None of us seems too worked about poor old Pharoah who got his heart hardened by God, or all the “ites” (Jebusites, Hittites, Amorites, Amalekites) who God regularly slaughtered and destroyed–he never gave them much chance to be called the children of God.

What about that pesky verse, “Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.?”

Why?  I believe it is because we are naturally enemies of God, but in his mercy and grace, he regenerates some of us for his glory.  But make no mistake, we deserve the punishment for which we were heading.

In all honesty, God does what he darn well pleases.  We choose, he calls, we choose, he calls, your doctrine just depends where you start the sentence.

Good conversation, sorry to have been gone–I’ll check in later.  Blessing to all of you, my brethren!

(Don’t you think we will all, at the moment of glorification, say, Ah crap!  I was wrong about this one!  His least thoughts are to marvelous to comprehend!)

LOL! That’s what people were doing at our church! Unless, of course, you were right up front with the “in” crowd… :/

>I think this partially explains why everything in the life of an SGM church is constantly “under evaluation”, why you hear phrases such as “constant change is here to stay” and reading books such “Good to Great”.  (An SGM pastor told me that CJ recommends that pastors read at least one good business book every year. ) They apply this constant evaluation philosophy  not only to the ministries of the church but to the care of people in the church. <

I noticed this at CLC as far back as the 80s, when CJ, Larry & pastors were all walking around acting like businessmen, using DayTimers, etc. While the desire to run the church efficiently is laudable, the problem is that the church — as a relational body of Christ — is not a corporation. It’s a collection of people who should be relating to God and one another primarily through the Spirit/spirit, not the intellect.

Nowadays that corporate impulse appears to have taken over completely — these blogs have documented the marketing-focused church-planting methodology. The addition of Josh Harris brought in a lot of new conference-running/moneymaking skills, which they’re milking to the utmost. I can’t believe how many conferences SGM runs, which must bring in tons of cash. You don’t need the Holy Spirit’s guidance to do any of that.

When you wrote:

“And what Former SGMer and Juli have commented on is a serious inconsistency in the doctrinal presentation: the concept of Character as ministry qualification.  With Calvin orthodoxy that is a fundamental impossibility.”

I think you may have misunderstood what I meant.  I actually do think that character is a qualification for ministry and I think a plain reading of I Tim 3 bears this out and pastors need to have the abiility to manage because I Tim 3 states that an Elder must be able to manage his own household well.

Rather, what I meant is that SGM seems to hold a view that a managerial/technocratic view that constant micromanaging of the affairs of the church will lead to ever increasing fruitfulness in the ministries of the church.

I think this partially explains why everything in the life of an SGM church is constantly “under evaluation”, why you hear phrases such as “constant change is here to stay” and reading books such “Good to Great”.  (An SGM pastor told me that CJ recommends that pastors read at least one good business book every year. ) They apply this constant evaluation philosophy  not only to the ministries of the church but to the care of people in the church.   I think its really self-atonement and/or self sanctification on both a corporate and individual level.

I give CJ much credit for the manner in which he essentially taught himself much theology but the problem is that all of these twentysomething pastors coming out of or desiring to go into the Pastor’s College are turning what he did into a formula.  Namely, if one reads and/or studies enough one can qualify himself for pastoral ministry even though the person has not lived long enough to acquire a enough life experiences to see how Scripture is rightly or even wrongly applies to real life situations.

“4. When God converts a sinner, and translates him into the state of grace, he freeth him from his natural bondage under sin; and, by his grace alone, enables him freely to will and to do that which is spiritually good; yet so, as that by reason of his remaining corruption, he doth not perfectly, nor only, will that which is good, but doth also will that which is evil.”

Essentially we are now free to do what is good, but since sin is still present we dont always do it.  So character can matter because after we are freed we can choose to do good (by God’s grace, with the HOly Spirit’s help)

I think Chapter 9 of the confession does a great job explaining free will and total depravity, and is good reading for anyone wanting to know what the reformed position is.

I’m not sure I’m on anyone’s page 

If anyone has ever met anyone who has actually mortified sin to the point where they no longer sin, I’ll fly all of our readers out to meet them.

I do agree with former’s “self atonement” statement. At the very least, getting stuck in Romans 7 has led to some over intense navel gazing.

Didn’t Jesus say something about getting the lint out of your own navel before…

…well, something like that.

Total inability refers to salvation. Every Christian I know believes that as believers, we are empowered by the Holy Spirit to mortify sin.

you said: It definately leaves one with the impression that SGM wants to have it both ways. 

yeah, that’s because SGM is full of “Convenient Calvinists” as discussed before. They, like many others, are trying to play both sides – they want to be considered orthodox but only selectively, which is a blatant contradiction.

you also said: 

in my former SGM church the pastors used to refer to mortification of sin as the ability to “manage your soul” and the ability to do so was often held up as a qualification for pastoral ministry.

this is just one example of many of the doctrinal inconsistencies of Calvinism that SGM uses….if we are totally depraved or have total inability, however you define it, then how can SGM say that one’s personal ability and responsibility to mortify sin is NOT an ability? Yeah…illogical doesn’t begin to describe it. Either man is responsible or he isn’t. You can’t have it both ways, no matter what anyone says.

You comment below is spot on:

“all true but today I sadly say that the role of the Holy Spirit has been “Reformed” to the sole gifting of individuals at the prophecy mic, teaching and preaching.”

After SGM passed through the “time of refreshing” period in 1994 – 1997 It seemed as of SGM began to grow uncomfortable with some of the more extreme practices which occurred in other charismatic and pentacostal groups during the period and I cannot remember the exact time frame but I believe that it was shortly after this move of the Spirit period that Jeff Purswell gave a sermon at one of the small group leaders conferences on the “non-spectacular gifts” and being at that conference it seemed to me that it was noticable attempt to deflect attention away from so-called “Sign gifts” and to broaden the definition of what is legitimate evidence of the presence of the Holy Spirit in a believer’s life.

However, simultaneous with an increased emphasis on the “non-spectacular gifts”, in my local SGM church, the leadership began to schedule recurring so-called “Worship and Ministry Night” and I understand that these type of meetings were being held in other SGM churches because supposedly CJ had directed the Senior Pastors that he did not want SGM churches to lose their “charismatic distinctives”  I know that these meetings continue at my old SGM church.

It definately leaves one with the impression that SGM wants to have it both ways.  They want a doctrine of the Holy Spirit that allows them to relate to the larger reformed community without raising eyebrows about charismatic practices but they want the passion and presence they experience during the time of refreshing period.

To say it another way,  by scheduleing these worship and ministry nights, it seems as if SGM leadership wants to create a controlled context where they can control how and when the Holy Spirit moves and thereby avoid excesses of the “time of refreshing period”.    It seems a bit arrogant to me.  Am I out of line with this thinking?  I do not think so because also in my former SGM church the pastors used to refer to mortification of sin as the ability to “manage your soul” and the ability to do so was often held up as a qualification for pastoral ministry.  This and the general relentlessness at which people pursued mortification of sin struck me as coming very close to seeking self-atonement.

marvels at the spectacle of #sbc2009 on Twitter… imagines the tweets from the Council of Trent or the Synod of Dort.

Thanks for your comment.
I guess those SGM members who are strongly charismatic would call this Reformed trend in SGM as “quenching” the Spirit. And others who espouse Reformed faith in SGM would call this Biblical “revival.”

So I guess there is a “tension” in SGM in doctrines — since not all SGM members are convinced of Reformed faith – even though CJ and Pastor’s College would promote it.

In either case, I am convinced that God uses weak and falliable creatures like us to bring glory to His name for His sake.

Freedom: Don’t forget, the Patriarch of constantopel excommunicated the pope and his legates as well, at the same time, so it wasn’t as much as the Eastern Orthodox breaking off of rome, as them both splitting and thinking that the other broke of from them.  Oh, and the apocrapha was not officaly part of sctripture in the catholic church until after Luther split the church, it was specifically mentioned as not cannon in Jerome’s translation (which he did of it only to apease Augustine), it was not officially included until the Council of Trent in 1563. (I was a church history major in college and have great interest in this time period).

You wrote “ It is interesting to see that there are many ex-SGM members who post here are not Calvinists. I am wondering whether their exodus from SGM church was not only pastoral abuse they experienced, but also in some measure, doctrinal. “  … I am still in SGM and to be honest it wasn’t so much the move to a “Reformed” theology that upset me (and still does) than it has been the complete rendering of the role of the Holy Spirit in the individual and in the church to little more than the “other” guy in the Trinity.   Yes, the polity has made a mess of the church … yes, the lack of humility of some of the pastors and leaders has been bad and at times horrible, yes, we went through about 2-3 years in which the name of “Jesus” was NEVER or rarely used during the Sunday service (I still find that amazingly strange!) … all true but today I sadly say that the role of the Holy Spirit has been “Reformed” to the sole gifting of individuals at the prophecy mic, teaching and preaching.   That’s it … what happened to the other gifts of the Holy Spirit?  They ain’t happening at any SGM church that I’m aware of … If we’ve become cessationists than boldly preach it.  SGM LOVES to be able to rub elbows with the Reformed but they really aren’t Reformed …

I wonder if Paul would have called himself an Arminian after being thrown from his horse and told by Jesus “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting; but rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.”

Jim – I think everyone has been respectful of everyone elses beliefs thus far and that is GOOD thing. I am sure we will get to whipping out scripture to back out points and discuss what we believe it say. This is very good!

I think the best thing anyone can do is if you get ticked off or angry, don’t post right away – takes some time to think about what you will write.

Thank you for your explanation. It does give me some understanding as to what has happened to SGM historically & doctrinally. Although I have seen an individual journey from Arminianism to Calvinism (like me), I have not seen mass exodus to Calvinistic camp like SGM. Surely, such drift will cause much reaction: both good and bad.

I am just an observer here – trying to understand ex-SGM members whether they be Arminian, Calvinist, no-label believer, or post-evangelical…  =)
It gets very confusing for me… with all the differences ex-SGM members have.

Very interesting. Again, thanks for your story.

For me, I exited SGM because of the heavy handed crap, not the doctrine of Calvinism.  I am now, however, not a Calvinist–I am His and could care less about the labels which divide and alienate brothers and sisters in Christ.

He is right (the truth) and I am His–great news, isn’t it?  If you need to be right, have at it.