Monday, February 23, 2009

Thou Shalt Not Steal
Maybe Mequon Should Close Too



Hmm. How am I going to teach that commandment?
The kids have googled my sermon series.
Ski is a follower of Craig Groeschel - from the very liberal Methodist and Disciples of Christ denominations.



Kelm got hired at The Love Shack for his skills in copy and paste.


Ichabodians, tell me you did not see it coming.

Paul Kuske and LPR were doing the Rock and Roll scene (badly) 20 years ago. Now The CORE emerges as a cruder, simpler, more childish version of all previous experiments. WELS is always experimenting with safe sects. In fact, so many pastors experimented with safe sects that they have left the Lutheran Church altogether to join their Babtist and Pentecostal brethren.

But do not be alarmed. You do not have to join another denomination now. You can join one of the WELS Church and Chicanery congregations across the synod. C and C is a non-geographical district managed by Church and Change/Parish Services.

Here is the proof.

Go to The CORE website, which is easy to remember:


http://www.gotocore.com

Look up: What will the pastor talk about this week?

The dates and topics are all lined up.

Starting on February 22nd, there are four on kaleo. I am guessing that Ski was not the best Greek student, since English itself is a foreign language for him. And using Greek in a sermon title is very Junior-year.

Oh wait. I found the exact same set of sermons here:

http://open.lifechurch.tv/series/3445

Week 1 Called to Care
Week 2 Called to Generosity
Week 3 Called to Serve
Week 4 Called to Make Disciples

And another set of The CORE sermons are at the same site:

http://open.lifechurch.tv/series/19

Week 1 The Pain of Loss
Week 2 The Pain of Suffering
Week 3 The Pain of Rejection

The pain series is exactly the same as the website's, in the same order.

Note the FAQs from the website:

General Questions
Q: What is LifeChurch.tv Open?

A: LifeChurch.tv Open is a site where churches can access, download and use creative content for free. It includes much of the creative work that the staff at LifeChurch.tv has done over the past few years and will be updated with new content going forward.

Q: What type of resources are available on this site?

A: The content includes, but is not limited to, message series artwork, themed videos that are used to promote and brand a series (provided in full resolution), message outlines, and layered graphic files.

Q: What does it cost?

A: Absolutely nothing. We do require that you agree to a license agreement (it's free) and that you use the content in a non-commercial manner in an effort to "lead people to become fully devoted followers of Christ." We do not want attribution (our name or brand to be on it). If we want anything it is to hear about how it impacted people in your church or community...please come back to the site and let us know.

Q: Why is LifeChurch.tv making this available for free?

A: We are passionate about changed lives and if there is even a chance that some of our creative content is useful to other churches in a effort to reach people for Christ....we are extremely excited about the opportunity to make it all available.


Q: So I don't have to mention that I got this from LifeChurch.tv?

A: That's right. You can use the content in your church and we actually perfer that you do not give us credit. Basically, you can pretend it's your own.

Q: Can I get it sent to me in on a DVD or CD or something else that I can hold in my hand?

A: No. We are only providing this content throught this website for you to download. It is free, and we are not able to mail or send it to you in another format (even if you were willing to pay us). Sorry if this is an inconvenience, but it is the only way that we can provide it to everyone and still stay focused on the vision that God has called us to.

Q: Is there any "fine print" in the license agreement?

A: Not that we are aware of, but PLEASE do read the license.

Q: What if I do not like any of the content you have available?

A: That's OK. We hope some of it is useful to others, but don't expect the content to be something that everyone will like. You can also come back in the future, maybe there will be something new that will work.

Q: Are there any copyright issues with the audio libraries that you use in your creative content?

A: Unless there is something that we overlooked, we have specifically procured (paid above our normal license fees) all the necessary licenses from any audio libraries, etc. used in our resources. This is not only for distribution of the resources that include them, but also for the rebroadcast of those items as long as they are not used for commercial purposes as we require in our license.

Q: Can I edit the video teaching messages that I download?

A: No. The video teaching downloads cannot be edited and must be used in their entirety. You can modify the videos to playback on different formats, but you cannot otherwise edit the teaching videos. This restriction helps us ensure that parts of the message are not taken out of their original context or intent. Thank you for understanding.

Q: How do I download complete message file to a DVD?

A: To burn the image directly to a DVD, you will need to install third party software that is capable of understanding and burning image (img or iso) files. Most popular DVD burning software include support for burning images.

If you do not currently own any commerical software that supports this function (e.g. Nero, Roxio), then you can download a freeware program that will burn the DVD image to disc. Please consult the vendor-specific documentation for further assistance in burning the image to disc.


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Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Thou Shalt Not StealMaybe Mequon Should Close Too":

Wow. Thanks for the research.

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GJ - I am wondering, "Why waste all that money on The Sausage Factory when the graduates are just copying sermons from the websites of false teachers - without any discipline."

Only recently Kelm gave a paper at Mequon on how to improve seminary education. He is an example of their complete failure.