I'm a faithful reader of the CGGC's new CONTAGIOUS... blog. I check for additions to it on at least a daily basis.
The blog contains three categories. To date, the one most commonly contributed to is the first one launched: Repentance.
As I understand it, there are rather tight restrictions on how a properly constructed post is to be written for the Repentance blog. One of the guidelines is that the title must begin, "We...," the pronoun must be "we," not you. "...Are Broken in..."
And, if you look to the early posts, the titles all conform to the required model.
The first few posts were entered by people specifically handpicked to be contributors to the blog.
Since then, I'm guessing, others have joined in, and adherence to the prescribed formula has loosened.
When I first caught wind of the plan to create the blog, I wondered what I'd write, if I'd write anything, if I had been invited to participate.
And, I immediately knew.
My post would have been entitled, as this one here is, We are Broken in Being Broken.
It is clear from the Word that repentance doesn't come from thin air.
Jesus begins the so-called Sermon on the Mount announcing that the blessed are people who are poor in spirit and who mourn, are meek and who hunger and thirst for righteousness.
As I quote here repeatedly, Paul told the Corinthians that godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation. He instructed the Philippians to work out their salvation with fear and trembling.
And, in the CGGC...in most of Western Christianity, for that matter...its at this very early stage of spiritual transformation that we are completely broken.
I pick up, from our leaders, from time to time, concern about our spiritual state as a body. But, as much as I try not to be cynical about the state of the church...
...and I think I'm not cynical...
I don't pick up the sense that our leaders are driven by a need to work out their own salvation with fear and trembling nor do I discern poverty of spirit or spiritual mourning or meekness or spiritual hunger and thirst. I don't read them working toward getting our people to wallow in godly grief in the hope that our grief with be blessed by the repentance that leads to salvation.
(By the way, in reading early Church of God history, those spiritual qualities were at the core of all we did when we were a thriving and blessed movement. Those are the spiritual goals that drove us and provided focus for our ministry.)
What I do pick up on from our leaders today, when they are concerned, is a concern not about our lukewarmth and unrighteousness before a holy God but worldly, institutional, concern that if we don't turn things around, our institutions will crumble and die out in the next generation or so.
We need to rediscover the teachings of Jesus, beginning with Matthew 5:3-10.
And, while we're still church, not Kingdom-focused, let's focus on what Jesus said to those seven churches in Revelation 2 and 3.
We need to embrace the spiritual transformation of Paul who, for the sake of Christ, considered his own righteousness to be "garbage." And, who really did instruct those dear to him to "work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." (Philippians 3 and 2).
Father, through the presence and power of Your Spirit, break our hearts. Crush every bit of hardness in our hearts. Turn us into people so shattered by our awareness of our own brokenness before You that we allow You to rebuild us perfectly in Your image. Create new hearts in us so that, from true godly grief, we may discover the repentance that leads to salvation.
We ask this so that our lives may please and glorify you and that we may shine as lights in our world.
Thursday, November 29, 2018
Sunday, November 25, 2018
Update on Evie
Evie's heartbeat is nearly regular, due to medications she's being given. Apparently, there will be a lot of tinkering with medication levels before everything is settled.
And, there's a surgery that may work for her but that won't happen for quite a while.
All things considered, she's living a fairly normal life these days.
Thanks for your prayers.
And, there's a surgery that may work for her but that won't happen for quite a while.
All things considered, she's living a fairly normal life these days.
Thanks for your prayers.
An Observation about Red Letter Living
My intention is to live my life, as literally as I am able, in obedience to the red letters of the Bible, that is, to the words of Jesus.
My perception is that that makes me different from most church people here in America. In my opinion, most church people live, to one degree or another, to be good church people, not to obey Jesus directly. What that means depends on the church a person identifies with.
I don't say that I live the red letter life well, only that that is my focus, my goal, my intention.
When I talk about being a follower of Jesus among the people of the world, I talk about it in those terms. And, no one accuses me...to my face, at least, of hypocrisy.
People who know me well know, of course, know my shortcomings and some of them are rather quick to challenge me on my faults others will question me, if not challenge me.
Here's my observation. It occurred to some time ago:
People who know me superficially, and pick up on the red letter thing, often give me more benefit than I deserve and project Jesus traits on me, even when those traits are not present in me.
That suggests two realities to me.
1. People still are aware of the genuine Jesus story, and,
2. They are looking for it, and not churchiness, in people who self-identify as followers of Jesus.
This convinces me, more than ever, that the most effective evangelism is of a gospel that is lived out sincerely, if not perfectly, before it is preached.
And, most mere church people, I'm afraid, don't show Jesus in their way of living. They show church.
And, church no longer inspires.
My perception is that that makes me different from most church people here in America. In my opinion, most church people live, to one degree or another, to be good church people, not to obey Jesus directly. What that means depends on the church a person identifies with.
I don't say that I live the red letter life well, only that that is my focus, my goal, my intention.
When I talk about being a follower of Jesus among the people of the world, I talk about it in those terms. And, no one accuses me...to my face, at least, of hypocrisy.
People who know me well know, of course, know my shortcomings and some of them are rather quick to challenge me on my faults others will question me, if not challenge me.
Here's my observation. It occurred to some time ago:
People who know me superficially, and pick up on the red letter thing, often give me more benefit than I deserve and project Jesus traits on me, even when those traits are not present in me.
That suggests two realities to me.
1. People still are aware of the genuine Jesus story, and,
2. They are looking for it, and not churchiness, in people who self-identify as followers of Jesus.
This convinces me, more than ever, that the most effective evangelism is of a gospel that is lived out sincerely, if not perfectly, before it is preached.
And, most mere church people, I'm afraid, don't show Jesus in their way of living. They show church.
And, church no longer inspires.
Thursday, November 22, 2018
What is Our Definition of the Word, "Pastor?"
The guy who taught me Hebrew was a bit of a linguistic philosopher. By now, all these years later, I certainly remember his observations about words and language far more clearly than the Hebrew.
He said, "A word that means everything means nothing."
It seems to me that, in the CGGC especially, the word "pastor" has attained the status of a word that means nothing.
------
In our early, Church of God, days, the word was used in a King James Version way, i.e., as a synonym for shepherd.
The biography of John Winebrenner that is most helpful to me is Dr. George Ross' brief 1880 Semi-Centennial Sketch.
After describing Winebrenner as a courageous and radical prophetic figure, a relentless evangelist and a powerful preacher, Ross says, "As a pastor (Winebrenner) had few superiors."
Ross goes on to describe Winebrenner as a man who could, in addition to the activities he was best known for, also provide effective pastoral care, noting that he visited from house to house and prayed with every member of the family.
Interestingly, Ross points out that those visits normally ended with Winebrenner urging the "unconverted" to seek Jesus.
For many years, in the CGGC and everywhere, the word pastor simply referred to someone who acted as a spiritual shepherd and provided pastoral care.
In our movement days, pastor was something a person did, not a title one held.
It was that until no so long ago.
------
I've been following the dialog, on the CGGC CONTAGIOUS blog, between Lew Button and Dan Masshardt on Dan's post, "We are Broken in our Focus on Pastors."
In that chat, Lew uses the word to describe the APEST gift of being a shepherd and, to be fair to Lew, the NIV still translates the word, in Ephesians 4:11, as "pastors," though the ESV translates the word, "shepherds."
Lew is not alone. One way the word pastor is frequently used is as that Spiritual Gift and calling.
------
Another, very modern, way the word is used very commonly in the CGGC is as a label for people who possess credentials from the denomination. So, to many, if one is licensed or ordained, s/he is "Pastor So and So."
Therefore, to many, I'm still Pastor Bill.
I suspect that most of the CGGC people who use the word that way are ignorant of how extremely recently that use of the word came about.
In fact, when I entered the East Pennsylvania Conference of the Churches of God, people with credentials weren't called pastors. They were called ministers.
Credentialed delegates to East Pennsylvania Conference sessions, for example, weren't called Pastoral Delegates in those days. They were Ministerial Delegates.
People with knowledge of Church of God history know that it was extremely important to John Winebrenner and his colleagues, in our days as a thriving, blessed, movement, that the very few people who were credentialed were known as Elders. It was Elder John Winebrenner, never, ever, Pastor John Winebrenner. Winebrenner wouldn't have known what the title Pastor John means.
To be referred to as an elder was crucial to Winebrenner and our people with credentials in our movement days because, to them, that was the biblical way of speaking and we established churches on the New Testament plan.
When the Church of God rocked in the power of the Spirit, the New Testament, and no human tradition, was our only Authority, Our Only Rule of faith in practice.
------
Another use of the word that has become common in the CGGC today and is fuzzily connected to the one previously mentioned.
This use of the word refers to the pastor as the spiritual leader of a local church. This, ultimately, is a way of thinking that has its roots in deeply institutionalized, high church churches in which there is a strong distinction between clergy and laity. The deepest roots of this definition is in the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages.
As the CGGC becomes more and more institutionalized, the understanding is that a pastor is, essentially, a parish priest: a provider of religious products and services to be consumed by a passive laity becomes more and more prominent.
------
Still another use of the word in the CGGC these days is the one employed by Brandon Kelly, CGGC Director of Transformational Ministries, in his eNews APEST blogs. Brandon sees the pastor as a local church leader who supervises?, administrates?, manages? the functioning of APEST gifts in the local church.
My guess is that few people in the CGGC other than Brandon believe this. But, I'm not certain.
As far as I know, General Conference staff isn't actually DOING the position of pastor according to this understanding of the word: That is, other than talking, as far as I know, they're not equipping people to be pastors according to this definition.
Like the two previous uses of the word: Pastor as credentialed person and pastor as parish priest, this, pastor as local church APEST manager, is fuzzily connected to the others.
However, none of these fuzzily connected definitions of the word, to my knowledge, have any connection to the New Testament.
------
And, this fuzziness is its own problem. It's this fuzziness that makes the word mean so many things that it means nothing. It perfectly enables the dysfunction that feeds our decay and decline.
And, as nearly all of us admit, the CGGC is in the midst of numerical decline and spiritual decay.
Shepherd, or Pastor, dominated church cultures are so focused on tolerance-based relationship that focus on truth, even precision in language, becomes lost because, in the context of tepid, tolerant relationships, no form of precision connected to truth or principle matters.
Tolerance is fuzzy. Our conversation is fuzzy.
-------------------
So, the word, pastor, which is so important in our conversation, has become a useless word.
We're at a point now that our very important word, pastor, has no precise meaning. It means whatever the person using it wants it to mean. It communicates nothing precise.
It means anything and everything.
And, therefore, it means nothing.
That's a problem.
We must repent.
He said, "A word that means everything means nothing."
It seems to me that, in the CGGC especially, the word "pastor" has attained the status of a word that means nothing.
------
In our early, Church of God, days, the word was used in a King James Version way, i.e., as a synonym for shepherd.
The biography of John Winebrenner that is most helpful to me is Dr. George Ross' brief 1880 Semi-Centennial Sketch.
After describing Winebrenner as a courageous and radical prophetic figure, a relentless evangelist and a powerful preacher, Ross says, "As a pastor (Winebrenner) had few superiors."
Ross goes on to describe Winebrenner as a man who could, in addition to the activities he was best known for, also provide effective pastoral care, noting that he visited from house to house and prayed with every member of the family.
Interestingly, Ross points out that those visits normally ended with Winebrenner urging the "unconverted" to seek Jesus.
For many years, in the CGGC and everywhere, the word pastor simply referred to someone who acted as a spiritual shepherd and provided pastoral care.
In our movement days, pastor was something a person did, not a title one held.
It was that until no so long ago.
------
I've been following the dialog, on the CGGC CONTAGIOUS blog, between Lew Button and Dan Masshardt on Dan's post, "We are Broken in our Focus on Pastors."
In that chat, Lew uses the word to describe the APEST gift of being a shepherd and, to be fair to Lew, the NIV still translates the word, in Ephesians 4:11, as "pastors," though the ESV translates the word, "shepherds."
Lew is not alone. One way the word pastor is frequently used is as that Spiritual Gift and calling.
------
Another, very modern, way the word is used very commonly in the CGGC is as a label for people who possess credentials from the denomination. So, to many, if one is licensed or ordained, s/he is "Pastor So and So."
Therefore, to many, I'm still Pastor Bill.
I suspect that most of the CGGC people who use the word that way are ignorant of how extremely recently that use of the word came about.
In fact, when I entered the East Pennsylvania Conference of the Churches of God, people with credentials weren't called pastors. They were called ministers.
Credentialed delegates to East Pennsylvania Conference sessions, for example, weren't called Pastoral Delegates in those days. They were Ministerial Delegates.
People with knowledge of Church of God history know that it was extremely important to John Winebrenner and his colleagues, in our days as a thriving, blessed, movement, that the very few people who were credentialed were known as Elders. It was Elder John Winebrenner, never, ever, Pastor John Winebrenner. Winebrenner wouldn't have known what the title Pastor John means.
To be referred to as an elder was crucial to Winebrenner and our people with credentials in our movement days because, to them, that was the biblical way of speaking and we established churches on the New Testament plan.
When the Church of God rocked in the power of the Spirit, the New Testament, and no human tradition, was our only Authority, Our Only Rule of faith in practice.
------
Another use of the word that has become common in the CGGC today and is fuzzily connected to the one previously mentioned.
This use of the word refers to the pastor as the spiritual leader of a local church. This, ultimately, is a way of thinking that has its roots in deeply institutionalized, high church churches in which there is a strong distinction between clergy and laity. The deepest roots of this definition is in the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages.
As the CGGC becomes more and more institutionalized, the understanding is that a pastor is, essentially, a parish priest: a provider of religious products and services to be consumed by a passive laity becomes more and more prominent.
------
Still another use of the word in the CGGC these days is the one employed by Brandon Kelly, CGGC Director of Transformational Ministries, in his eNews APEST blogs. Brandon sees the pastor as a local church leader who supervises?, administrates?, manages? the functioning of APEST gifts in the local church.
My guess is that few people in the CGGC other than Brandon believe this. But, I'm not certain.
As far as I know, General Conference staff isn't actually DOING the position of pastor according to this understanding of the word: That is, other than talking, as far as I know, they're not equipping people to be pastors according to this definition.
Like the two previous uses of the word: Pastor as credentialed person and pastor as parish priest, this, pastor as local church APEST manager, is fuzzily connected to the others.
However, none of these fuzzily connected definitions of the word, to my knowledge, have any connection to the New Testament.
------
And, this fuzziness is its own problem. It's this fuzziness that makes the word mean so many things that it means nothing. It perfectly enables the dysfunction that feeds our decay and decline.
And, as nearly all of us admit, the CGGC is in the midst of numerical decline and spiritual decay.
Shepherd, or Pastor, dominated church cultures are so focused on tolerance-based relationship that focus on truth, even precision in language, becomes lost because, in the context of tepid, tolerant relationships, no form of precision connected to truth or principle matters.
Tolerance is fuzzy. Our conversation is fuzzy.
-------------------
So, the word, pastor, which is so important in our conversation, has become a useless word.
We're at a point now that our very important word, pastor, has no precise meaning. It means whatever the person using it wants it to mean. It communicates nothing precise.
It means anything and everything.
And, therefore, it means nothing.
That's a problem.
We must repent.
Plantar Fasciitis Update
I posted several months ago about developing plantar fasciitis in my left foot. My doctor told me how to deal with it but, in the end, said, whatever you do, it will be gone in about six months. And, it seems he was right.
I work on my feet on a very hard floor. Most of my work days are ten hours long. Many days were excruciating. But, I didn't miss one hour of work because of it.
About four months in, however, I developed tendonitis along the outside of the foot, presumably due to changing the way I step. The tendonitis is still around, though, on the worst day, it's not as painful as the other problem.
I'm afraid that the condition may be chronic, and come and go from time to time. But, that's, no doubt, only part of being a geezer.
I work on my feet on a very hard floor. Most of my work days are ten hours long. Many days were excruciating. But, I didn't miss one hour of work because of it.
About four months in, however, I developed tendonitis along the outside of the foot, presumably due to changing the way I step. The tendonitis is still around, though, on the worst day, it's not as painful as the other problem.
I'm afraid that the condition may be chronic, and come and go from time to time. But, that's, no doubt, only part of being a geezer.
Monday, November 12, 2018
Four Observations on Dan Masshardt's "Pastors" Post on the CGGC Blog
1. It's carefully supported with references to biblical authority, as if the Bible really is our only rule of faith and practice.
2. It understands early Church of God teaching and practice on the church and points out the differences between what we did when we were a thriving movement and what we're doing now in our decline and decay.
3. It is passionate and focused, bordering on strident, in a way that was common in our movement days but is considered unseemly today.
4. It actually calls, specifically, for repentance.
------------------
If you haven't read it yet, read it and break the ties that have us in bondage and do it.
2. It understands early Church of God teaching and practice on the church and points out the differences between what we did when we were a thriving movement and what we're doing now in our decline and decay.
3. It is passionate and focused, bordering on strident, in a way that was common in our movement days but is considered unseemly today.
4. It actually calls, specifically, for repentance.
------------------
If you haven't read it yet, read it and break the ties that have us in bondage and do it.
Thursday, November 8, 2018
An H-I-T Job on Brandon Kelly's eNews APEST Series
I received several useful and interesting off-the-blog comments on my post about heresy and theological error in what Brandon Kelly has been posting on the CGGC eNews and publishing in The CHURCH ADVOCATE regarding APEST.
One of those off-the-blog comments contains perhaps the most important observation I've seen about the culture the CGGC has created for itself in the past 80 plus years.
I refer to it as H-I-T: Honest, Insightful and True, because that's, precisely, what I think it is.
This is the two-sentence comment:
I don't think think the CGGC is really interested in APEST. They're just letting Brandon play.
And, based on the fruit we are producing, that fits.
I'm choosing to call this comment a H-I-T because...
The comment was communicated honestly and that's noteworthy to me because, in the CGGC, we're not honest with ourselves about ourselves. We're declining. Lance wrote that on the eNews since his first article as ED. Yet, in our dishonesty, in our denial of our own reality, we still will only mildly tweak, and only in talk, here and there.
It's insightful. It describes concisely, precisely and accurately the response of the CGGC body to this, nearly completed, year-long effort, by the leadership in the General Conference office, to educate, edify and motivate the body to implement APEST.
And, it's true. Does anyone deny either statement? Have CGGC people shown any interest in turning from their failing and non-blessed traditions to actually do APEST? Is there one shred of evidence anywhere that, as a people, the CGGC body is doing anything but to let Brandon invest his time playing around with APEST?
-------------------
I've been clear that, in my opinion, Brandon's APEST thinking is laced with theological error, even heresy. So, obviously, it doesn't bother me that what he's teaching will come to nothing.
However, those two sentences I quoted don't describe Brandon. They describe us, the people of the CGGC.
As I was meditating on the totality of this tragedy, the final words of the Book of Judges overpowered me:
...everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
Those were spiritually dark years for Israel. They marked a time of spiritual decline and decay.
To be fair to those people, they sought good. They did what was right, not wrong, in their own eyes.
As do, apparently, each of us, as we allow Brandon to play around with APEST for a whole year without any intention of heeding his wisdom or following his leadership.
Like the people of ancient Israel, each of us unrepentantly do what is right in own own eyes.
What that really means about the people of Israel, in those sad and dark days, is each person was his/her own authority, in effect, his/her own god.
It means precisely that about the CGGC today.
Woe unto us.
And, we know that we live in the midst of woe, don't we? The Lord of all authority and power and blessing isn't blessing us. And, we don't seem to care...at least, to care enough to change our ways...
...or, at least, follow our leaders in changing our ways.
------------------
So, according to someone other than me, the people of the CGGC are willing to let Brandon invest a year of his time in General Conference leadership playing with himself over the issue of APEST. And, that we have no intention of following the vision he is casting for us.
---------------------
To speak in traditional terms, the denominational i.e., church body, the CGGC, is declining.
And, Brandon and Lance, and the whole CGGC General Conference leadership team, really, is calling the body to a different practice of the Doctrine of Church, of Ecclesiology.
Does anyone think that it's a good or healthy or loving or Christlike thing that we'd let our denominational Director of Transformational Ministries go on and on about transforming our way of being a church together...
...and to have no intention of doing it...
...with the universal conviction that the wise thing, in Christ, is to allow our brother simply to play with his ideas!?!?!?!!!
That seems to someone other than me, to be the height of the wisdom of the CGGC body.
We must repent.
One of those off-the-blog comments contains perhaps the most important observation I've seen about the culture the CGGC has created for itself in the past 80 plus years.
I refer to it as H-I-T: Honest, Insightful and True, because that's, precisely, what I think it is.
This is the two-sentence comment:
I don't think think the CGGC is really interested in APEST. They're just letting Brandon play.
And, based on the fruit we are producing, that fits.
I'm choosing to call this comment a H-I-T because...
The comment was communicated honestly and that's noteworthy to me because, in the CGGC, we're not honest with ourselves about ourselves. We're declining. Lance wrote that on the eNews since his first article as ED. Yet, in our dishonesty, in our denial of our own reality, we still will only mildly tweak, and only in talk, here and there.
It's insightful. It describes concisely, precisely and accurately the response of the CGGC body to this, nearly completed, year-long effort, by the leadership in the General Conference office, to educate, edify and motivate the body to implement APEST.
And, it's true. Does anyone deny either statement? Have CGGC people shown any interest in turning from their failing and non-blessed traditions to actually do APEST? Is there one shred of evidence anywhere that, as a people, the CGGC body is doing anything but to let Brandon invest his time playing around with APEST?
-------------------
I've been clear that, in my opinion, Brandon's APEST thinking is laced with theological error, even heresy. So, obviously, it doesn't bother me that what he's teaching will come to nothing.
However, those two sentences I quoted don't describe Brandon. They describe us, the people of the CGGC.
As I was meditating on the totality of this tragedy, the final words of the Book of Judges overpowered me:
...everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
Those were spiritually dark years for Israel. They marked a time of spiritual decline and decay.
To be fair to those people, they sought good. They did what was right, not wrong, in their own eyes.
As do, apparently, each of us, as we allow Brandon to play around with APEST for a whole year without any intention of heeding his wisdom or following his leadership.
Like the people of ancient Israel, each of us unrepentantly do what is right in own own eyes.
What that really means about the people of Israel, in those sad and dark days, is each person was his/her own authority, in effect, his/her own god.
It means precisely that about the CGGC today.
Woe unto us.
And, we know that we live in the midst of woe, don't we? The Lord of all authority and power and blessing isn't blessing us. And, we don't seem to care...at least, to care enough to change our ways...
...or, at least, follow our leaders in changing our ways.
------------------
So, according to someone other than me, the people of the CGGC are willing to let Brandon invest a year of his time in General Conference leadership playing with himself over the issue of APEST. And, that we have no intention of following the vision he is casting for us.
---------------------
To speak in traditional terms, the denominational i.e., church body, the CGGC, is declining.
And, Brandon and Lance, and the whole CGGC General Conference leadership team, really, is calling the body to a different practice of the Doctrine of Church, of Ecclesiology.
Does anyone think that it's a good or healthy or loving or Christlike thing that we'd let our denominational Director of Transformational Ministries go on and on about transforming our way of being a church together...
...and to have no intention of doing it...
...with the universal conviction that the wise thing, in Christ, is to allow our brother simply to play with his ideas!?!?!?!!!
That seems to someone other than me, to be the height of the wisdom of the CGGC body.
We must repent.
Tick Bite
We experienced some unseasonably warm weather here last week. Last Sunday was a very pleasant day. So, I took our very energetic four-ish year old dog for nearly three hours of walks.
Yesterday, I actually looked at a spot on the back of my left hip that had been itching and saw what looked like a tick embedded in the skin. Evie confirmed my suspicion.
Evie pulled it out, very painlessly, with a tweezers. And, without thinking, we flushed it down the toilet.
I made an appointment with a doctor in the medical practice we use, but not with my doctor, who, apparently, is not available today.
Because of where the tick bit me, I can't really see what it looks like.
Evie says it doesn't look like Internet pictures of a Lyme disease bite or a Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever bite.
She says it appears to be infected, but, since she pulled out the tick, I can't feel anything.
So, I see this doctor today. I've seen this doctor before and he was useless. I ended going to my own doctor two days later, when he was available.
I don't want to play around with this.
Yesterday, I actually looked at a spot on the back of my left hip that had been itching and saw what looked like a tick embedded in the skin. Evie confirmed my suspicion.
Evie pulled it out, very painlessly, with a tweezers. And, without thinking, we flushed it down the toilet.
I made an appointment with a doctor in the medical practice we use, but not with my doctor, who, apparently, is not available today.
Because of where the tick bit me, I can't really see what it looks like.
Evie says it doesn't look like Internet pictures of a Lyme disease bite or a Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever bite.
She says it appears to be infected, but, since she pulled out the tick, I can't feel anything.
So, I see this doctor today. I've seen this doctor before and he was useless. I ended going to my own doctor two days later, when he was available.
I don't want to play around with this.
Friday, November 2, 2018
Theological Error, Even Heresy?, in Brandon Kelly's APEST eNews Posts
I'm writing this prophetically, not as a word of prophecy, but, because prophets are stewards of truth for the Kingdom, to draw attention to one dangerous teaching and one other teaching in Brandon Kelly's APEST posts in the CGGC eNews that I find to be impractical and very troubling.
------------------
What sort of theological error is so serious that it can be deemed to be heresy?
I have no precise answer to that question, especially one that is appropriate to a blog post like this one.
However, I think that when a theological error touches what we believe about God: the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, it's an error that crosses over a line that should never even be approached.
In my opinion, Brandon crosses over that line in his CHURCH ADVOCATE article referenced in his recent eNews post, which is the first of two posts on the APEST gift of the shepherd.
In that article, Brandon describes his understanding of the difference between someone with the gift of shepherding and someone who holds the "standard title" pastor, i.e., someone who leads a local church. (There's a whole short book that could be written to correct that theological error.)
In my opinion, Brandon crosses over the line that defines heresy when he says,
A pastor's responsibility in leading a local church is to ensure that all five of the Five-fold Ministries are being lived out as a community of faith and to have a basic competency in each five.
Again, there's a whole book here...and, not a short one.
But, to go to the place where Brandon's heresy happens:
Brandon is assigning to the local church pastor...
...to a human being...
...a work of the Lord...of God.
We often refer to the APEST gifts as spiritual gifts, and, certainly, they are.
But, in the Ephesians 4 passage Brandon is working from, it's Jesus, not the Holy Spirit Who is doing the gifting.
The NIV takes some liberties with the Greek text but makes the point appropriately: "So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets..."
Understand this:
It is Jesus Who created the APEST gifts. It is Jesus Who defines their purpose and Who directs the people who possess those gifts. (Eph. 4:11-13)
With these words, Paul is writing to the Ephesians about the Lord of the Kingdom directing the operation of the Kingdom.
Paul is not talking about the church here and he's certainly not suggesting, as Brandon does, that a local church pastor has any role in ensuring that APEST gifts are being lived out with a basic competency.
------------------
In my opinion, one way a theological error becomes heresy is to assign to a human being what can only be done by the Lord.
And, clearly, by suggesting that the human pastor of a local church ensures "that all five of the Five-fold ministries are being lived out as a community of faith...," Brandon does that.
This, in my opinion, is heresy.
And, it's an old sin: To claim for a human what can only be God's.
I'm certain that Brandon did this innocently and sincerely, and with the very best of intentions. And, I'm certain that he means to do no harm.
And, while I don't know him well, I know him to be a nice guy. And, I know he loves the church.
But, in my opinion, this is a very, very serious theological error.
I truly believe it is heresy. I believe it will continue to prevent us from walking in the power and blessing of the Spirit.
------------------
As to the other issue, the theological error:
It crops up in each of his posts about immaturity in each of the gifts he's addressed so far.
In each case, Brandon suggests that, when APESTs mature, they will moderate in living out their gift...that they will no longer be as extreme in living out their gift.
At first, I misread him. I suggested that Brandon was arguing that APEs would become mature and become more like shepherds, but that's not really it.
What Brandon suggests is that, as they mature, APESTs will cease to be radical in living out their gift. They will mellow. They will moderate.
I don't see that in the Word. And, Brandon offers no authority from the Word to support his opinion.
What I see in the Word is that, as any believer matures, s/he will engage in the mutual submission that is essential to life in Christ's body.
As Paul said in 1 Corinthians 12, the eye will realize that the whole body is not the eye. As it matures, the eye doesn't stop focusing. Instead, it continues to be the most insightful eye it can be, yet it rejoices in the fact that the body also has feet and hands.
This is an important distinction.
Life in the Spirit is vivid. It's continually fresh. It's life touched by fire.
And, maturity in the Spirit is not tame and reserved and moderate, as Brandon suggests. Maturity in the Spirit is life, real LIFE!
A mature APEST is every bit as radical in his/her gift as ever. Perhaps, more so. However, in maturity, APESTs love the other gifts, and the people who possess them, with genuine, Christlike love and Holy Spirit power...and they submit to them.
A mature APEST does it, as Paul says in Ephesians, "submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ." (Eph. 5:21)
Earlier, I said that, on this point, Brandon is impractical.
The mature in the body of Christ ooze the Spirit's power. The church's saints are not moderate and tame. They don't live their gifts with restraint. They produce fire, the Spirit's fire.
---------------------
One aspect of life in the Kingdom when there is what sometimes called revival, is passion for truth.
Right now, we don't have that zeal for truth.
There's error, even what strikes me as heresy, in the CGGC wind. And, we need to care about that...in community.
The Lord of all authority and power and blessing isn't blessing us.
We must repent.
------------------
What sort of theological error is so serious that it can be deemed to be heresy?
I have no precise answer to that question, especially one that is appropriate to a blog post like this one.
However, I think that when a theological error touches what we believe about God: the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, it's an error that crosses over a line that should never even be approached.
In my opinion, Brandon crosses over that line in his CHURCH ADVOCATE article referenced in his recent eNews post, which is the first of two posts on the APEST gift of the shepherd.
In that article, Brandon describes his understanding of the difference between someone with the gift of shepherding and someone who holds the "standard title" pastor, i.e., someone who leads a local church. (There's a whole short book that could be written to correct that theological error.)
In my opinion, Brandon crosses over the line that defines heresy when he says,
A pastor's responsibility in leading a local church is to ensure that all five of the Five-fold Ministries are being lived out as a community of faith and to have a basic competency in each five.
Again, there's a whole book here...and, not a short one.
But, to go to the place where Brandon's heresy happens:
Brandon is assigning to the local church pastor...
...to a human being...
...a work of the Lord...of God.
We often refer to the APEST gifts as spiritual gifts, and, certainly, they are.
But, in the Ephesians 4 passage Brandon is working from, it's Jesus, not the Holy Spirit Who is doing the gifting.
The NIV takes some liberties with the Greek text but makes the point appropriately: "So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets..."
Understand this:
It is Jesus Who created the APEST gifts. It is Jesus Who defines their purpose and Who directs the people who possess those gifts. (Eph. 4:11-13)
With these words, Paul is writing to the Ephesians about the Lord of the Kingdom directing the operation of the Kingdom.
Paul is not talking about the church here and he's certainly not suggesting, as Brandon does, that a local church pastor has any role in ensuring that APEST gifts are being lived out with a basic competency.
------------------
In my opinion, one way a theological error becomes heresy is to assign to a human being what can only be done by the Lord.
And, clearly, by suggesting that the human pastor of a local church ensures "that all five of the Five-fold ministries are being lived out as a community of faith...," Brandon does that.
This, in my opinion, is heresy.
And, it's an old sin: To claim for a human what can only be God's.
I'm certain that Brandon did this innocently and sincerely, and with the very best of intentions. And, I'm certain that he means to do no harm.
And, while I don't know him well, I know him to be a nice guy. And, I know he loves the church.
But, in my opinion, this is a very, very serious theological error.
I truly believe it is heresy. I believe it will continue to prevent us from walking in the power and blessing of the Spirit.
------------------
As to the other issue, the theological error:
It crops up in each of his posts about immaturity in each of the gifts he's addressed so far.
In each case, Brandon suggests that, when APESTs mature, they will moderate in living out their gift...that they will no longer be as extreme in living out their gift.
At first, I misread him. I suggested that Brandon was arguing that APEs would become mature and become more like shepherds, but that's not really it.
What Brandon suggests is that, as they mature, APESTs will cease to be radical in living out their gift. They will mellow. They will moderate.
I don't see that in the Word. And, Brandon offers no authority from the Word to support his opinion.
What I see in the Word is that, as any believer matures, s/he will engage in the mutual submission that is essential to life in Christ's body.
As Paul said in 1 Corinthians 12, the eye will realize that the whole body is not the eye. As it matures, the eye doesn't stop focusing. Instead, it continues to be the most insightful eye it can be, yet it rejoices in the fact that the body also has feet and hands.
This is an important distinction.
Life in the Spirit is vivid. It's continually fresh. It's life touched by fire.
And, maturity in the Spirit is not tame and reserved and moderate, as Brandon suggests. Maturity in the Spirit is life, real LIFE!
A mature APEST is every bit as radical in his/her gift as ever. Perhaps, more so. However, in maturity, APESTs love the other gifts, and the people who possess them, with genuine, Christlike love and Holy Spirit power...and they submit to them.
A mature APEST does it, as Paul says in Ephesians, "submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ." (Eph. 5:21)
Earlier, I said that, on this point, Brandon is impractical.
The mature in the body of Christ ooze the Spirit's power. The church's saints are not moderate and tame. They don't live their gifts with restraint. They produce fire, the Spirit's fire.
---------------------
One aspect of life in the Kingdom when there is what sometimes called revival, is passion for truth.
Right now, we don't have that zeal for truth.
There's error, even what strikes me as heresy, in the CGGC wind. And, we need to care about that...in community.
The Lord of all authority and power and blessing isn't blessing us.
We must repent.
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