Church – Page 63 – Michelle Lesley

A lot of people don’t believe me when I tell them this, but I’m kind of an introvert. On Sundays, after Sunday School, church, then Sunday dinner with my extended family, I usually go home and get straight in the bed for some quiet time and a nap, often with muscles aching from stress. I love my church, my family, and spending time with people, but for some reason, social interaction can be a bit draining for me after several hours.

And interacting with people I don’t know very well? Don’t get me started on all the different levels of anxiety that, for me, go hand-in-hand with introversion. My gut-level reaction to walking into a room full of strangers is to turn around and run as far away as possible.

But all of this sort of thinking is very self-centered. When I entertain those anxious thoughts and feelings, I’m focusing on me. My fear of man. My worries about what others will think of me. My discomfort and desire to be somewhere else. Me. Me. Me.

So how do we handle introversion and/or social anxiety in a godly way? Ephesians 4:21-24 gets right to the point:

assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.

We’re to put off our old, corrupt self, renew our minds, and put on the new, godly self.

First, we “put off”, or stop giving in, to those feelings, thoughts, and behaviors of anxiety:

“There are plenty of people talking to that person who’s visiting our church this morning. She doesn’t need to meet me. I’ll pass.”

“I need to go to that meeting, but I really don’t want to, so I’m going to stay home.”

“Nobody at this fellowship would be interested in talking to me, so I’ll hang out in the kitchen and ‘help’.”

Next, we “renew our minds” with what Scripture says about how we’re to regard ourselves and how we’re to regard others.

Giving in to me-centered fears and anxieties is the exact opposite of God’s instruction to Christians. We are to be about the business of putting others first. Dying to self. Serving others. Encouraging others. Loving and focusing on others with the intensity of the love and focus we lavish on ourselves. Philippians 2:3-4 puts it this way:

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests,
but also to the interests of others.

Notice that, while the world’s solution to introversion would be that you need to improve your self-esteem, and think better – and more – about yourself…

…that’s not the Bible’s solution. The Bible instructs us to be humble, stop the navel-gazing, take the focus off ourselves, and put the focus on loving and serving others.

Putting off and renewing our minds is where a lot of us stop when we’re dealing with sinful thoughts and behaviors. But if you’ve ever stopped there, you’ve probably gotten stuck and frustrated in the sanctification issue you’re dealing with. That’s because a vacuum demands to be filled. When you take something away, you have to replace it with something else, or you’re just going to go back to your old ways again.

That’s where putting on “the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness” comes in. What, exactly, does that mean? Let’s break it down a little bit.

🆕Since we’re new creatures in Christ, we don’t wallow in the old self, we put on the new self. Whereas our old nature was about pleasing ourselves, our new nature desires to please, obey, and imitate Christ.

🆕To understand what it means to be created after the likeness of God, think about what God is like. Does God fearfully hide Himself away from people? Does He avoid interacting with us? Quite the opposite! God “put Himself out there” to the extent that He became flesh and dwelt among us. He tells us we are welcome to confidently approach His throne and talk to Him non-stop.

🆕To walk in true righteousness and holiness is to imitate Christ. It’s to put shoes on being “created after the likeness of God”. How can I walk in the same way in which He walked in this situation? How can I best obey Christ’s commands? How can I die to self in order to live to Him?

Putting on the new self is proactively looking for ways to carry out the “do’s” of the Bible in place of the “don’ts”. To act instead of react. To seek opportunities to do the opposite of what the old self would do.

What are some practical ways to die to self, and to love, focus on, encourage, and serve others as an introvert?

Go. The first step, and sometimes the hardest one, is just showing up. Obviously, you don’t have to go to every social event, meeting, or activity in existence. You know the ones you need to go to. Make yourself go. Simply seeing your smiling face in the room might be an encouragement to someone else who struggles with social anxiety. And your presence sends the message to the host that you care enough about her and the activity to attend. That means a lot to people.

Smile and say hello. Small talk. Ugh. If you’re an introvert, it’s probably near the top of your list of anxiety-producers. Do it anyway. If it’s extremely difficult for you, before you arrive, set a goal of a minimum number of people to greet, shake hands with, and exchange a few pleasantries with. Can’t think of anything clever to say? “It’s nice to see you,” or a simple, genuine compliment like, “You look great,” or “I love those earrings,” makes people feel valued and worthwhile.

Help out. As long as you’re not using helping out as a way to hide out or avoid people, channeling that nervous energy into an activity can work wonders to get your mind off yourself and your fear, give you a topic of conversation with others who are helping (“Wow, I didn’t know our church had this many folding chairs!” “I think we need more cups at the beverage table.”), and tangibly serve people.

Listen. When I was working on my master’s degree in family counseling, I learned an extremely important skill. Listening – really listening. In a counseling situation, you can’t let your mind just drift off. You have to be laser focused on what the client is saying, paying attention to every word. Occasionally, you encapsulate in your own words what she has said and reflect it back to her, or ask an open-ended question that will lead her to expand on a particular aspect of what she has been telling you.

For therapists, this is called “active listening” or “reflective listening”. In Christianity, I would call it “compassionate listening” instead, because this same kind of listening is a way to show Christlike compassion and concern for others. You’re not listening because you’re getting paid for it, you’re listening because you care. The more I compassionately listen to others, the more I realize how much of a need for it there is.

We live in a noisy, fast-paced, sound bite, 280 character world. People have a need to be heard. Angry people ultimately scream, not about an issue, but out of a need for someone to take the time to listen. Lonely people need to know someone cares about them.

There aren’t many people in the world who take the time to sit down with someone, show an interest in what she’s saying, and let her take the time to express herself completely. When you do that for someone, you are serving her by giving her a rare and precious gift. Maybe one that she’s never received before. When you sacrifice your time to pay attention to someone, she might be doing most of the talking, but she’s hearing something important, too. She’s hearing, “I love and care about you,” “You matter to me because you matter to Christ,” “You are valuable in God’s eyes and in mine.” How can we withhold that kind of kindness and compassion from someone just to give in to our fears and make ourselves more comfortable?

Pray and check in. As you’re compassionately listening to someone, make a mental note of something you could pray for her about. Make that part of your prayer time until you see her again. The next time you cross paths (or if it’s going to be a long time, call or text her after a few days), let her know you’ve been praying for her and ask her how that situation is going (and listen compassionately as she tells you!). Think about how much it would mean to you for a sister in Christ to listen to you, remember what you said, take the time to pray about it, and then ask you how things were going. That’s how much it would mean to her.

It can be easy to give in to social anxiety and introversion, avoiding people and situations that make us uncomfortable. But Christ doesn’t call us to do only the things that are easy. He set the example for us of doing what’s godly even when it’s difficult. Obeying Christ when it’s hard helps us to grow in spiritual maturity, and gives us opportunities to serve others. And isn’t that really what following Him is all about?

Additional Resources:

Just Stop It: How to Repent of ____ A Multi-part “Put off/Renew/Put on” series by Clint Archer at The Cripplegate

Do you tend toward introversion or social anxiety?
What are some practical ways you’ve found for “putting off”
those things and “putting on” serving others instead?

Church

It’s Time for a Reformation in the SBC – 3 Issues We Need to Set Right

May 25, 2018June 17, 2019 Michelle Lesley

I don’t know the brother who said it, but I saw a remark the other day from a Presbyterian gentleman who said something to the effect of, “It’s time for all doctrinally sound Southern Baptists to leave the SBC.”

I get that.

When you have an organization as large, open, and widespread as the Southern Baptist Convention, problems – even major ones – are inevitable. At this point, there are many things the SBC is still getting right, biblically speaking…

There are many good and praiseworthy things going on in SBC life. We have hundreds of doctrinally sound pastors faithfully preaching the gospel week in and week out. Discernment and biblical literacy among Southern Baptist church members is slowly but steadily growing. The SBC takes a public, biblical stand on abortion and homosexuality while many other denominations do not. Our organizational structure for funding and sending out missionaries, while sometimes flawed in its execution, is without peer. Southern Baptist Disaster Relief is one of the finest relief organizations in the world. And there’s so much more. Find a godly Kingdom effort going on somewhere, and you’ll probably find a Southern Baptist involved in it. By the grace of God, while we’re far from perfect, we’re getting a lot of things right.¹

…But for some individual Southern Baptists and Southern Baptist churches, the biblical error and other problems pervading the SBC have become too much to bear, and they have deemed it time to walk away from what they see as a system damaged beyond repair, seeking refuge in ARBCA, Bible, Independent, or non-denominational churches and networks instead.

Like I said, I get that, and I don’t blame them one little bit. Believe me, I’ve had leaving on my mind more than once. And if the SBC continues its downward spiral, it’s an inevitability for nearly all of us who hold to sound doctrine.

But there are still plenty of us crazy, “glass half full” doctrinally sound optimists out there who, like Luther, don’t want to abandon the SBC to the rubbish heap if it can be avoided, but would rather see it reformed (little “r”), renewed, and restored to the glory of God.

If you’ve ever labored through the entirety of the Old Testament (and if you haven’t, stop denying yourself that blessing, and study it), you know that God exercised patience with Israel through centuries of idolatry, rebellion, and paganism of the vilest sorts, sending them prophet after prophet, warning after warning, discipline after discipline, lovingly calling, urging, and commanding them to repent and be reconciled to Him before finally executing judgment on them.

I’m just not sure we’re quite at the point of exiling the SBC… yet. I think maybe these are the days of Elijah. And Jeremiah. And Isaiah. And even Luther. A time for godly Southern Baptist men and women to stand firmly on the written Word of God and speak prophetically, chapter and verse, into their beloved churches and denomination, “Thus saith the Lord.”

And in that same spirit of the prophets of old, we don’t speak from a position of “I’m right and I’m here to prove it,” or because we’re haters, or because we’re power-hungry. It’s because we’re cut to the heart over the sin and idolatry we see among our brothers and sisters. We’re grieved that those things dishonor our precious Savior and bring His judgment and discipline upon those who participate in and propagate them. We deeply desire that our denomination and our churches experience the joy that comes with being spiritually healthy and biblically submitted to Christ.

So, while there are probably at least ninety-five theses that could be nailed to the doors of the Executive Committee in Nashville, here are three that would be a good start.

1.
The Authority and Sufficiency of Scripture

Nearly forty years ago, Southern Baptist movers and shakers in the conservative resurgence went to war for the inerrancy of Scripture. It was a long, hard battle, but they won. Now it’s time to fight for the authority and sufficiency of Scripture in the SBC.

The Bible is our authority as Christians, not the ideas, opinions, and traditions of denominational leaders, SBC celebrities, pastors, or any other person. The Bible. If the Bible commands us to do something, we do it. If the Bible commands us not to do something, we don’t do it. We don’t formulate our own programs and methods and try to squish the Bible in to make it fit. We start with the Bible. We stay with the Bible. We end with the Bible.

Because the SBC does not always submit to the authority of the Bible, we have leaders, celebrities, and pastors looking to, and promoting, sources outside the Bible for direction instead of simply trusting and obeying God’s written Word. We have influential “Bible” teachers who stand on stages in front of thousands and dare to proclaim, “God told me…”, functionally denying the sufficiency of Scripture by relying on supposed extra-biblical revelation (and teaching their followers to do the same). We have pastors and denominational leaders who look to polls and surveys to decide how to conduct their worship services or which social issues need to be addressed and how to address them. We have church growth gurus teaching our pastors to adopt all manner of worldliness that “works” to get sinners in the doors of their churches.

If the Southern Baptist Convention is to survive as an entity of biblical Christianity, the authority and sufficiency of Scripture is the number one issue that must be dealt with. If this issue is properly addressed and corrected, it will alleviate or minimize nearly all other problems facing the SBC. We must submit to God’s written Word and give Scripture its proper place – first place – in our denomination, our individual churches, and our personal lives.

Basic Training: The Bible Is Our Authority

Basic Training: The Bible Is Sufficient

2.
False Doctrine and False Teachers

If the SBC truly regarded the Bible as authoritative and sufficient, the cancer of false doctrine and false teachers that is slowly killing us would be cured or in remission. Indeed, the aforementioned false teaching of extra-biblical (God told me, showed me in a dream, spoke to me, etc.) revelation is probably the most pervasive false doctrine accepted among Southern Baptists.

When Hilkiah found the Book of the Law in the temple (Imagine a house of God in such a shambles of idolatry that people had to dig and search for the actual Scriptures. Selah.), and Shaphan read it to Josiah, Josiah tore his clothes in grief and began to set God’s house and God’s people in order. After covenanting together with the people to obey God’s Word, the very first thing Josiah did was to have the altars and vessels of false gods carried out of God’s house and destroyed. If the SBC would follow in Josiah’s footsteps we would see things like:

LifeWay would immediately remove and destroy any and all materials by Beth Moore, Andy Stanley, Priscilla Shirer, TD Jakes, Lysa TerKeurst, Sarah Young, Christine Caine, Bethel Music, Jesus Culture, Hillsong, and all other false teachers and promulgators of false doctrine.

There would be no more conferences, simulcasts, or leadership training seminars featuring false teachers, and false teachers would certainly not be invited to speak in any capacity at the annual Southern Baptist Convention.

Pastors, authors, and speakers who attempted to build a career inside the SBC by teaching false doctrine would be subject to church discipline for their sin, not turned into celebrities or appointed or elected to denominational leadership positions.

Messenger voting privileges at the Convention would be revoked for churches which habitually and unrepentantly welcome false teachers.

If the Bible were to become our sufficient authority for both orthodoxy and orthopraxy, our eyes would quickly be opened to the enormity of the hold false doctrine has on our denomination, churches, and individuals, and we would act accordingly and biblically.

A Naked Emperor in the Southern Baptist Convention

10 Things I Wish Southern Baptists Knew About Southern Baptists

The Peterson Predicament and LifeWay’s Peculiar Policies

3.
Disfellowshipping Errant Churches

Earlier this week, the Southern Baptist Convention severed ties with the District of Columbia Baptist Convention (DCBC- an association of Southern Baptist churches in the Washington, D.C. area) for refusing to disfellowship one of its member churches, Calvary Baptist, which had called a legally “married” lesbian couple to serve as its co-“pastors” over a year ago.

It was absolutely the right thing to do (the SBC has disfellowshipped several churches that embrace homosexuality), and I’m glad that this standard remains in tact, but…lesbian co-pastors…? That’s how bad it has to get before the SBC can, or will, act to remove a church? What about churches that are embracing sins other than homosexuality?

There are plenty of apostate Southern Baptist churches, and we have no mechanism in place for kicking them out of the SBC.

This is a verbatim quote from the FAQ section (5th question from the top) of the SBC’s web site:

“According to our constitution, if a church no longer makes a bona fide contribution to the Convention’s work, or if it acts to ‘affirm, approve, or endorse homosexual behavior,’ it no longer complies with the Constitution of the Southern Baptist Convention and is not permitted to send messengers to the annual meeting. These, however, are the only explicitly stated instances in which the SBC has the prerogative to take action.”

What does that mean? As long as your church doesn’t affirm homosexuality and gives to the Cooperative Program, you’re in. Never mind if your pastor twists God’s word until it’s unrecognizable. Or lets women and false teachers get behind the pulpit like Steven Furtick does. Or plays AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell” on Easter Sunday and says he probably wouldn’t have strippers on stage like Perry Noble does. Or any of the other ridiculous and blasphemous shenanigans so many of the seeker sensitive types in our denomination pull. Nope, as long as you give your money and stand on the right side of homosexuality, you’re good to go.² ³

I’ll be the first to admit, it would be a difficult standard to set and implement, but look at the standards the New Testament required of churches. We’ve got to set the bar higher than a homosexuality litmus test and an offering for a church to be in good standing with the SBC. Doctrine and practices simply have to be a factor.

Can there be another conservative resurgence that brings reform to the SBC? I believe there can.

The Bible says “nothing will be impossible with God.” I believe that. I believe that the God who spoke the universe into existence from nothing, who opened sealed tombs and barren wombs, who parted seas and walked on water and turned water into wine can change the hearts of Southern Baptists and the trajectory of the Southern Baptist Convention.

By His grace. For His glory. For our good.

¹A Naked Emperor in the Southern Baptist Convention
²10 Things I Wish Southern Baptists Knew About Southern Baptists
³As of 2019, this verbiage has been removed from the FAQ section of the SBC website. Conceptually similar language can be found here (see Article III: Composition).

Mailbag

The Mailbag: Potpourri (Spanking, Women teaching men, Working a homosexual “wedding”…)

May 14, 2018May 24, 2019 Michelle Lesley

Welcome to another “potpourri” edition of The Mailbag, where I give short(er) answers to several questions rather than a long answer to one question. I also like to take the opportunity in these potpourri editions to let new readers know about my comments/e-mail/messages policy. I’m not able to respond individually to most e-mails and messages, so here are some helpful hints for getting your questions answered more quickly. Remember, the search bar can be a helpful tool!

Can you share some Scripture with us that supports the idea that spanking is not abuse? I am genuinely curious as I have a young toddler of my own and go back and forth between the idea of spanking or not spanking.

The first way we know that a loving, properly administered spanking by godly parents is not abuse is that God would not tell us to do it if it were. The God who does not even want us abusing animals (see passages like Proverbs 12:10, Exodus 23:5, Deuteronomy 25:4) would certainly never tell us to abuse our children.

To equate proper spanking with abuse or to pejoratively call spanking “hitting” is a worldly idea, not a biblical one. The world’s (Satan’s) agenda is to get people to believe that spanking is abuse so that they will stop doing it. Since spanking began falling out of favor several decades ago, the cumulative result has been a greater number of children sinning with impunity and not being brought up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord, which is exactly what Satan wants. (Yes, I understand that is a general statement. There are always exceptions, but exceptions don’t negate the rule.) Christians parents might choose not to spank, but they may not biblically accuse others of abuse who choose to spank.

Beyond that, let me direct you to some resources that not only give you the Scriptures but give instruction in those Scriptures as well:

What the Bible Teaches About Spanking by Denny Burk (there are several additional resources linked in this article)

Capitol Hill Baptist Church Core Seminars: Parenthood Class 7- The Rod of Correction

Parenting in an Anti-Spanking Culture by John MacArthur

Shepherding a Child’s Heart by Tedd Tripp

How should Christians discipline their children? What does the Bible say? at Got Questions

We occasionally have guest speakers at our Wednesday church services that worry me. Charlotte Gambill [co-lead “pastor” of LIFE “Church”] for instance. I am a firm believer that women should not be teachers of Scripture to men, but I guess my question is this, should I leave my church because this is allowed in these Wednesday evening gatherings?

Well…I mean, I don’t mean this to sound facetious or anything, but sin is sin no matter what time of day or day of the week it takes place on. While there are certain circumstances in which it might be biblically appropriate for a woman to address a mixed gathering of Believers, preaching and teaching Scripture during a worship service is not one of them. And certainly no church or other Christian organization should be affirming a female “pastor” in her sin by inviting her to be a guest speaker for any sort of event.

I would not just quietly slip out the door, though. Set up an appointment to discuss the matter with your pastor. (You might want to use the principles and suggestions in my article How should I approach my church leaders about a false teacher they’re introducing? as a guide.) His response about the matter will probably tell you everything you need to know about whether or not you should begin looking for a new church.

Do you have a page on your website on how you verbally share the gospel with others?

I don’t recall ever having written an article on my approach in witnessing, but here’s what I would recommend.

1. Listen to Todd Friel’s Witness Wednesday every week on Wretched Radio. Todd is very good at opening up conversations with random strangers and quickly transitioning to a gospel presentation. (You might also want to order the resource Terrified.)

2. Watch the witnessing encounters in Ray Comfort’s Living Waters University YouTube videos. Ray has a standard (nearly the same, verbatim, every time) way of presenting the gospel and makes it look so easy!

These are the guys I attempt to emulate when witnessing as I trip all over my tongue and stammer around. You would do much better to follow their example than to follow mine.

If a Christian has a job as a banquet server doing weddings and one day there’s a gay wedding and the person is scheduled to work, would that be sinful to work and serve guests at the gay wedding? Would you say this is just like a Christian baking a cake for a gay wedding or is it different?

I think this is different. A business owner has the freedom to choose which jobs and clients he will accept and which he will not (at least, in America, he is supposed to have this freedom). An employee does not have any say so in which clients the business will and won’t serve. So, the employer is serving the client, but the employee is serving the employer.

If you feel uncomfortable working at homosexual “weddings,” try talking to your boss about it. Maybe you could volunteer to work a different shift, or in a different position in the business that would not require you to work at weddings. If your conscience bothers you a great deal about it, that’s totally understandable, and you might want to begin looking for a new job. Set up an appointment with your pastor for biblical counsel on this situation if it’s a decision that’s really weighing on you.

Basic Training: Homosexuality, Gender Identity, and Other Sexual Immorality

Should Christians Attend Homosexual “Weddings”?

I know women should not be pastors, but is it OK for women to teach men Scripture outside of church?

It depends on what you mean by “teach Scripture” and “church”. If you’re asking about sharing the gospel with someone, that’s not teaching Scripture to men in the church, it’s evangelizing those outside the church, and that’s fine. If you’re talking about teaching a Bible study to a mixed group in someone’s home, we need to remember that the church is not a building, it’s Believers, and that the churches in existence when 1 Timothy 2:12 was written were meeting in homes. So, that would be a “no.”

I think my article Rock Your Role FAQs might be helpful as you explore this more.

What do you think about _____ teacher, author, or ministry? Is he/she/it doctrinally sound?

I’m so sorry I don’t have the time to research all the teachers and ministries I’m asked about. If you’re trying to find out whether or not you should be following a certain person or organization, I encourage you to do the research and find out. Here are the steps I take when researching someone:

Is She a False Teacher? 7 Steps to Figuring it Out on Your Own

If you have a question about: a Bible passage, an aspect of theology, a current issue in Christianity, or how to biblically handle a family, life, or church situation, comment below (I’ll hold all questions in queue {unpublished} for a future edition of The Mailbag) or send me an e-mail or private message. If your question is chosen for publication, your anonymity will be protected.

Calvinism/Arminianism, Mailbag

The Mailbag: Should I leave a Wesleyan church?

April 30, 2018August 13, 2025 Michelle Lesley

Readers, please note:
Comments attempting to debate Calvinism vs. Arminianism, or questioning the salvation of Calvinists or Arminians, will not be published.

A few years ago, we had to leave our church. In the area we live in, church teaching is mostly fluffy and there’s a lot of worldliness. We “settled” for a church in which we know the pastor and his wife personally. The pastor lives the Word he preaches.

The problem I have with the church is the doctrine of the denomination. They are a Wesleyan holiness background – Arminian. This past year I’ve done some doctrine study on my own to understand the differences in the Calvinism / Arminian camps more fully. I do not agree with some of the doctrinal stances of the church. Are these big enough issues to leave? Am I being too critical?

Finding a doctrinally sound church is probably the number one problem I hear about from readers, and it just breaks my heart. I dearly wish every church out there taught sound doctrine so this would no longer be an issue for Christians. If your pastor preaches sound doctrine and makes sure it’s taught in your church, be sure to give him a hug and tell him thank you.

I needed a quick brush up on Wesleyan theology, and some of my readers may not be too familiar with it, so let me start off with recommending two brief articles: Wesleyan-Holiness Theology and Who are the Wesleyans, and what are the beliefs of the Wesleyan Church?

Though much of what Wesley originally taught was biblical and doctrinally sound, two major doctrines were not: sinless perfection (also known as entire sanctification) and the idea that a genuinely regenerated Christian can lose her salvation.

“Wesley recorded the experiences of others whom he had no doubt were delivered from all sin and filled entirely with the pure love of God.”

Whether one defines “perfection” as “completely without sin” or “growth and maturity in Christ,” the idea that either can be achieved in a human lifespan in this fallen world should be a no-brainer for anyone who’s truly born again and who takes a few minutes for introspection and logical thought – no prooftext needed.

The fallenness of this world will never stop providing temptations for Christians to sin. Those temptations will be there, and you will continue to give in to them until the moment you die, regardless of how long you live. Furthermore, the longer you grow in holiness, the more God opens your eyes to sins of the heart that you didn’t even realize you were committing. Bitterness, complaining, jealousy, idolatry, pride… The longer you live, the more sinful you realize you are. Ask the finest Christian you know, on his death bed, if he no longer gives in to temptation, if he no longer sins, if he has reached the point of complete spiritual maturity, and he will say to you, with Paul, “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from the body of this death?”.

Christian, you know your heart and your walk with the Lord – can you imagine ever getting to any point in your life at which you could say you were as perfectly sinless and mature as Jesus was?

The belief that someone who has been genuinely born again in Christ can lose her salvation is directly refuted by multiple passages of Scripture. The reason it can look to us as though someone has lost or forfeited her salvation – “deconstructed” or “left the faith,” if you will – is because, although many can fake it pretty well, that person was never genuinely saved in the first place. I’ve discussed the Scriptures dealing with the false doctrine of losing one’s salvation in my article The Mailbag: Can unforgiveness cause you to you lose your salvation?.

Let me also clarify that, while Wesleyans who hold to the tenets outlined in the articles on Wesleyism linked above are Arminians*, not all Arminians would agree with all of the tenets of Wesleyan theology. (Kind of an “All Wesleyans are Arminians, but not all Arminians are Wesleyans,” thing.)

*Just a little FYI for Christians who find themselves in discussions about Arminianism. ArmInian is spelled with an “I” in the middle. An ArmEnian (with an “E” in the middle) is a citizen of the Asian nation of ArmEnia. It is quite possible to be either a Calvinist Armenian or an Arminian Armenian :0)

To illustrate, I know a great many Southern Baptists whose beliefs could technically be classified as Arminian, but they would reject the Wesleyan notions of sinless perfection and the idea that a genuinely regenerated Christian can lose his salvation.

There’s a broad spectrum of Arminianism. Some Arminian churches are so biblical and handle God’s Word so well that a Calvinist could joyfully join one and find minimal disagreement with the preaching and teaching. I am Reformed and I happen to be a member of just such a church.

Finally, in addition to the formal doctrines of sinless perfection, losing one’s salvation, and Arminianism taught by Wesley, a lot can happen in 250+ years, and while I’m sure there are some small pockets of sound doctrine in individual Weseleyan churches somewhere out there, Wesleyism is now fraught with false doctrine of all sorts. This false doctrine mostly manifests itself as progressivisim (wokeness, egalitarianism, social justice, affirmation of perversion, etc.), but there are also examples of New Apostolic Reformation false doctrine as we saw a few years ago in the Asbury “Revival”.

You don’t state which Wesleyan doctrine(s) you find troublesome, so I’m not comfortable saying whether or not you’re being too picky and whether or not you should leave this church.

Another factor at play is how hard this pastor hammers the doctrines you’re uncomfortable with. A pastor who, for example, reluctantly keeps sinless perfection in the back closet because the church sign says “Wesleyan” but never talks about it from the pulpit is a different situation from a pastor who regularly preaches on sinless perfection and says you can’t be saved if you don’t believe this doctrine.

You also need to consider what your other options for churches are if you leave this one. Are there any churches within achievable driving distance that are more doctrinally sound than the one you’re attending? (You might find the resources in the “Searching for a new church?” tab at the top of this page to be helpful.)

The final piece of the puzzle, and probably the determining factor, is your husband. What does he think about all of this, and how is he leading your family? Is he saved? Generally doctrinally sound? I’m surmising the two of you are at least somewhat on the same theological page since you left the last church together and settled on this one together. If he is not leading you to sin, you will need to submit to his decision on this matter.

My counsel would be for you and your husband to make an appointment with your current pastor to ask questions and find out where he stands on all the Wesleyan doctrines. Then, you and your husband should take some time (a few weeks, a few months, whatever it takes) to search the Scriptures and pray about it together, as well as look at your options for other churches. Give your husband your input and let him know you’ll support whatever decision he makes.

Additional Resources

What is Arminianism, and is it biblical? at Got Questions

Calvinism vs. Arminianism – which view is correct? at Got Questions

Arminianism and Calvinism at Theopedia

Worship

God’s Not Like “Whatever, Dude,” About The Way He’s Approached in Worship

April 27, 2018July 17, 2023 Michelle Lesley

Social media is a strange universe to live in. There’s a lot of stupidity, but there’s also a lot that can be learned from various trending issues.

Such was the case recently when Christian social media was up in arms (and rightly so) about Cory Asbury’s worship song Reckless Love, and whether or not churches should use it in their worship services. Discussion centered around the use of the word “reckless” to describe God’s love for us and whether or not that was a semantically and theologically appropriate adjective. “Relentless” was suggested as an alternative lyric. “Reckless” was defended as an appropriate lyric. And then Cory Asbury’s explanation of the song came to light and did further injury to his doctrinal cause.

It was all a very interesting and helpful discussion, but, to some degree, it was a rearranging of deck chairs on the Titanic.

‘Cause we’ve hit the ice berg, folks. And the ship is taking on water.

Focusing on the word “reckless” missed the point – at least the big picture point. You see, Reckless Love was produced by Bethel Music. And Cory Asbury is a “worship leader, songwriter and pastor” with the Bethel Music Collective. Prior to joining Bethel, he spent eight years as a worship leader with the International House of Prayer (IHOP).

Why is this important? Because Bethel “Church” in Redding, California, and IHOP are, functionally, ground zero for the New Apostolic Reformation heresy. Heresy. Not, “They just have a more expressive, contemporary style of worship,”. Not, “It’s a secondary theological issue we can agree to disagree on.” Heresy. Denial of the deity of Christ. Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. Demonstrably false prophecy that the head of IHOP, Mike Bickle, has publicly rejoiced in (He estimates that 80% of IHOP’s “prophecies” are false.) And that’s just the tip of our metaphorical ice berg when it comes to the NAR.

IHOP and Bethel are, by biblical definition, not Christian organizations and certainly not Christian churches. They are pagan centers of idol worship just as much as the Old Testament temples of Baal were. The only difference is that, instead of being creative and coming up with their own name for their god, they’ve stolen the name Jesus and blasphemously baptized their idol with that moniker.

The point in this whole debate is not the word “reckless”. The point is that Christian churches should not have anything whatsoever to do with idol worshiping pagans as they approach God in worship. Yet Sunday after Sunday churches use Bethel music, Jesus Culture music, Hillsong music, and the like, in their worship of God.

And it’s not just that churches are using music from the temples of Baal in their worship services. We have women who usurp the teaching and leadership roles in the church that God has reserved for men – many even going so far as to preach to men and/or hold the position of “pastor”. We have men setting themselves up as pastors who do not meet the Bible’s qualifications. We have churches that let anyone – Believer or not – participate in the Lord’s Supper. We have pastors who welcome false teachers and their materials into their churches with open arms and castigate anyone who dares point out the false doctrine being taught. We have preachers who have forsaken God’s mandate to preach the Word and use the sermon time to talk about themselves, deliver self-help tips, or perform a stand up comedy routine.

And everybody seems to think God’s up there in Heaven going, “Cool! Whatever y’all want to do in the name of worship is just fine and dandy with Me. You do you.”

Well, He’s not.

God demands – and has every right to do so – that He be approached properly. In reverence. In awe. In holy fear. With clean hands and a pure heart.

Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord?
And who shall stand in his holy place?
He who has clean hands and a pure heart,
who does not lift up his soul to what is false
and does not swear deceitfully.
He will receive blessing from the Lord
and righteousness from the God of his salvation.
Such is the generation of those who seek him,
who seek the face of the God of Jacob.
Psalm 24:3-6

Let’s take a stroll through Scripture and be taught by those who learned that lesson the hard way…

Cain

Most of the time, when we read the story of Cain and Abel, we focus on the fact that Cain killed his righteous brother. But we tend to gloss over the event that precipitated the murder. Cain and Abel both brought offerings to the Lord. God accepted Abel’s offering but rejected Cain’s.

Scripture doesn’t tell us why God found Cain’s offering unacceptable. The Levitical laws delineating offerings and sacrifices hadn’t yet been given, and even if they had, grain offerings and other offerings of vegetation were perfectly appropriate if offered at the right time and for the right reason. Was it because Cain had a wrong attitude or motive when he gave his offering? Or maybe because he offered God leftover produce instead of his firstfruits? We don’t know. What we do know is that God had a standard of how He was to be worshiped, Cain violated it, and God expressed His displeasure.

Aaron and Israel

It’s shortly after the Exodus. The Israelites have seen God perform ten – count them – ten plagues on Pharaoh for his idolatry and failure to bow the knee to God’s command to let Israel go. They saw God destroy the entire Egyptian army in the Red Sea. And now, their fearless leader, Moses, has trekked up Mount Sinai and is late getting back. The people are worried and restless.

Does Aaron lead them to pray? Trust God? Be patient? Nope. He fashions an idol for them – a golden calf. And if that wasn’t bad enough, he wasn’t even creative enough to come up with his own name for this idol. He stole God’s character and work and blasphemously baptized the idol with that moniker. He led the people to worship the false god as though it were the true God. (Does that ring any bells?)

“These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it. And Aaron made a proclamation and said, “Tomorrow shall be a feast to the Lord.” And they rose up early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings.

Surely God gave them a pass, right? I mean, Moses broke the tablets of the Ten Commandments when he came down from the mountain before they even had a chance to read the first and second Commandments that prohibited what they were doing.

Uh uh. God told Moses to get out of the way so He could fire bomb Israel off the face of the Earth and start over with him. It was only after Moses pleaded with God to stay His hand that God relented and allowed for the lesser punishment of having the Levites kill 3,000 of them with the sword and sent a plague on the rest of them.

Doesn’t exactly sound like an “anything goes in worship” kind of God, does He?

Nadab and Abihu

Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unauthorized fire before the Lord, which he had not commanded them. And fire came out from before the Lord and consumed them, and they died before the Lord. Then Moses said to Aaron, “This is what the Lord has said: ‘Among those who are near me I will be sanctified, and before all the people I will be glorified.’” And Aaron held his peace.

Are you seeing a pattern here? God is so not OK with people approaching Him irreverently, via idol worship, or in any other way He deems inappropriate that He’s willing to kill them.

Saul

God sends Saul and his army on a mission to defeat the Amalekites. His instructions are simple: completely destroy everything. “Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.”

But Saul’s a smart guy, see? He knows better. He goes in and destroys all the worthless stuff, but saves the good stuff for himself. It’ll be OK with God, he reasons, because he’s going to take some of the really nice sheep and make a big, showy sacrifice. Like a rich man pitching pennies to an urchin shoeshine boy.

And when Samuel confronts Saul about his rebellion, “Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? Why did you pounce on the spoil and do what was evil in the sight of the Lord?”, Saul has the temerity to say, “I have obeyed the voice of the Lord.” Because he was going to perform an act of worship. And the fact that he was doing it his way instead of God’s way didn’t matter. In Saul’s mind, it was the outward act that counted and God should have accepted it.

God didn’t see it that way:

And Samuel said,
“Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices,
as in obeying the voice of the Lord?
Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice,
and to listen than the fat of rams.
For rebellion is as the sin of divination,
and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry.
Because you have rejected the word of the Lord,
he has also rejected you from being king.”

God is not pleased with worship offered by hands dirtied with sin and rebellion. Saul paid the price: his throne and God’s favor.

Uzziah

Uzziah started off well as king of Judah. He listened to the counsel of Zechariah, obeyed God, and prospered. But after a while, prosperity can make you proud, and that’s just what happened to Uzziah.

He became so proud, in fact, that he took it upon himself to enter the sanctuary of the temple and offer incense to God on the altar. That was a position of leadership restricted to the priests. Uzziah had never been installed as a priest because he wasn’t biblically qualified to hold the office of priest, much like many who take on the role of pastor today.

Bravely, Azariah and eighty of his fellow priests stood up to the presumptuous king – at the risk of their lives, but in defense of proper worship as commanded in God’s Word – rebuked Uzziah, and kicked him out of the temple. “You have done wrong,” they said, “and it will bring you no honor from the Lord God.”

Well! Uzziah was hot with anger. How dare these mere priests stop him – the king whom God had blessed and prospered – from worshiping God any way he wanted to!

Guess who God sided with? The priests who were upholding His Word and His standard of worship. God struck Uzziah with leprosy for the remainder of his life, which exiled him from the palace and a royal burial, and effectively ended his reign.

The Pharisees

Hypocrites! Blind guides! Fools! Blind men! Greedy! Self-indulgent! Whitewashed tombs! Lawless! Serpents! Brood of vipers! Murderers!

How would you like to be dressed down like that by Jesus? You’re teaching the Scriptures. You’re tithing to the nth degree. You’re traveling over land and sea to proselytize. You’re behaving with outward righteousness. You’re memorializing the prophets. As far as you can tell, you’re doing pretty well with this holiness thing.

And here comes the Messiah – the One you’re (supposedly) doing all of this for – and He shames you. Publicly. He exposes your blackness of heart to the commoners you want looking up to you. All because God’s way is for you to worship Him in spirit and in truth, but you insist on doing it your way- for all your deeds to be seen by others, and because you love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others.

You’re approaching God in arrogance and selfishness, and He will have none of it. You won’t die to self, so He – if only temporarily – kills your pride.

The Corinthian Church

You’ve probably never seen a Lord’s Supper as messed up as the way the Corinthian church was doing it. Some people were going without while others were getting drunk. The “important” people got to go first while the poor and lower class went to the back of the line. People were using the Lord’s Table as an opportunity for selfishness rather than putting self aside and focusing on the fact that the purpose of this meal was to proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.

That wasn’t acceptable to God. He didn’t want the church observing the Lord’s Supper just any old way. It was dishonoring to Christ and shameful to His church.

So God declared that “whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord…For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died.”

“But all of that was back in Bible times!” you might protest. “God isn’t killing anybody these days for worshiping Him improperly. In fact, some of the worst violators of God’s Word are rich ‘Christian’ celebrities!”

That’s right, they are. Exactly like God said they would be: “teaching for shameful gain what they ought not to teach.” And woe betide them when they stand before Christ in judgment. Because judgment is coming for them:

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’
Matthew 7:21-23

God is high and He is holy, and so are His standards for those who approach Him. He expects His people to obey His Word about how He is to be worshiped.

“I, the Lord, do not change,” God says in the Old Testament. The New Testament tells us, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” God hasn’t mellowed out or calmed down or gotten more tolerant. The God who poured out His wrath on those who blasphemed Him with unbiblical worship in the Old Testament is the same God we worship this side of the cross. Nothing escapes His notice. He doesn’t let sin slide. Whether in this life, or the next, or both, there will be a reckoning for unbiblical worship.

When it comes to worship, God is not a “whatever” kind of God.