SGM Chronicles: Where Are the Prophets?

Ironically, when we connected with an SGM church in 1992, I was deeply cynical and not inclined to connect anywhere. But from day one of my association with SGM, I saw a pattern that impressed me at the time. I started buying into the idea that these were people who were “doing church right,” unlike other groups I had belonged to. Much of what caught my attention was the form, the methodology. It would take years for me to see that beneath the externals, the fire was fading.

Recently the Spirit of God brought to my remembrance something I questioned even in those early days. I recall being impressed that SGM was a ministry that believed and practiced true five-fold ministry (four-fold for those who believe pastor-teacher are one gift expression). But one day I remember asking the leadership: “You have “apostles,” “evangelists,” pastors, and teachers. Where are the prophets?” I do not recall many specifics of the conversation. I do remember the response I got boiled down to a conclusion that there is no “office” of prophet in the New Testament, at least not in the way we traditionally think of the prophet from our understanding of the Old Testament. At the time I fully bought into this faulty perspective. It would be years later before I understood that the arbitrary and capricious dismissal of prophetic ministry, could very well be one of the primary fatal errors of SGM’s leadership structure.

In recent years, I have discovered that one of the major issues behind the state of the current “church” in America is what I would call the cancerous expression of the pastor-teacher gift. I have a friend who refers to this as the “pastorization” of the church. I can tell you, I’ve made an extraordinary discovery in preparing this: that the entire church system, not just SGM, has marginalized a primary leadership gift. Let me demonstrate what I’ve found in my research.

Using the ESV version of scripture, I came up with only 2 references to pastors in the New Testament: the ESV uses “Shepherds.” The first is in Ephesians 4:11 as shepherds are listed among apostles, prophets, evangelists, and teachers.

The second is dark and disturbing. Jude references those who “pervert the grace of God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.” In verse 12, Jude refers to “shepherds feeding themselves; waterless clouds, swept along by winds, fruitless trees in late autumn, twice dead, uprooted . . . ”

If you look at references for teachers you find:

Acts 13:1 - prophets and teachers

In I Cor.12:29 - Paul asks “are all teachers?”

II Cor. 12:28 - third teachers (behind apostles and prophets)

In Ephesians 4:11 - teachers are included with apostles, prophets, evangelists, and shepherds

Beginning in I Timothy 1:3, it’s intriguing that Paul begins warning about false teachers. He charged Timothy (an apostle, neither a pastor nor teacher) to “remain in Ephesus so that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine, nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies, which promote speculations rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith.” Paul goes on to say, “The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.

Paul distinguishes this purpose from that of others: “Certain persons, by swerving from these (these? - love that comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith) have wandered away into vain discussion, desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions.”

Might I suggest that the purity of the gospel must transcend “right concepts.” If love that comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith are missing, do we have anything more than “confident assertions?” This is NOT biblical faith. Faith is relational trust of our Heavenly Father, not merely our intellectual apprehension of biblical ideas. This may actually be a big part of SGM’s problems. Lacking the substance of relational trust in God, all that’s left are empty and confident assertions ABOUT God.

I Timothy 4:3 speaks again of teachers sought out by people looking for affirmation of their own passions

In Hebrews, the author chides the believers for their immaturity: “By this time you ought to be teachers.”

James 3:1 warns: “Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness.”

II Peter 2:1 references a warning about false teachers among them.

But notice the frequency of references to prophets:

Acts 11:27 - Prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch

Acts 13:1 - There were in the church at Antioch prophets and teachers

Acts 15:32 - Judas and Silas who were themselves prophets, encouraged and strengthened the brothers with many words

Acts21:10 - references Agabus, a prophet from Judea

I Cor 12:28 - And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers

I Cor 12:29 - Are all apostles? Are all prophets?

I Cor 14:29 - Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others weight what is said

I Cor 14:32 - the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets

I Cor 14:37 - If anyone thinks that he is a prophet, or spiritual, he should acknowledge that the things I am writing to you are a command of the Lord.

In Ephesians 2:19-20 Paul references the church as the “household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone.” Paul continues by saying that it is in Him (Jesus, the cornerstone) “the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the spirit.”

Notice that the foundational work is not done by pastors and teachers, but by apostles and prophets.

In Ephesians 3:5, Paul references the “mystery of Christ which was not made known to the sons of men in other generations as it has not been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit”

And in Ephesians 4:11: . . . and he gave the apostles, the prophets . . .

By now, the priority of prophets in the church should be very clear. So it should also be clear how foolish and even dangerous it is to attempt to operate anything and call it “church” without prophets.

Unfortunately SGM has pretty much reduced the gift of prophet down to expressions of “prophecy” at a microphone during “worship” at a Sunday morning service, and then only if the pastoral leader approves.

So what is a New Testament prophet? Let me first clarify that a prophet is not a psychic prognosticator, nor a bitter angry person with a bad attitude who is negative all the time.

Part of the clue begins in the Old Testament. In Jeremiah 1:10, Jeremiah is commissioned to “pluck up and to break down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant.” My friend, Dr. Stephen Crosby, describes a prophet as a person with a supernatural grace to identify what is crooked, and straighten it out:

If the foundation is crooked or cracked, or if the Chief Cornerstone is not accurately positioned in preeminence, a prophet is going to see it, call it out, and not let up until the presiding authorities do something about it. A pinhole for most people is an abyss for a prophet. This isn’t a defect, deficiency, or disorder in the prophet. It’s just his lens and his calling. It’s different than a pastor’s and equally necessary. Prophets call existing mindsets, systems, and structures into accurate kingdom alignment. This usually involves clearing out debris before a hole is dug and new concrete is poured. Prophets typically root out, pull down, destroy, and throw down before they plant and build (Jer. 1:10). Bad news often precedes good news in a prophetic ministry. The relentless focus on what is broken or crooked strikes those who don’t understand the prophetic mind as being unduly “negative.”

Prophets are configured by the Spirit of God, with a mandate to challenge any aggregation of power: wherever power/authority “collects” or “resides,” prophets are the God-given gift to assure power/authority is not mishandled or abused. Prophets are compelled by a higher perception of God’s justice than what others possess.

They have a strong hatred for injustice and the oppression of those who have no voice, by those who retain power and control:

This passion for justice is not merely justice for justice sake, which is a misguided perfectionism that obsesses about accurate adherence to some philosophical idea about right or wrong. God is concerned not because a precept of justice has been violated, but because a person has been hurt. Reflecting this aspect of God’s nature, a prophet’s primary concern is not merely the violation of some code, but the presence of oppression of any sort: seen, unseen, conceptual, methodological, or psychological. The prophet’s condemnation of injustice is rooted in his/her sympathy with divine care for humanity, particularly His own people.

Applying what we’ve learned to SGM, it appears that somewhere in its history, the role of New Testament prophets was either never understood or embraced, or at some point the idea was simply dismissed. Therefore, within SGM, prophets have been marginalized, even persecuted.

A spiritually toxic atmosphere of ongoing and systemic injustices, left unaddressed over time, will not be a place prophets will be able to tolerate without functioning in their gift. Their only recourse is to leave, and the local church pays the price for their departure.

Let me put a challenge to the SGM leadership: Put out a call to all SGM churches, to have people who believe themselves called of God as prophets, to come forward and identify themselves, and allow them to function as prophets, undomesticated by an imbalanced, insecure, and over-emphasized pastor-teaching gift.

It is also possible that some who are functioning as pastors, aren’t really pastors at all, but prophets. But because of the SGM environment, you have been emasculated, domesticated, and pigeonholed into a pastor-teacher role in an organization that has essentially choked out all the other gifts from functioning.

SGM leaders, If you have not already run the prophets off, and you now properly receive those who remain as the gifts they are (after all, Ephesians 4 says the LEADERS ARE GIFTS, they are not merely gifted people), by allowing them to function as leaders, who are just as legitimate as you are, you can very quickly resolve all of your outstanding relational and polity issues.

The alternative is to wander in endless processes of “reconciliation” that will ultimately leave the most important reconciliation undone . . . with Jesus, the one who should be the Head. Your alienation from Him and His ways, in the very fabric of your leadership paradigm, will never be resolved through “reconciliation.” You must look within, much deeper. I sincerely pray that you do so.

SGM Chronicles: A Preamble

For nearly 15 years my wife and I were involved in an SGM church. While I believe the Lord used the church to minister to us in many ways, at some point it became a place of bondage.

I want to initially say that I believe we bear the responsibility for submitting ourselves to the organization beyond the bounds of scriptural instruction. While we did much of this in ignorance, the power of submission was always ultimately ours. We have since repented of what we now recognize to be profound idolatry. A religious brand, a “local church”, alleged spiritual leaders, and other things became the focus of attention above Jesus himself. And to any of you whom we may have played a role in compelling to submit to this, we ask your forgiveness, and we open our lives to any reconciliation for anything we may have done to cause you to stumble.

Today we stand joyfully in a place of glorious liberty, with others who know the true spirit of sonship purchased by Jesus with his own blood.
And yet we also have heavy hearts for dear brothers and sisters who remain under the grip of religious bondage. That burden extends to the leaders who labor under the same bondage (maybe greater) in their perpetuation of a religious system that is run by “philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ”. (Colossians 2:8) Sadly their alleged pursuit of “sound theology” perpetuates a knowledge of Jesus that is according to the flesh.

THE GOSPEL produces a love of Christ that controls us and compels us to live for him, not for ourselves. This is the glory of the new creation. In him we are the righteousness of God. (II Corinthians 5:11-21)
The “church” gospel produces a counterfeit love… one that is directed back at itself. It refuses to find life through death, but instead seeks to control others to live for the church rather than Jesus. And sadly it insulates people from the power of the true gospel that liberates us from sin consciousness (Hebrews 10:1-2)

We are profoundly thankful for the Lord’s faithfulness to deconstruct us from “human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.” We enjoy the blessing of true Ephesians 4 leadership that continues to equip us “for the work of ministry”. These are not overlords, but brothers who have the entire Body of Christ in view, not a sect or brand of their own creation. Their purpose is that we “attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may not longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine….” (Ephesians 4:1-16). The church gospel previously bound us in eternal infancy at the feet of endless teaching no one ever graduates from, and few are ever equipped. All too many are simply corralled and controlled and their God given gifts are suppressed. Though the motive for this is probably sincere, the result is kingdom resources are bound up in this system of religious cronyism and nepotism that prevents God’s people from truly being HIS “workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works… “ (Ephesians 2:10)

Today we stand as ministers of the New Covenant, now boldly renouncing “disgraceful and underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God’s word, but by the open statement of the truth we commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God.” (II Cor 4:1-2) Sadly we believe the idolatry of the “local church” gospel has extended a veil over people that blinds them “to keep them from seeing the light of the glorious gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is NOT ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with yourselves as servants for Jesus’s sake. (II Cor 4:3-5 emphasis mine).
So today, my heart is not to “recruit”you to join us or any entity. It is to appeal to you to treasure “treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.” (II Cor 4:7) Jesus is the treasure… not a “local church” or its leaders. If we are truly “dead”, there’s nothing to defend or protect.

I’m reminded of the song we often sang, “Jesus, Lover of My Soul”. The chorus sums it up so accurately.
It’s all about you, Jesus
And all this is for you.
For your glory and your fame
It’s not about me,
As if you should do things my way.
You alone are God and I surrender
To your ways.

So this is what burns in our hearts. We, as brothers and sisters desire to see all of His people walk in liberty. For this reason, as the Lord leads, this will be the first in a series of articles to uncover the “veils” of religious deception that captivated us. By God’s grace we hope it will lead others to true freedom in Jesus. And as always, we stand ready to help and encourage you in any way we can.

Introducing: Revolution Radio

We are excited to announce a new initiative.

Dr. Steve Crosby and I have started a new talk program online. It is called "Revolution Radio". In fact, the first broadcast is available now.

Listen to internet radio with kingdomtalker on Blog Talk Radio

We will discuss foundations of the Christian faith, and explore how we can walk in the fullness of Kingdom Life in Christ.

You can subscribe to the broadcast, listen live, and even call in to ask questions or join the discussion.

Stay tuned.

Vince

An Urgent Message to Our Brothers and Sisters in CrossWay and SGM

As a former member of CWCC I've been grieved by events that have played out in recent months within the church and parent ministry, SGM.

I write this out of my passion for the glory of God, and the desire for my brothers and sisters to walk in the freedom of sonship. This does not constitute an endorsement of a person or group of people or their positions in any conflict.

Today, out of the conviction that church leaders have crossed a line, I asked my friend and author, Dr. Stephen Crosby to address the most recent issue of "marking people who are deemed divisive". While this is directed to help people in a particular church and "fellowship of churches", the message may very well apply to you. In all, may Jesus truly be Lord of His church.




In an organization, leaders generally consider themselves in the right. It is part of the paradigm they create for themselves: if you have succeeded in making your way to the top of an organization, then, by definition, the values for which you stand, must be right, because they have been authenticated and validated by peers in the organization. In a cult-like controlling atmosphere, any challenge from within the organization to the values which the leaders have vested interest in, will always be considered as betrayal and a threat to the consensus orthodoxy of the group (whatever orthodoxy that might be). This adapted quote highlights a vulnerability leaders in any organization have. The church of the Lord is not immune. Church leaders often confuse confidence in the Lord and His Word, with confidence in themselves (as leaders) and their abilities in the Word. It is a powerful delusion.

In a church, a leader is someone who cares for people on behalf of God; someone who lays his life down, someone who gives his life away, who allows others to “spend them” and be loved the less for it . . . all gladly and without complaint. Many problems in church leadership are self-inflicted from embracing an organizational paradigm of understanding, rather than a family and relational one. God’s family does not have any CEOs. The church is not an organization to be managed. The church is a new way of living life together. The church is a new way of being human, together.

A godly leader is someone who would rather suffer personal loss than see the Lord’s interests in His people suffer, or His reputation be tarnished. A godly leader is someone who is willing to suffer injustice quietly. Perpetuation and maintenance of the organization, and the vindication of the reputation of its leaders is categorically not the same as caring for God’s people. It is often antithetical to God’s interests.

Godly leaders should be walking dead men. In fact, only walking dead men are worthy of our trust and submission. A walking dead man does not need his reputation defended, nor care if his organization is perpetuated. If a leader is not a walking dead man, clear thinking and proper decisions based on Jesus’ interests, not his own, will be the first casualties in crisis when paychecks are threatened by criticism and the departure of the allegedly “unsubmissive.”

The hegemonic control over people’s consciences and thought processes required by many who are the most de-voted to a Protestant Reformation tradition, is more Papist than the Romanists they claim to be protesting. The control is dressed in the language of “submission to authority, accountability, honoring leadership, etc.” However, definitionally neutering Romanist thinking so as not to offend Protestant sensibilities does not negate the fact that in essence, they are identical to those same Roman concepts: you must categorically submit to an elite group of specially selected religious superiors, or suffer dire consequences, either metaphysical and spiritual in nature, or punitive and disciplinary in actual practice. The Greek word for “having authority” (exousia) is never used in the NT in reference to one believer (or leader) exercising authority “over” another . . . never . . . not one reference.

Unfortunately, the practice of “marking those that cause division” is often used as a speech and behavior control template by these same leaders. It is exegetically indefensible and unjustifiable to apply this disciplinary passage to anyone who simply questions authoritarian leadership. The biblical context is that of those causing division by in-troducing doctrines and scandals that undermine the specific apostolic teaching concerning Christ, especially Gnos-tic incursions into the early church. Simply disagreeing with, challenging, and confronting a leader in his behavior and teaching is not categorically sowing division. It might actually be the redemptive hand of the Lord trying to intervene to stop self-destructive tendencies within leadership that they do not recognize about themselves. To claim otherwise regarding these passages, is simply a cultic control technique that should be resisted by all who call on the Name of Jesus as Lord. Dissent is not disloyalty. Disagreement is not a lack of unity.

If you are attending a fellowship and some of these value systems, behaviors, teachings, and doctrines are being propagated as legitimate exercises of spiritual authority, I urge you to seek God and find safe harbor elsewhere.

1 Adapted from Vanier, Jean. Becoming Human. Toronto: Anasnsi Press, 2008, 75.
2 Majority opinion, the points of view required of subordinates to belong to the group. The problem with consensus orthodoxy is it becomes entrenched and not amenable to change and/or correction. Consensus orthodoxy within a group is not necessarily the same as biblical orthodoxy. Consensus orthodoxy degenerates into spiritual calcification if not challenged.
3 Gender limitation is not implied throughout.
4 2 Corinthians 12:15
5 Every NT verbal reference is active, not passive. That is, the idea of someone being passive as someone else exercises authority over them, cannot be found in the NT. See Authority, Accountability and the Apostolic Movement, by Stephen Crosby, at www.goczn.com/srcrosby.
6 Romans 16:17, etc.

Today's Unpardonable Sin

Even a Christ-hating, atheist, mocking, scoffing, secularist, media personality will know one scripture reference, and leverage it frequently: Judge not, that you be not judged.[1] The unpardonable sin of today’s secular culture is judgmentalism.

Unfortunately, there has been significant seepage from the secular culture into the minds and practices of leaders in the Lord’s church. It has reached the point where “judge not” means: turn off all faculties of discernment between good and evil, light and darkness, life and death. Any evaluation of a doctrine, practice, or behavior is considered being unduly “critical” or “judgmental”—allegedly something Christians are not supposed to do.

It has reached the point among us that to have any regard for character, holiness, purity, or death/life is considered a failure to understand the grace of God. I am a new covenant, radical grace of God guy in every way: theologically, practically, spiritually, and subjectively. In fact, I am often criticized for being just that. However, the grace that is really God’s grace is both empowering and instructive. Someone who is experiencing God’s grace in the power of the resurrection life of the Lord Jesus Christ, will be empowered to stop ungodliness.[2] They will not habitually practice sin absent of conviction.[3]

As a mentor of leaders around the world, I see (on a regular, and widespread basis) the excusing of the rankest, foulest, clearest sin possible in the body of Christ by the wave of the magic wand of being judgmental or religious for bringing the topic up. I have seen fornication, adultery, the love of money, drunkenness, witchcraft, sedition, slander, rebellion, idolatry, and other practices, all tolerated—by supposedly mature Christian leaders—because to deal with these practices is considered being judgmental by those who hold local church authority in their hands.

As is so commonly done from pulpit, street corner, and TV studio, the Matthew passage is quoted out of context, and in disregard for other “red-letter” admonitions from the Lord. If proof-texting is all we need, how can the same holy lips that forbid judging in Matthew’s gospel, turn around in John’s gospel and tell His hearers to engage in judgment, only doing so righteously, not according to appearances?[4]

Of course, propping up the “judge not” cultural virtue with a biblical proof-text cannot withstand close biblical scrutiny. For example:

Jesus was “judgmental” when He:

■Insulted people – Matthew 12:34 et. al.[5]
■Called them names – John 8:44
■Threatened them – Luke 13:3
■Whipped them – John 2:15
Paul was judgmental when he:

■Threatened people with curses – 1 Cor. 16:22[6]; Gal. 1:8-9
■Confronted their hypocrisy, judging their behavior – Gal 2:13-14
■Committed them to divine discipline – 1 Tim. 1:20; 1 Cor. 5:5
The Jesus we have created in our cultural, conservative, “Christian” religion is an idolatrous fantasy, a pure figment of religiously sentimental minds. However, that Jesus is a necessity to keep the church growing and the finances flowing. Often an unsanctified or over-expressed pastoral or evangelistic gift defined by cultural values of success and what it means to be a “good pastor” facilitates the “don’t judge” spirit. The lack of the expression of other equally valuable gifts and graces results in a very warped and utterly unbiblical expression of the pastoral grace.

What is the difference between prohibited judgments encouraged judgments?

The context of Matthew 7 is hypocrisy, not evaluation between good and evil. Jesus is dealing with those who want to “speak from behind the mask,” those who present themselves as something other than what they are, and measure and condemn others for the same sins they secretly engage in word, thought, or deed. Discernment is not being prohibited in Matthew 7.

Assuming we can agree that being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ is the divine purpose for all humanity,[7] we cannot go wrong being like Jesus. The judgment we are to engage is the kind the Messiah engaged in. He did not judge by what He saw with the eyes and ears. He looked beyond the surface. He confronted concentrations of power in all forms: religious, political, institutional, financial, spiritual, and based His judgments on behalf of the poor.[8]

The judgments we are prohibited from engaging in are those that are inconsistent with His Word and Spirit. We are forbidden from condemnation (of ourselves and others!): the issuance of a final decree on a matter, a judicial “sentence” of finality. There is only One who is qualified to make those kinds of judgments, because only He knows the hearts of humanity fully. We cannot know the depth, breadth, and scope of His redemption concerning others. We see through a window, darkly.

If all judgment/discernment is prohibited by the Lord, then the general discernment belonging to all believers (as sharing in the Spirit of Christ) and the specific gift of discerning of spirits, are both unnecessary—there is nothing to judge. I suggest that many of the problems experienced in individual lives, relationships, and in local faith communities result from precisely this failure to exercise the most basic elements of discernment: a failure to righteously judge.[9]

Not all judgments are negative! In our culture the word “judgment” has such a negative connotation, it is hard for us to understand that it is possible to make positive judgments! Acquitted! Son not slave! Free! Forgiven! These, and many others, are all positive judgments!

We are to make evaluative judgments from the new creation nature, based on the Word and Spirit of God. Our evaluations are to be full of grace and truth: truthfully gracious and graciously truthful,[10] and severe when necessary[11] . . . remembering our frames are but dust. We must always remember the mire we have been rescued from, and extend the same long-suffering graciousness to others. The measure with which we measure others, we will be measured by. Our judgment is in hope, and in mercy triumphing, not rejoicing in another’s weakness or failure.

Never the less, judge (discern/evaluate) we must . . . starting with our own hearts and the beams in our own eyes.


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[1] Matthew 7:1

[2] Titus 2:11-15

[3] 1 John 3:9

[4] John 7:24

[5] Semitic people believed that snakes reproduced asexually, without a father. To call someone the “children of snakes,” was the same in our culture as calling someone a bastard: fatherless. There was no greater insult possible toward a Jewish person. Their entire identity and “place in God” depended on their tracing fatherhood to Abraham and ultimately, God through Adam.

[6] And pronounce a grace-based blessing in the same verse!

[7] 2 Cor. 3:18; 2 Cor. 4:11

[8] Isaiah 11:3-4.

[9] Gift expression is healthy only in a fully expressive community of diverse gifts. All gift expressions are divinely designed to be in divine tension and counterbalance one with another. Truly, only the outworking of the inwrought cross and a very present ministry of the Holy Spirit can keep the whole body functioning beautifully.

[10] John 1:17

[11] Romans 11:22

Copyright 2011 Dr. Stephen R. Crosby www.drstevecrosby.wordpress.com. Permission is granted to copy, forward, or distribute this article for non-commercial use only, as long as this copyright byline, in totality, is maintained in all duplications, copies, and link references. For reprint permission for any commercial use, in any form of media, please contact stephcros9@aol.com.

What Really Matters

In the “real” world, the recipient of service gets to determine the value of the service received, not the individual providing the service. Demand determines supply, and price. For instance, the customer in the restaurant not the waiter, determines the size of the tip, based on the quality of the service provided. Too often in the church we believe our own press clippings. That is, our own evaluation of ourselves and what is important, bears no resemblance to reality, but we feel good about ourselves none-the-less.

Have you ever wondered what would motivate pagans in the first few years after the resurrection, to want to align themselves with this “Jewish cult” of a crucified, criminal, itinerant peasant preacher from a despised country? There were no “services,” choirs, “special music,” solos, a good Sunday School program, youth ministry, singles ministry, young adult ministry, men’s ministry, women’s ministry, nurseries, paved parking lots, latte bars, sound systems, worship teams, prayer summits, proper church government, budgets, elder boards, etc., to “attract them.” Something other than a clever name resulting from a demographic marketing survey to determine “relevance,” and a slick highway billboard with Ken and Barbie grinning down in stylistic perfection, had to be working.

Why would pagans risk losing everything that matters to them in life (perhaps even life itself) to “join” the “Way” as it was called. What was “attractive” about the church that made pagans risk everything?

I think that is a fair question.

The catch phrase: “We want to be a New Testament church,” sounds noble, but it was unnerving to me to discover some years ago, that in spite of that mantra being on my lips, very little, perhaps nothing that I was involved in as a “pastor,” had any bearing on what was attractive to pagans in New Testament times.

Some years ago there was an article in Christian History magazine in which the author did a survey of pagan literature regarding the church. Since the church is supposedly called to “serve the world” as ambassadors for Christ, it makes sense to not just believe our own press reports, but to believe what objective critics had to say about “the church,” both fairly and unfairly. Sometimes, our critics are the most honest harbingers of evaluation. Even in an unfair criticism, we need to look for the germ of truth. It is usually there.

Herein is a condensed and adapted summary of what the author of the article discovered from pagan sources regarding what attracted them to want to become a Christian, join the community. I cannot expound on every point here, except to say, none of the things we typical value (the quality of the sermons, the worship music, the “ministries” offered, the heat and air conditioning in the building, etc.), had any bearing whatsoever on the interest of unbelievers. Here is the list (not listed in any particular priority):

1. Fortitude under persecution/pressure
2. Fearlessness of death
3. Tight community
4. A life of moral purity and prayer
5. Strong leadership
6. Care for one another, care for the needy, they lived longer. They shared risk in a time of trouble, people drew together.
7. Miracles and deliverances
8. First century evangelism consisted of relationships not arguments.
9. Many women were drawn to Christianity, because the Christian ban on abortion appealed to them, as abortion was often fatal or sterilizing. No female infanticide also appealed. A Roman could leave a baby exposed to die if it was defective in any way, or if it was a girl, and a boy was desired. These things would “motivate” women.

Friends, what is distinctive about this list? The answer to this question was instrumental in my own journey of re-evaluating everything I was doing as a “pastor” within a traditional church. It was humbling to discover, that just about everything I was giving my time, energy, and other people’s money to maintain, was irrelevant to what really matters in reaching the lost. Just about everything that is valued in a typical, Western, American “size and success” Evangelical church, isn’t in this list.

God help us all to give ourselves to what really matters, for Jesus’ cause, rather than the perpetuation of a ghetto of irrelevant religious practices, that we happen to enjoy on a weekly basis. God deliver us from a man-centered, ego-centered, bless-me-centered, false gospel that permeates the very fiber and fabric of American cultural “Christian” religion.

The gospel of Jesus Christ is manifested in a life that is lived, not an argument that is won.

__________________

Copyright 2011 Dr. Stephen R. Crosby www.drstevecrosby.wordpress.com. Permission is granted to copy, forward, or distribute this article for non-commercial use only, as long as this copyright byline, in totality, is maintained in all duplications, copies, and link references. For reprint permission for any commercial use, in any form of media, please contact stephcros9@aol.com.

Our books and materials can be found at our online mall at www.goczn.com/srcrosby

The Good Side of the Wrong Tree

God’s purpose in humanity is not behavior conformed to biblical standards. It is transformation into the image of Christ, and the two are not unequivocally the same. Transformation is a faith appropriation process realized in us through death and resurrection, not a behavior modification process realized through the acquisition of layer upon layer of correct biblical information.

Have you ever wondered why sometimes when someone is teaching something biblically true, imparting a “great revelation,” or trying to implement something biblically accurate, that the end result is often spiritual death? It doesn’t matter how “biblical” the topic is—authority, family, marriage, government, finance, honor, submission, leadership, “accountability,” repentance, for-giveness, revival, worship, prayer, etc.—or how great the revelation is. The animating power and spirit behind it makes the difference between life and death. It’s possible to be deeply “revela-tional” and biblically accurate in one’s doctrine and practice, and touch nothing of the life of Je-sus in the process.

There were two trees in the middle of the Garden of Eden: the tree of life, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The promise the serpent made to Adam and Eve was not, “Eat of this tree and it will make you a bad person.” The promise was God-likeness. God is good and you will be like Him, only without God. The serpent wasn’t joking. He delivered on his word. Unbelieving humanity resembles God in human “goodness.” There is a good side of the wrong tree. The good side of the wrong tree has a striking resemblance to the tree of life. The only problem is, it is a form of goodness and God-likeness, separated from Life, and the end result is, and always will be, death.

The tree of life and the good side of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil are like identical twins—you have to be close to notice any difference. Imagine two identical quarts of milk in the fridge. Neither has been opened. You cannot tell from a distance and by outward appearance if they are really identical or not. You have to open them, and check the expiration date. Though they look the same, the aroma will tell you which you want on your cereal. So it is with the good side of the wrong tree. It stinks. Biblically conformed behavior, of itself, means nothing.

There are many legitimate principles and precepts in the scripture. However, when any biblical precept is implemented or energized from the good side of the wrong tree, its effect will be death:

Accurate Bible doctrine + good side of the wrong tree = death.
“Prophetic” revelation + good side of the wrong tree = death.
Well meaning intentions + good side of the wrong tree = death.
Passion for Scripture + good side of the wrong tree = death.
Passion for prayer + good side of the wrong tree = death.
Passion for the kingdom + good side of the wrong tree = death.
Passion for soul winning + good side of the wrong tree = death.
Passion for moral purity + good side of the wrong tree = death.
Governmental order + good side of the wrong tree = death

A life built solely upon adherence to biblical principles is designed by God to fail. A life built precept upon precept, line upon line, was the judgment God put on a leadership that was acting like babies, drunken in their own vomit. It is designed to cause those who try to build their life that way, to fall backward, be broken, snared, and taken. Precept upon precept, and line upon line was the punishment God laid upon Israel for refusing Him in His Person and the relational rest that is in Him. (Please read Isaiah 28 in context.)

It is possible, and common, to have one’s outward behaviors morally conformed to a biblical standard, and to be at the same time, relationally alienated from God and humanity. We can be blameless according to the “scriptural standard of behavior,” and be relationally toxic at the same time. According to Paul’s own testimony, his behavior was blameless according to the standard of God’s law. Yet, he was the chief of sinners, alienated from God and humanity, and he counted all that moral conformity as excrement compared to the excellency that is in Christ.

That is why a new convert whose behaviors are . . . well, consistent with being a new convert . . . can experience life-changing transformation into the image of Jesus, and know very little about the Bible. Freshness of love and relationship begets life, not mastery of the Bible. It is a matter of right relationship, not right doctrine. Knowledge puffs up . . . yes, even “Bible” knowledge. I can be “wrong” in my doctrine, and “right” in my relationships, and thus enjoy the manifest life and blessing of God. I can be right in my doctrine, and wrong in my relationships, and enjoy neither.

Since Jesus was explicitly clear that the fulfillment of all the law, and all God’s moral expecta-tions for humanity were relational not behavioral in essence, morally conformed but relationally alienated behavior that is from the good side of the wrong tree is still sin, and the fruit thereof will always be death.

The Adamic nature in us—the propensity to live life without consideration of God and His ways—has a death sentence on it, not a mandate for self-improvement through the exercise of biblical principles. We all would rather “try to live right,” than to die daily and experience His newness of life.

The unredeemed, natural, soulish, Adamic human nature can, from a base of sheer will power, conform itself to the mandates of biblical principles. This is especially true if there is some in-centive of esteem or reward that the Adamic nature will receive from being conformed to biblical principles.

The life we have been given in Him is like an artesian well. We do not have to flail the Adamic pump handle trying to make Christianity “happen.” It cannot be coerced to manifest through the application of biblical principles. If yielded to through faith appropriation of Christ’s finished work, and the experiential process of death and resurrection, it flows freely. It is in the nature and design of an artesian well to flow. It doesn’t need any help.

The problem is, Adam would rather flail than die. Professional pump-men earn the respect and admiration of others in the Christian community: “Look at how hard Brother Pumps-A-Lot is working for Jesus.” “Look at his earnestness!” “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if everyone were as devoted as Brother Pumps-a-Lot?”

There is just a small problem. Brother Pumps-a-Lot may not be converted. You cannot tell by his activity what kind of water he is bringing up, just like you cannot tell if the milk in the fridge is good or sour by looking at it from a distance. Religious activity in the name of Jesus is not the same as having a life-source change. Adam in a tuxedo and clean fingernails or Adam in grimy rags is still Adam.

Adam would prefer to pump in the noonday sun until the sweat is rolling off His nose like water over Victoria Falls, than to embrace the death sentence he has in Jesus, yield to the Spirit of Chr-ist within, experience unspeakable deaths, and be brought up again in His newness of life. Adam will always choose the pump handle over the grave.

The yoke that is easy, the burden that is light, is the yoke of His rest. The familiar Psalm 23 states: He makes me to lie down . . . (Not try harder!)

Makes me . . .

That sounds to me that we are not inclined that way!

The essence of the Christian life, the life we have been promised, is not the arduous acquisition of virtue through human discipline. It is the unfolding of the life that is in us, that has been given in the indwelling Holy Spirit. Through faith—relational trust—learning how to appropriate mo-ment-by-moment, the ever sufficient, eternally emanating life of Christ in resurrection. Through cycles of death and resurrection, all the days of our mortality, you and I will be transformed into the image of Christ: God gets many sons, and Messiah gets the nations!

Copyright 2011 Dr. Stephen R. Crosby