I wasn't alone in that.
Reports I received from the debate on the floor suggest to me that the debate over the motion to approve We Believe was lengthy and spirited and that the vote for approval was very far from unanimous.
I have had very limited conversation about what others opposed in it and, my sense is that objections were primarily either to specific doctrinal assertions made by WB or to previously important positions no longer included in the current edition.
I will admit that I paid very little attention to what WB asserts we do believe or to what it has left out.
In reading it, I couldn't get past the Introduction, which I, to this day, believe castrated our body's ability to create accountability for its members as far as matters of belief--and the behaviors related to belief--are concerned.
In the end, the CGGC's highest human authority, the delegates to General Conference, approved this dangerous and debilitating language included in the Introduction to We Believe:
From its formation, the Churches of God stressed the importance of unity in essentials, liberty in non-essentials, and charity in all things. The Church seeks to uphold biblical truth while respecting personal freedom.Now, let me just say that, in my opinion, as a matter of history, these assertions are lies. They are hogwash. They misrepresent the truth of our past.
But, my opinion aside, by the authority of the General Conference in session, these sentences define the role of absolute truth in the CGGC in 2015 and in the foreseeable future.
We now believe of ourselves that we stress unity in essentials, though we don't define what is and is not essential. You are free to have your own essentials and I am free to create my own.
Therefore, even the definition of what we stress unity in is left to personal interpretation and choice because there is absolutely no standard given.
Historically, I think, when other faith groups use this sort of language, though, essentials are, generally considered to be the basis content of the Gospel, "that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scripture and that he appeared...." (1 Cor. 151f) But, as far as the CGGC since 2013 is concerned, even the matter of what is essential in what we believe is nebulous and undefined.
Beyond that, by the authority of the General Conference in session, we stress the importance of liberty in non-essentials and, beyond that, in all things--whether they be essentials or non-essentials--we stress charity.
More tragically, according to the General Conference in session, we balance the upholding of, obedience to?, biblical truth because we respect personal freedom.
In other words, biblical truth doesn't trump personal freedom within the CGGC. Neither what the Bible teaches, even what it commands, is more important than an individual's exercise of his/her freedom to act and think as s/he sees fit.
So, in the end, we are left with undefined essentials and the proclamation that, beyond those murky waters, we are absolutely committed to practicing charity because that is what "charity in all things" means. And, we are certainly not authorized to hold anyone in the body accountable to biblical teachings, even the commands of Jesus, because we, as a matter of principle, respect personal freedom as much as we uphold biblical truth.
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For the prophet, there is an ability to see, as the Lord gives vision, the connection between the present and the future.
When I railed against the approval of We Believe it is precisely because I absolutely knew, of a certainty, that what We Believe said about essentials and non-essentials, charity, biblical truth and personal freedom would become a major problem for us.
Understand. Those statements about essentials, non-essentials, charity in all thing and the balancing of biblical truth and personal freed are universal.
Those statements purport to describe all of our history and everything we have said and done from day one. When we say,
From its formation, the Churches of God stressed the importance of unity in essentials, liberty in non-essentials, and charity in all things. The Church seeks to uphold biblical truth while respecting personal freedom......we have applied them to that Marriage, the Bible and the CGGC document that we are now using as authority. They apply to the Resolutions from 1986 and the excerpt from General Conference minutes in 2014 which are now being ballyhooed.
None of those documents have authority if they compromise the necessity to practice charity in all things (including the issues of sexuality and same sex marriage) and, if biblical truth doesn't trump personal freedom, certainly those humanly written documents can't override it.
Why? because the CGGC stresses unity in only some things and liberty in some other things but, above that, in all things, we stress charity. Because we don't uphold even biblical truth above one's right to exercise his/her own freedom.
In We Believe, we hold charity and the balancing of biblical truth to be our only, once and for all of our history, absolutes.
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Bottom line:
The only absolute authority we have in the CGGC today requires that we set aside biblical teachings and commands regarding sexuality and marriage to the point that we can't allow the Bible to interfere with someone whose sense of freedom leads him or her to practice homosexuality or to welcome same sex couples who want to have their love sanctified in a CGGC church.
Hope that some day a gay couple doesn't take a copy of the absolute proclamations of We Believe to a judge!
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In the past, I have noted that our theology is both theologically bankrupt and corrupt. I knew that a day like this was coming. It has now arrived.
Glory, if you want, in undefined essentials of the faith, in liberty in non-essentials, in charity in all things and the balancing of the authority of the Word of God against the exercise of personal freedom.
I, for one, denounce them. As I did. As I always will!
Repent of your shallow, tolerant, misguided sense of what is absolute.
What amazes me about those sentences asserting the importance of liberty and charity and personal freedom and diminishing the upholding of biblical truth is that not very long ago CGGCers universally would have been repulsed by them and would have labeled them as the sentiments of the extreme theological left who want to permit every kind of sin.
ReplyDeleteNow, they are in WE BELIEVE and possess the authority of the General Conference in session.
Can you imagine what the CGGC may stand for in the next generation if there is no repentance?
Please understand that I am not suggesting that the delegates of the 2013 General Conference joined the extreme theological left but what they were worked out as if they were.
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