Blessed are those Who Mourn

I was 63 years old when my first parent died, just two weeks ago,  and I am experiencing grief in a way that is new, and more immediate, to me.

There's nothing profound that I have to say about the grieving process itself...

...but, I have been thinking over the connection between spiritual grief and salvation...and a vital relationship that a human being can have with the Lord.

The Word makes it clear that grieving, mourning is essential to a human being's intimate connection with God.

You know, from the teachings of Jesus, the blessings for those who are poor in spirit, who MOURN, and are meek.

You know, if you read here, Paul's formula: Godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation.

James says that if you grieve, mourn and wail...God will lift you up (4:9-10).

And, it is at this point that shepherd dominated, uh, leadership fails the body.

Shepherds comfort and nurture as a result of their spiritual giftedness.

They, when they don't live in mutual submission to other giftings, and when they demand that their way be THE way, thwart the Holy Spirit when He moves to break us when we sin.

They, when they don't live in mutual submission with other gifts, stand against the strivings of apostles and prophets and evangelists when they, following their own spiritual giftedness, attempt to lead people into the godly grief that produces the repentance that leads to salvation.

They, when they demand that their way be THE way, confound the Spirit and the remainder of the body...

...attempting to create a, tepid, repentance-less walk with Christ, one that is phony.

They attempt to bring people into a relationship with Christ that ignores the reality that only Christ can lift up a sinner and He will do that only after the sinner has fallen down before Him, wanting nothing more than His mercy.

And, so, the church has become lukewarm and, ultimately, institutional. It has no fire.

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Bringing this thought to my ERC home: The shepherd leaders of the Conference believe, and want us all to believe, that the answer to our decline and decay is for us to allow them to create a plan.

They want to convince us that if we link a few new programs together and call them a strategic plan, our fortunes will change.

Please don't fall for that old line.

It is an old line.

They laid it on us twice before...and we bought it...and the plan failed.

The rate of our decay increases under those plans.

Our problems are not strategic; they are not solvable with better programs.

Our problem is spiritual.

We need to mourn, to grieve...

...as James says it, we need to grieve and mourn to the point that we wail.

We don't need a new plan.

We need to fall flat on our faces...to put ourselves in the position...

...to be lifted up

...by Him.

We must repent.

The First Christians did NOT Plant Churches

In the CGGC, during the era of shepherd domination, the local church has always been the center of universe. Jesus has not been.

These days, the church is more central than ever in the CGGC. Hence, the ERC's new New Strategic Plan and its goal of creating healthy, life-giving churches.

As the ERC Shepherd Mafia prepares to summon the Conference's parish priests and lay delegates to its special Conference session on January 13...

...it is important to note that the church was not core among the people of the first generation Jesus' disciples.

For, what? three decades? the CGGC, and especially the ERC, has hinged its hopes for church growth on the planting churches.

Church Planting has been the end all/be all...

...let's face it...

...during the era of our body's most disastrous decline.

I first wrote what comes next waaaaaay back in the days of the Emerging Church blog:

Church planting was never in the minds of the early disciples of Jesus. Neither was church multiplication. These failed and failing approaches to Kingdom expansion are fruit of the Shepherd Mafia's most essential heresy, Flockism.

Early disciples didn't plant churches.

As I say ad nauseam Jesus almost never talked about the church. In fact, the word church is absent from three of the four Gospels.

When Jesus mentions planting in the parables, obviously, He's not referring to churches, He's talking about spreading truth.

When Paul talks about planting in 1 Corinthians 5, he's not talking about planting a church in Corinth, he's talking about planting the GOSPEL there.

For three decades, then, the powers that be in the CGGC have been investing oodles time and energy and goo gobs of moolah in planting churches...

...when church planting wasn't even in the minds of Jesus and His first followers.

Is it any wonder that the Lord of all authority and power and grace and mercy and blessing is not blessing the CGGC?!?!?!!!!

In the three decades or so that the CGGC has been obsessed with church planting, truth, especially the simple truth of the gospel, has come to mean less and less in what it does.

And, as I say, and as we all know, the Lord of all authority and power and grace and mercy and blessing, very simply, is not blessing us.

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The new New Strategic Plan is all about churches...

...and parish priests...

...and, an expanded and more powerful than ever, Conference hierarchy.

But, the first followers of Jesus didn't plant churches. They planted the Word, the gospel.

They preached the gospel...Jesus.

We must do that.

We must repent.

The Family Holiday Gathering

We got together on, well, Xmas eve.

This may turn out to be the beginning of a new tradition. Evie and I have gotten together with my brother's family on the 24th for years and then met again with mom and dad on the 25th with mom and dad.

In recent years, the gatherings on the 25th were defined, for me, by the crumbling of dad's mind.

This year, Evie and I will take mom to Park City Diner for what the Diner calls "Christmas dinner." We made reservations. My brother's family will visit mom later in the day.

So, the whole family met on Xmas eve at our place because there are no steps and because there's a biffy on the main floor.

Everyone except mom contributed food. There was way too much to eat. The format followed the pattern of the Xmas eves of the past but with mom present.

That means silliness is the rule.

Evie asked that I start with prayer...I presume because mom was present...but it seemed appropriate. I gave thanks for all the things you would, even thanking God that He loved us so much that He gave his one and only Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.

I concluded my prayer thanking God for dad and the example he provided and the life he lived.

Uncharacteristicly, at the end, I heard several whisper, "Amen."

The gathering was bittersweet.

As we expected, as a result of the trauma of dad's death, mom has slipped a little further into Alzheimer's, not far yet, but further.

As I've said, dad just got sweeter and sweeter as his vascular dementia took him. Alzheimer's is another story, normally...at least, from what I understand.

It seems that mom's descent will not be like dad's.

Much of my personality comes from her and, so, this is especially challenging for me.

One positive thing with mom is that her love language has become very obvious. (These days, mom is something close to a 7 year old with very bad hearing and no short-term memory.) It's easy to know how to make her feel loved. Evie just talked to her and mom's memories of yesterday are very pleasant. That's adds to the sweetness of the memory for me.

It was probably happier to meet in a way that didn't have a definite connection to our memories of dad. He was very definitely in our hearts and we mentioned him from time very happily and pleasantly.

One other note: We gathered on Sunday morning. While many of us are very serious about following Jesus, there was no thought in anyone's mind about attending a church. I know some of the rest of them go to a church building from time to time, but Jesus is a much bigger part of our lives than what has become of the church.

Interesting.

Considering the loss of dad...and that we're still missing Lizzie...yesterday was a blessing.

Now that I no longer Believe in Christmas

I first brought this up here last year and feel it more strongly now.

In our denomination, we claim to be people of the Book. In our Mission Statement, we say we are committed to "establishing churches on the New Testament plan."

So, let's face these facts:

In the New Testament, disciples, indeed, did focus on the incarnation of Jesus but not on His nativity.

Even the Gospel accounts of the nativity, presented the story of the birth of Jesus to show the power of God's promises and God's prophecy and to proclaim Jesus as the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and as the suffering servant.

For the most part, the people I know who groove on the Christmas schmaltz, are serious about their faith but see Jesus in terms of the manger, as a baby, the height of innocence and weakness, one to be cuddled,...

...not as a Lord who gave up divine power to be a sacrifice and to command the men and women who follow Him to seek greatness by serving others.

What most of the people of the church today have made of Christmas makes me want to hurl.

I believe that they are a prime reason that the church today is weak and that it declines.

So, I ignore the High Church Holy Day, Christ Mass to embrace the entirely commercialized, sentimental, secular, celebration of Xmas,...

...of chestnuts roasting on an open fire, of letting my heart be light, of five golden rings (ba da bum bum), of presents on the tree, of Snoopy making a temporary truce with the Red Baron, of giving thanks to the Lord above cuz Santa Claus comes tonight, of dreaming of a White Christmas, of poor old grandma with incriminating Claus marks on her back.

And, all the while knowing that to be the greatest among His disciples is not to snuggle a baby, but to be the slave of all.

So, go, if you must. Pollute the truth of the incarnation by thoughts of cuddling God-as-baby. Comfort yourself with that easy and false gospel.

And, watch as your children and grandchildren grow up never knowing the One Who will, one day, separate the sheep from the goats.

What I Planned to Say at My Father's Funeral

My dad died slowly. Peacefully, but slowly. Long before he died, I knew that I would offer a tribute to him during his funeral service.

On the other hand, I knew that I become emotional at times like that and wondered if I could say what I'd planned.

In the end, as the Lord would have it, Lizzie died quickly and heart-wrenchingly the day before the funeral and I was too emotionally raw, during the service, to do anything but weep.

It was a beautiful service and a wonderful day. But, I didn't pay tribute to my dad then.

So, I will now. Here's what I would have said:

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The Book of James in the New Testament defines what true religion is for people who believe in Jesus. It says,

If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight reign on his tongue he deceives himself and his religion is useless. 

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: To look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

In the last years of his life, dad told me things about himself that I didn't know and that helped me to understand him better...and to respect him even more than I had.

He told me about long, and tedious, frustrating days that he'd spent taking women whose husbands had died to appointments at hospitals or doctor's offices or to government offices to deal with legal issues that arise after someone dies.

Interestingly, the frustration dad felt was for the pain of those women who, in the midst of their suffering, then had to deal with cold and uncaring institutions and bureaucracies.

Many of you here know the story of my cousin ______, who was physically abused by his father. When it was too dangerous for ______ to be in the home, dad took him in to our home and, more than that, made him a part of our family.

My dad was very religious in the way most people understand the meaning of the word religion. He was a regular church goer and he was very involved in the church.

But, more importantly, dad was religious in a way most people do not understand.

Dad put into practice the religion talked about in sanctuaries on Sundays. He set himself aside. He put others above himself. He sacrificed. He loved his neighbor as he loved himself.

My dad was truly a religious man.

Goodbye, Lizzie

Yesterday, one day before dad's funeral, we put our sweet Golden Retriever, Lizzie, down.

What a horrid expression, but that's what people say. We put her down. 

She was nearly ten and a half, a decent age for a Golden, but seemed to be slowing down more than she should have been so, two Wednesdays ago we took her to our vet for a check up. Her blood work showed some minor concerns, including a slightly low red blood cell count. We told the vet that we'd be in for her next regular check up in March. 

However, in the following days, she became even more lethargic so, last Thursday, the day after dad died, we took her back to the vet. Her red blood cell count was dramatically and dangerously low and she was diagnosed with an autoimmune form of anemia abbreviated IMHA. 

The vet said that she could be treated with prednisone so we started the treatment immediately. 

Still, Lizzie got worse, much worse.

Yesterday, we took her to a wonderful veterinary E. R. near Reading. Her red blood cell count had fallen to a nearly fatally low level.

After discussing the options available to us, we made the tough decision. The very kind and patient doctor told us directly that we were doing the right thing and that IMHA is a terrible disease. 

But, it all happened so quickly. 

In the midst of saying goodbye to dad, we have the pain of this loss. 

Certainly, this is a different sort of sorrow. But, the two piled on top of each other...

We called Lizzie, Sweet One. Like most Goldens, she was very quiet. But, she wagged her tail with more enthusiasm than any other dog I've known.

She was a very pleasant companion. 

The house seems very empty today.

The Existing ARTICLE VII in the ERC Mailing

I've clicked on the link to the existing ARTICLE VII in two emails and, to be certain that it wasn't a glitch related to the emails I received, I clicked on the link directly from the ERC website.

When I click on it, I don't get the existing ARTICLE VII. I get a supporting document for the new ARTICLE VII...a piece that actually promotes the NEW ARTICLE VII.

My emerging belief that the new ERC leadership team is profoundly dishonest and lacks integrity, which I'm struggling against, in spite of growing evidence,...

...also tempts me to believe that this was not a mistake but an attempt to promote the new ARTICLE VII under the guise of providing a full picture of the proposed changes.

(I wonder if anyone other than I even noticed the error. It's been up for a few days...and it's still there.)

The only alternative explanation that I can think of is that this is a genuine mistake that further points out the incompetence of the ERC's current leadership team...

...and reminds us of what we lost in Kevin, who, in spite of other perceived shortcomings, was a very capable administrator.

At this point, I'm leaning toward the incompetence theory.

Either way, though, we are worse off now than we were. Make no mistake about it!

Whether it's dishonesty or incompetence, don't trust these guys as far as you can throw them.

The Proposed ERC Constitutional Changes: Ministers

Numerous people have sent me the proposed changes to the ERC Constitution.

The change that interests me most initially is the proposed expansion of ARTICLE XI--MINISTERS.

Among other things, it places the ERC ordination vows into the Constitution.

And, I think about the attack on my ordination which, according to rumor, was discussed on the floor of the ERC Conference in session in 2016.

Two thoughts:

1. I am and have always been true to my ordination vows.

2. It is the ERC hierarchs who continually and shamelessly abuse their ordination vows.

In particular they are still making a mockery of the proposed Section 5. C. (3) having to do with the requirement that ministers subscribe to, teach and defend the doctrines of the Churches of God.

First and foremost among the doctrines of the Churches of God is that the Bible is our only rule of faith and practice.

And, these guys are pressuring the Conference to adopt a Strategic Plan with no Scriptural authority which they presented to the people of the Conference...

WITHOUT A SINGLE REFERENCE TO THE BIBLE!

Here's my take on the proposed amendment to ARTICLE XI:

1. Unanimously adopt it, then,
2. Defrock each and every member of the ERC Shepherd Mafia on the charge of insubordination to the doctrines of the Churches of God.

In my opinion, as long as the people who think of themselves as our leaders assert their own traditions and opinions over the doctrines of the Churches of God and the teachings of the Word of God, two things will be true:

1. Most of the people in the Conference will never follow them, and,
2. The Lord of all authority and power and grace and mercy and blessing will never bless us.

We must dive head first into the Word of God.

We must repent.

My Dad's Peaceful Exit

Dad died yesterday afternoon a little after 4:00.

As I blogged earlier, he took a turn for the worse last Tuesday night.

From that point on, he was not able to swallow. He went without food or liquids for more than a week, which is remarkable to me because he'd lost so much weight before this all started.

During most of the time, except for losing more weight, he seemed unchanged.

When the end came, it came very quickly. A nurse at the home said that he was beginning to show signs of immanent death about noon yesterday and he was gone about four hours later.

Dad was peaceful throughout. Even with morphine, he seemed somewhat uncomfortable during the last day or so. The Hospice nurse thought that the staff at the home might have been a little more aggressive with the morphine. Who knows?

In the end, though the end came quickly, his room was packed. Dad's remaining brother and his wife and had stopped by for a visit and stayed until the end and one of mom's sisters arrived with her beau about five minutes before the end.

Besides that, my brother and his wife, their daughter and a friend and Evie and mom and I were there. Dad was always a very private man and I'm certain that this was not his idea of a perfect end to his life.

It's a temptation at times like his to remember only the good about a person.

Dad was human. Like the rest of us, he was a son of the first Adam.

But, he was an absolutely devoted husband and father.

His mother died tragically when he was 14 and there were four younger siblings in the house. Over the years the younger ones have spoken to me about what a wonderful older brother he was. I think, in some ways, he took on the role of their mother.

He understood duty as well as anyone I've ever known and he did his duty to one and all.

He was a loyal churchman and did his part over the years, serving on boards, even teaching Sunday School.

And, though he was rarely vocal about his faith, he was, more than a churchman, a follower of Jesus.

In his later years, while he still had his mind, he told me stories of his care for widows who were in need. Twice, he took in a child who had been removed from his parents' home. I was growing up then and knew those stories well.

He lived the life much more loudly than he talked it.

(Undoubtedly, my frustration over today's church's tepid, church-focused definition of righteousness can be traced to the sacrifices dad made to show Christ's love and to obey His commands. Dad would never been vocal in expressing his own frustration, if he, indeed, was frustrated.)

Near the end, when I hope his mind was clear enough for him to understand, I told dad that he was my hero and that he still is. He will always be my hero.

His body died yesterday. Except for rare moments of clarity, his mind had been completely gone for many months.

Still, I'll miss him more now.

I'm blessed to have known him.

I'm proud to be his son.

Arrogance on the ERC Mountaintop

It was some time ago that I was made aware of the ERC Shepherd Mafia's plans to dismiss Kevin and that the idea was that his replacement could fill in one day a week until the search for the new E. D. was completed.

The Mafiosi are saying that we have an interim Executive Director but, from the moment I first heard what the plan was, here's what I thought:

This person is not an interim. He is a care-taker. 

And, that's the arrogance.

So, their guy can do as well, no better than, Kevin did working the job only one day a week!?!?!?!???

Apparently not!

Do you really think that we'd be enduring the fiasco over the rescheduling of date of Conference if Kevin was still in the chair?

Do you think that KEVIN would have tried to pull the wool over the Eldership's eyes over the real reason for changing the date...

...or, at the very least, have been less than transparent about it?

I do not.

We are not better off with this care-taker regime.

We'd be in far better hands with Kevin still in place, if this is how the Shepherd Mafia plans to lead!

The ERC is at a crucial moment as it faces a very uncertain future...

...and, we are not being led well.

It's time for a major overhaul of the Conference.

We need to get rid of the gang that's been our leadership culture for decades.

We need to dive head-first into the Word.

We need to deconstruct the institution and walk in the Spirit.

We must repent.

Dad's Health

If you're a Facebook friend you may already know most of this.

(I use this blog, to some degree, as a journal so this is as much for me in the future as it is a plea for prayers from brothers and sisters in Him.)

Dad took a turn for the worse this past Tuesday during the night.

At this point, he's sleeping most of the time, though he wakes up from time to time and is actually fairly clear minded. He says he's not in pain and that he is peaceful.

He's been taken off of nearly all of his medications, though he still gets morphine.

Until two days ago, mom, who is in the moderate stage of Alzheimer's, was in complete denial about the state of his health. Then, in an instant, she came to grips with the reality.

She's struggling. They've been married for 65 years and their lives have absolutely revolved around each other. She is about a ten minute walk, at her snail pace using her walker, from dad's room and she makes the trek in the morning, afternoon and evening. Last night, apparently, she stayed late into the night.

The rest of the family has been regular in visiting them anyway but we're all there daily now. Evie's on her way now. My brother's there now. I have work midday. But will go down after work.

The people at the store have been very supportive. I can take off to be with any time I want and can take as much time as I need. It will be at my own expense but knowing there's no pressure from the job is a tremendous relief.

Hospice is telling us that it's a matter of days, not weeks.

Nevertheless, dad's body is resilient. He's lost so much weight that he looks like a holocaust victim. But, his pulse is steady and his respiration is fairly regular. It could still be a long haul, though he seems to be perfectly at peace with the awareness that he is dying.

Dad has been quiet over the years about his faith but has lived the life right out of Matthew 25:34-40 and James 1:26-27. There is no question about his place in eternity.

We are all sad. And, very tired.

Push Back over the Issue of Institutionalism

There's someone who is in regular conversation with me off the blog over my blog posts. I often think that our off the blog exchanges are better than anything I put on the blog.

Yesterday, this guy (That's right, Lew, I identified this person as male.) took me to task because I'm pretty consistent in calling the new New Strategic Plan institution-based and the framers of the plan institutionalists.

He suggested that I'm making a much bigger point than is justified in pointing out that the new New Strategic Plan calls for the expansion of Conference staff to an E. D. and FOUR directors.

In the Round Table Meetings, apparently, Kevin suggested that not as much money would go into paying for these Directors as it might appear and that Kevin expected the E. D. to fill one of the Director roles.

So, let me be clear:

My strong objection is that this plan is focused entirely on polishing up the institution...

...AND NOT ON DISCIPLING AND MOBILIZING THE ENTIRE BODY.

All we've done in recent generations is attempt to get hierarchy right with the assumption that effective ministry will result from a perfectly functioning leadership structure.

Yet, all we've accomplished is turn our people into increasingly passive consumers of our leadership's religious products and services.

And, this new New Strategic Plan will continue that trend.

In the Church of God movement days, the Priesthood of all Believers functioned.

These days, we are becoming theologically conservative Lutheran wannabes. And, this plan will make us more like the Lutherans and even less like we were when we were a thriving Spirit-empowered movement.

We need less, not more, institution and more, not less, life in the Spirit.

Competence and Integrity on the ERC Mountaintop

First things first:

I RECEIVED THE NEWS ABOUT THE LAWYER DRIVING THE DECISION TO CHANGE THE DATE OF ERC CONFERENCE EARLY IN THE WEEK, LONG BEFORE I PUT THAT INFORMATION ON THE BLOG. 

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My network is abuzz with rumblings and reports concerning the upcoming FLY BY NIGHT ERC Conference session now scheduled for January 13, 2018.

It was people who converse with me who filled me in on the actual truth behind the reason for change in the date of the Conference meeting.

Because the hierarchs have removed me from the mailing lists, I honestly didn't know that the original memo from the Conference didn't tell the full truth until an ERC person, who is a reader of this blog, informed me that he didn't know that it was because of legal concerns that the date of Conference was changed.

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I never expected that this blog would serve as source of "All the News That's Fit to Print" about the Eastern Regional Conference of the Churches of God, General Conference.

But, that is precisely what it seems to have become.

You should know that I still have friends across the CGGC and that I hear a lot. I only pass on what I consider to be important to the Kingdom and to come from sources with direct knowledge.

I don't spread gossip.

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So, as a matter of historical fact, understand..

...this blog told the truth about the reason for the change in the date of the Conference session...

...BEFORE the truth was unloaded from the Conference office.

Perhaps the Interim E. D. planned, all along, to wait at least several days, until late Thursday afternoon to tell the entire story about the change in the date of Conference...

...and, perhaps, the fact that I spilled the beans, earlier in the day, had nothing to do with the timing of the Conference memo.

Perhaps.

I personally doubt that.

We all know the real-life timing.

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As I see it, there are now several issues:

I already raised one of them: Current ERC leadership doesn't do institutional church as well as Kevin did.

Make no mistake about it.

These guys are institutionalists.

They support the new New Strategic Plan. They advocate the expansion of Conference staff to an E. D. plus FOUR Directors. But, based on this little dance over the date of Conference,...

...these guys do institutionalism very poorly.

-----

The second, more crucial, issue is the question of the new leaders' integrity.

Why would they wait even a minute to tell the real story about the change in the date of Conference?

Only revealing the lawyer's role...

...AFTER THE TRUTH WAS TOLD ON THIS BLOG?????

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I've pointed out many times over the years that, unchecked and left to their own devises,...

...shepherds are so focused on relationship that they have trouble telling the truth.

The indisputable fact in this case is that there is only one reason that the date of Conference was changed...

...and, the ERC mountaintoppers didn't reveal that reason until the truth was mentioned in a public forum elsewhere, i.e., here.

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My network is telling me that, when you get the proposed changes to the Constitution, you'll see that the hierarchs will be asking the Eldership to give up its voice in determining the makeup of Conference Commission Structure.

Or, the hierarchs will be asking for even more authority over the body...

Or,...

...to be less accountable to the Eldership.

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The hierarchs need a two-thirds majority, FROM THE ELDERSHIP, to be released from accountability to the Eldership in this way.

It's up to the Eldership to release the hierarchs from accountability.

In my opinion, it would be foolish for the Eldership to grant the hierarchs the new power they crave.

Doing Institutional Church...Very Poorly

If I've heard, everyone else in the ERC world knows by now that the date of the special Conference session has been moved back so the legalities of changing the Constitution can be done according to hoyle.

What a joke!

Call this one The FLY BY NIGHT Conference.

People in my network high on the ERC mountain have been trying to convince me that this Conference session is really about leadership starting a conversation and getting feedback from the Eldership about the new New Strategic Plan...

...and not about foisting constitutional change to make the new New Strategic Plan a done deal.

Oh, naive little me! I was beginning to believe them.

As Maxwell Smart would have said, "Ah, the old, 'Let's live together in community trick.' Third time I've been fooled by that one this week!"

Then, the hierarchs got caught in their own game and were told by the LAWYER that they must give 30 days notice to change the Constitution. (Remind me: At what point did the lawyers get involved in the Gospels and the Book of Acts?)

So, what's this conference gathering really about?

Getting feedback from the Eldership?

Having conversation?

Living in mutual submission as a community?

Bahahahahahaha!

If it was about the conversation, the meeting would still be held on schedule. Nothing from the lawyer effects the talking and listening.

No.

This meeting is all about changing the Constitution so that the hierarchs can have their way with the Conference and do what they dern well please with a minimum of accountability from the body.

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But, as it turns out, this gang of hierarchs can't do institutional church as well as it was already being done.

The hierarchs just got caught in their own game.

This Conference session is about changing the Constitution and everything else is just P. R..

Maybe the Cynics do have it right after all.

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I'd like to laugh. But, because I love the ERC and CGGC, I'll probably cry.

We must repent!

Was the Explanation of the new New Strategic Plan a Flop?

There have been murmurs, through the network of people who keep me connected to the happenings on the ERC mountaintop, that there are some very highly placed people on the highest peaks of the ERC mountain...and others...who are devoted to the new New Strategic Plan and who think that all of us also would be excited...

...except for the fact that the people who prepared the PDF and presented the plan in those Round Table Meetings did a very poor job.

What I'm hearing is that the plan is perfectly fine and that we'd all know that, if we'd been given a better picture of it.

For example, one of my criticisms of the plan is that the people who wrote the plan ignored the shared belief of the CGGC that, "The Bible is our only rule of faith and practice," by including no Bible references in the presentation of the plan when...

...as I'm hearing it, the creators and supporters of the plan think that the plan is based on, or at least consistent with, important Scriptural truths.

If it's true that at least some people way up there on the mountaintop believe that the plan is the bee's knees and that the only reason we don't all know that is that it was poorly presented,...

...then I'm even more confused by the hierarchs' full-court press for the plan's approval.

If the mountaintoppers are thinking, "It's a great plan but we understand why no one thinks it is," they should be convening a special session of Conference to, properly, make the plan's virtues known to one and all...

...not to press an issue that wouldn't need to be pressed.

If this is the case,...

...and my sources are impeccable,...

...if the mountaintoppers want the Eldership to embrace this plan...

...they need to be selling it to the brothers and sisters, not pressing the body to approve it before the plan's benefts are properly explained.

Words on Paper 2.0?

The second of Stephen Covey's habits of highly effective people is, "Begin with the end in mind."

From where I sit, having the end on mind may be the most glaring failing of the people of the CGGC who think of themselves as leaders of the church (as opposed to servants of the King).

And, even by their own admission, our leaders have not been effective people in their supposed leadership roles. Their writing of the 2017 new New Strategic Plan...

...and their description of the 2015 old New Strategic Plan as merely words on paper tells that tale.

Hovering up here from my 40,000 foot vantage point, observing the recent behavior of the ERC hierarch culture, I think it's clear what the end is that our hierarchs have in their heads:

The approval of the new New Strategic Plan. 

Child's play.

In my many-decade-involvement in the Conference, leadership has never been denied official approval of its programs and strategies because...

...the delegates to Conference have always granted permission...

...of the words on paper.

What the Conference as a whole, has never done is to participate in the plans.

So, as I see it, the hierarchs' recent actions will end in a repeat of history in which they get approval...probably rather easy approval...
of their words on paper and nothing more.

Through the Round Table Meetings, according to the PDFs, the hierarch culture was adamant that the new New Strategic Plan would be implemented beginning January 1, though the people who attended those meetings, if the PDF is to be believed, had meaningful reservations about elements of the plan,...

...some even joining with me in doubting that the hierarchs had the authority, according to the covenant we have with each other other, as described in the Constitution, to implement the plan.

It seems clear to me that, at this moment, the new New Strategic Plan would be less than a month from implementation except that the Ad Council shouted, "Whoa Nellie Belle!" in that special meeting in November.

So, undaunted, the hierarchs are pushing it through, as best they can.

They picked Jim Moss to be the ERC's Interim Executive Director because he helped write the new New Strategic Plan, knows it inside and out, and is as excited about it as any four year old awaiting the coming of Santy Claus.

Then,...

...Jim introduced himself to the Conference as the new Interim Executive Director as someone who will be able to get the plan going when it is approved at the special Conference session in January.

The hierarchs are using a full court press to get the new New Strategic Plan approved when...

...as far as I can tell, approval is already a done deal.

After all,

The 2015 old New Strategic Plan was approved by the Conference in session...

...UNANIMOUSLY!

And, with much less effort than is being poured into the promotion of the new New Strategic Plan.

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

Here, however, are some key realities about the new New Strategic Plan:

1. Very few people attended the Round Table Meetings. Therefore, very few people know what they will be asked to approve in January.

2. The lack of attendance suggests to me a lack of interest in the plan one way or the other.

3. Read the PDF of the questions and answers if you doubt this, but many questions were raised about the plan. And, my take on the questions is that few satisfactory answers were provided. I'll say this: Many of the questions raised are concerns I myself have and the answers didn't satisfy me.

4. Based on the lean attendance of the meetings, few in the ERC seem to care about the new New Strategic Plan.

5. Based on the questions raised at the meetings, among those who do care, many have concerns.

6. The end that Jim and the hierarchs seem to have in mind, is simply to get the plan officially approved...something that has never, ever been a problem in the first place.

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

There is a culture in the ERC that allows the hierarchs to come together in the meeting rooms at the Church Center and plan and scheme to their hearts' content and, then, to beat their chests in pride over their fine work...

...so long as the Apathetics and the Cynics of the Conference have permission to give meaningless approval to their plans...

...and just so long as no one asks them to actually do anything about it.

That's exactly what happened, just two years ago, in 2015.

It's what the hierarch culture is working for now and...

...most likely, that's what it will get.

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

If the hierarchs cared about anything else, based on the slim attendance at those Round Table Meetings, and the nature of the questions raised,...

...they'd be focusing on informing the members of the Eldership about the plan,...

...not pushing the ERC community for approval.

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

What is likely, though, is, in the wake of the 2015 old New Strategic Plan,...

...we'll get Words on Paper 2.0.

Jim Moss's FULL COURT PRESS Memo...Thinking Theologically

I've been sitting on this post for several days, though I have had some conversation with people in my, uh, "network" about the Jim Moss memo and the new New Strategic Plan as the conversation heats up.

I, of course, wasn't on the mailing list of people who received the memo. I'm thankful to my friend who sent it to me.

I've been trying to be careful, during the time I've had the memo, to allow my many thoughts and emotions to settle so that what's consistent with my spiritual gift and calling may become more clear.

What we prophets do is see issues of truth in the big picture. And, I've been trying to relax to allow myself to see clearly what there is for me to see that serves the Kingdom...and our community.

Big picture: The ERC leadership culture has, to use a boxing metaphor, come out swinging.

Or, switch sports, this memo is an all-out blitz...

...a full-court press.

It is, perhaps, an aggressive, at the very least, assertive, first step, right out of the batter's box to take control.

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

A crucial New Testament principle is that it is what one does that is all that really matters.

Certainly, it is faith that saves us.

But, after Jesus began His ministry calling on all people to believe the gospel, He made it clear, in Matthew 25, for instance, that it's how one lives in faith that will determine whether s/he will stand before Him among the sheep or the goats.

And, after Paul says that we are saved by grace through faith, he adds that we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works. (Eph. 2:8-10)

So, what the ERC leadership culture actually does to begin the conversation about the new New Strategic Plan in its first post-Kevin communication is important.

What the ERC hierarchs really want is to get the new New Strategic Plan approved.

And, Jim Moss himself is the incarnation of their intention, as he himself makes clear.

Jim was chosen to be the ERC's Interim Executive Director because he strongly supports the plan...

...and, he even helped design it!

He's in place so that...

...when...

...WHEN...

...the plan is approved, the Conference will save four to six months in getting the plan going.

I believe Jim, in the memo, when he says that he didn't seek the job, as Interim Executive Director. Hiring him was the idea of a whole group of hierarchs.

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

One note of theological interpretation:

These guys are doing what they can to CONTROL the process and the Conference gathering in January, not to SERVE the Eldership. 

The CGGC is a conference, an eldership. Humanly speaking, our highest authority is the community when it is gathered.

We are not led by bishops. We truly believe that the Spirit speaks to us through the community.

The hierarchs are attempting to taking control. They are not allowing the Spirit to be in control.  They are trying to lead. They are not functioning as servants who are in place, at the pleasure of the Eldership, to carry out the ministry of the Conference...

...they are behaving as if the Conference exists to accept and carry out their wisdom...

...to be led by them, not by the Spirit speaking to them through, well,...

...our community.

It truly has always been the official belief of the Church of God that the Spirit speaks to the body through the community of the called, i.e., the Conference, the Eldership,...

...and that people who hold staff positions or hold commission membership serve the Conference,...

...not LEAD it.

I am sure that Jim, and the rest of the hierarchs, have only the best of intentions but the tone of Jim's memo defies the covenant we have with each other in the ERC and CGGC.

Thinking theologically, Jim Moss, as Jesus explained it, has been chosen to be the ERC's Interim Slave-To-All, not the hierarchs' key man in getting the new New Strategic Plan approved.

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

The truth is that attendance at those Round Table Meetings was very low and, based on the PDF, many of the people who attended them have reservations about the plan.

If our hierarchs were true to what we believe about our community, they'd be taking the initiative in serving the Eldership. Jim would not be thinking about getting the plan approved and implemented. He'd be thinking about increasing knowledge about and understanding of the plan...

...then allowing the Spirit to speak through the community.

I believe that the Conference does not need to be convinced to rubber stamp the new New Strategic Plan. It should be invited into an informed conversation.

It should be called to prayer so that the Spirit can be heard...

...so that He will speak...

...and we will hear...

...as the community of the called.

Lost Friendships

Over the course of the past few days, I've been thinking about who I've been friendly with over the years but am no longer friends with...particularly among people with whom I shared ministry in the past.

I started thinking about those broken relationships after receiving a very gracious note from someone who has been prominent in the CGGC who, in the note, regretted our lost friendship

Then, just the other day, I received an email from someone in the Conference which asked if Pastor ____________ and I are still friends, to which I replied, "No. Not even close. Sad."

As readers here know, I make truth a priority.

I've been in ministry for more than 40 years and, for years, subjugated my, I believe, God-given, obsession with truth in order to just get along in my denominational body...

...only to see that body decay at an increasing rate...

...and to feel my own godly sorrow increase to the point that it became impossible to bear.

And, so, I became, as the G. C. E. D. sometimes phrases it, a person of the Book, without reservation.

And, in only a few years, considering my advanced age, I've lost most of the denominational relationships I've had.

Taking the friendships I lost over my passionate opposition to the ERC's 2015 Strategic Plan as an example, I was of course, right about the Strategic Plan. Yet, no one has come to me apologizing for their role in our lost friendship, asking to renew the fellowship.

I take no pleasure in being accurate about the coming failures of the CGGC's programs and strategies. I felt the pain over the failure of the 2015 Strategic Plan even before the rest of the Conference voted to unanimously approve it.

And, I don't resent my former friends for disagreeing with me.

From the moment I took my first steps as a prophet, I understood how lonely the journey would, most likely, be.

And, on the other hand, people have come to me approving of my walk and even thanking me for it.

But, the truth is, very few church people and I are friends these days.

And, while I have no qualms about my intense focus on truth, there are times that I wish I had a larger universe of people to pal around with.

The Shepherd Mafia won't go down without a Fight

I use three terms to describe the people who make up the leadership culture that took over in the Churches of God about 80 years ago and is responsible for the sad state the body is in these days:

Shepherd Mafia,
Mountaintoppers, and,
Hierarchs.

Each of the terms describes, in its way, who this group is and how it operates.

These men, they are almost all men...most of them more geezerly than I am...are heirs of a tradition they take pride in, a tradition they wholeheartedly believe in and love...

...a tradition that has taken control of our body which was once a radical and dynamic, growing Spirit-empowered movement...

...and, through their stewardship over the course of generations, has become a dying institution characterized by decline, decay and, now, crisis.

Yet, they still believe in themselves and in their institutional ways which the Lord of all authority and power and grace and mercy and blessing has never blessed.

Based what I'm hearing,

1. The Shepherd Mafia's hold on power, at least in the ERC, has slipped...at least for this brief moment,
2. There are people, who are not me, who may be placing blame on them for our current decay,
3. In the past, the blamers were beaten down and simply eventually became Cynics, but a new group of Skeptics, who may take a run at the hierarchs, have energy and hope for the CGGC in the future,
4. But, the mountaintoppers are steadfast and still believe that they can tweak their failed values and ways to the point that they can convince the Lord to bless their programs and strategies.

In the ERC, there may soon be a tussle to determine which vision...which theology...will dominate our future.

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

Yet, it is the Shepherd Mafia that is battle-hardened. 

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

The Shepherd Mafia has not dominated for all of these generations without challenge. And, since the days it was an upstart contender, it is undefeated.

It is the Floyd Mayweather, Jr. of the CGGC.

Where do you think the Cynics came from? From lost tussles with the mountaintoppers...and from the way the CGGC mountaintoppers fight, and win.

Why do you suspect the Apathetics in the CGGC/ERC are disengaged? There certainly no Apathetics in the movent in Winebrenner's day.

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

My own story, as I live out my geezerdom in the CGGC, is defined by the part I played in a recent assault on the institution led by the hierarchs.

Ten years ago, there was an energetic community across the CGGC functioning on and beyond Brian Miller's, CGGC in an Emerging World blog...

...calling for a new and different CGGC.

One in which there was little or no hierarchy,...

...one in which focus was on Kingdom expansion not church growth,...

...one in which focus was outward, not inward...

...one in which the pastor-as-parish-priest leadership model was abandoned in favor of a culture dominated by apostolic servanthood...

...one in which the clergy/laity division was deconstructed in favor of a body in which every believer is a disciple who lives actively in the world as a priest...

...one in which pastors were not providers of religious products and services consumed by passive members of a congregation's laity...but in which all spurred each other on to love and good works.

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

It's hard for me to understand why that vision was resisted on the mountaintop.

Being naive about this sort of thing,...

...it's still hard for me to apprehend how the General Conference hierarchs actually did negate it.

Ed said nice things about it...

..Lance always seemed to be on board and, in fact, was doing that podcast with Brian, Fran Leeman and me.

But, the CGGC truth is that, in 2017, while, in Findlay, some of that talk is still spoken, our body is further from living out that vision than it was ten years ago...

...and the enthusiasm for Kingdom expansion and a denominational body in which every believer is a disciple who is an active priest is a faint shadow of what it had been.

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

And, the Shepherd Mafia still dominates...battered but unbowed...Floyd Mayweather, Jr.,...reigning and undefeated champeen!

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

In the east, the hierarchs have confessed that their 2015 Strategic Plan, presented with fanfare and adopted by the Conference without a dissenting vote, became mere words on a page.

The Shepherd Mafia created a new New Strategic Plan which it expected to implement in January.

Yet, this time around, there are dissenting voices...

...enough of them to delay the foisting of the plan on the hierarchs' minions.

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

Here are some ERC realities:

1. Unlike the gang in Findlay, the ERC powers that be never even talked the Kingdom, universal priesthood talk. They were always focused on church and the pastor-as-parish-priest leadership model...and they have that focus now more than ever.

2. Their Shepherd Mafia strongly believes in itself. These guys have successfully resisted many efforts to undo what have done.

3. The ERC hierarchs really believe in the church as an institution.  Their new New Strategic Plan calls for the expansion of Conference to an Executive Director plus four Directors.

4. They are currently dictating the way the ERC future is imagined. What we have now is the option of approving their Strategic Plan, or not.

5. They remain undefeated.

In my opinion, the hierarchs must decrease so that the Lord of all authority and power and grace and mercy and blessing can increase.

But, I'm afraid that they will have to be beaten...by people in the church...for that to happen.

They believe in themselves too strongly to repent.

At the beginning, at least, it will be up to you, Skeptics.

Scapegoating/Accepting Responsibility...Kevin Richardson

I see a disturbing pattern that may be manifesting itself in the ERC: Scapegoating.

Among the people who are in conversation with me and less than enthusiastic about the attack on my credentials, there is no convincing explanation of why the Shepherd Mafia did it.

Certainly, through this blog I expressed my opinion that the Lord of all authority and power and grace and mercy and blessing was not blessing the ERC and that that same Lord would not bless the current program or strategy...whatever it was in the moment.

But, honestly, as correct as I have been, my rantings here were not making any difference.

The Conference has always given the hierarchs everything they wanted and, until earlier this month, the Ad Council has always rubber stamped and given the hierarchs a blank check.

So, what was the attack on my credentials about? Why did the Shepherd Mafia go to all that trouble?

One theory is that, as the leadership culture was failing and the decay and putrefication of the Conference continued, the hierarchs were distracting the Conference, if even for a brief moment, from the reality of its failure by making a scapegoat of me.

Certainly, if the unsubstantiated gossip is true, a nice chunk of ERC Conference sessions in 2016 and a lot of the chatter had to do with me and not with the continuing failings of ERC leadership.

Actually, I wouldn't be thinking about scapegoating in connection to my story...

...except I'm beginning to think that scapegoating is what's happening right now with Kevin Richardson...and, that it's part of a pattern.

I've been contemplating writing a post on why Kevin can't be held responsible for the current state of the Conference...

...and I'll probably write it up in time...

...but, for now, I'm beginning to suspect that Kevin is going to be the current fall guy for the decades long failings of Conference leadership and that, if the hierarchs have their way...

...everything else will go on pretty much as usual and that the 2017 new New Strategic Plan will, in the end, be adopted...if they have their way.

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

Gang,

There's lots wrong in the ERC.

The stench of decay was present long before Kevin was elected as Executive Director.

It would be ridiculous to suggest that the other ERC Directors on staff have done good jobs and that Kevin alone has failed...and deserves to be fired.

And, please remember: The Shepherd Mafia was in place long before the current regime ascended the ERC mountain.

There's much more wrong with the Conference than Kevin can be held responsible for in the mountaintoppers' wildest dreams.

Don't scapegoat Kevin.

Whatever Happened to SERVANT Leadership?

I've become a student of change in the American institutional church.

I see lots of it...

...none of it is for the good, at least if following Jesus is the standard.

Jesus, who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant.

Jesus lived in the world serving the least, feeding the hungry, healing the sick...

And, He was clear in teaching how greatness can be achieved among His disciples: to be great is to become a servant.

The person among His disciples who yearns to be the greatest must become slave of all.

A few decades back, I was on staff at a seminary. At that time, that school, along with most was tweaking the wisdom of Jesus. We weren't in the business of developing servants of the King. We were about the task of developing servant leaders for the church.

I, personally, was never comfortable suggesting that training leaders, even servant leaders, was an appropriate goal of a Christian educational institution...but I was a greenhorn and no one asked me.

However, now, give me the day of the servant leader fad!

These days, churches have set for themselves the task of developing leaders, the very notion that we add the adjective "servant" be damned.

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

As I observe the movement in what the church says and does today, I see less imitation of Christ and more and more imitation of the world.

This cannot possibly be good.

It is not good.

We must repent.

How it FEELS to Oppose This Strategic Plan Compared to Opposing the Last One

For me personally, there were two big items of news from the 2015 ERC Conference sessions.

One was that the Conference UNANIMOUSLY approved a new Strategic Plan which I alone publicly opposed, though due to commitments to my job, I was unable to oppose it on the Conference floor.

AND, as Conference was shutting down, near the end of the third day, upon the recommendation of the Standing Committee, the Conference Administrative Council, also unanimously, voted to recall my ordination.

I have suspected here, on this blog, that my vociferous, passionate, relentless and lone-voiced opposition to the 2015 old new Strategic Plan may very well have been the straw that broke the camel's back and inspired the mountaintoppers to take their action against my credentials.

In all of that, in 2015, those things felt normal.

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

Since I'd embraced the New Testament message that Jesus prepared apostles to be chief servants, even slaves, in God's Kingdom, not pastors to lead the church, and since I'd noticed His teaching that it would be normal for prophets to function in the Kingdom, so much so that He gave instruction on how to distinguish true from false prophets...

...and, after some prayer, began to live as a prophet,...

...I'd known nothing but powerful churchly opposition in the CGGC along with only a smidgen of curious interest, yet no support.

I do remember one person, back in 2015, writing to me, very privately, that he also had deep reservations about the Strategic Plan but, to my knowledge, he only confided that in me.

Back then, I was a lone wolf, a voice crying in the wilderness.

As, at that time, I always was about everything.

In 2015, that felt normal. But, what was the emotion of the normal feeling?

Earlier in my prophet walk, the strongest emotion was anger. By 2015, sadness over the state of the Kingdom/church was as strong as an emotion, but loneliness was also present...

...though, by then, I had accepted the fact that I'd probably always be alone, humanly speaking.

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

Since 2015, everyone from Dr. Richardson on down has apparently come to the same opinion about the 2015 old new Strategic Plan as I expressed back in the day.

I'm not sure that anyone, even those in closest contact with me, is actually saying, "You were right, bill."

But, the 2015 old new Strategic Plan has been placed on the ERC's trash heap precisely as, in 2015, I said it should be.

No one is defending the 2015 plan. Or said another way, these days...

EVERYONE IS AGREEING WITH WHAT THE LORD WAS SAYING TO ME AND THROUGH ME IN 2015.

How does that feel to me? Actually, and interestingly, I have no feeling about it.

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

So, now it's 2017.

The hierarchs have announced that the 2015 Strategic Plan failed and became words on a page.

THEY decided, on their own, that it's time to create a new New Strategic Plan for the Conference. They held two rounds of meetings and planned to have the Ad Council rubber stamp it.

As in 2015, I spoke passionately against this new new plan...

...but, unlike 2015, when the plan was promoted in those Round Table Meetings, some expressed the same sort of concerns I'd been expressing.

And, though the hierarchs were adamant that the plan would be rubber stamped in November and implemented this coming January...

...the Ad Council didn't take out the rubber stamp, as it ALWAYS has done for decades.

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

In 2017, more than a few people are openly thinking what I think...

...but, and, understand, I get this...

...it's not that they agree with me.

As puny as this blog is, I suspect that almost no one who thinks what I think knows what I think.

The level of my influence is so minute that it is, essentially, nonexistent.

But some people are now thinking what I've been thinking, and saying, for years.

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

How does that feel? I've been asking that of myself.

Do I wish that people were writing me and calling me to say,

"You were right, bill. Thanks for being true to the Word and courageous in the Spirit. Thanks for remaining true, even when nearly everyone who now thinks what you thought and think, pooped on you. Thanks for being ahead of your time."

Surprisingly, no. If that happened, I suspect I'd be uncomfortable.

And, I'm honestly wondering why.

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

I'm still really trying to figure out this prophet thing. I'm guessing I'm about 10% there. I certainly believe in it but don't really understand it.

I know that, for me, it's about the Lord and the Word. Being faithful in the moment is my measure of success. That's hard to measure, especially when, most of the time, I'm out of step with almost everyone around me.

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

If you study the lives of the prophets of the Bible, you'll probably conclude that, emotionally, they were all a mess.

And, certainly, I am like them in that way.

Is This A Transitional Moment for the ERC?

I believe that it's possible that the ERC may be on the verge of a historic transformation.

When I entered the East Pennsylvania Conference in the 1970s, as I've said several times, there were pro-Conference and anti-Conference cultures...

...the groups that exist as today's hierarchs and their Good Old Boy network and the Cynics.

In the 40 plus years since then, those groups have evolved. And, the diversity in what is now the Eastern Regional Conference has increased.

There were always those who just didn't care about the moving and shaking that goes on at the Conference level. And, these people still exist and are the people I call the Apathetics.

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

In the 70s, there was only one staff member, a "Conference Superintendent," who was a great guy, but, really, mostly an administrator who traveled to the churches as the Conference luminary. (He installed me at Duncannon and Logania more than 40 years ago.)

Later on, Conference staff expanded to two.

Now, it's an Executive Director, two Directors, two finance people (typical of an institution) plus an Executive Assistant.

And, soon, if the hierarchs have their way with us, and the new New Strategic Plan becomes reality,...

...there will be an E. D., FOUR directors, a finance person and an Executive Assistant.

Make no mistake about it:

The new New Strategic Plan expands the ERC as an institution and is, precisely, feces neatly arranged on a newly polished sterling silver platter.

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

The hierarchs fully expected that the people of the Conference would roll over...

...as they always have before...

...approve the new New Strategic Plan thoughtlessly, as they normally do...

...and, then, allow the new New Strategic Plan to become words on a page...

...as their programs and strategies always become...

...so the hierarchs could, in the near future, justify their existence by putting together their next program and/or strategy.

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

But, not this time.

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

Clearly, as they approached this past Administrative Council meeting, the hierarchs still expected the Council to roll over and rubber stamp their plan.

Read the Round Table PDF. They seemed certain that the new New Strategic Plan would be implemented on January 1, 2018.

They planned to do an end run around the Constitution by simply saying that they weren't suspending it. Which, of course, they were.

And, in the past, they would have gotten away with it...

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

...but, not this time.

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

I, of course, don't know the particulars. I only know what would have happened in the past.

It's what happened in 2015 with the old New Strategic Plan.

That didn't happen earlier this month.

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

The dominance of the hierarchs is now in question.

There is now a group of Skeptics unwilling, for the moment at least, to rubber stamp the hierarchs' plans. Some of the are fairly highly positioned.

It is historically significant that these Skeptics are able and willing to think and act independently of the hierarchs and their Good Old Boy network...

...and to doit without becoming Cynics.

They are unwilling to blandly vote, "Aye," and to rubber stamp the hierarchs latest.

And, that unwillingness is absolutely and truly historic. By ERC standards, it verges on the prophetic.

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

Let me be clear, I'm acquainted with all of the ERC staff people, and being the geezer I am, in most cases, I've known them for many years. I know the hierarchs. And, even most of the people currently in the Good Old Boy network.

And, as individuals, they are wonderful people.

They are nice people. Individually, they are gentle people. They genuinely believe. They are perfectly sincere. They love the Lord.

As individuals.

But, joined together, they make up a leadership culture that has been devastating...deadly...to the church.

If the hierarchs who carry on the church-focused, pastor-dominated ways are permitted to carry on those church-focused, pastor-dominated ways one more time, the ERC may very well be burnt toast.

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

But, I see two hopeful signs that I want to believe are signs that the ERC could be entering a time of transition...of transformation.

1. The hierarchs blinked.  They admitted that the 2015 old new Strategic Plan was merely words on paper.

Understand: They have never done that before.

They are not as self-confident as they have always been.

2. The Skeptics have arisen, seemingly organically, to, at least, question the will and the ways of the hierarchs and their good old boy network. 

What has always happened...

...the thing that happened as recently as the 2015 old new Strategic Plan is not happening yet.

In 2015, the hierarchs planned...

...the Ad Council rubber stamped...

...the hierarchs then summoned the necessary enthusiasm to create fanfare for that Strategic Plan...

The Conference in session rolled over and, unanimously, approved...

And, as always, under the guidance of this leadership culture, no one did anything...

...until, in the context of the now advanced decay and putrefication of the Conference, the hierarchs panicked, attempted to foist the idea of a new Strategic Plan on the Conference...

And, the Skeptics said, "Now hold on!"

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

And, now the Conference has a chance.

What we need to do is repent.

At this point, I don't see that happening but it may.

As I study the word, I understand that repentance is the fruit of an emotional process.

Jesus talks about that process in the Beatitudes that appear at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. Study, especially, the first four blessings. Poor in spirit. Mourn. Meek. Hunger and thirst for righteousness.

We're not there yet.

Paul says, more succinctly, that godly sorrow produces a repentance that leads to salvation.

We're not emotionally on the path to repentance. But, we may get there, eventually.

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

Is this a transitional moment for the ERC?

No.

Not yet.

But, the ingredients that must be present at the beginning of that process may, possibly, soon be present.

Pray for the Skeptics...and their prophetic ministry.

A Christian Personality?

As you know, I intentionally live as a subject of the Kingdom of God in an incarnational way.

For many years, I worked, in a variety of capacities, as a minister in the church.

I finally resigned from the role of congregational pastor about five years ago, though I continued to have a prominent role in the ministry at Faith.

Now, I work as a Front End manager in a super market.

It's a humble job. A humbling job at times.

But, I do it gladly, more as an ambassador of the Kingdom than a missionary of the gospel, though there are elements of both in what I do and how I do it.

From the beginning, when I was first hired at the store as a part-time geezer bagger, I attempted to function as a servant, a slave even, of the store's customers as well as my co-workers. And, I believe that I was viewed as a servant by most people.

And, I found a sort of joy in the job and how I did it.

But, the joy was, and still is, a sort of secondary joy.

I serve one and all because Jesus commands His disciples to be servants. I don't do it because serving comes naturally, or even easily, to me.

On the job, I'm serving Jesus, not the person in front of me.

And, I'm fine with that. Jesus taught that self-denial is essential to those who would follow Him. Many times in a day on this job, I have opportunity to deny myself.

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

But, there's a guy I work with who seems to totally groove on the job of being in the role of a servant.

He's a bagger and, moment by moment, he seems to be in his element, going above and beyond in serving the customers, as well as his co-workers.

And, what he does day in and day out seems to come from the core of who he is. Serving seems to bring him a joy that is essential to who he is, not, as it is in my case, a secondary joy.

He serves organically. I serve intentionally.

I've known him now for more than four years and he seems to be a natural servant who finds joy in setting aside his own interest for the benefit of others.

He is good at serving, creative about it.

He proclaims himself to be a believer in Jesus and his lifestyle highlights his talk.

Man, do I, well, envy him!

No doubt, he has his own spiritual struggles. But, what gives him joy reinforces his claim to be a man of God.

How great is that!

Evidence that Supports My FECES Theory

Yesterday I suggested that one of the dysfunctions of the CGGC is that there are people in the body who, if leadership pooped and placed their work product on a platter, would exclaim, "Ain't that purty?!"...

...all because the CGGC is so dominated by shepherd values that only relationship matters.

I've received some, say, fascinated, tepid disagreement on that observation, off the blog.

But, I'm all the more convinced that the Feces Theory describes a key dysfunction of the CGGC that must be turned from if we, as a body, are going to have Kingdom impact in the future, as we did in past days when we were a thriving Spirit-empowered movement.

As a prophet, I see reality from a big-picture, 40,000 foot perspective. Here's what I see from way up there, and, I'll focus on the ERC with which I am most involved and familiar:

Since I entered the Conference more than 40 years ago, Conference leadership has been aware of the Conference's spiritual and numerical decline and has been developing programs and strategies to reverse the decline.

Yet, during all those decades, the rate both of spiritual and numerical decline has increased to the point that the tone of the current hierarchs, in promoting the new New Strategic Plan...

...can't we all agree...

... is desperate?!

Read the PDF if you doubt that.

History makes it clear that all of those programs and strategies, designed to reverse our decline were...

...Feces on a platter.

And, with every initiative, in the past...every last one of them...there has been a chorus of prominent people in the Conference prepared to sing, in four part harmony, "Ain't that purty!"

Every stinkin idea that has come down from the mountaintop in recent decades has failed. Everyone of them has been quickly abandoned, or conveniently forgotten, and replaced as the platter was reloaded with the next pile of crap...

...which was, of course, received the obligatory, and enthusiastic, chorus of praise.

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

As an example, consider the much ballyhooed 2015 old New Strategic Plan.

It was presented to the ERC Conference in session with great fanfare and, I'm told, unanimously approved...

...the chorus, as always, sang its praises in harmony...

...only to see the old New Strategic Plan unceremoniously dumped within a year as mere "words on a page."

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Is it any wonder that there are so many Apathetics, Cynics and, thank God, now, Skeptics, in the Conference!?!!

On this blog, people who are sincerely and genuinely unconvinced by the 2017 new New Strategic Plan have been called, "Snipers."

Yet, if history holds, this plan will soon be acknowledged to have been a load of crap.

What can possibly be wrong about being initially careful about taking a full whiff of what's on the loaded-up platter that is the 2017 new New Strategic Plan?

History, it seems, demands a high degree of caution.

We must repent.

Saying Goodbye to One more Promotion on my Job

I've mentioned that not so long ago, I experienced very serious vertigo and was admitted to the hospital for observation.

I didn't have a stroke.

I wore a heart monitor for more than 24 hours. No problem there.

And, no diagnosis.

There is a suggestion from a personal friend who is an ENT doctor that I have Meniere's disease, but I'm doubtful about that.

My primary care physician is treating me as if the vertigo was a type of migraine headache brought on by exhaustion from the job and anxiety related to my father's failing health.

I've also said that, in response to my health problems, I volunteered to step down from my managerial position at the store.

The HR guy didn't want me to leave the management team and asked me what I'd like him to do for me. I told him. He discussed the idea with the rest of the managerial team in my department and they agreed...And, have been more than generous in accommodating my wishes.

However, because of that, in my opinion, I don't really carry my weight on the management team in the way I'd like to...

...and, I believe, I should.

There is one more possible promotion coming up within a year or so, which I suspect I was a lock for...until I asked for special consideration because of my health.

Now, I'm guessing that that won't work out.

I have no regrets.

As it is now, I'm able to live Kingdom values incarnationally, as one of the rest of the crew on the job, even though I am a manager.

I'm doing what I do for the Kingdom as best I can, though, certainly, not perfectly.

I'll plug away at that.

And, give thanks to God.

Feces on a Platter?

Gang,

The image that is at the center of this post came to me out of nowhere and has stuck in my mind and it has the feel, to me, of a tame version of Isaiah's vivid prophetic image that appears in Isaiah 20.

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Probably the most destructive characteristic of the dysfunction of the Churches of God, General Conference derives from the reality that, in the church body, relationship rules.

Shepherd values dominate the CGGC's dysfunction.

We pervert the fierce, passionate, sacrificial love Jesus commanded and lived. We live in a festering pool of bland and lukewarm tolerance.

We judge others based on the degree to which they comply with what denominational leaders do...

...because, in the CGGC universe, mild acceptance to the whims and ways of leaders is valued.

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

I am convinced that, if the hierarchs of the ERC had pooped and arranged their work product on a silver platter, there are some in the ERC who would examine it and exclaim, "Wow! Ain't that purty?!"

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

And, in truth, it's from that paradigm, as far as I can tell, that the people who are defending the new New Strategic Plan are defending it.

Understand, at this point, I'm not saying that the new New Strategic Plan is feces on a platter.

What I'm saying is that the strongest argument for it is that it's our leaders' work and we should support them...

I know for a fact that there are people who love the Conference who are thinking theologically about the new New Strategic Plan and are deeply concerned and are raising profound questions, perhaps even objections...

...and the most meaningful reply I'm aware of to their concerns is,...

...as the defenders set their jaws,...

"It's...your...leaders'...poop!"

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

This plan is all about churches, pastors and hierarchical leaders...

...and none of that stuff is anywhere to be found in what Jesus did or taught.

It's time to openly assess the content of the new New Strategic Plan based.

We must repent.

There's already Xmas Music on the Radio

I'm not much of a music person these days.

When I listen to the radio, it's usually news or talk.

In fact, the only music I look forward to listening to on the radio is Xmas music.

Very little of that music is about Jesus. A lot of it is about Christmas itself or Santa Claus. Probably at least as much is simply about what people enjoy about snow or cold weather. I remain unconvinced. I HATE cold weather.

I blogged last year why I think it is counterproductive, as a disciple of of Jesus, to make a big deal out the nativity.

No doubt, I'll beat that drum again.

But,...

I stumbled on Xmas music for the first time this year on November 11.

November 11!?!?!?!!!

There's definitely such a thing as too much of a good thing. And, this, in my opinion, is an example of it.

Anyway, the local station that's already doing Xmas music does a countdown around Christmas day of listener's favorite Xmas songs.

So, you go on line and vote, listing the song as performed by a specific artist, voting for as many as three songs.

Here's my three in order:

1. I'LL BE HOME FOR CHRISTMAS, by Bing Crosby. (I've been sentimental about this one because it makes me think of my dad as we watch him die...very, very slowly.) Dad was in the army in WWII. He was home for Christmas but only in his dreams.

2. THE CHRISTMAS SONG, by Nat King Cole.

3. HAVE YOURSELF A MERRY LITTLE CHRISTMAS, by (of all people) James Taylor because he uses the original lyrics and because he does the song very well.

Interestingly, Evie voted for the same three songs...

...by the same artists...

...but with James first, Bing second and Nat third.

The most Perceptive Thing I've Heard Dave Draper Say

It was very early in my time at the seminary. And we were in a group that was spitballing about religious products and services Winebrenner might provide in the future.

Someone in the group mentioned the possibility of a degree in Youth Ministry.

And, Dave said, "I believe that you almost need to think of working with youth in terms of cross-cultural ministry."

Bingo!

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

How many times has the following scenario worked itself out in the church in recent decades?

A declining church, with an aging membership, is searching for its new pastor/parish priest and the geezers who sit in the back quarter of the room every Sunday say,

"We think we should hire a young pastor so (he) can bring in the youth because we don't have teens anymore."

What invariably happens is that the young pastor who is hired has absolutely no gift for reaching the youth culture and fails to attract teens.  And, though the young pastor tries to carry out the marching orders, in the end, that pastor finds (him)self in trouble because no teens show up and the shut-ins are being neglected, (he) is fired, an older pastor who knows how to visit shut-ins is hired, stays for a dozen years or so, so that when that pastor retires, the youngest person in the church is 40, maybe, 50something.

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

The truth is that, in the Book of Acts, ministry was highly specialized and focused around, well, APEST gifting.

And, there's really no mention of pastoring in the Book of Acts as the job is understood today.

There's mention of prophets, an evangelist, and teachers...

...but, predominantly, the Gospel spread during that generation, through the work of apostles.

And, even within the universe of apostles, there was specialization.

More than half of Acts follows the activity of Barnabas and Paul and, ultimately, Paul and his entourage taking the gospel...

...to the Gentiles.

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

One reason that the church today is declining and putrefying is its attempt to create a pastor dominated leadership culture in which the pastor is a parish priest who develops spiritual products and services to the church's laity...

...and to the unchurched world...

...in a one-size-fits-all way...

...so that the pastor/parish priest is...

...part missionary, part evangelist, inspiring preacher/prophet, teacher and, above all, comforting, nurturing shepherd.

Two observations about the pastor-as-parish-priest, failed and failing, leadership model:

1. It kicks what the Spirit empowered in the Book of Acts in the nether regions and,

2. For those of you in the ERC CGGC, it's what those well-intentioned Connecxtion groups in the new New Strategic Plan are designed to enable.

Jesus spent years preparing an apostolic culture to spread the news of His life, death and resurrection. Jesus explained how the gift of prophecy would function in God's Kingdom.

The Book of Acts describes the Spirit's work in empowering apostles, prophets, evangelists and teachers in highly specialized, not one-size-fits-all, pastor-as-parish-priest ministry.

Certainly not parish priests providing religious products and services to the laity and unchurched masses.

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

Dave's insight into youth ministry is spot on...

...but applies to a broader universe.

Much of the church today is focused on parish priest leadership. Jesus announced the coming of a Kingdom expanded through apostolic servanthood and sacrifice.

The former never prospers. The latter, empowered by His Spirit, always does.

We need to change our churchly ways to His Kingdom ways.

We must repent.

Who/What has Authority in the CGGC?

I was powerfully impacted, when I happened upon the promotional folder for the first ERC Strategic Plan and was punched in the face by its listing...

...BEFORE ANY SPECIFICS OF THE STRATEGIC PLAN APPEARED...

...of the ERC Core Values, the first and most prominent of which was...

THE AUTHORITY OF THE BIBLE AS THE WORD OF GOD .

That was then, this is now.

It struck me in reading the PDF of the ERC new New Strategic Plan, that there is no mention of the ERC Core Values...

...or, for that matter, what the writers of the new New Strategic Plan accept as authority over them...

...and, of course, all of the rest of us.

So, I began to examine their fruit.

There are two fruit I notice. One is big picture. The other is purely personal.


On the big picture level, I see that the entire new New Strategic Plan is focused in the activity...

...and authority of the hierarchs.

The Connextion Groups flow from their wisdom and authority.

All that is done emanates from Commissions guided by ERC staff members.

And, obviously, the PDF offers no biblical authority to guide the Connecxtion groups or the Commissions and their staff members.

From time time, I call CGGC leaders Popish.

Here's popism to shame any Roman Catholic pontiff.

IN THE new NEW STRATEGIC PLAN, IT IS THE HIERARCHS, CERTAINLY NOT THE NEARLY UNMENTIONED WORD OF GOD, WHO ARE NOW THE AUTHORITY IN THE ERC.


On the personal level, I asked numerous people many times the charge leveled against me to justify the attack on my credentials.

No one ever remembered an actual charge...

...even Dr. Richardson, actually...

...but absolutely everyone recalled that I do have this blog noted for...

...criticizing my leaders.

All I've ever heard is that my credentials were attacked because I attacked the mountaintoppers.

My trust in the authority of the Bible was never an issue, nor was my acceptance of the orthodox doctrines of the Christian faith, nor was my loyalty to the teachings and practices of the Church of God...

But, in the attack on my credentials there was another...

...higher?...

...authority?

The CGGC/ERC hierarchs.


There is a boatload of apathy and cynicism and skepticism across the CGGC.

And, I believe one prominent reason for it is that the hierarchs, as far as most of us are concerned,...

THINK MORE HIGHLY OF THEMSELVES...

...AND FAR TO LITTLE OF THE LORD AND HIS WORD...

...THAN THEY OUGHT TO THINK.

We must repent.

The ERC Core Values are Absent from the new New Strategic Plan

So, I went to my book case yesterday to the Church of God section to find those Forney CHRISTIAN ORDINANCES books that I'm offering and I discovered that I have kept the beautifully designed promotional piece prepared for the first ERC Strategic Plan.

I looked it over and discovered, prominently displayed, the assertion that the mission of the ERC grew out of "the core values that surfaced from answers to questions proposed to determine who we are and where we are going."

In the material I've seen being used to describe and promote the 2017 new New Strategic Plan, I've seen and heard nothing about those Core Value.

Clearly, those values no longer exist at our real-life core.

Do you remember the days when the people of the ERC openly embraced and talked about our Core Value?

I actually do.

And, do you remember what the first and most prominent Core Value was? It was,

The authority of the Bible as God's Word.

In the very impressive folder that promoted the old Strategic Plan, Scripture is prominent.

The cover page contains only a quotation from Jesus.

The first section of text is, simply, John 15:5, 8.

Then, while the document is heavy in explanation of the Strategic Plan, God's Word seasons the text.

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

FYI, in the PDF of the 2017 new New Strategic Plan, there is no reference to the authority of the Bible as God's Word. For that matter, there's no mention of our Core Values.

In the PDF of the new New Strategic Plan, biblical authority is never cited as the reason the hierarchs want the Conference to do what they want us to do.

What, for instance, does the Word say is a healthy, life-giving church, or pastor, or regional leader?

Who, according to the new New Strategic Plan, knows?

To be fair, while the new New Strategic Plan promotion doesn't cite the authority of the Word to justify even one element of the plan, it does conclude with a quote of Proverbs 3:5-6. Those verses, however, are used to motivate, not to suggest the the plan is rooted in God's truth or the teaching or the life of Jesus.

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

What concerns me, based on the content and promotion of the new New Strategic Plan, is that it documents the decline of the role of God's truth in the ERC.

There is no biblical authority cited for any element of the plan.

There is no reference to the Core Values of the Conference, which acknowledges that the authority of the Bible is our first and most prominent value.

And, most disturbingly, there is what seems to me to be the rise of what Bonhoeffer dubbed cheap grace in the plan.

I've criticized the CGGC for its nearly 30 year old tepid definition of what a disciple is but I'm still puking over the new definition of what a disciple is provided in the recent Chuck Frank video promoting the new New Strategic Plan.

Brothers and sisters, we are going to in the wrong direction.

We are theologically bankrupt and corrupt.

The first thing we need to do is return to our first and most prominent value, which we were still in touch with when we tried our first Strategic Plan:

The authority of the Bible as God's Word!!!!!

Using the Strategic Plan as an Excuse to Enlarge ERC Staff

You all absolutely must be reading the new New Strategic Plan PDF.

So much that is important is there waiting to be seen.

Buried in the proposal, put together by the institutionalists responsible for the plan, is the proposal that the size of the ERC staff be expanded to seven positions, six of which are full-time.

Seven.

Among the shuffling of titles is the completely new "Director of Communication."

I've heard nothing about what the job description is for the position...

...but I'm guessing that the ecclesiolaters on the top of the ERC mountain do not have in mind...

...empowering someone to preach and otherwise communicate the truth and Word of Jesus.

No doubt, the idea is to have someone communicate the glories and wisdom of the leaders of the ERC.

But,...

Leave it to the ERC hierarchs to think that the answer to the decline and putrefication of the Conference is to increase the size of the administrative staff.

What's the chance that the Lord of all authority and power and grace and mercy and blessing will bless this?

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

We must repent.

MILLENNIALS IN THE STRATEGIC PLAN: This Post Contains Real Comments

I sort of apologize for that last, blank page, post but I was telling by showing.

The ERC's new New Strategic Plan plan ignores the issue that we are driving away people under the age of 40, perhaps 50...

...though it acknowledges the problem.

I have a few observations:

One is that the issue appears to be important, at least to my readers. The blank page post got more hits in the first 24 hours than any post in more than a month. Some people do care about the ERC having a future! And, that is a good thing. A very good thing.

I literally beg you to read the PDF containing questions and answers from the Town Hall meetings. The issue of reaching young people was raised and no reply, from leadership, was recorded in the notes.

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

In my opinion, for at least the last 30 years, ERC leadership has cared about pleasing the geezers in the churches who PAY THE BILLS.

They've favored church boards over pastors who've brought, to the church, sinners who are rough around the edges. And, they've dumped on pastors who've prioritized reaching youthful people with the message of Jesus over caring for shut-ins.

Perhaps the best way to describe the new New Strategic Plan is that it carries on those values.

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

I am a person who lives and works among millennials. I know millennials and love them...and, I believe, that love is returned. They do seem to enjoy geezers who are authentic. They are far from offended by a joyful, robust Jesus-focused lifestyle.

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

As much as the hierarchs of the CGGC don't want this to be true,...

Clearly, it's what I write on this blog that inspired the challenge to my credentials...

Yet, what I write here makes sense to millennials who love and follow Jesus...

What I write, backed by the incarnational way I live, blesses those millennials...

...it attracts them...

...and, while people like Lance talk about valuing missional and incarnational living,...

...what I write here, in concert with our lifestyle, is treated, by the CGGC and ERC leadership culture as if it is a curse.

...and, they have cursed it by attacking my credentials and expelling my ministry from the CGGC.

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

If the new New Strategic Plan works perfectly...

...and, as far as I can tell, even most ERC insiders are already convinced it will crash and burn...

...It will only take care of the Boomers and Builders still around...

...and be viable for what? 10? 20 years?

THIS PLAN IS LITTLE MORE THAN AN ATTEMPT TO PERFECT THE VERY DYSFUNCTION THAT HAS DRIVEN THE CGGC DECLINE FOR GENERATIONS.

IT GIVES NO THOUGHT AT ALL, AND MAKES NO EFFORT, TO MAKE JESUS MEANINGFUL TO PEOPLE YOUNGER THAN THE BABY BOOMER GENERATION!

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

We must repent.

I Have Four Copies of C. H. Forney's, THE CHRISTIAN ORDINANCES

Three were given to me by Harvey Gossard, from his personal library, when we were both on staff at Winebrenner. One, never used and is in mint condition, I picked it up from the General Conference office many years ago.

This is not Forney's much more important, 1906, THE PHILOSOPHIC BASIS OF THE ORDINANCES, from which the current, and unique, CGGC position on the ordinances is based.

Harvey's three copies were once in the Findlay College and, later, WTS libraries. They had been donated by the estates of:

T. M. Funk,
D. M. Bare, and,
George Sigler.

You may be familiar with one or more of those names.

The books are marked as Withdrawn from the library collection.

The books from Harvey's library are all in good condition at least.

This is a hard bound book.

And, historically speaking, this book by Forney is important because it gives a picture of the Church of God as it decides how to continue in its own primitivist vision in the face of the emergence of the the Holiness and Pentecostal movements and their primitivist energies.

I don't need four copies of the book.

If you'd like to engage me in conversation to propose that one of these copies become your own, you can write to me and I'll gladly consider you as a candidate.

I'll respond to requests both on and off the blog.

Blessings to all who find inspiration in the history of our movement.