Paul's Passing Thoughts

Joe McKeever said, on June 29, 2011 at 11:20 am (Edit)

Utter nonsense, my friend? You attack my article in your blog. Why didn’t you send your thoughts to me? You attack it for being directed to laypeople, but if you had bothered to check out my blog you’d see everything on it is directed toward pastors and church leaders. Crosswalk (and others who picked it up from my blog) put the spin on it they chose. In fact they called it “7 things we get wrong about worship” when there are no 7 things in there we get wrong. I had named it something like “Worship: Getting it all wrong.” — There is a mean spirit in your attitude, my brother.

Joe,

My missionary daughter whom I am very close to sent me the article thinking that I would be impressed with it—I also suffered the wrath of her displeasure as well. But remember, my article is addressed to “WE.” I reread the article, and if there was a place where I said “Joe is ridiculous,” rather than a reference to your statements, I missed it. I do not mean to say that stupid ideas equal stupid people; “we” all espouse stupid ideas from time to time (however, I retract the statement regarding the idea that you are “clueless,” I simply don’t know that about you based on the one article you wrote and would definitely ask your forgiveness accordingly).

Though my use of words reflects my frustration with the lack of practical application that leads to hopelessness in our day—I meant nothing personal toward you. BUT, the fact remains, that in our day, instruction has been replaced with spiritual sounding truisms that only address symptoms and not the core problem. In my own life just the other day, I was counseling with a pastor who was laying the ground work in regard to a trial in my own life. I found myself thinking: “Ok, I feel better, BUT WHAT NOW? Feelings don’t last, but new ways (specifically, God’s way) create a new path that’s perpetual and produces peace. In fact, good instruction did come, and the effects of the application have had a profound and powerful impact in the lives of my family.

Joe, your counsel to Christians who go to a church that has weak leadership is: “You can still bring your offering.” What does that mean? It sounds good, but how do we bring an offering (and what exactly is the offering? Worship? What’s worship? Today’s Christians don’t even have a working definition of what sanctification is—do your own survey) in the midst of a bad church situation?

Dr. Jay E. Adams, the father of contemporary biblical counseling, often shares his experience regarding the reaction of many Christians in our day that come to realize their biblical role in sanctification: “You mean, there is something ‘I’ can do?! I didn’t know, I thought all I could do is pray and hope for the best.” Which “hoping for the best” usually leads to HOPELESSNESS.  We live in an age where following God’s instruction is supposedly an affront to the instructor! That is why your implication that all actions

(“Evangelism & Discipleship, Giving & Praying, Grow Out of Worship; Not the Other Way Around”) flow from “worship” is VERY upsetting to me. Joe, what in the sam-heck does that even mean? If we have to do worship before we do truth—we better know exactly what worship is. You are making “worship” something other than doing truth, so what exactly does worship look like? You don’t say—you just throw the term around like an idol that means anything to people that they want it to mean. That’s what idols are all about—they’re nebulous and open to our own self-serving interpretations.  This is a HUGE problem among Christians today: spiritual sounding truisms that mean all things to all people and affect a fill in the blank yourself teaching prism.

Joe, as far as going to you privately: you made the statement publicly. With all due respect, you have no problem with the thirty-plus comments that were also public and were not addressed to you privately. I am the only one that had a problem with your post, and that should be private? Forgive me if I am uncomfortable with that. Besides, it’s not a Matthew 18 issue—it’s a 2Cor.10:5 issue.

Joe, I deeply appreciate you referring to me as a brother and I gladly return the same to you, but let us bring in-depth, practical God-breathed instruction that is full of hope back to the church, and not the spiritual neo-novelties of the day.

Paul