It is not only evangelicals who believe that the public “judging” of preachers is a great sin. Many independent Baptists believe something very similar. While they believe that it is legitimate to "criticize" some Christian leaders, such as the Pope and Joel Osteen and perhaps Rick Warren, it is not right in their eyes to “criticize” fellow independent Baptists. Private warning is OK, but not public. A lot of people have told me that they love my Bible study materials such as the Way of Life Encyclopedia, the Advanced Bible Studies, the One Year Discipleship Course, An Unshakeable Faith, and Bible Times and Ancient Kingdoms, but they are offended by my “criticism” of “good men.” They think that it is unnecessary and divisive, and they have urged me to leave off the latter and devote myself to the former. The Lord knows I would like to follow this counsel, because what I love to do most is teach the Bible. There is one “little” problem, though, and that is that I am instructed by God’s Word not only to teach, but also to reprove, rebuke, exhort, and nowhere am I told to limit the ministry of reproof to a select group of preachers and churches. Forty-three years ago, before I knew anything about independent Baptists, the Lord saved me and soon thereafter he called me to preach His Word. Through Proverbs 6:23, He called me to preach “reproofs of instruction.” As a Biblicist rather than a pragmatist, I refuse to limit my ministry of reproof, since God’s Word nowhere limits it. In my experience, though, if it comes to taking a stand for God’s Word against one’s preacher heroes, in a great many cases, the Word of God gets second place, and those who commit this sin have a hundred ways to justify it. “It’s just not the way we do things, Brother Cloud.” (Friday Church News Notes, August 7, 2015, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143) Comments are closed.
|
Archives
February 2020
|