Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Missouri Gone Wild - Party in the Concordia Chi-Town




Nodding my head like yeah - from Google Images.

My source wrote: "Just so WELS won't feel lonely. LCMS is worse, of course, we knew that about Riverforest anyway."

Townhall

The tension between church and state has been around since Jesus held up a coin and confounded the Pharisees with His admonition to “render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.”


Caesar is entitled to a certain level of authority and taxation, Jesus acknowledged. But God, the Creator and Author of our souls, gets the rest. In this way, Jesus clearly limited Caesar’s reach. But government has a huge appetite for power and does not particularly like limits.

That’s why churches have been a thorn in the side of those who would impose socialism on us in the name of “equality” or “tolerance” or “fairness.” It’s why the political Left, since the mid-19th Century, has been at war with the church, alternately trying to co-opt it or destroy it.

When religious leaders support leftist goals, they are angels. When, on the other hand, they oppose abortion or the homosexual political agenda, reaction is swift and cries of “the separation of church and state” are raised. Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.) had no problem with the Conference of Catholic Bishops aggressively lobbying for the Obama/Pelosi government health care takeover bill in the House. She was undoubtedly delighted that they would put their weight behind a law making Caesar our ultimate doctor. But because the bishops insisted on the Stupak Amendment prohibiting federal funding of abortion, she bared her teeth and called for an end to the church’s tax exemption.

Some church-related entities don’t wait for the government to bully them before ceding moral ground. At Concordia University Chicago, a campus of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, which is staunchly Biblical regarding homosexuality, the theater department is showing The Laramie Project, a play about the town of Laramie, Wyoming’s reaction to the murder of Matthew Shepard in 1998. Based on a book by Moises Kaufman, the play fits the narrative of “gays as victims,” which has been their most effective strategy other than the unsubstantiated claim that people are “born gay.”

The play was hatched by the Tectonic Theatre Project, whose managing director, Jeffrey LaHost, claimed that conservative Christians are a hate group and want to murder homosexuals.

Here’s a snippet from a 2002 Baltimore Sun article:

“Kaufman is openly gay, as are some other Theatre Project members, and LaHost said the actors were disturbed that initial televised accounts of the murder included commentary from right-wing groups. ‘I can't think of any other minority group where it's still hotly contested whether or not it's OK to kill them [homosexuals],’ he said. When a black person is murdered, he said, ‘no one thinks they have to get an opposing point of view from the Ku Klux Klan.’”

The Sun article didn’t mention that conservative Christians were interviewed in 1998 about Shepard only because liberal media and homosexual activists were outrageously blaming them for his murder, citing a series of “truth in love” newspaper ads offering hope for change that featured ex-gays.

The play depicts Christians at best as feckless or perhaps unwitting handmaidens of hate. To stage it on a conservative Christian campus, where parents pay dearly to spare their kids from the relentless cultural and academic propaganda found elsewhere, is a coup.

---

But wait, there's more


Google Images: And a Jay-Z Song was on!




Brothers of John the Steadfast

As a part of my visit to the Northwest last week I was alerted to an alarming situation in our sister LCMS congregation, Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Renton, Washington. The Music Director is involved in the sinful homosexual and lesbian movement. This fact is openly proclaimed on the church website where it states that he was the former artistic director of the Seattle Lesbian and Gay Chorus. The church website also has a link to the Music Director’s personal blog which has a link to something called the “Gay Rag Radio Podcast.” (See below for links.)

The LCMS is sick and needs help. We have been saying that there is a crisis of supervision in the LCMS. This is just absolutely unbelievable! Who would have thought our grandfather’s church would come to this. I cannot believe that 30 years ago, 20 years ago, even 10 years ago anyone would imagine that the LCMS would sink so low as to have a congregation that has not only hired a promoter of the gay/lesbian agenda as a music director but then to openly state this on their website. What has made this pastor and his church so bold and courageous?

Bethlehem is a member of the Northwest District. We contacted President Schumacher of the Northwest District last Thursday morning by phone and e-mail about this situation. Since then the link from the congregation website to the Music Director’s personal website has been taken down but the congregation’s website still proclaims that the Music Director was the former artistic director of the Seattle Lesbian and Gay Chorus. To see the current church website click here. To see the way it looked before we contacted the bishop click here (not everything plots correctly, but you can see the link to jamesHing.com in context). Once you get to the personal website of the music director (which actually is located at http://web.mac.com/hinger/iWeb/Site/Welcome.html; we have archived it here), click on the word “blog” and you will see further evidence of promotion of the gay and lesbian movement. If you cannot follow that link we have archived it here as a pdf. Notice the Music Director promotes a gay and lesbian radio program on his blog. The full article about this radio program is archived here.

We are not sure that it was by the bishops urging that the link has been taken down. The bishop has not told us anything other than acknowledging that he got our e-mail and phone message. Putting the best construction on it, it seems as though he is the one who gets credit for this small step in the right direction.

Of course, the problem is not limited to the embarrassment this sort of public statement by our sister congregation and brother pastor brings upon the rest of us in the LCMS who are supposedly walking in concord and unity under the scriptures and confessions. The solution is not limited to taking down the offending links and statements. The solution is to see to it that we do not have open and public sinners serving in our congregations. This sounds a lot like the Kari Jobe matter. We were told that it does not matter if the music director of the youth gathering was a Pentecostal woman pastor. Now are we going to be told that it doesn’t matter if a congregation’s music director is a promoter of homosexuality and lesbianism? Which sin is worse, corrupting the pure Gospel with false teaching (Kari Jobe) or corrupting the pure Gospel with impenitent sin (promoting the gay and lesbian agenda)? The solution not only involves removing the embarrassing links and removing the openly sinful worker. It also involves getting this pastor and all errant pastors to repent of their compromising theology of worship, evangelism, scripture, unionism, and sexuality.

There is much more to this story. We will keep you posted on it. The LCMS is sick and is in need of much more careful supervision from its bishops, pastors, and laity. Please pass this article on to your LCMS friends and relatives, not to embarrass our beloved synod but to use it as a means of alerting them to what has become of their denomination under its leadership in the last several years.

Is "Our Valpo" A Congregation? - Ripped from the Pages of The Thword






Roman Catholic Archbishop Weakland paid about $400,000 hush money to his boyfriend, but WLC hired him and some his priests as special speakers for a series of public lectures. WLC's damage control team tried to make this a "private luncheon," something too hilarious to refute.


Call WELS headquarters at 414-256-3888 if you do not want more of the same. Or write a letter to: Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS)
2929 N Mayfair Road, Milwaukee, WI 53222.

Read Charlie Chaplain.

"WLC to call a second campus pastor." Some brief highlights:

"Now, WLC has grown to the equivalent of a congregation of 850 people. Strobel [the current campus pastor] commented that because of this development, 'the WLC student body is becoming hungry for spiritual growth,' and he is struggling trying to meet the spiritual needs of WLC."

"He feels that there is much more that he and his staff should be doing to serve the students, especially small group Bible studies."

***

GJ - They tried to rescue Jeff Gunn from his failing non-WELS congregation, but that was nixed.

Apparently the students are so spiritually starved from their own congregations that they need cell groups to tide them over during the week.

Should WLC determine if they are Lutheran before adding insult to injury? They started Church and Change through Charis. They tried a Werning/Hunter seminar, which was canceled amid great pouting by its leaders. They had ELCA theologian Martin Marty speak at the campus. Are they Roman Catholic, Babto-Pentecostal CG, or High Church Unitarian (ELCA)?


Martin Marty and his voodoo doll,
actually part of a long-running joke.

---

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Is "Our Valpo" A Congregation? - Ripped from the P...":

You just read whatever you want into anything you want, don't you Mr. Jackson?

If a college is growing, do they not need more physical and intellectual resources, such as classroom space and faculty?

Why would a growing institution such as WLC not need more spiritual resources as well?

"Apparently the students are so spiritually starved from their own congregations that they need cell groups to tide them over during the week."

You may be the first pastor I have seen that frowns upon Christians spending time with the Lord and with each other outside the confines of their own congregations.

---

GJ - I am a pastor? The Chicaneries are always telling me I am not. In fact, this anonymous, brave soul addressed his message "Mr. Jackson." I get a chuckle from people changing titles when they disagree with my Biblical, Confessional posts. One wit favored "pastorless," which means "without a pastor." Am I without a pastor? In fact, I have a number of friends who are pastors, and I value their judgment.

This story illustrates what another person observed, that bureaucrats grow their kingdoms, not by being more productive, but by building layers under them. The current campus pastor already has a staff, and now he needs an assistant to generate more cell groups. Wayne Mueller did the same thing, building up a core of loyal and obedient Shrinkers who marched to the mike at every convention and voted for additional loyal and obedient staffers.

Wisconsin Lutheran College (Brigadoon WELS, joining the synod during fund drives, then disappearing again) needs more Lutheran staff. WLC needs to boot the Chicaneries from the board. I am sure the new prez is a fine fellow, but he should head up a Babtist school since he came from Jeff Gunn's CrossWalk.

The rumor I heard is that the current campus pastor cannot get any interest going in his bee-bop whoopee services. Would another attendant at the beehive help? They should try a high church (for WELS) pastor, someone edified and inspired by the Book of Concord. College students favor real worship services, so WLC should be cutting edge with the liturgy, creeds, Gerhardt hymns, Luther, Chemnitz, Gerhardt, Jacobs, Krauth.

There are many reasons why WLC is called "Our Valpo."

---

Good News from Thrivent - Giving Minus






THRIVENT “GIVING PLUS” PROGRAM –Thrivent will no longer offer the present “Giving Plus” Matching program next year. So, if you have not made use of this program in 2009, please take advantage of it ASAP. There is only “x” amount of money left this year that Thrivent will match. When it is all gone, that is the end of it.

St. Peter Cares December Newsletter

***

GJ - By depending on Thrivent, the synods have not grown richer - they have impoverished themselves. Ditto Schwan funds.  Rock and Roll got $20,000 from the Antioch Foundation this year (not the $200,000 they wanted) and they still only have one web page.

Unfortunately, all the Thrivent-dependent parishes have prostituted themselves, constantly advertising one particular brand of insurance to get "free" napkins, "free" pastoral calendars, and token grants. Now their little lifelines are being pulled back.

No one seems to realize that outside money displaces giving rather than adding to it.

---

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Good News from Thrivent":

Giving Plus is already exhausted.

https://www.thrivent.com/community/outreach/giving/givingplus/index.html

---

GivingPlus® Program

Note: Funds for the 2009 GivingPlus® program have been fully disbursed, resulting in more than $67 million to Lutheran organizations from Thrivent Financial and its members. The program is over for 2009, and it will not be continued in 2010. View details on the change, including information on a new giving program called Thrivent Choice to be introduced in the spring of 2010. Interested in learning more about the upcomingThrivent Choice program? Sign up for monthly email updates.

---

Shrinkers Are the New Pietiests




Shrinkers turned doctrinal discernment into "slander, legalism, and lovelessness."


Spener was the first union theologian among Lutherans, but not the last.
He wanted to "downplay" doctrinal differences, to borrow a term from David Valleskey,


The high-pitched shrieking from the Shrinker girly-men is a result of the New Pietism instituted by their crew across synodical lines.

Once the basic premises of Pietism are accepted, the Shrinker program is worthy of praise.

  • Premise One - Doctrinal differences are not important enough to block cooperative efforts by Lutherans and the Reformed.
  • Premise Two - Fruits of the Christian life must be encouraged through the promotion of lay-led small groups (conventicles, cell groups).
  • Premise Three - The Word of God is not effective.

    The New Pietism has cloaked itself under various labels. In the 1980s, they still used Church Growth, because no one could be against the church growing. The WELS Doctrinal Pussycats even had their manufactured excuse for it. "We are not for Church Growth, but for Church Growth." I don't know who made it up, but the excuse was used often. I heard it from DP Mueller. The same lobbying group is more likely to use Emerging Church or the label du jour, whatever works for the moment.

    Fuller Seminary, Willow Creek, and Trinity Deerfield are all union institutions. Those three places are the main training centers for WELS Chicaneries, who have branched off to such places as Driscoll (Seattle), Groeschel (Life Church), Stanley (Northpoint, Drive conferences), Beeson (Granger Community Church), Rick Warren (Saddlesore), Exponential Conference (Patterson's fave), Dirt (Bishop Katie was there), Catalyst (Stanley, Groeschel, and Ski - Oh My!), and more.

    Missouri and the Little Sect on the Prairie are also deeply involved. The CLC (sic) is now "all church growth," thanks to Dan Fleischer and Steve Kurtzahn (WELS, CLC, WELS) bootlicking Paul Tiefel and David Koenig. The Church of the Lutheran Confession (sic) is exemplified by rancid Pietism, not by the Lutheran Confessions, hence the need to warn readers with the (sic).

    I have tried to convert the Pietists to Lutheran doctrine, using the Scriptures and the Confessions. Sometimes they are agreeable and do not listen, going on as before. At other times, they shout their favorite slogans, wrapped in various accusations ("not loving!") and calls for repentance (on my part).

    A Pietistic websty is easy to spot. The following characteristics jump out at the reader:
    1. They emphasize love and caring and friendliness. The domain name for the most Growthy parish in Fox Valley is stpetercares.com. Do you feel the love? I do.
    2. Pietists lead with how God has blessed them with an increase in numbers. The pastor says, "God has richly blessed us. We had ___ members when I came. Now we have ____ members." An emphasis on sound doctrine is lacking - too embarrassing.
    3. The websty avoids the name Lutheran at all costs. The next step is avoiding the name church, which The CORE has already achieved. Check out the Chicanery carcinomas: CrossWalk, CrossRoads, Christ the Rock, etc. It is possible, not not easy, to find out the synod affiliation.
    4. The Sacraments are "downplayed" to the point of disappearing from regular worship entertainment times.
    5. Slogans quoted are from Enthusiasts, who have so much more wisdom than fuddie-duddies like Luther, Chemnitz, and Melanchthon. It's easier to spell Warren than Melanchthon, so that is a bonus for any Mequon graduate.
    6. Time of Generic Grace is featured.

    --- Anonymous has left a new comment on your post " Shrinkers turned doctrinal discernment into "sl...": Good morning Pastor GJ! Yes, the words "Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Church" are listed once on the Core's webstry. It is not even on the home page, you have to click on the categories and scroll down a few times. Are Ski and others ashamed of being Lutheran? Oh yes, I remember now. Jeske said, "Change or die." He went on to make fun of those churches "out-in-the-sticks." I did not laugh at his funny remarks concerning close communion. Jeske's unionism is blatantly public; therefore, my input is not needed. Hey, I like my fuddy-duddy church with its Folgers Coffee instead of lattes. In our new visitors folder it says that church is not a movie theater. Considering the Core, do you think they list that one in there visitor information? You have to admit, that's pretty funny just thinking about it. Can you down play the sacraments? With the "felt needs approach" one has to be hospitable to the guest. Give them a choice, for example, "Would you prefer the body or the blood?" (Yes, that's morbid,remember, the Roman Catholics used to be given only the bread.) There are churches near my home[not Lutheran]that do not offer communion. Disclaimer: Time of Grace is not featured on my church's web. In Christ, from WELS church lady


    --- GJ - How about "Hello, I'm Pastor Bob. We have an exciting hour for you today"? He is dressed in a Hawaiian shirt. That happens all the time.