We have not taken the time to examine everything Mr. Laurie says and from what we have read, there are a lot of things we like about and agree with him. In this post we are not attacking Mr. Laurie but want to use some of his good words as an example to teach some ideas you may already know. we are not saying Mr. Laurie is guilty of what we are about to discuss either, we just need to use his examples.
#1.During an interview with CP at SoCal Harvest in Angel Stadium on Saturday, Laurie, the senior pastor of Harvest Christian Fellowship in Riverside, California, and author of over 70 books, was asked whether or not he believes compromises being made by Mainline denominations are helping lead America away from God.
“Yes, I do,” Laurie responded.
We at this website agree BUT we cannot restrict that agenda, for a lack of a better word, to just premarital sex. What about the fact that she is a woman pastor who is violating God’s instructions on who can be a pastor? Does that not also push people away from God? If we address one issue that is unscriptural but ignore another one then that is being hypocritical and cherry picking the issues we will call wrong and leading people away from God.
People can justify their opposition to the ‘glass ceiling’ in the church in any number of ways and they do it all the time, but is their justification correct? This leads into the next point
#2.”Yes, this is a problem because they are misrepresenting God,” Laurie continued. “So, someone might believe something like that, or another idea that says they can do whatever they want regardless of what Scripture teaches and this now becomes something that can push people away from God or keep them from understanding what a real Christian really is.”
If we are going to represent God then we need to represent him correctly in all areas of the Christian life. We cannot close our eyes to one violation because it is popular or culturally acceptable while condemning another because it isn’t accepted morally by those who believe God. If we are going to represent God then we must do what Jesus and the disciples did, and present all of the truth and let the people make up their own minds if they are going to repent or not.
The failure of people to repent is not an indication that the Bible got it wrong in some areas of life and that the contents of the Bible need to be altered. It is an indication that the people cannot accept the truth about God or do not want to accept the truth about God and have decided to remain in their sins. The people get to choose and for them to choose they need the correct information from the believer and the believer needs to correctly represent God and his views.
If the believer fails to do that then they could fall into the category of the unfaithful steward for they are not conducting God’s business correctly or honestly. If one allows for women pastors but not pre-marital sex then the believer is not being honest about God and his views commands etc.
#3.”We see Mainline denominations in many ways dying,” he said. “The churches that are growing and thriving are churches that I would call evangelical and orthodox for the most part in their beliefs. They are churches that tend to evangelize … and encourage their people to share their faith. These are the churches that are actually growing. The ones that are shrinking are the ones that are compromising and watering down what the Word of God says.”
Yes the evangelical churches are growing but the evangelicals also are losing a lot of people as well. But it is not due to just the lack of evangelizing but to the content the believers are being taught. Sadly, many evangelical churches leave their people vulnerable to secular teaching because they adopt so much of the secular world’s ideology and call it good or correct.
This is not limited to just the mainline churches as fundamental and evangelical and other true Christian churches compromise on many issues. One example is building extravagant structures another is adopting secular science over God’s word or as we see in that article altering what God has said and promote what is prohibited by God–i.e. women ministers and premarital sex
Compromise is not solely found in the mainline churches but it is found in different areas in the evangelical, etc., movements. If you want to attack compromise in other denominations then you need to make sure you have rooted it out from your own first.
#4.When someone says that the Bible is not the Word of God and that we can make things up as we go, pick and choose what parts of the Bible we want to believe, that to me is apostasy,” he reiterated.
And we agree BUT you cannot say that calling premarital sex is wrong if you call Genesis one wrong and secular science correct. That too is cherry picking what you will believe. In other words if one wants to call others wrong then they must be consistent and not do wrong in other areas of biblical life. I do not know if this woman pastor and her beliefs are an indication of the end times or not for such people have existed throughout church history since Jesus lived on this earth. We need to be careful when we try to identify an event especially when God has hidden that information from us. We should be focused more on getting the job done than worrying about when the end times are approaching.
Not everyone alive today will live long enough to see the rapture so we must concentrate on doing our duty correctly and stop pushing people from God through different areas we may not consider eligible to be included in the idea of pushing people away from God. Unbelievers are not just looking at women preachers and premarital sex when they decide not to repent.
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