We're turning off comments. We've allowed them for over twelve years now, so we have a proven track record of allowing both the friendly and the godless to disagree with us—and responding with equanimity. No one who knows the history of comments on Baylyblog can honestly accuse us of squelching disagreement. We don't even delete vicious slander!
But time. It's so time-consuming to respond, and generally speaking those who come here to scoff, preen, and parade their godlessness still must be responded to if we're to protect God's sheep.
It's also true that the Reformed celebrities never allow comments; and the few who do almost never deign to respond to criticisms or requests for clarifications themselves. The absence of comments on famous Reformed men's marketing sites is a big part of the reason we never...
recommend those sites to Christians. If a man claims to be a shepherd and wouldn't bother answering your question after he preaches or speaks at a conference or puts up a blog post, despite what he might like to claim for himself, much like a preacher who uses video venues, that man is no shepherd of God's flock. He's a celebrity. Allowing for one or two exceptions, you should avoid him like the plague.
We have always taken time to answer questions and pray and cry and laugh with those we teach and preach to each Lord's Day. Pastoral care is foundational to everything we do and has been the reason we've been so loathe to turn off comments. But now we must. It's the season of books rather than blog posts, and the season of blog posts that go out there and stink or smell good on their own merits, without the give and take of readers' responses helping to clean them up.
So we continue to be pastoral in our churches and the conferences we speak at, but not here in the comments. Except one thing: we will continue to read e-mails we receive through the links on the main page and will try to be conscientious in responding to substantive criticisms from souls who belong to Christ and honor His Word as the only infallible rule of faith and practice. So if you have a question that's more than a whim, please do send it to us by e-mail and I suspect we will continue to respond to those questions occasionally by placing our response as an addendum to the post added a day or two after its original publication.
To those who have been faithful through the years helping us with moderating comments, we thank you very much. You have been a great gift to us.
So now, goodbye to comments. They're done.
Tim serves Clearnote Church, Bloomington, Indiana. He and Mary Lee have five children and big lots of grandchildren.
Want to get in touch? Send Tim an email!
