Re: The Bible and Ted Haggard
| Posted On: 03/03/07 09:08:26 PM |
Age 56, MN |
When people like James DOBSEN, say TED HAGGARD had a MORAL failure, they need to go back to KINDERGARTEN 101 and learn what sin is and what SAVED means.
WHAT are the standards for being saved today, MY PET rat wants to know, because he thinks he is saved too.
PEOPLE WAKE UP!
LETS remove our heads from the sand or ELSEWHERE and stop calling those in GROSS sin having MORAL FAILURE.
People look up to DOBSEN, GIVE ME A BREAK, not only doesnt he want to call a ace a ace, he thinks those in the ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH are our brothers and sisters in CHRIST< time for a brain transplant I would say, this time try to get one with better BIBLICAL DISCERNMENT PLEASE. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.
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Re: The Bible and Ted Haggard
| Posted On: 11/10/06 12:05:48 PM |
Age 50, CA |
Ken, I get your drift and appreciate even your quipy dismissive.
However, there is still a more redemptive and less public nature and purpose than you espouse even to 1 Timothy 5. Do not receive an accusation against an elder except on the basis of two or three witnesses. Those who continue in sin, rebuke in the presence of all, so that the rest also will be fearful of sinning.
The background for how to handle accusations certainly has to be or at least must consider Jesus command to the church in Matthew 18. Such a clear instruction and nearly exclusive instruction must be part of Pauls repertoire as he counsels Timothy.
1Timothy 5 begins with very private consideration of accusations by the elders and an implied private confrontation. The confrontation is only moving to the rebuke in the presence of all when the busted sinner is among the unrepentant who continue in sin.
The translation you use Those who continue in sin accurately represents the present participle. Ted doesnt seem to be in such a category is he? If not he is therefore disqualified from the next step of public rebuke. Again the confrontation is like Jesus instructive command in Matthew 18 and has been redemptive in nature.
I believe Ken, too the purpose of the rebuke is answered by the question, Who is referred to by in the presence of all. The is clear when Paul continues So that (hina purpose clause) the rest also will be fearful of sinning. Who are the rest? You imply the rest is the watching world, but that is where your understood purpose deviates from Jesus and now Pauls.
You state the purpose is that the unbelieving world may take notice that God will not permit a professed believer in Christ to continue in willful sin against Him and to shower this kind of abuse on his wife and his children without severe punishment. This isnt about the world. Its about the church. Its about the church leadership. The rest are the others like the busted unrepentant elder. This is isnt a warning for the world it is a warning to the rest of the elders in the church. I see Teds fall and I shutter and think but for the grace of God there go I. Thats the purpose the rest of the elders examine themselves and repent of what is un-repented.
The rebuke in 1Timothy 5 demonstrates that unrepentant sin will not be tolerated among you church leaders. Its a rebuke so public that the elders specifically at Ephesus under Timothys authority will take notice.
The rest of the world nor the rest of the churches in the 1 century are not privy to the details of the rebuke. They may know it happened but they dont get the DVD. Neither brother do you and I. What you and I get, Ken is the warning to look to ourselves and the sin we deal with, we are warned to repent and deal with them rather than continue in them. Again as with Matthew 18 the purpose is redemptive and has you and I as elders in view as well.
Grace my brother. Art
By the way how does this christianworldviewnetwork operate? You get the notice of a post and they dont post it? Or was the response just not accepted as appropriate? Just wondering and I doubt you have any control or say as my post is not up but you got the notice.
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Re: The Bible and Ted Haggard
| Posted On: 11/10/06 09:15:14 AM |
Age 50, CA |
Speaking of what the bible says "precious little," of being "rebuked publicly." The point of Jesus words has little regard for the exposing a sinner as a sinner to the outside world.
Jesus is talking about an unrepentant believer's sin before the church . . . not the world . . . not the church universal for all time. . . but the church the ekklesia representatives of the gathering of the believers in a specific locale.
The intent of Jesus is redemptive both for the regenerated sinner and the ekklesia not simply a fearsome warning to the watching or mocking world as you might suggest;
"Even so Haggard is to be rebuked publicly, and all the more so because he was accepted as a leading evangelical spokesman, that the unbelieving world may take notice that God will not permit a professed believer in Christ to continue in willful sin against Him and to shower this kind of abuse on his wife and his children without severe punishment."
Additionally consider that the grammar of the Matthew 18:17 itself may call into question your punishment withdrawal requirement by the church at large. Whatever exegetical clarities or difficulties you may suppose in the passage, When Jesus says, "if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector." The command "let him be to you" is singular (esto soi). Meaning the order may not be to the church at large but a command of withdrawal to the individual who was sinned against in private which serves also as a prescriptive to prevent said individual from following the errant way. It is then as well Jesus' corrective to the unrepentant one.
However, it seems the whole text has a redemptive quality qualified by the Jesus' desirous overtones of "if he listens." If he listens! It would seem to me . . . I don't know but it would seem to me Ted has at least met Jesus' requirement and appeared to have "listened."
Is Ted really really really repentance to your satisfaction? Its none of my business and I doubt if its yours. You seem to really really really know his heart. Jesus does not make you nor your standard the qualifier.
Jesus states his own standard. The intention of Jesus is redemption. The hope (then and now)for the church and the sinner is "if he listens to you," that "you have won your brother." Let us hope and let our intent be as Jesus.' Let us pray that by Ted's apparent listening demonstrated by confession (whether you think his public statement is adequate or not), his resignation, his submission to counsel, correction and accountability the church may win back its brother.
I believe it is our faulty discipleship and a faulty iconoclasm in the American Church at large that tends to promote both an unhealthy need for hidden sin and shock and awe when discovered.
In the facade of "goodness" we become counter to the mission of Jesus and become an unreal icon neither the world nor the person in the pew next to us can truly trust or relate. We become vulnerable to the doubter and accuser's point that what is seen it "just a veneer." (Matt Foreman of the NG<F) see more if you like at pastor-art.com thought Ken I doubt many will because you have so few who seem to question your strong statements. Grace Art
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Re: The Bible and Ted Haggard
| Posted On: 11/10/06 06:40:22 AM |
Age 54, NY |
Bro. Ken,
I am concerned the issue with Ted Haggard is much deeper than this wretched sexual sin going to its roots in apostasy, for haven't the "evangelicals" committed spiritual adultery against Christ in their love of the world and thier love affair with the Roman Catholic Church and its Popes and celebrities?
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