These days I don't have time to enter a large and complex post but I have worked out a complete list of characteristics of the CGGC brand at the height of the Rosenberry Era. I think it's worth noting those characteristics as Ed steps down and Lance ascends to the top of the mountain. I will polish off that thread and enter it here if the pace of my life changes. Having that list will give us all a baseline that will help us comprehend the significance of the Finleyan Era.
There are sixteen characteristics of the Rosenberrian brand, as I understand it.
The last to be added to the list is, Creeping High Church-ism.
Think of the high church Advent Mass that Ed, as one of THE FOUR VICARS, led on the WTS Scotland campus these past two Christ-masses.
In the face of the CGGC's bold Bible talk in the new WE BELIEVE and in the Mission Statement that Ed himself penned, leadership's walk has not reflected the New Testament. Its walk comes straight from the priest craft of the high church of the Middle Ages.
Nowhere in the CGGC has defiance of the New Testament and its faith and practice been more bold and intentional than in the ERC.
Last year, the ERC staff grooved on Holy Week by sending out articles imploring pastors and churches to the faithful observance of all the holy days of Holy Week from Palm Sunday through the Holy Day Christendom names after the ancient pagan fertility goddess Ishtar.
ISHTAR!
Easter. Get it !?!
Talk about bold, joyous defiance of the actions of the CGGC General Conference in session! Talk about joyful and mindless insubordination to the New Testament plan.
Where in the Book of Acts do you find the practice of anything even remotely resembling Holy Week?!
For New Testament disciples, every week was holy. Every day was holy. Every moment was holy. And, every gathering of diciples celebrated all that Holy Week idolizes during one silly, ritualized week in the year!
So...
True to form, early in the morning, before we gathered in our home on Sunday, I received an email from the ERC E. D. containing a Palm Sunday meditation.
Needless to say, the phrase Palm Sunday was not uttered by anyone in our gathering. We were, as we always are, devoted to the teachings and practice of New Testament disciples.
So, I ask about CGGC mountaintoppers: How high (church) will they fly?
Undoubtedly, higher than ever in 2015.
As for me and my gathering, though, we will serve the Lord and obey the rule of His Word.
Well...
ReplyDeleteERCers got a second Holy Week meditation from the E.D. yesterday and, were it not for the fact that it itself spits in the face of CGGC talk, I would say it was well done.
Some thoughts about it:
Early on it assumes we will gather on Sunday to celebrate Easter. At Faith, we won't gather on Sunday. We chose to take that day off, simply because it seemed natural to take this Sunday as our first one off after the snow Sundays.
Second, the meditation hoped that we will not become lost in Easter traditions that have nothing to do with the message of the gospel. And, here, at Faith we do that very well. We celebrate the cross and the resurrection every time we gather because we take the bread and cup every time we gather.
Finally, and this is the essence of the high churchers sin against WE BELIEVE: the E. D. frequently chooses to substitute the word "Easter" for the word, "resurrection.". He mentions, for example, "the miracle of Easter." There is no miracle of Easter but there is a life-changing power in the resurrection. With that subtle shift in vocabulary, the E. D. turns focus away from Jesus and to humanly constructed tradition--the very traditions he hopes we will not become lost in.
I suspect that the service you have planned/will attend has more human tradition, and less pure gospel than you realize.
Discard the idea that there is a miracle of Easter. Make Jesus everything!