What is the church called to be?

By allowing gay persons to meet in an affirming environment, and by allowing a woman pastor to use its premises, Faith Harbor has in the eyes of the SBTC committed the unpardonable sin for which disaffiliation can be the only response. Its board chairman explains his view of how Christian reconciliation works:

'The door is still open for them to reconcile if they will just agree to abide by the theological parameters of the SBTC.'

In the SBTC's eyes, 'reconciliation' does not involve two parties listening to one another or making an effort to set aside their differences. Reconciliation is an act that must be performed by the 'wrong' party. The need for brotherly love and Christian respect for each other are trumped by the supreme moral imperatives of the Christian right: no gays, no female self-determination, no breaking with the party line.

Faith Harbour's pastor Randy Haney takes a different view in his church blog:

It always amazes me how much people hate those who try to get out of the box and take the message of Jesus Christ to those who are considered unclean. Now that I think about it, that was part of what the Jews hated about Jesus. How dare we defile the sanctuary by inviting sinners to come and be a part of hearing the message of Christ! Doesn't the Bible make it plain and clear that we are all sinners? Isn't our righteousness only found in Christ and Him alone? No man is righteous, except by the blood of Christ. Love God and try your best to serve Him. Allow God to love you, because He already does.

The Harbour is worth taking some time to read. Not only does it show the personal cost that can come from taking a principled stand against prevailing religious bigotry and ignorance, but reading the posts also provides some insights into the dishonesty of Southern Baptist leaders and their shifting efforts to characterize the issue. There are plenty of unedited examples of that same bigotry and ignorance in many of the comments that have been posted in response to Randy's blog entries.

Interestingly, just yesterday I received an e-mail from a Southern Baptist oriented dominionist organization calling itself the Christian Worldview Network. These are the same people whose 'survey' revealed that I am supposedly a godless, socialist, secular humanist. The e-mail contained a link to an article on church discipline by Jim Elliff, president of Christian Communicators Worldwide. Here is what a Southern Baptist theocrat has to say about the importance of judging others:

• The church is a society with rules
  
• The church is a society that is to judge its members
  
• The church has good reason to expect its members to conform to the rules
  
• When a church judges its members, it removes its most precious gift - fellowship
  
• Failure to purge out those who are wicked among you is flagrant disobedience

You can read the full article for yourself. It is a very depressing text, all the more so because it focuses almost exclusively on the statements of Paul to the Corinthians concerning discipline within the church. There is no attempt to ground the perspective in a broader ecclesiology guided by the teachings of Jesus Christ concerning the nature of the Kingdom.

The New Testament's overall witness to the meaning of community within the reign of God points in the opposite direction to that espoused by the exclusionists:

• 'These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.' You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men. (Mark 7:1-13)
  
• Love your neighbor as yourself... Love does no harm to its neighbor (Mark 12:31, Romans 13:9-10)
  
• Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. (Luke 6:36)
  
• Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. (Luke 6:37)
  
• If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone... (John 8:1-11)
  
• Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus... (Paul, in Romans 8)
  
• God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. (2 Corinthians 5:18-19)
  
• The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. (Galatians 5:6)
  
• Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him speaks against the law and judges it... who are you to judge your neighbor? (James 4:11-12)
  
• While you are pulling the weeds, you may root up the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest. (Matthew 13:24-30)