Last week, I noticed that George Jensen had a note on Facebook regarding his church's recognition that March 3 was Transfiguration Sunday.
I entered a comment suggesting that George puts "the high in CGGC high church," and, I added, "haha."
I'm pretty certain that George was not amused.
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Then, I began thinking at a 40,000 foot level.
One of the Characteristics of the CGGC Brand, is, To Talk is to Walk-ism, i.e., that, in the CGGC, "faith is disconnected from action."
And, without question, on one level, that's true.
The CGGC Mission Statement statement declares that the CGGC is committed to "establishing churches on the New Testament plan," a phrase that has deep historical roots in the Church of God, dating back to the very day that the Church of God was formed, in 1830. Since its first generation, to this day, the denomination declares the Bible to be its "only rule of faith and practice."
Yet, these days, that primitivist talk is not reflected in the actions of its General Conference and Regional leadership.
So, then, what's a pastor/parish priest to do?
If, on the level above the local church, talk and deed are at odds with each other, what's a local church to do?
George is typical. Enola is, too, with George as its parish priest.
Certainly, there's no authority for the observance of, in this case Transfiguration Sunday in the Book of Acts nor any place else is the New Testament (plan).
Still, if, in its action, denominational leadership disregards its own word, why shouldn't he, they?
George grooves on playing around the edges of high church-ism. No doubt, he sees value in a sort of hybridized low church, high church-ism.
And, as is the case with most CGGCers, as a pastor, George does what is right in his own eyes.
And, our Enola Church does Transfiguration Sunday, the New Testament plan and the Bible as their only rule of faith and practice be damned.
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Twice, to describe times of chaos among the people of Israel, the Book of Judges says, "...everyone did what was right in his own eyes."
In doing so, the Word is not praising the Israelites.
After all, in those days, the people had an authority beyond their own conscience. In those days, the people had the Word, the Law. Still, they did what was right in their own eyes.
Today, in our body, we also have more than our own consciences.
We have the Word, Old and New Testaments. And, as members of this body, we have the authority of the Conference, the Eldership, in writing, which forms the basis of our community.
The authority that forms the basis of our community says, "New Testament plan." It says, "only rule of faith and practice." It reaffirms those principles which can be understood in their meaning with roots in the earliest days of our history.
This doesn't allow for anyone to do what is right in his own eyes.
In our movement days, when we walked our radical talk, when we lived "New Testament plan" and "only rule of faith and practice," we thrived.
These days when we individually do what we think is right, we decline and decay.
The Lord of all authority and power and blessing isn't blessing us for doing what is right in our own eyes.
We must repent.
For your information your most recent blog post is based on a false statement that you made in it. You stated, “Last week, I noticed that George Jensen had a note on Facebook regarding his church's recognition that March 3 was Transfiguration Sunday.” I did NOT say anywhere in that post that my church recognized March 3 as Transfiguration Sunday. No such recognition happened at the Enola First Church of God. The sermon wasn’t even about the Transfiguration. Go ahead and log onto www.enolacog.com and listen to the sermon from that day and look at the Bulletin and Sonshine Weekly. There was no mention of the Transfiguration. I mentioned it on my personal Facebook page for reflection- especially for those that follow the Lectionary and the church calendar. And I challenge your assumption that churches that do recognize days on the church calendar and Lectionary are necessarily “high church.” One “low church” movement that has historically recognized many days on the church calendar is the Mennonite Church. Ask some old timers and they will tell you memories of Ascension Day or maybe even Transfiguration Sunday sing alongs in the church or a barn. You may disagree with my notion that following the church calendar is not necessarily high church, but you CANNOT deny that your statement that the Enola Church of God recognized Transfiguration Sunday is utterly and completely FALSE. So what are YOU going to do about your publicly published false statement?
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry, George. I apologize to you for my false reading of your Facebook post.
ReplyDeleteYou are correct that your note didn't indicate that the entire church was involved in the recognition of Transfiguration Sunday. I'm encouraged to know it wasn't.
As to what is High and Low Church, and where the Mennonites fall in on that continuum: Living in Lancaster County, I know...as I'm certain you do too, that there are nearly as many Mennonite sects as there are Mennonites.
There are Mennonites who use the Lectionary and perform same-sex weddings performed by
an LGBTQ+ member of their clergy and that there are Mennonites who still speak "Pennsylvania" German and eschew the use of automobiles. There are Mennonites of every shade between those two extremes. It's not accurate to say that Mennonites are low church.
What I don't apologize for, however, is the central idea of my post that your affinity for the Church Calendar illustrates.
By our word, both the Church of God and today's CGGC are not Low Church.
We are primitivists, or restorationists.
We, by our Word, are on mission "to establish churches on the New Testament plan," using the Bible as our only rule of faith and practice. In recent years, we reaffirmed those radical and early Church of God primitive principles...WITHOUT ALTERING ANY OF THE TRADITIONS WE'VE ADOPTED IN RECENT GENERATIONS.
We talked big but didn't change our walk.
And, that leaves people in your position, and mine, in the place of needing to decide how we will behave.
A very few of us choose to submit to the authority of the Eldership and seek a primitive way.
The most commonly chosen path, from my experience, is that pastors and churches do what is right in his own eyes.