Featured The Big, Huge Elephant in the Sanctuary with ALL of Us!

My church would welcome gays into our church. My church would welcome any sinners into the church. They will hear the Gospel and the entire truth. They will hear that their sin is sin. Open, unrepentant sinners would not be allowed to serve in any capacity or be members of my church.

 

Hebrews 1:1-2 says that God has spoken to us in "these last days" and he chose the apostles to represent His words through the writing of the New Testament. So we don't have to ask "what would Jesus Do", all we have to do is read what Jesus said through his representative spokesman - the New Testament scriptures.

One of his chief representatives is the apostle Paul. Paul says that such are to be excluded from the congregation not included (1 Cor. 5:11-13). Paul explcitly defines it not merely as sin, but in the second category of God giving men over to the lowest category of sin:

24 Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:
25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:
27 And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.

This seems to be a real issue with you as I noticed you make several posts concerning this subject. May I ask why are you so concerned about whether or not Baptists will receive such into their churches? Are you pro-gay? Are you for same sex marriage?

 

How do you treat people living together in a heterosexual relationship? How about the promiscuous man or woman? How about teens who are open about multiple partners?

How is that different if you change it from heterosexual to homosexual? Why is it different?

Where I serve, we allow anyone to attend. We allow anyone to worship. We allow anyone to attend groups. When it comes to serving and leading, however, we have a covenant that we ask them to sign that includes a clear moral statement where we state that only within marriage is sexual intimacy appropriate and for our leaders we ask them to please pledge before God to ensure their commitment to our community, themselves, and others.

 

That is precisely our way as well. We do not allow anyone open to serve, but they are welcome to attend. If someone attends with the purpose of stirring things or creating conflict, well we may ask them not to attend until or unless they could practice an acceptable decorum. I know there are some of this nature in our church (reasonably sure). So far as I know, they do not make it a point. My hope, is that exposure to the message of Word, conviction may come and perhaps their lives could be redirected toward the intent of proper relationships.

 

What about membership? What is Church discipline and is it only for the leaders?

Most all Baptist Churches have gotten lazy in this area, it seems now Churches are going to have to define what is a local church, who is allowed membership and how and when to administer church discipline. I imagine if we took it seriously our Denomination would shrink by at least 50%, and maybe that's a good thing.

 

I'm curious. Does anybody 's church specifically ask about this issue before letting someone join? Does your church make potential new members/transfer members sign that they are in agreement with the church's statement of faith?

Sure have. That's why it makes us look hypocritical and unjust to focus on this one sin. If the church were disciplining equally across the board, I don't think this one sin would have gained the traction that it has.

Scripture already does this part.

I've always said that it would be a necessary good thing. There are a lot of goats in with the sheep.

 

That elephant isn't in our church and I don't know too many churches where it is in the sanctuary.

Why on earth would we tell gays they are not allowed into the church for any reason? That's silly.

You don't reach folks for Christ by shutting them out.

 

There are a lot of people who treat homosexuality as though it is an unforgivable sin. But there is a big difference between serving in the church and coming into the church.

 

SO true.

Absolutely. Questions like in the OP make me wonder if we just sing songs like "Just as I Am" or "Amazing Grace" just for amazing show as we often treat others as though we don't really believe that.

 

I knew a preacher who didn't even want to interact with homosexuals, but had no problem bragging about how good of a Christian this one lady was, even though she was living with a man she wasn't married to.

 

A fair point, and one that I didn't bring up.

We use a covenant membership process which means that everyone who desires membership with our church family has some steps to complete in order to be considered covenant members. Part of that process is signing our church covenant which includes the same language about morality. Another part is to sit down with one of our pastors and discuss your salvation and place with God. We ask all covenant members to uphold a commonly held moral code.

This is one of the reasons we do covenant membership.

 

I suspect, (I know) if we were to take this to the literal end, then the entire congregation (Every Congregation) would be both limbless and sightless.

 

This is especially true of denominations that accept infants into their membership as they are lost persons who operate purely and only "in the flesh." If placing such under discipline destroy that church - good riddance, as it should never exist in the first place.

This is especially true of denominations who believe in justification by works, as they too are lost persons who operate purely and only "in the flesh" although in spite of what they teach there may be true believers among them. If placing such under discipline destroy that church - good riddance, as it should never exist in the first place.

However, whatever the case may be or the consequences, those publicly known to the church and community to be living in open sin should be excluded immediately - 1 Cor. 5:1-5 - irregardless if it empties the church of members, as such a church should not exist in the first place.

In regard to those who are known by the church to habitually and unrepentantly continue in sin, they too should be placed under church discipline - 2 Thes. 3:6 - irregardless if it empties the church of members, as such a church so characterized as no business existing.

The fewer these kind of churches the better!

 

I have never seen or directly known about a church member being placed under discipline. How does it work? Who decides to place the member under discipline? What does the discipline consist of? My church has a procedure for expelling a member (never used in my lifetime) but it does not have a procedure for disciplining that member.

 

Guilty dogs always bark the loudest and often very eloquently too.

 

I think you should love your daughter and maintain a relationship with her, no matter what.

 

All of us sin on a regular basis. That's a given.

Accordingly, the average church needs to have an iron clad set of By-Laws in place that refers to specific and on-going sinful lifestyles that obviously clash with the Word of God. Those living together while not married to be included.

Then, what do you do with the alcoholic that falls off the wagon? Or the husband and wife who decide to divorce? Or the habitual gossip? The church politician? The church's resident clan members that's going to have "it" their way or else?

Yes, all sinners should be welcome'd but should they refuse to turn from their sinful ways then so be it. But wait a minute here..., just wait one little minute. What about ALL OF US who refuse to turn from our sinful ways. :tonofbricks: You know, like some of us who wander over to see what kind of outfit Miss Sonja might be wearing today. Or how "cute" Robert looks.

...in short, we are all eat up with sin and will remain this way until the curse is gone forever. Especially "presumptuous sin". We're all guilty of presumptuous sin..., on occasion!

We are nothing but helpless sheep that need to be lead to the water hole daily so as to whet our whistle.

Yes, we need to draw the line someplace but in the process we can't expect perfection as there won't be any.