Steeple Chaser

2011-12-28T19:15:00.001-08:00

St.Arbucks Coffeeshop Cartoonist. KDS (Koinonia Deprivation Syndrome) is ubiquitous. Sadly, it can be most evident in families (nuclear and extended) at seasonal times. The classic Lennon-McCartney tune, 'Eleanor Rigby' ("...Ah, look at all the lonely people...") is also most evident on the faces of holiday church attendees who crowd into 'sanctuaries' under the illusion that they're going to find sincere love (Romans 12:9), empathy, rapport, and honest fellowship--only to be 'bombasted' with artificially-crafted, giant-screened, religious propaganda onstage. (As always, '...there is no room in the Inn'.)

Dark Roast: TGI-Finished..! If you find yourself relieved (for at least another glorious year) that you don't have to bear with narcissistic, (personality-disordered) in-laws listening to them boast about all the awards they've received (sadly, from toadies and bootlickers) for pharisaically giving their bleeding-heart alms in public, and doing their rhetorical ('sackcloth-n-ashes') prayers on street corners--you've saying some thank-god-it's-overs on your televangelist rosary..!

The Whole Fam Damily. If your 'fambly' get-togethers leave you with the self-loathing sycophancy and insincere flattery evokes in you, remember the comfort and liberation of the Holy Spirit is calling you to, 'Come out from among them,' and be spiritually liberated. (I tell folks in counseling, "Quit pretending you enjoy faux fellowship with the character-flawed and their fawning apple-polishers--or you'll end up turning your frustration and anger against yourself.")

The Left Foot of Fellowship. I told a seminar audience in Carson City, Nevada years ago,"Why be afflicted with narcissistically-disordered 'outlaws' at seasonal gatherings or even 'narcissistic-contract' churches where 'your role' is to sheeple-clap and toss lotsa sheeple-money in the offering plate--and bear with some grinning (humor, insight, wisdom and judgment-impaired) idiot up on stage making a fool of himself?" (I was never invited back--heh-heh...and thank God.)

Nourishing vs. Toxic. I know, of course, most folks (ruled by social and 'belonging-need' anxiousness) won't listen to therapeutic advice. Sadly, they keep forgetting, 'There is no fellowship between Light and Darkness,' between nourishing and toxic, between the charming sociopath and the sincere lover. Thus, 'nice folk' in America's Culture of Narcissism often live lives of quiet desperation....'in the midst of a wicked and perverse (2 Timothy 3) generation.'

The St.Arbucks Coffeeshop Cartoonist looks for nice folks with whom to enjoy coffee shop fellowship--sincere empathy, good rapport, and plenty of good satirical laughs. (Please, no toadies, pharisees, politicians...or sociopaths...heh-heh.)

The Culture of Narcissism

From Pretend Family to Pretend Church

2011-12-01T01:50:00.001-08:00

The Quality Critic At Large

A Necessary 'Stephen Ministry' in the Ecclesia.

Why aren't there more stouthearted godly men (honest men of childlike sincerity and like precious faith in Christ) addressing troublesome, disturbing, egregious behaviors, psycho-social sins, and violations of Christian Orthopraxy, Orthodoxy, and (discerning the Body of Christ) Koinonia among the Church at Large--and the quality of spiritual leadership in the community of the redeemed?

Blessed are the pure in heart doesn't fit the contemporary Church, it seems.

The raison d'etre of the Quality Critic at Large in Ecclesiology is to assess and evaluate occurences of Spiritual Abuse and even 'marking those who cause division amongst you', looking prayerfully for the faux shepherds who 'lord it over their flocks'.

Yet, Toxic Faith, Toxic Religion, and Toxic Spiritual Leadership usually appear to slip through the fingers of Christian examination like greased pigs at a county fair contest.

Pastors with a diagnosable Paranoid Personality Disorder call out and castigate congregational scapegoats from their (literally) bullying pulpits (or call people who ask hard questions into their offices to intimidate, suspend, or fire them--while overlooking their staff associates' adulteries--or associates' porn addictions even viewed on church computers.

There is no Quality Control in the community of the redeemed. All too often, the morally-insane are at the helm wearing The Emperor's New Clothes--with no childlike person of integrity to blow their cover.

Unbiblical gender-role violators and sodomites steeped in porneia are paid big salaries to lead choirs and orchestras because church administrators idolatrously worship the talent god.

Senior pastors grieve the Holy Spirit by snidely bragging about how they despise anyone over the age of 50--how they are sick of the older generation, the fuddy-duddies (the very folks the Holy Spirit would have them focus on primarily--as so-called pastor-shepherds).

Some golden calf leaders hawk a greed-n-coveting-based gospel founded in a fallacious quid pro quo (give to get) philosophy.

One senior pastor (who I believe is a misogynist) exercised meanness of spirit and I believe vicious coldness of heart by pointing out that a young bride standing before them (the sanctuary filled with her family, relatives, and friends) at the wedding ceremony "...is not a virgin," pontificating about how he is going against his principles by condescending to perform the ceremony.

These mockers and spiritually abusing bullies are often Emergent or mega-church wannabes, lusting (with the pride of life) to create their Hegelian dialectical-purpose-driven, undiscipled barnfull of spiritual orphans, and ecclesiastical versions of Hitler Youth or Mao's Red Guard--with no accountability or ministerial responsibility to mature saints--whom the Lord has there to stabilize, teach the young greenhorns, and look the pastor in the eye when he regresses to prancing around like a girlyman on stage batting for both sides.

Study the Bible regarding how to recognize false prophets and false teachers. Study Isaiah, Ezekiel, Matthew, James, Acts. Look at their cronies--who they hang out with. Study the leprosy metaphors in Scripture analogous to spiritual uncleanness and the need for spiritual quarantine (cf. 1 Corinthians 5) in the epidemiology of sin and evil. Examine, in biblical theology, the vital necessity for a sound Pneumatology and integrated ministry of the Holy Spirit in the Body of Christ.

Start studying and thinking for yourself. Don't feed the cancer by attending these places, kowtowing to the hubristic, and/or giving God's money to these arrogant faux ministers.

Religion is too often a haven for the psychopath (a.k.a. sociopath) who has the Simony-cleverness of charming you on the one hand--and the bullying personality to intimidate you on the other hand--the cunning cruelty to make an honest inquirer feel very uncomfortable who asks (John 16, Jude) questions prompted by The Spirit of Truth.

(Excerpt: Unpublished Work in Progress)

Wolves Wearing Wool

TEFLON CHURCHIANITY..?

2009-07-10T06:29:00.000-07:00

American Teflon Churchianity & the Koinonia Deprivation Syndrome:The 30-Story Orange Juice Machine That Gives One Cup a Month

Is society being flim-flammed by an 'urban religious myth' that minimalizes being transformed by the Holy Spirit in Christ, and meaningful Chriistian fellowship--and maximizes simply showing up at a steeple box..?

Is it a religious myth that just 'church attendance' constitutes--or will provide--the meaningful fellowship, 'koinonia', and biblical assembling together needed in order to survive and thrive as a member of the community of the redeemed..?

1. Can just 'going to a church' fail to heal Koinonia Deprivation Syndrome (KDS), social alienation, loneliness, touch-deprivtion (God-to Man--or Man-to-Man)--or meet Christ's healing manifesto regarding Himself based on Isaiah 61:1-3..? (Notice that Jesus and Paul did not go to the synagogue for fellowship.)

2. Can just 'going to church' generally be viewed as a tribal custom and (essentially secular) pop-cultural practice which brings with it as many problems as the solutions it claims to offer..?

3. 'Going to church', in the experience of many, appears often to be no more than a 'bait 'n switch' operation--offering faux caring, saccharine compasion, (brochure only) promises of a 'touching experience', non-intimate rapport, wax apple empathy, platonic understanding, touted spiritual empowerment, giving-based relational friendship, and (conditional) help in times of need--in exchange for a suck-up-to-the-government-tax-deductible contribution in the plate--or, especially, large pledges during fund drives.

4. 'Going to church', apparently in the experience of many, places the naive 'seeker' in the presence and manipulative control of social charmers, religious salesmen, ecclesiastical politicians, the Apostate Church, pop-cultural religiosity, mega or emergent church group-think, the manipulation of lighting, music, 'give-more-do-more' pressure, the intrusive indignity of steeple-box pulpit-pontification and (albeit often subtle) crowd-control.

5. Simply 'going to church' may, like a God ISP, offer biblical teaching of Christian ideals (but more like a fast-food McMinistry)--while omitting authentically empathetic rapport and support-system fellowship. Could the lonely-in-a-crowd individual be kept offline without the essential 'Kingdom passWord'--to real life fellowship in Christ? Are most steeple boxes simply filled with e deer-caught-in-the-headlights pew-sitters..?

6. Is there a "life coaching" solution..? I believe part of the KDS solution lies in training each 'new creature in Christ' to begin building his/her own effective fellowship milieu (psycho-support system). Each new (or older) Christian believer must be helped to build his/her own (at least 10 to 12) koinonia group of (wise-elder-to-younger) stable, sane, Bible-studious, serioulsy-devoted-to-Christ friends--and meet regularly for fellowship, prayer, and sharing--and not be seduced into Teflon Churchianity a its used-car-salesmen subsidiaries, and (not the Father's) 'business of religion'.

(excerrpt: unpublished work-in-progress)
American Teflon Churchianity & Koinonia Deprivation Syndrome Copyright 2008 by Philip C. Brewer All Rights Reserved

The Song of the Soul Set Free / Church Music

2009-07-10T06:17:00.001-07:00

Christian Life Coaching
BLOG DISCUSSION: 'SINGING IN THE SPIRIT'
The solution to the 'Church Music' problem' will be found in sound Pneumatology
(sound doctrine, experiential knowledge & orthopraxy in the Holy Spirit).
by P.C. Brewer

{Note: I often wonder if any Reform Theology cessationist--who believes 'that which is perfect is come' means the Ending of the Apostolic Age--or the Closing of the New Testament Canon (90-95 a.d.)--instead of the correct interpretation--the Second Coming of Christ--and who thinks that the Gifts of the Holy Spirit (I Corinthians 12-13; Romans 12) got locked up in the catacombs in the First Century--can really ever worship God--in Spirit and in Truth (?). For example, if 'tongues has ceased' for the past two thousand years--so also has knowledge--and thus we haven't needed preaching and teaching either for the past two millennia--ha..! Is this one of the reasons I've had so many Reform theologians as Life Coaching clients...?}

1. "Let him who has (spiritual) ears--hear..."---Jesus (the 'spiritual senses' must be anointed by the Holy Spirit--in order to engage in the music of the transformed (new creature in Christ Jesus) heart.)

2. Worship, Praise, and Testimonial Songs (to the Lord God (knowing Him) and about the Lord God's (knowing His works) are a part of the Gifts of the Holy Spirit--a gift of God (study the Psalms of David, and study Ephesians 5: 18-19). (Study Joshua and Judges: "knowing God and knowing His works.)

3. Only the redeemed believer in Christ who has been given 'a spiritual song in the heart' ( the Song of the Lord) from the Holy Spirit--can 'worship God' or testify of God in Christ'. (Otherwise music and singing is merely a psychological, cultural, tribal exercise.)

4. Spiritual Songs and Hymns transcend above personality, tribal, cultural, popular, and subjective (emotional catharsis)human expression. And there are important understandings with regards to praying with the Spirit and praying with the understanding.

5. The worshipping, praising, testifying Christian vocalist and/or instrumentalist yields to the Holy Spirit's unction (inspiration, motivation, wisdom, love, empowerment, and instruction) and then God, the Holy Spirit, literally 'sings through that individual's soul (his-her human personality)--back to God and about God' (cf. the Psalms: e.g. Psalm 34: "My soul boasts in the Lord."; Ephesians 5:18-19. "...with songs and hymns and spiritual songs."

6. The 'earthen vessel' (clay jar) may superficially 'shape' the 'surface' of the song of the Lord--e.g.: resulting in a certain'style'--but the critical issue is whether s/he is 'singing the song of the Lord' in the anointing and unction of the Paraclete,the Holy Spirit Who comes alongside (vs. simply a carnal, humanistic, albeit entertaining soulish expression).

7. Only the 'song of the Lord--in the Holy Spirit' will bless God and will bless others: (Psalm 34: '...the Lord heard me...and the afflicted will hear and be glad--be ministered to." ("I will send a Comforter..." ---Jesus)

8. Study the reverse (opposite) of the above in the world's music--only the pagan songs written in the passion of occult mysticism--the reveries of Bacchanalia, Eros, Voodoo, Santeria, satanic (e.g.:Black Sabbath, The Doors) Rock--really make an impact (albeit ungodly and spiritually toxic) because they engage with the 'spirit world' (they are 'pneumatic' demonically like Jannes & Jambres who faced Moses). But only Christian worship is spiritually nourishing andPneumatic--wrought by the Holy Spirit. Pentecostals who fall, who go bad, who become apostate--go into occult mysticismof some form or another--because they will never be satisfied with simple secularism--or non-pneumatic religiosity.

9. Thus Christian Music must be grounded in the context of sound Pneumatology (the Christian believer's proper understanding of (and life in) the Holy Spirit)--and thus must be 'Pneumatological' to enter the Holy of Holies (not subjectively soulish) in nature--entering via our great High Priest, Jesus Christ and the veil of His shed blood. A song sung in the power and anointing of the Holy Spirit will lead from spiritual darkness to God's Light, and will always exalt Jesus Christ--always leading the seeking heart from that which is Trivial--to that which is Profound...from that which is Vulgar--to that which is Beautiful...and from that which is Profane--to that which is Sacred.

10. There is literal 'singing in the Spirit of God' in glossolalia (heteras glossae--other tongues, angelas glossae--languages of angels, or other cultural languages (cf Romans 8)--not known by the singer-in-the-Spirit); but all Christian singing (whether in known or unknown languages) must also be in the Holy Spirit--or it is merely a soulish, human-centered (vs. Theocentric), earth-bound, tribal, or cultural exercise--and merely psychological phenomena.

(Excerpt: Unpublished work-in-progress)
The Song of the Blood-Washed Soul
Christian Music: How We Sing the Song of the Lord in a Strange Land
Copyright 2009 by Philip C. Brewer
All Rights Reserved

-------------------------
(Discussions of Christian music are becoming quite common--for example, this one:)
From: "REVIVAL List"
Date: Fri, 16 Dec 2005 13:26:02 -0600
ANDREW STROM: Some people simply CANNOT understand my
stance on modern music - and its use in worshipping God. They
say, "But you are a Holiness and Revival-type guy - so how can you
condone this awful modern music?" Some people are completely
baffled by my stance on this. Hopefully the below piece on the
History of music in the church (from the Middle Ages onward) will
bring a little more understanding:

CONTROVERSY! - HISTORY of CHRISTIAN MUSIC
by "pastorbob"

Many see this as a new problem to the church and blame it on
the worldliness of the 'young' people or the fact that the 'old'
people are totally out of touch with reality. The debate on just how
contemporary music should be in the church is an age old one
which keeps reccurring. The problem is that we have not learned
from our past. Santayana once said, "Those who cannot remember
the past are condemned to repeat it" (Miller, 119). This, I believe,
is the foundation of our current contemporary Christian music
debate in our churches.

It is the intent of this paper to show that this is not a new problem.
I will do this by surveying the history of church music and by
examining the beliefs and practices of the key figures in each period.

The Medieval Period

Gregory I laid the foundation for the enlargement of the use of
music in the church. He developed the Gregorian Chant which
modified the scales and all voices sang in unison. All musical
instruments were banned during this time and only men were
allowed to sing in worship.

During the end of the 14th and 15th centuries the professionalism
of church music developed to a much greater extent. Only
professional choirs sang in the churches' worship services and the
common folk were extremely limited in what musical participation
they had. This contributed to their desire to sing religious music
outside the church. During this period the development of the
secular Folk Song was prominent among the commoners both
Christian and pagan. So, taking their example from the 12th
century troubadours men like Francis of Assisi wrote simple songs
of devotion and praise and these sprang up as important parts of
the religious life of the common Italian people. (McElrath, 147).
Even back in the Middle Ages, there was the need for the people
to sing religious songs in ways that were familiar to them. Again,
this is not unlike the situation today.

The Reformation

In some senses the Reformation was not only one of theological
reform but also of musical freedom. This musical reformation
began with John Huss (1373-1415). He opposed all polyphonic
and instrumental music and only would support the singing of
devotional and simple songs in unison. He stated that unison
makes all men equal in worship. (McElrath, 151) I believe Huss
took a step forward in the use of popular songs for the common
people, but by rejecting the use of polyphony and instrumental
music he took a step backward in music's overall influence on the
church. The Bohemians, Moravians and followers of Huss put such
an emphasis on popular praise in music that in 1504 a hymnbook
was published for use by the common people.

Luther, however, took a position of adapting the use of popular,
secular tunes with the truth of Scripture. He also believed that
there was room in the church service for the use of instruments,
especially the organ, polyphonic choir singing as well as
congregational singing in the venacular. (Norman,) Luther said,
'To win popularity a song must be in the most simple and common
language.' (Miller, 113) Luther got his inspiration for his music
from the popular German ballads of his day. The tunes were
borrowed from German folk songs. (Leupold,196) Luther was not
so concerned with the associations or origins of the tunes as he
was with their ability to communicate Biblical truth. (Miller, 113)
Luther went as far as to say ' The devil has no need of all the good
tunes for himself.' He further stated that 'For the youth's sake we
must read, sing, preach, write and compose verse, and whenever
it was helpful and beneficial I would let all the bells peal, all the
organs thunder and everything sound that could sound'. (Miller, 114)
Luther cared only to communicate biblical truth and to set hearts
on fire for the Lord. Is this not the cry of those who support the
use of a variety of instruments as well as musical styles in church today?

Others did not agree with Luther. Zwingli reacted against the use
of any instruments that had association with the Catholic church.
Calvin went even farther in his opposition to Luther's 'liberal' use of
music in worship. Calvin felt that instruments were only tolerated
in the Old Testament because the people of God were only infants
then. He opposed the use of instruments and the singing in parts.
He also eliminated any lyric not found in Scripture. He allowed only
the singing of the Psalms in worship

Two strands of church music, that which is 'sacred' resulted from
the reformation: Germany followed Luther in the singing of hymns
and the use of instruments while England and Scotland followed
Calvin's psalm only singing with out instruments. John Bunyan's
attempt to introduce hymn singing into his church resulted in a
split and at his death in 1691 the church finally agreed to
compromise. Those who opposed to hymn singing could either sit
in the vestibule or sit quietly through it until that part of the service
was done. (kind of like what happens today during the choruses singing.)

Isaac Watts (1674-1748) returned from church and complained to
his father that the Psalm singing was boring. His father challenged
him to compose something better. And did he ever! He wrote over
750 hymns and psalms and had such an impact and influence on
hymnology that he is called the 'Father of English Hymnody'.
(Miller, 120-121) Watts advocated the use of hymns of human
composure as opposed to Calvin's strict 'Scripture only' position.

Watts was not so readily accepted. There were those who thought
he was placing his own human words above the Word of God.
There were also those who felt poetry used in any sense was evil
as it aroused the sensual pleasures of man and was too worldly to
be used in church. Churches split, pastors were thrown out of their
churches and many people were enraged over Watts hymns and
their use in the church.

The funny part of all this was that even though the acceptance of
Watts hymns was slow, it did happen. When hymn singing was
fully embraced by the church in Europe as well as in the US,
tradition set in and no other type of song should be sung in the
churches but Watts hymns. It seems Santayana was correct once again.

The Wesleyan Revival

John Wesley was the spiritual father of Methodism. He preached
about having a vibrant and exciting relationship with Jesus Christ.
He was evangelistic and highly energetic in his preaching. His
brother Charles was the musician in the family. His hymns were
influenced theologically by John's arminianism and the Anglican's
churches freedom of accepting new musical and worship styles.

In relation to the Psalm singing of the old Puritan tunes, the music
of Charles Wesley was considered 'pop' . Wesley's music is
tuneful, with dance like melodies which were often taken from
improvisatory instrumental music. (McElrath, 157) Much of his
music had secular origins and influences. He adopted new
melodies from the popular opera and English folk melodies. (Miller,
125) Wesley had no problems mixing the secular and sacred when
it came to writing songs to communicate a biblical message.

Gospel Songs of the 19th Century

The gospel songs of the 19th century had it's beginnings in the
revivalist camp meetings in rural America. The camp meeting
songs were characterized by phrase repetition and choruses.
(Eskew, 171) The term gospel hymn or song was popularized by
the Moody-Sankey revivals in 1875 in England. D.L. Moody had
been called the greatest evangelist in the 19th century and he
believed that singing played a vital role in evangelism. He said: "If
you have singing that reaches the heart, it will fill the church every
time...Music and song have not only accompanied all scriptural
revivals, but are essential in deepening the spiritual life. Singing
does at least as much as preaching to impress the Word of God
upon people's minds. Ever since God first called me, the
importance of praise expressed in song has grown upon me."

Moody realized that he needed something new as the rural camp
songs would not reach the urban people he was targeting. So he
found Sankey. Moody and Sankey clothed sacred songs in a style
that was indistinguishable from popular tunes. They found that this
enhanced the power of their ministry.

Again, not all were impressed with Moody and Sankey. The Scots
were deeply entrenched in the Psalm singing of Calvin and had
even rejected the wonderful hymn writing of their own Horatius
Bonar. The Scots considered organ music to be of the devil.
Someone once said that if Moody kept singing songs like he was
doing, pretty soon he would have the people dancing. (Miller, 133)
In the end, the music of Moody and Sankey was to have a
incredible influence on the revival in Scotland and England.

The Salvation Army and William Booth

William Booth (1829-1912) had a burden to reach the common
people of England who were not churched. He resigned his
position as a Methodist minister and began to work among the
poor in London. His work eventually became known as the
Salvation Army. Unique to Booth's music was his use of a wide
variety of instruments: violins, viola, concertives, brass instruments,
drums and anything that would make a pleasant sound before the Lord.

Salvationists brought their instruments together and formed
Hallelujah Bands' Not unlike the 'Praise Bands' today. Most of the
people he wanted to reached, the unchurched, didn't know the
church tunes popular at his day. So he took tunes from the local
music halls. He used secular tunes and added Christian words.
Booth wanted songs that were simple and in the language of the
people. Songs that would stick in the minds of the people when
they left his meetings. He saw thousands saved who never had
never stepped foot in a traditional church.

Again, however, not all saw these innovations as positive. Many
Victorian clergymen, the press and local officials saw this type of
music as offensive and distasteful. Others felt that the secular
tunes would remind the people of the secular words and lead them
to sin. This didn't happen and the songs caught on like wildfire.
Booth made this charge to his soldiers in the band: 'Music has a
divine effect upon divinely influenced and directed souls. Music is
to the soul what wind is to the ship, blowing her onwards in the
direction in which she is steered...Not allowed to sing that tune or
this tune? Indeed! Secular music, do you say? Belongs to the devil
does it? Well, if it did, I would plunder him of it, for he has no right
to a single note of the whole gamut. He's a thief!...Every note and
every strain and every harmony is divine, and belongs to us...So
now and for all time consecrate your voices and your instruments.
Bring out your harps and organs and flutes and violins and pianos
and drums and everything else than can make melody! Offer them
to God and use them to make all hearts about you merry before
the Lord.' (Miller, 136-137)

Contemporary Society

The late 1960's saw the beginning of the Jesus Movement in the
US. This movement saw the antiestablishment of the culture
seeping into the church. With this came the need for a new music
style was free from the tradition of the established church. Music
that was more experiential and subjective and that was concerned
with expressing how the individual felt in his relationship with God
was what was being sung during this time. Most in the tradition
church thought it a fad but they were mistaken.

It has not only lasted but that grown and matured to the
contemporary Christian music we have today. And the traditional
church is still fighting against it. Some see it as a fresh moving of
the Holy Spirit while others see contemporary Christian music as
a blatant compromise with the world. Not unlike what we have
experienced throughout the history of the church.

Those in favor and support of this movement see churches utilizing
this musical format as the fastest growing segment of the church
today. They see innovative pastors utilize contemporary Christian
music in their worship services, youth services and evangelistic
outreaches all with great success. In fact, even Billy Graham has
utilized Christian pop singers in his crusades.

Opponents say that what appears good on the surface is a thinly
veiled disguise of Satan trying to weaken the structure of the
church. It shows the total lack of discernment and an embrace of
all that's worldly by the church at large. They want a return to the
traditional pattern of church hymnody. Personally, I would like to
ask them which traditional pattern of hymnody are they talking
about, but that is another matter.

Conclusions

It has not been the intent of this paper to come up with an answer
to the contemporary Christian music problem. It has been my
intent, however, to make people aware that this debate has gone
on for centuries. I hope to have shown both sides of the issue,
that there seems to be a pattern that develops:
1. Separation: One form of music gets firmly entrenched in the
church.
2. Integration: Bold, creative innovators who are convinced that
the old forms are outdated and not meeting the peoples needs
come up with new forms of music that are culturally relevant to the
common people.
3. Conflict: At this point, there is a charge from the traditionalists
that this new form of music is contaminated by the world and is a
compromise to it.
4. Renewal: Although music is not the only force in the change,
it is a strong and powerful one. This part sees the acceptance of
the new music and the church music is finally once again in the
language and style of the common people.
5. Traditionalized: The music which was once new and fresh
becomes standard and traditional and put in the hymnbook and is
now considered sacred.

During this time the popular style of the people is rapidly changing
and the pattern reverts back to step #1. The cycle begins again.

We need to learn from history so that we will not continue to repeat
it. The church is in the world and therefore it's message must be
culturally relevant. We removed the old English from the King
James, we removed Latin from the service, yet we are tied down by
the weight of traditional hymnody.

We need to be like William Booth and reclaim music for the
Church! We need to be like Luther and say that the devil should
not have all the good tunes!

SOURCE: http://mywebpages.comcast.net/pastorbob/theologicalpapers/
musicinthechurch.htm

CAVEATS: DEFECTIVE PNEUMATOLOGY, KDS, SECULARIZATION, ARTISTIC PHILISTINISM & SHALLOWNESS

2009-01-25T17:23:00.000-08:00

The Problem With Perfect Pitch, Artistic Sensitivity, A Substantive Personality, & Love of Christian Fellowship in the Holy Spirit

In The Republic, Plato wrote the allegory of The Cave, in which a trapped man escapes the ingrown, culturally-deprived, oppressive dankness of a subterranean cave and discovers a wonderful world of light and beauty outside and beyond.

This seeker-of-liberty, with great effort, frees himself from the ignorance, solipsism--and even persecution of his fellow prisoners--who will punish anyone attempting to leave the underground hole.

To share his excitement about the beauty of the outside world, he crawls back into the dark place only to be chained up again--and is permanently and irrevocably restrained.

The prophet will invariably be without honor in his home town--and will usually be stoned--in the rock-throwing sense.

A continually painful lesson from God's Word that I seem to have to re-learn several times a month--is that "There is no fellowship (in Christ's love) between (spiritual) light and (spiritual) darkness." There must be no unequal yoking--no marriage--or other intimate entanglements--if i understand scripture correctly--between a Christian and a Christ-rejector.

But I've often had to learn that same lesson over-and-over--even in the context of the Fresno area local churches(Sadly, the mega-churches are the worst!).

I've counseled with folks year-after-year who suffer from (my term) Koinonia Deprivation Syndrome (KDS)--and have no group of sincere and caring Christian friends to meet with, share concerns and needs with, pray for and pray with. (Of course, this is not church attendance, bell choir membership, or even going to Sunday school.)

Many a Christian couple and Christian family suffers from KDS--but, because of their secularization, are too embarrassed, aloof, or self-conscious to practice regular Bible study, and prayer-and-share together.

They will even turn (when KDS is the real issue) occasionally to pastoral or professional counselors--to salve wounds, heal relationships, or find inner peace--when regular fellowship together, sharing and participation in the Holy Spirit, and sincere couple and family prayer times together in Christ--would do all the restoration, reconciliation, and healing necessary. But their secularized mind-set keeps them out in the cold--spiritually, relationally, and emotionally.

With non-Christian ( Christ-rejecting--Cross-rejecting) unsaved friends, I want to show them Christ's love and the Holy Spirit's truth--but not expect fellowship in the Spirit. To aggressive American secular media, the Hollywood Star System, Christless politicians, unsaved psychologists, unregenerate businessmen, or worldling teachers--I can just say, "Hey--don't want any..'deja moo'...heard your bull before...ha!"

But it's more difficult, I believe, to confront professing Christians about their secularized thought-patterns, attitudes, and behaviors--or admit them to myself--or to suggest something as old-fashioned and quaint as Family Prayer Night--and then, in addition, a prayer-with-Christian-friends night.

With secularized believers this is regarded as idiotic and irrelevant.

Years ago, it was my privilege to visit L'Bri in Huemoz, Suisse, and enjoy meeting with the late Dr. Francis Schaeffer and many of the residents and staff. I discovered, in discussions, that there was apparently a friendly difference in philosophy between two scholars, Dr. Schaeffer and Dr. Os Guinness. I only talked with Dr. Schaeffer, but it seemed to me that while Dr. Schaeffer was concerned about Secularism (and its iconic windmills he was jousting against such as abortion, pornography, drugs, or crime--all important concerns, of course) Os Guinness was more concerned about the secularization of Christian minds.

I lean more toward the latter concerns which I inferred Guinness held. When professed (only christianized?) Christians allow themselves to regress into secularized thinking, paganized problem-solving, listening to the counsel of the ungodly (cf. Psalm 1), turning their backs on sincere Christian fellowship-- and become ineffective--they will suffer KDS.

When backsliders scoff at 'the mind of Christ' and resist 'the mind of the Spirit'--and consequently develop the sickness of KDS--it is no wonder The Church can seem to be a ninety-story orange juice machine that gives one cup a month--regardless of Mega-Church Row attendance, barns-full-of-strangers, and mega-tron power-point displays.

When a pastor, teacher, seminary professor, or a denomination which has a defective Pneumatology--preaches and teaches against the Gifts of the Holy Spirit being for Today--(perhaps fearful of emotionalism, excess, and wild fire)--they bite the hand that feeds them--and consequently lead their people into works-righteousness-by-default.

"Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." Captives are set free, and sight is restored to the blind (cf.: Isaiah 61:1-3). Sinners fall to their knees in confession and repentance. Carnal Christians forgive and make amends. There is blessing and freedom in the Holy Spirit--and protection from secularization of mind and heart. And victory over Pharaoh, Jannes and Jambres, Nadab and Abihu, Cora, the Prophets of Baal, Simon the Sorcerer, Demas, Alexander the Coppersmith, and Diotrephes.

Cessationist preachers, teachers, churches, and religious denominations--hand out spiritual bootstraps via digitalized-Christian-living homilies--so their constituents can fake-it-till-they-make-it--and try bravely to do-God's-work-without-God's-power. Like an atheist at his own funeral, the graduate of this cessationist, Spirit-grieving propaganda is all-dressed-up-with-no-place-to-go...!

Somehow these poor sheeple are supposed to achieve self-help sanctification, do The Great Commission, and fight devils (cf. the seven sons of Sceva in Acts). People are given Schulerisms, Sheenisms, and Positive Mental Attitude (PMA) sermons, "Keep a stiff upper lip, old chap...be positive..!" (I love the quote,"I find Paul appealing...but I find Peale appalling..!")

Yet, in reality, the Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (remember the movie?) recruits will only be going off to war to fight on the wrong side.

Wannabe ministerial voices will be singing castrata in the religious choir of Evangelicalism.

The Book of Acts illustrates an important truth: as the leaders go--so go the people.

Sadly, many Christian leaders (pastors, para-church leaders, missionaries) I've met around the United States--are not nice people--really not friendly, seem not to have the Holy Spirit's anointing, appear deficient in rapport-building skills, do not bond, are spiritually teflon, and even hostile--up close and personal. (Dr. Fritz Perls believed there are only two kinds of people in the world--nourishing and toxic. True..?) So it is to be expected that some ineffective leaders, in their aloofness, emotional coldness, and lack of empathy (despite their rhetorical platform performance) don't have a shepherd's heart, and thus can't model and teach their folks authentic fellowship-in Christ (not an ice cream social--ha!) with real concerned prayer and sharing together in the Holy Spirit.

A college friend of mine, gifted as a pianist and vocalist, won a scholarship to a major music conservatory on the East Coast. He had perfect pitch. I could ask him to sing an "A" and as he vocalized the "A" I would sound a tuning fork. He would always be on perfect pitch. Sometimes when we attended a concert or heard church music, he would have to get up and leave the room--because the instruments (or human voices) were not tuned to A-440, and the off-key dissonance was intolerable to his auditory gift. His gift of having perfect pitch held challenges for him.

The Gift of the Holy Spirit (which the Heavenly Father God promises to bestow authentically upon the seeker) opens the door to life's harmonies, melodies, and the privilege of being in tune and tuned-up with God's glory, and His nurturing, edifying presence--but also reveals the darkness of sin, the clash of healthy vs. unhealthy cultures (throwing babies to crocodiles, historically--ripping beating hearts out of virgins--or many, less-extreme, examples), dangerous world-views, devious political manipulation, and satanic ideological paradigms.

The moving of the Holy Spirit in drawing a responder to God, bringing a transforming-of-mind, power, deliverance, wisdom and love (2 Timothy 1:7; Zechariah 4:6; Acts 1:8, 2:4), however, may break a glass--or a crystal cathedral--ha!--and will separate the profane from the sacred, the trivial from the profound, the deep from the shallow, and the vulgar from that which is beautiful.

Cacophony (or any kind of 'phony' insincerity--ha!) will be revealed by the Bringer-of-God's-Truth (John 16). Any (not some one predestined-with-a-heaven-chip-to be-saved) responding person (not a card-signer!) transformed in Christ (Romans 12:1-2), will have an allergic (spiritual) reaction to false teaching, untruth, and evil: (occult mysticism, paganism, witchcraft, sin, lies, sinners, perversion, terrorism, criminality, and the spirit of anti-Christ) in the secular world system.

The baptismal fullness of the Holy Spirit in a Christian's life will guide, instruct, and bring God's fullness of joy in Christ. However, there may be (because of the Holy Spirit's alertness) sometimes a painful awareness of discord, a root of bitterness, knowledge of a spirit of disunity in the local fellowship. perhaps the cymbal-clashing violation of I Corinthians 13 agape and filial love in Christ. I believe that God, the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the Godhead--is the healing and therapeutic Minister in the Trinity.

Can the Holy Spiirit heal Personality Disorders (AXIS II on the DSM IV-R)..? social Work, Counseling, Psychiatry--have all given up trying to treat Personality Disorders and Psychopathy.) Yes, I believe so--even disorders like Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and Narcissistic Personality Disorder. (The Anti-Social Personality Disorder is just good a old-fashioned criminal version of Sinner-in-need-of Salvation-in-Christ.) But what about the Borderline Personality Disorder..? (I've learned that the disordered Borderline Personality does not miss people...interesting.

The Borderline is a truely teflon personality which does not bond. (cf.: the book, 'I Hate You--Don't Leave Me" about the Borderline Personality--seems to overlook this point.

A nourishing person can't really hang out with toxic people--unless perhaps he is on a mission and preaching the Gospel of Christ Jesus--but then that's not fellowship. That is Jonah going--even hesitantly--to Nineveh.

The Apostle Paul, even while in prison himself, was concerned and sensitive to the fellowship-threatening conflict between two women in the Church of Philippi.

I believe that once the sincere seeker-of-Christ has experienced authentic fellowship with the community of the redeemed and intimacy with the Heavenly Father in the Holy Spirit, he will never be satisfied with the plain vanilla relationally-teflon programs of churchianity.

Two years ago I realized how impoverished (and spiritually dry) I'd become regarding nourishing (home atmosphere) koinonia. I couldn't find anyone to have regular times of prayer-and-share with. I struck out across the USA looking for it--but really also trying to re-capture what I'd experienced in Fresno twenty years ago. So, perhaps this was a quixotic quest.

My early years in Fresno had been filled with rich fellowship in the Spirit, interesting conversation, a busy counseling practice, beautiful musical concerts, fruitfulness in the production of fine art, and ministry trips across America, to Colombia, South America, the U.K. and Europe--but somehow I lost my way...ran out of songs to play...and Oh Lord...stuck in Lodi again...I was suffering severe KDS.

The person who enjoys the opportunity to reflect profoundly and resonate with others who relish good conversation--or who has the good eye and taste to be an aficionado of fine art, good writing, good music, or poetry--will grow sick of continual idle banter, pop--cultural banality on radio or TV, or the rough crowd--non-substantive personalities. (Think of the proverb, "Shallow brooks are noisy.")

Likewise, sensitivity to the Holy Spirit (perfect pitch)--and sound Pneumatology--has its blessings--but also its challenges.

In pastors' support groups (one for ten years and another for four years) I tried to get the message of this Blog across and it wasn't understood. So don't feel bad if you don't get it either...ha!

(excerpt; unpublished work-in-progress):
'Perfect Pitch: Benefits & Challenges'
Copyright 2009 by Philip C. Brewer
All Rights Reserved

Thou Shalt not Think: If You Meet Buddha On the Road

2009-01-12T04:16:00.000-08:00

"Thou Shalt Not Think..Is Emergent Revivalism Turning Eastward...?"

The 3 'Waves' of "Revival' each make 'leader statements' and 'culture statements'--Toronto--Pensacola--Lakeland.

While we pray for conversions to Christ, for the afflicted to be healed by our Great Physician, we are also (not 'paranoid' but) sober and vigilant regarding any 'revivalistc' form of new religious movement--in light of the warnings (Hebrews) against apostasy and falling away from the Gospel (Galatians 1) of Jesus Christ.

I think, initially observing and listening to the 'leader statements' of each religious movement is probably the most important thing to do--with Bible in hand.

For example, in the Book of Acts, we learn the principle: "As the leaders go--so go the people." Study the leader fairly but carefully.

But it is also important to study the cultural, tribal, sociological, and psychological presentation. We can observe, for example in Lakeland, a 'cultural manifestation'--and within culture--various 'tribal statements'...being made

Why shouldn't the thoughful, prayerful evaluator be alert to demagoguery when it is present--to crowd-manipulation, to group think, and any form of brainwashing--when it presents itself..?

Musically...Reflective Worship Music which is melodious, harmonious, beautiful (e.g. like the 'urban gospel' stylings of the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir or Christ Church, Nashville Choir) are absent--in Toronto, in Pensacola, in Lakeland. Latter Rain revivalism features the tribal frenzy of indoctrination, keep-em movin' (not very skilled) Rock--and a pitifully-obese man-in-black kid--playing a tiny Wal-Mart-special-from gramma guitar. Aggravating, embarrassing--even boring.

Refledtion... isn't welcomed in mass indoctrination atmospheres. Because 'reflection' deflects 'thought reform' techniques--and heightens discernment, logic, evaluation, and consideration of what is going on.

Reflective "weighing" of what is going on is necessary (according to Paul in 1 Corinthians) but cannot easlily be done in a manicky, pressured-speech, frenetic 'brainwashing' atmosphere of chanting, jumping, adrenaline-pumping, glandular-galloping repetition. (Is this 'vain repetion as the heathen do'..?) Watch the Lakeland phenomenon on GOD TV. The manicky millenial warm-up jumping homonally back and forth across the stage--agitated--with Food Fight pressured speech--perseverating breathlesly--chanting a pseudo-song off-key--is a disturbed person--not a 'worship leader', I'm afraid.

Are televangelists, Emergent Church leaders, and Third Wave Revivalists all swerving into advocacy of some form of Eastern Mysrtical Irrationality..?

'The main 'commandment' of Buddhism is: Thou Shalt Not Think.

Buddhism, Buddhist ideation, and Eastern Mysticism has significantly influenced the Emergent Church Movement, in my opinion.

Anti-evaluative 'koens', the banning of logical thinking, striving toward a 'non-judgmental', quasi-'right-brained' listening-for-the-sound-of-one-hand-clapping constitutes a buddhistic thought-reform approach.

In essence, the musical chanting, breathing, jumping styles of some aspects of Buddhism have been incorporated--via New Age Seattle Grunge--and masqueraded as Emergent Church paradigm-shifting.

Are other Eastern Mysticism influences also seen in some of Todd Bentley's kundalini' resonances and implications..?

(excerpt: unpublished work-in-progress):
Thou Shalt Not Think: Is Emergent Church Revivalism Turning Eastward...?
Copyrigh 2008 by Philip C. Brewer All Rights Reserved

(Satire) Are Baptists Saved..?

2009-01-04T18:50:00.000-08:00

Are Baptists Saved..?
by Phil Brewer
"Tip-toe through the tulips..." --as sung byTiny Tim

Three Years in a Row--Then I was Persona Non Grata... For three years straight I was invited to Carson City, Nevada to be the speaker for the Southern Baptist (SB) State Conference. But I was given the left foot of fellowship when they found out I was a classical pentecostal.

Free at Last..! They didn't find out until after the third year that my third-generation Southern Baptist preacher Dad had, as a teen in Appalachian Eastern Kentucky--after experiencing the Holy Spirit's (John 16) drawing, conviction, and conversion to Christ, and later, as a young SB minister, having had a transformational mind-renewing (Romans 12:1-2; Acts 1:8, 2:4; Ephesians 5:18-19) Holy-Spirit-Baptismal epiphany (receiving God's gift of a devotional speaking-in-tongues prayer language, and finding his first authentic and meaningful koinonia-fellowship in Christ with MacArthur Jollay, an Assemblies of God pastor in London, KY) jumped the SB ship and joined the AG--later becoming the AG District Superintendent for the State of Kentucky.

Healthy Dissilusionment..! Prior to his being baptized in the Holy Spirit, Dad had already left the SB rejecting (intelligently and accurately) the erroneous cessationist Baptist teaching that "...that which is perfect is come" meant the (1) closing of the New Testament Canon, and/or (2) the ending of the Apostolic Age (90-95 A.D.). Dad had been a good Bible student already, as a young man, and correctly realized that "tongues shall cease...when that which is perfect is come" refers to the Second Advent of Christ--not the above-mentioned (1, 2).

(The Humor of Christ. When Dad was driving me from Pennsylvania to Florida for my matriculation into college at 17 years old, he laughingly told me, "The Bible states in that passage that 'when that which is perfect is come' knowledge shall also cease...so according to the Reformation Theology T.U.L.I.P. types, we haven't needed Preaching or Teaching either for almost 2000 years...!" We shared a good laugh over that silliness.)

Joyless Crutch-ianity. For three years the Nevada pastors had set up private counseling sessions with me-to complain about their joylessness, spiritual powerlessness, purposeless de-motivation--wondering if they were actually on the positive (implanted heaven chip) side of Louis Berkhoff's robotized Calvinistic, Double-Decree Predestination foolishness and scripture-twisting--versus the condemned to H-E-double-hockey-sticks (the bad place) hinderparts of tulipville.
After my (documented theological alien) disclosure, I enjoyed the Nevada Baptists' facial expressions (picture the constricted affect of someone who'd inadvertently popped a whole jalapeno--or a vegetarian being told the soy burger he'd just gobbled amidst belches was Black Angus steak). One angry Baptist yelled at me, "I don't CARE what the Bible says--tongues are of the devil..!"

Find the Already Found. One year I was invited (once and only once!) to hold an elective seminar at the California State Youth Conference at the Saroyan Theater in Fresno, California. There were about 3000 Lutheran college and high school students in attendance. The huge banner stretched across the front of the stage read, "Finding the Found."

{Tip-Toe Through the TULIPS. In Reformation T.U.L.I.P. Theology, the Elect--who were elected billions of years ago in the mind of God--only need to be Found. If you're not sure the ones you've located belong to the Found--that's okay--they can join the choir, play in the praise band (regardless of character), and help you, the pastor, pay the light bill. Inform your congregation that they hopefully have already been unconditionally elected (yes, implanted in the predestination sense with what I like to call in computer lingo a heaven chip) via God's limited atonement--Jesus, you know, didn't die for everybody, sorry--then that's okay--and even regarding these folks you're really not sure if they'll make the short list--i.e. be, in fishing lingo, big enough to keep.}

Pre-programmed Anyway. Missionary work and evangelism are only going-through-the-motions anyway. The grace--that God sics on The Elect (yes, this is theological elitism!) cannot be resisted by them--yes--they are programmed to persevere. (Yes, Harold Camping Rick Warren, John MacArthur, Dallas Seminary, and all the faithful Reform Theology folks shuffle to this party line.)
Tony Campolo was the main speaker and did his famous "It's Friday--But Sunday's Comin" sermon--based on a something he'd heard a pastor-friend preach in Philadelphia.

LRP, WF, etc. In my elective, I spoke on the problems with dispensationalism, cessationism, and double-decree predestination--in light of scripture and the Classical Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements. I also touched on the aberrant distortions and excesses of Latter Rain Pentecostalism (LRP) and Word Faith (WF) teaching (Beall-to-Branham-to-Copeland) which the classical pentecostals (e.g.: AG) had rejected from the late-Forties to the present day.

Showing the Mess in the Backyard. I also admitted that I had been disappointed (as had my ex-reform theology Dad) with the apparent spiritual impoverishment, dissipation, and deteriorating pneumatology of the classical pentecostals--including the AG--and my disillusionment with the tribal customs, impaired rapport, anemic fellowship, shallowness and superfciality of San Joaquin Valley Pentecostal Holiness, Pentecostal Church of God, and Assemblies of God churches--wondering if Ichabod (The Glory Has Departed) was truly inscribed over their front doors by God.

(One pastor of an older AG church bragged to me that he had kicked out several men who'd come to him and told him they thought God's glory had departed from his ministry and from the church. I was in a Christian Leaders' Support Group with this pastor for fourteen years and I believe those kicked-out men were no doubt correct.)

(Peoples Church had already become doctrinally and Pneumatologically compromised with a please-everybody-ecumenical-message and staff--and I'd already become jaundiced about the Episcopal churches I'd held seminars in--and Wesleyan (free will, responsiblity, sanctification-obsessed) Methodist and Nazarene groups I'd visited.)

Why All the Fuss..? In the seminar I focused on the obvious scriptually-based importance of devotional glossalalia and the intercessory comfort, divine communication, empowerment, and even my firm conviction regarding the cognitive and affective edification provided in the mind of Christ and the mind of the Spirit via the gift of devotional prayer in the Holy Spirit. I spoke of the Spirit of God as the non-modalistic Third Person of the Godhead--warning about the error of Jesus Only teaching.

Sound Pneumatology. The Holy Spirit is the Paraclete Who comes alongside to comfort, to instruct, to re-direct and correct with God's truth. The Holy Spirit's gifts describe the Giver and not the Recipient (contrary to Rick Yohn (nowadays Rick Warren et al) and all the evangelcal types who keep trying to help people discover their spiritual gift--as if they're administrating some sort of Personality Inventory). We looked at (Ephesians 4; Romans 12; and I Corinthians 12, 13), and the Apostle Paul's cautionary instruction (I Corinthians 14) regarding public-tongues excesses--while proclaiming that he spoke "...with tongues more than you all" in his private devotions before God, the Father, God, the Son, God, the Holy Spirit--One God--in three distinct Persons. Some present seemed to have a light turn on in their minds--realizing that the limited and not that common public Gift of Tongues ("Not all speak with tongues") had been a red herring to the cessationist T.U.L.I.P.S.

The Big Question. At the Lutheran Conference I asked the group, "Why do so many evangelicals and ecumenicals fight against devotional tongues--and really bite-the-hand-that-feeds-them by fighting against God the Father's authentic gift of the Holy Spirit (not a scorpion, not a stone) and baptism by Christ into the power and work of God, the Holy Spirit..?"

Then I answered my own question, "Because Satan wants a powerless churchianity-...and he is deathly afraid of Christ-exalting, Holy Spirit-empowered believers who are supernaturally transformed and anointed to be witnesses for Jesus Christ--in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth. Keep the little do-gooder steeple boxes 'down in the vale' full of spiritual-dwarf gutless wonders playin' bingo..."

Will modern-day Uzzah's and Ananias and Sapphira's who malign the the Holy Spirit and, as profane persons, touch the presence of God--suffer the same tragic fate...?

(excerpt: Part One: Unpublished Work in Progress) Are Baptists Saved..? Copyright 2008 by Philip C. Brewer All Rights Reserved

B.I.B.L.E.
1. (Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth)
2. "Mental Floss to Prevent Truth Decay"

DISCUSSION: Commentary & Good Article by J. Lee Grady...

2008-08-15T12:52:00.000-07:00

REASONABLE VOICES

Good article below (after my introductory comments) by J. Lee Grady, Editor of Charisma.

Thank God there are some reasonable voices out there like his--whether or not they've recently just come to their senses--or from the beginning knew Bentlley was a bent pin.

Or perhaps reasonable voices emerge just because of healthy disillusionment and disgust with the crazy excesses of sick 'Latter Rain Syndrome' revivalism.

Over the years I've worked as a clinician in two acute psychiatric units. I'd often rush out to meet my friends after my shift--not just to grab a sandwich--but mainly to talk with somebody who was sane, nothearing voices, (and, because he'd had a vision that he was Napoleon--had his hand in my blouse--Ha!). Like--when you've had the unfortunate experience of witnessing a bar fight--or some bitchy soccer mom beating up the coach--you relish going to a scenic park and reading a good book.

I've felt the same way after leaving a Latter-Rain type church or meeting (with its hyper-deliverance, holy laughter, pre-frontal-lobe-disturbance-visions, writhing on the floor like snakes, animal sounds, slaying, PMS-prophetesses, hopping-to-bad-music-like-jumping-jack idiots, pre-occupation with angels, obsession with ridding the place of jezebel-spirits, and making maudlin money-grubbing pleas for some damn--mythical usually--orphange in Haiti) ...looking for conversation with anyone--anyone sort of in their right mind--ha!..go to an art show..or, hey...a good cigar shop--talk with sombody--the bigger sinner the better--but hopefully an intelligent reader (a real rarity in Fresno!)--but somebody not religiously-pre-occupied in the goofy charis-manic sense--somebody not taking lists of demon names on a steno pad--with a copy of Frank and Ida May Hammond's Pigs In the Parlor tucked under her arm.

Sane voices (which are also biblically-sound Christian voices) can help us fend off the emotionally unstable, the apostates, the confused sheeple, and, sadly, the so-called 'Christian leaders' who endorsed, 'anointed', praised, followed (and will still follow) Bentley et al--and his 'Strange Fire' (a la Nadab & Abihu) Menace-try.

I have been personlly amazed at finding people that I'd known for years (and thought had half a brain) who still seem to want to remain in the 'Strange Fire' nest--like little birds with their mouths open--waiting for more worms. And, of course, worms they will get..!

For years, i've been warning people (not only about buying food from roach-motel fast food Mc-restaurants) but about the dead cessationist NAE and their ecumenical impotence on the one hand--and about Latter Rain Schizotypal ( charismagical) Personalities on the other.

Throughout my many years of ministerially-unhappy captivity in the 'egypt' of California's San Joaquin Valley--I've seen, for the most part, the one extreme or the other.

You may ask, "Have you found a haven in your cartooning and writing? And have you enjoyed the Psalm 23 respite you find in Satire..? And, while not being cyncial--do you continue to relish a healthy and robust skepticism and sales resistance to any prophetess..? And a godly aversion to all things evangelical, ecumenical, pop-religious, and 'prophetic'. And a healthy allergy to words like 'Elijah' and 'Jezebel'..? And mentally stable avoidance of any tattooed, splenetically-revivalistic, rock-n-roll-praise-band-atmospheres full of kundalini-gyrating emergent-church millennials..?

...Is the Pope Catholic...? ----P.C. Brewer

---------------------------------------------------------------

Life After Lakeland: Sorting Out the Confusion by J. Lee Grady, Charisma

Todd Bentley's announcement that his marriage is ending has thrown our movement into a tailspin—and questions need to be answered.

It was not supposed to end like this. (Ed. Note: Really? How could it have ended in any other way..when it was off-center 'Latter-Rainism' from the start..? --PB)

Evangelist Todd Bentley had heralded the Lakeland revival as the greatest Pentecostal outpouring since Azusa Street. From his stage in a gigantic tent in Florida, Bentley preached to thousands, bringing many of them to the stage for prayer. Many claimed to be healed of deafness, blindness, heart problems, depression and dozens of other conditions in the Lakeland services, which ran for more than 100 consecutive nights. Bentley announced confidently that dozens of people had been raised from the dead during the revival.

But this week, a few days after the Canadian preacher announced the end of his visits to Lakeland, he told his staff that his marriage is ending. Without blaming the pace of the revival for Bentley's personal problems, his board released a public statement saying that he and his wife, Shonnah, are separating. The news shocked Bentley's adoring fans and saddened those who have questioned his credibility since the Lakeland movement erupted in early April.

"Among those who jumped on the Lakeland bandwagon, discernment was discouraged. They were expected to swallow and follow. The message was clear: 'This is God. Don't question.' "

I'm sad. I'm disappointed. And I'm angry. Here are few of my many, many questions about this fiasco:

Why did so many people flock to Lakeland from around the world to rally behind an evangelist who had serious credibility issues from the beginning?

To put it bluntly, we're just plain gullible. (Ed. note: "Duh..." --PB)

From the first week of the Lakeland revival, many discerning Christians raised questions about Bentley's beliefs and practices. They felt uneasy when he said he talked to an angel in his hotel room. They sensed something amiss when he wore a T-shirt with a skeleton on it. They wondered why a man of God would cover himself with tattoos. They were horrified when they heard him describe how he tackled a man and knocked his tooth out during prayer. (Ed. Note; What's that Appalachian saying about "...didn't you know what it was when you picked it up..?" --PB)

But among those who jumped on the Lakeland bandwagon, discernment was discouraged. They were expected to swallow and follow. The message was clear: "This is God. Don't question." So before we could all say, "Sheeka Boomba" (as Bentley often prayed from his pulpit), many people went home, prayed for people and shoved them to the floor with reckless abandon, Bentley-style. (Ed. Note: Of course--"Monkey see--monkey do..." --PB)

I blame this lack of discernment, partly, on raw zeal for God. We're spiritual hungry—which can be a good thing. But sometimes, hungry people will eat anything. (Ed. Note: 'Sheeple' contestants on Fear Factor type TV shows eat all kinds of rodents and vermin...because they want the money..! --PB)

Many of us would rather watch a noisy demonstration of miracles, signs and wonders than have a quiet Bible study. Yet we are faced today with the sad reality that our untempered zeal is a sign of immaturity. Our adolescent craving for the wild and crazy makes us do stupid things. It's way past time for us to grow up. (Ed. Note: Trouble is--that's asking the impossible of I.Q.of 5 'Millennials'--ha! --PB)

Why didn't anyone in Lakeland denounce the favorable comments Bentley made about William Branham? (Ed. Note: Ignorance of modern Church History also comes back to haunt us! --PB)

This one baffles me. Branham embraced horrible deception near the end of his ministry, before he died in 1965. He claimed that he was the reincarnation of Elijah—and his strange doctrines are still embraced by a cultlike following today. When Bentley announced to the world that the same angel that ushered in the 1950s healing revival had come to Lakeland, the entire audience should have run for the exits. (Ed. Note: Ah...but the 'sheeple' didn't recognize the fact that Bentley is 'Latter Rain'...and, of course, there wasn't a scholarly Bible student in the bunch. And, sadly, these folks 'pre-screen' themselves--like attendees at professional wrestling--or Benny Hinn meetings...--PB)

Why didn't anyone correct this error from the pulpit? Godly leaders are supposed to protect the sheep from heresy, not spoon feed deception to them. Only God knows how far this poison traveled from Lakeland to take root elsewhere. May God forgive us for allowing His Word to be so flippantly contaminated.

A prominent Pentecostal evangelist called me this week after Bentley's news hit the fan. He said to me: "I'm now convinced that a large segment of the charismatic church will follow the anti-Christ when he shows up because they have no discernment." Ouch. Hopefully we'll learn our lesson this time and apply the necessary caution when an imposter shows up. (Ed. Note: Don't hold your breath..! --PB)

Why did God TV tell people that "any criticism of Todd Bentley is demonic"? (Ed. Note; Because GOD TV administrators present themselves as pushers ofNew Order of the Latter Rain--due to their endorsement of Bentley's propagandizing:"This fire of revival started in 1948 and is coming back to go around the world today!" --PB)

This ridiculous statement was actually made on one of God TV's pre-shows. In fact, the network's hosts also warned listeners that if they listened to criticism of Bentley, they could lose their healings.

This is cultic manipulation at its worst. The Bible tells us that the Bereans were noble believers because they studied the Scriptures daily "to see whether these things were so" (Acts 17:11, NASB). Yet in the case of Lakeland, honest intellectual inquiry was viewed as a sign of weakness. People were expected to jump first and then open their eyes.

Just because we believe in the power of the Holy Spirit does not mean we check our brains at the church door. We are commanded to test the spirits. Jesus wants us to love Him with our hearts and our minds. (Ed. Note: Amen and amen...!!! --PB)

Because of the Lakeland scandal, there may be large numbers of people who feel they've been burned by Bentley. (Ed. Note: Hey--we can only hope. --PB) Some may give up on church and join the growing ranks of bitter, disenfranchised Christians. (Ed. Note: Like many of the intelligent folk I enjoy chatting with in coffee shops.) Others may suffer total spiritual shipwreck. This could have been avoided if leaders had been more vocal about their objections and urged people to evaluate spiritual experiences through the filter of God's Word.

Why did a group of respected ministers lay hands on Bentley on June 23 and publicly ordain him? Did they know of his personal problems?

This controversial ceremony was organized by Peter Wagner, who felt that one of Bentley's greatest needs was proper spiritual covering. He asked California pastors Che Ahn and Bill Johnson, along with Canadian pastor John Arnott, to lay hands on Bentley and bring him under their care. (Ed. Note: Wouldn't this cause a sensible, sane, wise Christian to question the spiritual wisdom of the above-mentioned 'respected ministers'..? --PB)

Bentley certainly needs such covering. No one in ministry today should be out on their own, living in isolation without checks, balances and wise counsel. It was commendable that Wagner reached out to Bentley and that Bentley acknowledged his need for spiritual fathers by agreeing to submit to the process. The question remains, however, whether it was wise to commend Bentley during a televised commissioning service that at times seemed more like a king's coronation.

In hindsight, we can all see that it would have been better to take Bentley into a back room and talk about his personal issues. (Ed. Note: And then take him out to the wood shed!....ha! --PB)

The Bible tells us that ordination of a minister is a sober responsibility. Paul wrote: "Do not lay hands upon anyone too hastily and thereby share responsibility for the sins of others" (1 Tim. 5:22). We might be tempted to rush the process, but the apostle warned against fast-tracking ordination—and he said that those who commission a minister who is not ready for the job will bear some of the blame for his failures.

I trust that Wagner, Ahn, Johnson and Arnott didn't know of Bentley's problems before they ordained him. I am sure they are saddened by the events of this week and are reaching out to Bentley and his wife to promote healing and restoration. But I believe that they, along with Bentley and the owners of God TV, owe the body of Christ a forthright, public apology for thrusting Bentley's ministry into the spotlight prematurely. (Perhaps such an apology should be aired on God TV.) (Ed. Note: Again...don't hold your breath..! --PB)

Can anything good come out of this?

That depends on how people respond. If the men assigned to oversee Bentley offer loving but firm correction, and if Bentley responds humbly to the process by stepping out of ministry for a season of rehabilitation, we could witness a healthy case of church discipline play out the way it is supposed to. If all those who were so eager to promote Bentley now rush just as fast to repent for their errors in judgment, then the rest of us could breathe a huge sigh of relief—and the credibility of our movement could be restored. (Ed. Note: Please explain further in detail about 'the credibility of our movement'...sounds intriguing..! --PB)

I still believe that God desires to visit our nation in supernatural power. I know He wants to heal multitudes, and I will continue praying for a healing revival to sweep across the United States. But we must contend for the genuine, not an imitation. True revival will be accompanied by brokenness, humility, reverence and repentance—not the arrogance, showmanship and empty hype that often was on display in Lakeland.

We are weathering an unprecedented season of moral failure and spiritual compromise in our nation today. I urge everyone in the charismatic world to pray for Bentley; his wife, Shonnah; his three young children; Bentley's ministry staff; and the men and women who serve as his counselors and advisers. Let's pray that God will turn this embarrassing debacle into an opportunity for miraculous restoration. (Ed. Note: Trouble is--all the cronies, toadies, and groupies chose to dance with the devil out of their own naivete, narcissism, self-conscious attention-seeking, and shallowness . These folks are a mile-wide-and-an-inch-deep--because of their very glomming onto Bentley in the first place. Look at the YouTube videos of these associates in their trance-like stage performances. They're all one taco short of a Happy Meal---ha! --PB)
J. Lee Grady is editor of Charisma.

'Branding': From Dictators to 'Emergent' Postmoderns

2008-08-04T10:42:00.000-07:00

{Interesting..Read this book review below and then read the next (older) article about "Church Branding" ...Later, I'd like to have a discussion about another aspect of 'branding'--the postmodern 'cult of body-tattooing'--PB}

DESIGNING DICTATORS

By CHRISTOPHER BENFEY
Published: August 3, 2008
New York Times Book Review

How did a practice as vile as branding become so valued, indeed, the very mark of value? Officials in the past have branded slaves and criminals — remember Milady's fleur-de-lis in "The Three Musketeers"? Samuel Maverick didn't brand his cattle, but dictionaries are vague about whether he was the first maverick or his cows were.

Today, cities and colleges have joined toothpastes and soft drinks in the battle for "brand loyalty."

Steven Heller's "Iron Fists" makes a sophisticated and visually arresting comparison between modern corporate-branding strategies — slogans, mascots, jingles and the rest — and those adopted by "four of the most destructive 20th-century totalitarian regimes": Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, the Soviet Union under Lenin and Stalin, and Mao's China.

As he pursues his four "case studies," Heller, by means of unsettling images and shrewd analysis, amply restores the vileness to branding.

From "Iron Fists"
"Give me four years' time"; a photomontage from 1937.
IRON FISTS
Branding the 20th-Century Totalitarian State.
By Steven Heller.
Illustrated. 223 pp. Phaidon Press. $90.

From "Iron Fists"

"Let's build a fleet of airships in Lenin's name"; a poster from 1931.

"Iron Fists" has the dimensions and dazzling illustrations of a coffee-table book, but its subject will fit uneasily among Monet's waterlilies or Fabergé eggs. Heller, who was a senior art director at The New York Times for many years and now writes the Visuals column for the Book Review, brings a graphic designer's perspective to these disturbing proceedings.

He is aware that comparing supposedly "benign" corporate brands with government-disseminated propaganda may seem a stretch: "A popular brand of frozen food or laundry detergent is not forced down the consumer's throat with an iron fist."

Still, as he notes, "the design and marketing methods used to inculcate doctrine and guarantee consumption are fundamentally similar." His aim is not to diminish the insidiousness of the regimes under scrutiny, but rather to reveal why they were so effective.

Three of Heller's dictators considered themselves artists and eagerly participated in marketing their brands. Mao fancied himself a poet and master calligrapher; Mussolini wrote a pulp novel and portrayed himself as a hypermasculine sex symbol.

Hitler was an aspiring architect and avid watercolorist before adopting what Heller calls his "sociopolitical art project." The Führer sought to control all aspects of the Nazi brand, from the swastika "logo" to his own image, with mustache but without glasses.

Heller argues that Mao with his "Mona Lisa smile" and Lenin with his proletarian cap functioned in much the same way as "trade characters" like Joe Camel or the Geico gecko, putting "a friendly face on an otherwise inanimate (or sometimes inhumane) product."

Like modern corporate competitors, these leaders borrowed freely from one another, with Hitler taking the straight-armed Roman salute from Mussolini and Mao adopting Socialist Realism from the Soviets.

Some of the most interesting pages in "Iron Fists" explore the ambiguous place of avant-garde art in rigidly designed societies. Mussolini and Lenin were more accommodating of modernist impulses than Hitler, who declared war on "degenerate art" while making an exception for the filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl's "paradigms of heroic branding."

The temporary "fusion" of Fascism and the technology-embracing art movement known as Futurism led to some terrific pro-Mussolini visual design before Il Duce settled for neo-Classical "Roman" kitsch instead.

The early years of the Soviet Union provide some of the best examples of art flourishing amid utopian hopes for a new society — in Rodchenko's posters (including his famous promo for "Books" in 1924), El Lissitzky's remarkable children's books and Eisenstein's films.

All four regimes ended up suppressing individual creativity as a threat to the total control they sought. When the regimes fell in turn, their brands were retired. The swastika, an ancient symbol whose meaning, Heller says, "was forever changed when the Nazis co-opted it," is now banned in Germany except for "artistic, scientific, research or educational purposes."

Mussolini's body, so central to his national image, was hung from an Esso gas station, an inadvertent premonition, perhaps, that oil companies would henceforth rule the world.

For the most part, Heller's prose is as clear and uncluttered as the graphic design he admires. He takes no ideological position and does not distinguish between repressive regimes of the right (sometimes called "authoritarian") or the left. Nor does he advance any overarching theory about the destiny of art in totalitarian regimes, though he leaves no doubt about the grim fate of ordinary citizens.

Given his dark subject, he can be forgiven for abusing adjectives like "infamous," "horrific," "diabolical" and "heinous," though such words lose some of their power with the third or fourth repetition. They also obscure the continuity between branding campaigns of the past and our own battles over flag pins and the Pledge of Allegiance.

Heller makes no claims to a comprehensive survey, but one wonders why Imperial Japan, at least as "infamous" as Fascist Italy and with an interesting record of artists roped into the cause, was spared. One might also cavil about the material's organization, which places the Nazis first, according them a third of the book, even though Lenin's revolution and Mussolini's Fascism predate Hitler's rise.

Still, as Heller makes clear, the Nazis were the supreme masters of branding, both at the figurative level, in the vicious propaganda campaign he calls the "branding demonization" of the German Jews, and in a literal sense, as the Nazis "resorted to the most degrading branding technique imaginable."

My German grandparents, with a big "J" stamped across their exit passports, were among the lucky ones. Those less fortunate, as Primo Levi wrote of the inmates of Auschwitz, were branded with an indelible tattoo: "This is the mark with which slaves are branded and cattle sent to the slaughter, and that is what you have become. You no longer have a name; this is your new name."

Christopher Benfey is the Mellon professor of English at Mount Holyoke College. His most recent book, "A Summer of Hummingbirds," is about American artists and writers during the Gilded Age.

--------------------------------

Burned by Branding

What churches can learn from the anti-Starbucks movement.

Believe it or not, not everyone loves Starbucks. The Wall Street Journal's Janet Adamy has written about the growing resistance the Seattle-based coffee cartel is facing in many communities. The issue—Starbucks ignores local culture in favor of maintaining its brand-identity.

The already omnipresent Starbucks has plans to triple its locations worldwide to 40,000, but Adamy says the plan has alarmed some communities. "The proliferation of [Starbucks] stores has prompted a small number of cities to block it from opening out of concern the chain will erode the local character."

I've attended a number of conferences and read many reports in recent years about the popular multi-site church model. Invariably these sources will reference Starbucks as an example for churches who wish to establish themselves in multiple communities. But what should the church be learning from the rising anti-Starbucks sentiment?

During my first year of church ministry the two more experienced pastors on staff took me to "the Oracle." The old man lived in a bungalow not far from our church. I entered the house rather nervously. The 60's era furniture was covered in plastic, and every horizontal surface I could see was stacked with books. The Oracle looked to be in his 70's, he was unshaven, his trousers held to his belly by suspenders. He wore only a tight-fitting undershirt (popularly called a "wife-beater" thanks to the TV show "COPS").

The Oracle (aka, church consultant) sat in his recliner studying our numbers. He had requested detailed records of our church attendance, service schedule, and giving trends. He wanted nothing else. We sat in nervous silence waiting for the wise man to speak. After a few minutes of the old man saying "Hmmm," "Ahhh," and clearing his phlegm, he finally spoke. Without taking his eyes off the papers he started to tell a story.

"A few weeks ago I had a leaky pipe in the kitchen. Nasty things, leaky pipes. We used to have a very nice little hardware store up the street. It was small, but it was all we had. It's gone now." I looked at the two older pastors that had brought me here. Is this guy nuts? I asked with my eyes. Why have we come to an old man with dementia for advice about our church? The Oracle kept talking.

"So, I got in my car and went to the new place. They built a new Home Depot not far from here. You know the one. It's orange. You can't miss it. Sure enough, Home Depot had the part I needed. They have every part anyone could ever need." He paused for a moment, then started up again. "I like to drive," he said. Oh no, I thought, he's lost it.

"I drive all over the place. And you know what? There are Home Depots everywhere. And they always look the same. Orange. I say to my wife, 'Look another Home Depot' and she laughs at me. And when you go inside they are the same too. The plumbing aisle is always the plumbing aisle."

The Oracle finally put the papers down and looked at us. "You need to become Home Depot," he said very seriously. I felt like Luke Skywalker in Yoda's hut. I wanted to check behind the old man's chair to see if Frank Oz was controlling him.

The consultant went on to say the era of small churches was ending. The future was in mega franchised churches. The most important element, the Oracle said, was "brand identity." No matter where your church locations are, they must all be the same. Like Home Depot, or McDonalds, or Starbucks, people must know exactly what they are going to get from your church in any location.

That was my introduction to multi-site ministry.

But the Oracle didn't have the clairvoyance to see what Starbucks is now facing. Its strategy of vigorous brand management is no longer working. In fact, the coffee giant is now learning from the little guys' play book. New Starbucks stores are opening that do not reflect its well-established corporate identity. They are trying to personalize their stores to resemble local cafés that fit in with the community. One Starbucks in Denver has even abandoned the green mermaid logo of the brand.

The lesson—people don't necessarily want to be connected to a massive corporate identity. An increasing number want to identify with local, accessible, and human-scaled institutions. My own experience affirms this. I am writing this post in a local coffee shop. At 8am there is not an empty table in the house. This is where community happens in my town. Directly across the street is a Starbucks. That store sees a steady stream of people pass through to get their morning fix. But the tables are empty. It isn't a place people gather, converse, or write blog posts
.
What is the church to learn?

That's what the comment section is for, but I'll start with this thought. If the church is to be merely a dispenser of spiritual goods and advice, a place people pass through to get their religion fix, then we should follow the example of brand-driven corporate giants.

But, if we hope to form meaningful communities of Christ-followers we shouldn't neglect the power of being local.

Rather than reading the latest branding book, why not gather mature leaders and listen for the Holy Spirit? How is he advising us to be the community of Christ in this unique place at this unique time?

Posted by Skye Jethani on November 20, 2006

(Discussion) Koinonia Deprivation Syndrome (KDS)

2008-07-13T22:37:00.000-07:00

'KDS' and Going to Church: Cure--or Custom..?

1. Is it the best-kept secret in Evangelicalism--that American Teflon Churchianity is a 30-Story Orange Juice Machine That Gives One Cup a Month..?

2. Is it an urban religious myth that 'social action' should erode forward and eclipse The Gospel of Christ in priority, importance, and emphasis..?

3. Is it an urban religious myth that being a church member, an Episcopalian, a Baptist, etc. is just as important as--or equivalent to--being transformed by the Holy Spirit in Christ..?

4. Is it an urban religious myth that going to church constitutes meaningful fellowship, 'koinonia', and biblical 'assembling together'..?

5. Is it an urban religious myth--that going to a church will heal KDS, social alienation, loneliness, touch-deprivtion (God-to-Man--or Man-to-Man)--or necessarily access Christ's manifesto regarding Himself based on Isaiah 61:1-3--in the same way that standing in a garage will turn you into a car..?

6. Could it be that going to church (in many cases) is a 'tribal custom' and (essentially secular) pop-cultural practice which brings with it as many problems as the solutions it claims to offer..?

7. Sadly, could going to church often be no more than a 'bait 'n switch' operation--offering faux caring, compasion, a 'touching experience', rapport, empathy, understanding, spiritual empowerment, relational friendship, and help in times of need--in exchange for a suck-up-to-the-government-tax-deductible contribution in the plate..?

8. Could going to church in some cases place the naive 'seeker' in the presence and manipulative control of social charmers, religious salesmen, ecclesiastical politicians, the Apostate Church, pop-cultural religiosity, mega or emergent church group-think, the manipulation of lighting, music, 'give-more-do-more' pressure, the intrusive indignity of steeple-box pulpit-pontification and crowd-control..?

9. Could going to church like a religion-ISP, offer biblical teaching of Christian ideals--while omitting authentically empathetic rapport--the essential 'passWord'--to the real life experience of the pew-sitter..?

10. Whatever your conviction is regarding the above-listed points, it is the opinion of thie writer that each new (or older) Christian believer must be helped to build his/her own (at least 10 to 12) koinonia group of (wise-elder-to-younger) stable, sane, Bible-studious, serioulsy-devoted-to-Christ friends--and meet regularly for fellowship, prayer, and sharing--and not be seduced into Teflon Churchianity and its used-car-salesmen subsidiaries, and (not the Father's) 'business of religion'.
---------------------------------
While I do not discourage attendance to Bible-believing churches where there are spiritually healthy pastor-teachers who are empowered by the Holy Spirit and who are scholars of the Word--and who are true shepherds in Christ (and not 'spiritual hirelings'), I still encourage each member of the community of the redeemed to build a koinonia group for him or herself.

(excerrpt: unpublished work-in-progress)
American Teflon Churchianity & Koinonia Deprivation Syndrome
Copyright 2008 by Philip C. Brewer All Rights Reserved

The Apologetics Index (Research Reference)

2008-07-10T22:33:00.000-07:00

The Apologetics Index (apologeticsindex.org) 'family of web sites' provides over 25,000 pages of research resources on religious cults, sects, new religious movements, alternative religions, apologetics, anticult, and counter-cult organizations, doctrines, religious practices and world views.

These resources reflect a variety of theological and/or sociological perspectives.

Refreshment & Reconciliation

2008-06-26T00:09:00.000-07:00

Blog Discussion: Minisitry of Reconciliation (2 Cor.) & Times of Refreshing

Greetings fellow bloggers and Friends! (Please note: my blogs tend to turn out like 'improv' jazz pieces--laid out in a sort of 'stream of consciousness' Joycean manner, and as a result, may not always have a logical Socratic process--but come off more like a 'right-brained' artist-painting-in-his-studio style--eliciting observers' reactions like, "Why is he covering the canvas with black and green paint--isn't he supposed to be painting a 'still life' of the flowers there in his garden..?" When later published in book form--I 'hopes' it'll all be 'digitalized'--whatever! (I love words. When I tried to use a big word with my Dad's Eastern kentucky brothers, my Appalachian uncles would frown, put their heads in their hands, point at me, and moan, "...He read a book..."...with the kind of facial expressions folks wear while attending a funeral service...)

TIMES OF REFRESHING
by P.C.B.

I'm having a time of devotion to the Lord as I write this--listening to Christ Church Choir on my iTunes--hope you can get this CD soon--entitled: "He Has Been Good.".

'DRAW NEAR TO GOD...'. I'm thinking of the 'ministry of reconciliation' which is the theme of 2 Corinthians--a current study of mine--along with Jesus' ministry as told in the Gospels of Matthew,Mark, Luke, and John--as I listen to "There Is Healing In This House," "He has Been Good to Me," "The Word Is Mercy," "Touching Jesus," "He Forgives and Forgets," "I Will Trust In You," by Christ Church (Nashville) Choir.

(Christ Church Choir models the kind of 'ministering music' an anointed church choir can present--to the Lord's glory-to the edification and comfort of people--and witness to and exaltation of Christ Jesus.)

THE PRAYER CLOSET. I'm in a time of celebration in praise, worship, thankfulness, and profound appreciation to Jesus, my Great Physician, today--as I am receiving my Heavenly Father God's ministry to me by the Holy Spirit. I sense His divine healing touch today--and, beyond physical healing, a profound communion in the Spirit--God's gift of hope and encouragement--that His ministry through me will go forward in the empowerment of the Holy Spirit--that He will never leave me or forsake me--that He is there, not silent--that our loving Father God does hear and answer prayer ("And you shall seek Me and you shall find Me--when you shall search for Me with all your heart...and I shall be found of you." (Jeremiah 29:13).

"We overcome by our testimony, and by the blood of the Lamb."

"Epignosis:" ('knowledge-upon-knowledge')...the experiential and revelational knowledge of God--is not capricious subjectivism, emotionalism, or just religious feel-goodism in the psychological sense--although I've often enjoyed that too..!

IT IS THE RELATIONSHIP THAT HEALS. I've always recogized God's Holy Presnece in Christ, the ministry of the Holy Spirit--when I am filled with godly hope--when His peace reigns over my soul--and tears of thanksgiving, intimacy with God, His love, His joy, and worship of Him--flow freely--and when the meaning of biblical scripture opens up like a garden rose before my eyes, mind, and heart. When confirmation of the Lord's calling, His purpose (no--not 'purpose-drivenness'!), His guiding companionship, His surgical Truth in the Holy Spirit--becomes Central Government and Life Management.

(I know this is what we long for in large gatherings of corporate worship. And we always welcome that experience when possible.) But I am also reminded of the profound value of (individual-private)'closet-of-prayer' times.

THE HEALING TOUCH. When one desires to be taken out of 'wilderness deprivation' spiritually--lifted out of barrenness of soul--the parched desert of secularization, ennui, malaise, the crudenss and rudeness and crassness--of 'this present world's thinking, attitudes, mindset, despair, melancholia or anxiety--a 'closet-time' of intimate worship, listening, dialoge, sharing--and sometimes sobbing out one's 'groanings that cannot be uttered' and praying in the devotional language of the Spirit--is theTreatment of Choice--the only Cure--for (Psalm 23) restoration of the Soul--for the deliverance from fear that Solomon describes in Proverbs 34:1-4.

HEALING OF THE FAMILY TREE. But also--family, and small 'koinonia group' sharing of intimate confession, repentance, tears of contrition and tears of intimate love and spiritual restoration--healing, forgiveness, mercy, and fellowship in Christ--in the Spirit's efficiency and effectiveness--will do more in a few hours--than Humpty-Dumpty repairmen..!

(Not to speak of 'economy'--think of the millions--I understand--spent on mental health, counseling, social workers (whatever 'they' do--ha!) therapy, family therapy, CD recovery meetings, psycho-analysis, psychiatry, clinical psychology--all the 'wallet-padding' of so-called 'professionals'!)

A family time of experiencing God's loving, healing presence in Christ--of being in 'the upper room' together--baptized in the Holy Spirit--crying in reconciliation with each other and God--sharing loving hugs--is essentially--the only Solution for Individuation and Personal Adjustment--and relational reconciliation and social harmony.

SACRED VS. SECULAR SOLUTIONS. Most (if not all) of the 'marital and family therapy' conundrums, dillemmas, hostility, grievance-collecting, abusive histories, feuds, conflicts, emtional woundedness, alienations, hostility, addictions, rejections, emotional-abandonments, selfishness, love-withdrawals, vendettas--I have tried to work with for thirty years as a counselor--would be--would have been--healed--if couples and families had had the courage and faith--to practice the above-mentioned 'times of refreshing'--intimacy in His Presence-- and His hopefulness--to obey the Holy Spirit--and practicetouching Jesus--as did Blind Bartemaeus, the woman with an issue of blood, the Ten Lepers, the man at the Bethesda Pool, Peter, James, John and His Disciples..!

GOSPEL SONGS: THE ROMANCE. The community of the redeemed's great gospel songs dealing with healing of shame, guilt, sin, alienation, loneliness, forgiveness---great (Traditional and Urban) Gospel, 'testimonial songs' like, "Friendship With Jesus," Touching Jesus," "He Knows Just how Much You Can Bear," "My Savior's Love," "The Love of God," "He Forgives and Forgets," "God Leads His Der Children Along," have, in the so-called 'postmodern church' been marginalzied and pushed aside by the (especdially White male-rocker-alternate-grunge) praise bands and the all-too-commercial 'praise music industry'' (and what an industry it is--hopefully much of it still not a 'worship of the commercial golden calf'...!).

CULTURE OF NARCISSISM. Is this because this is a generation too often unable to 'abstract', appreciate the profound, or rejoice in sincere love and profound thankfulness to the Lord God for what He has done? A Culture of Narcissism has no heart for sensitivity to the Holy Spirit--thus loses the benefits of the Spirit's freedom from fear and His gifts of "...power, love, and soundness of mind."(2 Timothy 1:7). The christianized and religious parts of American culture (sadly) behave like the nine-out-of-ten lepers--who went on their way healed--yet self-absorbed and thankless.

PNEUMATOLOGY. There is little Pneumatological Experience--few are baptised in the Holy Spirit--few seem to experience God's healing touch in Christ. Do few know God, His Works, or His Presence (cf. Joshua and Judges)...? It seems to be the case.

TESTIMONY. Testimonial Songs may be considered maudlin and sentimental--not 'reformation theology'--not masculine enough--too 'pentecoostal'--too'charismatic'. But the art of the testimonial song is the story of The Great Romance between man and God--which continues in great poetry, ballet, great drama, great musical compositions, great novels, and fine art.

{War on three fronts: A Personality War; A Cultural War; A Spiritual War--will be discussed in future blogs.}

IS GOOD TASTE POLITICALLY INCORRECT? Isn't this devotional desert in contemporary Christianity which we address here--part of 'culture war' phenomena--in the same sense that the beauty and gravitas of fine art, great clasical compositions or brilliant jazz arrangements and improvisations are sniffed at, ignored--or even maligned--by brutes, blue collars, blunt-minded jocks, carnies, and art-despising rednecks...? Is not philistinism always lurking in the shadows behind theCity of God from the beginnings of Redemptive History..?

GENERATIONISM. Can this just be a 'generational' phenomenon? For example, 'young people' study classical music, ballet, immerse themselves as art students in studies at the Rjik, Van Gogh, Louvre and The Prado Art Museums, major in medicine--become nan-technologists--or go to Aspen for intensive 'clinic-festivals'.

Is this perhaps a 'culture war' perhaps already lost in a 'cultural coup'--and thus no longer even a'war'.

Have too many young people today been thought-reformed by Pop Culture..?

MYTHOLOGY? Is it a postmodern religious myth that 'the youth need their own music' or that, say today's 18-22 year-olds, function in monolithic soldarity regarding artistry, interests, and quality of taste? Is this just an urban cultural myth--that simply must be debunked--despite the attempts of the Emergent Church, religious collectivism, or the propaganda of Group Think would have us believe?Is 'cultural relativism' actually just another socio-anthropological myth..?

ARE THERE 'ESTHETIC' ABSOLUTES? Can we pronounce that just as sin is sin--from the beginning--even though we now can put in on Power Point--so quality is also quality--and beauty, profundity, and the Sacred--have been so from the Beginning--honoring and reflecting the nature of God...?

I.E.: ARE THERE STANDARDS? May we postulate that any trend, fad, or 'tribal/cultural attempt' at music--which is harmony and melody-(even rhythmically) and conceptually impaired--will simultaneously show itself to be Pneumatologically-challenged--impoverished in ministerial appropriateness, relevance--lacking the Anointing of the Holy Spirit--even though not overtly 'religious' in nature...?

BEAUTY, TRUTH, TASTE, QUALITY, PROFUNDITY--AND THE SACRED. In other words--may we enjoy giftedness, by outstanding artists in any genre--the mandolin and guitar impressario, J.S. Bach at the organ, Art Tatum, George Shearing, Rachmaninoff--at the Piano, Horowitx, Heifitz--in the concert hall, Rembrandt, Michelanglelo, or Rodin--in his studio, the gifted raconteur, the gifted stage actor, a T.S. Eliot, poet, a novelist like Victor Hugo or Flaubert--as being anointed by the Holy Spirit..?

(Excerpt: Unpublished MSS)
"Times of Refreshing: The Holy Spirit VS. Pop Culture"
Copyrght 2008 by Philip C. Brewer
All Rights Reserved

The Eden, NC Methodist Church My Grand Dad Clarke Founded

2007-03-18T00:07:00.000-07:00

The Mega Church Phenomenon

2007-02-22T12:47:00.000-08:00

Lynchburg, Virginia, Ozark, Missouri, San Antonio, Texas--and the Wild West: Is This God's Wellness or Orwellian Madness...? (I do believe that the Mega-Church can offer many good ministries to the community, and in a future addendum to this article will consider the positives.)

After my cross-country trek last Fall, during which I visited several 7000 to 12,000 member churches, I penned in my journal ponderings like, "Will the current mega-church explosion--this ecclesiastical you-can-buy-anything-you-need-here-Walmartization of religion--eventaully implode on itself..or are there sufficient redemptive trickle-downs? Is this just a systemic Pop Culture spasm--or something resonating with Acts 2..?

I do earnestly pray that the Mega-Church can be a mighty ministry for the Lord God, that it truly is a sign of healthy spiritual growth--and not just a phenomenon of "fatness in Numbers" and a barn full of 'spiritual orphans'. The following thoughts are not meant in any way to be condemning, pejorative, or cynical. I am praying that all local churches, large or small, may be spiritually healthy gardens of godly growth.

The Steeple Chaser, as a thoughtful observer, (seeking always to be skeptical but not cynical, satircal but not sarcastic) might wonder: "Is there some part or aspect of mass-movement churchianity--the kind with placating platitudes, defective Christology and Pneumatology, a 'diffenrent gospel' of charismagical health, wealth, and narcissistic Successism, with its barnfulls of herded, passive sheeple perching-up-there-in-the-bleachers--that points to The Apostasy mentioned in Hebrews..?

And/or is this, perhaps in the socio-psychological sense, an eschatological sign that America is ready for fascism..?"

What about the Mega-Church 'atmosphere' and its meta-messages..?

Is jumbo-tron screenism (sometimes even taped elsewhere by an absentee pastor who perhaps enjoys fishing for cookable fish)--which provides unwanted glimpses of uvula and forced inspection of the American-Idol-wannabe vocalist's latest dental prosthesis, and the offering-taker's cheek mark which looks too much like the shape of New Zealand) really just a Big Brother vehicle for the one-way-commuication of a subtle totalism and authoritarianism afflicting itsel on the redeemed community..?

Even though some may laugh at this point, the critical thinker (rare breed that he is) might ask: "Does the nineteen-foot high in-your-face close-up of a speaker's florid 'affect' achieve more of a ('purpose-driven') brainwashing and 'thought reform' goal--than interpersonal nurturing, nourishing pastoral teaching-from-life, and compassionate day-to-day shepherding..?"

Would it rain on the herd-thinkers' parade to ask, "Is the mega-church phenomenon just another corporate takeover--another co-opting, 'benignly hostile' scarfing up of the more meaningful, effective, (and 'nutritious') small church 'mom and pop' operations..?"

But just as it's easier to cop out and move from the accountability of a small town--to hide impersonally and anonymously in the big city and live the 'secret life of Henry Fife'--it's also ("fer shure") easier to slip into the mega-church cattle drive.

Why not? Everybody's doin' it..!

The old saying comes to mind and makes me grin, "Fifty million Frenchmen can't be wrong." Ha--the reality question is, "Can even one Frenchman be right...?"

(At least you can try, perhaps, to correct their perceptual distortions, impaired insight, impulsivity, and truncated judgment--if you keep them in small groups that is..!)

Please organize a 'panel of experts' who can clear these questions up for me..!

The Christian Leader's Support Group

2007-02-10T19:28:00.000-08:00

_____________________________

“I’m so busy—I have to take the time..!”
The Christian Leader’s Support Group
by Phil Brewer

Your Relational Support System. Ideally, you have a loving family, some good friends you can trust, and respectful regard in your ministerial milieu. But whatever the quality of your support system, you may want to consider organizing a support group of four or five peers. Friends and family are precious treasures and constitute part of our relational wellness. But your own support group, with its focus, accountability, honest feedback, mining of biblical truth, active listening, heartfelt prayer, sincere empathy, and shared vision offers profound benefits. The adventure of a functioning support group run in an atmosphere of courtesy, mutual dignity, and edification awaits you.

Seeking Candidates. Look for persons of like precious faith—who love God, whose lives are dedicated to faithful stewardship of the gospel of Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 4). Look for men who basically share (or feel compatible with) your world view and Christocentric vision. And homogeneity of gender (all men or all women) seems to work best.

Caveat: Discouragement. A good support group takes time. You must resolve to do some ‘research and development’ before your ‘engineering’ is improved. One or two may drop out, or not show up in the first place. But lay all before God in your earnest prayer for a functional support group, be persistent, and He will bring it to pass.

Caveat: “Clones.” Cloned sameness (while appearing to double strengths) may also double weaknesses. Healthy heterogeneity can enrich the gather-ings: an intelligent youth pastor or dedicated music minister enjoying wisdom of older senior pastors; a first time church planter comparing notes with veterans; a liturgical or mainliner with an independent charismatic or classical Pentecostal. Godly representation from different ethnic and multicultural backgrounds can bless your koinonia and bring valuable perspective. A counselor, a chaplain, or parachurch leader can spice up the conversation.

Seek Wisdom. Pray for the Holy Spirit’s guidance to build a group of men/women who are rational, sensible, mentally healthy, and generally easy to get along with. (Someone who is chronically hostile, contentious, inappropriately suspic-ious, emotionally immature, a crank, a 'concrete thinker' who can't think abstractly, a grievance-collector, has a one-issue theology or simplistic hobby horse--usually needs more in-depth therapeutic ministry than the typical support group can offer.) 'High maintenance personalities' require 'high maintenance engineers' (life coaches!).And pray earnestly that your group will be focused: listening—observing, paraphrasing, understanding.

Transference Issues. Even though a pastor can’t have this luxury in his congregation, don’t build anyone into your support group whom you consistently feel uncomfortable or nervous around—or just don’t like. If you have sincerely brought this before the Lord, you may simply have a ‘transference issue’ and should just pray for that person from a distance. A support group can be chilled by transference issues (which often have nothing to do with his or your spirituality). For example, you may remind him (without realizing it) of a Little League coach he didn’t like, or he may remind you (unconsciously) of that prof who gave you a low grade, or that vicious ‘Diotrephes’ type church boss (cf. 3 John) who sabotaged your last pastorate and got you voted out! The typical support group doesn’t provide an appropriate arena for figuring out why you don’t like someone.

Phase One: Proactivity. Seek the Holy Spirit’s management. Make in-person and phone inquiries. Get Email addresses. Scan or snail mail this support group information to persons who may be interested. Invite four to six motivated persons to coffee. Agree to pray corporately regarding the support group. Stay in contact via Email and/or phone with those showing interest.

Phase Two: Organizing. Get together for an early breakfast discussion with the committed. Suggested maximum is six members per support group. Set the date for your first meeting. In the first support meeting, agree on a standard (albeit flexible for holidays or emergencies) time of the month and day of the week. Choose a ‘round robin’ location at the different homes, off-ices, (or comfortable and private church rooms) of group members. A full breakfast, or just snacks and beverages, may be offered as each member hosts the support group on his particular month. Suggested meeting time is from 8:00am to 1:30pm, one day a month—e.g.: second Thursday of each month. Of course, your group may choose a different schedule.

Phase Three: Management. Over the years several standard questions have proved helpful. Each member should try to manage his time in dealing with each question, while at the same time feeling relaxed enough to express himself candidly and fully. A support group member also has the privilege of deferring on a particular question (perhaps “all is well” in that category or he just may not want “to go there” at this time). One question might take forty-five minutes to go around the circle. Another question might be dealt with in a shorter period of time. In some meetings a particular member may need more focused empathy and time from the rest of the group. If profound issues emerge which seem beyond the scope of a support group, the member may want to talk privately with a qualified Christian consultant. Generally that life coach shouldn’t be in the same group, I think. While the support group has a very healing and encouraging purpose, it may not be able to function as psychotherapy or group therapy. Christian trust, based on absolute confidentiality, of course, is a must. Priority requires a prayerful sensitivity to the Holy Spirit’s leading (e.g.: “themes” for the day) and proper orchestration (i.e.: no domination of time by one of the members).

Phase Four: Suggested Support Group Questions.

(“During this past month…)

1. …What has God been saying to you in His Word? (devotional Bible study and prayer-journaling—not just Sunday’s sermon if a pastor)

2. …How have you been using your time? (schedule, pacing, recreation)

3. …How are your relationships going? (family, friends, staff, ministry)

4. …How are things going personally? (stress, motivation, decisiveness, inertia, effectiveness, frustration, worry, anger, thinking, obsessions, perceptions, confidence, creativity, calling, hope, humor, health)

5. …What spiritual leadership principles have you learned--or desire to? (Are you growing in leadership-effectiveness & problem-solving?)

6. …How may we pray with you?” (wellness needs: physical, mental, spiritual, relational, economic, career-satisfaction--ministry, calling)

Support Group ‘peer-feedback’ can help one realize things like…

1. Life (& ministry) is a marathon not a fifty-yard dash (pacing, more time with the 'strong' than 'weak', sabbaticals, 'time-out'--not just 'time off').

2. Clearly defined boundaries, limitations, and 'compartmentalizing'--stall burnout.

3. Religious institutions were made for man (not vice versa) (“The sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath”). Don’t be too 'religiously-pre-occupied'.

4. One must not derive too much self identity from 'role-image: “...have a life.”

5. Idealistic expectations can be blunted and lowered (accurate reality-testing).

6. Creativity, self-care, healthy humor, being flexible—help maintain wellness.

7. Difficult people and problems can be coped with (or seek God and move on!).

8. "The battle is the Lord’s"--become a Satisfied-Satisfier instead of a Frustrated-
Satisfier. (Frustrated-Satisfiers can backslide into Frustrated-Frustraters).

9. Your own handicaps & perceptual distortions may be managed and corrected.

10. Inspiration & encouragement from your group is available during blah times.

11. Support during personal struggles--e.g.:loneliness, alienation, sickness.

12. Build an enduring close friendship or two perhaps from your Support Group.

13. Develop insight re: how you come across to others (e.g.: facial expressions, mannerisms, habits, personal hygiene, communication style). Do you need voice-coaching to help you project properly with intercostal diaphragmatic breathing—because you preach with an effeminate, high, squeaky-squawky voice--torturous to listen to? [Many leaders have no insight regarding how tedious it is to listen to their perhaps good material—because of poor voice projection and lame rapport! Sadly, others may just be boring--blunt 'affect', emotionally cold, with impoverished and uninteresting no listen-no study-no pray lives--droning on-and-on--superficial and self-absorbed--with no depth of rich humor, satire, irony, paradox, or metaphor. Some are judgment-impaired magical thinkers--or secret-lifers*--some feel compelled to be on TV.]

14. Not trying to do God’s work--without God’s power. Like it or not (cf. Acts) the effective Christian leader must walk in the Spirit (as the leaders go--so go the people). The Spirit stops 'policy wonks', 'control freaks', 'toadie collectors', and attention-seekers. The Pneumatic (Spirit-empowered--Zech. 4:6) minister of Christ must not only have a healthy Christology but experiential knowledge and practice of a sound Pneumatology. (Who is in charge here?)

15. An honest Support Group can be an arena for the soul-healing confession--that artificial charm, secular market-driven purposes, programs, and the strange fire of carnal charisma have failed miserably to reach souls in the stewardship of Jesus Christ. My dear minister-Father told me about the deacons in a rural Kentucky church, who, when asked, “What is the anointing of the Spirit?” replied, “We don’t know if we could define what it is…but we sho-do-know-what-it-ain’t…”

EMMAUS
Christian Leadership Assistance Program
Philip C. Brewer, Director
(e) CounselPro@gmail.com
(Online LifeCoaching): http://christianleaderlifecoaching.com

Copyright © 2002-2003-2004-2005-2008 by Philip C. Brewer All Rights Reserved

Analog vs. Digital: The Soren Hypothesis

2007-02-02T22:55:00.000-08:00

Life is 'Analog'--not 'Digital'. Surviving and Thriving Depends on Coping With, Defending Against, and Gaining Victory Over--'Digitalization' by inappropriate Religiosity, Idealism, Institutionalism, Socialism, Culturalism, and Totalitarianinsm.

"I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless, I live."

Christ is perfection. "...in Him I live and move and have my being" ...in my human messiness and frailty.

In this hypothesis, Human Living--with its problems-of-living and problems-of-loving--is 'analog'--not 'digital'--in that life is 'messy'. Even though digitalized things are fun to read (a novel) or to watch (movies, TV sitcoms, anything with a beginning, middle, and end) one does not live in a novel, a film, a TV show, or a piece of fine art.

Yet, again, we enjoy a painstakingly-crafted sculpture, neatly-worded choral music, or a sermon (from behind a pulpit with three points and a poem), because prepared presentations are 'digital', and really must be so to be logically followed--whether or not in the Western European cultural tradition.

Yet ministry always emerges from life and from community. Folks would rather "see a sermon (analogously) rather than hear one (digitally)."

Christian ideals are 'digital' but the challenge a human seeker of God has in reaching toward these ideals (the daily grind, the lonely apartment, the dead-end job, the reality of aging and loss of function) is 'analog'.

A man tries this door, tries that one. One attempt is analogous to another--analogous-to-some-frame-of reference--or to a past attempt. And, perhaps a pattern is developed. A totem is set up. A taboo is legislated.

Or perhaps a well-intended-yet logical fallacy is inferred from a correllation ("Let's not take Henrietta to the party with us because every time we take her we have car trouble"). Ask any scientist or researcher, correlations and causes are not always neatly paired up.

But the fallable, "researching and developing" analogous human being sweats and struggles in relation to a standard or placement of the bar by biblical plumblines. political pontificators, or pulpit preachments--hoping to 'improve his engineering' some day, to better his 'batting average', or to make par.

Christ's exhortation "Be ye perfect" is analogous to serious 'research and development'--like not freaking out but just relaxing in the bottom of the boat with Jesus next time on the Sea of Galilee when the storm hits--like not denying Him next time. Like casting the recalcitrant devil out this time. Wholehearted devotion. Obediently following Him, taking up His cross--yet, so messily, in such frailness, even in times of human craziness--definitely not in the 'digitalized perfection' that only God can possess.

Analog: the Spirit vs. the Letter of the Law. The righteous person in Christ may well know not to 'touch the Ark'--yet Christ will liberate the 'analogous' human seeker of God and His truth from neurotic anxiety about eating the 'temple shewbread' or pulling his ox out of the ditch on the Sabbath.

The First Century Sadducean/Pharisaical obsessive-compulsive distortions of godliness were an impossible 'yoke', an iron grip of digitalization that neither they nor their religious-systemite 'frustrated-satisfier' victims could bear. Jesus, the Anointed One, the Second Person of the Godhead, Himself divinely perfect, broke into a fascist (Roman ruled) world, and Pharisee-bound world in which the cure's totalitarian (a toxic kind of digitalization to be sure) grid was worse than the disease. Both the paranoid and the obsessive-compulsive--attempts angrily (in a human and social-engineering sense) to digitalize people and digitalize life.

Attempts to (politically or religiously) 'digitalize' human beings minus the Messiah (even trying to moralize minus-the-Messiah) will always backfire, and produce iatrogenic (treatment-caused) problems. Study Judas' moralizing-minus-the-Messiah in his bleeding-heart-liberal-fretting over "the poor" in John chapter 12.

The disciples, for a while, had 'frozen expectations' wanting Jesus to be the Conquering King in their 'now' rather than the Suffering Servant which had to come first in prophecy. They frustrated themselves by pressing the wrong 'prophetic template' over their Savior's mission. He had to go to the Cross first.

"How have the mighty fallen." Perhaps a more proactive approach could be taken to prevent Christian leaders from falling from grace and/or to prevent their messy misconduct from terminally disillusioning their constituents.

This would be to teach the redeemed community the humble realities of human frailty, while cautioning pulpiteers and televangelists regarding excesses of Triumphalism, Entire (instantaneous) Sanctification, and the touting of grandious idealizations, pedestalizations, and an obsessive legalism that belongs only to paranoid psyches and social systems.

Was the Apostle Paul demonstrating this 'analog truth' to us when he confronted Peter or fussed about taking a fellow missionary along after the man had messed up?

What about when he struck out (Acts) initially toward Asia and 'hit the wall?' Paul thought he was supposed to go to Asia but was blocked.

His R&D continued with more dedicated lab work in the Spirit as he then headed toward Bithynia--again only to find his goal frustrated and his 'spiritual engineering' perhaps only slightly improved.

Then God upgraded his 'spiritual sonar and radar' (and included the vision of the man from Madedonia), giving Paul a very clear, graphic visual schematic--better mission-mapping.

Paul's 'analog faithfulness' (I Corinthians 4: "...It is required that a man be found faithful") resulted in improved 'spiritual engineering' and successful goal-attainment as he walked more and more sensitively "in the Spirit" (Romans 8:1).

The Analog Nature of Christian Realism. First Lydia was led to Christ, then on to Philippi to be hosted by being beaten up (an 'analog reception' to be sure) and then thrown in jail (another 'messy' illustration of what it can be like to be smack-dab in the middle of God's will, led by the Spirit's finely-tuned engineering--and with the Pneumatic copability of the Spirit to sing the 'song of the Lord' in a messy (analogous, ordered-chaos) place.

Would not an analog-like faithfulness in serving God function better as the Christian's modus operandi--than trying to find (as one writer puts it) "the mystical dot" of God's perfect will, or the "dot" of perfect, self-consciious and introspective holiness..?

Might the 'digital dot' (as too often may be preached) only exist in the mind of the obsessive or the legalist..?
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Copyright 2007 by Soren et al.

OCD: The Leaven of the Psychological Pharisees: The Stingy Man (Proverbs 23:6-8)

2007-01-26T23:30:00.000-08:00

"Do not eat the food of a stingy man, do not crave his delicacies; for he is the kind of man who is always thinking about the cost. "Eat and drink," he says to you, but his heart is not with you. You will vomit up the little you have eaten and will have wasted your compliments."

In his letter to the Galatians, the Apostle Paul describes the 'fruit of the Spirit' i.e.: the evidence of the Holy Spirit's indwelling presence in the life of the believer. Paul also describes the opposite: the works of the sinful nature.

Ministering to the Obsessive-Compulsive (or 'Psychological Pharisee' (PP). Not too flatteringly has the Obsessive been labeled as 'anal retentive." The PP's concerns focus on Time, Money, Dirt, Control and Order. Ritualistic washing or 'checking' may be his compulsive modus operandi. The psyche of the PP lives and operates 'under the Law'...in the self-imposed (and imposing upon others) iron grip of a soulish legalism.

Living with the obsessive PP (as life with a Paranoid) is a waiting game: it's only a matter of time until you're caught in his grid, until you've messed up or shown your humanness a little too overtly. The PP is watching for color to go outside the lines, controlling for sloppiness or dirt, subtracting the minutes, counting the pennies.

On the other hand, the suspicious Paranoid is different. He is hyper-vigilant--idealizing you, at first, but only for the purpose of eventually kicking you off his artificial, idealized pedestal--playing the cat-n-mouse game described in Eric Berne's classic book, Games People Play, as, "I caught You, You Son of a Bitch." The Paranoid, watching vigilantly and waiting patiently, will inevitably turn against you in one hostile confrontation--while the Obsessive PP will gradually incarcerate you in his thought-policing system.

Sometimes the Paranoid and Obsessive styles combine. Study the cultic leadership style of Jim Jones of Peoples Temple mass suicide notoriety, the criminal behaviors of mafiosi, the hounding officer in Les Miserables, Eco-terrorism, or even harrassment-history of the IRS.

The Paranoid--with his Ideas of Reference, Suspiciousness, Jealousy, Grandiosity, and Persecutory distortions of perception--operates more as active and mobile surveillance--sweeping the guarded territory with floodlights, sensitive dogs, and circulating security.

The Obsessive PP, both prisoner and warden in his own system, acts as more of a passive-but-activated 'digitalized alarm system' in a locked building. You forget to lock a door or shut a window, or cross an alarm-sensor beam--and sirens will scream, horns will blow, and industrial-strength buzzers will whine.

The PP (Psychological Pharisee), as all personality disorders do, gives us a niche-glimpse of that which oppresses and imprisons the human self--of goblins and ghoulies, and long-legged beasties, and things that go bump in the night--and of the worms-that-die-not...in hell.

"Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty..." But, the PP (Obsessive-Compulsive) lives in mental anguish--a soulish tension between Rage and Fear. The Fear causes dogged Compliance to ritual and convergent thinking--until rage occasionally tips the scales the other way into Defiance.

The Defiance of the PP manifests itself in teeth-gritting control-freaking, hoarding, and resistance: resistance to appropriate change, innovation, creativity, artistic beauty, divergent thinking, and healthy humor.

A primary personality characteristic of the PP is stinginess. This is usually a pathological and extreme brand of stinginess--often acted out (to the embarrassment of others) in public settings: business transactions, purchases, and adding up (and quibbling over) restaurant tabs.

The thought content, style, and cognitive process of the PP reveals a mulling, repetitive rumination--awash in tedious detail and superfluous facts. All non-Christian world religions are obsessively and psychosocially pharisaical. Eastern and Western mystical and metaphysical religions are populated by PP. All occult mysticism courts and produces PP.

Over the years I've become convinced that spiritually sick 'personality disorders' like the Obsessive-Compulsive (PP) may only respond to sound Pneumatology in Christian orthopraxy.

"Have you received the Holy Spirit since you believed?" If the human personality is 'pneumatic' and created by God to function properly as an 'open system' and not a 'closed system' it must receive the Heavenly Father's gift of the Holy Spirit in order to function according to the Master Designer's schema and morphe.

"Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free." Consider this hypothesis: the Book of Acts, Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, First Corinthians, Joel, Zechariah, and other biblical portions were written especially to emphasize the importance of sound, practical Pneumatology among the people of God.

"Be filled with the Spirit," Paul wrote in Ephesians 5:18.

It was the Central Event in the Human Race, when God incarnated into human flesh--Jesus, the Christ--in the authentic form of God and authentic form of Man. And for too long had the obsessives been placing a yoke upon the necks of others they themselves could not wear.

God had long shown His displeasure at Israel's 'new moons, sabbaths, feast days, tithing of mint and cumin, and legalistic talmudic observance--while their hearts were far from Him.

Jesus appreared at a time of theological and psychosocial crisis--a horrific scene of moneychangers in the Temple of God, and people (for whom the Sabbath was actually made) being forced into an obsessive-compulsive sabbath-binding grid.

Jesus had to come and break the obsessive-compulsive 'religiossification' (my term) of calcified totems, taboos, folkways, pastimes, and tribal customs which could strangle the Human Race's opportunity to hear the message of God's love and redemptive plan in history.

The Lord of the Sabbath walked on the scene, the Master, who had to put His house in order, "...Yes, you whited sepulchres, not only can you yank your ox out of the ditch on a holy day, I can heal a man on the Sabbath...My disciples can eat the shewbread of the Temple, and they don't have to be ritualistic handwashers, rhetorical fasters, and public alms-givers...or bleeding hearts with a faux concern for 'the poor'..."

Jesus, at His ascension, bequeathed to His disciples and to us, the (Acts 1:8) empowerment of God, the Holy Spirit. The Upper Room, perhaps the 'delivery room' of Christ's Church, and the experiential-knowledge of Christ there, was crucially important.

Otherwise, the community of the redeemed in the Early Church would have been too critically victimized by personality-disordered 'crazymakers': Schizotypals, Paranoids, Narcissists, Borderlines, Schizoids--and the Obsessive-Compulsives (PP).

Obviously (according to the New Testament narrative) some of the toxic, non-'Spirit-filled', like Diotrephes, Simon the Sorcerer, and Alexander the Coppersmith slipped through the lines and did cause harm.

Today, faux 'pneumaticians' may be like psychosocial viruses in Christendom causing glitches to frustrate sound orthopractic Pneumatology--and understandably have caused thoughtful dispensationalists and cessationists to look with jaundiced eye at any form of Pentecostal belief and practice. Pseudo-charismatic and faux pentecostals who elbowed their way into televangelism poisoned the well of the agora ministry pool.

(In the future we can address 'charismysticsm,' 'charismania,' and 'charismagic' (my terms) and attempt to see where B.B. Warfield and other cessationists may have had legitimate "wildfire" anxiety--even with their skewed research, cessationist dispensationalism, superficial "blink" impressions (cf. the book, BLINK), and an anemic understanding of the critical importance of a sound doctrine of the Holy Spirit.).

The theology, hamartiology, soteriology, and epistemology of the First Century Ecclesia, Marturia, Diaconia, and Koinonia had to be, of necessity, Pneumatic--empowered and guided by God, the Holy Spirit.

Jesus instructed, "Wait...until you receive power."

So many bemoan the awful truth that today's evangelicalism is in reality a '30-story orange juice machine that gives one pint a month'. High-powered marketers are hired to write soulish motivational books that so many 'sheeple' rush out and purchase--or sheeple pastors buy by the truck load and hand out to their congregations.

"...But all the king's horse's and all the king's men..."

B.B. Warfield and The Conspiracy of Silence. I think Dr. B.B. Warfield was 'theologically stingy' and abused his ecclesiastical clout as he sat in the Chair of Theology at Princeton circa 1900.

Warfield wrote his reactionary tome, 'Counterfeit Miracles' and, in my opinion, sabotaged the Evan Roberts Revival in Wales circa 1904, and what even worldwide could have been the spread (without over-emphasis on Azusa Street) of a sane Classical Pentecostalism that avoided Latter Rain excessess and the 'holy roller' image.

Of course, Satan loves a powerless Church. Psychological Phariseeism (PP) must be at the very least dual-diagnosed by the Spirit-guided pastor-teacher.

In its most toxic form, PP requres a triple diagnosis (1. carnality and the works of the sinful nature; 2. obsessive-compulsive personality disorder; 3. and spiritually viral occult-mystical influence.)

As a dual-diagnosis, PP presents as a combination of the Galatians 5 "works of the sinful nature", and obsessive-compulsive pathology of the human personality--melded together.

I wrote much of this Blog a year and a half ago while observing a16-17 year-old young man--over a three-month period--who was going through obsessive washing rituals).

This aritcle is getting more and more attention--some friendly and some upset (because, of course, the 'truth hurt's--ha!)

I actually had applied this article to pastors whom I had observed over the years--to be as obssessive and petty, as compulsive, ritualistic, small-minded, and stingy--as the ancient Pharisees I'd read about in the Bible.
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No person, who has OCD (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder) should be in any kind of pastoral ministry--or business, for that matter. The (OCD sufferer) stingy, 'anal retentive,' type should not only--not be in business--but no one should do business with him--or her.

(OCD--along with the other 'personality disorders'-- is a systemic aspect of the unredeemed, non-transformed-in-Christ-by the-Holy Spirit, sinful human nature. So--having a personality disorder--or psychopathology--or especially any form of 'demonization' is a contradictory premise--like trying to serve two masters--God and mammon.)

The OCD is self-absorbed, resistant, (un-'potty-trained' spiritully--ha!!) and emotionally infantile. S/he may blame it on cultural background: "We (Scots, Arabs, italians, etc...fill in the blank) are selfish shylocks--we're crafty, that's just the way God made us..." Yeah, right...!

Read the Old Testament accounts where God was angry as hell and fed up with the Israelites' 'new moons, sabbaths, tithing of mint and cumin--ad nauseum'... and rightly so!

Look at Jesus' righteous anger--the Son of God--turning over the moneychangers' tables in the temple--satirizing the compulsive washings of the pharisees--all their stupid rituals, the pharisees' legalistic, control-freaking, sabbatarian anger at Jesus' healing of the lame man on the sabbath--and petty stinginess.

The pharisees were showing the same poor mental and spiritual ill-health as today's pets-over-people types--"Oh, you poor ox down there in that awful ditch--I know it like be the Sabbath 'n all that--but who care--honey!...daddy be gonna rescue y'all outta that there ditch right now...yeah baby...but, Jesus,...now doncha be healin' up fo-yo self no lame types now y'hear?!!... like it be the Sabbath and all that...like yo know the rules...don't gimme that Son-a-God divine stuff--ain't buyin' it now y-hear..?!"

Spiritually speaking these OCD pharisee-types, of course, were savages--faux-religionists--disgusting to God--and a hindrance to godly people, of no help to the suffering and afflicted, and worthless to the Kingdom of God.

Modern-day Judaizers are failing God--just like the Apostle Peter was momentarily doing in the First Century. (Remember when the Apostle Paul had to rebuke him and set him straight.) But, Peter received Paul's correction--demonstrating that he was teachable--and that he had ears to hear.

(I wish I'd been there to hear Paul, "Peter--get a clue--you're regressing into neurotic, legalistic 'Peter-ville' again--earth to Peter....duh...what're you gonna do next--start cuttin' off ears again too, Peter..? Hey--get a grip--no, that's probably the wrong way to put it--get real, Peter...!")

Today, Paul would say the same (good humor--good pun!) thing to the 'Concision Party' of Judaizers, "I wish they would slice themsleves off (in a certain key place--ha!).

I praise God when I read in the Gospel accounts how Jesus rebuked the pharisees--instructing them that "the sabbath was made for man--not man for the sabbath!"

Thankfully, the Holy Spirit of God--in today's community of the redeemed--is marginalizing, squelching, neutering--ha!--OCD types--and kicking them to the curb..!

Of course, OCD is again--one of the 'works of the sinful nature'...sin...one of the manifestations of the fallenness of Human Nature--and, of course, another reason why every human being must respond to the wooing, calling, conviction--of the Holy Spirit of Truth (John 16)--and be transformed (Romans 12:1-2) by the Holy Spirit--by God's renewing of the mind.

There is no other hope for personality disorders like OCD.

"Let God arise and His enemies be scattered!" --Psalm 68:1

(Excerpt: unpublished mss):
"OCD: the Psychological Leaven of the Pharisees"
Copyright 2008 by Philip C. Brewer (part B) All Rights Reserved

The Crying Place: Shanghai, China

2007-01-26T22:09:00.001-08:00

I wonder if anyone can help me research this: in Shanghai, China, I've heard there is a kind of tea room that is called The Crying Place, and the customers pay a fee to go in, sit at a table with a box of tissues, and cry. The establishment is supposedly quite popular and always filled to capacity. I heard a pastor mention this in a sermon a couple of years ago.

How many churches, I wonder, offer a place for someone to come and cry. A place where it would be acceptable to cry--to shed tears of confession and repentance, or tears of sorrow and grief, tears of remorse, or tears of joy..?

My Eastern Kentucky Baptist-turned-Pentecostal-minister Dad told me once he never trusted a dry-eyed, emotionally aloof and cold conversion to Christ.

He would ask,"How could the regenerative and transformational epiphane in the Holy Spirit--being drawn to God, the Father--having the revelation of The Cross of Christ and His atoning blood as propitiation for the seeker's sin--be responded to in an aloof, perfunctory, matter-of-fact, emotionally cold manner..?"

The truly stable and mentally healthy person in Christ will have the liberty (in Christ) to humbly, vulnerably, sincerely weep before God in the wholesome catharsis that expresses the comfort of the Comforter--in sorrow or in joy. And s/he will have the Spirit's empathy in rejoicing with those who rejoice and weeping with those who weep.

Psychopathy, according to Drs. Meloy and Hare, experts in the study, shows its presence in many ways in the human personality. Some symptoms manifest as glibness, superficiality, emotional coldness, and lack of empathy--qualities, by the way, often exalted in the Hollywood Star System and American popular culture.

Perhaps there is just no need for a Crying Place here...

Liberty Christian Fellowship

2007-01-14T22:31:00.000-08:00

Top Rating *****

Today was at least my twelfth visit over the past four years to this warm-hearted group of dedicated Christians, meeting on Millbrook Avenue two blocks south of Mckinley Avenue in Fresno, California, who worship and minister faithfully to each other and their community.

Pastors Joseph and Catherine Thornton are always encouraging, listien with focused interest to what you're saying, and are a model of what sincere love and effective pastoral shepherding is all about.

They carefully teach the love and doctrine of God, the Father, Who created the universe, Who nurtures and supplies needs, and Who gives the gift of the Holy Spirit to the sincere seeker in Christ.

They teach a sound Christology (doctrine of Jesus Christ) with no cultic defects, and correctly present Jesus Christ as mankind's Savior Who gave Himself up to be crucified for the propitiation of Man's sin, and Who, in His Resurrection, conquered sin, death, hell, the grave, and Satan. And from Whom, those who cling to Him, receive mental, physical, and relational healiing, and the (necessary for ministry) baptism in the Holy Spirit.

Liberty Christian Fellowship holds to a sound Pneumatology (doctrine of the Holy Spirit). And the pastors, the capable and reverent worship musicians, elders, and all the "brothers and sisters in Christ" (from those just taking their spiritual baby steps--to the spiritually mature) minister in the Spirit's comfort, empowerment, and wisdom.

A banner hangs over the door in the back of the beautiful sanctuary which reads, "This is a House of Restoration."

And I did find this to be an evening of restorative healing. After the service, we gathered in the front and prayed for each other to be healed in body and soul. There was earnest prayer for loved ones who did not know Christ and for healing of family relationships.

The Lord was present. There were tears of gratitude, joy, release, forgiveness, and realization of Christ, the Great Physician's, healing touch.

In my visiting of churches over the years I have often longed for an experience like today's at Liberty Christian Fellowship--often desired such authenticity in sincere kindness, friendliness, empathy, and meaningful ministry.

I pray that any Christian ministry which doesn't enjoy the 'seven characteristics of life' in the Life of the Spirit may soon yield to The Perfect Gentleman, God, the Holy Spirit, and to the breath of spiritual life He brings to any humble and sincerely-seeking congregation.

Copyright 2007 by Soren All Rights Reserved

Soren

Aisle Running Critic at Large & Theological Forum

2007-01-13T21:57:00.000-08:00

STEEPLE CHASER. Should there be such a thing as a (respectful and benign yet honest and bold) 'quality control inspector' (a la book reviewer, or theater critic) who goes around to churches and publishes evaluations--based on a fair 100-question-1-10 scale covering areas such as doctrine, hospitality, and the ministry of the Holy Spirit?

Could rapport and friendliness (v.s. non-bonding 'teflonism'), sincere love, empathy, and substantiality (v.s. glibness and superficiality), mental health (v.s. crazymaking), quality of music, creativity and the arts, community outreach, and intelligent conversation--be given a "quotient" rating system by the ecclesiastical critic..?

Could the 'personality' of each local Christian fellowship be observed and experienced? Could this 'church personality' be reflected upon and described in a blog..?

Would this (hopefully fair, friendly--but factual) reportage encourage more internal quality control in the redeemed community by addressing syndromes like "the Emperor's Clothes" and absence of spiritual life, and stimulate healthy corrective discussion within each group?

In my own experience over the years I was often tempted to go back to a church I had visited with a sign around my neck and a paper cup. The sign would read: "Eye Contact--$1.00."

As a counselor in private practice for many years, I've listened to many stories of church experiences--often by people who had stopped going anywhere. Following are some examples of statements made to me over the years:

1. "I was man-handled by a rude usher and forced to sit where I didn't want to."

2. "They seemed authentically interested in me, asked thoughtful questions, and were very friendly."

3. "No one--but a glazed-eyed greeter--even looked at me--much less smiled or said hello."

4. "The pastor gave me a warm handshake, called me later, and after attending several months I've found that he has a true shepherd's heart--as do other spiritual leaders there he has trained."

5. "I've never met so many emotionally cold, ""God's Frozen Chosen," bland and boring people in my life."

6. "The pastor there teaches the Bible truths in a very interesting, practical, and applicable way--with illustrations from his own life experiences--not from a dusty book."

P.S.: Many pastors could spice up their sermon-introductions, I think, by subscribing to SERMONSPICE.com where they can obtain excellent thematic stage-setting 3-4 minute videos to introduce their messages.
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THEOLOGICAL FORUM:
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I would enjoy hearing your thoughts re:

1. The Positive Mental Attitude (PMA) Phenomenon:
...................Would you agree that...
A. Norman Vincent Peale was the Protestants' PMA guy...?
B. Bishop Fulton J. Sheen was the Roman Catholics' PMA guy...?
C. Robert Schuller (now his son too) is the Evangelicals' PMA guy...?
D. Joel Osteen (now at 40,000?) is the Mega Church PMA guy...?
E. Hagin & K. Copeland et al are the Latter Rain Pentecostals' PMA guys...?

2. Another question: I wonder if Triumphalism or Word-Faith teaching would fit the Apostle John's experience on the Isle of Patmos--the early Church Christians-to the present--who have undergone persecution, martyrdom, suffering..e.g. Hebrews 11...?

3. Or my hypothesis: Word-Faith, Positive-Confession, and Latter-Rain Pentecostalism is not only out of (and antagonistic to) the Classical Pentecostal tradition of say, the more Wesleyen-based Assemblies of God or Church of God (Cleveland, TN)--but really out of classical Christian orthodoxy and orthopraxy. i.e.: Word-Faith belongs more in the metaphysical Mind Sciences: Religious Science, Christian Science, New Consciousness, and Emersonain Transcendentalism. (?)

4. And another thought: would there be a danger (or would I be too 'theologically paranoid' to worry) that the Emergent Church, in many of its so-called 'paradigmatic-Hegelian-shifts' is perhaps in many cases--or varying degrees--in reality the emerging Apostate Church of the Last Days--a manipulated 'consensus' fostering syncretism in doctrine--and perhaps containing aspects of 'fascism-lite' or a 'totalistic' propaganda-driven nature--as it resonates with the mega-church phenomenon...?

5. And (re: Pneumatology): My Methodist and theologically-educated Mom and my So. Baptist-to-Scottish-Presbyterian-theologically-educated Dad both rejected Latter Rain Pentecostalism (with its holyrollerism: impulsivity, inappropirate pre-occupation with demons(instead of having a scholarly 'demonology'), unstable emotionalism--histrionics, anti-education bias, directive prophecy, non-reflective shallowness, and the kind of splenetic subjectivism one might call 'Charismagical', 'Charismystical', and 'Charismanic'--my terms).

My parents' conviction was that they were non-cessationists: they believed that the Gifts of the Holy Spirit--particularly those listed in Romans 12 and I Corinthians 12, 13--were for today--and did not cease (at the closing of the Apostolic Age--or the completion of the New Testament Canon). Our family experienced divine healing physically as did people to whom they ministered. However, they cautioned me regarding the dangers inherent in not subjecting all experience to scripture and Latter Rain excesses such as 'charismatic clairvoyance' in which, in a William Branhamesque manner, someone on a platform would call out diseases and afflictions or "read a person's mail" by telling people their name and street address.
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Copyright 2007 by Philip C. Brewer