The CGGC Needs a New Wineskin

Each of the first three New Testament Gospels records Jesus speaking a parable about new wine and old wineskins.  Here from Mark 2:22 ESV:

...no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins—and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins.

Entire books have been written exploring Jesus' meaning but, in general terms, His intent can't be missed: It is not possible to put what new is new and dynamic into a container that is old and rigid.

Based on what I am reading and hearing, there are many in the CGGC who are extremely hopeful that, through the leadership of the new G.C. E.D., change for the good will take place in our body.  And, I also wish only the best to Lance and our body.

However, I am not optimistic.

I have little hope over the issue of the CGGC wineskin. 

I am certain that we need to use a new wineskin, yet it has been the practice of our body, for several generations, to demand that the old wineskin is perfectly adequate to contain any wine we choose to put into it.

And, any CGGCer who is honest has to admit that every time we've tried to change programs and strategies, i.e., the wine, we have insisted on not changing core values and organizational structures, or the wineskin. 

And, we always fail.

As I read Lance, and as I have known him over the last twenty-plus years, I have known him to be a new wine kind of guy.  He is bright and creative.  He has already demonstrated the courage to boldly assess the state of the CGGC union as failing, one that, without change, has a bleak future.

Here's what I hope for and pray for as far as Lance is concerned:  That he begin with the wineskin, or, as I've usually said it, at the macro level.  That he courageously look straight into the eyes of the mountaintoppers, those who have prospered from the old wineskin, and demand that change begin at the level of our values, that he demand that nothing of the old structure, including well-compensated staff positions, even his own, can be considered sacred.

It, as I say, clear to me that Lance is a new wine guy.  I don't know, however, that he is a new wineskin guy.

Can we all agree that no changed rooted in failed values and merely based in a new program or strategy is likely to succeed?  Can we agree that we need a change of heart?

The truth is that these are truth we have not agreed to in practice for a long time.

We must repent of the wineskin.

Then, we can buy some new wine.

The CGGC Message. And How the Supreme Court Changed It.

It strikes me that the greatest significance of the recent Supreme Court decision has been that it forced a change in the message that the CGGC transmits.

We are not now what we were.

Since the early 1990s and the creation of the program known as MORE AND BETTER DISCIPLES: 35,000 IN WORSHIP BY 2000, the core CGGC message has been the simple plea:

COME TO OUR CHURCH!

From that time on, in practice and belief, we have openly invited one and all to sit their fannies in a CGGC sanctuary and to, therefore, by our actual word, be a disciple of Jesus.

Certainly, not all of us embrace that message as truth, but as a body, it is a reasonable description of how we have lived out what we believe for more than twenty years.

However, we have responded to the same sex marriage thing from the same mountaintop that produced the, then, current message. And, we have now qualified that open invitation.

As is the case with shepherds handling truth, the change is defensive--reactionary.

The new message?

COME TO OUR CHURCH (but not to marry someone of the same sex.)

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My friends, this is not good enough and it's certainly not true to the way of Jesus, Who spoke righteously yet mercifully to the woman at the well--after HE sought HER out--and who extended His hand to touch an untouchable leper.

I have been waiting for something to come down from the mountain about this sea change moment that is anything other than institutional and sacramental. As each day passes, I have less and less hope for something of Jesus to appear.

Our truth is that we are, for the moment, an institution and we are sacramental in how we do ministry. So, by all means, let the mountaintoppers deal with that part of the issue. But, please, guys, don't stop there.

Gathering 7-26-15--The Same Sex Marriage Talk

We finally addressed the issue of the day.

It's been nearly a month since the U.
S. Supreme Court handed down a decision legalizing same sex marriage in all fifty states. And, though it has been hard to escape discussion of the issue, until today, we had.

As I repeat ad nauseam here, our gatherings are not focused on the worship of God in the way Christendomites worship. For us, worship happens when an individual disciple offers his/her body as a living sacrifice. We meet to spur each other on to love and good works, the love and good works being the worship.

When the same sex weddings thing did come up today, it was a part of what for us is a more important conversation about how each of us stands up for truth without being ashamed of the gospel or our Lord.

The issue, as most conservative Christendomites have to deal with it, that is, how do we avoid having to ritualize gay marriage? is one we won't ever have to deal with because we don't have a sanctuary, or believe in them, and we don't do weddings for anyone. Period.

Knowing what the typical evangelical response to the Supreme Court has been, it struck me how different our mindset is. Our people's question is, "How can I be salt and light and a testimony for Jesus?" not, "How can we preserve the purity of our sanctuary? And, how can we protect our pastor from being forced to officiate at a same sex wedding?"

In the New Testament, clergy didn't officiate over weddings and the word church wasn't used to describe the part of a building where rituals were performed.

So, we are free to struggle to spur each other on to lives that rebuke sin, stand for truth and offer love and mercy to people who need to believe that Jesus is Lord.

In the conversation today, that ran longer than any reasonable sermon, there was some discussion of "the religion of pleasure," which is hedonism, the idea that what brings pleasure or happiness is truth. It seems to me that in our group, we are opposed to it. I'm not sure everyone in even the theologically conservative church is. Perhaps more on that later.

Yet Another Act of Mercy that has Come to Nothing?

Last week we received an email from our Regional office asking churches to send in our stories of community involvement and a few years ago we could have done that easily. In fact, a few years ago, The CHURCH ADVOCATE ran an article about our congregation's nontraditional VBS which was held in the community park, not on our own property.

These days, however, we are no longer writing those stories. We see the struggle to bring individuals to repentance as our commission. We no longer work for community transformation.

And, from our experience, when you function from the place in which you are practicing mercy and grace, both of which, by the definition we use, are undeserved and offered to people who have not earned acts of love, you don't often have happily ever after stories to tell.

We take solace in our frequent failures in the example of Jesus who was despised and rejected by nearly all who surrounded the cross that held His dying body. Success, by that standard, is defined by faithfulness to God's will, not by a happily ever after end to the story.

That brings me to an update on the woman I have called Janey in the past. She came to Evelyn because she heard that our church gives financial assistance to people in need.

We gathered information on her situation and, in the process, Evelyn proclaimed the gospel to her and explained the need for personal repentance. We have been schmoozed many times in the past. And, I believe that Janey wanted more from us than money. I think she wanted a spiritual life with God through Christ.

In the end, the rest of our group was ambivalent but Evie and I felt led to take a risk on Janey. All of our tithe and offering money goes to people in need. None of it goes to the church. So we took a decent sized chunk of what we set aside and sent a check to Janey's landlord, to whom she owed money.

Since then, the contact with Janey has slowly evaporated to the point that we are now hearing nothing from her.

Again, I truly believe that she wanted repentance for her own life, but, as Jesus taught in His parable of the soils, it seems that she will not, in the end, produce fruit.

In our gathering's discussion on what to do with Janey, our talk focused on Ephesians 2:10 which says that we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works which God prepared in advance for us to do and the question: Is this a work He prepared for us to do?

Evie and I decided that we had to act as if it was such an act. Others were not convinced.

Two thoughts:

1. Failure or not, I, personally, don't regret the investment of the money, or the time or of the love and mercy. It is the Lord's money and my conscience is clear.

2. It breaks my heart that, in the CGGC, we have no community beyond our own group in which to work through these decisions.

Gathering 7-23-15: The First in Eight Weeks

Do you have a friend whom you hardly ever see these days and, when you do meet, feel as if you have never been apart? To be able to live in relationship in that way is fruit of a profound and mature relationship.

Imagine, if you can, that your "church" didn't hold a worship service for eight straight weeks. What do you suppose that next meeting would feel like?

As far as our Thursday night group is concerned, we don't have to imagine. We met last night for the first time in eight weeks and, to me, it was as if we'd just met last Thursday.

There was one significant difference between this one and all of the previous gatherings of the group: We met in our home so that our 89 year old next door neighbor, whose family is out of state for a few days, could join us.

We had a very sweet gathering. Everyone was comfortable.

As I've mentioned in connection to all our groups, there never is a plan for the gathering. We have become adept at permitting the Spirit to lead.

One participant was delayed at the last minute so we decided to put off the taking of the bread and cup until after the (very delicious and lovingly prepared) meal.

I led, when we did, as I do only rarely and I was blessed to do it and by the spirit of it, even with Mary, our neighbor, present for the first time.

After that time worked itself out, we spontaneously entered into a time of praise along with the confession of sin, which led to an honest and intimate time of affirmation.

It strikes me that one crucial difference between what we do and the traditional, seeker-sensitive, Christendom-oriented, parish priest led service is that what we do organically allows for the confession of sin to one another to take place. And, it does take place among us fairly often.

Our gatherings seem to me to produce fruit of repentance among our people much more than traditional services do, in my opinion.

One reason, I believe, is that we are all invited to make our own sin and failure fair game in our gathering culture.

And, so, we can not gather for eight weeks and pick up without skipping a beat.

We are blessed.

The CGGC Web Site

(I'm a little under the weather these days, dealing with some dental issues, and don't have the wherewithal to do the blog justice but I have been playing with my phone.)

I noticed some rebooting of the CGGC web site.

You may recall that, some time ago, I criticized the theology of the "JOIN JESUS" banners atop the CGGC website. Incidentally, I encountered some pretty ferocious off-the-blog backlash against my theological take on the join Jesus stuff.

Well, JOIN JESUS is gone from the web site.

It's too early to know if this change signals actual theological orthodoxy on the CGGC mountaintop but here's hoping.

http://www.cggc.org/

No Gathering--But Confrontation of Sin: 7-19-15

We'd'a met today but others who are core providers of grace to those who are among "the least of these" were not going to be participating and I, at least, felt as if the load that would have fallen on us--especially Evie--would have been too great. I know she would've done it anyway. No one I know carries her own cross more willingly than Evie does.

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Still, we are able to keep in touch and I just finished an exchange, via text, with another gatherer regarding how to respond to the brouhaha that is exploding everywhere regarding same sex marriage and Christianity.

I was startled and upset yesterday to see that, I'll call her Alli, linked on Facebook to a Huffington Post article blasting Franklin Graham for opposing same sex marriage and then arguing from Greek and Hebrew that the Bible does not have a problem with same sex sex.

Alli, it happens, is an avid texter. She is always the first to respond to a group text. We've had many good chats over the years via text and, so, texting seemed a good way to approach her. So, I confronted her.

It went well...at least so far.

I told her that I have been reading Greek and Hebrew for about forty years and that none of the conclusions the article reached are based in truth.

She said she linked to the article because she sees so much anger and hate on Facebook toward gays from her Christian Facebook friends.

I pointed out that her article was filled with hate speech toward Franklin Graham and reminded her of the many ways Samaritan's Purse shows God's love to people in need. I believe that she felt a little convicted for advancing hate speech herself.

The conversation concluded with an agreement that it is challenging to stand up for grace and mercy at a time when so many around us are so angry but that we have to hold to what is true while also walking in love.

I know that this issue is not resolved but I have taken a first step.

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Alli never reads this blog so she has no idea of the conversation that is taking place here and my criticism of CGGC mountaintoppers for actually doing nothing regarding gays other than to take legal steps to withhold from gays the CGGC version of the Sacrament of Christian Marriage.

As I think about it, I am more and more convinced that, while we, in the CGGC, will talk mercy and love and outreach, we never will walk those actions.

Time will tell.

A Spirited Exhange over Yesterday's Post

Gang,

This came in last night from someone whom I regularly quote anonymously on this blog.  I edited slightly to preserve anonymity.

In recent years, particularly because I'm an ERCer, I have spoken of theological bankruptcy on General Conference and Regional mountaintops.  I have to point out, as I noted in my reply, those days have changed, in Findlay at least.

We are in danger of starting a new chapter of Talk-ism.  That deeply concerns me.

My reply is in italics.

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Bill, You have me nuts!  What are you trying to say about same sex marriage. make it very clear so I can’t miss your point.  

 

With the Bruce Jennner thing..., I am not in a very good mood.  Maybe you should read the book called “Making gay okay” by Robert R. Reilly, or you should listen to Ravi Zacharias for his take on the matter.

 

Monday (I talked to) a young man who is about to enter ministry. He spoke so clearly about the conference and his position on same sex marriage.

 

You who brag about your integrity concerning scripture have me real confused.  Right now I’m in no mood for a guy who somehow seems to think he is right and the rest of us are not!

 

In fact, the catholic stance is looking pretty good to me right now

 

****

 

My friend,

I thought I was actually pretty clear and I'm not certain what your confusion is.

So far, all the ERC and CGGC have actually done is to insulate clergy and CGGC real estate from same sex marriage rituals and I think that to do only that is sin.  We have done absolutely nothing else.

I like a lot of what Lance said.  I believe I made that clear.  What is beginning to scare me is that, it seems to me, the next phase in the evolution of CGGC Talk-ism will be to endorse what Lance says and pretend that, by saying we agree with it, we have acted on it.

Let me tell you in advance that Lance has a lot of good things to say.

There is a serious danger in the possibility that leaders will do what Kevin did the other day and endorse Lance's biblical common sense as if agreeing with truth alone is living truth and then, as Kevin audaciously did the other day, add one more piece of institutional ammo to the strategy to insulate clergy and church real estate from the sinners who are right outside of our churches' doors.

Hedonism is taking over the culture and we suppose we are standing for truth simply because we agree with what someone else says about truth so long as we take legal steps to keep sinners from accessing our religious products and services.

That is very wrong.

Can I be more clear?

bill

Gathering: 7-16-15

The last time our Thursday night group met was June 28. I checked the blog. So, that's what? seven weeks?

That's not a huge deal for the way we live in community, like it would be for others, but it matters.

We were all set to meet last night and I was really looking forward to the meeting. (The Thursday group is the one that feeds me best.)

Everything was set for the gathering when, early in the afternoon, my mom and dad had a meltdown, ended up in a state of extreme paranoia, and absolutely DEMANDED the family come to them in the evening and give an accounting of "what's going on...that we don't know about!"

That demand came to me. So, I, with heart break, set about calling off the gathering, explaining and asking for forgiveness. There was compassion and understanding in the group, and I am thankful for that.

I am still feeling the spiritual loss of missing out on the gathering.

In the end, the family showed up for mom and dad and they barely remembered that they had summoned us.

That left me frustrated and angry at them and, more so, with myself because they can't help it.

Harrumph!

Conversation of my "Raw Reflections" Thread

Gang,

As someone who only 85 days ago had the Administrative Council of his Region vote unanimously (and, as far as I can tell, illegitimately) to recall his ministerial credentials, I have not been accustomed to receiving praise for the things I say and do, especially from individuals who are from my Region.

Nevertheless, since I entered my raw reflections some praise has come my way, some of it from a decent distance up the ERC mountain though, by no means, from one of its peaks.

Two members of the ERC clergy have contacted me by email with positive comments and constructive conversation and one of those (the surprises continue) has authorized me to include his comments--AND NAME!!!-- on this blog.

And, so I will do that.

I have already offered some preliminary comments in response but will enter some further comments at the end of this post.

My deepest gratitude to George Jensen for his email and my deepest admiration for his uncommon courage in engaging me in conversation and authorizing me to publically identify his comments with his name.

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Bill,

 

Connecting your original posting in “Raw Reflections” (which was good – I think what you and Evie did for “Ann” was spot on) with your comments to Dan’s deleted comments, am I correct in concluding that you think that the CGGC is guilty of only addressing the whole LGBT issue by banning same-sex couples from being married in our sanctuaries?  While that may be the only response some congregations have considered concerning this issue, is it not true that our leadership is encouraging a ministry mindset that is consistent with what you and Evie did for “Ann” while at the same time recommending that we codify the banning same-sex union services in our churches (for our legal protection)?  One only needs to read Lance’s first e-news as Executive Director (sent out July 2) to see this is the case.  So, if I am correct in concluding that you have a “beef” with the CGGC as a whole concerning how it is responding to the LGBT issue, especially when the leadership has encouraged and recommended a “like Evie-responded-to-Ann” mindset (for lack of a better terminology) for ministry, why so (that is, what is the basis of your “beef”)?  Feel free to copy this onto your blog if you want to.  I don’t’ have a blog account and I don’t have time to set one up today.

 

-George C. Jensen

 
George is correct is describing my, as he calls it, "beef."

Based merely on the response that I have received personally to my characteristics of the CGGC Brand, the one Characteristic that I identify which resonates most powerfully with people who hope for repentance in the CGGC is To Talk is to Walk-ism.

Within the last decade, especially, within the CGGC, we seem to have become convinced that to say something is actually to do it.  I have provided numerous real-life examples of how the works.  The most irritating of these to me is the Mission Statement's assertion that we establish churches on the New Testament plan when, in fact, we never exegete the New Testament in determining how we will move forward and, in fact, mine the traditions of the Middle Ages more than ever as we develop new policies and programs.

It surprises me that George, who has a significant prophetic streak in him, would be satisfied with the, admittedly, articulate, wise and, certainly, very sincere words that Lance published two weeks ago.  For all of the wonderful things you can say about Lance and what he has written,...

...as the Bee Gees sang, back in 68, "It's only words."

And, words, these days, far too easily pass for real-life action in the CGGC.

The truth remains that the sum total of what the CGGC has done in response to the rise of hedonism and its fruit, the recent SCOTUS decision legalizing same sex marriage, is to take action insulating members of the CGGC clergy and CGGC sanctuaries from participating in and hosting same sex marriage rituals.

The CGGC has yet to do anything flavored with grace, mercy and love toward people who embrace hedonism in any form, and, particularly, homosexuality.

Based both on what we have done and not done, I am appalled and profoundly opposed. 

I am angry at our leaders and I am also angry with the complacency of our entire body.   My heart breaks from those all around us who are dying in their sin.

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I have three comments about what has come from CGGC mountaintops:

1.  It is compromised to the point of meaninglessness by WE BELIEVE's absolute proclamation of universal CGGC tolerance.

I've quoted this foolishness earlier and have pointed out that I opposed it from the beginning.  WE BELIEVE says

From its formation, the Churches of God stressed the importance of unity in essentials, liberty in non-essentials, and charity in all things. The Church seeks to uphold biblical truth while respecting personal freedom.

With that understanding, any declarations we publish about same sex marriage, no matter what policies we establish, we now declare, by the authority of the General Conference in session, our highest human authority, that our body has always held, as its most important absolute, tolerance of diversity in all things. 

We stress unity in some things, liberty in others but, in all things, we stress charity.  We seek to uphold the Bible's truth only the extent that, in doing so, we don't show a lack of respect for the exercise of personal freedom.  (To this day, the General Conference's approval of that sentence leaves me weak in the knees!  What could the delegates possibly have been thinking?)

2.  In action, it is purely institutional.

What we have actually done is focused on insulating members of the CGGC clergy and CGGC real estate. 

In the spirit of Talk-ism, we claim to be kingdom-oriented and externally focused but, as has been the case for nearly ten years, when we actually do something, we turn inward and we think about church--worse than that, INSTITUTIONAL church--not kingdom. 

We don't do anything focused on the world that God loved so much that He gave His only begotten Son to.

3.  It is heartless and intellectual.

What we have gone to the trouble actually to do is of the human mind, not of God's heart.

In the note I copied from George and in the other conversation I have had about Raw Reflections, the act of mercy that Evie practiced, with me in a supporting role, was praised.  None of the heart that produced our action toward "Ann" is reflected in what the CGGC has done to this date regarding homosexuals or same sex marriage rituals.

As I read what is coming down from the mountaintop, to the point that it produces action, is extremely legalistic, and not in a pharisaical way.  At this point, I'd be blessed by good, old-fashioned biblical phariseeism in comparison to what the mountaintoppers are doing. 

When I read action-oriented content coming out of Findlay, my sense is that it is not written for my consumption.  It is written with an attorney's approval to be read, not by people seeking Christ or by followers of Christ, but by judges.

This offends me.  I hope it offends others who pray, "Your Kingdom come, your will be done...."

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Anyway, George, I am with you to the extent that I am a fan of what Lance, only one person, has written.

I am encouraged, as some of you may know, that Dr. Richardson has endorsed it from the top of the ERC mountain.

But, the New Testament truth is that, one day, all of us will be judged by the King and, as the King tells it, we won't be judge by our words, much less by words of others that we like. 

He will identify His own by what they have done--by the fruit their lives have produced.

So far, based on what we have done, there is no Jesus in us on this matter.  No mercy.  No love.  No grace.

As far as this is concerned, we could be offering seminars to the Amish in keeping the world at bay.

We must repent.

Functionally Liberal

You may know that in Revelation 2 and 3 Jesus addresses churches and repeatedly He says, "I know your deeds," not, "I know what you believe" or "I know what you think."

It's not, in my opinion, that what we believe and think is unimportant but, in the end, if what we believe and think is faulty the fault will bear fruit in actions that don't reflect the righteousness Jesus lived and taught.

So, all those centuries ago, Jesus made it simple for those churches and judged them by their deeds, even when the sin He found in a church traced to following false teachings.

Recently, I posted a disturbing passage from WE BELIEVE which describes the CGGC as valuing, among other things liberty in some areas of belief, charity in all things and the upholding of biblical truth only in a way that holds exercising personal freedom as being as important to us as upholding biblical truth.

And, I pointed out that these are the sentiments precisely reflect the convictions of the radically theologically liberal. And, they are.

The truth is that the people of the CGGC are not theologically liberal, yet, stunningly, delegates to General Conference approved that liberal language and gave that language supreme authority in our body.

Certainly, what we think is not liberal but what we profess to do in regard to biblical truth is radically liberal, even to the point that we balance the authority of the Word against each person's right to exercise personal freedom. In this way, our deeds are liberal. Radically, radically liberal.

Based on WE BELIEVE, we are functionally liberal.

But why?

One of my characteristics of the CGGC brand is: Mellow Relationships Over Truth.

Though we get to the bottom line in a different way than liberals do, we get to the same bottom line, one in which biblical truth is not our absolute authority. One in which the exercise of personal freedom is as important to us upholding the Word.

In the CGGC, for several generations, the seeking of placid, tolerant relationships has been the end all and be all, so much so that we could put language in WE BELIEVE that limits our quest to uphold biblical truth so as to allow for the exercise of personal freedom.
Sadly, while nearly all of us vehemently disagree with what liberals think, we end up holding the same value as far as the authority of biblical truth is concerned--at least according to WE BELIEVE , we do.

But, do we?

I don't.

Gathering: 7-12-15

I haven't been feeling well for the past few days. Last night, I hope, was the worst of it. I rarely sleep five hours a night and am awake and out of bed by about six most mornings. Last night, I slept amost straight through from about 9:00 until after 7:00 this morning. This may be the second time in this calendar year that I slept until seven.

I say that to explain that Evie did nearly all the preparation for the gathering.

And, during the gathering, I did far more consuming than participating and, that's okay.

It was a wonderful time in the Spirit. Evie had a notion about where she hoped the meeting would go and started us moving in that direction but her vision was never realized.

Key participants in the group are in the midst of a real emotional and spiritual struggle within their larger family. We have been offering listening ears to them recently and I planned to make certain that we received an update but before they even sat down, they told us that they had an update. So we listened and responded for a long time, perhaps 20 or 30 minutes.

We are all about Hebrews 10 and spurring each other on to love and good works and that is what we did.

There was sporadic praise time throughout the gathering today but the majority of the gathering time focused on the taking of the bread and cup. The theme, I know, was unplanned but it came to be about thanking the triune God for the cross.

As the gathering broke up, after the meal, several people commented on how that conversation was precisely what they needed today. My thought is that that is not surprising because, today, nearly everyone present had a hand in moving the direction of the discussion of the Word, as we moved in the Spirit. The actual taking of the bread and cup was a blessing and the meal we shared was a special blessing, so much more than a matter of the food and drink.

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One other loosely connected note. We attended a funeral this week. The service was in a church and it was the closest thing to a Sunday morning show as we have experienced for a while. So much of what I once took for granted now seems like unnecessary drama to me. For example, being told when to stand and sit. The standing/sitting thing is not a part of what we do. In gathering, people do those things when and how they want and, because we are all participants and not consumers the need to move the flock around is not much of an issue.

One final observation about the funeral service: the family choose to sing I'LL FLY AWAY. When we got to the final chorus, the organist got us started and then stopped so we ended singing a cappella. It was beautiful.

It was also what we do all the time. And, I've come to prefer non-instrumentalized singing. It was good enough for the Apostle Paul....

As I Read the New WE BELIEVE, All CGGCers can do Whatever they Please as far as Gay Marriage is Concerned

You may recall that I strenuously opposed the revision of We Believe that was adopted by the General Conference in session in 2013.

I wasn't alone in that. 

Reports I received from the debate on the floor suggest to me that the debate over the motion to approve We Believe was lengthy and spirited and that the vote for approval was very far from unanimous.

I have had very limited conversation about what others opposed in it and, my sense is that objections were primarily either to specific doctrinal assertions made by WB or to previously important positions no longer included in the current edition.

I will admit that I paid very little attention to what WB asserts we do believe or to what it has left out. 

In reading it, I couldn't get past the Introduction, which I, to this day, believe castrated our body's ability to create accountability for its members as far as matters of belief--and the behaviors related to belief--are concerned.

In the end, the CGGC's highest human authority, the delegates to General Conference, approved this dangerous and debilitating language included in the Introduction to We Believe:

From its formation, the Churches of God stressed the importance of unity in essentials, liberty in non-essentials, and charity in all things. The Church seeks to uphold biblical truth while respecting personal freedom.

Now, let me just say that, in my opinion, as a matter of history, these assertions are lies.  They are hogwash.  They misrepresent the truth of our past.

But, my opinion aside, by the authority of the General Conference in session, these sentences define the role of absolute truth in the CGGC in 2015 and in the foreseeable future.

We now believe of ourselves that we stress unity in essentials, though we don't define what is and is not essential.  You are free to have your own essentials and I am free to create my own. 

Therefore, even the definition of what we stress unity in is left to personal interpretation and choice because there is absolutely no standard given. 

Historically, I think, when other faith groups use this sort of language, though, essentials are, generally considered to be the basis content of the Gospel, "that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scripture and that he appeared...." (1 Cor. 151f)  But, as far as the CGGC since 2013 is concerned, even the matter of what is essential in what we believe is nebulous and undefined.

Beyond that, by the authority of the General Conference in session, we stress the importance of liberty in non-essentials and, beyond that, in all things--whether they be essentials or non-essentials--we stress charity.

More tragically, according to the General Conference in session, we balance the upholding of,  obedience to?, biblical truth because we respect personal freedom. 

In other words, biblical truth doesn't trump personal freedom within the CGGC.  Neither what the Bible teaches, even what it commands, is more important than an individual's exercise of his/her freedom to act and think as s/he sees fit.

So, in the end, we are left with undefined essentials and the proclamation that, beyond those murky waters, we are absolutely committed to practicing charity because that is what "charity in all things" means.  And, we are certainly not authorized to hold anyone in the body accountable to biblical teachings, even the commands of Jesus, because we, as a matter of principle, respect personal freedom as much as we uphold biblical truth.

---------------------------------

For the prophet, there is an ability to see, as the Lord gives vision, the connection between the present and the future.

When I railed against the approval of We Believe it is precisely because I absolutely knew, of a certainty, that what We Believe said about essentials and non-essentials, charity, biblical truth and personal freedom would become a major problem for us.

Understand.  Those statements about essentials, non-essentials, charity in all thing and the balancing of biblical truth and personal freed are universal. 

Those statements purport to describe all of our history and everything we have said and done from day one.  When we say,

From its formation, the Churches of God stressed the importance of unity in essentials, liberty in non-essentials, and charity in all things. The Church seeks to uphold biblical truth while respecting personal freedom...

 ...we have applied them to that Marriage, the Bible and the CGGC document that we are now using as authority.  They apply to the Resolutions from 1986 and the excerpt from General Conference minutes in 2014 which are now being ballyhooed. 

None of those documents have authority if they compromise the necessity to practice charity in all things (including the issues of sexuality and same sex marriage) and, if biblical truth doesn't trump personal freedom, certainly those humanly written documents can't override it.

Why? because the CGGC stresses unity in only some things and liberty in some other things but, above that, in all things, we stress charity.  Because we don't uphold even biblical truth above one's right to exercise his/her own freedom.

In We Believe, we hold charity and the balancing of biblical truth to be our only, once and for all of our history, absolutes.

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Bottom line: 

The only absolute authority we have in the CGGC today requires that we set aside biblical teachings and commands regarding sexuality and marriage to the point that we can't allow the Bible to interfere with someone whose sense of freedom leads him or her to practice homosexuality or to welcome same sex couples who want to have their love sanctified in a CGGC church. 

Hope that some day a gay couple doesn't take a copy of the absolute proclamations of We Believe to a judge!

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In the past, I have noted that our theology is both theologically bankrupt and corrupt.  I knew that a day like this was coming.  It has now arrived.

Glory, if you want, in undefined essentials of the faith, in liberty in non-essentials, in charity in all things and the balancing of the authority of the Word of God against the exercise of personal freedom.

I, for one, denounce them.  As I did.  As I always will!

Repent of your shallow, tolerant, misguided sense of what is absolute.

Raw Reflections

I'm writing this while it is still raw.

We just returned from a funeral. We were not mourning the deceased. We'd only seen him a few times in the 40ish years since we were first introduced to him but we are close to members of his family.

We know a handful of the about one hundred people who attended the service. Two of the people we know are women who are obviously a couple though they are very discrete about it. So discrete, in fact, that the woman who was not a relative of the deceased attended but kept her distance from her companion during the day's activities.

This woman, I'll call her Ann, clearly was grieving. She herself knew the deceased well and was feeling her own grief and she was grieving for the woman she loves in her loss.

We entered the so called sanctuary early and were seated when Ann came tiptoeing in on the outside so as not to be noticed. Ann sat down on the far outside of a pew away from everyone else but only two pews up from the one we were in. When she sat down, I whisper-shouted ANN, someone leaned over and nudged her, she looked over, Evie and I waved her into our pew, she came over, Evie opened her arms offering a hug and Ann just melted. Quietly, but right there in the sanctuary, she melted down. She wept silently and hugged Evie desperately.

-------------------

There are a lot of things I don't know about the life of love that Jesus commands and about what it means to show mercy.

I don't always know what it looks to show love and to live a life of mercy but I do know some things about what it does not look like. As, I was watching Ann weep on Evie's shoulder and listening to Evie's tender words of comfort, my mind actually raced to thoughts of people in the church who think they are being faithful to Jesus simply by banning same sex couples from being married in their sanctuaries.

And, I became angry at those people.

Double Trouble

I found this a few weeks back through a Facebook friend:

http://www.christianitytoday.com/edstetzer/2015/june/rapid-rise-of-non-denominational-christianity-my-most-recen.html

When you think about Barna's projection of the decline of the local congregation along with what Stetzer observes about the decline of denominational Christianity, you can see why some of us are less than enthusiastic about the increased emphasis on the local congregation and the denomination from the CGGC mountaintops in recent years.

Neither Barna nor Stetzer see a serious decline in Christianity but both see that the very thing the CGGC has been working toward crumbling rapidly in the near future.

The Spirit Himself seems to be moving and CGGC leaders seem to be demanding that we follow a path other than the one the Spirit is directing.

The Historic Importance of the CGGC's Rosenberry Era

75

What follows is something I began to work on nearly three years ago.  As you will see, it is an attempt to assess the significance of the Rosenberry Era in the CGGC. 

I wrote it in the flood of my strong, negative emotion that was my response to Ed's Leadership by Program, after the Findlay mountaintoppers announced their embrace, on behalf of the entire CGGC, of the fad-of-the-moment that was Transformational Church.  (You will note that my prediction at the time that it would amount to nothing more than one more flash in the pan was accurate.)

Anyway, by the time I finished writing what follows, I discovered that I was thinking outrageous thoughts and coming to outlandish conclusions about Ed's leadership which startled even me.  So much so that I couldn't bring myself to click Publish. 

I've been sitting on this for nearly three years, not knowing if I agree with myself or not but, in the end, I'd have to say that I'm about 90% on board with what I wrote.

I publish it now because the import of the Rosenberry Era is something that Lance and, for that matter all of the CGGC, will have to deal with.

We know how great the struggle is for a single congregation to move forward after a pastor who has radically redefined that church's ministry has moved on.  How will Lance deal with filling Ed's shoes?  How will we, as a body, treat Lance in the light of the end of the historically game-changing Rosenberry Era.

Think about it.

Feel free to agree or disagree with me on the blog or in private.

I'd love to know how you appraise Ed and how you think we should embrace Lance and the challenges he faces as Ed's successor.

----------------------------------------------

"I have concluded that by the year 2025...only about one-third of the population will rely upon a local congregation as the primary or exclusive means for experiencing and expressing their faith..." (George Barna, Revolution, 2005, p. 49)

----------------------------

Ed Rosenberry is a game changer.

In all the history of the Church of God, no one impacted our body in the way John Winebrenner did.

In the space of ten years, Winebrenner progressed from being an attractive, dynamic young ministerial candidate in the view of the German Reformed Church's congregations in and near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania to become a radical advocate of 'new measures' evangelism so much so that his actions caused him to be locked out of the Harrisburg church.

In a short time within those ten years, Winebrenner became an innovative church reformer who could not function even as a radical in the German Reformed Church.

Ultimately, Winebrenner's views became so outside the mainstream that he formed a new body of converted sinners committed to "the establishment of churches on the New Testament plan."  On the day that body, the Church of God, was formed Winebrenner went so far as to reject Protestantism, calling for "another great reformation."

To this date, only one person, Christian Henry Forney, has been acknowledged to have an impact on the Churches of God that can be spoken of in the same conversation as Winebrenner's.

Forney's impact was so great that he was able, within about 70 years of the founding of the Church of God, to transform Winebrenner's "another great reformation" movement into a Protestant denomination which no longer yearned for that other "great reformation" of Winebrenner's dream. Forney succeeded in redefining the Churches of God as a Protestant body.

Forney did that by leading the Church of God away from Winebrenner's extreme view of the ordinances--Feetwashing, in particular--into an understanding of church rituals which, though unique, accepted Protestant Low Church presumptions.

Ed Rosenberry is noteworthy because he is, in this day, creating change nearly as groundbreaking as the change Winebrenner wrought and, in some ways, even more extraordinary than the change Forney achieved. 

Agree or disagree with the fruit of Ed's leadership, the time has come to acknowledge his extraordinary achievement. 

In doing so, however, it is important to note:

One difference between Ed's revolution and that of Winebrenner
is that Winebrenner's thinking was innovative
--far ahead of its time--
while Ed's is reactionary, intended to restore
imagined old days and old ways.

Until recently, I would have agreed with conventional wisdom and said that the three big movers of  CGGC change have been:

1. John Winebrenner,
2. C. H. Forney, and
3. S. G. (Sherman Grant) Yahn.

And, until recently, both Forney and Yahn were and should have been ranked above Ed for the degree in which their achievements broke important ground. 

Because Yahn is less studied:

Yahn's great achievement was to shepherd into existence the first formal CGGC Doctrinal Statement.  In 1925, after years of preparation, Yahn was able to lead the adoption of a Doctrinal Statement, and to convince the people of the Churches of God that they were being true to their history, even though Winebrenner was famous to them for saying,

“The Church of God has no authoritative constitution, ritual, creed, catechism, book of discipline, or church standard, but the Bible. The Bible she believes to be the only creed, discipline, church standard, the test-book, which God ever intended his church to have.”

The adoption of the Doctrinal Statement was an historic achievement.  It does not, however, rank with what Ed Rosenberry is doing in the CGGC today for two reasons:

First, what Yahn did fit tightly into the spirit of his time.  The year 1925 was the height of the Fundamentalist-Modernist debate.  Other bodies were doing what Yahn led the Church of God to do, i.e., to choose, formally, one side or the other. 

Second, what Yahn did, simply extended what Forney began.  Forney chiseled out a Protestant identity for the Churches of God.  Yahn merely refined that identity in terms of the driving issue of his day.

Ed Rosenberry's leadership is far more noteworthy in that it is succeeding

in convincing the CGGC to defy the spirit of this time. 

Rowing upstream is difficult.  It is even harder to convince others to join you in doing it.  It is a rare and extraordinary achievement to do that and to convince people who you've convinced to row upstream to feel complacent, even excited, even righteous, about doing it.

That is precisely what Ed is doing.

Between about 2005 and 2007, a small but passionate, yet growing, core in the CGGC had formed around the conviction that the CGGC must no longer be church-centered and internally-focused with an increasingly top-heavy leadership hierarchy. 

In those years, words and phrases such as Kingdom-centered, externally-focused, apostolic, the priesthood of all believers and flat organizational chart entered into the CGGC conversation. 

In addition, during those days, and for a few more years while Ed was laying a foundation, there was vibrant conversation about how the CGGC should respond to that day's fad, the Emerging Church's, passion to make the gospel meaningful to postmodern people. 

Before Ed, a remnant of CGGC people engaged in that conversation and formed themselves into a rather tight apostolic/prophetic community which carried on a cutting-edge dialog regarding those issues on a blog devoted to fashioning a place for "The CGGC in an Emerging World."

Under Ed's historically powerful leadership, all of that is now dust in the wind.

Ed Rosenberry is about church.

He is a shepherd--a flock man.

Here are five historically important fruit of Ed Rosenberry's leadership:

1. There is no longer conversation valuing Kingdom over church.
2. There is, now, no dialog about making the gospel meaningful to postmoderns.
3. Focus has been returned to discipleship through bringing people to the institutional church, instead of the sending disciples to reach the people who need to follow Jesus.
4. The organizational chart is not flattening; it is has become more hierarchical and top-heavy than it has ever been.
5. Conversation about abandoning the distinction between clergy and laity and the priesthood of all believers has been replaced by a stronger emphasis than ever on the leadership of the clergy.

---------------

This reversal of passion for Kingdom and ministry to postmoderns and universal priesthood

to return to CHURCH-focus incarnated in the introduction of new programs
administered from denominational headquarters
is the extraordinary shift

to upstream rowing
that Ed leads.

• In the years since Ed was installed as Executive Director in Findlay, the CGGC has stopped thinking about Kingdom. 
• Our leadership team has readjusted its focus, once again--NOW MORE THAN EVER--on the CHURCH.
• We are no longer concerned with joining in Jesus' prayer, "your kingdom come, your will be done."  We are now, again, church improvers.  Church builders.  Church adopters.
• We don't talk about reaching postmoderns.  (I can't recall the last time I read that word in communication from the General Conference.)
• We talk less and less now about going into the world and more and more about improving the church and bringing people to it.
• And, while we once chatted excitedly about the Priesthood of all Believers, we have now, through our new credentials proposal, expanded the ease with which people can become members of our annually licensed clergy.

-----------------------------------------

I once heard Norman Sawchuck define a leader as a person able to get people to follow him/her where they would not go otherwise.

If that's leadership, Ed may be our greatest leader ever!

================================================

Remember that, with only minor editing, this was written nearly three years ago.  You may want to substitute, for postmodern, millennial because the jargon has shifted. 

What do you think?

Gathering: 7-5-15

The Sunday gathering gang met at our house today. Rather normally. We had some absentees due to the holiday.

You may recall that last Sunday we dropped everything, in mid gathering, and took off to a local restaurant to meet someone who works there and has been in conversation with Evie about ways we can show her mercy financially. (That conversation is continuing in positive ways. This woman, it turns out, has been burned several times by churches and pastors and is very cynical about "organized religion.")

Anyway, in the moment of serendipity last week, we lost our chance to take the bread and the cup. It may be hard for you to understand how powerful that act can become when it is the one act that is central to your gathering. I noticed the loss of it last week but not doing it created an emptiness for Evie, so much so that she asked the group, after the singing time concluded, if we could do it next. We did. She led with a very moving idea having to do with how deep the Father's love for us was in sending His Son to live and die for us when we were still sinners and how easily, sometimes, we choose sin, even knowing the extent of His grace and love.

Later, we had a time of celebration and, as we prepared for prayer, some conversation about the ways we are incarnating His mercy, grace and love in the world.

As always, the meal was a moving time of fellowship.

Now, I'm hoping for a restful remainder of the day.

BASED ON AN IDEA FROM MY HONEY: A Note to CGGC Pastors on a Sure-Fire Way not to have to do a Same Sex Wedding

Get yourself defrocked by your Conference's mountaintoppers!!!!!!

If you need to be mentored in this, send me an email. I have a track record of success.

Lance's First eNews Post Contains the "R" Word Twice that I Saw

A new CGGC day has begun...

...and with inclusion of the word that was once, apparently, unspeakable or, um, untypable? in official CGGC communications...

The notorious R word.

Twice, actually, if I counted correctly.

If you are a Facebook friend of George Jensen, you may already have read his rave review of Lance's first eNews offering as E.D., which has created a Facebook tidal wave of praise for Lance's initial offering. And, sorry George, but I agree with George far more often than I do with most in our declining body.

I, too, agree that Lance got off to a very good start, though I'm not able to find all the superlatives George did.

To his immense praise, Lance actually acknowledges the importance of biblical truth for our body apart from increases in the numbers of nickels and noses. Yikes! Perhaps he IS a revolutionary.

Oddly, Lance finds himself encouraging CGGCers to become practitioners of grace and not merely to be people holding to truth without acts of love and grace.

As much as I truly appreciate what Lance has written, as I boisterously cheer his use of the R word, I think he gives the CGGC far more credit for holding to biblical truth than we deserve. In the issue he addresses, I believe, we are being more tradition driven than Bible driven. As is usual, it seems to me, even here, our truth comes more from the Middle Ages than from the Word. (I'd love for the CGGC to call a conversation on marriage in the New Testament.)

We truly are not a people of the Word and we need to be honest with ourselves about that. We have not been driven by passion for truth for several generations. R-ing of our devotion to tradition will not come to us easily. Too many mountaintoppers prefer tradition to truth.

Anyway...

...good start, Lance. Thanks for using the forbidden word twice right from the beginning!

I hope all of you will read the eNews and give it careful and serious thought.

Why Gathering was Cancelled: 7-1-15

I start work early on Wednesdays and I always turn off my phone except during breaks.

A participant in our Wednesday gathering starts an hour later than I do, showed up and saw me and told me that she just received a text from Evie saying that gathering had been cancelled because my dad was just ambulanced to the hospital.

Bottom line: A long time problem he's had with an undiagnosed allergic reaction, probably autoimmune, which causes his tongue to swell dangerously suddenly reoccurred.

Evie was already at the hospital by the time I called her and she told me he was being treated and was stable but that the stress of the day would be far too much for her to handle if we also had to host gathering.

In the end, we called off the Thursday gathering as well. Today, I'll be taking our next door neighbors to Reading Hospital for an appointment with his doctor. We know that we will both be very drained by the end of the day.

These are dark days for us. In addition to the issues of caring for my mom and dad and our neighbors, my sister-in-law's father is in the last days of his life, dying from complications related to Alzheimer's.

In the midst of all of this, I must add that it is a blessing to live in intimate community with the people who join us in gathering. Those people help us feel the presence of the Lord even in our darkest hours.

On a distantly related note, the answer to those two questions remains in the negative.