I'm writing this while it is still raw.
We just returned from a funeral. We were not mourning the deceased. We'd only seen him a few times in the 40ish years since we were first introduced to him but we are close to members of his family.
We know a handful of the about one hundred people who attended the service. Two of the people we know are women who are obviously a couple though they are very discrete about it. So discrete, in fact, that the woman who was not a relative of the deceased attended but kept her distance from her companion during the day's activities.
This woman, I'll call her Ann, clearly was grieving. She herself knew the deceased well and was feeling her own grief and she was grieving for the woman she loves in her loss.
We entered the so called sanctuary early and were seated when Ann came tiptoeing in on the outside so as not to be noticed. Ann sat down on the far outside of a pew away from everyone else but only two pews up from the one we were in. When she sat down, I whisper-shouted ANN, someone leaned over and nudged her, she looked over, Evie and I waved her into our pew, she came over, Evie opened her arms offering a hug and Ann just melted. Quietly, but right there in the sanctuary, she melted down. She wept silently and hugged Evie desperately.
-------------------
There are a lot of things I don't know about the life of love that Jesus commands and about what it means to show mercy.
I don't always know what it looks to show love and to live a life of mercy but I do know some things about what it does not look like. As, I was watching Ann weep on Evie's shoulder and listening to Evie's tender words of comfort, my mind actually raced to thoughts of people in the church who think they are being faithful to Jesus simply by banning same sex couples from being married in their sanctuaries.
And, I became angry at those people.
Tuesday, July 7, 2015
Double Trouble
I found this a few weeks back through a Facebook friend:
http://www.christianitytoday.com/edstetzer/2015/june/rapid-rise-of-non-denominational-christianity-my-most-recen.html
When you think about Barna's projection of the decline of the local congregation along with what Stetzer observes about the decline of denominational Christianity, you can see why some of us are less than enthusiastic about the increased emphasis on the local congregation and the denomination from the CGGC mountaintops in recent years.
Neither Barna nor Stetzer see a serious decline in Christianity but both see that the very thing the CGGC has been working toward crumbling rapidly in the near future.
The Spirit Himself seems to be moving and CGGC leaders seem to be demanding that we follow a path other than the one the Spirit is directing.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/edstetzer/2015/june/rapid-rise-of-non-denominational-christianity-my-most-recen.html
When you think about Barna's projection of the decline of the local congregation along with what Stetzer observes about the decline of denominational Christianity, you can see why some of us are less than enthusiastic about the increased emphasis on the local congregation and the denomination from the CGGC mountaintops in recent years.
Neither Barna nor Stetzer see a serious decline in Christianity but both see that the very thing the CGGC has been working toward crumbling rapidly in the near future.
The Spirit Himself seems to be moving and CGGC leaders seem to be demanding that we follow a path other than the one the Spirit is directing.
Monday, July 6, 2015
The Historic Importance of the CGGC's Rosenberry Era
75
What follows is something I began to work on nearly three years ago. As you will see, it is an attempt to assess the significance of the Rosenberry Era in the CGGC.
I wrote it in the flood of my strong, negative emotion that was my response to Ed's Leadership by Program, after the Findlay mountaintoppers announced their embrace, on behalf of the entire CGGC, of the fad-of-the-moment that was Transformational Church. (You will note that my prediction at the time that it would amount to nothing more than one more flash in the pan was accurate.)
Anyway, by the time I finished writing what follows, I discovered that I was thinking outrageous thoughts and coming to outlandish conclusions about Ed's leadership which startled even me. So much so that I couldn't bring myself to click Publish.
I've been sitting on this for nearly three years, not knowing if I agree with myself or not but, in the end, I'd have to say that I'm about 90% on board with what I wrote.
I publish it now because the import of the Rosenberry Era is something that Lance and, for that matter all of the CGGC, will have to deal with.
We know how great the struggle is for a single congregation to move forward after a pastor who has radically redefined that church's ministry has moved on. How will Lance deal with filling Ed's shoes? How will we, as a body, treat Lance in the light of the end of the historically game-changing Rosenberry Era.
Think about it.
Feel free to agree or disagree with me on the blog or in private.
I'd love to know how you appraise Ed and how you think we should embrace Lance and the challenges he faces as Ed's successor.
----------------------------------------------
"I have concluded that by the year 2025...only about one-third of the population will rely upon a local congregation as the primary or exclusive means for experiencing and expressing their faith..." (George Barna, Revolution, 2005, p. 49)
----------------------------
Ed Rosenberry is a game changer.
In all the history of the Church of God, no one impacted our body in the way John Winebrenner did.
In the space of ten years, Winebrenner progressed from being an attractive, dynamic young ministerial candidate in the view of the German Reformed Church's congregations in and near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania to become a radical advocate of 'new measures' evangelism so much so that his actions caused him to be locked out of the Harrisburg church.
In a short time within those ten years, Winebrenner became an innovative church reformer who could not function even as a radical in the German Reformed Church.
Ultimately, Winebrenner's views became so outside the mainstream that he formed a new body of converted sinners committed to "the establishment of churches on the New Testament plan." On the day that body, the Church of God, was formed Winebrenner went so far as to reject Protestantism, calling for "another great reformation."
To this date, only one person, Christian Henry Forney, has been acknowledged to have an impact on the Churches of God that can be spoken of in the same conversation as Winebrenner's.
Forney's impact was so great that he was able, within about 70 years of the founding of the Church of God, to transform Winebrenner's "another great reformation" movement into a Protestant denomination which no longer yearned for that other "great reformation" of Winebrenner's dream. Forney succeeded in redefining the Churches of God as a Protestant body.
Forney did that by leading the Church of God away from Winebrenner's extreme view of the ordinances--Feetwashing, in particular--into an understanding of church rituals which, though unique, accepted Protestant Low Church presumptions.
Ed Rosenberry is noteworthy because he is, in this day, creating change nearly as groundbreaking as the change Winebrenner wrought and, in some ways, even more extraordinary than the change Forney achieved.
Agree or disagree with the fruit of Ed's leadership, the time has come to acknowledge his extraordinary achievement.
In doing so, however, it is important to note:
Until recently, I would have agreed with conventional wisdom and said that the three big movers of CGGC change have been:
Because Yahn is less studied:
Yahn's great achievement was to shepherd into existence the first formal CGGC Doctrinal Statement. In 1925, after years of preparation, Yahn was able to lead the adoption of a Doctrinal Statement, and to convince the people of the Churches of God that they were being true to their history, even though Winebrenner was famous to them for saying,
Rowing upstream is difficult. It is even harder to convince others to join you in doing it. It is a rare and extraordinary achievement to do that and to convince people who you've convinced to row upstream to feel complacent, even excited, even righteous, about doing it.
That is precisely what Ed is doing.
Between about 2005 and 2007, a small but passionate, yet growing, core in the CGGC had formed around the conviction that the CGGC must no longer be church-centered and internally-focused with an increasingly top-heavy leadership hierarchy.
In those years, words and phrases such as Kingdom-centered, externally-focused, apostolic, the priesthood of all believers and flat organizational chart entered into the CGGC conversation.
In addition, during those days, and for a few more years while Ed was laying a foundation, there was vibrant conversation about how the CGGC should respond to that day's fad, the Emerging Church's, passion to make the gospel meaningful to postmodern people.
Before Ed, a remnant of CGGC people engaged in that conversation and formed themselves into a rather tight apostolic/prophetic community which carried on a cutting-edge dialog regarding those issues on a blog devoted to fashioning a place for "The CGGC in an Emerging World."
Under Ed's historically powerful leadership, all of that is now dust in the wind.
Ed Rosenberry is about church.
He is a shepherd--a flock man.
Here are five historically important fruit of Ed Rosenberry's leadership:
I once heard Norman Sawchuck define a leader as a person able to get people to follow him/her where they would not go otherwise.
If that's leadership, Ed may be our greatest leader ever!
================================================
Remember that, with only minor editing, this was written nearly three years ago. You may want to substitute, for postmodern, millennial because the jargon has shifted.
What do you think?
What follows is something I began to work on nearly three years ago. As you will see, it is an attempt to assess the significance of the Rosenberry Era in the CGGC.
I wrote it in the flood of my strong, negative emotion that was my response to Ed's Leadership by Program, after the Findlay mountaintoppers announced their embrace, on behalf of the entire CGGC, of the fad-of-the-moment that was Transformational Church. (You will note that my prediction at the time that it would amount to nothing more than one more flash in the pan was accurate.)
Anyway, by the time I finished writing what follows, I discovered that I was thinking outrageous thoughts and coming to outlandish conclusions about Ed's leadership which startled even me. So much so that I couldn't bring myself to click Publish.
I've been sitting on this for nearly three years, not knowing if I agree with myself or not but, in the end, I'd have to say that I'm about 90% on board with what I wrote.
I publish it now because the import of the Rosenberry Era is something that Lance and, for that matter all of the CGGC, will have to deal with.
We know how great the struggle is for a single congregation to move forward after a pastor who has radically redefined that church's ministry has moved on. How will Lance deal with filling Ed's shoes? How will we, as a body, treat Lance in the light of the end of the historically game-changing Rosenberry Era.
Think about it.
Feel free to agree or disagree with me on the blog or in private.
I'd love to know how you appraise Ed and how you think we should embrace Lance and the challenges he faces as Ed's successor.
----------------------------------------------
"I have concluded that by the year 2025...only about one-third of the population will rely upon a local congregation as the primary or exclusive means for experiencing and expressing their faith..." (George Barna, Revolution, 2005, p. 49)
----------------------------
Ed Rosenberry is a game changer.
In all the history of the Church of God, no one impacted our body in the way John Winebrenner did.
In the space of ten years, Winebrenner progressed from being an attractive, dynamic young ministerial candidate in the view of the German Reformed Church's congregations in and near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania to become a radical advocate of 'new measures' evangelism so much so that his actions caused him to be locked out of the Harrisburg church.
In a short time within those ten years, Winebrenner became an innovative church reformer who could not function even as a radical in the German Reformed Church.
Ultimately, Winebrenner's views became so outside the mainstream that he formed a new body of converted sinners committed to "the establishment of churches on the New Testament plan." On the day that body, the Church of God, was formed Winebrenner went so far as to reject Protestantism, calling for "another great reformation."
To this date, only one person, Christian Henry Forney, has been acknowledged to have an impact on the Churches of God that can be spoken of in the same conversation as Winebrenner's.
Forney's impact was so great that he was able, within about 70 years of the founding of the Church of God, to transform Winebrenner's "another great reformation" movement into a Protestant denomination which no longer yearned for that other "great reformation" of Winebrenner's dream. Forney succeeded in redefining the Churches of God as a Protestant body.
Forney did that by leading the Church of God away from Winebrenner's extreme view of the ordinances--Feetwashing, in particular--into an understanding of church rituals which, though unique, accepted Protestant Low Church presumptions.
Ed Rosenberry is noteworthy because he is, in this day, creating change nearly as groundbreaking as the change Winebrenner wrought and, in some ways, even more extraordinary than the change Forney achieved.
Agree or disagree with the fruit of Ed's leadership, the time has come to acknowledge his extraordinary achievement.
In doing so, however, it is important to note:
One difference between Ed's revolution and that of Winebrenner
is that Winebrenner's thinking was innovative
--far ahead of its time--
while Ed's is reactionary, intended to restore
imagined old days and old ways.
is that Winebrenner's thinking was innovative
--far ahead of its time--
while Ed's is reactionary, intended to restore
imagined old days and old ways.
Until recently, I would have agreed with conventional wisdom and said that the three big movers of CGGC change have been:
- John Winebrenner,
- C. H. Forney, and
- S. G. (Sherman Grant) Yahn.
And, until recently, both Forney and Yahn were and should have been ranked above Ed for the degree in which their achievements broke important ground.
Because Yahn is less studied:
Yahn's great achievement was to shepherd into existence the first formal CGGC Doctrinal Statement. In 1925, after years of preparation, Yahn was able to lead the adoption of a Doctrinal Statement, and to convince the people of the Churches of God that they were being true to their history, even though Winebrenner was famous to them for saying,
“The Church of God has no authoritative constitution, ritual, creed, catechism, book of discipline, or church standard, but the Bible. The Bible she believes to be the only creed, discipline, church standard, the test-book, which God ever intended his church to have.”The adoption of the Doctrinal Statement was an historic achievement. It does not, however, rank with what Ed Rosenberry is doing in the CGGC today for two reasons:
First, what Yahn did fit tightly into the spirit of his time. The year 1925 was the height of the Fundamentalist-Modernist debate. Other bodies were doing what Yahn led the Church of God to do, i.e., to choose, formally, one side or the other.
Second, what Yahn did, simply extended what Forney began. Forney chiseled out a Protestant identity for the Churches of God. Yahn merely refined that identity in terms of the driving issue of his day.
Ed Rosenberry's leadership is far more noteworthy in that it is succeeding
in convincing the CGGC to defy the spirit of this time.
Rowing upstream is difficult. It is even harder to convince others to join you in doing it. It is a rare and extraordinary achievement to do that and to convince people who you've convinced to row upstream to feel complacent, even excited, even righteous, about doing it.
That is precisely what Ed is doing.
Between about 2005 and 2007, a small but passionate, yet growing, core in the CGGC had formed around the conviction that the CGGC must no longer be church-centered and internally-focused with an increasingly top-heavy leadership hierarchy.
In those years, words and phrases such as Kingdom-centered, externally-focused, apostolic, the priesthood of all believers and flat organizational chart entered into the CGGC conversation.
In addition, during those days, and for a few more years while Ed was laying a foundation, there was vibrant conversation about how the CGGC should respond to that day's fad, the Emerging Church's, passion to make the gospel meaningful to postmodern people.
Before Ed, a remnant of CGGC people engaged in that conversation and formed themselves into a rather tight apostolic/prophetic community which carried on a cutting-edge dialog regarding those issues on a blog devoted to fashioning a place for "The CGGC in an Emerging World."
Under Ed's historically powerful leadership, all of that is now dust in the wind.
Ed Rosenberry is about church.
He is a shepherd--a flock man.
Here are five historically important fruit of Ed Rosenberry's leadership:
- There is no longer conversation valuing Kingdom over church.
- There is, now, no dialog about making the gospel meaningful to postmoderns.
- Focus has been returned to discipleship through bringing people to the institutional church, instead of the sending disciples to reach the people who need to follow Jesus.
- The organizational chart is not flattening; it is has become more hierarchical and top-heavy than it has ever been.
- Conversation about abandoning the distinction between clergy and laity and the priesthood of all believers has been replaced by a stronger emphasis than ever on the leadership of the clergy.
This reversal of passion for Kingdom and ministry to postmoderns and universal priesthood
to return to CHURCH-focus incarnated in the introduction of new programs
administered from denominational headquarters
is the extraordinary shift
administered from denominational headquarters
is the extraordinary shift
to upstream rowing
that Ed leads.
that Ed leads.
- In the years since Ed was installed as Executive Director in Findlay, the CGGC has stopped thinking about Kingdom.
- Our leadership team has readjusted its focus, once again--NOW MORE THAN EVER--on the CHURCH.
- We are no longer concerned with joining in Jesus' prayer, "your kingdom come, your will be done." We are now, again, church improvers. Church builders. Church adopters.
- We don't talk about reaching postmoderns. (I can't recall the last time I read that word in communication from the General Conference.)
- We talk less and less now about going into the world and more and more about improving the church and bringing people to it.
- And, while we once chatted excitedly about the Priesthood of all Believers, we have now, through our new credentials proposal, expanded the ease with which people can become members of our annually licensed clergy.
I once heard Norman Sawchuck define a leader as a person able to get people to follow him/her where they would not go otherwise.
If that's leadership, Ed may be our greatest leader ever!
================================================
Remember that, with only minor editing, this was written nearly three years ago. You may want to substitute, for postmodern, millennial because the jargon has shifted.
What do you think?
Sunday, July 5, 2015
Gathering: 7-5-15
The Sunday gathering gang met at our house today. Rather normally. We had some absentees due to the holiday.
You may recall that last Sunday we dropped everything, in mid gathering, and took off to a local restaurant to meet someone who works there and has been in conversation with Evie about ways we can show her mercy financially. (That conversation is continuing in positive ways. This woman, it turns out, has been burned several times by churches and pastors and is very cynical about "organized religion.")
Anyway, in the moment of serendipity last week, we lost our chance to take the bread and the cup. It may be hard for you to understand how powerful that act can become when it is the one act that is central to your gathering. I noticed the loss of it last week but not doing it created an emptiness for Evie, so much so that she asked the group, after the singing time concluded, if we could do it next. We did. She led with a very moving idea having to do with how deep the Father's love for us was in sending His Son to live and die for us when we were still sinners and how easily, sometimes, we choose sin, even knowing the extent of His grace and love.
Later, we had a time of celebration and, as we prepared for prayer, some conversation about the ways we are incarnating His mercy, grace and love in the world.
As always, the meal was a moving time of fellowship.
Now, I'm hoping for a restful remainder of the day.
You may recall that last Sunday we dropped everything, in mid gathering, and took off to a local restaurant to meet someone who works there and has been in conversation with Evie about ways we can show her mercy financially. (That conversation is continuing in positive ways. This woman, it turns out, has been burned several times by churches and pastors and is very cynical about "organized religion.")
Anyway, in the moment of serendipity last week, we lost our chance to take the bread and the cup. It may be hard for you to understand how powerful that act can become when it is the one act that is central to your gathering. I noticed the loss of it last week but not doing it created an emptiness for Evie, so much so that she asked the group, after the singing time concluded, if we could do it next. We did. She led with a very moving idea having to do with how deep the Father's love for us was in sending His Son to live and die for us when we were still sinners and how easily, sometimes, we choose sin, even knowing the extent of His grace and love.
Later, we had a time of celebration and, as we prepared for prayer, some conversation about the ways we are incarnating His mercy, grace and love in the world.
As always, the meal was a moving time of fellowship.
Now, I'm hoping for a restful remainder of the day.
Friday, July 3, 2015
BASED ON AN IDEA FROM MY HONEY: A Note to CGGC Pastors on a Sure-Fire Way not to have to do a Same Sex Wedding
Get yourself defrocked by your Conference's mountaintoppers!!!!!!
If you need to be mentored in this, send me an email. I have a track record of success.
If you need to be mentored in this, send me an email. I have a track record of success.
Lance's First eNews Post Contains the "R" Word Twice that I Saw
A new CGGC day has begun...
...and with inclusion of the word that was once, apparently, unspeakable or, um, untypable? in official CGGC communications...
The notorious R word.
Twice, actually, if I counted correctly.
If you are a Facebook friend of George Jensen, you may already have read his rave review of Lance's first eNews offering as E.D., which has created a Facebook tidal wave of praise for Lance's initial offering. And, sorry George, but I agree with George far more often than I do with most in our declining body.
I, too, agree that Lance got off to a very good start, though I'm not able to find all the superlatives George did.
To his immense praise, Lance actually acknowledges the importance of biblical truth for our body apart from increases in the numbers of nickels and noses. Yikes! Perhaps he IS a revolutionary.
Oddly, Lance finds himself encouraging CGGCers to become practitioners of grace and not merely to be people holding to truth without acts of love and grace.
As much as I truly appreciate what Lance has written, as I boisterously cheer his use of the R word, I think he gives the CGGC far more credit for holding to biblical truth than we deserve. In the issue he addresses, I believe, we are being more tradition driven than Bible driven. As is usual, it seems to me, even here, our truth comes more from the Middle Ages than from the Word. (I'd love for the CGGC to call a conversation on marriage in the New Testament.)
We truly are not a people of the Word and we need to be honest with ourselves about that. We have not been driven by passion for truth for several generations. R-ing of our devotion to tradition will not come to us easily. Too many mountaintoppers prefer tradition to truth.
Anyway...
...good start, Lance. Thanks for using the forbidden word twice right from the beginning!
I hope all of you will read the eNews and give it careful and serious thought.
...and with inclusion of the word that was once, apparently, unspeakable or, um, untypable? in official CGGC communications...
The notorious R word.
Twice, actually, if I counted correctly.
If you are a Facebook friend of George Jensen, you may already have read his rave review of Lance's first eNews offering as E.D., which has created a Facebook tidal wave of praise for Lance's initial offering. And, sorry George, but I agree with George far more often than I do with most in our declining body.
I, too, agree that Lance got off to a very good start, though I'm not able to find all the superlatives George did.
To his immense praise, Lance actually acknowledges the importance of biblical truth for our body apart from increases in the numbers of nickels and noses. Yikes! Perhaps he IS a revolutionary.
Oddly, Lance finds himself encouraging CGGCers to become practitioners of grace and not merely to be people holding to truth without acts of love and grace.
As much as I truly appreciate what Lance has written, as I boisterously cheer his use of the R word, I think he gives the CGGC far more credit for holding to biblical truth than we deserve. In the issue he addresses, I believe, we are being more tradition driven than Bible driven. As is usual, it seems to me, even here, our truth comes more from the Middle Ages than from the Word. (I'd love for the CGGC to call a conversation on marriage in the New Testament.)
We truly are not a people of the Word and we need to be honest with ourselves about that. We have not been driven by passion for truth for several generations. R-ing of our devotion to tradition will not come to us easily. Too many mountaintoppers prefer tradition to truth.
Anyway...
...good start, Lance. Thanks for using the forbidden word twice right from the beginning!
I hope all of you will read the eNews and give it careful and serious thought.
Thursday, July 2, 2015
Why Gathering was Cancelled: 7-1-15
I start work early on Wednesdays and I always turn off my phone except during breaks.
A participant in our Wednesday gathering starts an hour later than I do, showed up and saw me and told me that she just received a text from Evie saying that gathering had been cancelled because my dad was just ambulanced to the hospital.
Bottom line: A long time problem he's had with an undiagnosed allergic reaction, probably autoimmune, which causes his tongue to swell dangerously suddenly reoccurred.
Evie was already at the hospital by the time I called her and she told me he was being treated and was stable but that the stress of the day would be far too much for her to handle if we also had to host gathering.
In the end, we called off the Thursday gathering as well. Today, I'll be taking our next door neighbors to Reading Hospital for an appointment with his doctor. We know that we will both be very drained by the end of the day.
These are dark days for us. In addition to the issues of caring for my mom and dad and our neighbors, my sister-in-law's father is in the last days of his life, dying from complications related to Alzheimer's.
In the midst of all of this, I must add that it is a blessing to live in intimate community with the people who join us in gathering. Those people help us feel the presence of the Lord even in our darkest hours.
On a distantly related note, the answer to those two questions remains in the negative.
A participant in our Wednesday gathering starts an hour later than I do, showed up and saw me and told me that she just received a text from Evie saying that gathering had been cancelled because my dad was just ambulanced to the hospital.
Bottom line: A long time problem he's had with an undiagnosed allergic reaction, probably autoimmune, which causes his tongue to swell dangerously suddenly reoccurred.
Evie was already at the hospital by the time I called her and she told me he was being treated and was stable but that the stress of the day would be far too much for her to handle if we also had to host gathering.
In the end, we called off the Thursday gathering as well. Today, I'll be taking our next door neighbors to Reading Hospital for an appointment with his doctor. We know that we will both be very drained by the end of the day.
These are dark days for us. In addition to the issues of caring for my mom and dad and our neighbors, my sister-in-law's father is in the last days of his life, dying from complications related to Alzheimer's.
In the midst of all of this, I must add that it is a blessing to live in intimate community with the people who join us in gathering. Those people help us feel the presence of the Lord even in our darkest hours.
On a distantly related note, the answer to those two questions remains in the negative.
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