What Does Faithfulness Mean?

Hopefully, this will be my last comment on the whole ELCA thing for a while.  The fallout may be just beginning, although in the first few days, I have my doubts.  Witness this article in the Grand Forks Herald. Anyone who thought the laity was going to save the ELCA better look for another hero.  One lady in a rural North Dakota parish had this to say:

[Edith] Anderson said she’s not open to arguments about what can be said to be right or wrong based just on Scripture.

“What the Bible is is an interpretation of people. To me, it’s not God’s word. It didn’t come out of His mouth. It’s all in how you interpret it.”

That seems to be the attitude of most of the ELCA at the moment.  Who can say?  So I’ll just go from my own instincts and feelings.  Why even belong to a church, then?  Why not just go home and meditate on the gurglings in your stomach?  Of course, if you’ve been indoctrinated with “the Bible is not God’s Word” for twenty years, is such a sentiment really unexpected?

In fact, the past twenty years are really at the heart of this whole mess.  When the ELCA’s predecessor bodies ordained women, they said exactly the same things as they were saying at this CWA.  They were arguing based on their daughters’ experiences of being rejected when they felt “called.”  They were arguing based on their emotional responses to seeming injustice and inequality.  They were wielding the “gospel” against the Scriptures.  They were fighting those nasty “law” proof-texts with Galatians 3:28 (apparently, the proof-text to end all proof-texts).  And there are pastors and people in the ELCA who are surprised at how far their church body has fallen?  They have been entering full communion with any and all takers, and sharing the Lord’s Table with anyone who believes anything about Jesus in the name of “love,” and they’re surprised that people just don’t care what the Scriptures have to say?

Frankly, they made this bed before 2005 (say, circa 1970…1950?), and now they are struggling with whether to sleep in it.  Well, this is how I measure the faithfulness of those who fought this battle to the bitter end: how quickly can you pack your things and get out?  (I say that, knowing that it takes some time to figure out how to get it done.  God bless those who are working on it.)  I’m tempted to say that I know it’s difficult, and that if my church body did the same thing, I’d struggle with leaving.  But I have to say that that would be a lie.  I would feel only the slightest qualms, because I have allegiance to the LCMS only as it holds to the Scriptures and the Lutheran Confessions.  As soon as this church body leaves those, I leave it.  (That day may, of course, come at any time.)  But the LCMS has the opposite problem of the ELCA.  Whereas the ELCA has officially approved heterodoxy and officially condoned what God has condemned, there are still some congregations that bravely struggle on.  The LCMS, on the other hand, officially holds to the whole Scriptures and the whole Book of Concord, while there are congregations who have jettisoned both for the sake of numbers, relevance, and worship-tainment.  I guarantee, as soon as the LCMS officially abandons the teachings of the Scriptures or the Confessions (ultimately, to abandon the Confessions is to abandon the Scriptures), I’m done.

The clock cannot be rewound, and some in the ELCA are awakening to that fact.  Others, however, are not, and I have a hard time understanding.  Perhaps a pastor will say that he (she) is staying for the sake of the people; but is that loving, or is it selfishness?  Will they be left to the wolves when you are gone?  (And you will be gone some day.)  Is it not better to show them that their church has left them behind, along with the Scriptures, and there is no going back.  I humbly suggest that there has never been a church this far gone that has drawn back from the abyss.  It simply doesn’t work that way.  To quote someone, “God gave them over…”

So, want to be faithful?  There is only one choice: leave the ELCA.  And if you want to be Lutheran, then there’s no room in Rome.  Besides, Rome won’t be any better than the LCMS if you really think female clergy-type persons are good and closed Communion is evil.  To quote someone else, “You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.”

Timotheos

The Press on the CWA

Here’s the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, and here’s the Grand Forks Herald.  Here’s a picture of the damaged steeple–I think that’s more than just a “piece.”  (Symbolic?  You make the call.  It was the steeple of the church where Goodsoil was having its “eucharist.”)  And here’s the link to John Piper’s interpretation.

Timotheos

How Many Will There Be?

Here’s one (along with part 2).  Here’s a congregation [I realize that this was four years ago].  I’ve also seen at least a couple on the ALPB discussion boards.  Here’s a website for those considering leaving.  And here’s WordAlone’s advice.  I wonder if anyone’s keeping track…

Timotheos

The Death Knell of the ELCA

I suggest that this means the effective end of the ELCA.  The proposals from the Sexuality Task Force now only need to have a simple majority to pass.  According to some of the speakers, women’s ordination was passed by a simple majority as well.  Unless God intervenes by His grace, these proposals will be passed.  The ELCA will then join the Episcopal Church in its further apostasy.

But who is surprised?  It’s like Jenga: you can remove one or two or even a few blocks, but eventually the weight cannot be sustained.  The only thing that remains unresolved is, what will pastors and members of ELCA congregations who oppose the recommendations now do?

Timotheos

Two-thirds or Not Two-thirds?

The ELCA is currently debating (at 9:19 pm) whether to accept or reject the sexuality proposals based on a regular 50 + 1 majority or a 2/3 “super-majority”…  This is probably the most important vote of the week.  Stay tuned…

Timotheos

Whither Hence for the ELCA?

That’s the question, and, although I have my suspicions, I don’t think anyone can really call it at this point.  The two votes which most people will be watching are those on whether to accept a “social statement” (probably roughly the same thing as an LCMS CTCR document) which would effectively bless relationships between two people of the same sex (essentially making a same-sex relationship the equivalent of marriage), and whether to amend the ELCA’s constitution to explicitly allow the ordination of persons who are in open homosexual relationships.  The items up for a vote are here, with more information.  (The actual Task Force recommendation on changing the ministry standards is here.)  Probably the most important vote will be on rules and procedures, and whether to adopt the proposals with a simple majority or 2/3.

There are a number of letters going around trying to influence the vote one way or the other.  There is the Open Letter being circulated by WordAlone and CORE.  There is the dialogue/debate between Herbert Chilstrom and Carl Braaten, both ELCA pastors/professors.  There is a letter from ELCA seminarians.  And a letter from Hispanic ELCA pastors.  Again, it seems that many more prominent ELCA pastors/members are opposing the proposals than supporting them, but it all depends on the voting members of the Assembly.

Now, I respect that there are faithful members of the ELCA willing to stand up for a seemingly unpopular position contra the homosexual agenda (witness this on the ELCA website; interesting timing, don’t you think?  C’mon, practically all the clergy support the proposals!  At first, I questioned the idea of a 2-1 lay-clergy membership of the Assembly; now, I think it may be the only thing that saves the day.)  I respect them, however, as I respect brave people on a sinking ship.  It may not quite be rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, but the iceberg is right there, nonetheless.  And I have to agree with the former bishop Chilstrom on the CORE Open Letter, regarding ecumenical relationships.  What makes the signers of the letter think that homosexual pastors will make those relationships grow cold, if female clergy-type persons and the church insurance paying for clergy abortions didn’t?  Not to mention sharing altars and pulpits with the Episcopalians, the Methodists, the Presbyterians, and the United Church of Christ(!).  Surely, if the Lord’s Supper couldn’t persuade the ELCA to think twice about relationships with Rome and Constantinople, homosexual pastors shouldn’t either (especially if the “gospel” demands it).  I know the ELCA has been more involved in semi-official talks with Rome than, say, the LCMS (something we should remedy), but I can’t believe Rome would consider real fellowship with a church body that has priestesses.  Or a church body that does not discipline those that contravene even its modest rules.  (See here for a list of homosexuals who have been ordained and serve[d] ELCA congregations without or with little discipline.)

Whatever happens this week, know this: the homosexual lobby is as patient as they come.  If not this year, then two years from now.  If not then, then two years more.  This ain’t going away, and if the voting members know that, they might just as well show their exhaustion and say ‘to hell with it.’

I also wonder, incidentally, what a ‘yes’ vote will mean for heterosexuals who want to live with their ‘partners’ outside of marriage?  Certainly a double standard cannot exist, can it?

Timotheos