Just
wondering....
This is for the Universalist
crowd. IYO is Judge Greer's Pastor a legalist, or do you
see
him as a true under Shepherd
with a right heart attitude trying to recover an errant
sheep? judyt
Do you mind if a non-universalist addresses
this?
No, not at all
I agree with much of Farah's critique. I
disagree, however, with what he seems to prescribe as a "fix." What the
church needs is not more laws -- Judge Greer had surely heard the
commandment: "Thou shalt not kill"; nor does it need a more rigid
enforcement of the laws it has -- Greer was asked to leave,
wasn't he?
Greer was apparently a nominal
Christian at best with no fear of God at all in his heart. I heard
someone say the pastor asked him to leave because he wanted only one god in his
Church.
What the church needs is a clearer
articulation of what it means to love God with hearts, minds, and
souls, and to love neighbors as oneself. I had a professor who put it
something like this: When a church has a sin problem, it is not time to
preach law more forcibly, while easing up on the grace stuff (as if our
problems were caused by being overly gracious); no, when the church
has a sin problem, it is time to preach grace more
clearly.
The problem I have with the above
is that it turns God's wisdom on it's ear. The law was given to
Moses so that sin might be exposed and the need for Christ revealed.
IMO which may not count for much here there is not enough preaching and
teaching from the law. People have no concept of God's holiness or of the
filthiness of sin. I was
raised in a dysfunctional family
singing Jesus loves me this I know as far back as I can
remember.
Think about it and I think you'll agree.
The law has never made people righteous -- it
did not make the Jews righteous, it will not make Christians righteous,
and it cannot make the world righteous. Do you agree with me? Why then do
Christians sometimes act as though a stricter adherence to and enforcement
of God's law will in some way begin to address the sin problems the church
encounters?
Most Church ppl are mainly walking in
sin so their hearts are condemning them all the time. They try to
work harder because of ignorance. They don't know what to do about it
because they have not received instruction in God's Word.
The Law even in its glory was never anything
more than a slave. Yes, a slave. Paul calls it a "pedagogue,"
No we are the slaves Bill.
By the Law comes the knowledge of sin
(Romans 3:20)
The Law is Holy and the Commandment
just and good (Romans 7:12)
The Law is spiritual - we are carnal
sold under sin (Romans 7:14)
The Law is good (1 Timothy
1:8)
given to lead the Jews to Christ (Gal
3.24).
And also to lead us to Christ - If one
is not sure what sin is, then why would they want to stop doing
it?
In the Greek world a pedagogue was a
slave whose sole purpose was to guard the children as he brought them to
the one who would teach them. Hence the law "was our (pedagogue) to
bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are no longer under a
(slave)'" (vs.24-25).
And how does faith come Bill?
Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God (His Law,
Commandments, and Statutes).
Therefore, it is not the law which was the
"schoolmaster" or the "tutor" to teach us the ways of righteousness -- as
our English translations lead us to believe; no, Christ is our teacher,
our schoolmaster, our tutor; and "righteousness" comes only by way of
faith, as we grow in relationship with him.
The Law is righteous Bill and we
Gentiles are not children of any covenant until we come to Christ (by the
hearing of God's Word)
"For I through the law died to the law that I
might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer
I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live
in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave
Himself for me" (Gal 2.19-20). And so,
this gets to the heart of our discussion on legalism.
Christ does not live in you except you
be "born again" born of the Spirit who accompanies the Word, unless you
can climb up some other way.
The Christian who believes he still needs
laws to govern him, is a man who has not come to terms with the fact that
the one who has fulfilled the law (who is no longer confined
under the guardianship of a slave no less) has been graciously
placed within his inner being.
Jesus is at the RH of the Father in
Heaven Bill. The Holy Spirit is the one who is placed in our inner
being when we are "born again" or "born of the Spirit" and this is just the beginning of a
walk of grace in which we will learn to overcome as He overcame by
His power working in and through us.
In other words, we ought not think of the
"law written upon our hearts" as a legal transfer -- a taking of that
which was once an external code of conduct and perceiving it now in
terms of internal restrictions; instead we should approach it in terms of
a gracious gift bestowed deep within us of him who is greater than the law
-- of him who can actually make us righteous -- for as Paul says, "if
there had been a law given which could have given life, truly
righteousness would have been by the law" (Gal 3.21).
The Levitical Law is what has passed
away Bill and noone on TT is advocating going back to that. However,
Gods Commandments and Statutes are still the standard ie: "For the Law is
fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbor as
thyself" "This I say then, walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not
fulfil the lust of the flesh" (Galatians 5:14,16) and "Love fulfills the
Law" (1 Corinthians 13:10)
Friends, it is the royal law which is written
upon our hearts by Christ Jesus as we grow in relationship with him;
for as we, the church, learn to love him with all our hearts, minds,
and souls, we will begin to love our neighbors as ourselves.
Bill
You will find it impossible to
love Him in anarchy because He says "If you love Me you will do what
I say" judyt
In a message dated
4/2/2005 3:05:09 PM Pacific Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
writes:
Just wondering....
This is for the
Universalist crowd. IYO is Judge Greer's Pastor a legalist, or do
you see
him as a true under Shepherd with a right heart attitude
trying to recover an errant
sheep?
judyt
Meet Judge Greer's pastor
Posted: March
29, 2005
1:00 a.m. Eastern
By Joseph Farah
 2005
WorldNetDaily.com
I am convinced God uses trials like the Terri
Schiavo case to test men.
Pinellas County Circuit Court Judge George
Greer was tested â and found
wanting. He had seven years to consider
this case and got it wrong every
time.
I don't know Greer
personally, but I know many people like him. They go
to church on
Sunday and then between Monday and Friday lead lives with no
seeming
connection to what they hear preached in the pulpit, what they
read
in the Bible, what they claim to believe of the Christian faith.
This
may be the biggest single problem we have in America today â
this
disconnect between the spiritual lives of Christians and how
they
practice their faith in the world.
Greer, until recently, was
a member of the Calvary Baptist Church in
Clearwater, Fla. He left at
the urging of Pastor William Rice, who
counseled him wisely: "You
must know that in all likelihood it is this
case which will define
your career and this case that you will remember
in the waning days
of life. I hope you can find a way to side with the
angels and become
an answer to the prayers of thousands."
Rice has my highest regard
for that decision. Too many pastors in this
country don't require
obedience to God as a prerequisite for church
membership. They seem
to believe in a kind of "cheap" grace that comes
with regular
attendance or tithing rather than a Christian walk. They
seem to have
no minimal standards for fellowship and communion with the
saints.
There are few heroes in the Terri Schiavo scandal. Her parents
and
siblings qualify. Terri herself qualifies. Those who braved
arrest to
bring her cups of water qualify. And, in my book, so does
Rev. William
Rice.
Do you want to know why the church doesn't
have influence and impact in
our increasingly secular world today?
Because there are too many
so-called Christians like Judge George
Greer and not enough like Pastor
William Rice.
Greer's friends
have attacked the church and defended the judge, saying
he was
interpreting the law to the best of his ability. However, if that
is
true, then Greer, as a Christian, had a duty to obey God's laws
rather
than man's laws. That would require him to leave the bench if
he truly
saw a conflict. Instead, Greer opted to leave his church â
and,
presumably, his weak faith.
"Like evangelicals across the
world, we are horrified at the thought that
a handicapped woman could
be, in effect, starved to death before a
watching world," Rice wrote.
Admitting he was not a legal or medical
expert, Rice asserted: "I
know right from wrong. I know what God thinks
about human life. I
know there is only one way to describe the prospect
of starving a
woman to death because she cannot feed herself. It is
wrong."
Rice continued: "Morality and truth must serve as our guide.
Terri
Schiavo is not on life support. She is not dying. Good evidence
exists to
suggest that she is responsive. All she receives is food
and water, the
same as you and me. Are we to conclude that she is
less than human
because she cannot feed herself? Can a month-old
child feed himself? Is
an elderly patient stricken with some
debilitating disease and unable to
feed herself suddenly less human?
Do we now use an IQ test to determine
if someone possesses the right
to live? Isn't that God's choice? Only God
can give life, and only He
should take it away."
"Tread carefully if you think this is simply
about a dying woman being
allowed to die peacefully," Rice wrote.
"Remember when we were told that
Roe v. Wade was simply about helping
women who had been raped or whose
lives were imminently threatened?
Today, few abortions fall into that
category, but millions of human
lives have been sacrificed upon the altar
of selfishness. And the
slide down the slippery slope continues."
In case Greer was still
confused, his pastor gave him more to think
about.
"This case
seems complex, but it is as simple as four words: 'Thou shalt
not
kill.' If you need a compass for this complex case, you'll find
it
there," he wrote. "As we all know, the Sixth Commandment means it
is
wrong to murder â to take the life of an innocent person without
just
cause. If I were the nurse in that hospice center and the
directive were
given to me to discontinue feeding a living human
being and watch as he
or she starved to death, I couldn't do it. I'd
rather get fired, resign
or do something else."
Christians can go
on blaming others for the problems we face in this
country. Or we can
go into the churches and start cleaning up the messes
we have in our
own houses of worship. It's time to take back the
churches. It's time
to renew the idea of standards. It's time to make
church membership
mean something again.
Judge George Greer did the wrong thing. Pastor
William Rice did the right
thing. If we had more pastors like Rice,
we'd have fewer judges
like
Greer.
:Legalist, plain and
simple -- at least in this decision. But you
knew I was going to say that.
JD
