John Wesley Turns Over in His Grave
The Methodist Pastor's name is Karen Dammann. A jury of fellow pastors have
decided that she can continue in her position even though she is "married"
(understand that the term "married used here has absolutely nothing to do with
the Biblical definition of what marriage is) to another woman. It took the jury
of Methodists pastors ten hours to come to the decision that such is allowable
under the denomination's social principles even though their creed book (The
Methodist Book of Discipline) labels such to be "incompatible with the teachings
of Christ."
The trouble is that pastor Karen and her fellow pastors have abandoned the
Scriptures of God in favor of social trends they see within their denomination.
The founder of their denomination, John Wesley, believed that the Scriptures
were the infallible word of God. He was right about that. These pastors no
longer believe that. They say, "We need to be careful about creating rules that
exclude people." I agree. We ought not to be in the business of creating rules
at all. That is God's business. But we had better be obeying His rules, or we
are in sinful rebellion against Him!
The conservative wing of the denomination stands against such moral relativism.
They see such as rebellion against the Lordship of Jesus Christ. They are right
about that. It is time for them to wake up and understand that the making of
human religious creeds is not their business either. If the Scriptures are
inspired by God and able to equip us unto every good work (2 Timothy 3:16,17)
and if God has given us all things that pertain to life and godliness (2 Peter
1:3) then a creed book of rules is at best redundant and at worse an alteration
of the gospel of Christ.
There is one course for people of all denominations. The Scriptures says, "Come
out from among them and be separate" (2 Corinthians 6:14-18). Our thanks to
Pastor Karen for so graphically illustrating the dangers of allowing human
councils make up the rules. What arrogance to think that man has the right to
sit in judgment over God's Law! There is only one Lawgiver (James 4:12; cf.
Romans 1:25-26; 1 Corinthians 6:9-11; 1 Tim 1:10; Jude 7).
By Jon W. Quinn
Final Page
From Expository Files 11.7; July 2004
