In the words of Frank Drebin – Please disperse. Nothing to see here!

Well, I understand what the problem is here: you’re all looking for the perfect church.

What I would say is, if you ever find the perfect church, don’t join it – you’ll spoil it.

Yours sincerely,

Arnold Smartarse

This is why tenure needs to be defended at all costs. The trustees of SBTS failed when tenure was revoked. While I respect the need for some theological criteria at a seminary ( need to affirm a basic creed, for example) no tenure at all is a recipt for abuse by the leader…

The scenario leaves room for deniability, but is completely in line with past workings in the SBC. If anyone thinks Albert isn't a patient calculating man, then they haven't paid attention to the Calvinist takeover or even the fundementalist/conservative takeover, which serves as the model for reshaping of denomination. Calculating and shrewd, not Christlike but shrewd. Good news is there are plenty of narrative examples in the OT, so he can claim to be biblical in his approach, lmao.

Now that is the type of evangelical angling I remember, this is the rule, not the exception. The takeovers, the constant lying, the manipulation and gutting of people. I have personally seen it, people taken out just for spite or political reasons, and for the most honorable reason – money. It's all done in the love of Jesus, but there is a brutality and calculated viciousness to it.

Assuming a minimal amount of effort, how can someone (Stuart Scott) fail to get a Ph.D. from SBTS if Mohler wants him to get a Ph.D.? That is a serious question.

Gram3 wrote:

Assuming a minimal amount of effort, how can someone (Stuart Scott) fail to get a Ph.D. from SBTS if Mohler wants him to get a Ph.D.? That is a serious question.

I wondered that also?

Lea wrote:

that 3 years of lies timeline for newcal church takeovers

That’s really a thing? It wasn’t just us? I know Dever has warned against rushing it, but prescribing 3 years? That’s creepy.

And that was exactly the timeline at our church. ‘Cept it failed.

Lydia wrote:

I wondered the same.
@ Gram3:

It’s called ABD — All But Dissertation. That dang dissertation separates the men from the boys and the women from the girls. 😀

@ Ted:
I read 3 to 5. And it’s a very subtle process. Quiet Revolution written by Ernest Risinger gives a bit of an outline.

OK, I’m prejudiced, but that’s because I, a mental health consumer, get my mental health care from licensed psychologists and psychiatrists. That’s because my insurance won’t cover it otherwise and I’m not independently wealthy.

So now that you know my bias up front, let me tell you that I find Heath Lambert’s ACBC to be scary. I checked earlier this week to see if the counselors in my state (Arizona) had any sort of state licensing, and none of them did. (BTW, ACBC’s website is awful for trying to figure out where counselors are. I can’t help but believe this is absolutely intentional.) So if your ACBC counselor completely messes up, you have nowhere to go to complain and maybe get their license to practice yanked.

On top of that, Lambert has put out this “95 Theses,” which says, in part, the Bible is sufficient for counseling. Well, no, it’s not sufficient. With all due respect, the writers of the Bible didn’t know about mental illness and brain/body issues like we do today (and we’re just scraping the surface when it comes to what we know about the mind). This doesn’t mean spiritual matters can’t play a part in a wholistic answer to a person’s mental health issues, but “Biblical counseling” is not going to get to the heart of paranoid schizophrenia or chronic major depression.

Warren Throckmorton has more to say about this on his blog and I recommend people go there and read what he’s written recently. It’s very thoughtful but also challenging to Lambert and the ACBC.

As for the SBTS thing, i’m so not surprised. Just not.

I think it may be time to look at each of these odd isolated stories as part of a bigger movement. If you look closely enough, I think you will see that they are working what would seem like mutually excludive angles through their various associates. Another disturbing trend that I think fits into the overall strategy is guys taking on 2, 3, and 4 roles when any one of those roles is more than a full time job if done properly and not as just as an authoritative figurehead. As I’m writing this, it is becoming more obvious that he’s getting all his pieces in place.

Lydia wrote:

@ mitch:
Great comment. Mahler seems to have something like Stalin had with his Cult of Personality minions surrounding him. Everyone seems scared to death of him. So it’s constant praise and adoration all the time.

“Just like Comrade Kim Jong-Un, Except CHRISTIAN(TM)!”.

Lydia wrote:

I read 3 to 5. And it’s a very subtle process. Quiet Revolution written by Ernest Risinger gives a bit of an outline.

I’ll have to get Quiet Revolution (used, of course). Mark Dever’s book The Deliberate Church also has a lot of that, more so than his Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, which I found underwhelming. When I was on the diaconate in was that one (Nine Marks) that we read, not knowing where it was leading. Fortunately, the effort failed but it has been devisive.

This is what R Albert Mahler wrote about Scripture and Conselling in 2014.

https://www.biblicalcounselingcoalition.org/2014/10/21/scripture-and-counseling-foreword-by-dr-r-albert-mohler-jr/

And here is an announcement about a new appointment in Biblical Counselling at Boyce, that meets the approval of Mr Mohler.

“Rogers is completing his Ph.D. in biblical counseling at Southern Seminary, after earning his M.Div. and master of arts in biblical counseling from The Master’s Seminary in Sun Valley, California, in 2006. He is also a fellow and board member with the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors (ACBC) and previously served in several ministry positions, including as pastor of soul care at College Park Church in Indianapolis, Indiana.

“One of our most important programs at Southern Seminary and Boyce College is biblical counseling,” Mohler said. “Andrew Rogers will bring outstanding leadership to the Boyce College program, preparing a new generation of young people to counsel on the basis of the unqualified truthfulness, authority, and sufficiency of Scripture. Rogers comes with a long tenure of experience in biblical counseling and is a leader in the field. We eagerly look forward to him joining the Boyce College faculty.”

http://news.sbts.edu/2017/06/19/boyce-college-adds-old-testament-biblical-counseling-professors/

Lowlandseer wrote:

And here is an announcement about a new appointment in Biblical Counselling at Boyce, that meets the approval of Mr Mohler.

“Rogers is completing his Ph.D. in biblical counseling at Southern Seminary, after earning his M.Div. and master of arts in biblical counseling from The Master’s Seminary in Sun Valley, California, in 2006. He is also a fellow and board member with the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors (ACBC) and previously served in several ministry positions, including as pastor of soul care at College Park Church in Indianapolis, Indiana.

“One of our most important programs at Southern Seminary and Boyce College is biblical counseling,” Mohler said. “Andrew Rogers will bring outstanding leadership to the Boyce College program, preparing a new generation of young people to counsel on the basis of the unqualified truthfulness, authority, and sufficiency of Scripture. Rogers comes with a long tenure of experience in biblical counseling and is a leader in the field. We eagerly look forward to him joining the Boyce College faculty.”

http://news.sbts.edu/2017/06/19/boyce-college-adds-old-testament-biblical-counseling-professors/

And what kind of destruction will these “pastors” bring in their “counseling”?

@ TR:
Lol! He really used that scripture? Ok, If your thoughts offend……get a lobotomy?

Lowlandseer wrote:

And here is an announcement about a new appointment in Biblical Counselling at Boyce, that meets the approval of Mr Mohler.
“Rogers is completing his Ph.D. in biblical counseling at Southern Seminary, after earning his M.Div. and master of arts in biblical counseling from The Master’s Seminary in Sun Valley, California, in 2006. He is also a fellow and board member with the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors (ACBC) and previously served in several ministry positions, including as pastor of soul care at College Park Church in Indianapolis, Indiana.
“One of our most important programs at Southern Seminary and Boyce College is biblical counseling,” Mohler said. “Andrew Rogers will bring outstanding leadership to the Boyce College program, preparing a new generation of young people to counsel on the basis of the unqualified truthfulness, authority, and sufficiency of Scripture. Rogers comes with a long tenure of experience in biblical counseling and is a leader in the field. We eagerly look forward to him joining the Boyce College faculty.”
http://news.sbts.edu/2017/06/19/boyce-college-adds-old-testament-biblical-counseling-professors/

Wait, is that John MacArthur’s school?

And wasn’t MacArthur’s teaching on mental illness vs the Bible implicated in some lawsuit or perhaps some depressed person’s suicide?

Please pardon me if I have muddled some facts, and please feel free to provide the correct facts if my memory is not working correctly today.

Nick Bulbeck wrote:

Does “leading the field” involve having the wisdom and humility to solve a wide range of problems, or just becoming more and more practiced at giving the same answers to every problem?

I was driving through farm country and saw a farmer who was out standing in his field.

Well, and then I did a bit more research, and it’s a bit sicker than I thought.

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court, settling a clergy malpractice dispute that originated in Los Angeles, Monday refused to review a California decision holding that pastors and church workers have no legal duty to send troubled parishioners to licensed psychiatrists.

The high court action ends a 10-year legal battle over whether church counselors and unlicensed church therapists can be held liable for their advice. When a mid-level appellate court ruled that church officials could be forced to pay damages for inadequate advice, the case was cited as evidence of how far California courts had gone in stretching the limits of legal liability.

The case was based on the April 1, 1979, suicide of 24-year-old Kenneth Nally. Despondent because he had broken up with his girlfriend, Nally had already attempted suicide once and had been treated by physicians and a psychiatrist. He also had confided in pastors of the 10,000-member Grace Community Church in Sun Valley.

*snip*

MacArthur added: “I feel sympathy for the Nally family. But I never believed that the church was responsible in any way for what happened.”

Walter Nally said Monday that he was disturbed but not surprised by the decision. “This whole fight has been in vain as far as the courts are concerned,” he said. “It’s unfortunate that young people can die as a result of church counseling, and they don’t have a voice in our courts.”

http://articles.latimes.com/1989-04-04/news/mn-952_1_supreme-court

I don’t have the ability to see if this is still good law in the state of California. But I suspect, due to church-state separation issues, it still is. That being the case, I would absolutely not recommend church counseling, because there’s no way to hold people accountable when they do something wrong. And, keep in mind, at least in Arizona, none of the ACBC’s approved “counselors” hold a state license of any sort. I suspect that’s the case in pretty much every other state.

Lowlandseer wrote:

This is what R Albert Mahler wrote about Scripture and Conselling in 2014.
https://www.biblicalcounselingcoalition.org/2014/10/21/scripture-and-counseling-foreword-by-dr-r-albert-mohler-jr/

There is some scary stuff in there.

“Part of the biblical counseling ministry of the church proceeds from the pulpit as church members corporately submit themselves to the Word of God.”

The pulpit is now synonymous with the Word of God?

This goes with a comment I made on a different thread.

bonnie knox wrote:

I was driving through farm country and saw a farmer who was out standing in his field.

And nobody can deny.

Avid Reader wrote:

Whoa! That’s the same Stuart Scott that teaches that husbands should “do whatever is necessary” to correct their wives and doesn’t believe that the Holy Spirit still speaks to believers today?

Does “whatever is necessary” include fists?

Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

Does “whatever is necessary” include fists?

According to the reviewer, Scott emphatically teaches against physical enforcement of the husband’s will. So there’s that, at least.

@ Muslin, fka Dee Holmes:
Thank you for the information!

Avid Reader wrote:

Read between the lines—Stuart’s ACTUAL words were telling husband to “do whatever is necessary” to correct their wives as long as they remember that their “authority stops short of physically abusing our wives.”
Stops short of? God help us—this is the man training the next generation of pastors!

And counselors, apparently. How is it even POSSIBLE for women to get a fair hearing/treatment from someone like this???

Avid Reader wrote:

as long as they remember that their “authority stops short of physically abusing our wives.”

Yes, that is what I meant by “there’s that, at least.” It is pathetic, but it is necessary because some men have to be explicitly instructed that their authority is restricted.

I don’t have inside knowledge of what went on recently. But this story about 10 years ago is consistent with what I heard about 10 years ago. I had heard Eric was being threatened with being fire. He was not respected by the students and others in the program because, as I understood it, he would not go wholeheartedly for “biblical counseling”. I knew Eric and heard the story that Mohler had changed his mind back then and saw some of the abuses going on in “biblical counseling” at his seminary and thought then, 10 years ago, they needed Eric.
As we see in many other areas brought to light by WW, Mohler can not be trusted.
I knew Eric back 10 years ago. You will never meet a more humble caring person than Eric Johnson. He is thoroughly a good evangelical and Biblical person. I could recommend someone needing counseling going to Eric. But I would never recommend anyone go to a person for counseling who went to Southern Seminary.

It is interesting to note that, according to Christianity Today, the Trustees at SBTS

…plan to officially adopt the [Nashville] statement at their next meeting in October. The document, created by the Council of Biblical Manhood and Womanhood last month, joins the school’s “clarifying documents” like the Danvers Statement on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood and Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy.

So, in order to be a student or faculty of good standing (i.e., continued enrollment or employment), one must sign the Nashville Statement as well as the others, but NOT, it should be noted, the Nicene Creed; ESS is still okay.

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2017/september-web-only/johnson-southern-biblical-counseling-christian-psychology.html?start=2

Muslin, fka Dee Holmes wrote:

I don’t have the ability to see if this is still good law in the state of California. But I suspect, due to church-state separation issues, it still is. That being the case, I would absolutely not recommend church counseling, because there’s no way to hold people accountable when they do something wrong. And, keep in mind, at least in Arizona, none of the ACBC’s approved “counselors” hold a state license of any sort. I suspect that’s the case in pretty much every other state.

I’m pretty certain that unless ‘biblical counselors’ already have state licenses before they’re trained at Master’s or wherever, they’re not qualified to be licensed. These counselors have no oversight, no accountability, no malpractice insurance, no HIPAA restrictions, and no mandatory reporting requirements because most of them are not formally ordained. Best to avoid them and get help from a state licensed practitioner who is a Christian. I’ve seen some people’s lives seriously and irreversibly damaged as a result of ‘counseling’ from TMU/TMS grads.

Lea wrote:

I do hope somebody stands up and says ‘no’ on this.

I think it was C.S. Lewis who said something about men with chests. If, by chance, a Trustee stood up to the others, what would happen? He would be kicked out of the Cool Guys Club into the outer darkness of insignificance with the rest of us. Power is powerfully addictive.

Gram3 wrote:

If, by chance, a Trustee stood up to the others, what would happen? He would be kicked out of the Cool Guys Club into the outer darkness of insignificance with the rest of us. Power is powerfully addictive.

Yes. I think it’s one of those things where if it’s only one, they get kicked out. What if it’s two? 10? 50? 1000? If you kick too many people out of your club, you no longer have a club. Christianity shouldn’t be about staying in the clubhouse.

BTW, roaming on twitter and relevant to the discussion (maybe it was in the other thread) about how BC’s don’t care about results…some guy tweated this:

Well, a) I’m a BC, b) I’m not driven/impressed by results alone as to theory/practice, c) but I’m still glad you got help. I’m not mad.

!!!!!!!!!!!