thisnumbersdisconnected
New Member
That made me think of this, C4K ...Actually I wouldn't do either.
I have no problem listening to sermons - but there a key words in the titles that clue me in to what the message is going to be about.
'Struggle theology' is a clue word to mock those who realise that the Christian life is going to be a battle or a race. It requires diligence and effort. It is either a fight or Paul lied. That is 'struggle theology.'
And I don't know about the rest of you, but I realise that the outcome of the war is settled - but that doesn't mean we are not going to have battles along the way.
Couldn't remember where I saw that, but found a source on the Internet for it. This represents a total lack of understanding of what the Christian life is, and we come across many every single day who buy into what Pride is saying, who think that there is absolutely no excuse for continuing to struggle, who reject the concept of strongholds, who refuse to see that they -- yes, even they -- fail to live up to the standards of perfection they believe are theirs for belonging to Christ. I speak of those who think all you have to do is to point to your "election" or your belief in Christ and call upon Him to snap His fingers and eradicate from your life those miserable sins that keep poking their ugly little heads up and biting you on the posterior.“Struggle Theologians say, ‘Forget that stuff about being more than conquerors in Christ and all things being possible to him who believes. Don’t start thinking you are better than other people. In fact, we’d like you to concentrate on other people. Don’t think about Jesus if you can help it. Think instead about sinners who call themselves Christians. These are your real role models. Whatever they can’t do, you can’t do either.’
“If a Struggle Theologian can find one person who professes to be a Christian and also is failing to overcome the sin of habitual drunkenness, he considers that sufficient reason to tell all of us that drunkenness is a difficult problem requiring complex coping strategies and that there are ‘no simple answers’ to this problem. If you try to point out that the Bible says drunkenness is a sin, not a disease, and that we are supposed to live above sin, the Struggle Theologian will accuse you of thinking you are better than other people and of being insensitive to the real problems others face. He may even go so far as to claim that when the church calls sin ‘sin’ and expects sinners to change their ways, we are driving the poor victims of sin even farther from the ‘healing’ that supposedly only occurs when we unconditionally accept them and their bad behavior.” (pp. 28-29, Flirting with the Devil, Bill Pride).
I suspect that those who apply the epithet of "Struggle Theology" to others are unable to conquer their own sins as well, and seek to make others miserable so they have company.
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