Here’s his closing paragraph (remember that this a parable):
While the true fundamentals of the gospel must be defended, God hates the sowing of discord among brethren, and dogmatism on disputable matters is a clear violation of Romans 14. When are the leaders of the Amish community going to stand up and deal with this catastrophic problem in their group? When are they going to set aside time to read broadly and educate their consciences to get to the radical center on every issue? When are they going to get aggressive about helping their people do the same, and make the changes that need to be made? When are the leaders going to step up and band together to stop being intimidated by the radical, right-wing fringes of the movement? How can they possibly justify separating themselves even from the leaders within the Mennonite community and other godly Christians around the world? When are they going to shake off the paranoia of purity, get off the slippery slope of disunity, and fight their way back toward oneness and interdependence with the rest of the body of Christ-or die trying? That decision may mean that the Amish institutions would lose so many members that they would end up folding financially and the power brokers lose all their control, but as an Amish leader once said, ‘Our institutions do not have to continue to exist, but we do have to do what’s right.’ Pastor Don, the Amish are a group of people I can never stop caring about. I dearly love them all. But I hate that blasted Amish hyper-separation heresy—with all my heart!”
Pulpit Magazine has a selection from John MacArthur on the relationship between the church and the world. He holds no punches in challenging the church on the matters of seeker sensitivity and friendship with the world, which, by the way, puts one at enmity with God.
Evangelicalism seems to have been hijacked by legions of carnal spin-doctors, who are trying their best to convince the world that the church can be just as inclusive, pluralistic, and broad-minded as the most politically-correct worldling.
The quest for the world’s approval is nothing less than spiritual harlotry. In fact, that is precisely the imagery the apostle James used to describe it. He wrote: “Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
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The Christian message simply cannot be twisted to conform to the vicissitudes of worldly opinion. Biblical truth is fixed and constant, not subject to change or adaptation. Worldly opinion, on the other hand, is in constant flux. The various fads and philosophies that dominate the world change radically and regularly from generation to generation. The only thing that remains constant is the world’s hatred of Christ and His gospel.
These words need to be heard. Even if one disagrees with MacArthur’s application, he must do something with the following passages, which seem impossible to reconcile with many of the practices of so much of the church today.
Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for so did their fathers to the false prophets. —Luke 6:26
And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. —John 3:19–20
The world . . . hates Me because I testify of it that its works are evil. —John 7:7
If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. —John 15:18–19
Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. —James 4:4
This move has created no small stir in the Fundamentalist world, where Joe was respected as a musician, leader, and teacher. Joe received an undergraduate degree from Bob Jones University, a Ph.D. in Biblical Studies from Pensacola Christian College, and taught at Northland Baptist Bible college as professor of Theology, Biblical Studies, and Counseling for ten years. He was also a senior pastor of a Fundamentalist church for eight years.
Here are some Fundamentalist responses and discussions:
The Lutheran church continues its decline in the West, but experiences steady growth in Third World countries.
Lutheran church membership soared in Africa and Asia between 2005 and 2006 but continued its steady decline in the modern West, according to the Lutheran World Federation, an international communion of Lutheran churches.
. . .
Countries in Asia saw the largest growth, adding 900,000 Lutherans, bringing the total there to 8.2 million. European nations experienced the deepest drop in membership, where the number of Lutherans fell by more than 566,000 to 37.4 million.
Lillian Kwon at The Christian Post discusses the trend of churches using movies in their services.
The growing phenomenon of “theater churches” and movie-like screens at the pulpits has more churches talking relevance in the 21st century.
The latest survey by the Leadership Network, which fosters church innovation, revealed at least 250 churches are meeting in theaters in at least 36 states. These theater churches are one of the latest popularized trends integrating culture and the gospel message to bring in the unchurched.
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The majority of Americans are already talking about the content of movies or television programs—the most popular topic of conversation, Barna reported in 2003. And WingClips notes that most people can recount scenes from favorite films but only a few can recall the central theme of last week’s sermon.
“Let’s face it, movies are our modern-day parables.”
The folks at Church Marketing Sucks just finished a series on innovative churches, which you may or may not find helpful. I post about it here only to inform you of what some are saying, not necessarily to endorse the views expressed.
The latest available annual figures show that the Roman Catholic population increased at a rate of 1.5%, which was just slightly higher than the population increase of 1.2%.
The Catholic population grew most rapidly in Africa, at 3.1%, while overall population growth in Africa was 2.1%. The Catholic population also grew faster than the overall population in Asia (2.7% to 1.2%) and the Americas (1.2% to 0.9%).
The Journey, a Baptist church in St. Louis, MO, uses a local bar, Schlafly Bottleworks, to discuss important topics or current events and invite people to church. The church has grown from 30 to 1,300.
Abu Daoud discusses why so many Muslims are converting to Christianity.
I don’t know if this can be verified, but I heard that more Muslims have converted to the way of Jesus Christ in the last ten years than in all the other years since the advent of Islam in the 7th Century. I’m not sure it’s an accurate figure, but I will say that something is certainly happening among Muslims and that there is an openness in their society that was not there before.
He gives four reasons for this.
The Bible: We forget how compelling and convincing Jesus’ teachings and parables are.
Dreams, Miracles: What can I say? They are happening, and folks here don’t have the initial inclination that Westerners do to “disprove” or “figure out how it was done.”
Charity: “They will know that we are Christians by our love.”
Christian Community: It is a witness to the beauty of the Christian community, and thus its faith, when Muslims see genuine respect and friendship between men and women.
Joseph Zichterman, a former Fundamentalist (of the Bob Jones, Pensacola, Northland stripe) turned Seeker/Emerging, who recently explained why he left his separatist roots and joined Willow Creek Community Church and entered the Emergent conversation, has now released a lengthy piece entitled “A Tale of Two Amishmen: Inside the Mind of a Spiritual Defector,” which is “dedicated with love to a group of people [he] can never stop caring about.”
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