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A letter signed by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is calling for President Trump's removal from office. Even more shocking, the ELCA comes against anyone who believes the 2020 election was fraudulent saying, "In addition, we recognize the need to hold responsible not only those who invaded the Capitol, but also those who supported and/or promoted the President’s false claims about the election, or made their own false accusations." (See here)
Buckle-up God-fearing Christians, in a country that was built on freedom of speech, half of our society, big tech and the faux-Christian community have succumbed to hate and are now calling for repercussions for those with thoughts and beliefs that are not their own. It is time to reexamine your relationship with God, invest in your faith, grow in your knowledge of God's Word and train up those around you to do the same. Fear not, God is with you. Here is the article on the ELCA website announcing the "ELCA presiding bishop joins NCC leaders in letter to vice president, Cabinet and Congress." 
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"I think what we need are Christians who are serious Christians. I think we had a cultural Christianity in America...but to have people who go to church but don't really know why or don't really believe those things, we've got a lot of those. I call them Mainline Protestants... but most people who go to Mainline Protestant churches, why have they ceased going? Because at some point it became culturally acceptable to stay home on Sunday because 'nobody believes that stuff anyway.'" - Eric Metaxas  (The following two articles were written by Rev. Tom Brock of pastorsstudy.org. You can follow Pastor Brock on Facebook - here and Twitter - here.)
Back in 2009, when the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America voted to allow practicing homosexual clergy, the agreement was that both liberal and conservative voices would be honored in the ELCA on this issue. For years, Living Lutheran, the national ELCA magazine, in numerous articles has promoted only one point of view, the liberal one. Numerous articles are like this one from the January 2018 issue: "Elizabeth Rawlings (is) the ELCA pastor of The Sanctuary, the Lutheran/Episcopal campus ministry at the University of Washington, Seattle...Many of the students identify as LGBTQ+, and Rawlings, who is bisexual, knows that to lead such conversations for those who are in a critical stage of their faith development means "being real and...being open about when and how I struggle." At The Sanctuary's website, the Episcopal priest is also "out queer". The website reads: "Together, we worship, play, pray, dance, do yoga, hike, eat, meditate, make art, conversate and much more. We are a Q Center Safe Zone and a Reconciling In Christ ministry (a designation given to ELCA ministries who are supportive of the LGBTQ+ community). We engage in interfaith conversation and relationship. We do our best to live out the radical, gracious love of God in Jesus Christ." (see here) For years now I have been waiting--and waiting and waiting--for one article in Living Lutheran to express a conservative view on homosexuality. Churches and groups around the country are helping people out of homosexual behavior (see restoredhopenetwork.org), but such a story has never made it into Living Lutheran. Given how left of center the ELCA has become, I am guessing such a story never will. So much for "diversity" in the ELCA. In Jesus our Savior, Pastor Tom Brock pastorsstudy.org (Here is the Living Lutheran article. Below is Rev. Brock's second blog) The Bible is "biased, contradicts itself and can get real weird...(a) mess" says Lutheran/Episcopal Ministry In my previous post, I shared about The Sanctuary, the Lutheran/Episcopal campus ministry at the University of Washington, Seattle, which was mentioned in an article in Living Lutheran Magazine, the national magazine of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The ministry fully supports the LBGTQ+ agenda. The Episcopal priest is "out queer" and the Lutheran pastor is bisexual. How does a "Christian" ministry get to the point where it celebrates behaviors that the Bible condemns? This is done by getting rid of the authority of Scripture. Below is the ministry's statement on what the Bible is all about. "What is the Bible? The Bible is one of the resources we use to guide our lives of faith. As Lutheran & Episcopalian Christians, we believe that the Bible is the inspired word of God. It is a collection of stories of God's people and how they saw God acting in their lives and the lives of others. As it was written, edited, compiled and translated by humans who were products of their time and place and likely had their own agendas, there is bias, sometimes it contradicts itself, and it can get real weird. When we read the Bible, we consider the context of those involved in passing the stories down to us when we apply Biblical teaching to our own lives. Even with the mess, the contradiction and the weirdness, God is present in the Bible and is present with us when we read scripture. The Bible is one of the tools we use to understand who God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are, how they have acted in history, and how they are still active in the world (and our lives) today." (see here) Martin Luther, who taught the Bible alone is the highest authority in the Christian life, would ask to have his name removed from the Lutheran/Episcopal campus ministry in Seattle. Sincerely in Christ, Pastor Tom Brock pastorsstudy.org (The following articles were written by Rev. Tom Brock of pastorsstudy.org. You can follow Pastor Brock on Facebook - here and twitter - here.)
Tonight I attended a Saturday evening worship service at an Episcopal church. Second only to the United Church of Christ, the Episcopal Church in America is filled with the worst heresy in American Christendom. Their head Bishop Katherine Jefferts Schori has likened the Holy Spirit to White Buffalo Woman in Native American spirituality. In a sermon she chided the Apostle Paul for casting a demon out of a girl in Acts 16, instead Paul should have recognized God within her. And the Episcopal Church has the retired Bishop John Shelby Spong who writes books denying the Incarnation, the Virgin Birth of Christ, the miracles of the Bible, Christ's substitutionary atonement, Christ's bodily ressurrection, etc. etc. So why did I attend an Episcopal church? Because you can still find good, Biblical Episcopal churches and I love their worship and the fact that they serve Holy Communion weekly. The church I attended tonight is a good church with a Biblical pastor who does not go along with the craziness that has come to characterize American Episcopalianism. But I was sad tonight. Nowhere in the service did the pastor mention what happened to America this week. Not a sentence in his sermon, not a prayer lifted up acknowledged the fact that America as abandoned the God-ordained institution of heterosexual marriage. I don't get it. Or maybe I do. Serving a church for 29 years, I know how hard it is to preach against, say, divorce and remarriage, when there are remarried people in the pews. Perhaps the pastor knew of a parent or a grandparent who would be offended for their homosexual child if he took a stand for traditional marriage. I know its hard. But, please, we have to do it. If we love people, we have to preach the truth. And God will hold us accountable if we don't. So I ask you to pray that your pastor has the boldness to lovingly mention in the services tomorrow what happened to America this week. One reason we now have homosexual "marriage" in America is because good, Biblical Christians have been too quiet. Maybe even send your pastor an email tonight or mention before the service tomorrow "Pastor, could you please pray today about America this week and that we need to repent as a nation?" One last thing. Did you ever think you would see the White House lit up in the gay pride rainbow colors like it was last night? Such a clear sign that we are asking God to judge us. In Jesus our Savior, Pastor Tom Brock pastorsstudy.org --- Part II This morning I worshipped at a congregation of the Missouri Synod Lutheran Church. The Missouri Synod, in contrast to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, is a good, Biblically-based denomination. The Missouri Synod is strongly pro-life, whereas the ELCA pays for abortion for any reason with offering dollars in the ELCA healthcare plan. The Missouri Synod takes a stand against homosexual marriage and homosexual behavior, whereas the ELCA ordains practicing homosexuals. So what happened today at this Missouri Synod church? Did the pastor address what the Supreme Court did this week by forcing homosexual "marriage" on all 50 states? Not a word in his sermon. But coming up in the service was the prayer time. I sat in the pew and prayed that he would at least bring it up during the prayers. Again, not a word. I left so sad. It was a nice service. Nice music, nice message. But I couldn't help but think of what an old white-haired Lutheran pastor said many years ago "We are nicing people right into hell." I came away affirmed in my belief that one big reason we now have homosexual marriage in the United States is the silence of Biblical pastors who are afraid to offend people. I think of what happened in Minnesota in 2012 when conservative pastors were asked to sign a statement affirming an amendment which would have preserved traditional marriage. Relatively few would sign it. So now we have what we have. May God have mercy, Pastor Tom Brock pastorsstudy.org |
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.
1 Thessalonians 5:21 Dan Skogen
Former ELCA seminary student and former ELCA member who is fed up with the ELCA's consistent mockery of God's Word. If you have been helped and blessed by Exposing the ELCA's ministry, please help us continue to proclaim the truth of God's Word to ELCA members who need to hear it.
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