pinakidion.*

Doug and I are going to study the book of Ephesians together. We are going to try to do it a la Reading the Bible for All Its Worth. There’s a lot of work upfront, but I hope it is worth it.

All posts from us will have Ephesians in brackets for the Googlers of the religious blogosphere.

If anyone else wants to join, feel free. The only rule that I am placing on myself is No Commentaries. Bible Dictionaries ok, Eerdman’s Handbook ok - but no commentaries.

It will basically go like this:

1. Find out the history of the Ephesian church in Acts. This provides some context.
2. Use whatever resources you have (except commentaries) to discover when and where it was written.
3. Read the book in one setting.
4. Answer the who and what questions. (I have to keep in mind that this is an overview, I can get bogged down in minutia this early.) For example, who are the Ephesians? What is the author saying to the original audience? What situation is the author addressing? What does Paul say is happeneing to himself? Whom does he address specifically? What does he say about God?
5. Go through the chapters and answer the why questions. Why is Paul saying this to them? Why did he use this example? Why does he mention certain people?
6. Lastly, after going through chapter by chapter, review your notes and ask How does this apply to me?

The first post will appear Monday, and all other posts will appear Monday and Thursday for the month of April.

I look forward to it. Thanks for being my friend, Doug.

A day of prayer and fasting was held yesterday in regards to the unity proposal.

Now, we wait for this Monday when the list of ratifiers appears on DToday.

After wrestling with this for over a month and posting my thoughts here, I am still choosing to take a stand on this Unity Proposal.

• I can abide the return to discipling partners because it is voluntary and transitory. I do not agree with it, but I am willing to consider myself the weaker brother a la Romans 14 and let it go.
• I can abide supporting HOPE Worldwide again - I believe they still engage in one questionable practice of garnering cash from overseas, but they have eliminated many positions that should not have ever existed. Again, I can consider myself the weaker brother because I cannot prove my perspective to most people here.
• I originally voted for our participationg in the Eurasian Missions Society without sending money. Now, whether we send money or not, they appear to be above board. Besides, Kip has appeared in the Ukraine, so they need whatever help we can send.

I want to be unified with other churches. I do not believe that every individual congregation is an island unto itself.

However, this is the final straw. I cannot abide a return to our bad theology. I cannot abide setting up a shibboleth to see who is towing the party line. Jesus did not pray 1 Tim 4:16 in the Garden of Gethsemane, he prayed that we would be unified. More importantly, though, most folks here seem to want the unity proposal. Why should I create problems for them? They have wrestled with it and come to different conclusions.

I have prayed and wrestled and hoped for so many things. My faith in change is all but gone and I cannot live with the present reality. Make no mistake, I have not left my church. I am, however, feeling faithless and hugely disappointed. I did not draw this line. Others drew it and asked where I will stand. I stand on one side, and many I know are on the other.

In Grace Based Parenting, Dr. Kimmel says that there are two fundamental truths he wanted to teach to his children:

• You are a gift from God, go make a difference.
• You may struggle doing the right thing sometimes, but you’re forgiven.

I am struggling to do the right thing and I want my son to do the same. The right thing appears to take me on a path that diverges from the path of my friends - and thus I hesitate where I usually push ahead. It may be knightly to tilt when you should withdraw, but I am neither knightly nor noble. I am only a man. I pray and search for God with everything I have.

I will be okay, I just need to express some deep sadness and disappointment. I am still hopeful that things will be different. I still trust that God has His own purposes in mind. I am grateful that He has led me down this path for all its ups and downs, even if this ‘downturn’ feels really painful

This unknown person was seen using the facilities just south of the Virginia state border. It should be noted that the nearest road was 4 miles away and the nearest gas station almost twice that far away.

A certain former friend took this picture in an attempt at humor - to protect from blackmail during the Christmas Banquet, it is being published here, although slightly altered to obscure the identity of the subject.

Wait until the banquet, my former friend. Wait until the banquet.

We made it home. I am posting from Rock’s house. I am giving him pictures of my son.

I wanted to stop in St. Louis, I really did. I did not read the blog until just now, so I didn’t know. I also thought about going to Columbus, but it was three hours out of the way. For reasons that I cannot explain here, time was critical and the trip was risky. We were about to go through western NC, but the route was carefully planned for the reasons that the trip was risky in the first place.

I added a link to Chick-Fil-A(R) because the story of the trip will be posted here. It’s long and will take several posts. Yes, chicken sandwiches feature prominently.

My father bought my Cadillac from me so that I could get out from under it. Maybe in the future, I can buy it back from him. For now, though, it is a roughly $500 month headache taken away. Seriously, the payment was only $299, the insurance required by the lease, was the worst part.

Anyway, me and close friend Shane (aka tool) are off to the East Coast on a driving excursion.

The highlight, of course, is Chick-Fil-A(R).

Reason #1783 of why it’s good to love Chick-Fil-A(R):

You can create a map on their website of all their stores on a given route.

Full size map is here

We have our first church voting ‘nay’ on the Unity Proposal. Actually, this is the first church I know that has published a decision at all. I assume that Los Angelos, Chicago, San Antonio, New York, and Hampton Roads will endorse it because a leader of those churches helped draft the plan in the first place.

So, it has started. I do not believe that this is an isolated incident, although others that vote ‘nay’ making a public statement may be rare. I also believe that it will be a somewhat rare event that a ‘yes’ vote will be on a church’s website, namely because the list of ascenting congregations will be listed on DToday.

I did communion yesterday. I talked about stories. In many ways, this site is one side of my story. I say one side because it only records my thoughts at a given moment in time. Unless I make mention of it, it does not track what I do.

Anywho, here it is:

Stories

[http://www.pinakidion.us/story.mp3]

Bill,

Now that I am the entire first page of a google search for the word pinakidion, I figured I’d post this. Scott and I have been looking for you for years. Look, I know I didn’t call you back in 1990, but I really want to now. Scott and I have been looking for you independently for a number of years.

Scott didn’t find me until a couple years ago.

Remember the 36 hour binge of D&D that forever put “gray-furry-giant” in front of everything for a month?
Remember when Scott lived close to the High School?

Just find one of us. Post, write, call, send a telegram postage due, I don’t really care.

I know this may seem sudden, but we really have been looking for you.

I now know how to create my own Gangster Bankroll.

Please alert Dynamite Hack, if they are not the authors of the e-how.

Somehow this seems appropriate after last night. After a three hour talk about what we can do for our church, we end up quoting Jump Around and Triumph to each other.

…Word to your Moms,
I come to drop bombs:
I got more rhymes than the Bible’s got Psalms…

Everlast from the group House of Pain

Yes, I have strange friends. Good friends, but strange friends.

I am famous for my more-later’s. It usually means that I had a series of complete thoughts, but not a complete idea, or the time to develop the complete idea. Well, this time, I think I have the time to finish at least one of these more-later’s. This one pertains to the theological issues in the Unity Proposal. It is long.

The theological issues are:

• The inconsistency of our overall theology.
• Unresolved issues regarding Control and Obedience

Read more…

Two days early, the proposal was released.

Not much changed in the plan itself except that it is a plan and not a proposal. The Q&A had some extensive rewriting. The comment that appalled me last week has been changed.

It seems that my church will sign on. This makes me sad.

Personally, I’m just tired. I pray Psalm 53 and take comfort from Psalm 37. No matter, though. Unless a miracle happens, not much will change and it feels like we are returning to our vomit. Ultimately, we did not change our doctrine, barely modified our practices, retained our peculiar vocabulary and maintained an uneasy practice of being the one true denomination.

We blew our big chance.

Some have thought this might be a reaction to Kip. It just might be. I mean, we are trying to do what Kip does through legislation. The difference is that we seem to require committees while he works through his magnetic personality. Considering that one of the Gang of Nine has said publicly that he hopes to stamp out anyone that speaks against ‘the church, whether it is Kip or some blogger’, there may be other agendas at work.

Conspiracy theories, though hold no attraction for me in this matter. The only agenda is trying to get back something of what we once had. I believe we never truly had unity, thus returning to a form of what we were will not bring it back, either. I applaud the effort, but disagree with the execution.

It’s an overreaction, plain and simple. If our present state is a result, as the Gang of Nine affirm, of an overreaction, the answer is not a severe course correction. Growing up running a couple of boats, I know what happens when you oversteer, the boat capsizes. I fear the same will happen here. (Granted the entire arguement is invalid from them and me- the pendulum swing so often quoted is a logical fallacy of the middle ground.)

Even if I am wrong about this, this is not what I want spiritually for my family or me. More later.

I do not always appreciate the comics drawn by Sincamper, a former staff member of the ICoC. However, some of them really strike me as so true that I have to laugh (and wince) at myself because I was there.

For example, when someone was being baptized, nothing ruined the moment more that the following (which I have seen happen):

Nothing demonstrates the tendency for all of us to revise our history than this cartoon about an elder:

It amazes me sometimes the things that God has saved me from by being in a good place.

I met with Pastor Gibson today to talk about a banquet he is holding to recognize Christian leaders in the community that are making a difference. We talked for almost an hour. He is hoping to get those that claim to be Christians to come together and do something for the community, this banquet being an initial step.

I shared with him a desire to really help people, the main reason I became a Christian in the first place.

When I think about unity, I believe that there is a time to do something. I have found in my life that one thing that can build goodwill and togetherness is a common project. Pastor Gibson and I have disagreements about the finer points of doctrine, not about salvation, but about gifts of the Spirit. I can spend three hours going back and forth with him about cessation of certain gifts. We disagree on Biblical hermenutics - I tend to take a historical approach, he seems to take an allegorical approach. We could spend days talking about the strengths and weaknesses of each approach. My approach is modern, his is more inline with second century thinkers. We have very different church cultures - I prefer more contemplative and quiet services, he prefers energetic services. Someday we will talk about how we can help each other in this way.

But when it comes down to it, am I really being a Christian? Am I serving my community? Here is a man that believes he is called by God to serve the community through education, ministry, and just caring. He is getting different people involved and trying to help those hurting in our city - those that need to see God in their suffering.

I want to help. I told him that I tend to be good on ideas and bad with details, but that I want to be involved. I offered the two things I know I can do well: present material extemporaneously (definition 2, without notes) and work on computers. As the organization comes together, I’d like to join its board of directors. It is in the process of being licensed as a 501(c)3.

Why was I excited to post about this? Because it is time to exercise my faith instead of talk about it. If people within the ICoC subculture do not understand my vision of unity, maybe a demonstration would be more helpful. To many people, talk is cheap. When I say that I believe the ICoC needs outside help to understand unity, this program is a demonstration of one kind of help we need. This is the kind of help that shows that those that profess Christianity can come together and do Christian things. No single denominatioh has to do everything themselves. (The other kind of help would be best received by those more closely associated with us doctrinally. This kind of help includes issues of polity, caring for members, leadership culture, and the like.)

What I Am Not Saying
I am not saying that doctrine is unimportant. I am saying that I will not use doctrine as a barrier to perform acts of Christian service in my community. A non-Christian does not tend to understand why we cannot come together to do good, even if we disagree about doctrine. My Muslim friend, especially, does not understand why people would spend so much time trying to convince “other Christians”(her words) that they are not Christians because they are not the same as you are. Yes, it is oversimplifying and inaccurate, but non-Christians I know see do not understand that.

I feel comfortable teaching someone doctrine. More importantly, I feel comfortable teaching them how to determine doctrine for themselves. What I cannot do, though, is effectively explain 2000 years of sectarianism. I can teach that how a person lives and what a person believes is equally important (1 Tim 4:16). What I cannot do is demonstrate how doctrine can be used as an excuse to live a less godly life. I also cannot reconcile Mark 9:38-41 with having to serve the city only within my denoimination.

I look forward to letting you know more as things develop. It is encouraging that there just might be a place for a liberal like me, I am doing this with my minister’s blessing. Pray for us that we can make a difference in our city.

I could not make it home. It turns out that even bereavement fares are $500 these days. Not only that, I couldn’t be back here in less than four days. I would have loved to be home, but with the move and other things, my family needs me here. I talked to Mom and she is holding up as best can be expected under the circumstances.

Man, did the Unity Proposal get a lot of attention while I was away. I have no internet at home until Friday, so I have been blissfully unaware of discussion going on here.

I hope to post later today about something positive in regards to unity that is going on here in town.

It’s funny, I have two copies of the Final Unity Proposal. I got one by hard copy per instructions on page one. The other arrived by different means.

I really have too much to do to deal with this, so let me say this after reading it all weekend.

There is a lot of ‘not-so-bad’ in the document. I think encouraging regional participation is a good thing. I think defining who we are instead of defining who-we-are-not is a great thing. I believe a meeting to determine how we can help churches, like SE Asia and Australia currently receiving little to no help, is a fantastic thing.

Overall, though, I am sorely disappointed. As the proposal itself mentions, we had a great oppotunity to do something and all we did was come up with a wordier version of the LA Unity Proposal. We could have joined the call for unity amongst the Restoration Movement churches. At least, we could have encouraged seeking outside help from other fellowships. We could have emphasized our own need for humility in judging entire denominations as apostate. Instead, we keep using a code phrase - baptized disciples to represent the extrabiblical command that believe, reprent, be baptized (Acts 2:36) is not enough. It needs to be believe, repent, commit to being a disciple, be baptized. I thought we recognized that doctrine as error some time ago.

For Alan, this is all that is mentioned about ‘other fellowships’.

We have no desire with this process to formulate judgments about any of those in other fellowships. We agree
that, “We are not the only Christians but are Christians only”. The design of this proposal is to strengthen the
bonds between some 500 churches that share a common history and heritage so that we might continue on our
journey together in faithfulness to God on the way to heaven. Additionally, we originally thought the document
might be somewhat shorter, but became convinced during the process that the present length was necessary for
clarity and fullness.

To those worried about a return to our ‘discipling’ paradigm:

10. Our membership in each congregation constitutes baptized disciples, men and women who have pledged to
live their lives as saints of God in the holiness he requires. Our members agree to strive to be devoted, not
only to their Maker, but to the body life of the church. This includes making wholehearted efforts, for example,
to attend each [applicable] meeting of the body, and pursuing joyful, watchful, challenging, and encouraging
“one another” relationships in which we spur one another on toward love and good deeds (Acts 2:42,
Romans 12:10, Hebrews 3:12-13; 10:24-25).

I know what the above sentence means in real English. It’s a statement that says, “we believe in discipling partners”.

More appalling is the supplementary doucment of Questions and Answers:

6.How should those churches be treated that choose not to sign up?
There may be many different reasons why some churches may not sign up. They are still our brothers and sisters in Christ, and we need to continue to respect, love, and cherish one another in the Lord. But it does give us an awareness of those churches that want to take part in an active fellowship amongst one another.(Emphasis added)

I want to take part in an active fellowship, especially with former ICoC churches and Christian Churches in town. I simply do not agree with the Statement of Beliefs and practices.

However, I’d be surprised if my church did not sign it. Honestly, there’s no benefit to us to sign it. We already meet regionally and hold events together. We go to each others conferences and the leaders meet together once or twice a month. This agreement gives us no benefit

I hope that I was wrong in what I wrote to the group earlier. I said that trying to include a statement of beliefs and practices will draw a line in the sand and potentially divide us. We may say that churches are our brothers and sisters that do not sign it, but if the framers of the proposal believe that non-signers are not interested in unity, no one else will believe that they want unity.

Worse yet, some of Kip’s splinter churches could sign this agreement without qualms. In theory, they believe the same thing. They send people to the ILC (this year in Va. Beach), they maintain regional contact and international missions. What will we do if Chris Broom’s church signs the agreement?

I had great hopes, but a liberal like me has little place in this framework. Let’s start talking about helping each other out and taking care of our own. After that, we’ll just have to see.

In celebrating the birth of my son, it is now time to celebrate the passing of my grandmother. She died this morning resulting from complications of diabetes, a condition she has had for longer than I have been alive. The funeral is Friday at 2pm, and I am trying to get home.

This is not how I wanted to come home to visit.

However, she suffered for quite a while and now she is at rest. I pray that she is also at peace.

She told stories of running with the revenuers - the folks that ran moonshine during Prohibition would ask ladies in town to travel with them to make deliveries in order to avoid suspicion. I do not remember if the feds ever caught the folks she rode with or not.

She was always proud of her grandchildren, her great grand children, and her great-great grandchildren. She favored my brother, Marcie, and me, and always enjoyed our visits. When my brother had his first, you would have thought that she had won the lottery. The same was true for Marcie and me. She always loved children.

She had six of her own. In turn, she had 26 grandchildren, 54 great-grandchildren and 9 great-great grandchildren. We would all get together about once a year at the Odd Fellows/Rebekah Lodge and catch up. Unlike my father’s side of the family, my mother’s is spread all over: Germany, Louisiana, Nebraska, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, California, Pennsylvania, and a few others if I thought about it long enough.

Knowing my family, this trip to the lodge will be like most others. They’ll be a couple of arguments. Uncles and aunts will disavow each other. Everyone will blame someone else for some minor thing going wrong. In general, there will be an argument about who was supposed to open the lodge and questions of why we couldn’t use so-and-so’s house, etc. The kids will play in the main hall or the field out back. At least one jello mould will sit untouched and then the creator of this gastronomical delight will believe the family hates her. Throughout will be some crying, yelling, and general carrying on. Once the pig is done, though, everyone will eat, have a good time, and scratch their heads wondering why they were angry in the first place.

And then we will grieve.

As such, I believe we will celebrate death in much the same way we celebrate life - with all our heart and soul.

I am in-between places at the moment, so I am not able to write very much. Hopefully, we will be moving to a nice townhome this weekend. No internet access where I am staying at night.

Interesting things going on with the Unity Group’s latest. It is largely a positive and helpful article, if not a bit much on the editorial side. Someone wrote in one paragraph what the group wants - they want to have a representative council like they wanted to have in 2003. For those that do not know, the plan was to have a unity meeting in 2003 after the World Sectors dissolved at the end of 2002. That unity meeting never took place and it is the subject of much revisionist history from Kip and from current leaders.

In any case, the plan appears to be a meeting to sit down and talk about these things. Great! Let’s set a time and place. How about Kansas City? It’s not too expensive and it is centally located to all cities in the US. Hotels aren’t outrageously expensive and neither is meeting space. October sound good? Chicago is not good as it is too expensive. LA is not good for the same reason and it is too far (and too expensive) for some east coast churches. Washington DC or Atlanta is the same, but for west coast churches. By all means, don’t make this a part of August’s seminar in Norfolk, Virginia. Keep in mind that since HKL, not every church has a lot of money anymore to send delegates. Let’s make some decisions to facilitate having the most people attend, not just the right people to attend.

My only remaining disappointment is that a lot of time is spent telling people what to believe instead of what to do to move forward. I can imagine that it took a while to agree that the best course of action is to have a sit down meeting together. LA’s original proposal was to re-create to World Sectors because it would be expedient. Similar proposals are also aimed at being expedient. My proposal was the same way - let’s not have a bunch of meetings about what unity means, but have a meeting about who will take care of remaining churches that do not get support. (I figured that it assumed unity and wouldn’t delay aid getting to other churches.) It may seem like a let down that after all this time, the result was to have a Continental Congress. I do not believe it is a let down at all, but the demonstration of much needed restraint.

Again, let each church appoint a delegate and let’s get talking. Time and place are all that is needed. I would hope that it would be an event without a lot of special music and dance programs. Let’s get to business and finally start talking. I do not believe a universal standard of a delegate is neccessary, each church can make up its own mind whom they send. Following the Jerusalem Council model, a popular study topic these days, each church sent a delegate of their own choice. When the council made a decision, the council sent delegates of their choice (the council’s) to spread the decision. And as I noted previously, even this decision was changed later and Scripture contains no mention of a second council to alter it.

However, I get the sense that disagreeing with the Unity Group’s treatise on what a delegate should be would warrant the label of agitator. More than that, so many words in this article and many of them spent on commentary like this:

These discussions are merely a starting point. If we had had these practices going on in a healthy manner, we would have been better able to confront the problems we shared before, during and after the recent upheaval in our churches. Together we stand, divided we fall.

Truth is that we simply do not know what would have happened if this had been in place before. For me, I believe I would have more respect for those that purport to be leaders because they would have earned it by exercising temperance, love, restraint, and concern for the welfare of others. Had this been in place, the upheaval would have happened years ago and would have been similar to the Worlwide Church of God’s time of drastic reform. Had this been in place, we would have listened to the Church of Christ elders in the 80s and never elevated Kip to be the leader of our denomination. Who knows? Only God knows his purposes for everything that has happened. Unlike many, I believe that hindsight only reveals other options available at the time, not solutions. (Hindsight is not so much 20/20 as it is a pretty like wiping a fogged window to see through it.)

All that being said, I am ready for this meeting. It will be contentious and difficult at times, but I hope it will accomplish a lot.

I’m moving and the police have ended the standoff two blocks north of my house. Needless to say, I have little time for the lofty ideals of a group of select men. Like many semithoughts here, I hope to develop them later. I really mulled over this for a couple days, but in the end I think Khrushcev said it best:

Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build a bridge even where there is no river.

Nikita Khrushchev