Posted on 06/06/2014 6:39:56 AM PDT by robowombat
As a member of a SBC church and the mother of a woman legally married to another woman in DC., I pray my church holds firmly to the Bible. Unlike Cortez, I didn’t change my mind because one of my children has chosen to practice homosexuality in spite of having been raised in the church.
Rather I pray for her repentance daily.
If the SBC caves in to this sin America is truly lost.
obviously!
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
“And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.”
That about sums it up. Hoping the Southern Baptists will remain true to Christian teaching on sexuality. The truth is not based on majority vote.
The large Southern Baptist Church that I had attended, and to which my mother still belongs, has at least one member that I know of in an open, homosexual relationship (he used to be my boss.) I don’t know what the church’s extent of knowledge on this relationship is, but when they do become aware of it, it will be interesting to see what happens. The church subscribes to the “welcoming” philosophy of “doing church,” and I don’t think they have ever ex-communicated anyone. The first time will likely be a house shaker, if it even happens.
Sick.
Yes, I know what you are saying. The doctrine of the perseverance of the saints is sometimes difficult to understand. The very proof that you truly believe is remaining in the faith and obedience to God’s commands. Hebrews teaches that if someone can turn apostate with no repercussions, then they probably were never truly saved. I do believe that our faith is given and maintained by God, not ourselves.
Have a blessed day!
I’m glad you posted it, because religion, or more properly a relationship with the living God by the only means He has given, the Lord Jesus Christ and His sacrifice on our behalf, is not isolated from how the believer lives in society.
True believers are reading/studying the Word of God and learning how to live in this world, which is temporal, by believing what God has said and by obeying Him in the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit—until the day they are taken to their true home in heaven to be with the Lord.
One of the things God has said in His Word is that the Lord Jesus Christ is coming again (to this earth, literally) to judge both Israel and the nations for their rejection of Him and for their unwillingness to repent of their sins so they can be forgiven.
After God pours out His wrath in judgment, Jesus is going to literally set up His kingdom on earth and rule and reign from Jerusalem for 1000 years. Then comes the final judgment of the ungodly before God and their eternal separation from God. They this present earth and heavens will be burnt up. There are other details, but this is the general sequence of events.
So if you know this and you believe it, it is going to affect the way you live NOW. This is the way the apostle Peter put it in 2 Peter 3:7-13:
7 But the present heavens and earth by His word are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. ...9 The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance. 10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up.
11 Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, 12 looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, on account of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat! 13 But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.
So, all ungodliness will, in the end, be recompensed by a holy God, and Romans Chapter 1 is clear enough as to this particular form of ungodliness that is mentioned in the title of this article. Romans 1.
Yes correct. As someone raised within the SBC I was taught that. Each church is a self governing commonwealth. It just has to endorse basic beliefs of Biblical Innerantcy to be SBC. SBC membership means being able to be part of a large retirement fund and other resource pooling arrangements. Churches join and leave the SBC all the time. The Jimmy Carter baptists have set up something called the ‘Cooperative baptists Convention’ which would not, i suspect be uncomfortable with a ‘gay friendly’ agenda. The Baptist church my parents were members of from its founding decided (its in the Va suburbs of DC) to leave the SBC and become a Carter Baptist church. This gay acceptance stuff has been around in the shadows in the SBC for decades. A recent grad of the seminary in Richmond and the son of prominent members of my folks church preached a sermon there about 1980 where he used Aeosopian language but clearly was endorsing queerdom as a ‘lifestyle’. Few caught the inference. My mother did and let his mother know what she thought of it. This guy dumped the ministry in a couple years and went to being an ‘investment adviser’.
Some churches will choose to follow Christ and others will choose to follow Satan.It has always been this way. Only the defining issue has changed.
>>> The Baptist Church embraces the apostasy of “Once Saved Always Saved” so this isn’t a great stretch.
It is one thing to state your position on a doctrine such as this. It is quite another thing to call it apostasy.
Apostacy is related to heresy. More frequently I’ve been noticing opponents to this doctrine come out and flatly call it a lie. This is an extremely dangerous stand to take in comparison to unbelief.
If you are wrong, and it is sound doctrine based on the word of God, then you are essentially calling the Word of God a lie. God’s word is inspired by the Holy Spirit.
I hope you understand where this is heading, and what you are saying... because speaking against the Holy Spirit is clearly unforgivable.
Membership numbers are not more important than distinction of sin verses obedience to God. If homosexuals and their sympathizers leave the Church, they leave the Church. If the Church condones sin for membership numbers, it is NOT the Church, and the Christian will not associate with it.
This is already happening in other denominations, and persecution for not cooperating with the homosexual community’s agenda will come. This will result in the true Church being purged of non-Christians, and with the deadwood identified and removed from the Church, with God’s help, may even be more effective in a spiritual revival.
Romans 8:28. Something to look forward to. Let’s roll!
Thank you for your thoughtful reply. I’m not a theologian (I’m not even a Southern Baptist, but an independent Baptist)We have seen many people make a profession of faith (ala “going forward”) in our rural church, but few have ostensibly remained in the faith. I don’t have the ultimate answers about Biblical interpretation (issues such as the Trinity, Sin unto Death, etc.) I Just believe that our Faith is given to us and maintained by Jesus and noone can pluck them out of His hand. This would be a good discussion on another thread. I do love the SBC and the epic battles they won against modernisn in the 1980’s. They are attacked because they are the largest Bible-believing denomination in America.
I don’t believe that a ‘true believer’ that is ‘truly saved’ will ever stop believing and abandon Christianity. If they do, they weren’t.
No we don't.
Wow. You are a truly amazing and inspirational woman. I can’t imagine what that must be like for you. I will pray for you and your daughter.
I believe this is mainly a formality. The SBC has been trending more conservative, not less, on a number of issues. Al Mohler is a good example of that. But things like admission to fellowship are necessarily addressed by the convention, because being in fellowship has a number of advantages, and those advantages should be limited to only those member groups in good standing. Hence the decision making cannot be careless and informal. There must be a coordinated action. Think of it as church discipline at the level of congregations rather than individuals. I know we are living in strange days, and unpleasant outcomes are always possible, but I am cautiously optimistic in this particular situation.
I hope you’re right, and I hope this convention adheres strictly to the bible. I will wait and see.
On a side note, I just had a conversation with a young lady who was violently opposed to the bible, and was extremely ticked off at me when I said it was the absolute truth.
She said it’s like any story and embellished. I said either Jesus is a liar or he’s not, which is it? I was accused of being of inferior intelligence. I tend not to argue much, just tell the truth to a person’s face and let the Holy Spirit do his thing.
This is the kind of attitude it seems which has been around since the biblical days. Messages aren’t well received.
We all need to stick to our biblical guns no matter what society says.
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