Posted on 06/02/2014 6:09:52 AM PDT by Bratch
Southern Baptists will be heading for Baltimore in just a few days, and the annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention is to be held in a city that has not hosted the convention since 1940. This time, Baptists attending the meeting will face an issue that would not have been imaginable just a few years ago, much less in 1940 a congregation that affirms same-sex relationships.
Just days before the convention, news broke that a congregation in suburban Los Angeles has decided to affirm same-sex sexuality and relationships. In an hour-long video posted on the Internet, Pastor Danny Cortez explains his personal change of mind and position on the issue of homosexuality and same-sex relationships. He also addressed the same issues in a letter posted at Patheos.com.
In the letter, Cortez describes a sunny day at the beach in August of 2013 when I realized I no longer believed in the traditional teachings regarding homosexuality.
Shortly thereafter, he told his 15-year-old son that he no longer believed what he used to believe. His son responded with an even more direct word to his father: Dad, Im gay. As Cortez writes, My heart skipped a beat and I turned towards him and we gave one another the biggest and longest hug as we cried. And all I could tell him was that I loved him so much and that I accepted him just as he is.
According to the pastor, events then came rather quickly. On February 7, 2014, his son, Drew, posted a coming out video on YouTube. Two days later, the pastor told his church about his new position on the issue (also posted on the Internet). In his message to the New Heart Community Church congregation, Cortez admitted that his new position represented a radical shift that put him into conflict with both the position of the church and the convictions of the denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention. He acknowledged that his change of heart on the issue of homosexuality put him at odds with the SBCs confession of faith, the Baptist Faith & Message.
In his letter, the pastor said that his aim was to see the congregation allow for grace in the midst of disagreement. To his regret, he said, many in the church were not pleased and the church had to consider whether to terminate the pastor. After voting on March 9 to prolong the time of consideration and prayer, the church voted on May 18 not to dismiss the pastor and to instead become a Third Way church.
Cortez cited Vineyard pastor Ken Wilsons book, released earlier this year,A Letter to My Congregation. Wilson, who serves a Vineyard church in Ann Arbor, Michigan, describes his book as an evangelical pastors path to embracing people who are gay, lesbian, and transgender in the company of Jesus. Wilson argues that, even as he has come to affirm same-sex behaviors and relationships, the issue need not divide congregations or Christians.
Pastor Cortez cited Wilsons argument as foundational to the position he and his church are now taking agree to disagree and not cast judgment on one another.
But, there is no third way. A church will either believe and teach that same-sex behaviors and relationships are sinful, or it will affirm them. Eventually, every congregation in America will make a public declaration of its position on this issue. It is just a matter of time (and for most churches, not much time) before every congregation in the nation faces this test.
The impossibility of a third way is made clear in Pastor Cortezs own letter.
In one paragraph, he writes:
So now, we will accept the LGBT community even though they may be in a relationship. We will choose to remain the body of Christ and not cast judgement. We will work towards graceful dialogue in the midst of theological differences. We wee that this is possible in the same way that our church holds different positions on the issue of divorce and remarriage. In this issue we are able to not cast judgement in our disagreement.
But in the very next paragraph, he writes:
Unfortunately, many who voted to remain traditional will now separate from us in a couple of weeks. We are in the period of reconciliation and forgiveness. Please pray for us in this. Then on June 8, we will formally peacefully separate, restate our love for one another, and bless each other as we part ways. It has been a very tiring and difficult process.
In two successive paragraphs the pastor refutes himself. His church is notgoing to take a middle ground. He states clearly that we will accept the LGBT community even though they may be in a relationship. And his church did not unanimously agree to disagree, for a significant portion of the church is leaving on June 8, just 48 hours before the Southern Baptist Convention convenes in Baltimore. Many who voted to remain traditional are now forced by conviction to leave the church.
Why? Because there is no third way. The New Heart Community Church has voted to accept the LGBT community even though they may be in a relationship. Even if it is claimed that some continuing members of the church are in disagreement with the new policy and position, they will be members of a church that operates under that new policy. At the very least, their decision to remain in the congregation is a decision to stay within a church that affirms same-sex behaviors and relationships. That is not a middle position. It is not a third way.
For some time now, it has been increasingly clear that every congregation in this nation will be forced to declare itself openly on this issue. That moment of decision and public declaration will come to every Christian believer, individually. There will be no place to hide, and no place safe from eventual interrogation. The question will be asked, an invitation will be extended, a matter of policy must be decided, and there will be no refuge.
There is no third way on this issue. Several years ago, I made that argument and was assailed by many on the left as being reductionistically binary. But, the issue is binary. A church will recognize same-sex relationships, or it will not. A congregation will teach a biblical position on the sinfulness of same-sex acts, or it will affirm same-sex behaviors as morally acceptable. Ministers will perform same-sex ceremonies, or they will not.
Interestingly, a recent point of agreement on this essential point has come from an unexpected source. Tony Jones, long known as a leader in the emerging church has written that there is no third way on same-sex marriage. As Jones notes, denominations may study the issue for some time, but eventually it will take a vote. At that point, it will either allow for same-sex marriage, or not.
In his words:
And the same goes for an individual congregation. At some point, every congregation in America will decide either, YES, same-sex marriages will take place in our sanctuary, performed by our clergy; or NO, same-sex marriages will not take place in our sanctuary, performed by our clergy. There is no third way on that. A church either allows same-sex marriages, or it doesnt.
Tony Jones and I stand on opposite sides of this issue, but on the impossibility of a third way we are in absolute agreement. Conservative evangelicals have understood this for some time. It is interesting that those on the left now understand the issue in the same binary terms. There is no middle position.
Once again, Tony Jones gets right to the essential point:
What Im saying is that a church or an organization can study the issue in theory, and they can even do so for years. But this isnt really a third way or a middle ground. Instead, it is a process. And at some point, that process has to end and practices have to be implemented. At that point, theres no third way. You either affirm marriage equality in your practices, or you do not.
Actually, as we have seen, Pastor Cortez makes the same point. The practice of his congregation is now to accept openly-gay members and members in openly-gay relationships. That does not allow for any middle ground, and that is why his church faces an exodus of members next Sunday.
Now, the Southern Baptist Convention also faces a moment of unavoidable decision. A church related to the Convention has officially adopted a gay-affirming position. The Baptist Faith & Message, the denominations confession of faith, states that homosexuality is immoral and that marriage is the uniting of one man and one woman in covenant commitment for a lifetime.
Furthermore, the Conventions constitution states explicitly that any congregation that endorses homosexual behavior is not in cooperation with the Convention, and thus excluded from its membership.
There is nothing but heartbreak in this situation. Here we face a church that has rejected the clear teachings of Scripture, the affirmations of its confession of faith, and two millennia of Christian moral wisdom and teaching. But the Convention also faces a test of its own resolve and convictional courage.
I am confident that the Southern Baptist Convention will act in accordance with its own convictions, confession of faith, and constitution when messengers to the Convention gather next week in Baltimore. But every single evangelical congregation, denomination, mission agency, school, and institution had better be ready to face the same challenge, for it will come quickly, and often from an unexpected source. Once it comes, there is no middle ground, and no third way.
Sooner or later and probably sooner the answer of every church and Christian will be either yes or no.
If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task. Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God's church? (1 Timothy 3:1-5)
Right on, Dad.
I agree with your point. A friend went to a Lutheran Synod meeting over the past weekend, and was slapped in the face with a Marxist lecture on White Privilege.
"Go and sin no more."
and was slapped in the face with a Marxist lecture on White Privilege.
I tend to agree, much as it pains me to see it happen—I would much rather see theological liberals let the Holy Spirit sort out their heterodoxy, or see them leave on their own.
I totally agree and it’s going to be a lot sooner than 10 years. It’s as if time has sped up with respect to this stuff, it’s snowballing and hurtling downhill.
I have friends who are homosexual. I have friends who are fornicators. Both know where I stand. Except most congregations give fornication a pass because to many of their family and friends do it. Just like this pastor and homosexuality
They’ve been told to leave at past Conferences; but that’s not what they want. They want to outlaw Biblical Christianity. Methodists are going to have to develop spines. But I don’t see it happening except in isolated pockets of the nation.
I also think that no one should be encouraged or allowed to join a Christian church without having to complete two semesters of lessons and then pass an exam. They can be video lessons or online lessons with a workbook; but pastors must stop acting as banquet managers for cafeteria Christians and wedding-venue shoppers and start holding people’s feet to the fire. Judgment Day certainly will.
White privilege is only possible with liberal guilt. Conservatives are not so gullible.
Maybe. It depends on what "issue" you are thinking about.
Exactly. Women’s ordination is usually the prerequisite to embracing homosexual behavior.
Liberals Baptists are an enigma to me. Allow me to illustrate:
“Embrace homosexuality. Check.
Ordain females. Check.
Support abortions. Check.
Baptize infants. No way that’s a sin!” :?
Maybe they will allow same-sex marriage between men only.
Funny you should mention that. I was thinking about what Jesus said in Matthew 19:4-6
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=MATTHEW+19%3A4-6&version=NASB
4 And He answered and said, Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female, 5 and said, For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh? 6 So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.
This passage is the biggest reason why Bible-believing Christian churches have always taught that marriage is one male to one female. Jesus essentially stated that women are an essential part of what marriage is. That’s an extremely emancipating message to women, especially in that 1st century, male-dominated context. If Jesus had taught the opposite(that women were unessential to marriage) that would not have been an emancipating message to the female of the human species. In fact, it would have been a truly misogynist one.
In many cases if a church withdraws from the SBC, it has to make a large payment to do so.
That's the last thing desired by the American people.
“Go and sin no more”
Why do some people always forget that part?
Agreed. Jesus did more for the empowerment of women than any other person in history. It was a woman whom Jesus revealed Himself to as Messiah. It was a woman who anointed Jesus in preparation for His sacrifice. It was a woman who was told to go preach the good news. And it was a woman whom Paul chose to establish the church at Ephesus.
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