Living in sin
The brokenness of the world and the work of the Evil one does not stop at the doors of our Christian institutions or nominal leaders. The Lord Himself assures us that the gates of Hades itself will not prevail against His church. This does not mean that it will not prevail against some of those in it nor that the stink of the Evil one’s corruption will not enter and become fixed in its body before the final victory.
We can see the stink of this corruption and the festering of sin in the recent meetings of the primates. They consider themselves Godly and just men (and one woman) seeking to do the will of God and build up His church. Whether they actually do it is entirely another matter.
At the conclusion of the meeting the Archbishop of Canterbury, who chaired the meeting, was asked about the communique, “What message is this sending to people”?
The Archbishop responded that the communique reflected 97% of what the Communion is doing in regards to the healing and feeding of the world.
The Archbishop is a learned and perhaps gracious man but on this point he is very wrong. It is actually the other way around. If the communique is a gauge then 6% of what the Communion is doing is ministry, joint work and Christian witness. The other 94% is given over to obsessing over divisions and attacks upon its own members. The communique runs to approximately 5500 words. Of that, beyond the introductory salutation, 350 words, at most, deal with issues of Christian witness and ministry.
The message that this meeting sent to people is that the Communion cannot be bothered to do much of anything besides obsess on and wallow in its own brokenness and sin.
This is a perverse and wicked witness to the Gospel of the Lord. His commands to us are simple: Love God, love one another as I have loved you, and feed My sheep.
For bringing this message to the world and the councils of the Communion unceasingly and completely, the Episcopal Church has been cast as a pariah, a modern day leper. So be it. If we are crucified for preaching this we are in good company.
The Anglican communion continues to embrace its own brokenness with a speed and rapaciousness that is shocking in its sinfulness. It has grown the perceived mote in its own eye into a lodestone paralyzing it to the very commandments given directly to us by the Lord, in person.
If this is not the stink of corruption then what corruption in fact is, is beyond the human spirit to discern.
We can see the stink of this corruption and the festering of sin in the recent meetings of the primates. They consider themselves Godly and just men (and one woman) seeking to do the will of God and build up His church. Whether they actually do it is entirely another matter.
At the conclusion of the meeting the Archbishop of Canterbury, who chaired the meeting, was asked about the communique, “What message is this sending to people”?
The Archbishop responded that the communique reflected 97% of what the Communion is doing in regards to the healing and feeding of the world.
The Archbishop is a learned and perhaps gracious man but on this point he is very wrong. It is actually the other way around. If the communique is a gauge then 6% of what the Communion is doing is ministry, joint work and Christian witness. The other 94% is given over to obsessing over divisions and attacks upon its own members. The communique runs to approximately 5500 words. Of that, beyond the introductory salutation, 350 words, at most, deal with issues of Christian witness and ministry.
The message that this meeting sent to people is that the Communion cannot be bothered to do much of anything besides obsess on and wallow in its own brokenness and sin.
This is a perverse and wicked witness to the Gospel of the Lord. His commands to us are simple: Love God, love one another as I have loved you, and feed My sheep.
For bringing this message to the world and the councils of the Communion unceasingly and completely, the Episcopal Church has been cast as a pariah, a modern day leper. So be it. If we are crucified for preaching this we are in good company.
The Anglican communion continues to embrace its own brokenness with a speed and rapaciousness that is shocking in its sinfulness. It has grown the perceived mote in its own eye into a lodestone paralyzing it to the very commandments given directly to us by the Lord, in person.
If this is not the stink of corruption then what corruption in fact is, is beyond the human spirit to discern.
posted by The AoM at 2/22/2007 10:15:00 AM
2 Comments:
AOM: Your observation that Christ's "commands to us are simple: Love God, love one another as I have loved you, and feed My sheep" gets right to the heart of what we seem to be missing. For my own take on the reactions to the communique, see
http://communioninconflict.blogspot.com/2007/02/on-reactions-to-communique.html I'd be happy to get your take on it.
AOM: Yes and yes again and amen.
Marshall, you've written: "Whether you tend toward the right or the left, if your actions are unedifying (and I submit that separatism and secessionism are both unedifying in the highest degree), you are doing us all a disservice."
I find this truly through-provoking and look forward to re-reading and reflecting.
Peace, my brothers.
Post a Comment
<< Home