From: Calvin R Wylie < [email protected] > X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; U)
I don't see the emphasis on passion in churches as a problem. No I don't think one can have a healthy church on passion alone, but I think it may simply be a backlash to the apathetic 70s and 80s. It good to see passion making inroads again. Less programs and more passion seems to me to be a symptom of good health. There will always be those who will mistakenly follow charismatic leaders without substance, but that doesn't not detract from the need for passion. Can a engine produce power without the explosive properties of a fuel? Without some sense of passion how can a marriage survive the drudgery of day to day living? Can worship of a God who cleared the temple and wept over Jerusalem be passionless? --C. Wylie
From: "John Leach" < [email protected] >
I think we need more Passion. More Passion for God (all of Him). More Passion for souls ( everyone's). More Passion for the Truth (all of it). And more Passion for the Love and the Righteousness of God (in us). Call me new-fashioned if you will, but I think this type of Passion has been missing. Except in the formally 'down and out' New Converts, we see too little of this type of Passion. Dutiful, and Faithful service are essential. However I would pray that they be motivated by a Passion for God, and a Passion for all mankind. I would pray that they not be motivated by a passion for being right. For I can be right without being righteous. I can be correct without being corrected. And I can be grounded in sound doctrine without being grounded in Truth and Love. I believe one Passionate, and Faithful gentleman called it "Perfect Love." I can only pray that some day I can be as Passionate, and Faithful as he! -- J.Leach
From: Jonathan White < [email protected] >
I think you're right on target...
Which means "burned-out" pastors are outta' here...
and that intellectual pastors better start working on resumes...
and that Sunday School classrooms better be at least 50% confession booth...
and that existentialism with its faith in faith is in the saddle in the church as well as the secular culture...
and that Spiritual Adventures better be long on adventure and short on spiritual...
and that historic, prepositional truth Christianity in pretty much dead in America...
and that Simon the Sorcerer is more in demand than the apostles who taught about "what they had heard, seen, and touched." Of course, Jesus had passion, too, didn't He?
--Jon
From: [email protected] (C. Holloway)
A new mysticism is replacing pragmatism in the lives of many people...especially the young . To them, we "older generation" have brought too many of our own perspectives, too much of our cultural biases, and, a negative surplus of our own language, to the 21st Century. . {They} feel as though they can bridge the gap between the 21st Century and the First Century, between the infinite and the finite, between God and man........and do so without creating a level of abstraction that would render it meaningless. They do not have time to back up and see the big picture! This group believes that they have found God's special formula in communicating with His people...........namely, personal and supernatural! In short.....Saint Vitas dance is the only cure for Rigor Mortis!.
From: "Andy Trowbridge" < [email protected] >
Let me ask this question, why is it we can't have both. Jesus had both, God has both, I think as preachers we need to incorporate both matter-of-fact and passion into our services. I am sorry but the truth is still the truth. We can try to escape it any way we want, however; God is going to nail you every time when you sin. He does not allow for Passion without truth. There were many in Jesus' times that tried this. Ask Saul(Paul) what happened when he had passion, but lacked truth. He thought what he was doing was for God (at least I think so). My problem is that I preach the truth, against sin, yet I come back every week to a church filled with only twenty to thirty people. I am not going to be detoured just because the people are afraid of the truth. I believe God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow despite what some people think.
I think that having passion includes having a passion for what is true of God. That should be what sets us aflame not some hollow passion because I am the churches pastor. Jesus submitted to God despite what was going on around Him I think that we should follow this model and submit ourselves to God despite what the world says. We are God's servants not servants of the world. I am done preaching now.
From: "Andy Whitman" < [email protected] >
I offer a different perspective, a commentary on your column from another Christian mailing list. Please know that, although I disagree with some of your points, I greatly appreciate your writing, and value your views. Thanks for doing what you do, and for providing a forum to discuss your ideas. --Andrew Whitman Lucent Technologies
<Since I share some of the same fears and biases as the author, and since I've moaned countless times about these tendencies in the Church in the past, I think it's only fair to note that stereotypes are still stereotypes, and that although they contain kernels of truth, they miss the big picture by loading one part of the whole with too much import. I'm good, if that's the word, at doing that too. People don't go to church to "feel." There are far more powerful and effective means of stimulation if that's what people are after. I don't think they go to church to be "entertained" either. Most people don't find a sermon during which they are convicted of sin to be all that jolly of a time, even if it *is* preceded by a killer electric guitar solo. I'm currently attending a church that fits the criteria mentioned in the article. There are big projection screens instead of a pulpit, a worship band, and "passionate" worship with people raising their hands and scrunching up their faces and doing whatever they do to indicate that they're involved with the proceedings. But I don't think they're there because they "feel" more there. I think they're there because they're encountering Jesus, and because their lives are being transformed. Could they encounter Jesus in other churches, maybe even in those matter-of-fact-faith churches that the author values? Theoretically, yes. But in reality, no. Many of the people I've encountered haven't needed matter-of-fact answers. They've needed to be saved. Every church I've attended but one has engaged in musical chairs -- people moving from one congregation to another. But in one, the "feeling" church, the vast majority of the people come in off the streets, with no Christian background. They're coming to Christ. There's a simple test for this, really: look at th