Revising The CGGC Brand: "Incoherence" Becomes "Organized Hypocrisy"

Friends,

As you know, I've been working on a description of the CGGC brand for some time now.  The project was inspired by a comment in an eNews article in early 2013 that a future project for CGGC leaders would be to define their own notion of the CGGC brand. 

Knowing how this sort of thing goes in the CGGC in the 2010s, considering the radical Mission Statement that doesn't describe the mission we live out and the 2013 "Statement of Faith" which doesn't describe a belief system consistent with our actions, I have decided to be honest about my own perceptions of what the CGGC brand really is.  This has been a useful exercise for me.

My description has gone through several drafts and is now the point of tweaking.  I believe that what I have published is essentially what I see.  However, I do think that I am still able to polish the wording of my take on the CGGC brand.

I have been most dissatisfied with the last of the thirteen characteristics that I identify.  The last of the characteristics is this in its latest form:

13. Incoherence. There is illogic and outright contradiction among the things the CGGC claims to be true about itself.  There is also lack of consistency between what it says and what it does.

The word 'incoherence' is highfalutin (as is the word highfalutin).  It doesn't say well what I see in the CGGC.  So, I have decided to rework the entire last item in my thirteen characteristics of the CGGC brand thusly:

13.  Organized Hypocrisy.  There is illogic and outright contradiction among the things the CGGC claims to be true about itself.  This illogic and contradiction is, in reality, deeply rooted, highly intentional and carefully executed.  A hypocrite is an actor: "...a person who acts in contradiction to his or her stated beliefs or feelings."  It is a positive and essential value of the CGGC to speak one message and to, without qualm, act out another that is entirely disconnected from that avowed principle.

As one example, consider the fact that our General Conference leadership worked for nearly six years to convince the General Conference delegates in session to adopt a new We Believe and the 2013 Statement of Faith which both claim that the Bible in our "only" "rule" and that, having succeeded in that, they immediately began to promote the unbiblical practice of observing Lent.

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As offensive as the things I write and say are to many in the CGGC, there are several words I have not yet found the courage, nor the faith in the Lord, to write or speak.  Several of these are the words that derive from the word hypocrite.

But, I think the time has come for me either to publish the words or to consider myself a false prophet.

Jesus regularly used the hypocrite words to describe the Scribes and Pharisees--the religious institutionalists--of His own day.

I now summon them to describe, at the very least, the CGGC's institutional values and practices.  Not to do so would be to confess to being faithless to my calling.

Awesome Video in Which Justin Meier and Reggie McNeal Parrot what bill Sloat has been Saying and Doing

What a stunner!

There are three points where one, the other or both could be reading from this blog.

1. They talk about what we (in the American church) do--and specifically much of Church Planting--as being a form of idolatry.  (However, they don't use my term ecclesiolatry.)
2. Reggie says, "We need Repentance Conferences."
3. In looking into the future for the body of Christ, Reggie describes what he calls "network churches."  He mentions two types.  His second type is a high definition picture of what we have already "planted" and what we are already doing at Faith.  (Jump in.  The water's great.)

A prophet in his own country, eh?

You have to watch this!

You have to DO this:

https://hearthecall.wistia.com/medias/ur72owf9lh

The New CGGC Trinity: The Father, the Son and the INSTITUTION

Note:  Readership of this blog has almost exactly doubled since I blogged, Why I Don't Observe LENT.  I have no idea why this is so.

Nevertheless, if you are a new reader, welcome.  Your participation on the blog itself or, as so many seem to prefer, privately through email is a blessing to me.

bill

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Friends,

It is a false value held by the CGGC and other groups concerned with following Jesus--and who are dominated by shepherds--to care about creating and maintaining mellow relationships among people at the expense of wholehearted passion for and adherence to truth.

However, truth is the essence of Jesus-following. Jesus said, "I am...the truth..."  And, He often warned of falsehood. 

The New Testament warns of false Christs and false apostles, false  prophets and false teachers.  It proclaims that salvation is only for those who hold firmly to the true gospel.  It also states that those who believe something other than that gospel believe in vain.  (1 Corinthians 15)

I now suspect, based on the fruit it is producing, that the leadership of the CGGC, at least on the General Conference level, has abandoned the genuine New Testament gospel to so great an extent that it is guilty of heresy.

My head is still spinning and my heart is still pounding over Ed Rosenberry's eNews statements:

At the luncheon on Tuesday when the panel was asked as leaders how to implement change in a pre-existing institution like the Church, the University, or business...

and,

...it was quite interesting to learn that the leadership challenges in banking are not that much different than those in the Church.

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I have attempted to explain away these statements to myself in a way that permits me to see, in Ed, belief in orthodox Christian truth that is consistent with the Gospel proclaimed and lived out in the Word of God.

I have tried.  But, with great sorrow, I have failed.

Instead, I have concluded that no one who believes that the Father is God, Jesus is God and the Holy Spirit is God and that they are One could possibly make the statements that Ed has made.

People who believe in the Trinity and whose lives produce fruit of that belief embrace the reality that, since Pentecost, God inhabits His people and that the church is a living body; it is an organism, not an organization; it is certainly not an INSTITUTION and it can not be compared, as Ed compares it, to a university or a business, particular a bank.

People who embrace the Trinity believe that the community of saints/disciples/followers of the Way make up a unique community in the world and that this community is united and empowered by the presence of God Himself.

People who confess what the Word teaches about God and God's people do not believe--and they can not say--anything that even remotely resembles what Ed says about the church as institution or the similarity between leading the church and leading a bank or other business or a university.

I am appalled and I fear for the soul of anyone who can say what Ed has said AND for the souls of all the people who can accept these sentiments without qualms.

I see a new Trinity in the fruit of what Ed Rosenberry, and of those on his staff who (publicly, at least) walk in lock step with him:  A false Trinity not of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, but one of the Father, the Son and the institutional church.

Read their writings.  There is much about the church as an institution.  There is, however, no Holy Spirit in the things they say or write.  In fact, they never speak or write about Him.

God help them.  God help us.

We must repent and we must address the issues of what we believe about our Christ and His Body.

"Rhetoricalism:" The Root of Many CGGC Sins

One of my favorite preachers is the ERC's E. D., Kevin Richardson.  Kevin's preaching, at least his preaching that I hear, is missional and radical--even apostolic.  Sadly, I normally have the opportunity to hear Kevin preach only once each year--as a part of ERC Conference sessions.

Every year I've heard Kevin speak, the same two-part phenomenon has taken place: 

1. Kevin describes, from the Word, radical truths about the way a disciple of Jesus Christ should live--and His Body should function.  (Each of these truths, incidentally, have, at the time, aligned with my own struggle for obedience.)
2. Everyone I know who hears him preach these vibrant messages seems to agree with Kevin and to be inspired to think as he thinks.  Yet, from year to year, no one I encounter produces fruit of being changed from living tradition-bound ways due to Kevin's radical preaching.

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I am a past participant in the CGGC's Missional Leadership Initiative, which operates on a two year cycle and is resourced by the missional guru, Reggie McNeal.

During the last part of the very last session my MLI group met with McNeal, Reggie cautioned us: "Don't let your commitment to mission be merely rhetorical."

He implied that it is possible for evangelicals, especially, to allow themselves to be convinced that by believing in being missional that they are actually being missional.  It is possible for people to go one step further and to argue and to debate for a missional theology and yet, without reservation, continue to behave in a non-missional way.

I have no idea why Reggie chose to say that to a CGGC MLI group. 

I don't know if he had picked up on the fact that it is characteristic of the CGGC for its pastors and 'lay' leaders to fall prey to the temptation to think that to believe something--and even to argue in favor of it--is the equivalent of living out that belief.  Perhaps Reggie says that to everyone in every, as he would call it, tribe.  But, the fact is that, in the CGGC, rhetoricalism reigns.  We really do bear fruit of holding the conviction that to think a thought is to live it out.

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This explains what happens when Kevin preaches his powerful, pointed sermons to ERC Conference delegates.  In the CGGC ERC, at least, many people seem to be convinced that to hear a powerful sermon on radical discipleship, to agree with it--and perhaps even to steal that sermon--is to live in obedience to Jesus.

However, the Word of God contains the exact opposite teaching: 

"Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash."  (Mt 7:24-27)

"If you love me, you will keep my commandments."  (John 14:15)

"But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves." (James 1:22)

The practice of rhetoricalism is the root of many of my characteristics of the CGGC brand.  Among them:

Traditionalism (set beside our radically outward-focused statements of faith and mission and vision.)

Faddism, which allows us to jump willynilly from one grand new strategy or program to another, even if the new one contradicts the previous one and/or what we say we believe or to embrace as our mission.

A Middle Ages View of Leadership under the authority of the new WE BELIEVE and MISSION STATEMENT which proclaim that the Bible is our "only" "rule." 

Cynicism: The natural result, in the CGGC body, of the frequent, abrupt and often contradictory, changes in direction conceived of by leadership.

To Talk is to Walk-ism, the characteristic most closely derived from rhetoricalism.  The one which takes the thinking that is the root of rhetoricalism and gives audible and written words to it.

Cheap Grace, which Bonhoeffer demonstrated is not grace at all but which has been the way of the CGGC for decades and which the CGGC avoids in thought, yet practices in action.

False, Flock-Based Righteousness which has no place in the Gospel Jesus lived and preached

and

Incoherence, my poorly chosen used to describe the fact that there is considerable contradiction among the things the CGGC says and does.  

By any standard, the CGGC is in a long cycle of decline.  Clearly, a root cause for that decline is this dangerous reality decried in the Word from Genesis to Revelation: We have allowed ourselves to think that thinking is living.  On the Day, it will not be.

We must repent.

Cannibalism of the Clergy in the CGGC

Fellow CGGCers,

 

Below is an email (edited to preserve the identities of individuals) I recently received from a fellow member of the CGGC clergy.  This person wrote to me in response to an email in which I asked several people in the CGGC clergy what they understand the CGGC's ONe Mission to be. 

 

I believe every word of this email because, over my years in the CGGC, I've known of this sort of thing to happen many times. 

 

As Paul Simon wrote, "It's the same old story, everywhere I go."  In fact, when I was member of the ERC Commission on Church Renewal, that Commission engineered several very similar stories. (See my anecdote following the email.)

I'm blogging this because I have been contemplating blogging on this issue for some time.  Here is a case in point.

 

I'm disgusted by the cannibalism that is an ordinary part of our DNA.  What you will read below could happen in any region of the CGGC USA.

Here's I challenge I offer to everyone who reads the email that follows:  Identify for me a region in the CGGC USA that this story could not take place and explain why.

 

The CGGC is sick...from top to bottom and from side to side...and it has been for years.

 

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Hi Bill,

Sorry for the delay in responding. I really have no idea what the cggc mission is, and don't really have anything to do with anyone in the cggc anymore.

 

My regional director has refused to speak to me [for several months], our region's church/pastor [commission] will have nothing to do with me - and no one will tell me why.

 

It's one of the most bizarre things I've ever experienced. [A General Conference staff person long known to this person] offers to 'listen' to me now and then, and I've met with [another member of GC staff] a couple of times, but other than that... nothing.  So... I really have nothing good to say about the cggc.
 

We are trying to get involved in a non-denominational church - and that has not been easy either. Plus I've been working long hours at my new job. I am a ____________________ for __________. I don't know if I'll do it forever, but I don't foresee ever being in ministry again. I especially don't see being involved in the cggc again. I doubt that I could even if I wanted to.

 

What's most frustrating is that I have no idea why.

 

I'm just dumbfounded that a regional director can just REFUSE to speak to a pastor in their region.

 

I've tried apologizing, I've reached out twice trying to reconcile.

 

I've talked to Findlay people and our regional president... and nothing happens.

 

When you coined the term "Shepherd Mafia"... you nailed it.

So, I'm sorry I'm not much help with this; and sorry for the rant . . ..
 

peace & blessings,

 

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As I mentioned, I participated in several similar stories as a member of the ERC's Commission on Church Renewal. 

One of the most embarrassing and painful for me was a case in which an ERC pastor contacted the Commission and asked for assistance.  He was concerned by what he regarded to be increasing tension between the Church Council and himself.  He asked the Commission to mediate.

The Commission set up the meeting he requested and the meeting was well attended by all parties involved.  The Commission offered an open forum for the free exchange of any and all concerns, explaining to the Council that their pastor was concerned and want to resolve any problems between it and him.

We on the Commission were delighted to hear that no one had any serious issues with the pastor and that, in fact, members of the Council expressed their appreciation for their pastor's ministry.

Instead of engaging in conflict resolution, the Commission concluded the evening by leading a time of celebration.  And, afterward it held a brief private meeting with the pastor to give him a head's up on some very minor issues of concern we picked up on from the members of the Church Council.

We were overjoyed...until the next month when we received word that that pastor and his wife had gone away for a week of vacation and that, while they were away, the Council scheduled a special meeting and fired him.

What discipline do you suppose was exercised against the Church Council, by the Commission, its staff person and by the Region's Executive Director?  What direct support do you suppose was offered to the pastor in this conflict by any group or person in the Conference?

Nada.

That pastor never had a meaningful ministry in the ERC again and the Conference quickly sent another pastor to serve the church.

This story is not the only similar sort of story I can tell from my decades in the CGGC.

The CGGC's people will never repent of unrighteousness until righteousness is demanded of all of its leaders and people.

We are spiritually sick.

We must repent.

Why I Don't Observe LENT

Gang,

I am writing this blog as a direct and intentional response to the entirety of the February/March 2014 issue of The Church Advocate whose cover features its lead article, Why I Observe LENT, by Ben Tobias.  (Ben capitalized Lent, not I.)

Blame for the promotion of Lent, however, does not extend to Ben alone.  His article is followed by one authored by Bill Shoemaker entitled, ONe Mission During Lent.  Additionally, the back cover of the issue features a recommendation of Todd Hunter's book, Our Favorite Sins, by Don Dennison.  Following the theme of the issue, Don says, "The season of Lent is a perfect time to address the temptations which lead to periodic and, all too often spiritual failure."  Hence, to read the book is consistent with a life of piety that includes observance of the season of Lent.

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Below are three reasons that I do not observe Lent:

1.  Lent is the product of human tradition and the New Testament denounces human traditions.

  Ben Tobias' article asserts, "Lent was developed by the early Church..." and he is correct, so long as he uses the term early church not as including, by many decades, the New Testament church. 

To my knowledge, the earliest reference to a practice that, even in the most remote manner, resembles what, after numerous evolutionary twists, would become Lent, is in the early third century--about 200 years after Jesus was walking the earth.

  Think of it this way:  If 2014 is early American history, Lent was, indeed, as the article suggests, developed by the early church.

  Clearly, even by the account of advocates of the observance of Lent, Lent is a product of human tradition. 

There is no teaching to observe Lent in the New Testament.  There is no evidence of its observance in the New Testament.

I do not observe Lent because the New Testament does teach the observance of Lent and because the New Testament goes further and teaches that human tradition is evil because obstructs obedience to the commands of God (and of Jesus):

  Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, ² “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat!”³ Jesus replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? (Mt 15)

  ⁸ You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.”

⁹ And [Jesus] continued, “You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! (Mk 7)

  ⁸ See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ. (Col 2:8)

  I believe, as, Paul says to Timothy, that it is "all Scripture that is god-breathed and is useful..."

  Scripture does not teach or model Lent.  Scripture also warns of the sort of human tradition that Lent represents.

  I have enough on my plate to love Jesus and to obey everything He commands.  I don't need to divert or dilute my focus by observing Lent.

  Because I love the Lord and His commands, I don't observe Lent.

2.  The doctrinal and faith statements adopted by the General Conference in session, the CGGC's highest earthly authority, in 2013 prohibit me from observing Lent.

  The new We Believe and the new 2013 CGGC Statement of Faith make similar but, (curiously) not identical statements, about the authority of the Bible in the CGGC.

  We Believe states:

We believe the Bible is the inspired, infallible authority, the Word of God, our only rule for following Jesus in every aspect of our life.

  The 2013 Statement of Faith says,

We believe that the Bible is the divinely inspired Word of God, the only infallible rule of faith and practice.

  In both authorities, the Bible is declared to be, for the people of the CGGC, its "only" "rule."

  This is radical language--much stronger than is taken by many other denominations.  It is language that traces back to John Winebrenner and the Church of God's founding generation.  (Though this is fuel for another discussion, it may very well be heresy.)  But, this language is authority in the CGGC. 

  Everyone in the CGGC, including Ben Tobias and Bill Shoemaker and Don Dennison, is bound to submit to it.  Everyone who doesn't submit to it is being insubordinate.

  Because words have meaning: If the Bible is our only rule, it is, therefore, our ultimate ruler. 

  And, since the Bible is out highest spiritual authority, based on the action of the General Conference in Session, our highest earthly authority, observing Lent is permissible in the CGGC only if it is taught and/or modeled in the Bible.

  Lent is not taught in the Bible.  It is not, in any way, modeled in the Bible.

  I don't observe Lent because I love the CGGC and I am, for the moment at least, still active in it.  Because I am, I am bound by CGGC human authority over me to do all the Bible teaches and not to do anything it fails to teach.

  Because I submit to the CGGC, I do not observe Lent.

3.  The Mission of the CGGC, adopted on the authority of the General Conference in session, forbids the observance of Lent.

  The Mission of the CGGC, adopted by the General Conference in session in 2010 asserts,

As witnesses of the Lord Jesus Christ, we commit ourselves to make more and better disciples by establishing churches on the New Testament plan and proclaiming the gospel around the world. (Matthew 28:16-20, Ephesians 3:8-11, Acts 1:8)

  To be on mission in the CGGC is to pursue the goal of making 'more and better' disciples through two means.  One of those two means is to establish churches on the New Testament plan.

  The term New Testament plan, again, traces back to our body's founding generation.  Any study of the history of that generation will reveal that the term means that the Church of God only teaches what the New Testament teaches and it only practices what the New Testament models.

  Again, Lent is neither taught nor was it practiced in the New Testament.

  I do not observe Lent because I am a good and faithful member of the CGGC and because I am deeply committed to the CGGC's mission.

  Because I subordinate myself to CGGC authority, I do not observe Lent.

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There is a fruit that the current General Conference leadership produces, it seems, every time it produces a crop.  And, that fruit reeks of spiritual decadence and sin.

Understand this: 

It is because of Ed Rosenberry and his leadership team that the concepts of "the New Testament plan" and the Bible as the CGGC's "only" "rule" have reentered the CGGC dialog.  Ed and his staff have pulled these concepts from a Church of God history in which they had been buried, for all practical purposes, for more than an century.  Ed and his team fought for years to place those concepts in authority over them.

Here's where the decadence and sin come in: 

Having moved the CGGC body to make this vision and mission our authority, they, then, are the very people who lead defiance of those authorities.  The bold promotion of the observance of Lent in The Church Advocate is merely one of numerous examples.

My friends, they didn't have to initiate making only rule and New Testament plan authority over themselves and over all of us.  But, they went to great effort to do it!  Now it is THEIR authority, too.

This style of leadership is, simply, insane.  It defines dysfunction.

We must demand their confession of sin against the covenant we share.  We must demand that they repent and sin no more.

The CGGC Brand in 2014

Gang,

Very much against my will, I was essentially forced to write my dissertation, not on any topic that interested me, but on the practice of Feet Washing in the Churches of God, General Conference.  That project was distasteful to me and it was a struggle of many years to complete it and the result was dismal: A piece of writing I don't recommend to anyone.

Fifteen years after its completion, the only insight I drew from the project that still edifies me is a comment made by my third reader during my dissertation defense.

He had asked, "If you could boil your understanding of Feet Washing in the Churches of God down into one sentence, what would it be?" 

Actually my answer was one I was happy with because it was an insight of the moment.  I said, "It has evolved."  But he immediately corrected me.

He said pointedly, "It is evolve-ING."

Bingo!

And, I have come to understand that that reality: "It is evolve-ing," is true of the CGGC--and much more so in 2014 than it has been at any time in the CGGC's history.  The rate of our evolution [or, perhaps, de-volution] is increasing exponentially under the reign of the current leadership team.

Sadly, the change that leadership is shepherding propels the CGGC back toward the Middle Ages, not into a risky, Spirit-empowered and blessed, Word-informed future that is characteristic of movements participating in revival.

There are two major changes in my assessment of the CGGC Brand in early 2014 compared to my 2103 assessment.  First, I have kept the list of characteristics intact at thirteen but I have removed,

A Rodney King: "Can-We-All-Just Get-Along?" Doctrine of the Church.

And replaced it with,

Ecclesiolatry.  (I explore the depths of this sin on my Ecclesiolatry blog.)

I believe that that word came to me as a prophetic insight, though I have recently discovered that the word has been existence for years.

I still believe that can-we-all-just-get-alongism is an essential part of the CGGC's DNA in 2014.  However, it is not nearly as important in describing what defines the CGGC's uniqueness as is its choice to substitute veneration of the church for obedience to the Lord of the church.  Also, this characteristic is closely linked, in the CGGC micro-universe, to characteristic number 4, i.e., Traditionalism.

Second, I have tweaked,

Flock-focused Righteousness

So that it becomes,

False, Flock-focused Righteousness 

This tweaking highlights my increasing conviction that the CGGC is preparing the people who, blindly, accept its definition of Christian living to be numbered among the goats on the Day.  This breaks my hearts for the innocents in the CGGC's pews and fills me with rage toward the preachers of this false righteousness.

Here's the revised description of the CGGC Brand as it, and my own understanding of it, evolves:

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1. Decline.  In the first sixty years or so of its history the Church of God began from scratch and grew to approximately 800 active congregations. From that peak, the CGGC has declined to far less than half that number, losing a total of 60 congregations between 2001 and 2010 alone!

 

2.  Institutionalized "Churchianity," not Christianity.  With increasing fervor, the CGGC focuses on an institutionalized, parish priest-centered view that church is with parishes or flocks, led by clergymen, with an ecclesiastical elite ruling over all.  The CGGC now only pays lip service to what Jesus commands of His disciples. The CGGC today renews churches, makes transformational churches, adopts churches and plants churches yet only goes into the world to make disciples after all the headquarters and local parish work is thoroughly finished, therefore, never.

 

3. Ecclesiolatry.  Ecclesiolatry is the creation and veneration of the church as an idol, as opposed to love of and obedience to Jesus Christ, the Lord of the Church.  Idolatry is creating objects of worship to suit our own passions and prejudices.  The CGGC substitutes love for the church for love for the church's Lord.  Hence the obsession with planting, adopting, transformationalizing and renewing local churches while the Church's Lord's talk was about and His prayer and passion was to establish a His Father's Kingdom.  The church is the CGGC's Golden Calf.

4. Traditionalism. What the CGGC does is, no longer, rooted in love for, nor obedience to, Bible truth. These days, CGGC practice derives from the way of thinking that led to the rise of the church as an institution in the Middle Ages. The CGGC's founder, John Winebrenner, who saw even the Protestant Reformation as a failure, wouldn't recognize what has become of the movement he began.

5. Faddism. The CGGC shifts direction according to what is fashionable among other religious denominations. Hence, today, the people with offices in headquarters buildings fret over the CGGC 'brand.'  Most recently, with other trend-driven denominations, the CGGC has sought to embrace the  'transformational church' fad.  Currently fads such as this, not biblical truth, drive CGGC change.

6. Mellow Relationships over Truth. The CGGC has serious issues with truth primarily because it values, to the extreme, human relationships rooted in tolerance of others but does not value hunger and thirst for righteousness.  The CGGC no longer holds, as the most important relationship, love for the Lord, which Jesus called the greatest commandment.  The CGGC no longer takes firm stands on any biblical truth, as the recently adopted revision of We Believe makes clear.

7. A Middle Ages Approach to Leadership. Perhaps the most harmful achievement of CGGC elites is the creation of a 'laity.' In its early years, the Church of God had significantly attained the priesthood of all believers. Recently, however, CGGC higher ups have transformed the typical participant in a CGGC congregation into a mere consumer of religious products and services supplied by the parish clergy and their higher ups.

8. Strong Central Planning Coupled with Lower Level Clergy and Congregational Rebellion.  It is not enough to suggest that the CGGC is becoming clergy and higher up dominated. (See item 7)  Even in the expanding CGGC clergy world, there are extremes in power from the bottom of the clergy pyramid to its peak. Higher ups in denominational headquarters and in regional offices act from a sense of power that no Roman Catholic Pope would dream of.  However, in response, many pastors outside of the good-old-boy leadership network, and most local CGGC congregations, ignore and sometimes defy (always without consequence), the authority of the leaders located in the denomination's central planning offices. (See also, item 13.)

9. Cynicism. As much as our higher up are shepherds seeking peace, calm and quiet among the pastors and congregations of the CGGC, there is a stifling atmosphere of cynicism among our pastors and congregations toward those in CGGC seats of power.  (See item 7.)  There is also cynicism flowing from leadership down into the body.  This cynicism flows in every direction: From the top down, from the bottom up and horizontally among factions in the body.

10.  To Talk is to Walk-ism.  According to the New Testament, a follower of Jesus is one who possesses a faith that organically produces acts of obedience to God's will. (Matthew 7:21-23, 24-26, 25:1-46; John 14:15; 2 Cor. 5:10; Eph. 2:8-10; Jas. 2:12-26; Rev. 2-3).  However, CGGC faith is disconnected from action.  It is possible to talk CGGC talk without walking it.  Hence, for example, the GC Mission and Vision Statements that are not lived out--and virtually no one notices.

11. Cheap Grace.  The CGGC calls people to easy-beliefism. Jesus said that anyone who doesn't hate his father and mother isn't worthy of Him. There was a time, in its founding generation, that the Church of God called sinners to a radically changed way of life.  Dietrich Bonheoffer (who coined the phrase, cheap grace) could have been viewing today's CGGC when he wrote: "...cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline. Communion without confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ."

12. False, Flock-focused Righteousness. One need only read the first part of the Sermon of the Mount to understand that right living, as radically defined by Jesus, is key to discipleship. In the CGGC, however, righteousness is defined as a local parish, or flock, achieving consistent growth in parish/flock-oriented activities such as 'worship service' attendance not, as Jesus taught, disciples serving each other and caring for the least of the brothers and sisters of Jesus and going to all nations making disciples.

13.  Organized Hypocrisy.  There is illogic and outright contradiction among the things the CGGC claims to be true about itself.  This illogic and contradiction is, in reality, deeply rooted, highly intentional and carefully executed.  A hypocrite is an actor: "...a person who acts in contradiction to his or her stated beliefs or feelings."  It is a positive and essential value of the CGGC to speak one message and to, without qualm, act out another that is entirely disconnected from that avowed principle.