In the city, for the city...
by David and Tim Bayly on October 2, 2010 - 9:02pm
(Tim) This past week, I was in Chicago overnight and took a pic of this sign in front of Broadway United Methodist Church a couple blocks from Wrigley Field in the Lakeview neighborhood. Note the usual word 'Worship' accompanying Sunday times is missing; also the women pastors; and then the suitable author and quote.
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Comments
In other circumstances, I might aplaud the quote. As it is, all I can say is, "Oh, the irony!"
And, I'd be willing to wager (if I were a betting woman) that neither of these pastorettes know Wilde repented before his death. Well we might wish it wasn't in the direction of Rome he turned, but his repentance seems to have been genuine.
Kamilla
>>his repentance seems to have been genuine.
Sad his repentance clearly isn't what's being celebrated.
The United Methodist Church has really been given over to their sins as of late. Example above.
Not to mention the small cross in the rainbow on the sign. "Open and affirming" comes to mind.
I'm unsure why you titled this entry the way you did--isn't "In the city, for the city" a PCA thing? Yet this church is UMC. ???
It's hard to comment on the quality of the service, if you didn't actually attend the service.
Next time, force yourself out of your comfort zone, think outside the box, and at least hear the service. To judge them (particularly without knowledge) is a sin against Scripture.
>>I'm unsure why you titled this entry the way you did...
Dear Chantal,
Being "in the city, for the city" is a very old game (maybe "conceit" is a better word) and to have observed how very often it ends with the city--not our Lord and His Word--winning. And most often, it is the refusal to teach and preach and discipline souls toward the Biblical doctrine of sexuality that gives the city of man its victory--as here at Broadway United Methodist Church where sodomy is honored and woman preaches and teaches and exercises authority over man.
The concept, if not the words, long predated PCA men. It was hip when I was in high school thirty-five years ago as families from my suburban church moved into Chicago to be in the city, for the city at LaSalle Street Church. And by several first-person accounts, LaSalle was characterized by the same failure to discipline for the Biblical doctrine of sexuality that now is characteristic of the churches called "Redeemer."
Of course, they deny this, but I've seen it firsthand myself again and again, and have lived long enough to say time will prove the truth with them as it's done with San Francisco and Denver's PCA plants.
Love to all in Houston, dear sister,
We live right next door to a Unitarian congregational building (I have a hard time calling it a church) and their signs are a weekly source of amusement/head shaking for us. Recent highlights have been the "Harvest Blessing led by Pagan Studies Group" and "Animal Blessings- All pets and their owners welcome." This past Sunday, their sign read, "To thine own self," and Craig and I had a great discussion about the irony of Shakespeare's true fool, Polonius, with his pompous, meaningless truisms. It seems fitting that the character who "darkens counsel by words without knowledge" has become a spokesperson for the culture and held up in esteem by this group of Unitarians.
Tim,
Thank you for clarifying! I now understand what you were getting at.
J,
You said:
"It's hard to comment on the quality of the service, if you didn't actually attend the service.
Next time, force yourself out of your comfort zone, think outside the box, and at least hear the service. To judge them (particularly without knowledge) is a sin against Scripture."
In some circumstances, your first statement may be true. However, this church gives the passer-by so much information on the sign itself that attending the service is really unnecessary. 1) There is a quote from a man who was not intending to bring others closer to God, and whose life was not primarily characterized by such a pursuit, which represents the church's placement of man's subjective opinion and relative sense of authority (or lack thereof) above the Word of God. This rebellion is further solidified by 2) the fact that the church has woman pastors, which reveals an unwillingness to submit to Scripture, and a denial of God's authority and His order of creation. 3) The church apparently openly accepts the practice of homosexuality, which further confirms their denial of the truth of God's Word.
Based on the information provided on the sign itself, there is ample "knowledge" for judging the spiritual state of the church and the content of its services. Furthermore, Scripture commands Christians to make such judgments about those who claim to follow Christ (1 Corinthians 5:12-13). I can say confidently, without attending a service there, that they do not preach the Word of God, and if they do it is full of misleading doctrine and false teaching. And apparently, as Tim pointed out, they themselves do not even claim that any worship happens on a typical Sunday morning...
This church has given itself to the pleasure of an illusion which denies the reality of God's holiness and His inevitable judgment.
"J",
LOVE that fallacy!
So, if I offer you a glass of an odorless and colorless fluid, will you drink? Will you drink in spite of seeing me pour from a bottle labeled, "Hydrogen Peroxide"? Even though you've just told us it is illegitimate to judge something by its labeling, I have my doubts that you would drink from that offered glass before your judged its contents to be poisonous.
Kamilla
When you name your church "broad way" from the inception, you are kinda asking for this result, aren't you?
Jesse, I think that's the name of the street it's on, but you got a smile out of me for that one, Mr. Bunyan....
And J, what Kamilla and Alex said. One does not need to partake completely in something to get a good idea it's not worth trying.
I figure it is, but I couldnt help it...it was a two foot putt.
Congratulations on knowing what is said without even hearing the sermon!
JJ,
If you'll go to the web site and graze around, you'll find plenty of words right out of the asses' mouths. If they are writing "Hee Hawww, Heeeeeee Hawwww," if their music minister lives with his partner of 12 years (can you understand the code??), well ... I don't need the first-hand aural evidence to know what kind of animal inhabits that barn.
JJ, with discernment such as that which you recommend, I wouldn't recommend going anywhere in Chicago--you will inevitably fail to recognize the signs that you're about to wander into a very bad neighborhood.
Sorry, but reality is that when a known homosexual icon is sympathetically quoted, you won't find Biblical teaching on homosexuality. In the same way, when the "pastor" is a woman, she cannot provide Biblical teaching on masculinity and femininity--the only truly Biblical lesson she can provide is to repent and resign, in which case her name would no longer appear on the church sign. Any number of other key doctrines are affected by this--the Trinity, ecclesiology, even salvation itself.
As one would guess from another obvious sign; the name "United Methodist Church." Some believers are members, but it's in general not due to what they're teaching the seminarians.
(I grew up United Methodist, for what it's worth)
If they preach Jesus' love, that is enough for me, at least
J,
One last warning, and I'll toodle along.
You opine, "If they preach Jesus' love, that is enough for me, at least ..."
If you would just read what they're writing, you'd know that when they use the word "Jesus," it's not referring to the fellow in the Gospels, or the rest of the New Testament, including those grisly passages in the latter half of the Apocalypse.
Yes, they preach love that comes from someone they refer to as Jesus. But, if you think he's the same one as in the Bible, I've got some lovely bridges for sale. For you, I'll make a special discount.
JJ, the trick is that with what they're preaching, it's NOT Jesus' love. Jesus preached repentance, not acceptance and pride, to sinners.
What this church has is a bald faced lie from the pit of Hell, and its leadership is going to have a nasty surprise when they meet their Maker if they don't accept Jesus' love--repentance and faith, not acceptance and pride.
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