those who pay them.
They are freeloaders and thieves.
Why two or three thousand? Why not two or three hundred? Or two or three million? I mean, as long as we adding to Scripture, let’s add big. Somehow, I wonder if these numbers are aspirational.
I’m thinking of starting Freeloaders Anonymous. AKA, the Fellowship of the Dones. Misfit Community Church. Or…The Island of Misfit Disciples, AKA The Island. Go with a Gilligan’s Island theme, bamboo and pam branches, beverages in half-coconuts, worship band called The Mosquitoes, the leader is called the Skipper… But you can leave the Island if you want to.
Sorry… Getting back to work.
May wrote:
Yes! Their retort would be though, who the Lord loves, he disciplines. I liked the title of Dave Hunts book (on Calvinism)
‘ What Love Is This? ‘ I have no idea how 9Marks and company line up 1 Corinthians 13, with their, * marks *.
I find tremendous comfort in the fact that God sees all that Dee and Deb do behind the scenes for those who’ve been wounded.
He sees it all.
Who is caring for the wounded these days and who is running an ever-increasing, controlling corporation?
@ Hester:
Of course yhey don’t, or yhey eould never hsve yhe gsll to act in this manner.
I would suggest studying a list of Russian swears and using them. no one will know what you are doing and it will get it off your chest. I do it all the time!
Do you remember Karen Hinkley’s *discipline?* They wanted to control her finances so she wouldn’t move towards a divorce by separating her finances from the pedophile’s finances. Thank goodness she had a good head on her shoulders and told them to get lost…well, she said it a little nicer. I am projecting what i would have said along with a few choice Russian phrases.
Here’s a thought for Mr Leeman.
Scenario 1. What if I did what I have done for a good portion of my life in church, but now in a 9marks-approved establishment? What if I showed up faithfully every Sunday, gave fairly regularly and sacrificially, did just enough to get by, didn’t rock the boat in Sunday school and small groups. No passion, no real interest. Just doing church.
I’d be a member in good standing. A worthless pew peon, mindlessly giving, mindlessly “worshipping”.
Scenario 2. I’m out of a 501c church. I am a Christian. I have the Spirit in me. He won’t let me sit idle. He won’t let me disengage from the Body. I therefore seek out people to help on my own. I pray for those in need on my own. I give of my time and energy to those in need. I open my home to the hurting. I build relationships with people for mutual support and accountability.
Scenario 1 is Gospel™ Approved. Scenario 2 makes me a damned freeloader.
Scenario 1 enables my natural tendency to sit back and let others do the work and lead me around, to slip in the back, and slip out without doing a thing. A vestigial organ in the Body.
Scenario 2 forces me to get off my lazy rear end and be His hands and feet because His Spirit doesn’t let me drift away.
Scenario 1 keeps folks around who are nominal Christians. It offers a thrice-weekly appearance of godliness so the true decay in your soul never shows.
Scenario 2 means the ones who have the Spirit come together of their own initiative and be His Body. It means the ones who have no life in them drift away on their own, and it lets them, because what good is faking it?
In their efforts to create the perfect church polity, they’ve effectively quenched and hid the Spirit. That should give them pause.
Mandavilla wrote:
You know, the church we attended where “the myth of Adam and Eve” was heard from the pulpit, had a regular practice of bringing communion to those who were physically unable to attend the church service. In contrast to the church we left, which though not a 9Marks church, certainly resembled 9Marks organization and authoritarianism, and prided themselves on their “right” (hypercalvinistic) doctrine.
We sometimes talk about the difference in those churches. The first was “all grace” and the second was “all law”, or so it appeared.
Mae wrote:
For those not familiar with it, the book Mae references is a great read … Hunt provides a scholarly study of Calvinism and unveils unsettling truths about this aberrant theology which is spreading across the American church. Look for “What Love is This? Calvinism’s Misrepresentation of God” by Dave Hunt.
numo wrote:
This looks like what my phone does. At least, when autocorrect hasn’t changed the words into something completely unrelated.
Hope this day is a little better for you. (Sounds so trite, sorry.)
@ GovPappy:
Somebody once said (no idea where I heard or read this and maybe I thought of it in my dim and distant past) ‘if God withdrew the Holy Spirit from your church midnight next Saturday, how much would carry on as though nothing had happened’?
Deb wrote:
So weird. Wonder why CJ won’t be speaking? After all, those guys supported him and provided him safe haven from church discipline! You’d think he’d be there to share his testimony of how he’s now safe in the arms of men like Mark Dever, Ligon Duncan & Al Mohler, and how you too can purchase all the atonement you need from the SBTS for a couple million bucks!
Paula Rice wrote:
In my experience, the NeoCals/9Marx/Acts 29 & their Ilk associate “Freeloading”=”Haven’t Signed Authoritarian, Controlling, Give-Up-Your-Rights, Legally-Binding Church Membership Covenant”. (Many of the NeoCals don’t believe in the tithe from the Old Testament.)
The NeoCal pastors (and Mark Dever writes about this in 9Marx) announce that they can’t *possibly know who their flock is* if a person didn’t sign a Membership Covenant. My former NeoCal pastor and elders announced from the pulpit, “How could he possibly know you considered him to be *your pastor* if you hadn’t signed a Membership Covenant*?” I thought the whole thing was so childish.
I would sit in the pew and silently reply, “Because they showed up, that’s why.”
Faithful Christians who attended church for years, didn’t believe in signing a Membership Covenant, were told to never come to church again. Ditto for newcomers: “If you aren’t willing to sign a Membership Covenant than God hasn’t called you to this church.”
Arrogant and unloving all of it. Unbiblical.
Death may not be an excuse!
I know I linked this one on the last thread, but it was OT and didn’t get any traction.
9Marx article excerpting a Schmucker book: http://9marks.org/answer/how-can-i-lead-my-church-clean-its-membership-rolls/
“Begin removing non–attending members, beginning with the easiest and moving to the hardest. From easiest to hardest…
Members who are dead. Put the names of any dead members of your church before the congregation with a motion to remove them from membership in the following business meeting. This gives the congregation some time to think about what they’re doing and why.”
Just out of curiosity, what would happen if the congregation voted down the motion to remove dead members?
The dead members would be stuck in hotel calvinfornia!
@ Gus:
That was my other thought. Dever “[doesn’t] think you can serve the Lord’s Supper to one person alone.” Okay, so why doesn’t he as the pastor who brought it to the person, take it too? Then there’s two people and they’re not alone anymore. Problem solved.
@ refugee:
It’s my tablet, going haywire!
Thanks for your kind words, and likewise.
Ken wrote:
Excellent post, Ken. 9Marks/Acts 29 and the other NeoCals say that they can’t *possibly know you are a member of the church if you didn’t sign a [binding, authoritarian, legal contract] Church Membership Covenant*. They are so wrong.
I wanted to cry the day that at my former NeoCal church told a godly, long-time Christian man from East Asia that he was no longer permitted to come to church because he would not sign a church membership covenant! He had been quietly and faithfully attending the church for six years, gave of his time and money, and was really quite humble.
They – senior pastor and elders – announced from the pulpit they couldn’t possibly know you were one of their flock if you didn’t sign a Church Membership Covenant. They required all attenders to sign one and announced from the pulpit that people wouldn’t be able to attend church if they didn’t sign.
2,000 years ago how did they figure out they were a church without Church Membership Covenants?
The problem here is bad theology. Bad theology leads to bad practice.
Leeman’s mistake is minimizing the universal, invisible church.
I suspect that he believes the universal, invisible church exists, but he has concluded that the ordinances or sacraments are to be practiced only by a visible, local church.
That is not illogical, in some regards. However, it is not specifically stated in the NT. It is a theological conclusion.
We are not given much information about the relationship between the larger body of Christ, which includes all persons across the globe who belong to Him. Who are in all variety of local churches, or no local church at all. But the fact that we don’t have much information about how this body relates to local churches doesn’t mean we are free to dismiss it.
In fact, we don’t have a complete, comprehensive explanation of the local church and its authority either. If one local church declares a person not to be a Christian by virtue of their behavior, but another local church accepts that person and declares that they belong to Christ, which church is correct?
We don’t know. And to claim that we do know creates as much error as living with the chaos that is caused by the lack of hard NT instruction and answers to these questions.
Mr. Leeman has put all of his theological eggs in one basket – the local church. Not only is this not warranted by the actual text of the NT, but it leads to some weird consequences, as we are witnessing.
Btw, if a minister takes communion to an ill person who cannot attend church, doesn’t that qualify as 2 or 3 gathered in my name? Christ is there. I understand the desire to administer the ordinances/sacraments in a local church setting, but here we have person who cannot attend that. Since the desire to administer the ordinances in a local church is really a constructed conclusion lacking in any direct NT word (but which I too prefer), why would we let that construction deny participation in one of the ordinances to an ill person? That makes no sense to me. In fact, it is reminiscent of debates with Jesus about what could or could not be done on the Sabbath. Eerily similar, in fact.
These days I just jump straight to the comments.
All these MenaGAWD act the same, sound the same, so predictable you could just cut-and-paste from the last 10.
Hester wrote:
Not in his job description?
Dave A A wrote:
Boil the frog SLOW.
“First they came for the Jews, but I wasn’t a Jew…”
Mae wrote:
The same Newspeak love as the Ministry of Love in 1984.
All in the definitions, My Dear Wormwood.
Mom!! What do you think of this? Was CJ Mahaney a freeloader at Capital Hill Baptist? I mean he hung around, he preached, he wasn’t a member at all when he did all this. Here’s a question I have since Jonathan Leeman holds the keys and determines who is and who is not a Christian, is CJ Mahaney a Christian?
@ Gram3:
“I don’t know what ‘gospel accountability’ is”
whatever it is, it sounds like people answering to men and not to God (unless they see themselves as His ears), but that can’t be. Why? Because a person’s conscience is a private place where the person meets with God alone. Those ‘men’ have no right to intrude on that sacred space, no. They attempt to overstep a sacred boundary and it makes them look like what they are: busy bodies intent on controlling people at the micro-level, intrusive, and judgemental
May wrote:
The only thing that matters is “I HOLD THE WHIP! YOU FEEL THE WHIP! PRAISE GAWD WHO HATH THE BIGGEST WHIP!”
Deb wrote:
HUMBLY, of course.
(chuckle chuckle)
This pious™ church deeply hurt a woman, put their congregation at risk by giving lots of leeway to a pedophile, and made sure that thousands of members of the congregation were intimately informed of the victim’s supposed *sin*.
Mom, I think 9 Marks should institute Gospel Centered Polygraphs to help determine who is and who is not committed to their local church. Only a true believer who submits to one should be a member of the local church. PLUS…Jonathan Leeman and Mark Dever could use them at CHBC to make sure that people buy their books (as comparing to sharing, etc…) so that they can prop up the reformed industrial complex.
Celia wrote:
Wasn’t “Unity” (or something similar) the name of Antichrist’s regime in the old Thief in the Night movies?
Jeff wrote:
Well, Duggargate and all the “TITHE! TITHE! TITHE!” preaching shows spending enough $$$$$ on Indulgences will.
“When coin in Pastor’s coffer rings…”
In the past 20 years I’ve lived in three cities, have attended three churches, and have been part of three small groups.
In each case, those small groups became sort of miniature churches unto themselves. Each was still associated with the larger church body from which most of the small group members came. But in each case, there was substantial autonomy.
If for instance, as happened on several occasions, a pastor suggested study material, we might have used it or we might have said “we will pass this time.”
In each case, no one felt so strongly tied that complete auto my wasn’t possible if needed. In each case group-specific liturgy (if you want to call it that) and how-we-do-things unwritten rules spontaneously arose. So, yes, small local churches.
This is, I suspect, how most ‘Dones’ will end up in churches in coming years. It is the thing that has likely kept my wife and I from being classified as ‘Dones’ as it has helped to smooth out turbulent times in the larger churches to which we’ve belonged (not to mention true support in life from closely fellowshipping believers).
Haha… just remembered that we even had a small group split once, just like a church. The other splinter group became hardened neo-Cal patriarchalists. Half of us had a relatively amicable parting. Eventually their group disintegrated and is no more. We are still going strong. Go figure.
Hester wrote:
Good question! What is Mark Dever going to do when he is wearing a diaper again at 88? Is he truly a Christian if he is in a nursing home and takes communion there?
E.G. wrote:
Great story! Proving that Love wins, not The Law.
E.G. wrote:
Great story! Proving that Love wins, not The Law.
What does that say about chaplains, then? Are we considered flaming heretics for serving people who aren’t regulated by Gospel (TM) churches? How about when we bring communion to the shut-ins or baptize those who are unable to be immersed?
The arrogance of these folks is actually astounding to me! They come across as modern day Pharisees in the worst way. In the sake of maintaining their human interpretations and systems, they would deny the hurting sheep care and spiritual support. Nothing, in my opinion, could be further from the TRUE Good News of Christ!
Here’s a post I wrote about the upcoming SEBTS church discipline conference.
https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2015/08/14/sebts-church-discipline-conference-9-marks-jonathan-leeman-and-eric-cartman-say-respect-my-authoritah/
You know what I am wondering….I live in the DC area. Washington, D.C. and this is a military town. So what happens when members of the military are deployed to Afghanistan, Turkey, UAE, or Qatar? Can an Air Force Officer or a Captain in the Army take communion in the US military when they are deployed? When a person is deployed can they participate in activities with a Chaplain? Or do they need to use their leave so they can come back to the US and take communion here?
What a racket!
Witch Hazel wrote:
To be fair, I’d say it’s a bit of both. Considering its roots are in a common meal, I’d say that we remember in unity. 1Cor. 11, which echoes Matt 5:24.
I’ve been sitting in Starbucks sipping my tall dark roast the pas hour. I’ve been thinking about this post all morning. I want to comment but there’s just too much to say. But I’ll try to be brief. Oops. I’ve got to get back to WORK (something Leeman, Dever, etc. know NOTHING about).
E.G. wrote:
This said, people who use communion to ostracize those they disagree with on what should be minor points, or who deny it to some individuals based on his, that, or he next thing are going against the very unity that they preach. It’s abysmal behavior.
…and, while I’m in no way opposed to my Catholic brothers and sisters, this behavior is very Catholic in foundation. Which is weird, considering these guys’ theology otherwise.
Divorce Minister wrote:
Yes, arrogance and Pharisees describe them perfectly! And they have endeavored to turn the gospel into a NT law that (if they continue in this way) might conceivably approach the 613 laws of the OT! How sad.
Eagle wrote:
If he has enough functional neurons at 88, he’ll get some sort of Revelation to give himself a Special Dispensation.
I got to ‘gospel chaos’ & had to look away due to the imminent implosion of my eyes. This is all about power & control, it’s terrible.
And in other news: I know there are lots of dog lovers here, if I could beg some thought & prayers for my beautiful Darcey, thirteen & three-quarters whose bone marrow has stopped making red cells. This may spontaneously reverse, get kick started by steroids or be the sign of something sinister. I’ve had her since the day she was born & she’s been a bright warm spot in some cold hard years. I’ll know Tuesday if it’s time for her to rest or if we can pull off an indian summer, her not being that old for a terrier. She knows what love is, & she’s never been near a seminary.
Eagle wrote:
Maybe he tithed, and that made everything okay.
refugee wrote:
Come to think of it, this reminds me of the passage from Acts 8, about buying and selling the Holy Spirit (or attempting to, at least):
18 When Simon saw that the Spirit was given at the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money 19 and said, “Give me also this ability so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.”
20 Peter answered: “May your money perish with you, because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money! 21 You have no part or share in this ministry, because your heart is not right before God. 22 Repent of this wickedness and pray to the Lord in the hope that he may forgive you for having such a thought in your heart. 23 For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.”
Beakerj wrote:
Praying for you and faithful, loving Darcey.
@ Anonymous:
Yes.
Following on from what I posted yesterday in another thread here, it seems to me that the view promoted by Jonathan Leeman and others like him in 9Marks is a particularly virulent form of Independency. Those of you who sort of know me, know that I love the works of the Puritans, and although I knew that the likes of Thomas Goodwin and John Owen were Independents, it still came as a bit of a surprise – shock even – to read his polemical attacks on Presbyterianism. In particular, in Volume 11 of his Collected Works, in the treatise on The Government and Discipline of the Chirches of Christ, p485-526, he actually argues that church membership is a covenant, such as was prefigured in the Old Testament and exemplified by marriage and the “gluing of one partner to another”. He then applies this to the local church and says that this “teaches the necessity of constancy in church fellowship. It is a covenant of God, and God hath a part in all covenants, between man and wife, prince and people, but especially in all holy covenants; therefore they may not depart the one from the other, but God must part them. God hath set us us in the church by virtue of a covenant, therefore we must have God’s leave and the church’s leave to depart, if we will depart in God’s fear. Unless God dispose of it, a member may not depart, nor the church dismiss him; there is a tripartite covenant: God is one party, the member another, the church the third”.
It’s not surprising therefore to find that Goodwin features in some 9Marks articles such as this one http://9marks.org/article/journalall-churches-saints-why-new-testament-polity-prescriptive/
At which point I can gratefully say thank goodness for the Presbyterian James Bannerman who says this in his two volume ‘ Church of Christ’ regarding who can admit to church membership.
“But when the judgment is transferred from the external profession and character to the inward conviction and experience of the candidate,—when, instead of being called upon to determine the credibility of what is seen and may be known in the outward man, the office-bearers of the Church are charged to decide upon the reality of what is unseen and cannot be certainly known in the inner man,—it is plain that there is a task committed to them which they are utterly incompetent and unqualified to discharge. They can be no witness to the secret work of God done on the soul of a brother; they can have no knowledge of the reality of that mysterious transaction by which to himself, but not to other men, it may be made manifest that he has passed from darkness to light; they can have no evidence sufficient to guide them in seriously pronouncing a judgment on the state of grace, or the opposite, of a candidate for Church membership. The knowledge and the evidence of such a saving experience must, from the very nature of the case, lie only between God and the man with whom God has graciously dealt; and are a knowledge and an evidence which another can neither understand nor receive. The man himself, whose experience it is that God has done the work of conviction and conversion on his soul, may have the knowledge, and underlie the responsibility involved in it. A stranger can neither share in the one, nor is competent to undertake the other. And if, in the admission to the membership of the Church, direct evidence of a state of grace on the part of the person admitted is required, the decision upon the question involves a responsibility which the office-bearers of the Church cannot take, because they cannot have the knowledge necessary for it, and a responsibility which the person himself cannot transfer to them, because he cannot communicate along with it that knowledge. The power to look upon the heart, and to judge of its spiritual state, is a power which God challenges as His own; and man, even although willing to transfer such judgment to a fellow-man, has not the power to do so.”
@ Beakerj:
Oh, Beaker. Will be praying for you, and for Darcey.
Been there. Last year we gambled thousands on surgery that had a good possibility of giving us three or four more years with our not-quite-elderly dog, an integral part of our family and our autistic child’s unofficial therapy dog. Unfortunately, she died a couple days after the surgery due to a rare complication. I understand some of what you’re going through right now.
Tim wrote:
Thank you. Plus the whole 9marks thing is intrinsically imperial, not possible to reproduce organically in several other cultures. If it is Biblical, how can that be?
Anonymous wrote:
Thoughtful analysis, thanks.
My first exposure to (Mr.?) Leeman was his book on church membership. I couldn’t exactly put my finger on what bothered me about his book. It sounded eminently reasonable. The best I could do, in trying to explain my unease, was to say that he started from the premise that church membership is mandated in scripture, and based his argument and scriptural support on that foundation. Coming from the opposite conviction (formal church membership, in particular involving written covenants, is not biblically mandated), one can build an equally compelling case.
Then I saw his book titled “Church Discipline”. I don’t even want to crack that cover.
@ Beakerj:
Thoughts and prayers for you both, beakerj.
GovPappy wrote:
Ah, but see, that sacrificial giving adds up.
We tithed faithfully for two decades. I estimate our tithes add up to what it would cost to send each of our teens to a good quality private college. Just think how much $$$ we’d have left over if they chose to go to state schools!
Oh, wait. We have no college fund. Never had enough money “left over” from tithing and living expenses to sock away money for college and retirement. Biggest irony of all? That church did inestimable damage to our family, especially to our teens.
Can we have our money back?
@ refugee:
But then, the leadership of that church believed that godly kids shouldn’t go to college, so that’s all right then.
/sarcasm
GovPappy wrote:
p.s. I could quote this entire comment, it’s so well put.
Excellent analysis.
Gus wrote:
They are hirelings.
Jesus had some things to say about hirelings.
NJ wrote:
Oh, NJ. This makes me sick. I want to cry. Some of the most beautiful faith I’ve seen in my life, was displayed by people with very limited cognitive function. Jesus himself talked about “faith as a little child”…
May wrote:
Brilliant insight! I never noticed that before.
Someone’s got their priorities upside-down.
K.D. wrote:
I love this picture.
“By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
John 13:35
Not seeing a whole lot of it Jonathan and Mark!
Just an observation.
“We should always be disposed to believe that which appears to us to be white is really black, if the hierarchy of the church so decides.”
-St. Ignatius Loyola
Refugee:
You really should read the book on Church Discipline. It, too, sounds reasonable in parts.
Until you step back and look at the arguments as a whole.
Leeman constructs a paradigm of discipline by combining the passage about the keys and Matthew 18 and other chapter. It is woven together logically.
Once you have read his article on Church Authority, the book on Church Discipline, you see his method of analysis and the way he interprets and argues for his points.
The big starting problem is ecclesiology. He basically makes the local church a small version of the Catholic Church.
What he is arguing for in these respective fields is everywhere assumed but never stated. That is his MO for interpreting scripture. And that is verified by his overuse of analogies.
It’s fine to argue about things theologically and I don’t want to shut that down. Theologians need to make their points and argue among themselves.
But anytime one starts arguing for a particular practice in the church that involves excommunication, authority etc., we have entered a situation where what is believed has real impacts on people’s lives.
It’s one thing for people to argue about so many theological issues, but issues involving discipline and church authority have a direct and immediate impact, and often a devastating one.
If the authority for one’s interpretation in these areas is analogy, stringing together various texts to construct a membership or discipline paradigm, and assuming things that are not directly stated, that is a very weak foundation.
I suspect this membership/discipline train is losing steam and that will only continue. I hope so, at least.
@ refugee:
What church did you go to Refugee?
Gram3 wrote:
Since New Calvinists say that Calvinism = Gospel, then it would naturally mean to them that one should be accountable to the tenets of Calvinism and its patriarchal system.
@ refugee:
Thank you. It’s personal.
A shout-out to Jonathan Leeman, Mark Dever, John Folmar and Tomas de Torquemada!
http://youtu.be/OvJdT_QR-v4
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
They came for the dead members, but I wasn’t dead…
They came for the live members, but I wasn’t a member…
Then they came for the freeloaders…….
Max wrote:
Who needs Christ when you have CALVIN?
refugee wrote:
Bet Pastor and Elders (the Only True Elect) have all the money they need for college and retirement (and other expenses like jet-set to conferences and Furtick Mansions…)
@ Dave A A:
Love it!
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
The guys who vociferously promote church discipline, would they themselves subject themselves to discipline by other groups if they sin?
Jeffrey Chalmers wrote:
Yes, but this implies clear thinking on the part of the giving members.
Abused by SGM wrote:
Was CJ Mahaney subjected to church discipline? No he was a freeloader at CHBC.
Eagle wrote:
Sorry, Eagle, I don’t feel comfortable enough to give personal details. There was a bit of stalking after we left our church, and the teens were traumatized, even by that little bit. I’m very glad they backed off and we didn’t have to explore a restraining order. Though we have had no contact in months, and they removed us from their rolls, I don’t want to explore the possibility of someone guessing my “real identity” and coming after us again with accusations of slander or libel or defamation whatever the term might be. Or whatever they might do. Frankly, I’m relieved they’ve turned our kids over to Satan and are leaving them alone. One of them suffers panic attacks, just running across members of the former church out and about in the community.
Let’s just say it was a denominational church, a member in good standing in a large reformed denomination (one that runs the gamut of ultra-conservative to what I believe might be termed mildly liberal). They were not affiliated with Acts29 or 9Marks, but they shared a lot of similar thought. Over the years they have espoused Doug Wilson, Steve Wilkins and Steve Schlissel (until they decided Federal Vision was heresy), the Bayly brothers, Kevin Swanson, R.C. Sproul and Jr., John Robbins and the Trinity Foundation, and Vision Forum, among many. Hopefully that gives you a flavor of their theological bent.
Abused by SGM wrote:
Most of them just leave their church and go somewhere else.
Bridget wrote:
And did!
@ refugee:
p.s. It was not a mega-church. Something under 500 attendees, I’d say. I’m being intentionally vague. Some of the families there take up more than one row of seats.
@ Jeffrey Chalmers:
It is kind of amazing that a lot of the younger folks are good with attending at a place where there’s no congregational financial accountability. That’s on the leaders for slipping in a fast one, and the members for not caring.
refugee wrote:
That sounds like a seriously confused church. John Robbins and Trinity Foundation do not play together nicely with Federal Vision. At all, except perhaps for the outlines of reformed theology. It sounds like they combined the lunatic fringe of a number of different and incompatible points of view. Glad you and your kids got out! People may not realize that these guys pray imprecatory prayers on their enemies. Refugee is correct to be very, very cautious. Steve Wilkins. That’s a blast from the past.
@ Gram3:
Oh, yeah. The gurus came and went (and their popularity waxed and waned). I’m not saying John Robbins and Federal Vision were simultaneous (though they weren’t that far apart). The common denominator seems to be patriarchy and authoritarianism.
refugee wrote:
How did this happen?!? OMG! Being stalked?!? Did they show up announced at your house? Show up at your kids school? Did they try and contact you repeatedly when you asked them not to? This blows my mind…I can’t imagine this.
‘Keys’ Leeman- just one more religious Stalinist in the long line of those who self-appoint themselves as a Prophet, Priest and King and oppress all those who fail to bow down to them. You know, I haven’t heard one word or deed from any of these power hungry bastages that demonstrates any real love for others, just punishments for those who don’t follow their rules.
Freeloaders? Freeloaders? Uh, who pays these pastors that act like kings? Anyone who attends these patriarchal, Authority ruling, clergy over laity type churches deserves what they get! Where are the men of God that humbly serve their flocks instead of using them as an ATM?
Eagle wrote:
Let’s just say certain elders took it upon themselves to assume responsibility for the teens’ souls. For a little time, at least.
Once my spouse confronted them and convinced them that there was no hope of us coming back, the harassment ceased and they shook our dirt from their sandals.
@ refugee:
Deeply sorry about that…that is uncalled for.
refugee wrote:
And “Christains” wonder why the reputation of “Christianity” is on the over decline in the U.S.? Stalking!!
Ops… iPads are not best to write these posts on. The main line detonation needs to “discipline” that church! This is America! No church should be allowed to “stalk” people that leave their church!
Jeffrey Chalmers wrote:
Yeah. Shades of Karen Hinkley and TVC…
@ GovPappy:
What if there is no church in your area? Or any other believers that you know of?And what if you live in a city that is two hours away from the nearest church, and it is not feasible to make the drive? But you can Skype with fellow believers once a week!!!
What if you are in a foreign country and cannot understand English and American culture? What if it terrifies you to leave the house because the culture is so foreign? You are just happy to be here and not in a war torn country. Yes. You are a believer, but trying to go to a church is just way too much for you.
These are both true scenarios. Real people and part of the real church.
The real church is so much bigger than the cereal box so many people try to fit it into. Not all of us are Wheaties. Some of us are Grape Nuts.
Okay, to bring this back to the topic, our former church handed out copies of Leeman’s Church Membership and the 9Marks book Church Elders: How to Shepherd God’s People Like Jesus during the time we were there.
Made me leery of 9Marks, even though our church never affiliated, just seemed to esteem the products.
refugee wrote:
Quiverfulls?
A LOT of this seems to go together, like Abusive System seeks Abusive System.
Jeffrey Chalmers wrote:
This is assuming that church has a “main line denomination” to begin with.
You get a lot of horror stories from Independents, whether quasi-denominations like the IFBs or true Independent splinter churches. When it’s “Just Me and the LOORD”, there’s nothing to provide a Reality Check if you start drifting into Cult(TM) territory or abusing. (Not that the corruption could extend up into the denomination or not-a-denom, but it’s a lot easier if you’re truly Independent with NO outside ties or links whatsoever.)
Abused by SGM wrote:
Ask Jimmy Swaggart, Jim Bakker, and any MoG who suddenly “felt Led to Plant a Church” when he got caught and put under denominational authority. Scandal? Getting called on it? Split and start your own where You’re the Head Apostle and mini-Pope — how many denoms are out there? 50,000?
Kindakrunchy wrote:
I’ve always been more Froot Loops myself.
“If ‘You are what you eat’, then I must be malt & hops!”
— line from my high school days
Deb wrote:
I noticed that Alistair Begg will be speaking at this conference. This saddens me. He has a program on the Christian radio station in my area, and even though I know he is a Calvinist, I don’t think of him as being part of the authoritarian 9Marks camp. Am I wrong? Are all Calvinist pastors being implicitly or explicitly told that they must get on board with the 9Marks disciplinary code of doing church?
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Oh, yeah. Quiverfulls eventually took over the church. Smaller families remained, but the Quiverfulls held the power.
Darlene wrote:
This is a real concern. I’d like to know the answer as well.
@ Gram3:
That might help explain the church splits, as one philosophy gained strength and supplanted another.
Gram3 wrote:
So that is why we are so screwed up? We’ve been riding the lunatic fringe for more than a decade, and never realized it until the pain grew too much to bear and we left. Talk about boiling frogs. (It wasn’t that bad when we first started attending. I’m *sure* it wasn’t that bad. If it had been *so* patriarchal, *so* authoritative, we wouldn’t have stayed past that first Sunday. It must have slid gradually into insanity.) Sheesh.
@ refugee:
Please do not be hard on yourself. That is the last thing you need to do right now. The fact is that there are men who will take advantage of people who desire to please God, and these men will insert themselves into the place of God, for all practical purposes. That usually doesn’t happen right away, and lots of times things will seem fine and only in retrospect can you see that things you dismissed when you questioned them were significant. I am sorry beyond words about your kids, and I hope that they will able to remember how much the real Jesus loves them and that they will be able to forget the other. It may not even seem possible for that to happen, but it can. The names you mention are familiar to us, and your comment took us way back. We understand in a way that perhaps others may not. It seems that the leadership was, as you said, following after one guru after another instead of pursuing Christ. Thanks for telling your story.
@ refugee:
I think it was Patrice on another thread who said something very interesting. She said (hope I get this right!) that there are authoritarian and other kinds of streaks in all sorts of theologies. I think she is exactly right. Authoritarianism comes in all flavors, and there is one for every taste. Speaking for myself, we got involved in a a series of authoritarian churches for what seemed like good reasons to us, and authoritarianism was not on the radar going in. None of those churches looked the same, but the end was the same.
NJ wrote:
If I were you, I would consider looking for a different church for this reason alone. Your autistic son is just as much a part of the body of Christ as those who don’t have ASD. The Methodists, Wesleyans and Christian Missionary Alliance tend to be much kinder in their approach than the Reformed.
refugee wrote:
Just one more thought. Perhaps there was a private memo somewhere about forcing one or more of us under care. (Was “forcing” the word used with respect to Karen? It was some sort of coercive term, that much I remember.)
Gram3 wrote:
I think I am hypersensitive to anything that smells like authoritarianism, these days. It makes it difficult to darken the door of any local church, frankly.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
I prefer granola. But grape nuts sounded krunchier.
Darlene wrote:
Those are some good suggestions along with some baptistic churches. Maybe JeffS or Sallie Borrink or PCAPastor or Jed Paschall can weigh in on this, but in my experience there are PCA churches that take confessions of faith that are appropriate to the circumstances of the individual, and following that confession of faith, the individual is allowed to participate in communion. I’m not talking about paedocommunion which is another issue, just to be clear. There is an OPC church I know of that is rigid like this, but not the PCA churches I know of.
Authoritarianism is part of the “human nature”… As I have said on numerous threads, my 28 years as a faculty member in a “secular humanistic ( you name the negative adjective) university” as been very enlightening. I soon realized that the behavior of some of my colleagues was no different many of the “leaders” in my fundamentalist, or evangelical background… Same sel righteousness, same arrogance about knowing the “Ttue way” etc… The things that the “Christain groups” did to me more “righteous” and less “worldly” we’re NO different than faculty colleagues… The only difference is what one was been “righteous about”…. I would much rather deal with University politics than church politics…. There is no “holiness/keys” involved!
Gram3 wrote:
refugee wrote:
Unlike Jonathan, I believe the Holy Spirit can work when and where he wills, including in the lives of people who have been hurt by people acting in Jesus’ name. Maybe that is away from the institutional church for awhile. Hopefully you have some mature Christian friends outside the orbit of that church, though I also understand how that can be difficult when you’ve been in a totalist environment.
Jeffrey Chalmers wrote:
That has been our experience as well.
iPad again..
… “Christain groups did to be more “righteous” and less “worldly”are NO different” ….
Dave A A wrote:
It depends on which way the dead vote
@ Darlene:
It saddens me as well. I often listen to Begg on a Christian radio station in our area. As a matter of fact, I heard his message a couple hours ago as I was preparing dinner for my family.
@ Jeff:
is possible they are looking at Catholic confession and misunderstanding both the form and the sacrament, and therefore adapting it to a PUBLIC arena of open confession of serious sins, which for many reasons, is not what Catholic confession is all about.
is also possible that, having read something about the monastic tradition of the Catholic faith, the 9 marks folks attempted to design a ‘Benedictine’ isolationist movement, also not understanding the voluntary and very sacred calling of some in Catholicism to the monastic life. . .
I don’t think the 9 marks folks intend a corruption of Catholic ideas, so much as they misunderstand and in their attempts to ‘modify’, they have left out the spirit of Catholic ethos and filled it with something that looks a lot like need for control and need for power . . . it’s a shame, the Catholic ideas they ‘didn’t get’ were never intended for anything but good
okrapod wrote:
I agree completely with your analysis. But there is also the fact that the RCC has the weight of a mighty throng behind it, and more importantly almost 1500 years. The YRR churches, as they exist currently usually start with a small membership and have a few years of history. The foundation that Leeman is building on is mighty thin.
Will M wrote:
Though I disagree with the RCC concept of the church, at least they are consistent and have been so as far as I know. The pope is not trying to impose some new idea on the RCC and its people. OTOH, 9Marks and Founders and like-minded people are introducing ideas into Baptist and even some Reformed churches which are very inconsistent with traditional Baptist practice and beliefs. The RCC and EO churches do not subscribe to sola scriptura, and everyone knows that. But supposedly 9Marks does. Why do they just make things up, then, which are nowhere in the texts they claim to honor? They are their own magisterium.
__
“We Were Made To Thrive?”
“On Wartburg?”
In Christ?
hmmm…
Party on Deebs!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OmenumjA6k8
…no time for da blues, Heaven ain’t half full yet!
(grin)
Hum, hum, hum…”Here in this worn and weary land
Where many a dream has died
Like a tree planted by the water
We never will run dry
So living water flowing through
God we thirst for more of You
Fill our hearts and flood our souls
With one desire
Just to know You and yo make You known
We lift Your name on High
Shine like the sun made darkness run and hide
We know we were made for so much more
Than ordinary lives
It’s time for us to more than just survive
We were made to thrive
Woah
Woah
Into Your word we’re digging deep
To know our Father’s heart
Into the world we’re reaching out
To show them who You are
So living water flowing through
God we thirst for more of You
Fill our hearts and flood our souls
With one desire
Just to know You and to make You known
We lift Your name on High
Shine like the sun made darkness run and hide
We know we were made for so much more
Than ordinary lives
It’s time for us to more than just survive
—> We were made to thrive
Joy unspeakable, faith unsinkable,
Love unstoppable, anything is possible
Joy unspeakable, faith unsinkable,
Love unstoppable, anything is possible
Joy unspeakable, faith unsinkable,
Love unstoppable, anything is possible
Joy unspeakable, faith unsinkable,
Love unstoppable, anything is possible
Just to know You and to make You known
We lift Your name on High
Shine like the sun made darkness run and hide
We know we were made for so much more
Than ordinary lives
—> It’s time for us to more than just survive
We were made to thrive! Hey!” [1]
-Casting Crowns
***
Don’t trade your birthright for empty IOU’s…
What?
“I came that they might have life, and that life mucho abundant!” -Jesus
Yahoooooooo!
ATB
Sopy
___
[1] Casting Crowns: “We Were Made To Thrive”© HALL, JOHN MARK / WEST, MATTHEW © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC.
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/castingcrowns/thrive.html
;~)
—
I volunteer to be a comment moderator.
James Brown wrote:
We’ll keep you in mind. Once we learn who you are. 🙂
@ James Brown:
Are you the same James Brown who sings, “It’a a Man’s World”???
If so, ruhro.
May wrote:
This is one of the most simple yet profound things I’ve ever read here. Excellent.
@ Nancy2:
The lyrics go on to say “but it wouldn’t be nothin’ /without a woman or a girl.”
@ Christiane:
I think those guys, along wit the so-called Gospel Coalition, are rather intensely anti-Catholic. Fwiw.
@ Christiane:
Btw, nice to see you making stops over here. The more iMonkers, the merrier!
Hi Max, Mae, Gram3 and other folks,
If you have any books you recommend would you mind posting them at the top of the page here on The Wartburg Watch? (Under the Interesting tab, Books.)
You can also post recipes and movies too. (I posted Nick’s Yorkshire Pudding recipe.)
Thank you!
It was hard for me to stomach what I read in the main body of the post about refusing communion to those who can’t get to church through no fault of their own. Have these guys become so hardened to their Jiminy Crickets within that they’ve become incapable of human feeling? And are their moral compasses so demagnetized they now point nowhere?
This one’s for Dever, Leeman, 9marks and the whole panoply of those who have substituted dogma for compassion. It was written in 1971 by Ian Anderson, also known as Jethro Tull:
When I was young and they packed me off to school
And taught me how not to play the game,
I didn’t mind if they groomed me for success,
Or if they said that I was a fool.
So I left there in the morning
With their God tucked underneath my arm —
Their half-assed smiles and the book of rules.
So I asked this God a question
And by way of firm reply,
He said — I’m not the kind you have to wind up on Sundays.
So to my old headmaster (and to anyone who cares):
Before I’m through I’d like to say my prayers —
I don’t believe you:
You had the whole damn thing all wrong —
He’s not the kind you have to wind up on Sundays.
Well you can excomunicate me on my way to Sunday school
And have all the bishops harmonize these lines —
How do you dare tell me that I’m my Father’s son
When that was just an accident of Birth.
I’d rather look around me — compose a better song
‘cos that’s the honest measure of my worth.
In your pomp and all your glory you’re a poorer man than me,
As you lick the boots of death born out of fear.
numo wrote:
You are right, but last I heard, that James Brown was dead.
Beakerj wrote:
I do hope that God will give you more wonderful time with your sweet Darcey.
@ Nancy2:
I like his music, though.
Moving right along…
Bill M wrote:
In Chicago, they always vote Democrat/Incumbent.
No matter what their party affiliation when alive.
__
Beakerj,
Sorry bout Darcey. I’ve been there. 🙁
If you have to let her go take courage, take her into your arms and rock her as “falls asleep “.
ATB
(tears)
Sopy
—
Bill M wrote:
We may laugh– but Schmucker and his buds are dead serious about this stuff. “This gives the congregation some time to think about what they’re doing and why.”
Why, indeed?
refugee wrote:
If I may so observe, refugee, I think you have put your finger on what’s so dangerous about the false gospel of man-made and man-wielded rules that is currently “resurgent” among God’s people. It sounds eminently reasonable, and FWIW, you have my respect for not ignoring your own unease.
I don’t know a great deal about stage magic, but I do know about the principle of misdirection: that is, focusing the audience’s attention on something other than what is actually enabling the trick to work. In every case, the switch happens away from the audience’s attention, and in many cases, it happens right at the beginning of the trick before the audience has even thought to pay attention. So we, the audience, are staring intently at a deck of cards or whatever, watching out for a switch that we will never see because it has already been done: we’re already looking at the wrong deck of cards.
In this case, the switch Lehman performs is in the very title, with the word “Church” itself. He means something totally different from the church as described in the new testament. Before he even asks the reader to consider how the church should operate, he’s already inserted the idea that “the church” is NOT the Church, but a legally separate, walled-off subgroup of believers that are split off from other believers locally – it doesn’t worship with those other believers, nor share Communion with them, and it need not work with them to reach the community nor preach the gospel with them nor even pray for their blessing and growth.
Note that the New Testament does not contain chapter after chapter denouncing this idea of “church” in great detail because it was simply beneath the contempt of the NT apostles. As Paul pointed out to Corinth, it was absurd to follow one leader or another as though Christ were divided. The idea of “church-hopping” was impossible – you could no more “find another church” than you could find another Earth.
Alistair Begg. My family heard him speak at a conference many years ago here in the UK, before he left for America, and very much enjoyed his lucid, challenging ministry. It was nothing short of inspirational. I still remember it clearly.
Then a couple of years ago a family member heard a recording of one of Alistair Begg’s recent sermons, in which Begg espoused complementarianism. They nearly died of shock when Begg declared that in Scotland (where he’s from) it’s traditional for a couple only to marry when the man owns a house. Not true!
I’m glad to hear he still sounds reasonable at least on radio, but I fear he’s bouhgt into the Neo_Reformed movement hook, line and sinker.
St.Thomas wrote:
I don’t think anybody deserves what some abusive churches do to some or all of their members. From a distance, it’s easy to see and recognise the abuse. But once you’re slowly drawn in, it’s more difficult to realise they are slowly tightening the noose, you only start finding it strangely difficult to breathe.
It’s easy to judge from a distance. When we think we are among friends, we’re all (too) trusting and tend to expect and believe the best concerning our friends. What would be the meaning of friendship, after all, if it required constant vigilance and distrust?
In theory at least, the same should apply to the church we go to and its members and leaders.
@ refugee:
Just saw this comment.
I went through that same unease on my first exposures to their views of church. The separate individual parts can look ok, and they all seem to fit the system, and there’s scripture everywhere, but then you step back and look at the big picture of what they want, and you recoil from it.
Also when you start substituting how they say it looks with how it often ends up being in practice (like the forced intimacy of small groups, or church discipline), the picture breaks down.
Muff Potter wrote:
I think it’s the triumph of ideas/right thinking over love. I don’t believe these are all bad men, but:
*Having right ideas and following the implications of those right ideas into every jot and tittle of life can be kind of intoxicating. It gives a sense of power and accomplishment.
*Having to make “hard decisions” or “say hard things” for the sake of right ideas makes people feel brave
*For some, any sort of “mystery” causes some anxiety about loss of absolute certainty. There is a low tolerance for anything other than black and white
There is no conflict with serving a communal meal to a single person who could not come to the meal if one thinks of the mystery of our union in Christ. But if one’s mind is very oriented to specific details and applications, it can get carried away and confused by those.
The “love test” is so helpful. I Cor 13. Clanging gongs and all that.
Even if you were a “right idea” person and thought communion had to be served in a group, the love test means that you do what it takes to bring a group to the bedside of the ailing person so that you include them in the communion. Not rocket science.
Darlene wrote:
Exactly. There are more than a few denominations (I’m a United Methodist pastor) that have a policy of open table for communion. I hope you’ll consider this.
@ Velour:
Velour, I just posted links to a couple of books on Calvinism/New Calvinism that have given me a glimpse into the minds of “reformed” folks … particularly as to how their belief and practice lead to the problems being reported by TWW and other watchblogs. I also posted a good article there from Christianity Today, as the “young, restless, and reformed” began to emerge in the American church, launching the New Calvinist movement. Hope these resources are helpful to folks desiring to understand what the heck is going on! Once you see it, you can’t un-see it!
Abi Miah wrote:
I do not believe they are all bad men, either, and I think the “buts” that you listed are exactly what I’ve seen in the clergy-dominated churches I’ve been in. Well put.
@ Velour:
Whoops, I meant to say I posted the links at the top of the page here on The Wartburg Watch (Under the Interesting tab, Books, in the menu dropdown) … as you suggested.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
Exactly. And then we “see” what we expect to see. And don’t “see” what we do not expect to see. Maybe I’m just a slow learner, but even when I know what the trick is, I still got fooled because of misdirection toward the Big Idea of the day.
Dave A A wrote:
Well, that actually happened in an SBC church we attended years ago! My wife volunteered to serve as church secretary in a small church which did not have a paid position for that office. She promptly discovered that the church membership roll was 2X or more than the number that actually attended. When she suggested removing deceased members, those who had moved from the area, and others missing in action, she was met with much weeping and gnashing of teeth! It seems that SBC churches have this annual thing they file with the denomination called “The Letter” stating membership numbers, baptisms, revenue, etc. To reduce any of those in the annual accounting would make the church look bad, like it was struggling or about to close its doors. Based on that experience, I became convinced that the largest Protestant denomination in America is really not that big at all … if you remove dead folks, those who have relocated for whatever reason, and others just not showing up for whatever reason. Thus, a 16 million member denomination may only really be about 8 million actual people … of that number, only 4 million may occasionally show up to church … and of that number, most are uninformed, misinformed, or willingly ignorant about the times we are in. They don’t have a clue that the denomination is being Calvinized by an army of young, restless, and reformed! In my humble, but accurate, opinion, the SBC needs more folks like me who would speak their mind! ;^)
Max wrote:
So they pad the numbers.
Like Scientology, like Common Core No Child Left Behind test scores, like Third World election results, like Pravda & Tass during the Cold War.
May wrote:
Also not practical, especially in an area where house prices go crazy. I’m considered a man of some means, and by the time I was able to afford a house, I’d aged out of the marriageable range.
Muff Potter wrote:
It’s called “Dispensing of Existence”.
numo wrote:
They’re just flaming green with Envy that THEY’re not The (circa-1500s) Pope pronouncing Dogma Ex Cathedra for the entire Church and World and ordering all burned who don’t immediately agree 1000%.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Yeah, that’s pretty much the case, HUG. But, praise God, He has always had a faithful remnant … the Church within the church!
@ Muff Potter:
Sorry if Anderson’s lyrics got a bit lengthy but I felt they’re germane to the topic at hand with very little tangent.
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
In the late 1970s it was only just becoming possible for ordinary Scots to think about buying their own house. The vast majority lived in council houses, certainly in the area where Mr Begg last served as pastor before moving to the USA. Having said that, both churches where he served were bigger than the average Baptist church and were in more affluent areas so this might have coloured his memory. I do remember that Baptist women wore bigger hats than anyone else to show how holy they were.
Max wrote:
Maybe the YRR want to excommunicate the dead folks because they figure they’ll vote traditionalist?
But seriously, it’s good that 9marks want churches to clean up the rolls, but bad that they can’t allow the secretary to do this. Because they want some official ceremony to teach the congregation, so’s the congregation will be habitualized to vote “yes” when the “tough” situations come up, i.e:
“Non-attending members in the area.This is certainly a tougher group. These people may want to maintain their membership, they are able to attend, and they may have relationships with other members, but they don’t want much to do with the church. Move slowly and continue to patiently instruct people about the meaning of church membership.”
We know from numerous other 9Marks teachings that this tougher group is not simply to be removed from the list. They must, unlike (we would hope) the dead members, be disciplined, excommunicated, and shunned.
Muff Potter wrote:
You may be experiencing false guilt since the Deebs are cracking down on long, offt-topic comments. But I don’t think this is the sort they have in mind. That song played a significant role in my conversion to Christ. I took the lines, “I don’t believe you. You had the whole damn thing all wrong. He’s not the kind you have to wind up on Sundays.” very personally– kind of like “conviction of sin”.
Even more off-topic, I now have “Living in the Past” running through my head. And in my head, it always runs:
Let us close our eyes,
Outside their lives go on much faster.
Oh, we won’t give in,
We’ll keep living in the pasture.
Oh, we won’t give in,
Let’s go living in the pasture.
Nick Bulbeck wrote:
In the upcoming “church discipline” horror story, we’ll all do well to remember that the problem isn’t just “discipline” that’s run amok, it’s “church”.
Dave A A wrote:
What Dee said about Mortality and Morbidity rounds made me think of Lessons Learned memos and Failure Analysis reports that the business/engineering worlds generate in order to prevent future losses. Obviously this hasn’t happened in the wake of *any* of the huge leadership failures among the Gospel Glitterati and will not happen because these men are incapable of self-examination. Or critical thinking. Or just plain thinking. They have made it abundantly clear that that care nothing about loving the pewpeons, despite the gushy rhetoric about loving us well. It is scary to contemplate it could be worse than The Village ELDERS’ epic fail, as the kids say.
Gram3 wrote:
And pewtaters.
If it is worse, it will only mean to them worse mistakes and more tweaking needed– nothing wrong with the fundamentals.
Dave A A wrote:
My conversion epiphany was the old Charlton Heston flick The Omega Man.
One man’s blood untainted by a plague and how he gives his life to ensure that his antibodies are used to revive a world in the grip of death and darkness.
Dave A A wrote:
Our Ideology is Correct and Pure, Comrades.
Gavin White wrote:
I have little knowledge of how housing is done in the British Isles. I have heard the term “council houses” in a UK context but am completely in the dark as to what it means.
Max wrote:
Terrific! Thanks, Max!
@ Headless Unicorn Guy
Social Rental Housing provided by the local (town or state) authorities in large estates or “schemes”. Don’t know if it equates with “Projects” in American cities. Like this
http://discuss.glasgowguide.co.uk/uploads/monthly_09_2011/post-6109-1315136754_thumb.jpg
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
Council housing is housing stock owned by local government – local authorities in the UK are known formally as “Councils”, viz Birmingham City Council, Edinburgh City Council, etc. The idea is that council housing is rented by local residents and allocated on a means-tested basis so that those on low incomes are not made homeless by being priced out of the housing market. I don’t doubt that the same thing exists under a different name in the US; a difference in Blighty is that a significant volume of publicly-owned housing was built in the late 1940’s to replace homes destroyed by bombing during the Second World War.
Historically, Councils have generally owned sizeable local blocks of housing – hence the idea of a “council housing estate”. On the one hand, tenancy agreements could often be relatively long-term so that a sense of community could develop even though tenants did not own the houses in which they lived. On the other hand, council estates have tended to be associated with poverty and urban deprivation. That’s not to say that there has been a stigma attached to them as such, but the middle classes and those aspiring to “go up in the world” have generally wanted to live away from them. Obviously, the snobbish look down on them.
P.S. Councils are known as “cooncils” in Scotland.
#ochayethenoo
Probably too late for most readers to note this comment, but I just saw this topic. I am the person Dee wrote about in the story who’s been emailing her recently.
The day I was removed from leadership – it was kind of mutual, as the pastor was heading in that direction and I resigned to get away from this mess as it was developing – was both a freeing day and a hard day. I knew I had done nothing wrong, yet I was pushed out because I was “not loyal enough” and “that is an important quality in business, as you know.” I also knew the small group would suffer, because we had gelled so well over the past year. One woman became a widow about a year ago, and we as a group ministered well to her, especially three of the ladies. None of that mattered in shuttering the group. In fact, from what I could tell, almost nothing I mentioned as we discussed some differences made any impact at all. It’s rare to find a mind so closed.
This church is a large church – some might call it mega-sized – with a well known senior pastor, and a radio ministry over Christian radio stations. Elder run, I noticed after my wife and I became part of it how authoritative and closed minded it was.
There are many other things I could write, but the details simply prove out the points Deb and Dee make here repeatedly, as do many of you who write comments.
While it has been a freeing change in my life, I was surprised by the emotional reactions I felt. Frankly, the first few weeks were kind of rough. I had some help from encouraging emails from Dee and Deb, and a few people in our defunct group. There’s a reasonable chance we’ll re-form the group in some fashion later this year.
Some commenters on this site mentioned books by Viola recently in another thread. I looked some of those up and just purchased Reimagining Church. After a few days reading into the book, I find it a source of healing as well. As many of you say here, we are the church – the bride – the body of Christ. Never again will I let man’s inventions substitute for that.
I followed up with the church and resigned my membership, even though it is not allowed by their rules. They agreed to let me resign quietly, and now I’m free of any obligations they might have tried to place on me.
I’m sorry for the long post, but I hope it encourages you if you find it at the tail end of these blog comments.
pk47tech wrote:
Hi PK47tech,
Welcome! I am sorry that you were removed from leadership at your former church. I am sorry that you were not deemed *loyal* enough, when your loyalty is not supposed to be to men but to Christ!
I am glad that the group you headed attended to a widow.
It is quite a shock to the system to not have a church home, ties, and relationships. I was ordered to be excommunicated and shunned at my NeoCal church this past year for standing my ground with the pastors/elders about their friend, an ex-con/Megan’s List sex offender they brought to church, gave church membership to, allowed him access to all church activities (including those with children), told no one (members/all adults), and placed in a position of leadership and trust. They told me in a meeting, I had discovered the sex offender on Megan’s List while doing research, that he was *fine* and *safe* and it was *ok* that he touched children at our church, including my friends’ 4-year old son (I saw the sex offender run his hands through the boy’s hair and my friends had no idea).
There can be hard days leaving these churches. There are many good people in them and good experiences. It can be very odd to be on the outside looking in.
But I want no part of this. Max has made some good comments about the state of our churches on various posts here.
I will be praying for you and your wife. Please let us know what else we can do.
Regards,
Velour
P.S. Here is conservative Baptist Pastor Wade Burleson’s very good article what he sees as the greatest problem in our churches today: authoritarianism.
http://www.wadeburleson.org/2012/01/our-problem-is-authoritarianism-and-not.html
Wade is the pastor that is on The Wartburg Watch’s EChurch on Sundays.
He has also written an excellent article about why people should say *no* to signing Membership Covenants.
@ pk47tech:
Thank you for telling your story.
Your willingness to speak and expose another example of heavy-handed elder rule is encouraging to one who presently opposing similar elder totalitarianism.
pk47tech wrote:
Amen and God bless you.
pk47tech wrote:
Thank you for sharing your story, and I hope that what you read here encourages you. We have had similar experiences and have found fellowship as freeloaders. May the Holy Spirit guide you through what I know is a difficult time.
Gram3 wrote:
Gram3, most definitely I have. What you have written about the church and its theology over the months I’ve been here have helped, and stretched me, as have what others have written.
It’s sad we’ve had to experience these episodes from institutional churches, but we do come away with a resolve to *be* the church. I think that is one of the best outcomes! May the Holy Spirit guide us to act and be faithful through His work in our lives. For me, the journey seems to be starting again.
Church of the Freeloaders, what a novel idea! Oh wait, there already is one, it’s called The Episcopal Church and all are welcome come and freeload.
Gavin White wrote:
Appears similar but not identical. For instance, I doubt Council Houses have as bad a rep as The Projects usually do.
And you had a good reason behind it, having to replace all that housing destroyed in the war ASAP. Don’t know if (like our postwar car culture/suburbia/freeway system) the side effects have overtaken the benefits by now.
Leeman’s idea of “the Church” reminds me of “the Borg.” It’s all about the health and well being of the whole. The parts of the whole are irrelevant and expendable.
Topics for the April 2016 Together for the Gospel conference have been announced here:
http://t4g.org/speakers/
Interestingly, they include this breakout session:
Don’t be a 9Marxist! Using Church Authority to Help, Not Hurt
Join Mark Dever and Jonathan Leeman (Bio) for this discussion.