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.
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