When all the rules followed are Biblical.
Anonymous said...(Bailing Water:
Making a charge stick against the Church and Changers will prove next to impossible when it comes to heresy. C&Cers can bob and weave, rationalize, and mislead with the best since facts and reasoning must be checked at the door. The insidious harm comes in shifting the focus from the efficacy of the Word to the efficacy of marketing and buildings while draining WELS’ coffers. They threaten to render the synod anemic and unable to continue
January 23, 2009 4:04 PM
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GJ - Yes and no. I have heard this excuse before. I was able to prove Floyd Luther Stolzenburg a heretic with one question - "If an evangelism effort fails, is it because the wrong methods were used?"
Stolzenburg jumped in and said, "Yes!" and began to explain.
DP Mueller said, "No," only to have Kuske jump in and defend Floyd's doctrine, as he always did.
Mueller had to talk over his vapid VP and point out the Biblical doctrine of the Word.
Previously, Mueller promised that if I proved Stolzenburg a heretic, LPR would be shut down.
Nothing of the sort happened. Instead, Mueller, Kuske, and Schroer all insisted that it never happened. At another meeting to silence me, Schroer said, disingenuously, "I have nothing in my notes."
Their problem was that I told a lot of people what happened, so the officials were caught in another lie. But what was one more lie in a string of them?
Zehms and Stolzenburg--aided and abetted by Mueller-Kuske--caused so much damage in Colubmus with their precious Church Growth Movement that LRP was finally shut down. The goal all along, as Wally Oelhafen explained, was to get Floyd a call in the Wisconsin Synod. No effort was spared. Wally, with "I love CGM" tatooed on his right deltoid, was in Kuske's corner.
So they supported Stolzenburg in getting a call to an independent Lutheran congregation. He is still there.
The moral of this story is - it depends on which rules are followed. The Wisconsin sect has a thousand unspoken but understood rules. If purely doctrinal questions are asked and follow up questions are permitted, the heretics could be identified in a few minutes.
For instance, Kelm has paraded his love of Reformed doctrine for decades. At 64, is he going to find a way out of his published errors? Why is he in fellowship with the Willow Creek Association? WELS supposedly left unionism in the 19th century. Kelm and Parlow brought it back officially at St. Mark, Depere. Trapp did the same at his Willow Creek franchise, jointly operated by WELS.
Bruce Becker has attacked the efficacy of the Word alone. One of his latest communications asked congregations what worked in addition to the Word. He insisted on hiring Kelm and adding to the synod's financial burdens.
When the synod politicians start explaining how difficult it is to deal with a pastoral adulterer (with clout) or a heretic, the sect rules are being followed. So this will really depend on which rules are normative.
