Friday, July 24, 2009

What Willow Creek WELS Worships



Parlow, left, at Babtist Stanley's Drive 08 Conference


Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "More Admonitions Like This Are Needed":

Here are the worship principles for St. Mark De Pere.

The document in question can be found here:

http://stmarkpartners.org/downloads/Biblical.pdf

"Made to Worship: Biblical Prescriptive Principles for Corporate Worship at St. Mark"

1. Worship in truth and spirit. – John 4:23
2. Worship the true God only. – Matthew 4:10
3. Worship in an orderly fashion. – 1 Corinthians 14:40
4. Men are to be the spiritual teachers/preachers in a congregation of men and women. –
1 Timothy 2:11-12; 1 Corinthians 14:26ff
5. Strive to do all to the glory of God. – 1 Corinthians 10:31
6. Edification of the Church. – Ephesians 4:11-12

What's missing here? No Law, no Gospel, no means of grace, no forgiveness, no Christ. But I'm sure you'll feel really good about yourself and learn how to be a "good person" and have a "happy life" if you go to this church. Make sure to bring your vomit bag if you do.

And it gets worse. Here is the St. Mark's website description of their worship styles: (http://stmarkpartners.org/content/category/9/33/78/)

"St. Mark Lutheran Church exists to make a meaningful and relevant impact on the lives and hearts of people who live in the Northeast Wisconsin area. We offer hope, healing, and spiritual solutions to people wherever they are in their journey. For spiritual seekers, those investigating the gospel message, our goal is to help you find practical answers to your spiritual questions. For everyone, we want to provide availability and easy access to a variety of experiences that help you grow spiritually.

Because we believe the message of God’s love and forgiveness is the most thrilling, inspiring, life-changing message of all time, we want to do everything possible to reach people with that message. Therefore, we strive to make our presentation of Christ creative, relevant, understandable, memorable, and engaging. We want to help you connect with the personal hope and practical help that God can give us.

Therefore we offer two "styles" of worship: contemporary and traditional, that you can explore, learn, and grow spiritually in a way that is memorable, engaging, and that suits your personal style."

Funny. I always thought the church existed to proclaim the Gospel to lost sinners and administer the word and sacraments. Welcome to our Brave New World in WELS.

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Beavis and Butthead are not content to trust in the Word.