Friends,

I only have time for a short post on this, so I need to get straight to the point. Read on only if you have courage as I am a bit testy this morning. I know we have hashed and re-hashed this issue over Granger, but I have a different perspective to lend: that of the ‘pastor.’

I haven’t followed the ‘Granger is Full of Heretics’ story too closely, and I am relatively new to the ways in which certain ADM (’Actual Damnation Ministries’) work, so I’ll need just a bit of help here.

First, SOL links to this story with this title: Who’s to Blame for the Granger Debacle? The author of Slice writes:

When over half of your congregation doesn’t believe that Jesus is the only way to salvation, who is to blame? When nearly that same amount doesn’t believe the Bible is authoritative, where does the fault lie? Is it the fault of the pastor? The elder board? The small group leaders? The architects of the building? The local utilities? The house band?

Second, this is actually a link back to a blog I am starting to dislike more and more, despite the author’s claim to not be an ODM, (My) Truth Matters. The author writes:

Who is the shepherd of the local church? Who is responsible to “feed and guard the sheep”? Listen to how Mark Beeson takes no responsibility and blames the people and then describes the “changes” that will be made.

Third, here’s where it gets to the point. So, Granger church (of which I know very, very little) does a little survey and concludes that there are some things wrong or at least concludes some things that need to be addressed. Then they start addressing these issues, but only after making the results of the survey public knowledge, and thereby setting up the ADM’s for at least three days worth of posts and ’see I told you so’s’. So, if I understand this correctly, and follow the logic and work habits of the ADM’s: 1. Criticize a church with whose theology and practice you disagree. 2. Make certain you publish all their flaws publicly for all to read.  (3. Said church does a survey which concludes there are, yes, problems, that need to be addressed. [Would that more churches had such courage. Would that more ADM's had such courage.] ) 4. Publish new articles criticizing the Church for agreeing with what you were saying. 5. Publish more articles that go out of their way to assign blame. Continually harp on the ‘pastor’ or ‘leadership’ of said church in an effort to prove oneself right and to show massive prophetic powers to constituents and contributors. 6. Start the whole process over again when said church makes changes that you don’t think ‘go far enough.’

Fourth, the blame game…hmmm…where I have heard that before? Oh, yes: “Was it you?…It was the woman….It was the serpent…It was…uh…it was the, uh…Nixon…Clinton…” At some point the blame becomes pointless. If you are an ADM/ODM please tell all of us why you give a damn (sorry) who is to blame for this? WE ARE SINNERS! We will do the wrong thing and make wrong choices. The issue here is not that they found something wrong, but that they had to courage to admit it in the first place. I could survey the entire world and find that 98% people don’t believe Jesus is exclusively the way to salvation. Granger found the problem…why do you care who is to blame? Have you nothing better to do with your pathetic dreary graceless blogs? If they have found the problem, if they are working at fixing it, why do you care? How does what they do affect your comfortable lives behind keyboards and microphones?

Fifth, the gist here is about the role of the preacher in the church. One the one hand, I want to respond, “You think it is the job of the preacher because you have a terrible misunderstanding of the role of the preacher/evangelist/pastor.” ”Our culture tells us a great deal about ‘the minister,’ and much of what it says is inaccurate. It has presented an image of how he should look, what his job is, how he is to act, what he is supposed to in times of illness and death, upon whom he is supposed to call and how often and for what occasions, and even what his family should be like. ‘The ministry’–that vocation in which one is overwhelmed with meetings and a myriad of tasks, torn by conflicting expectations, molded by centuries-old traditions of the pastor-priest–seems impossible to increasing numbers of candidates who sincerely yearn to serve God.” (Joe Ellis, The Church on Purpose, 111 (Standard Publishing, 1982)

You want to know why we are ‘losing the battle for America’? It’s because the people who sit in the pews and at their computer work-stations blogging don’t have any idea what is going on in the life of the typical American pastor and because people like ADM/ODM’s scare the hell into young people who want to go into ministry so they can PREACH. But thanks to a culture of feeders, preachers cannot focus on what matters (ministry of the Word and prayer, Acts 6) because we have to all sort of other stupid things like go to meetings, visit this person or that, hand all the admin…blah…blah…blah…It is lazy parishioners…lazy Christians…people who won’t carry one another’s burdens, people who won’t feed one another, people who won’t care for one another…that are to blame. It’s just too easy to blame the man or woman upfront isn’t it? Takes all the burden off of you, right?

On the other hand, I want to say, “Those who can, preach; those who cannot criticize or blog.”

If you sense a bit of anger here, please do. If you are offended by my use of the word ‘damn’ or ‘hell’, tough. I’m tired of these people who have nothing better to do but sit around and assign blame. I’ll tell you what: I’ll take the blame for Granger having the problems they do. Maybe now the AMD’s will shut up about it.

jerry

PS-”To this day the Biblical role of the church member has not been substantially reclaimed. Christians, by and large, do not demonstrate a clear awareness of the demand for serious, even radical, commitment. They tend to be pale shadows of the dynamic, Spirit-filled world-changers the New Testament describes. The primary doers–those responsible for getting Christ’s work done–remain the salaried ministers. Many of the church’s members continue to be observers of ministry, perpetuating a platform-audience relationship.” (Joe Ellis, ibid., 112) Well said.

Tags: Granger, parishioner whining, pastors, pew-sitters, preachers, SOL, Truth Matters

Mike Ratliff does a fourth part in his series of blogs called The Abomination of Easy-Believism. Here is his rebuttal to our earlier post.

My brethren, is this passage of the thief on the cross an example of what we are calling Easy-Believism? No, it isn’t All along we have been saying that God will save His people even when the one sharing the Gospel with them messes up. The tragedy of Easy-Believism is the validation to untold numbers of professing Christians that they are really saved even though they are not surrendered to the Lordship of Christ nor are they able to walk in repentance. Those who are doing this will have to answer to the Lord about this. Let us not make that mistake. [emphasis mine]

So this means that when Rick Warren “messes up” on his gospel presentation, God still saves people and they come to faith. Plus, Rick Warren does tell his congregation that Jesus needs to be Lord of their lives, we should assume that he has done all he can to help get people to the place of salvation. Just thought I would make that clear. And, since we cannot sort thru who is really saved and not in that moment, we should validate all of them are beleivers after they have made the commitment (i.e. acknowledging that 500 came to faith at Saddleback this weekend) and let the spiritual cards fall where they may. Glad we cleared all that up.

As a former military man (Army, 11 Bravo, 25th Infantry Division) I am accustomed to and familiar with military operations and language. So when people start throwing out analogies to war with their Christian walk I’m left wondering if they really know what the “cost” is. Often I’m left wondering if I know what the real cost is. I’ve never been in an actually war, conflict, or skirmish. The closest that I could get was in simulations of war. Lots and lots of simulations.

My drill sergeants were seasoned, decorated, veterans. They had tasted the battle, they saw first hand what the front lines were like. One of my drill sergeants, a mountain of man, often said “Gentleman, I have seen war first hand, I’ve looked into the eyes of men dying in the field, nothing we do can prepare you for that. But you, if your time should come, remember your training and do what you know”

We did a lot of simulations. This tactic, that tactic, and yet some more tactics. Drill, Drill, Drill. It really became instinctive, like breathing. On our last week of basic training we do a little exercise called “Field Training Exercise” or FTX for short. It is a week of all out battle with other platoons. Each platoon is given an opportunity to defend and attack a perimeter. It is imperative that during this training each man does his specific task otherwise the whole platoon would be in jeopardy.

On our second night of FTX we were being attacked from our south perimeter, it was a heavy fire fight that lasted for about 2 hours. Being on the north perimeter my task, as was the task of everyone that was “dug” in, was to defend the north perimeter regardless of what was happening anywhere else on the perimeter. Otherwise we would become vulnerable from multiple positions.

Throughout our training there were several guys, who being former R.O.T.C., felt the need to always prove themselves worthy and share how much they knew and how valuable they were. Unfortunately they weren’t well received by the others in the platoon. In fact they were shunned. Not because they were “know it alls” but because they had a unique way of making the rest of us feel like crap and getting us “dropped” (dropped= a tool drill sergeants have to make you do push-ups, flutter kicks, paratroopers, down-ups, or front leaning position until your arms fall off. Usually used when some R.O.T.C. guy corrects the drill sergeant) all the time. As misfortune would have it, for FTX, my “hole buddy” and I were “dug” in with both of these guys at our 11.

About 30 minutes into the firefight my R.O.T.C. friends decide that they’re going to leave their position and make the 1/2 mile trek across the perimeter to assist on the south side fire fight. Which in turn leaves a gaping hole in our perimeter. Within a matter of an hour or so our whole platoon is over run because we had been flanked to the north and could not defend our position. Everyone in our simulation died. Except for the two R.O.T.C. guys who were found in the middle of the perimeter sitting back to back with their weapons at the ready.

On night four of our FTX the same scenario happened, attacked to the south but “dug” in on the north. Immediately one of our R.O.T.C. friends gets out of his hole and starts to head to the south. Almost simultaneously; me, my “hole” buddy, and the other R.O.T.C. guy take aim and shoot our wandering friend. Dismayed he asks “Why would you shoot someone from your own platoon” to which my “hole” buddy responds “Your better to us dead than alive. Your a liability and I would rather have you die and save the whole platoon than the other way around.” We won our “battle” that night. Maybe it was the experience from before that helped or maybe it was because we chose to do what was in the best interest of everybody in our platoon. Certainly the possibility exists that it was multiple reasons.

So what does this mean for us? Can I suggest that when it comes to the spiritual battle that we are all in; we as Christians need to stay in our “positions” and trust that those on the other side of the perimeter will put into action that which they were trained to do. Otherwise you may get shot at from people who are supposed to be on your side. All because you’ve become a liability and are more harmful than helpful to the cause.