The phone ID showed a cell phone, so I assumed a graduate student was phoning about the assignments. I picked it up and someone began shouting at me. I assume it was one of the pastors - hard to tell when someone is shouting and will not stop.
The harangue concerned the post below, which I noticed had been read more frequently lately.
Accusation #1 - You posted something about my church and the newsletter.
I said, "No, I posted someone's comment."
Accusation #2 - You said I did not include subjective justification in the quotation. I ran out of space.
I said, "If that is the problem, then correct it."
Accusation #3 - You are playing fast and loose with the facts and violating the Eighth Commandment.
I answered, "This was publicly stated, so publicly correct it. Do you believe in UOJ?"
Accusation #4 - You are not going to get me involved with code words.
I said, "Just answer my question. Do you deny UOJ? Is the entire world forgiven?"
Accusation #5 - Greg Jackson, you are nuts.
I was trying to get a coherent answer from him when he abruptly hung up on me. The outline above suggests an orderly progression that was lacking in his phone etiquette. At some point he was scornful that the wrong photo was posted. I laughed that it could be changed. For the sake of journalistic integrity and scholarly purity, I left it as is, below.
That was hardly the only nasty, screaming, bullying phone call from a WELS clergy-person. One popped his cork over whether Columbus WELS started Pilgrim Community Church. Stating that I was there when it happened did nothing for the poor man's temper tantrum.
Some of them like to attack through their ELCA pastor buddies. They see ELCA as a useful extension of the WELS Grapevine (more like the Slander Machine).
Larry Olson's daughter once sent an email with a long list of ugly names in it, concluding that I was unloving. I told her that I was just trying to convert her father to Lutheranism.
Here is Don Patterson's email to me:
Hey, Greg,
I am not a part of Church and Change Leadership. I went to one conference a few years ago and had my own reservations. Also, Robert Timmerman does not serve as a church council pres at our church. You are lying on your blog.
Don
Donald Patterson
kududon@gmail.com
12-10-08
subject: Don't be a fool
sent to BethanyLutheranWorship@gmail.com
Timmerman was his council president, so the only person abusing the facts was Kudu Don. Patterson was not a Church and Changer? He posted lovingly about Church and Change on their list-serve, which went dark once I began getting copies of it. Also, Patterson attended the very last Church and Change conference and took a bunch of workers to the Exponential Enthusiasm conference in Orlando.
Patterson is God's punishment against his district, just as Engelbrecht is against the Northern Anything Goes District of WELS.
Here is the post and comment, from October 16, 2011.
AC V has left a new comment on your post "Pope Benedict Showing His Age and Liturgical Style...":
Yet another example of WELS UOJ subterfuge, this time at parish level. In the October 2011 newsletter of St. Peter Lutheran Church in Fond du Lac, WI (just down the road from Appleton), the lead article entitled "Luther's Last Will and Testament: The Smalcald Articles" the author writes:
"As children of the Lutheran Reformation, may we steadfastly stand on the truth of the Bible as it is faithfully expounded and explained in the Smalcald Articles. The first and chief article is this:"
The author then goes on to quote that article from the SA. However, there is a curious "..." in the middle of the quotation. What is the "..."? Look up the entire article and you find that the author left out this important part:
"Now, since it is necessary to believe this, and it cannot be otherwise acquired or apprehended by any work, law, or merit, it is clear and certain that this faith alone justifies us as St. Paul says, Rom. 3:28: For we conclude that a man is justified by faith, without the deeds of the Law. Likewise 3:26: That He might be just, and the Justifier of him which believeth in Christ."
In other words, the author gave the impression that Justification does not include faith. Narrowing it down to the sentence before and after the "...", this is how the author teaches UOJ:
"Likewise: All have sinned and are justified without merit [freely, and without their own works or merits] by His grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, in His blood...Of this article nothing can be yielded or surrendered [or can anything be granted or permitted contrary to the same], even though heaven and earth, and whatever will not abide, should sink in ruin."
In the WELS this is code for: "You better believe in UOJ, or else!"
---
raklatt said...
And this from among the group that is thinking about making its own translation of the Bible? The Epistle of Paul to the Romans would be shorter than the Third Epistle of John.
But wait...does DP stand for DiotrePhes? 3 John would of necessity have to be even shorter. 3 John 9-10 would have to be left out for it says: "I wrote unto the church, but Diotrephes, who loveth to have pre-eminence among them, receiveth us not. Therefore if I come, I will remember his deeds which he doeth, prating against us with malicious words. And not content therewith, neither doth he himself receive the brethern, and forbiddeth those who would, and casteth them out of the church."
No new translation will be done. It is so much easier to edit Luther and the Book of Concord.
October 17, 2011 5:48 AM
