Christopher Hall put his finger on one of the points I have been trying to make here. Why do we get all bent out of shape when LCMS Pastors participate in joint worship with clergy with whom we are not in fellowship and then shrug our shoulders at the non-sacramental, seeker sensitive, non-denominational style worship that goes on in so many LCMS congregations every Sunday -- and which is indistinguishable from the local generic Protestant or non-denominational congregation down the block? Exactly.
Read it all HERE......
As the good Pastor said, "I do not do either, by the way," so no one is advocating for joint worship. What is being challenged is the identification of our church body and our confession that one makes from the non-sacramental and non-liturgical services that are the norm for so many LCMS folk on Sunday morning (especially in larger and suburban congregations).
"What is being challenged is the identification of our church body and our confession that one makes from the non-sacramental and non-liturgical services that are the norm for so many LCMS folk on Sunday morning (especially in larger and suburban congregations)."
ReplyDeletePeople move to the suburbs from somewhere else. They want a social club, and they use the church for that. Now, there is nothing wrong with socializing with people from church and nothing wrong with the church providing social opportunities. There is something wrong with not properly teaching the adults, youth, and children.
The difference is not in what happens, and that is indeed a shame and wrong. But there is a difference, and it makes all the difference.
ReplyDeleteWhich is, when these things happen in a church with a different confession, it is either consistent with such confession as they have, or inconsistent with such confession as they have but the confession is not ours, Which means that, in either case, there does not exist even the possibility of addressing it on the basis of our confession.
When these things happen in a church of our confession, that possibility does exist, and whether it ever comes to pass or not, in the meantime to go to a church of a different confession that is more "reverent", "traditional", "liturgical" etc over a church of our confession is to place one's preferred style of worship over the substance it is supposed to express no less than the CoWo crowd.