This is exactly what I’ve been looking for! In a single sentence you’ve said what I’ve had trouble explaining in volumes of conversation. Wow and thanks!

Then ScottL said:
“Does this again relate to your heart that we teach only what the Scriptures directly espouse, rather than how to apply it to daily life in all the nitty-gritty?”

Do the first from the pulpit.

The second is for all the other conversations. Small Groups, dinner table, classes, etc… This is where it needs to be a discussion, not a lecture. And reasonable people can and will disagree on many details.

I agree with your heart and thoughts in your articles as a challenge to evangelicals. It is much needed, no doubt. This is a voice crying in the wilderness. But (and I am sure you sensed the big BUTT, I mean but, coming) I do have a couple of questions/thoughts to consider:

1) You had stated – ‘But if you are an evangelical leader, and you’re paying attention, do this: Teach and preach what you believe are the essentials. Do it well, Biblically, often and persuasively. Then stop and leave people alone.’

Does this again relate to your heart that we teach only what the Scriptures directly espouse, rather than how to apply it to daily life in all the nitty-gritty? Because, though I would say things like mode of baptism are non-essentials, I wonder if we should just only teach that we need to be baptized (an essential, though some would say it isn’t), but leave out any teaching on mode (definitely more of a non-essential)? And this goes across the board. Obviously, there has to be a line as to what we emphasize, but maybe it is broader than just ‘essentials’. Maybe it is important to passionately (yet not with condemnation) teach on such ‘non-essentials’. Just a thought.

2) No doubt Todd Bentley and others have stepped over the line. But we must consider God is a God of the non-normative, and sometimes the wild. Consider Jesus, the proto-type of how to live a God-oriented life. He had a spitting ministry (Mark 7:33; 8:23). Not your normal everyday Christian occurrence. Or consider Isaiah’s ministry in the nude (Isaiah 20). Please understand my heart, I don’t think these are the normative every day Christian life experience. But, though Bentley and others have stepped over the line way too much, there is no doubt we will be called to step over the line.

Again, I am an adamant believer that the God-life to be lived is through conversation, meals, sex with one’s spouse, walks along the river banks, etc, etc. But we must embrace that God will call us to be a little ‘wild’ at times. As Lewis put it in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, ‘Is he [Aslan] safe? Of course he isn’t safe. But he’s good.’

“But, in endorsing the economic, immigration, and penal policies of that party, they closed the door to any believer that had serious questions about the way in which those policies were worked out. [Note: the way in which a policy is worked out often does have moral implications, but these were ignored by the Religious Right.]” Exactly! Amen! That’s why I voted for Senator Obama. (but I probably can’t say that out loud at church

I have a few questions about this part of your last comment:

“The Reformation brought some significant and needed change, but, like all revolutionary movements, it also brought some unintended destruction.

Unless Protestantism seriously deals with its unintended destructions, it will not only continue to splinter, but also continue to have discussions of identity every few decades, just like it has since the Reformation. After all, Methodism, Baptists, Nazarenes, Salvation Army, the First and Second Great Awakenings, Pentecostalism, Charismatic Movement, etc., were all movements that tried to reawaken the dying flame, to define anew Christianity, to regain its “lost” identity. None of them succeeded because they were not dealing with the negative parts of the Reformation.”

First, OUCH Is Pentecostalism/Charismatic Renewal dead? (a lot of past tense, I’m A/G

Is reawakening the dying flame good, bad, or even needed?

Do you feel that your movement is burning brightly? (I sure feel you as an individual are, how is the spiritual life of the whole denomination?) (I live in Southern MN, so I do not know any Orthodox folks)

Do you feel the (movements, awakenings, revivals) listed were purely human efforts to “define anew Christianity, to regain its “lost” identity,” or is there a God side to them? (Did God show up, when people were hungry for Him, or is that not possible outside of Orthodoxy/Catholicism?)

Thanks for any answers you might give.

So the Church in the West experimentation with giving authority to a temporal State was mainly due to the fact that at a certain point in history it was the Church and only the Church that was left to constructed.

The problem with Protestantism was never their protest, Luther made sence there was much abuse in the clergy, there were many pastors that were not teaching the Gospel, and did not know how to teach it, even as far back as Wycliff I would say that their grievances had merit. Many of the Bishops in the west were hard headed and in truth lazy they did not want to deal with the problems of translating the Bible and having to explain it. They would much rather supress the movements and deal with it in their own time. By then the Bishops time became God’s time and the revolt began. Even then it took the Bishops 40 years to get it all sorted out. However it “was” sorted out, and Trent settled it, as far as the Church is concerned.

However those that had stepped out never looked back, they were too busy making up myths about the Church in order to keep people out of her.

Protestantism curse in the end is authority nothing more and nothing less. What is the Church,? Who speaks for her,?

Which is ironic Father Ernesto because in end that is the problem between Orthodox and Catholics as well. Look forward to hopefuly a new true ecumenical council in which both West and East (the whole east) can give us the good news that we are one again.

Great series of posts! Definitely got me thinking.