August 23, 2009
I intend to start blogging again.
I’ve been studying the breakdown of churches and congregations for the last year. I think I have some things to say on that subject that are worth sharing.
Let me preface my remarks by saying that I did not grow up in my youth as a Christian. My family belonged to a Catholic church, and I once thought that I wanted to be a Catholic priest. I turned away from believing in God as I progressed into pre-adolescence. I lived as an agnostic/atheist for about 25 years. I repented from rejecting God about 12 years ago. Why? I found myself in desperate need of grace.
I am a member of an independent Baptist church, but I have not attended services there for several months. So I don’t have any particular allegiance to a denomination or group, If you ask me to recommend a good Bible-believing church to you, I could not come up with one at the present time. I would not recommend a church without attending it and interviewing the people there. Why? For the same reason I have stopped going to my church down the street, doctrine and theology.
I cannot recommend, nor can I suffer, a church where doctrine and theology clash with the Holy Bible. Why? Because adherence to the Bible in teaching and practice is the only thing that will distinguish the Church from every other belief system.
I find it disturbing when a church publishes a statement of faith, and then routinely sanctions teaching and practice which run contrary to that statement. In any other setting that would justly be called lying, but not so in pews full of existentialists who get their theology from “Christian books” and other forms of entertainment. Loose theology finds fertile ground in congregations where men are idolized and the sayings of men (aphorisms) are raised to the same level as Scripture. I do not have a place in such a church. Why? Because I could not sit by without challenging false doctrine. I would be considered a troublemaker.
Here’s the point…I’ve been brought to faith and shown the Light of the World by His Word. (He has changed my life and my thinking 180 degrees from where it used to be in the days of my rejection.) Therefore words mean a great deal. And not only words, but actions too. Words and actions that conflict with reality are false, and therefore rightly to be called lies and deceit. To accept that words can mean anything one wants them to mean, and to say that truth is relative, that is playing with irrationality. That is to invite a breakdown in communication, and without communication nobody can know Christ, except the false christ of their imagination.
I ex-communicate myself from any church that lacks integrity concerning the teaching and preaching of the Holy Bible.
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Posted by reburris
July 19, 2008
One of the best ways to believe God is to walk in faith. I don’t know Josh Rittenhouse, or his mother, Carol. But I believe we worship and trust the same almighty savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. And they need help. I heard about them through Lane Chaplin’s blog.
I plan to trust God and pledge a monthly gift to help pay for Carol’s medications. I hope you will do the same.
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Posted by reburris
May 18, 2008
Jay Bakker says that God loves homosexuality. Jay is Emergent. He is a poster boy for what the lusts of the flesh can produce. He came to the conclusion that God told him that homosexuality is not sin. Jay is the pastor of a nightclub church in NYC, so he is well versed in scripture. But he’s not citing scripture as he defends homosexuality. It’s funny (sad) how that always seems to get left out when preachers justify sin.
Jay, brother, I have news for you. God hates homosexuality (Lev 18; Lev 20; Rom 1; 1Cor 6; 1Ti 1; and Jude). Read those passages, brother! The LORD puts homosexuality in the same category as infanticide, incest, beastiality, adultery, pornography, idolatry, witchcraft, covetousness, drunkenness, extortion, and theft.
Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness. If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.
And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. (Joh 3:10-21)
The love of God provided the blood of the lamb, which is given to redeem you from the curse of sin. But you’re one of those Red Letter Christians who ignores half of the red letters. Aren’t you, Jay?
HT: Apprising Ministries
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Posted by reburris
May 18, 2008
How many so-called Christians think that the Bible is a good book with flaws? There must be quite a few. Consider the Moonies, the Mormons, the Anglicans, the Roman Catholics, the Quakers, the SDA’s, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Emergers… I’d better stop before I offend somebody.
Paul tells us, in Romans 1, that God gives people up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts.
We live in a sex-obsessed culture. Heterosexuals are just as guilty of sin as homosexuals. The flesh is exalted in our mega-churches. Corruption thrives everywhere else men add philosophy or tradition to the plain teaching of the Holy Bible. That guilt conditions people to turn their ears toward reprobates like Gene Robinson.
It’s interesting how nuanced attitudes toward sexual perversion can become. I was just reading an article on Wikipedia that cites the opinion of an ASPCA doctor. He said that no evidence exists to show that beastiality leads to sexual deviation. That’s right, what was once deviation has been reclassified. The Anglicans reclassified homosexuality a long time ago by reclassifying God’s Word prohibiting it. Those parts of scripture became errant and the deviation became acceptable.
The Bible says homosexuality is deviation. Gene Robinson says it is blessed.
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Posted by reburris
April 30, 2008
I’ve been neglecting this blog to study connections between Gnosticism in the early Church and modern pseudo-Christian movements. Meanwhile, Phil Johnson has an excellent post on Evangelical political failures at the TeamPryro blog.
The Church is to be led by the Holy Spirit and the Word of God. All other patterns lead to failure in the work of God, which is the business of the Church. Flesh fails but the Spirit will succeed.
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Posted by reburris
April 14, 2008
We’re examining the Nine Pillars that the Emergent church is founded on. The list of foundational points comes from Brad Cecil.
2. Language is limited
I said that I agree with this point in my first post on this subject. I must now eat crow, because I don’t agree with this point at all. This second excuse is also a matter of pragmatism.
God seems to think language is sufficient enough. The Bible comes to us through words. The LORD used language as the primary means to communicate His will and purpose to men for the last 6,000 years. Take a simple phrase like “the LORD spoke”. That phrase appears 143 times in the Old Testament. Revelation came to men as “the word of the LORD” 242 times in the OT and that phrase can be found 13 times in the New Testament. Paul tells that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God (Rom 10:17).
Satan tempted Jesus after the LORD fasted in the wilderness, telling him to turn a stone into bread. Jesus answered him saying, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God (Mat 4:4).
Conversation, which Emergents seem to worship, is dependant on language! So, if we concede to this point about language being “limited”, then what is to be accomplished by conversation?
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Posted by reburris
April 13, 2008
The Center for Regressive Progressive Churchianity Christianity represents an unbiblical view of Christianity. Their view of Christ is very low. They don’t mind promoting a homosexual anti-Jesus. How is that possible? Well, it’s like Tony Jones says in his latest book, it’s the theology. Tony ought to know, because his theology one of existentialism and doubt.
Let look at the 8 Points of Regressive Churchianity and see what they say about Jesus. Bear in mind that this crowd supports government sponsored abortatoriums and a homosexual anti-Jesus.
Point
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Which Jesus?
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| 1. Proclaim Jesus Christ as our Gate to the realm of God |
Jedi Mind-trick Jesus
Rather than assuming that Jesus is a sacrificial savior, or “The Savior,” this first statement suggests that one can be a Christian by considering oneself a follower of Jesus’ teachings and using his life, as we know it, as a model. It can also be implied that for those Christians Jesus and Jesus’ teaching provide a way to experience, relate to or approach that Energy, that Force or that Presence we choose to call God.
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| 2. Recognize the faithfulness of other people who have other names for the gateway to God’s realm |
Space Cadet Jesus
Today with our awareness of black holes, post quantum physics, multiple dimensions and multiple and expanding universes, it is impossible to believe that any one religion could have the whole picture or the correct understanding of God, let alone have an exclusive path to that God. To suggest anything else would be at best, arrogant. More importantly, many Christians today find that learning about other religions and even encompassing some practices from these traditions has enhanced their understanding of their own religion, has augmented to their personal religious experiences and deepened their faith. |
| 3. Understand our sharing of bread and wine in Jesus’s name to be a representation of God’s feast for all peoples |
Do This to Forget Me Jesus
Progressive Christians then assume that we are following the instructions and the model of Jesus when we practice open communion. We are acting out of a long tradition and a fundamental expression of God’s love, the heart of the original Jesus movement. Of course the real challenge is to continue to live our daily lives with that same attitude of openness, or in Dr. Crossan’s words, with radical egalitarianism, after we leave the safety of our sanctuaries. |
| 4. Invite all sorts and conditions of people to join in our worship and in our common life as full partners, including (but not limited to): believers and agnostics, conventional Christians and questioning skeptics, homosexuals and heterosexuals, females and males, the despairing and the hopeful, those of all races and cultures, and those of all classes and abilities, without imposing on them the necessity of becoming like us |
Go and Sin More Jesus
Progressive Christians take a different approach. From our reading of the gospels, we have come to the conclusion that the followers of Jesus are to welcome all people without imposing on them the necessity of changing their attitudes, their culture, their understanding of the faith, or their sexual orientation. To take this position a step farther, we would also say that the established members of a church should always be alert to the possibility that they are the ones who must do the changing. They always must be ready to adapt themselves to the people they hope to welcome. |
| 5. Think that the way we treat one another and other people is more important than the way we express our beliefs |
Whatever You Believe Jesus
Because progressive Christians do not demand that new members change to mirror the existing core beliefs of the membership of a church, some people have accused them of having no moral standards. Their accusers, however, may be confusing cultural norms with morality. By putting behavior ahead of belief in a hierarchy of values, progressive Christians are insisting that followers of Jesus are bound to treat their fellow human beings with kindness and respect. … The changes that are required in people who want to follow Jesus would include giving up greed, coercion, exploitation, and oppression as behavioral norms both in the church and in society. |
| 6. Find more grace in the search for meaning than in absolute certainty, in the questions than in the answers |
Confucian Confusion Jesus
According to the gospels, Jesus rarely gave a straight answer to a straight question. Instead he responded with another question or told a puzzling story. At the risk of disappointing his questioners, Jesus put them in a position of having to think for themselves. Rather than offer his disciples answers to life’s most perplexing problems, Jesus introduced them to deeper and deeper levels of ambiguity. Matthew’s collection of Jesus’s aphorisms, known as the Sermon on the Mount, shows how Jesus confronted his disciples with contradictions. |
| 7. See ourselves as a spiritual community in which we discover the resources required for our work in the world: striving for justice and peace among all people; bringing hope to those Jesus called the least of his sisters and brothers |
No Mercy for the Fetus Jesus
Jesus experienced God in a profoundly intimate way as the “Parent of all of creation.” As a result of this extraordinary relationship it seems that Jesus, like others who have had such experiences, had a clear vision about the interconnectedness of all life. As part of that reality, Jesus recognized every human being as a child of one God. For him, one’s identity began and ended by simply being God’s child. Any other identifying factor was secondary to this truth and likely a distraction (e.g., family, wealth, status, position). As a child of God, every human deserves dignity and justice regardless of status in this world. Anything less would be an affront to God or sin against God. |
| 8. Recognize that our faith entails costly discipleship, renunciation of privilege, and conscientious resistance to evil–as has always been the tradition of the church |
Pick Your Evil Jesus
Genuine concern for other people includes resisting any forces that would drain them of energy, deny them sustenance, rob them of dignity, or destroy their hope. Progressive Christians believe that the resistance to evil in society, rather than the enhancement of our social position, has always been both an obligation and an opportunity for those who follow Jesus. |
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Posted by reburris
April 11, 2008
Brad Cecil presents nine pillars that the Emergent church is founded on. The pillars are cracked!
1. Post modern refers to the period after modernity. It appears to “us” that a significant epistemological shift is occurring – the likes of which we haven’t seen in 400 years.
Crack 1. Paul spoke about the present generation of vipers in 2nd Timothy 3. Note that they resist the truth and want to redefine God as being weak. They never come to the knowledge of the truth. They are reprobate concerning the faith.
This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;
Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away. For of this sort are they which creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts, Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith. But they shall proceed no further: for their folly shall be manifest unto all men, as theirs also was. (2Ti 3:1-9)
I don’t hear believers disputing the power of God, or being ashamed of biblical truth and faith. I hear practically nothing but those things from
Emergers.
My experience in conversing with Emergers is that they refuse to read their Bibles in context. They push their Bibles aside and resort to pragmatism when I show them where they deal with the text deceitfully. They make self-refuting statements and get angry when I point out their error. And when their poor handling of scripture and their fallacious statements are exposed, then they claim that they are being slandered.
That kind of inability to read and process Scripture with integrity points to a corruption of their mind as the problem. The epistemological shift is one away from knowledge grounded in truth toward knowledge grounded in belief. In other words, opinion and pragmatism trump the Word of God. Postmodernism merely tries to validate that shift away from the Holy Bible (truth) as good and progressive. The Word of God says it is bad and regressive. I side with the Word of God, because postmodernism leads away from rationality and not toward it. That much is clear to me from my experience with Emergers.
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Posted by reburris
April 10, 2008
Brad Cecil has started blogging in defense of the Emergent church. He has a list of points that the Emergent church is founded on. I’m copying them here for discussion.
The Nine Foundational Pillars of the Emergent church
1. Post modern refers to the period after modernity. It appears to “us” that a significant epistemological shift is occurring – the likes of which we haven’t seen in 400 years.
2. Language is limited
3. Human concepts are limited
4. There is no place of irreducible certainty (foundation)
5. Considering the above it would be very difficult to convey absolute meaning using language and human concepts
6. Christian theology has become enslaved to the 1st order assumptions of modernity and is far more Cartesian than Christian and has become ashamed of faith
7. A Reformation of recognition and repentance is needed
8. New theological thought is needed to free Christian theology from the enslavement of modernity and enlightenment assumptions and conversation and friendships would be more productive than developing imperatives.
9. This is just the beginning of the transition and a great deal of work and theological thought lay ahead for those who desire to join the conversation.
Being a Cartesian rube, I don’t get it. I’m sure the postmodern schoolmen will disagree, but my rejection of this is not based on ignorance. My rejection of it is based on the Holy Bible.
I can agree with points two and three, but I don’t don’t agree with points one and four. So point five doesn’t follow. And the remaining points are not supported. In other words the last four are founded on the fifth, which is founded on the first four. You’ve got about one-half of a foundation there, and the walls are unsupported. (Please accept my apology for mixing metaphors. Pillars, structural elements, …)
Jesus Christ is Truth and He is The Foundation. So this attempt to reduce him to a weak god does not fly.
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Posted by reburris
