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Methodist Church Splits
The deadline for United Methodist churches to decide whether or not they’ll leave to form a new denomination has arrived. About a quarter of the US churches will split off, although it has not yet become official for all of them.
An article on MSNBC got my hackles up because of the title: “The Bible verse proving anti-LGBTQ Methodists have not truly read the Bible.”
I was a member of the United Methodist Church all my life and even served on multiple church boards and charge conferences. When we moved to Michigan, I found that all the nearby UMC congregations had turned progressive, and Progressive Christianity is the express train to Hell, in my opinion. It’s a gateway out of Christianity. Congregations that go progressive are usually dead in about 10 years, a third of the congregation has become atheist, a third remains Christian, and the rest don’t know what they are. Meanwhile, conservative congregations do well.
The article is a good example of what progressive Christians are up to. They simply disregard the parts of the Bible they don’t like, that don’t fit their lifestyle choices.
The minister who wrote the above had some mean and misleading things to say about Christians who don’t go along with his progressivism. He implies that we “deny the full humanity of LBGT people.” Nope, they are welcome in the Church. They are welcome in leadership positions, even. What they can’t do is try to teach the congregation that a sin is not a sin.
He uses some common arguments to try to show that non-progressives are wrong about the Bible. One is to say that out of over 30,000 verses in the Bible there are only six that deal with homosexuality. The other point is to cite Galatians 3:28: “In Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female.” He then argues that Christ is setting aside sexual distinctions, so gays ought to be acceptable; we can just set those 6 nasty verses aside.
The trouble is that even if Christ accepts men, women, gays, or whatever, that does not mean that those people can’t still be sinners. And the 6 verses that the pastor wants to throw out very clearly make homosexual practice a sin.
Beware people who use the Bible against the Bible. That’s a trick with which only the Saints can get away. You can’t use one passage in the Bible as scissors to cut out other passages you don’t like. And the effort here is to claim that homosexuality isn’t sinful by simply ignoring parts of scripture.
Hate the sin and love the sinner. Well, we’d better because we’re all sinners. A homosexual lifestyle is no worse than other forms of sin like adultery or living in sin, but it’s still a sin. People saved in Christ are supposed to repent of their sins and pray for God’s help in becoming better. We all struggle with our sins.
Pastors who teach that sins are not sins are endangering the immortal souls of themselves and their congregation. It’s very deadly when a person stops regarding a sin as a sin.
I wish the United Methodist Chruch many blessings, but, like I said, express train.
The Global Methodist Church will do fine. The UMC, not so well. I have compassion for the UMC faithful who are sticking with congregations that they have been members of for years. I have have many friends at a local UMC church with a a fairly conservative, gospel based pastor that voted to stay in the UMC. I don’t think they have a clear idea what is going to hit them when their current pastor moves on to his next position, and is replaced by someone chosen by the current powers in the UMC. Not sure why so many denominations and congregations think they can mix Truth and non-Truth and end up with anything palatable.
Why are You reading MSNBC?
You have my empathy. As a Catholic I hesitate to offer my advice to the UMC. We have our own problems with Pelosi and Biden who consider themselves devout Catholics. As far as the mainstream media goes, I would say that one verse Bible memorization taken out of context is not theological discernment.
Embracing the sinner to try and get them on the right path is far different than having to embrace the sin.
I don’t see the need to vote to leave as a church. If I want to leave UMC, I can do so with my feet.
I trace the complete intellectual dishonesty of the movement back to March 3, 2019 when it smacked me in the face. I’m sure it predates that by quite a bit.
From what I’ve seen, I suspect that many small rural churches were put in a bad spot with respect to buildings and assets and just general confusion about who was splitting to where and even having a pastor at all. A rather disgusting affair…the UMC skin suit will rot away rather quickly from this end.
This part made me giggle. As if.
Depends on whether your involvement with it is an individual or a corporate thing. For some people it’s a family breakup in many senses of the word “family.”
I mean what I mean.
I said exactly what I mean for me. Are you implying that I am lying? What exactly are you trying to say about me. It is not about a family break up for me. Nothing I said makes it seem that way. Why would you accuse me of soemthign different? Why are you trying to put words into my mouth?
If *I* want too *I* can vote with my feet. If I thought this was a “family” breakup, I would have said so. I am not talking about anyone else by me. Did I mention anyone else? I was talking about me.
Why do you think I was talking about someone else?
Bryan, Of course you can leave any given congregation or denomenation all by yourself. However, if you want your entire congregation, that you have been a member of, that you have friends and family in, to leave an inhospitable denomination and join a more congenial one, you need a vote of the congregation. I too have left denominations and congregations. When you leave a congregation, it feels like ending friendships and relationships. If you can keep the congregation together, and move to a much better denomination , it is much better and preserves relationships.
My wife’s Methodist church “stayed,” but about a third of the congregation has left in the past couple years. The “issue” never seems to come up in services/activities, but the minister decided on his own, causing a lot of bad feelings.
I’m Catholic (not exactly a devout one) so I have no dog in the fight, but I attend with her regularly and am sad about the missing members.
So you are going to tell me what I feel too?
Here’s an idea, when addressing me directly, if you mean to use a general “you” then you should use the word “one” so as not to be unclear.
But, the plain reading is that the two of you are talking to me, by saying you.
I was talking about me. not you. Not anyone else. What mattered to me and me alone.
Someone got a wedgie.
Our UMC church has many members who grew up in multi-generation UMC families.
The vote was over 90% in favor of disaffiliation.
Bryan, Enjoy being offended. It was not my intent, and I suspect it was not The Recticulators either. Peace.
Because you said, “I don’t see the need to vote to leave…”
yes
*I* don’t’ see the need to vote to leave.
As clear as it possibly can be.
*I* as in Bryan Stephens. What other’s want to do is up to them
I don’t know how more clear I have to be for you.
I am clear now?
News accumulator let me down.
During our congregation’s consideration whether to “disaffiliate” from (leave) the United Methodist Church, our pastor described the sex issue as merely the “presenting symptom” of a deeper question of what was going to the primary driver of church doctrine: Scripture (with assists from history and experience), or Popular Culture? The “progressives” clearly think Popular Culture should have primacy in order to be “relevant” and that church doctrine should change to “keep up with” the lates changes in Popular Culture.
Our congregation voted just about a year ago 80% to leave the United Methodist Church. Leaving as a congregation allowed us to keep our real estate so we can continue to be a major ministry force in our town and county (our town is the county seat), as the congregation has been since about 1856, and from our current real estate since 1894, during which time the congregation has been affiliated with three different Methodist denominations. We (the congregation) are still deciding on which of the many Methodist and Wesleyan denominations and associations with which to affiliate next. For now, the only change visible to anyone is the removal of the word “United” from some signage and from our website and slightly altering the church logo. Our pastor also decided to leave the United Methodist denomination, and he is staying with our congregation. Most of the 20% of the congregation that voted to stay UMC have now departed for other congregations in the region that stayed UMC. We have also picked up many people who value our decision to leave the UMC.
Members of several congregations in our region that stayed United Methodist despite some misgivings about the direction the UMC is headed are worried that although their current pastors may be sound, what will the next round of pastors the denomination sends going to be like? What will happen as the pipeline of theologically sound people coming out of seminaries dries up as the seminaries become increasingly progressive? Will the denominational ordination process weed out theologically sound candidates for ministry in favor of culturally progressive candidates?
I’ll bet if you think about it you’ll think of ways to be clearer. Hint: If it concerns only you, I suppose you wouldn’t have to say anything at all. But on a public forum where a vote to leave was discussed, and you jump in and speak of “the need to vote,” it’s not at all clear what the “I” is seeing or not seeing.
C.S. Lewis advocated writing in a way that recognized that anything that can be misunderstood will be misunderstood, and that much of his craft was about putting up barriers to such misunderstandings. Here on an informal forum I think we can just work them out as we go along.
Your reaction is very clarifying.
Your reaction is very clarifying.
How insulting can you be?
Should we have a contest?
I haven’t read the article, but from the title it sounds like they’re really into proof-texting.
For anyone interested, there’s a fantastic book from a pastor in Michigan about ‘progressive’ Christianity.
I believe the UMC church I was at chose to stay…at least that was where the pastoral staff’s head was.
I would have to guess that the more mature crowd that filled about 50%-70% of the seats at the 11:00 traditional service (and, I would again guess provided about 90% of the weekly offerings) were not the staying type. The less mature crowd that filled about 95% of the seats at the earlier “contemporary” service were likely just fine or strongly in favor of staying. I don’t see that dynamic as very positive for the long-term stability of the system. But that’s just me…
What I’ve observed from other denominations is that people disaffiliate one person/couple/family at a time unless they have special ties to the local church.
Yes. And when Grandma and Grandpa leave the kids and grandkids likely all take business elsewhere.
Hmmm
This type of issue is a big part of why I don’t belong to a denomination or attend a denominational church.
That may help, but it doesn’t mean a person is safe. We are members of an independent, Confessional (1689LBC) Baptist church, not a member of any denomination. Nevertheless, when we fail to follow the God-given word, trouble ensues and departures result. I know three churches who have died (one of them I’m glad of.) Who decides what scripture says? Aye, there’s the rub.
And I also know a plethora of churches where the Word is de facto secondary. Some have grown. Easy believism is easy and sometimes successful – if all you want is a social club.
Our vote to disaffiliate was ~95% in favor, ~3% against, with ~1% abstain.
While the reason to disaffiliate was based on repeated inconsistant use of the UMC rules to punish certain behaviors, while ignoring the behaviors that were clearly against rules of the church. The modern LGBT-Ei-Ei-O madness is a symptom of a much deeper problem.
Nonetheless, the reason to stay and vote was to ensure the congregation could have control over the property the congregtion paid for. However as a result of disaffiliation, we had to pay state oganization 2 years worth of “taxes” called apportionment. It was a bill of about $120K. This to retain the property worth about $3M.
We chose not to go with the Global Methodists for a simple reason; why would we give aother group of faceless overlords control over what we had built?
In the GMC each church owns their property.