Paradigm Change

In the catalog of fads embraced by the CGGC in the last generation please remember Paradigm Change.

Paradigm change is a bandwagon mountaintoppers jumped on during the failed, no disastrous, MORE AND BETTER DISCIPLES: 35,000 in Worship by 2000 campaign.

The truth is, however, that that campaign was not really paradigm change. It was really nothing more than a desperate attempt to tweak Shepherd Mafia flockism. And, it failed.

As far as I can tell, for the last 80 years, the CGGC has been mired in Shepherd Mafia flockism which vests so-called leadership in the parish priest and an increasingly large and authoritative institutional hierarchy.

And, that entire period has been a time of spiritual and, in time, numerical decline.

Let me be clear about something I have said on this blog many times, which few CGGCers, if any, seem to believe:

I love the people who are on the top of the CGGC mountain. 

While it's true that I regularly point out the continuing decline of the CGGC and place blame for it on the mountaintoppers, I do love all of the mountaintoppers I know personally and am anxious to find a reason to enthusiastically support them.

I am convinced that they need to throw out the failed paradigm and do it no matter what the cost may be to each of them personally.

It is the paradigm that is killing the CGGC. Our real problem is a values problem.  We need to repent of the values upon which Shepherd Mafia leadership is built.

We need to turn to Jesus and to build the CGGC part of His church on the foundation He created.

As I used to say on Brian Miller's blog, our problem is not micro. Part of this means that the problem is not with Lance and his staff and with the Regional E. Ds. and, if they have one, their staf. As I've been saying for years, ours is a macro problem. It is with the system, the structure.

It's true that the members of the hierarchies may lose their jobs if we turn to Jesus' values.  But, I call on all of those people to be willing to decrease so that Jesus and His Kingdom and His church may increase.

On the level of values, we must repent.

Oh Come Let Us Adore Him?

Lately, I have been disturbed, almost tortured, by the certain knowledge that people I know will be among the vast throngs who, on the Day, will hear Jesus say, "I never knew you. Away from me you evildoers."

This has been a concern for several years, as is evidenced by the fact that False, Flock-Based Righteousness is listed among my Sixteen Characteristics of the CGGC Brand. But, these days, I am feeling this concern with greater, well despair, than ever.

And, I believe that, because we just experienced the Christmas season, I am particularly aware of how crucial genuine righteousness is in the teachings and way of Jesus.

I work in a retail setting and I had contact with many hundreds of people as they were preparing for Christmas.  And, I found myself being sensitive to what Christmas was meaning to them as that day approached.

For many, it's just Xmas with no Jesus. For others, though, Jesus is a part of it, or, at least, attending a church service is.

For many regular church people, Christmas is an end unto itself--celebrating the birth of Jesus is the highlight of the spiritual year and, for many church people, it is an act of righteousness in itself.

Yet, I see nothing in what Jesus taught or did to justify that way of living. And, I fear for the souls of the so-called followers of Jesus who practice that sort of piety.

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Jesus was very clear about the content of the faith that will qualify a man or a woman to be invited into the Kingdom prepared for them since the creation of the world.

It is a life of obedience to Him and of servanthood of the least among us, it's a life of mercy, of grace and love of the Lord with all of one's self and of neighbor as self.

It is a faith that produces fruit in self-sacrifice.

Celebrating the nativity may or may not be a part of that life but, if it is a part of that life, it can only be a small part of it.

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However, for most of the people I observe who really groove on Christmas, Christmas is the big act of service and Jesus is a baby to be cuddled and adored, not the Living Word and Suffering Servant who came not to be served but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many.

This Christmas thing is a dangerous thing.

I fear for the souls of the people who groove on it.

How to Deal with Christmas Tension

This Christmas thing, for Christians, is an exercise in dealing with intellectual conflict, expecially for "low church" Protestants, which the CGGC was when it grooved before it began to putrify.

The question is, what do you do with the tension between biblical truth that provides no authority for the celebration of the birth of Jesus as a Holy Day, the, originally Catholic, yearning to sacramentalize and liturgize the birth of the Messiah and focus it on the activity of the clergy inside a so-called sanctuary and Xmas as an excuse to engage in excessive materialism.

What many Christians do these days is, I think thoughtlessly, approach these options as if they are choices in a smorgasbord and gorge themselves with as much of what they want to consume as they can until they become ill.

Others attempt to be purists in one way or another.

During my CGGC parish priest days, we had a family leave the church because it displayed a Christmas tree because the tree is pagan fertility symbol.  The people of the church just rolled their eyes in disdain, certainly not brotherly love. Their response was, essentially, that they wanted to have the tree. Period. The tree was pretty and, really, who gives a dern if it has no Christian meaning and even has, no pun intended, roots in pagan religion.

And, as I've detailed here, I attempt what I think is a more pure form of purism.

The people who left the church accepted Christmas as a Holy Day.  They simply wanted to keep true to the biblical story.

I, in my mind, want to be truly pure. I want to truly be biblical. There was no celebration of the nativity among New Testament disciples. I see no reason to make a Holy Day out of it now. So, I don't.

We love Xmas. But, even then, we Jesusize it. We temper the materialism and almost all of it is devoted to giving to the least of these. (Evie and I had a budget of $10 in spending on each other. )

We met with family doing goofy, Sloat-humor things and eating favorite foods. And we experienced joy. I haven't laughed that hard since, well, last Xmas Eve! Today, we'll take leftovers to mom and dad and eat sandwiches and laugh again and wonder if this will be the last time.

We may pray this time, rejoicing in family, but in not Baby Jesus.  And, we will laugh with Xmas joy.

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The problem with the smorgasbord approch is that it is fuzzy, thoughtless and, in the end, worse than meaningless. It teaches nothing.

In fact, it confuses.

Repent.

As the Song Says...

"Santa Claus knows we're all God's children,

And, that makes everything right.

So, let's give thanks to the Lord above,

Cuz Santa Claus comes tonight."

My 2016 Spiritual Assessment--A Third Prophetic Emotion

It has been my habit to use this time to year to assess where I am spiritually compared to a year ago. So, I just finished reading my end of the year assessment for 2015. It was interesting.

I wrote about my parents' mental decline, which continues. Last March, they were both formally diagnosed as having dementia, mom with Alzheimer's and dad with vascular dementia. Dad's is more advanced but less bothersome.  Alzheimer's sucks. Yesterday, my brother was visiting mom and dad when Evie stopped in and dad said, "Well, Evelyn! Roger, do you know Evelyn?" He was stunned to hear that they've known each other since Roger was in Jr. Hi.

Also, last year, I was chagrined about the defrocking and the unspiritual way it was done. I pledged to resist it. This year, the unrighteousness of ERC leadership in that matter has reached depths that would have been beyond my imagination, even a year ago. I am attempting to address a particular grievous sin committed against me according to the teachings of Jesus. The person who, I believe, sinned against me is resisting the process. I am determined, however. And, in better days, Ed Rosenberry rightly noted that I am "relentless." This is not the time to be specific in a public way, but I ask for prayers for that other person and for me.

Last year, I also reflected on the emotional nature of my life pursuing my belief that I am gifted to be a prophet. I mentioned two emotions that manifested themselves immediately, i.e., anger and sorrow.  In the past year, a third emotion has manifested itself powerfully: fear. Fear for the souls of the church people who miss Jesus in their devotion to the institutional church. I see so little of the life Jesus modeled and commanded in church people and, in particular, in some who see themselves as leaders of the church.

Finally, as I reflect on the state of my spiritual life at the end of 2016, I have to say that I am content, generally, with the state of my mission working at the store. I am now a front end manager and that position increases opportunities to be a presence for the Lord and the Gospel. I would never return to the role of parish priest in the CGGC or in any other setting but I groove on participating in the priesthood of all believers in a way I never enjoyed being a parish priest.

One other note: I have been blessed by the number of people from the CGGC who continue to reach out to me and offer fellowship to me. Most now respond to me as if I am a leper. I am blessed by the more than a few who continue to treat me as a brother.

Church-Oriented, Inwardly-Focused

To the degree I am able, I keep my eyes open to note what's taking place in the CGGC world.

I recall the hopeful days when, empowered by Wayne Boyer and facilitated by Brian Miller's blog, a small, passionate core of CGGC people shared visionary dreams among each other.

In those days, we encouraged one another and spurred one another on to love and good works and we challenged and chastised the CGGC establishment for promoting a church, not Kingdom orientation and an inward, not outward focus.

So, where are we ten years later?

As I look around me, here's what I see: CGGC churches focusing, more than ever, on creating an extravagant Christmas Eve show to satisfy the congregation and to draw people into the church building.

My friends, we are backtracking and, don't lose the connection, we are declining.

For a moment I considered putting on Facebook, this note about our work here at Faith:

FAITH COMMUNITY:
No Christmas Eve Service,
No Christmas Day Service.
Serving the least of these 24/7/365.

I didn't enter it because, in the end, I concluded that Facebook wasn't the proper venu for that message.

But, I think the message has value. So, I'm putting it here.

The CGGC decline continues as its churchism and inwardism expands, as far as I can tell, exponentially.

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I just read Lance's eNews. It assumes we will all be engrossed in the special church building-located shows of the Christmas season while, at the same time, Lance reminds us of the incarnation and the fact that we also are sent out.

The focus on the show in the building and the message that we are sent into the world don't fit together.

I wish, rather than taking the extravaganzas as a given, that Lance would have taken a firm but loving shot at them.

The CGGC needs to trash those extravaganzas and be in the world.

Here at Faith, we have no shows for Christmas Eve or Christmas day. We are among the least of these, and serving them, all the time.

Lost Doctrines of the Church

Who, who is reading this, doesn't know that the Western church is in decline?

Yet, Jesus, the One whose Name the church lifts up, is the essence of power, grace, mercy, authority and love.

The church dies as its human leaders and as its people scurry, more feverishly than ever, to save it.

Still, nothing church people attempt reverses the decay.

Each strategy, plan, and program fails more pathetically than the one that came before it.

The rate of the church's decay extends exponentially in the way Stage 4 cancer ravages a body in the final throes of death. Who can avoid the stench?

And, as it putrifies, the church continues, without blessing, to lift up the Name of the One who is all power and grace and mercy and authority and love.

How is this happening?

There are many reasons for the decline but, in my opinion, one of the most basic is that the church is thinking about the wrong things, teaching the wrong things. And, at the same time, thinking about right things in the wrong way.

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From the first days it began chiseling its beliefs into granite in so-called creeds, the church has missed the spirit of the life and teaching of Jesus.

Jesus said that people who hunger and thirst for righteousness are blessed.  From the beginning, He told people curious about Him that unless their righteousness surpasses that of the Scribes and Pharisees they wouldn't see God's Kingdom. He commanded people to seek first God's Kingdom and His righteousness.  Paul of Tarsus noted that the Kingdom of God is a matter of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

Yet, the church doesn't even have a category in its vast catalog of doctrines to consider what righteousness is. It has its Christology, its pneumatology, its eschatology and, of course, its ecclesiology...

(...if you don't know what those fancy church words mean, don't even think about looking them up.)

But, the church doesn't have and never has had a word for its teaching and beliefs about righteousness.

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The Greek word for righteous is dikaios. The word for righteousness is dikaiosune.

So, how about digging into what Jesus treasured and taught? Could we turn our hearts toward what Paul considered a thing the Kingdom of God is a matter of?

Righteousness!

If we must have big words, could we at least invent the word dikaiology!

Followers of Jesus today need to live the way Jesus commanded them to live.  They need to, as He put it, seek God's Kingdom, not God's church, and His righteousness.

They will be blessed if they hunger and thirst for righteousness.  But, the (institutional) church decays. It dies. So many are religious but few are righteous.

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A few quick observations:

Times of what is sometimes called revival were moments when people focused on what it means to follow Jesus by living rightly.  Those people stood apart from the religious of their day by turning to Jesus, not church tradition, to define the way they lived.  They defied church tradition, and they did it boldy. They turned to the way and teaching of Jesus. They sought God's Kingdom and God's righteousness.

Today's putrifying church defines right living in terms of itself, of the church, not as Jesus lived and taught righteousness.

Hence, in my tradition, to make more and better disciples still means to get people to attend a so-called church worship service.

Jesus almost never even spoke about church.

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We need to turn to Jesus.  We need to listen to what He said, to what He COMMANDED. We need to seek to live the way He lived. We need to follow His example.

We need to allow Him to call us to righteousness.  We need to live righteously, as He defined right living.

We must repent.

Gathering: 12-18-16

A nice time today. Not that disciples gather to feel nice but, once in a while, it's not a bad thing. Today's was more Christmasy than fits my taste but it's not all about me.

An unusual feature of this gathering is that I led Word time. I don't do it often. Evelyn urged me to, so I did. When I do, it's always interactive and usually centered on a biblical story which I exegete on the fly, something I enjoy and feel I do well in the Spirit.

Today's was on the visit of the Magi.

Bread and Cup time was encouraging.  It connected the incarnation with the atonement and the resurrection.

The meal was yummy.

There was some sadness. Our friend Ward was absent. He's still in the nursing home recovering from a stroke.

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I remember being exorcized, in the days of Brian Miller's blog, over churches that were not going to meet when Christmas was on a Sunday.  And, I still think that if you believe worship is an act of righteousness not worshiping on Christmas because it's a Sunday smacks of hypocrisy.

Having said that, we meet on altering Sundays and Christmas is an off Sunday for us. What we'd do if it was an on Sunday I can't say.

Jesus is a Very Popular Guy

I began a job working in a super market about three years ago.

The reasons I did it were complex and varied but my approach to the job was simple: I was determined, from day one, to live according the commands and teachings Jesus as literally and as faithfully as possible. 

In my mind, central to that Jesus-following lifestyle was to continually live in repentance which, to me, by that time, and still, means to live in self-denial in every moment, to always show mercy, to, in the presence of difficult customers and coworkers and managers, always to turn the other cheek and walk the second mile, to, when dealing with those people, let vengeance be the Lord's, to always rejoice in the Lord, think about what is true, noble, right, pure, lovely and admirable, to love my neighbor as myself and to love disciples as Jesus loved the apostles when He washed their feet. It has, at its core, to be a slave to everyone, without exception.

And, looking back over the years, I have to claim, in all honesty, that, actually, I've succeeded in being Jesus fairly well, better than I would have expected, though, certainly, not perfectly.

(I do have to note that there is a self-sustaining momentum to being Jesus as I have been.  I did it well at the beginning so that other people came to expect it so that, now, their expectation guides me and makes it easier to choose the Jesus way when the real me might win out in a particular moment...)

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...Anyway,

I have never been so popular!

And, perhaps not surprisingly, I'm especially well-liked by difficult people many of whom seem to be drawn to me, and are not really difficult around me.

And, interestingly, by the millennials and people younger than they whom, I think, are fascinated to meet a geezer who looks older than grandpa, but isn't grandpa, and treats them as if he is their slave.

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So...I want to say that the lesson I've taken from my years in ministry on my mission field is that there's no reason for people to be standoffish toward church people, as many are these days...

...if church people actually are disciples, men and women who obey Jesus...

...and if they live in the world...

...the people of the world will be fascinated by them, even confused by them, but in the end, warm up to them, even like and love them.

JESUS IS A VERY POPULAR GUY. PEOPLE LOVE HIM. THEY'VE ALWAYS BEEN DRAWN TO HIM, NOT PUT OFF BY HIM. 

And, even I have experienced a highly diluted form of that phenomenon.

Imagine how it could work for other, more likeable people.

Church people must repent.

I Couldn't Recommend the Local Church of God

As you know, I work among a large crowd of millennials and geezers and I love it.

One of the millennials I've worked with for the past few years graduated from high school last June and matriculated at Elizabethtown College, my alma mater in my hometown.

She has returned to the store to work a few hours over her Christmas vacation and our shifts yesterday began the same time so we had a chance to chat as we were waiting to begin work. At the same time, a geezer in our department, who attends the church she attended regularly through high school was with us and asked her where she attends church now. (The church they attend here is one of the UCC churches that split off from that denomination due to doctrinal issues.)

After stammering, she admitted that she doesn't go to church when she is at school.

We talked for a short time about churches in E-town, including the large campus Church of the Brethren, which she has no interest in attending.

And, there was a nanosecond when I considered suggesting that she give the Elizabethtown Church of God a try.  But, I didn't.

The decision to say nothing was an instinctive, in the moment, thing.  Since then, I've been trying to break that momentary impulse down.  Here's what I came up with:

I've known the church fairly well in the past and, recently, it had a very gifted missional, uh, pastor but he's gone and nothing I've seen suggests his vision continues. And...

...based on what I know about the church, my millennial friend wouldn't find anyone her age in attendance.

I project a rather distinct notion of what being a Christian is on my work site mission field and I don't want to see that soiled. I have an opportunity to be Jesus in this young woman's life and, honestly and sadly, I don't trust a CGGC congregation to partner with me in my mission.

Oh, how I wish that was not the case.  But it is.

What I'd do about the Santa Claus-Christ in Christmas Thing if I had Kids

I don't have kids so I know this is easy for me to say. But...

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I would encourage the Santa thing to the hilt and tell them this about Jesus: "No one knows when Jesus's birthday was. Some people choose this time of the year to celebrate that He came into the world but we don't make a big deal out of his birth because we care more about the life He lived later, the truths he taught us and the fact that He died to save us and that he rose from the dead."

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As I've said, the nativity of Jesus is never even mentioned in the Bible after the beginning of the Gospel of Luke while the crucifixion and resurrection are and Christmas didn't become a big holiday until it was commercialized into Xmas.

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I say, "Let your kids enjoy Xmas without confusing them by trying to fuse the Xmas/Christmas thing."

Xmas is a blast and there's nothing biblical about Christmas.

My Attitude Toward Leadership

I've mentioned that not too long ago, I received an unsolicited promotion into a management position at the store.

When I was contacted about the opportunity, the person who spoke to me detailed the reasons I was selected as the person whom the owners and management believed would be the best fit for the job. There were about a half dozen reasons. (One of them was, interestingly, my leadership. More about that, perhaps, later.)

Another reason I believe I was selected, though it wasn't mentioned, because, I believe, it was taken for granted about me, is my absolute support of management. I have always aggressively supported the people in authority above me on my job.

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I've been thinking about my attitude toward leadership in my life in general and, it strikes me that submission to and support of leadership is something that is natural to my personality.

That should be apparent to any thinking person who reads this blog as far as my relationship to CGGC authority.  I am aggressive and passionate about supporting and defending CGGC authority, much moreso than anyone else I know of.

The highest authority in the CGGC is the Bible which we call "the inspired, infallible Word of God."

Therefore, it is my aggressive support of the Bible's authority that still has me aghast at Dr. Richardson and his recent determination to create a Strategic Plan which he admits is foreign to Scripture.   (And, I am told that he thinks that I am the the one who should be defrocked.)

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The highest human authority in the CGGC is not its staff members or its Commissions and Committees but its Eldership who created our ruling documents to which it itself is obligated to submit.

I, more than anyone I know, am mindful of the authority of the CGGC Eldership and of its declarations and I, more than anyone I know, am aggressive in supporting them..

...and putting them into practice.

Sometimes I think that I am the only person in the CGGC who is aggressive in supporting CGGC authority.

Renewing a Missional Contact

One of the ministries we have been engaging in for decades has been inviting strangers, and sometimes acquaintances, to live in our home.

We began to do it long before we began to take the Sheep and Goats teaching seriously.

And, I will admit that, often, these episodes don't end well.  One that has was inviting a guy we found out about through a former employer of Evie's.

Shortly before he was to move in, he asked if his girlfriend and her daughter could move in with him.  That was a tough call to make, though we did it. Then, just before they moved in, his new probation officer knocked on our door requesting an unannounced interview with us. We passed the interview.

Those people we enjoyed and we're still in contact.

Another recent success was with my coworker, Matt, with whom we're still in contact and whom we visit every time we're in his area.

During the last three summers, we hosted college guys who did internships with Evie's former employer. Evie's stayed in contact with them.

The first of them is coming into the area to have lunch with us today.

He's a nice guy and a pretty typical millennial.  He's not become a disciple from his contact with us but he has seen us living our wildly unabashed life as followers of Jesus and he's certainly not turned off by it either.

So, we'll spend a few hours catching up with him, showing him, as Steve Sjogren says it, God's love in a practical way.

A Prophetic Word I Haven't Spoken Yet

When I evaluate myself on how faithfully I live out my belief that I am called to be a prophet, I'm not kind to myself.

There are many things I have not said, yet, at least.

It may surprise some readers of this blog that what I don't say is the harshest stuff that I believe the Spirit is saying.

Why I don't say those things is a question I often ask myself. Sometimes, I'm actually afraid to say them because I'm not confident that I can say them faithfully or accurately.  Some other times, I've tried putting them into words and it didn't happen.

Here's a harsh word I'm going to try to hint at, at least:

When I read the Gospels, I'm afraid that many people in important positions in the church, especially my own tradition, are not, in reality, subjects of the Kingdom of God. 

In a way others might say it: I'm afraid they are not saved.

Jesus was careful to make it clear that, on the Day, many who think they are His people will be stunned to find that He refuses to welcome them into His Kingdom.

Think of Matthew 7: "Not everyone who calls me Lord will enter into the Kingdom of heaven..." or Matthew 25's sheep and goats teaching where the people on His left exclaim, "When did we see YOU hungry...?"

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When I look at church, uh, leaders today, I see men an women devoted to their idea of the church. I see, in them, a burning passion to save the church from extinction but I see very little of what Jesus will reward in Matthew 25. Actually, in many of those people, I see none of it!

I observe people dashing from meeting to meeting, forming committees and commissions and task forces and doing those groups' work with so great a passion that there is no time, and I'm afraid, no concern for living the radical life of service and self-sacrifice Jesus demands.

I see a people who have made an idol of the institutional church.  I see people who love and serve the church.  I see people with little, and some with no, focus on Jesus.

And, I see no fruit of salvation in them. I see nothing of the power of the Spirit. I see absolutely no evidence that the Lord is blessing anything they are doing as their institutionalized church implodes.

I fear for them for eternity.

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There. I've hinted at one of the words I've been loathe to speak.

We must repent.

Amish and Mennonite, uh, Worship

Our house church only meets every other Sunday these days.  And, our nine year old Golden Retriever, Lizzy, is fascinated when she is in the car and sees a horse pulling a buggy.  There are three plain Mennonite churches within about five miles of our house and so, expecially but not exclusively on nongathering Sundays, I take Lizzy for a drive so that we pass at least two of those churches.

Last Sunday was a gathering Sunday but our prep was well underway at the time the Mennonites travel, so we went for a drive and saw a record 39 horse and buggy teams.

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To my surprise, I have discovered something that gives me pause to think.

As I drive by the meeting houses, taking care not to hit a horse or kids, I've become fascinated.

Two things strike me.

One is that these groups have tons of young adults and kids. These families have oodles of children and, no doubt, many do not stay in the church but, trust me, in my area many do and these groups are growing.

The second thing that strikes me is the body language of the people standing around outside waiting for the gathering to begin, even in this cold weather.  There is obviously a sense of anticipation and expectation among these people. They seem to believe that something worthwhile is about to happen in their lives.

And, there will be no worship band nor light and fog show and no Ph. D. trained preacher.

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My wife's dad was raised in a plain church. I've never attended what you might call a worship service but I've been to weddings and funerals, which, for them, are very much like their Sunday Gatherings.

Every time I've been with them while gathered, the same thing has happened. I've observed a strong emphasis on their conviction that to believe in Jesus is to live in the world as a disciple. For these people, Christianity is a way of living, not merely things you believe.

To use the language of Hebrews 10, central to their meetings is spurring each other on to love and good works.

And, clearly, that emphasis works today as well as it did in the generation Hebrews was written.

In my faith tradition, our Gatherings once were also oriented toward urging the whole body to righteous living but not these days.

And, we are declining.

We must repent.

Gathering 12-4-16: Incarnationism

Not everyone in our Gathering is into embracing Xmas as I described in a recent post.

So, when we did the everyone has a hymn part of the gathering, no one suggested FROSTY THE SNOW MAN or even LAST CHRISTMAS I GAVE YOU MY HEART. Everything was straight from the hymnal that we have a few copies of.

As much as I despise celebrating the weakness of the baby Jesus, I must say that I wasn't disappointed by Word time today. The focus was on the Word becoming flesh.

Evie had on a Word on how so many people are beside themselves now that Donald Trump is President-elect. She pointed out that Jesus came to BE peace on earth and, as much as the prospect that Trump may be disturbing, Christ's peace dwarfs even Donald Trump.

Bread and Cup time was powerful, connecting the incarnation and the sacrifice.

I got to say that, according to Romans 12, our true and proper worship has nothing to do with singing and listening to sermons but it is the offering of our bodies as a living sacrifice.

And, I got to say that true worship only take place when we are not here.

All in all, this gathering was an unexpected blessing to me.  I'm glad we met.

Living Matthew 25:34f

I married so far out of my league I have no words for it!

We just agreed that I have a $200 budget to buy groceries for people I wait on at the store between now and Christmas.

Questioning a Fundamental Disciple Making Principle

In the November 18, 2016 eNews Lance addressed the reality that, while the CGGC has paid lip service to having, as its core goal, making "More and Better Disciples," it is not making disciples effectively.

I found his article provocative and I'm blessed that Lance mentioned discipling at all.

I pile the highest heap of praise I can pile up in noting that Lance is an extremely honest man. In the past, the eNews would never have acknowledged even the slightest flaw in our body.  In fact, it would have described a reality in the CGGC that would have made the record of disciples in Acts 1-6 seem pathetic.

Lance's article begins by stating, plainly and precisely, that the CGGC is not effective in making disciples. Thanks, Lance, for your honesty!

This honesty is no small thing. If the cynicism that is core to the CGGC Brand is to be overcome, honest communication from the Mountaintop will help kill it.

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Having said that, Lance makes an assertion about how discipling takes place that is not what I see in the Word.

Lance says, "Disciples of Jesus make other disciples of Jesus."

And, I suspect that that is conventional wisdom in the church today. However, it's not, as far as I can tell, New Testament wisdom.

As I read the New Testament, the truth is that APOSTLES make disciples of Jesus.

The Gospels of Matthew, Luke and John all contain similar versions of Jesus sending followers into the world to make disciples and all of them take place when Jesus is alone with the men He prepared to be apostles. Jesus never sent disciples in general into the world to make disciples. He could have. He would have, I believe, if disciples make other disciples.

The traditional name of the fifth book of the New Testament is THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES.  And, that title is accurate.  The book is about Apostles making disciples.

I need to ask the people of our body why we have been failing to make disciples.

To me, the biblical answer is that we are parish priest led, by people who are, for the most part, gifted to be shepherds.

As I read church history, the movements that prospered were those who empowered people to function within their apostolic calling, even if they didn't call those people apostles.

Lance, many of us want our body to thrive in making disciples. I am convinced that we won't succeed in doing that until we both empower APEST and disable parish priest dominated leadership.

Embracing Xmas

I suspect that this thread may offend even the readers of this blog who, otherwise, are inclined to be sympathetic to everything I write here.

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I think the, "Put Christ back into Christmas," sentiment that floats around at this time of year is, very simply, tomfoolery. In truth, Christ never has been in Christmas, at least since the first moments Christmas became a big deal.

Until recently in the context of the 2,000 years of Christian history, Christmas either didn't exist or it was a minor part of the liturgical calendar. (I imagine that you've heard this from other bah humbuggers.)

December 25 meant so little at the beginning of of the history of the American republic that, when American Methodists decided to meet to organize after the Revolutionary War, they picked a date when the people prominent in the movement could conveniently travel and meet and they chose December 24 in 1784 to begin their Conference.

The truth is that Christmas became a big deal only after retailers developed a marketing scheme around it in the last century and Christmas took off as a scheme intended to induce people to spend money they wouldn't normally spend.

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But, I don't denounce Christmas simply because I abhor the materialism that is at its core. I abhor for, well, and I hate using this word, for theological reasons.

The biblical truth that there is no evidence that early disciples thought much about the birth of Jesus, let alone celebrate it.  When early disciples thought about the coming of Jesus into the world their focus was on the incarnation, or on the reality that God took on human flesh:

"Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking on the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness..."

Early disciples considered the powerful image of the creator of all things becoming human as the inspiration for how they themselves should think about living in the world.

These days, as we focus more on the story of the birth of Jesus, we think of Jesus, not as the inspiration for a life of servanthood lived in humility, but as a cute little thing we want to take in our arms and cuddle.

And, that is how most churchgoers live these days--as believers in a little, helpless Jesus, One who needs us and not as the eternal, holy, righteous Lord Who came into the world not to be served but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many.

As the institutional church makes more of the nativity of its Lord, its Lord becomes smaller and weaker and His church, inept.

The biblical truth is that only two of the Gospels even mention the birth of Jesus and those two accounts do so only to prove the power of the Word in predicting the coming of the Anointed One, proving that Jesus is the Anointed One. There is no suggestion that Jesus should be worshiped as a baby, nor Mary as the Blessed Virgin.

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Having said that about Christmas as a holy day, I can tell you that as soon as I tossed out the Christ in Christmas foolishness, I was able to embrace the sweet, silly, secular Xmas season without guilt and with spectacular pleasure.

And, I do.

I'm not into the gift giving and receiving thing but my brother's family and we adopt a needy family every year and investigate what would make a groovy Xmas for it and buy oodles of stuff to empower that, though much more of what we give is designed to meet geniuine needs, not material wants.

And, I especially love the seasonal music. It's the only music I listen to on the radio. It's with the music I become sentimental, and amused as well.

Some of the music is about Christmas, more of it is about Xmas but a lot of it is merely an attempt to romanticize and glamorize brutally cold weather.  I hate cold weather.

SLEIGH BELLS RING? (I'm listening to that one right now.) Have you noticed how much of the music is about non-church bells?

My three favorite Xmas songs are, without a doubt:

1. HAVE YOURSELF A MERRY LITTLE CHRISTMAS, which was introduced in the movie, MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS, and was first sung by Judy Garland. Did you know that the second line was supposed to be, "It may be your last," but Garland wouldn't sing that so it was changed to, "Let your heart be light."  This is an amazing Xmas anthem!

2. I'LL BE HOME FOR CHRISTMAS. I'm enough a geezer to have a father who served in World War II. The song was written in honor of the men and women in the military during that war. I can get very sentimental about that as I watch my dad leave us as he slips into dementia.

3. THE CHRISTMAS SONG. Did you know that this song was co-written by the Velvet Fog? I'm not crazy about chestnuts but I could listen to Nat King Cole all day long.

(I also get a special hoot out of the Porky Pig version of BLUE CHRISTMAS, which you almost never hear on the radio. I understand for the politically correct reason that it might offend s-s-s-stutterers.)

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I  encourage you to join me.  Become sentimental about cold weather and the silly little secular Xmas season.

Don't sentimentalize Jesus. Lift Him up, don't make Him little.

Drawing a Line in the Sand Between God and Us

That's what the ERC is doing in creating a new Strategic Plan after Dr. Richardson had the insight to admit that this kind of planning is foreign to Scripture because, after that, he said, in effect, yet all of us know better than to live by the wisdom of the Word, at least in this case.

Key to the vision Dr. Richardson cast for the creation of the new Strategic Plan is his plea that all of us join together in prayer, asking God to fill the strategic planners with His wisdom in developing the plan that we, nevertheless, understand is foreign to the wisdom of His Word.

That is saying, in effect:

"Lord, we're drawing a line in the sand between You and us that WE won't cross over.  Please, Lord, defy your own wisdom and step over that line we have drawn and come to us and bless our planners as they defy your wisdom. "

Can anyone see how self-focused, tradition-bound and foolish this is?

It's akin to faithless people in the Old Testament trying to figure out where to put the altar to Baal in reference to the temple and then asking the Lord to bless them as they gather at Baal's altar.

This is a radical image but, based on the Lord's continued lack of blessing on the CGGC, we need to consider it seriously.

Does anyone think that the Lord will bless this Strategic Plan?

Gathering: 11-20-16

At this moment, the time is 8:24 and we, mostly Evie honestly, are preparing to host our first house gathering in, as far as I can tell, slightly more than three months.

The house looks fairly nice.  All of the detritus of my parents' move is safely out of sight. And, because Evie's preparing a classic Thanksgiving meal, it smells wonderful.

One complication: Our heat pump went on the fritz a few days ago and the guy we use to maintain it is, inexplicably, on vacation until after Thanksgiving and we've decided to tough it out.  We have a fireplace that makes a pretty fire more than it produces heat and we figured that the heat produced by cooking and body heat will keep everyone comfortable.  Yesterday the high temperature was 69 but, by about 8:00, it was snowing and now its in the 30s, cloudy and windy and the temperature inside is currently 67.

I'm looking forward to gathering because I think that one reason Evie and I haven't been sacrificing enough lately is that the gatherings we have had have not been in a home and, therefore, have not lent themselves to the spurring of each other on to love and good works.

I pick up the folks from the home in about an hour...

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Well, the temperature peaked inside at 70 degrees, the meal was tasty and it was nice having the gang back in our home.

Two of the guys from the home missed.   One, the guy I call Bennie has a very bad cold.  Our friend Ward, though, has had a mild stroke and is in a rehab setting.

Our Word time, which is usually very powerful, wasn't today.  It was interactive as usual and centered around the theme of thankfulness.

Sadly, our sixth grader, was filling us on the real, politically correct, story of the first Thanksgiving, which he accepts.

Bizarre!

With that in the background, it was difficult to get to a biblical concept of giving thanks.

Still, being together in our home base was sweet.

Not Sacrificing Enough

I have pointed out many times in the past that I believe that a core characteristic of the CGGC brand is "To Talk is to Walk-ism."

That means that actions count for almost nothing in the CGGC.

In the past, especially in Findlay, big, radical talk was common but all action was bland, moderate and tradition driven.

Honestly, I'm not picking that up from Lance.  His talk is forward-looking and what he himself does matches his talk.

Recently, here in the ERC, we've witnessed some serious talk-ism from Kevin Richardson, co-writer of WE BELIEVE and its radical position on the authority of the Bible in the CGGC, in his promotion of a new Strategic Plan even though he admits the idea of a Strategic Plan is foreign to Scripture.

While I continue to defend the authority of the Conference in the face of Kevin's defiance of its position on the authority of the Bible, I have to acknowledge that, here at Faith, we are struggling against Talkism in our own setting.

One of the, well, Characteristics of the Faith Brand is that, in the New Covenant, worship has nothing to do with gathering and singing and hearing a sermon. For us, true and proper worship is to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice.

We believe that passionately.

This morning Evie said to me that, lately, she and I have not been sacrificing enough.

And, as soon as she said it, I was convinced.

But, I will say this in our defense. Evie and I will change this deviation from our core belief immediately whereas, previously in Findlay, there was no intention to live out radical talk.  The talk itself, truly, was the walk.  And, with Dr. Richardson, I'm convinced, based on past actions, he thinks he possesses the authority to lead the Conference in doing something that is foreign to the teachings of Scripture, even though, in doing so, he's defying Conference authority as well as the Word.

As the NIV says it, in Jesus, "true and proper worship" is about personal sacrifice.

We will begin to do that again.  Now.

A Report to My Commission

The most outrageous item for me to report is that the Conference still neither confirms nor denies the flurry of rumors, that surfaced during the spring, that my ordination was recalled.

And, more to the point, if the rumors are based in fact, Dr. Richardson and his staff are insubordinent to the authority of the Conference by not following its directive to recall my ordination.

If the rumors are based in fact, the inaction of Conference staff is suggestive of one important dysfunction that goes far in explaining why this Conference of the CGGC is in, especially spiritual, decline.

Jesus teaches that those who would be great in the Kingdom would be slaves of all.  That attitude of hyper-servanthood is entirely missing from ERC mountaintoppers. They view themselves as leaders, not slaves.

I'll ask what I frequently ask.  Is it any wonder that the Lord of all power, mercy and grace is not blessing us!

A second item: I've heard nothing from the ERC Commission on Church Renewal about the possibility that they may recommend the depantsing of Faith Community.

For all I know, they've already recommended it and, for all I know, Faith has already been depantsed.  That would be true to form.  The Ad Council already defrocked me before I even knew that the status of my credentials was under review.

I'll repeat the question about the Lord's blessing.

One final note, I have become aware that some heavy-duty lies about me were spoken on the floor of Conference last spring and the person who spoke them has, perhaps inadvertently, acknowledged speaking them.  I'm doing my best to follow the teachings of Jesus in approaching a person who sins against you. So far, it's not going well but I am resolved.

To be fair to the person who spoke untruthfully about me, that person believes that his misrepresentation of me was justified under circumstances he recalls being in place. As I say, I am resolved.

My Calling

I've written this up here several times over the years.

I came to understand this in almost exactly in these words for the first time nearly ten years ago.

I pray over this more than anything else I pray about, always asking the Spirit to show me I'm off base, if I'm off base.

It derives from Jeremiah 1:10, Romans 1:1 and Ephesians 4:11-12.  This is it:

To be a servant of Christ Jesus called to be a prophet and set apart to uproot and tear down and to destroy and overthrow the church's pastor dominated leadership culture and to build and to plant a servant community in which apostles, prophets, evangelists and shepherds and teachers are all empowered to live within their callings and, therefore, to prepare the saints for works of ministry.

From early on, I've struggled with the words, "to destroy and overthrow."  These are words that appear over and over again in Jeremiah. Jeremiah carried them as a part of his ministry for decades. They are especially challenging in a shepherd dominated spiritual world.

But, I'm taking them seriously today more than ever.

Sick

I point out, so frequently that I think it annoys some of the kids who work with me, that I'm a geezer.

A few months ago, I was offered and accepted a position in management in the super market I've been at for the past few years.

It has surprised me how much more exhausting the work is compared to what I had been doing, some parts of which was pretty heavy physical work.

The exhaustion has physical and psychological components.  In the job, I'm in demand constantly and the pressure on my introvert-ism is unbelievably intense.

On Monday, I began to feel a worse than normal cold coming on and, starting out with the level of exhaustion that has become normal, my energy level tanked below what allows me to keep up on the job.

Half of Tuesday and half of Wednesday I am lead manager of the front end of the store, so I contacted the guy who works the other manager shifts on those days and told him that I'm only going to work when I'm manager.  

It's hard for me to take the time off because this is Thanksgiving time and our workers are really pushed.  But I believe I have done the best thing if I'll be able to survive Thanksgiving week itself with my coworkers.

I think back to my days as a CGGC parish priest when, if I felt tbis way, I'd just slow down for a few days and no one would notice and I wouldn't have given it a passing thought.

Like many so-called laypeople, I will lose money for the hours I don't work and we're not rolling in it these days.

Who Has Plans for Whom?

At the height of my participation in the institutional church, I was a pastor of enough consequence I had a paid, full-time secretary.  Looking back, I'm impressed with myself. Neither Jesus nor Paul had a secretary, let alone one who was full-time!

My secretary's favorite Scripture verse was that, "I know the plans I have for you," verse in Jeremiah. A good verse, no doubt.

I've been thinking about that verse a lot lately since Dr. Richardson of the ERC noted that despite the fact that the idea of a Strategic Plan is foreign to Scripture, he believes we all know the importance of planning and that he and other ERC mountaintoppers were undergoing a process to create a new Strategic Plan to replace the one the Conference approved only last year with great fanfare and joyous enthusiasm.

The idea that disciples of Jesus should come up with plan after plan in the hope that their plans would succeed, excuse the vivid verb but I think it fits, RAPES a most basic truth contained in the Word of God.

The Lord is the creator of all things and He alone possesses power and authority. It is He alone Who can plan.  It is for humans to seek to live under His authority, to seek and to do His will, to understand His plan and to obey Him.

As well-intentioned as Dr. Richardson and his colleagues may be, we all know that previous plans have not been blessed by the One who possesses all power and authority.

Can't they see that it is for the Lord, not for them to plan?!  Well, we know that Dr. Richardson, at least, can see that. He said so in so many words. He, apparently, thinks he can improve on biblical wisdom. Is that blasphemy.  Or, is a more grievous sin, if there is one?

Having a Strategic Plan is, indeed, foreign to Scripture.

But, ERC mountaintoppers are determined to plan any way.

God help us.

God forgive Dr. Richrdson and his fellow planners.

We must repent.

Why, According to Dr. Richardson, I am in trouble in the ERC

This is no secret. He's said it to my face several times and, based on reports I've received, he said it to the Conference in session.

I'm in trouble for pointing out things like his recent assertion that, despite the teaching of Scripture, he is leading the Conference in writing another Strategic Plan.

All I've done is stand for the authority of the Bible and, in our CGGC setting, his need to submit to the authority of the Conference.

I'm know that I'm personally involved in this, but this strikes me as being similar to Herod imprisoning John the Baptist for pointing out his sin.

There must be massive repentance across the CGGC.

My Take on the Election

I used to be a politics junkie who followed election intrigue as if it were a sport.

Part of my repentance in recent years has been to leave all of that behind.

Jesus said that His Kingdom is not of this world and so I don't pour my own self into this world in the way I once did.

On the other hand, it is my belief that when He said that we should give to Caesar what's Caesar's, for disciples of Jesus in a republic, voting responsibly is a necessity. So, I followed the political season and voted.

In my job I literally talk to hundreds of people every day and it stuns me how candid people often are in those conversations. I suppose that I've had hundreds of brief chats about the election over this long political season and the conversation continues.

By far, the prevailing sentiment this time around has been that people disliked both of the major candidates.

When there was passion for one of them, in my experience, it was exclusively for Trump, never Hillary. But most people were voting for the candidate they despised less.

Living in Pennsylvania, most who planned to vote for Trump expected to lose the vote in this state due to the efforts of the Philadelphia machine to produce a majority for Hillary. It is certain that 100% of dead voters in Philadelphia voted straight Democrat.

It was a real stunner that Trump prevailed here.  He campaigned hard in this part of the state, holding about half a dozen well-attended rallies which produced a huge turnout on election day.  Our wait at the polls was our longest ever by far.

Here in Pennsylvania and across the country, it was a surprisingly good day for the GOP.

Donald Trump is not a Reagan conservative and most GOPs in Congress are.  Who knows what will happen in the months to come?

Were I still a politics junkie I'd be ecstatic.

That's the political news from Lake Wobegon, PA, "where all the women are strong, all the men are good looking and all the children are above average."

Does Anyone in the ERC Have the Authority to Say, "Yet"?

I continue to be stunned over Kevin Richardson's recent article promoting and justifying ERC mountaintoppers decision to develop still another Strategic Plan, only one year after it published the last one with great fanfare and enthusiasm.

Kevin admitted straightforwardly that the words are not in the Bible and that the concept itself seems "foreign to Scripture. "

Then he said, "Yet..."

How does any human being who claims to believe, "All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful..." say that?

I have to ask, based on this fruit Kevin produced, how much authority Kevin think he has.

And, I'll say this:

NO POPE WOULD HAVE EVER ATTEMPTED TO INTRODUCE EVEN THE MOST RADICAL INNOVATION TO ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH DOCTRINE OR PRACTICE WITHOUT USING SCRIPTURE TO JUSTIFY IT.

Not even one Pope in all of history would have said, "Yet."

Can you see how far we have fallen?

The CGGC has authority issues.

We all know that God is not blessing what we do.

Can there be the slightest question why.

Kevin must repent and publicly confess this sin.

All who are willing to give any human the right to say, "Yet," must repent and confess in tears.

We must repent. This is bad.

Gathering Such as It is: 11-6-16

We try, as best we can, to live by the wisdom that says:

The important thing is to keep the important thing the important thing.

At this point we have far more life going on than we can handle.

Mom had cataract surgery last week on a cataract that was so huge that the doctor couldn't guarantee anything as far as results are concerned.   In the end, everything turned out nicely--a sweet answer to prayer.

Evie accompanied her and I spent the day sitting with dad who, in the most common way of assessing dementia, is well into stage 6, out of 7.

That sort of time with dad always exhausts me.  The mini strokes have killed dad's attention span, so that it extends only for about a minute but the strokes have also left him a sweet, simple man.  He and I spent about four hours together.  He slept some of that time and then repeated the same few questions dozens of times. Where's your mother? Why is she away for so long? Who's with your mother? How did she get there? When will she be home? Why is this taking so long?

I had no difficulty being patient but there is something about seeing the man who raised you reduced to that level of existence.

All this is to explain that neither of us have the emotional wherewithal to do all that is involved in hosting a Gathering. So, we are taking a large number of the regular gang out to lunch.  The folks from the home always enjoy the outing but they do miss seeing Lizzy.

After that, we will probably start a small fire in our fireplace and drift off to sleep.

There is a huge sale going on at the store. I'm not sure that I mentioned that a few months ago I was offered a management position at the store. In my new position, very busy times just about kill me.

A nice Sunday afternoon nap will probably hit the spot.

Join God in the Work He is Doing: NOT

Fifteen to 20 years ago, a microfad that spread across the CGGC was doing the interactive study of Henry and Richard Blackaby and Claude King's, Experiencing God.

Many of the CGGC engaged in the study and spoke enthusiastically of the depth of its biblical wisdom.

The study is well done, not only because it is profoundly biblical, but also because its central idea is clearly communicated.

The central idea is that the essential act of Christian discipleship is to join God in the work He is doing.

The authors of the study present numerous examples from the Bible that that is the way men and women of God live.  The most powerful biblical examples are drawn from the life of Jesus Himself.

It is clear, from the study, that the person who lives righteously has no plan, that s/he has no goal but to be a willing instrument in God's hand.

And, in announcing the ERC'S decision to create a new Strategic Plan, Dr. Richardson seems both to acknowledge that truth and to spit on it.

He declares that the idea of a Strategic Plan seems foreign to Scripture. "Yet," he says, to paraphrase, we all know that for humans plan is a good thing.

Is there anyone in our body, apart from me, who is appalled not only that Kevin could say this but so brazenly lead the Conference on a path that he himself understands defies biblical authority.

Does anyone else recognize that he is holding his own authority above the authority of the Word of God!?

The Lord hasn't blessed the Strategic Plans of the past.  And, He will not bless Kevin's vision this time around.

I know very well that I am a lone voice crying in the wilderness.

Won't some of you whose voices are heard, speak up?

God's way for us is to repent, not to form our own new plans.

Everyone-did-what-was-Right-in-his-own-Eyesism

I'm convinced that I need to add a new characteristic to my description of the CGGC brand.

The end of the era of the Old Testament Judges was a dark time for Israel. The Word describes that as a time when "everyone did what was right in his own eyes."

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I have noted that a characteristic that defines the CGGC identity is cynicism. By that I mean that mountaintoppers behave as if they have limitless authority and that many of the clergy and most congregations simply ignore leadership out of unabashed cynicism.

For many years I've heard the pastors and people of the CGGC say that they don't care what leadership says we believe or how it describes our mission or vision or strategic plans because, they say, "We do what we believe is right no matter what 'they' say or do."

And, for all those years I've seen CGGC mountaintoppers spin their statements of belief and vision and mission and devising their plans without making serious effort to extend those thoughts and plans to the entire CGGC body. In that way, mountaintoppers practice their own kind of "in-our-own-eyesism."

This dynamic seems to me to extend to the very core of the CGGC identity.  It seems to me to be a characteristic of the CGGC brand.

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What's wrong with this way of thinking?

Many things are profoundly wrong with it but, among people who think of themselves as disciples of Jesus, it spits in the face of Jesus commanding all who call Him Lord, "Love one another as I have loved you."

In one word, this "own-eyesism" is an actual sin.

As long as we practice it and fail to repent of it, the Lord will not bless us.

We must repent.

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FYI, I'd place it as item 11, immediately after Cynicism.

Defying the CGGC's Belief that the Bible is Our Only Rule of Faith and Practice

Recently, in an email exchange, an ERC mountaintopper asserted that I am, using my term, in deep doodoo with the Conference because of my criticism of leadership.

I responded by saying what I have said a few times here:

I don't ever criticize leadership.

The CGGC is, to use the theological term, Presbyterial, that is, it is a body in which the highest earthly authority is the Conference--as our founders called it, the Eldership.

The CGGC truth is that its greatest earthly authority is found, not in any Executive Director or Council or Commission or headquarters building, but in the actions and declarations of the General Conference in session. After that, in my ERC for instance, the second greatest authority is found in the actions of the ERC in Conference session.

When I appear to be critical of Kevin Richardson or of Lance or or even an Ad Council, it is because I, a credentialed elder in the body, am exercising my obligation, as an elder, to promote and defend the authority of the Conference, the Eldership.

And, that is all I ever do.  And, as the Lord gives me strength, I will always do it.

What I say next is not about Kevin Richardson.   It is about the integrity of the whole CGGC and the authority of the Eldership.

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As an elder in the CGGC, I am appalled by Kevin Richardson's recent justification of ERC leadership's decision to create a new Strategic Plan.

In the most recent General Conference, our highest earthly authority, in session updated WE BELIEVE and created a Statement of Faith both of which speak of the Bible as our "only rule," to quote the Statement of Faith precisely, of faith and practice. Kevin was a writer of WE BELIEVE and a delegate to General Conference.

The words of WE BELIEVE and the Statement of Faith are strong and absolute words. They are radical.  Our General Conference chose them. They, therefore, have authority over the CGGC body.  No one forced the General Conference to adopt so radical a position on biblical authority.

But it chose them.  And, now all of us--ALL OF US--are bound to submit to them.

"Only rule of...practice."  Those words don't really leave any wiggle room.

I myself am nothing more than a member of the CGGC Eldership who accepts the authority of the earthly body which I pledged to serve.

As a member of the Eldership, Kevin Richardson stuns and offends me.  To justify the creation of the new Strategic Plan he says this:

You can't find the words (strategic plan) in the Bible and even the concept seems foreign to Scripture.  Yet, in our hearts we know the benefits of good planning.

"Only rule," Kevin. Highest earthly authority.

Can you imagine how John Winebrenner would have responded if an elder in his day had written those word!!!???

Forget Winebrenner.

Kevin's words defy the 2013 proclamation of WE BELIEVE and Statement of Faith. They are insubordinent to the authority of the General Conference.

I'm not criticizing Kevin personally. I continue to have a great amount of affection for him in spite of everything.

But, I am defending the Eldership--the integrity and authority of the CGGC.

If we cared about truth, Kevin would be in trouble.

The Lord will not bless this.

There must serious repentance in our body.

Another ERC Strategic Plan! Can You Believe it?

That word came down from the mountain top recently.

I could write a tome against it, and perhaps I will.

For now, I'll point out that it was just in 2015, LAST YEAR, that the ERC approved the last Strategic Plan. Can those of you in the ERC remember the enthusiasm for it spoken by the mountaintoppers when they sold it to you? JUST LAST YEAR?

And, I will add that I reviewed this blog from that time last year.  I was passionately critical of the, now old, Strategic Plan and predicted, last year, that it would come to nothing.

Shall we count that another prophecy about the CGGC/ERC on this blog fulfilled.

We must repent.

Gathering: 10-23-16 and Ramblings

This will be another time that we simply round up our gang from the home and take them to a local restaurant.

In the wake of clearing out my parents' Independent Living apartment, so much of their stuff is cluttering our place, and we are so exhausted from other commitments, that we chose not to invest energy in cleaning to be ready to host people.

I have a new position at the store which is a major assault on my introvert-ism. I'm exhausted from that more than anything else and Evie is juggling two part-time jobs at the moment plus keeping track of mom and dad and their adjustment to Assisted Living.

The mom and dad thing is a heavy emotional burden. Dad doesn't know where he is.  He's in Lancaster but is obsessed with getting back to Pennsylvania. Though we visit regularly, he thinks his children don't know where he is.

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One of my favorite BBC TV series, which has now ended, is Lewis. Lewis, when it was running, was one of the series that could be seen on PBS' Masterpiece Mystery.

Lewis' sidekick, James' Hathaway was struggling, as the series ended, with his father's decline into dementia in a way that hits pretty dern close to home for me and the show's treatment of the relationship between son and father is poignant to me. We have the whole series on DVD and I've been watching the final episodes.

Hathaway, incidentally, is very similar to me. He is a very cetebral person and a former seminary student who still passionately believes in God but has given up on the priesthood.

In the next to last episode, Hathaway is talking to Lewis about his pain and frustration related to his dad's loss of memory and Lewis says to him, "Life is only a series of moments and that's all we have."

For Hathaway's father, of course, those moments are now not connected with each other but for James, they still are.

At the end of the episode, Lewis and Hathaway make a moment with James' dad, which James will remember but his dad will lose.

Paralyzingly powerful to me.

I'm guessing that one of the writers of the show must be going through something similar to what our family is going through with dad.  In any case, Lewis' insight startled me.  I wasn't watching the show to glean life wisdom.

All I have now with dad are moments. For dad, the memory of those moments will dissolve as soon as the moment passes. And, that is profoundly sad.  But, for me, they will live on, probably even after I develop dementia, if I follow both of my parents path.

And, that is something that is very valuable.

My Comment on the 10/14/16 eNews

If you haven't read it yet, Lance suggests churches set up programs and strategies that will present a welcoming image to people who might attend.

One of his suggestions is of the 21st century, i.e., to have an attractive, informative and up to date web site.  The others are from the 90s' failed 35,000 by 2000 program.

All of them amount to creating a skeleton that suggests that a church is welcoming.

My comment, which the administrator published, hits a theme that I began to scream at the CGGC in the days of Brian Miller's blog, which is that our real problem has nothing to do with the skeleton, or with programs and strategies, it is a matter of heart.

Our problem is that our people don't obey the love your neighbor as yourself command.

Our problem is that our leadership has been preaching, for years, that people attend church to consume religious products and services provided by clergy and staff, that our people attend church to BE loved, not to love and to be served, not to serve. And, our people are entrenched in that cheap grace Gospel.

Our problem is with leadership and its preaching of a false Gospel.

We can do what Lance suggests but if we don't repent of the false truth we embrace and if there is no change in our hearts we can have award winning web sites and perfect welcoming strategies and still produce no benefit for the Kingdom.

Nothing has changed.

We must repent.

While My Cousin David was Dying

He's dead now.  He was the first of my generation of my dad's side of the family to die, and he was the second most young out of 20.

He developed lung cancer, which was stage 4 and had spread to his liver, spine and brain before he experienced symptoms.

He struggled for about six months until he succumbed.

One week before he died, his dad, my uncle, called me and told me that David was very ill that he was declining rapidly, was paralyzed from the waist down and that, before he died, he wanted to marry his long-time girlfriend.   My uncle called to ask me if I would go to David's home and perform the wedding.

I wanted to do exactly that.  Not because I enjoy doing weddings but because, in doing so, I would have a golden opportunity to offer David an opportunity repent of his sin and believe the Gospel.

But, I couldn't accept the invitation because the status of my credentials is cloudy due, in my opinion, to many acts of disobedience to the teachings of Jesus practiced by men who see themselves as leaders of my Conference.

I had to reject my uncle's invitation because I didn't want to bring David's widow into ERC politics. And put her in the position of having to deal with an illegal marriage. There are inheritance tax issues at stake.

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And, for the first time, I felt a negative emotion toward the people who set aside many teachings of Jesus to defrock me.

The fact is that I still have my ordination certificate and I have no intention, at the moment, of returning it. But, Evelyn said to me--shouted at me, "Bill, you are a defrocked minister!" In my mind, I'm not, but I couldn't bring my cousin's family into this ridiculous squabble.

And, as I said, for the first time I felt a negative emotion about the defrocking thing.  I was, well, furious doesn't touch describing my emotion. And, I'm still feeling that emotion.

Interestingly, I've been surprised about the emotional component of the defrocking thing.  I've been purely neutral and I guess it's because I believe I am a prophet walking reasonably faithfully in God's will and that this is what happens to prophets and, I guess, this is the peace of God that transcends all understanding. I only know that I have been emotionally neutral.

But, not when what my defrockers' actions touch my family in the way they have.

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Even at that, I forgive them, but when I think of my family, I can not forget this.

Gathering Update

The last time I journaled a Gathering was seven weeks ago, due to the malware issue. I have to say that, during the time I couldn't access the blog, I missed journaling our Gatherings more than anything else I do with the blog.

During that time, a coworker joined with us one time.   When we met at work later the next week, she asked if we did what we did during our Word time specifically to address an issue she is dealing with in her walk.  The truth is that we hadn't. I told her the truth: It was the Holy Spirit working, either in her or in us, or all of us.

One other time, when Evelyn led us to a passage, the time in the Word edifed me so powerfully that I needed to write it down here, but couldn't.

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Most weeks, however, we have not gathered.

Much of what we removed from my parents' place is still stored here and there were times our place was too cluttered to host people, other times that we were too exhausted to go to the effort and, last week, we were at the tail end of a cancer scare that involved Evie being rushed into a biopsy.  Thankfully, the biopsy showed no cancer.

All that said, we didn't gather today. This is a day when I expected to be too tired, and I am very tired.  The new responsibilities on the job make me more people-tired and wear on my introvert-ism, so I  am more tired of people than anything else.

An Update for My Commission

It's been quite some time since I reported to my commission, due to the malware issue.

Actually, there is little to report.

I still have received no notification from the Conference regarding the recall of my credentials.

Possibly because of that, I've heard nothing from the Commission which began to forge a process to depants Faith Community.

Fascinatingly, I did get material from the Conference recently dealing with my pastoral contract for 2017.  Go figure.

I have initiated one more process, which is related to the Conference's decision to recall my credentials, that I can't detail at the moment out of obedience to Jesus' teaching in Matthew 18.

Malware

This is my first post here in about six weeks. I've been inactive because some malware blocked my access to the blog and we were up to here with stuff to do related to moving my parents into Assisted Living. Plus, I was adjusting to a new position on my job.

Obviously, I got the malware issue resolved. So, I'm back!

For now, I'll just add this:

WE MUST REPENT.

Styles of Grief

This is, very definitely,  putting the cart before the horse and describes something that I am convinced, more and more, will never happen.  But, in the loss of our wonderful friend Maggie, our Golden Retriever, I have come to understand that people each have a unique style of grieving.

I've blogged about Maggie many times, during her prime, her decline and death and in the aftermath of losing her and I won't analyze why she affected me as profoundly as she did.

But, I will say that Evie and I both felt her loss intensely but that we have dealt with losing her in very different ways, ways that are natural to us.  And, I'll add, ways that could have created conflict if we were both not as self-aware and as committed to each other as we are.

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In recent years,  I've made a serious study of repentance in the Word, in history and from practicing it and in calling others to repent.  And, I have learned some things that I am confident are true.

A cornerstone truth about repentance is that the act of repenting is part of a process and that repentance is fruit of what must come before it.  One thing that absolutely must come before repentance is, as Paul says it, godly grief, or as the NIV translates him, godly sorrow.

One reason I see no reason for hope for the CGGC at this moment is that I see no evidence of grief on any mountaintop that is visible to me.  I see contentment there tinged, perhaps, with mild concern about the future if our fortunes don't change.

Trust me.  Without repentance,  our fortunes will not change.

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A serious problem for us now is that (mostly) men gifted to be shepherds dominate us.  Shepherds resist repentance because they comfort the grieving.   Prophets, on the other hand, pour gasoline on the fire that is godly grief.

If, someday, by an act of accepting the work of the Holy Spirit, we would give in to the godly grief He would create, we could repent.

Then shepherds could have one of the roles designed for them by the ruler of the Kingdom.   They could channel the godly grief in its great variety of styles so that it could lead to a repentance that leads to salvation.

To do that, though, our shepherd mountaintoppers are going to have to step aside. They are going to have to allow the Spirit to lead us, as He did in our movement days.

In the history of God's people, though, when shepherds achieve dominance, they very rarely step aside.

They are normally either crushed or allowed to see their fiefdoms dwindle to nothing, as appears to be the case in our current decline, or they are gone around through the empowerment of a new movement, as is, really, how the Church of God came to be in the first place.

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We all must repent but the shepherd mountaintoppers really must repent. And, step aside in favor of the Holy Spirit.

Gathering 8-28-16: A Restaurant Retreat

Two of our worlds are colliding.

Mom and dad are downsizing from their Independent Living apartment into a much smaller, two room Assisted Living unit. And, we are preparing for that move.

Dad was less than a month short of his fourth birthday on Black Friday in 1929. His childhood was defined by the Great Depression.  Mom was born during the Depression in a family that would have been poor even in good times.

They are not hoarders.  Everything about them has always been tidy and well organized but they have always found it hard to throw possessions away.  And, so, they have, literally, tons of stuff. Day by day, Evie brings more of it to our place where it is being stored until we and the rest of the family can decide what to do about it.

And our small condo is so overstuffed that we can't host a gathering.

So, the plan is to offer to take the core of the Sunday group for an early lunch at our expense.  The people from the home are so glad to eat anything other than institutional food that they are always pleased on these days.

A few others may come to join us at their own expense.

We used to try to take the Bread and the Cup on these occasions but I, at least, have concluded that it's too hard to do in a way that is not unworthy, so we no longer even try.

Evie and I are both so tired that we'd be happy not to do even this.

We will do our best to fulfill the purpose of gatherings and attempt to spur one another on to love and good works, but it will be an effort.

A Gift of the Movie, GOD'S NOT DEAD

A few days ago, a guy I work with, who is a Millennial, came into the store on his day off to present to me a copy of the movie, GOD IS NOT DEAD.  He had just acquired a spare copy and knew I had never seen it.

Yesterday we watched it.  I'm not going to review the movie here, apart from a brief observation later.

What I will do is comment on the tone of the movie in light of my recent post in which I describe what unchurched seekers consider to be a "true" Christian.

The movie has a number of story lines, most prominently one about a college freshman who stands up radically and without compromise for his faith in the face of a professor who asks all of his students to hand in a paper stating that God is dead, hence the title of the movie.

When my young friend and coworker ended up with an extra copy of the film, it occurred to him to gift it to me.

I asked myself why.

Honestly, my answer is that he sees me as a radical, uncompromising follower of Jesus, and that he wants to be that himself.

In that other post about what people think is a true Christian, I said that Evie and I aspire to be red letter Christians and that I fail to achieve that but am very intentional in that goal while, so often, the lives of church people are tepid and bland.

I strive to be an ambassador for the Kingdom in the world, not a representative of a church.  And, I believe, someone noticed.

I have to say that I didn't really enjoy the movie but I will cherish my copy of it forever because it represents to me my young co-worker's recognition of my desire to be radical and uncompromising in my walk.

Could I get into this much Trouble for Being Wrong?

Unsubstantiated rumors persist that the ERC defrocked me in session this past April and there is a question that has been going through mind since I got the first rumblings that I was being whacked on the orders of the ERC's Shepherd Mafia.  And, this is that question:

Could I have gotten into this much trouble for being wrong?

Reports I've received from people who attended Conference say that when the desire of the mountaintoppers to defrock me was brought to the floor that it was clear that many of the delegates didn't even know who I am and far fewer had read or even heard of this blog.

So, why go to all the trouble to whack me?

What does the whacking say about the mountaintoppers?

And, what does it say about me?

I don't really know the answer to those questions but I will note that the predictions that I have made here about the continuing decline of our ministry have been accurate and that I have repeatedly said that, if the mountaintoppers are going to lead a change in our fortunes, they are going to have to repent and lead the body in repentance.  They remain hard-hearted to both of those calls.

Many other people criticize Conference leaders, some even mock them, though, admittedly, not as straightforwardly as I do and those people often do it in a gossippy way, behind their backs.

I don't know, but I genuinely do wonder if the ERC mountaintoppers have whacked me for no other reason than that I have been hitting the nail on the head as far as they are concerned:  That I, very simply, am in trouble because I have been right about them.

All of us must repent.

A Piece of Junk Mail?!?!? A Report to My Commission

There are times when I am so taken aback by circumstances that I have no words, even coherent thoughts.   Something that happened a week ago still has me flummoxed.

I work late on Wednesdays and go straight to bed when I get home.  When I hauled myself out of bed on Thursday morning, Evelyn showed me an envelope from the previous day's mail and said, "Do you want to see what was in the Certified Letter from the Conference that you didn't accept?"

I took it from her.

It was a plain, business size, white envelope with my name hand printed in blue ink. There was no return address but a Harrisburg post mark and, ironically--and I love this irony--a "Forever" stamp.

Most importantly to me, there was no return address.

I never, ever answer a phone call if I don't recognize the number of the caller.  I figure that if the person really wants to talk to me they can leave a message and, if the message is important to me, I'll return it.

It's the same with junk mail.  I never open it.

Any piece of mail with no return address on it is classified as junk, if it is addressed to me.  It goes through the shredder.

(By the way, there has been no other contact from the Conference regarding the status of my credentials.)

Having said that, I guess I shouldn't be surprised to be sent a piece of junk mail which anyone with half a brain would strongly suspect was from the Conference concerning something as, uh, trivial? as my defrockment.

At this point, my brain is still frozen about this, but two basic questions do come to mind. One is the question of how stupid the ERC mountaintoppers think we are.

The other is: How far will the ERC go in disobeying Jesus in dealing with someone it believes has sinned?  Jesus is crystal clear about that.  And, isn't His goal forgiveness and reconciliation, not condemnation?

The answer for me, at this point, to the how far in disobedience they will go is that ERC leaders will go much farther than even I could have imagined.

Is it any wonder that the Lord is withholding His blessing from us?

YIKES, fellas!

Sabbathing: 8-21-16

Today is a day we don't meet with our Sunday group.  I've said before that, as much as I am blessed by our gatherings, none of them can compare with the weeks we don't gather.

And, I'm beginning to wonder if that's not God's way anyway.  We know that the omnipotent Lord rested on the seventh day. Certainly,  He didn't need the rest.  And, we know that He commanded Israel to make rest on the seventh day the sign that it is keeping His covenant with it.

I find that I groove on a day committed to rest and that I thrive when I do it.

Last night, I worked the closing shift at the store.   On Saturday,  closing, in my department, ends with a grueling hour after the store actually closes and I woke up today hurting a little.  

The rest is good physically, emotionally and spiritually.   It is a genuine blessing.

Forget the Sunday morning show.  I'll take this over that any day it's available to me.

On Being Known as a "True" Christian

Not long ago, I exchanged a few messages with someone who used to be a coworker and, for a time, a participant in our Sunday house gathering and she mentioned someone she knows whom she considers to be, using her word, a "true" Christian.   And, based on things she's said to me in the past, implied in that comment she was implying "like Evie and you."

And, it occurred to me that, these days, I hear talk about who really is a "true " Christian,  from nonchurch, God-seeking people, fairly frequently since I stopped trying to fit in the traditional, institutionalized church.

And, I've been trying to unpack the meaning of the term to those unchurched, God-seeking people.

Here's what I'm concluding:

True Christians are transparently Jesus-driven, not church-consumed, and they live that out uncompromisingly in the world, though they don't necessarily live it out vocally.

Rumor has it that I have been defrocked by my Conference of churches and people hint to me that a reason people oppose me, in that setting, is that I am too uncompromising.  Ironically, it seems to me, that, in the nonchurch universe, I stand out, in a way that is attractive and compelling, for that very reason.   And, the same seems to be true of Evie.

We are intentionally determined to live as what is sometime called "red letter" people and, in a world filled with church people, it strikes me that that is extremely unusual.

I  will say about myself that I don't achieve red letter very well.  It also seems to me that it is the sincere attempt,  not the success that touches people who are seeking spiritual truth.

In our world the church is declining.   And, it seems really to be true that people love Jesus but, more and more all the time, hate the church.

Mom and Dad are Moving to Assisted Living

Their dementia doctors have been stressing the importance of this since our first appointment with them and we've been pushing the home they are in even longer than that.   And, an apartment is becoming available,  so we are about to make the big move from independent living.

Most likely all will be accomplished by the end of September.

I,  at least, was stunned to discover how expensive it is.  Mom and dad are in a very nice facility but it is, by no means,  high end.  And, the cost for their spacious two room apartment,  with all the services and amenities, will be somewhere in the range of  $425-450.  A DAY!

They worked hard and saved conservatively all of their lives and they have been guaranteed access to continuous care and, when the savings are gone, they will still be cared for.  But, needless to say, the savings will burn up quickly.

Before we became involved in this, I would never have guessed how expensive this degree of care could be.

Fortunately,  dad is now so far into vascular dementia that he can't appreciate the magnitude of the financial obligation being undertaken on his behalf and mom barely gets it.

eNews Wisdom: Here to There

I was fully engaged with Lance's last eNews blog which hit highlights of this year's Global Leadership Summit which he experienced at Winebrenner Theological Seminary.

Lance noted that Bill Hybels offered this as a definition of leadership: "...getting people from here to there."

Lance was impressed when Hybels said,

A leader knows it's not okay to stay here and that we need to be going somewhere.

To me, this statement defines the essence of what has driven the CGGC decline for at least the last generation.

CGGC leaders have been absolutely obsessed with "there."

Spiritual gift driven ministry
35,000 by 2000
Natural Church Development
Missional Leadership Initiative
ONe Mission
Hear the Call
Leadership Development
Making disciples...

...to hit only the highlights.  All fervent attempts to, as Hybels says, be going somewhere.

All of which failed, or are failing,...

...miserably.

All of which intensify our spiritual and numerical decline.

Trying to be going somewhere has not been our problem for a long time.

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Our problem is not with the yearning to be going somewhere.  We have been doing that obsessively.  The problem has been with leaving our "here."

Our leaders have always needed to hold on to what they have, hoping to graft on to the old something new that will give geniune spiritual life to our here.  And, that has never worked in all of the history of the people of God. And, it will never work for us.

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Two truths strike me in this Hybels stuff:

1.  This leaving here/going there thing is nothing more than what Jesus and the apostles and the prophets called repentance.   And, to this point CGGC leaders have resisted calling for repentance or practicing it.  We are going to have to repent to do what Hybels is talking about.

2. My Characteristics of the CGGC Brand is my attempt to describe the CGGC "here." And, the more I think about it,  the more I think it is very accurate.

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The best place for the CGGC to start is for the Findlay crowd to call a gathering to define what the CGGC "here" is and to pledge to the Lord and to the whole Body that we will leave it, that is, we will repent of it and turn from it.

We must repent!

Gathering: 8-14-16. Canine Rooted Church Growth

Because of what we believe about following Jesus, we don't invite people to church, not that we think it's necessarily wrong to do it, we just don't.

We think that following Jesus is done in the world and that attending a gathering of disciples is not an act of righteousness but is intended to provoke in others righteous living.

We consider people to be a part of our community who never or rarely or, because they are separated by distance, can't physically be present in our meetings.

When a new person physically is present in our gathering, it is, most often, because they ask if they may attend.   And, that happened today.   A coworker,  who had been a part of our Wednesday gathering,  invited herself partly because she wasn't up to being in the throng of her congregation and, honestly, to be able to spend some time with Lizzy.

So, participation expanded because of the presence of our "missional mutt."

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We had a nice time and achieved our purpose of spurring each other on to love and good works.

The theme during Word time and bread and cup time was on each disciple's participation in the ministry of reconciliation by being an ambassador of the Kingdom in the world.  Powerful stuff.

The meal was healthy and awesome with gobs of fresh veggies and fresh fruit.

A very edifying time.

A Certified Letter: A Report to My Commission

One hundred and one days after, according to several people, the ERC in session voted to recall my ordination, I found a slip of paper among the pieces of my mail informing me that a Certified Letter was awaiting me at my local post office and that it had been sent from ERC located in Harrisburg.

I have not picked it up and don't plan to.  I believe that it is scheduled to be returned on the 14th of this month.

Based on what I know to be true and on what I have heard from others, I consider the behavior of the ERC staff and Commissions and Committees in regard to me to have been underhanded, secretive, cowardly and unbiblical and, as far as I am concerned, when they want to communicate with me the content of what is in that letter, they are going to have to consult the teachings of Jesus and approach me in a way that is obedient to the Way.

The Doctrinal Statement of the CGGC says that the Bible is our only rule of Faith and Practice.  Nothing that I know of in the Word justices the practice of communicating with a brother by means of a Certified Letter.  I  accepted one such letter at the beginning of this ungodly process, not knowing what the bureaucrats were doing.  My error.  I shall not enable their dysfunction and disobedience again.

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BTW, the sending of the Certified Letter is a real-life example of Organized Hypocrisy.   The people who wrote and voted to approve the only rule of Faith and Practice language in our Doctrinal Statement ONLY THREE YEARS AGO sent that letter.

8-7-16: No Gathering, The Best Kind of Sunday

Jesus never talked about, designed or participated in anything like what you might call a worship service.  In fact, when He talked about the church, He never talked about people getting together for singing or praying or listening to preaching or taking an offering.

In our community, we haven't had a worship service for years.  And, we gave up gathering every week a long time ago.

Today is a no gathering Sunday.  As much as I love our gatherings, I love the days we don't gather even more.  No doubt this is because both Evie and I are introverts.   We love being alone together in the Lord as much as anything.

This morning was wonderful!  I spent time enjoying the beauty of God's creation by taking Lizzy for two walks on the golf course.   I wrote a report for my Commission and put it on the blog, did a few chores around the house and listened to KEEP THE FAITH on the local WORD FM station.

I can all but guarantee you that, no matter professionally it was performed, your Sunday morning show didn't refresh you as much as my Sunday morning has refreshed me.

The Sabbath was made for man.  My only regret is that it took me so long to submit to that teaching of Jesus.