Reading THE CHURCH ADVOCATE (August/September, 2104)

Gang,

As I always do, I've been reading the latest issue of The CHURCH ADVOCATE with great interest and care.  There is some very good stuff in this one.

I've just read Lance Finley's very stimulating article.  It touches on thoughts I've been thinking and, interestingly, it coincides with a post I've been planning. 

Lance's article climaxes by inviting one and all to attend The Gathering in Findlay in October and to hear Scot McKnight present insights on the content of the Christian Gospel as it is detailed in his awesome book, THE KING JESUS GOSPEL.

The first part of Lance's article is a challenge to consider the possibility that what many of us think Jesus' gospel is, is not what Jesus' gospel is.  Lance writes with conviction and he writes well.  His brief article is positive and provocative.

I've read McKnight's book and I believe that Lance is correct:

We would all be well served to question our own definition of the gospel and we should all be prepared to realize that there is much error in what we think about the very essence of Christian truth.

Thanks, Lance.  Well done.

(FYI:  I have also read Justin Meier's five point definition of the church and found it to be as provocative as Lance's article.  I also found Justin's article to be far more radical than Lance's.  I'm very curious about how Justin says will fare in the CGGC's To Talk is to Walk universe.  If God is willing, I'll write more about Justin's article later.)

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For now...

...having read Lance's article, I am prepared to prophecy in a way I rarely do:  I will prophecy predicatively, that is, I will offer a picture of what will happen in the future.

As is the case with many prophecies of the future that appear in the Word, my prediction comes with a condition, and it is the typical condition:  "Unless you repent and turn from your sin...

...what I am saying will happen, truly will happen." 

I suspect that many of you will not find the prediction shocking.  But, I want to say this before it happens (...unless there is repentance, of course.)

Here's the prediction: 

This year's gathering will, in the end, will be the same tragic and colossal waste of time and human and financial resources in the CGGC that 35,000 by 2000, Natural Church Development and TCAT have been.

So, to be specific:

Unless we repent and turn from our sin, this year's gathering will, in the end, will be a tragic and colossal waste of time and resources.

Of all the "Characteristics of the CGGC Brand" that I have identified, the one that is most applicable here is number 10: To Talk is to Walk-ism.

Perhaps the greatest danger to the CGGC's future is the reality that, in our body--especially in the last half dozen years or so--we seem to live believing that to say something means to have done it. 

That is: It is a core value of the CGGC that for us to say that something is true about us makes it a real-life truth about us.

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So, what will happen if Scot McKnight convinces CGGCers--ones who have not repented of To Talk-ism--that they need to rethink the gospel?

What has been happening recently, is that they will agree that we need to rethink the gospel.  AND, having done that two things will happen:

1.  Having thought that we need to rethink the gospel, they will think we have walked the walk of rethinking of the gospel and, most tragically--AGAIN--

2.  Not one thing will change as far as the shepherd-dominated dysfunctions that drive our sin and the decline that is the fruit of our sin.

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In Lance's article, he asks his readers when was the last time they thought about the content of the gospel.

Coincidentally, I have been doing that and I have been doing it for years. 

In fact, I blogged about the CGGC's false take on the content of the gospel years ago on Brian Miller's blog.  I have been meditating feverishly on the content of the gospel since long before I read McKnight's book.

And, I will add this:  One of the convictions that underlies much of what I blog here is that what the CGGC does, from the top down, is fruit of belief in a false gospel.

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Here's a second part of the prophecy:  Unless what we do changes radically after Scot McKnight leaves Findlay in October, we will be heaping more burning coals of God's wrath on ourselves.

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As it stands now, I will be unable to attend The Gathering because of commitments I have to my job and my family.  But, if you can...

...please attend The Gathering.  And...

...please leave prepared to live differently and to demand that we all live differently!

If God is willing, I will write more on this thread later.