One of the people who's chatted with off the blog regularly and for many years, has often raised the issue that I am NEVER positive and constructive in my posts.
I suppose that everyone who's taken homiletics (preaching) classes has been taught that to be an effective preacher in the long run, one has to be balanced, i.e., you can't praise all of the time and you can't harangue continually.
Why have I not figured that out so that my message here would be more effective?
Over the years I've had several thoughts in reply.
Most primarily, what I write here is not a series of sermons. The balance that might, or might not, be necessary for effective preaching is not a concern here.
Also, I've repeated that I attempt to be faithful in transmitting the "words" that I believe I have received from the Lord. I've said that when He gives me something positive, I pass it on.
More to the point: The Lord Himself has been negative about EVERYTHING that the CGGC has done for a very long time.
My negative take on the CGGC is consistent with His ongoing lack of blessing on our programs and plans and the fads we've followed.
Try arguing with me that the Lord isn't blessing us. Try proving that I'm wrong when I say that the CGGC is in the midst of generations of spiritual decay and numerical decline. Try suggesting that I've been wrong to foreshadow the failure of every program and plan devised so ingeniously by our holders of institutional authority.
And, please don't think that being right about all of these things has given me one moment of joy or pleasure.
Off the blog, not so long ago, I was chatting about Ezekiel 33. I recounted the fact that I grew up in a high church Protestant denomination and, I've said here before, I could recite the whole Apostles Creed long before I could read...
...and, that part of the liturgy recited by the minister every week, came from Ezekiel 33 and that I'd memorized that before I could read, though I didn't know it came from that chapter for many years.
Every week, the minister would quote, "As I live, says the Lord God, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked but that he might turn from his ways and live."
That's true of the Lord and it's, honestly, how I feel.
It doesn't make me happy to see our congregations slowly die and to know that the youngest people who attend many of them are in their 40s, or 50s, even 60s.
Still, I can't seem to escape the strong feeling that the Lord wants me to, I
dunno,...
...sometimes it feels like I'm rubbing your noses in your failure and folly...
...as the spiritual decay and numerical decline continues.
Please understand, that the God who so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, takes no pleasure in withholding His power and blessing from you.
When I say, "We must repent," I'm positive that this is His word.
We must repent.
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Having said that, if you're a regular reader here, you have to have noticed that I've not been consistently negative lately.
I've praised and recommended Nick and Dan's Bible Study Podcast.
Doing so seems as organic to my walk with the Lord as, as one example, my condemnation of the foolish and failed 2015 ERC, "New" Strategic Plan.
So, from now on, if you accuse me: "Why are you always so negative!" I'll be able to plead not guilty...
...not that I care about the human response.
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Let me be clear about why speaking positively about Nick and Dan's Bible Study Podcast seems organic to my walk with the Lord.
It's not their message, though I love the message.
What they do is counter-culture, even revolutionary, for us because they actually do what they talk about. Their talk is fruit of an already existing walk.
What they are saying is only a tick or two more, to use their own words, radical and controversial than what you hear from the holders of institutional authority in the CGGC.
The revolution for us, especially in the last decade or so, is that these guys walked the talk before it even occurred to them to talk about it in a podcast.
For us, these days, the pre-walked talk is the revolution.
Here's a serious warning, and I believe that it is from the Lord.
Your temptation, as imbibers or the CGGC culture, will be to engage them only on the level of the talk, as if "to talk is to walk-ism" is biblical.
As I understand these guys, they're not talking simply to be heard.
They are offering a challenge to action.
Just intellectually agreeing with them will not satisfy, as it does in others CGGC contexts.
Their revolution is the call to a walked talk...
...as the first women and men in our movement could not have imagined belief divorced from action.
We must turn, as Ezekiel said, "from our wicked ways and live."
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