Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Co-Worker of the Notorious Iver Johnson - Worried about Slandering False Teachers


ex-WELS but still a pastor, Michael J. Albrecht.
What did he know and when did he know it?



Brett Meyer has left a new comment on your post "Heavens to Betsy, Amy":

People should be offended that their elders, clergy, church, district and Synod are allowing such heinous statements and practices to continue. I've wondered that myself as I witness the glassy eyed stares of the laity I talk to. The answer is in the false doctrines which they are being taught. UOJ is certainly the most wretched and damaging, separating the confessor from Christ. Yet, there are others which are taught with equal vigor and have similar effects. One is the great commission where the (W)ELS perverts Matt 28:19 into a Methodist/Pentecostal call to action. Another is concerns how public sins are treated and the proper application of

I ran across this (W)ELS essay which, regardless of its ineffectiveness as a deterrent to the power of positive thinking (it really acts as a platform for the false teaching to express itself), promotes the same twisted agenda that we see time after time from the false teachers in the Lutheran Synods - "it's not what he said that matters, it's what he meant when he said, or did, XYZ that really matters."

Positive Thinking And Possibility Thinking In The Church: What Does Scripture Say?
[South Central District Pastor/Teacher/Delegate Conference
Lord of Life Evangelical Lutheran Church Friendswood, TX January 28-29, 1988]
By Pastor Michael J. Albrecht

Whenever we set out to evaluate and to criticize people with whom we find ourselves in disagreement, it behooves us to remember not only that slander is a crime, but also that no matter who they may be, they are protected by God's Eighth Commandment. Whether he be a heretic or a pagan, each and every one of my fellow human beings deserves for me to put the best construction on what he says and does. Page 1

I hope we are being fair to Dr. Peale if we now move on to a brief evaluation of his most popular book, assuming that we have sufficient background to understand his words as he intended them to be understood. Page 3

http://www.wlsessays.net/files/AlbrechtThinking.PDF

***

GJ - To quote Bishop Fulton Sheen, "I find Paul appealing but Peale appalling."

Norman Vincent Peale was an apostate, a non-Christian who plagiarized his best-seller from an occult writer. That plagiarism was proven decades ago.

Peale inspired Robert Schuller. Albrecht practically drooled on Schuller's hob-nailed boots in this essay. The humor is impossible to miss - now that Schuller's cathedral is bankrupt, just like the Church Growth Movement he spawned.

Stadler and Albrecht were known as Shrinkers before they were booted out of WELS. Stadler was buddies with Paul Calvin Kelm and Wayne Mueller. I will look up the graduation photo. Birds of a feather do flock together.

What a treasure trove in this class: Stadler (Church Growth), Forest Bivens (Fuller Seminary alumnus), Joel Gerlach as professor - bragging in a letter sent to Herman Otten that he went to Fuller at some point.