It has been said that divorce is like a death in the family. I would submit that this is not a fair comparison. When a member of your family passes away, loved ones flock to the funeral. Your friends stand by you at the cemetery and watch as the deceased is lowered into the ground. Friends and family descend upon your house with gifts of food and companionship. I can remember when my mother passed away. My closest friends in the world traveled great distances just to sit with me. We stayed up late that night telling stories about my mother.

During my divorce, however, I was alone.

To read the rest of the article please visit Provoketive Magazine.

We cannot blame sugary soft drinks for obesity, tobacco for lung cancer, media for corrupting our children, immodestly dressed men or women for our lust, social media for divorce, etc. The problem is sinful hearts, and the only solution is the good news found in Jesus Christ alone. All humanity must admit that the good news is Jesus Christ and that our sinful hearts are the bad news. Husbands and wives cheat because they believe a new relationship (sin) is the good news (gospel).  Why do they believe this lie?  Because their hearts are evil.

I agree with Pastor Moore. Facebook isn’t the problem; rather, the problem is that in our fallen states we often times prefer sin over a relationship with Christ. Having recognized this preference for sin, however, one must wonder if Facebook is worth it for the married Christian. In the world of social media, temptation often runs rampant. A husband or wife who is prone to cheat probably shouldn’t run the risk of harboring friendships with members of the opposite sex apart from their marriage (online or otherwise). So would it be better if we just abstained from Facebook all together? After all, as Christians we should be looking for ways to limit opportunities for sin … and Facebook sure makes it a lot easier to cheat.

Personally, I would stop short of recommending that Christians abstain from Facebook all together. There are probably some that should, but not all. I would, however, recommend that all Christians who choose to use Facebook should do so wisely. Here are some tips:

1. Create a joint account with your spouse: I recommend all married couples do this because it puts to rest any suspicions (provided both the husband and the wife have unfettered access to the account). One positive result of a joint account is that friends, family, and others will begin to view you and your spouse as a couple. Admittedly, Facebook doesn’t have an official option to do this, but it’s easy enough to figure out after playing with the settings a bit.

2. Use Facebook as a tool to spread the gospel: Many of us are hesitant to discuss our faith with others. While you may not have the guts to evangelize in person, Facebook can be a natural extension of your walk with Christ. Did you have fun at church Sunday morning? Share it on Facebook. Did God answer a prayer? Praise Him on Facebook. Want to invite someone to a Bible study? Invite them on Facebook. Social media can be a wonderful way to share your Faith. If it offends someone, they can always un-friend you, right?

3. Use Facebook to connect with other believers. Utilize Facebook as an instantaneous way to communicate with your fellow believers. I’ve recently discovered that Facebook is a wonderful tool to voice urgent prayer needs. With one status update, I can instantly request prayer.

Granted, we could all close our Facebook accounts and sign up for Faithbook, but I submit there is a way we can use social media wisely.

What’s your opinion?

A friend recently sent me a link to an article written by pagan author Patti Wiggington titled, Do Pagans Believe in Sin? I offered my friend an unsolicited rebuttal and thought I would share an edited version with my readers.

First, let me say that Wiggington is a wonderful writer. She clearly and articulately states what it is she and other pagans believe. I appreciate that because it makes it much easier to digest and rebut.

Having read the article, I found that Wiggington was suggesting that sin is “relative” – as such, she argues that sin is subjective. Here’s a quote that illuminates her argument, “Ultimately, what matters most is that you find a way to remain true to your own values and ethics.”

Christianity argues that sin is objective. It doesn’t matter what I think is a sin. If I think murder is okay, God still says it is wrong. If I think being a drug addict is okay, God still says it is wrong. Here’s where it gets tough … If I think lust is okay, God still says it is wrong. God says hate is akin to murder, it doesn’t matter what I think. To me, this seems far more realistic and practical than the argument that it is our own values and ethics that are important. Why? Basically, people are susceptible to stupidity. If you think about, responsible fathers treat their children the same way. We don’t leave our naive children to live life on their own as they see fit – we instruct them on the best way to live and the best choices to make. God treats us in the same manner.

Christ teaches that sin is objective, acknowledges that none of us meet a holy standard, and gives us a plan to deal with it and strive to be better. Again, this is exactly how a responsible parent handles their own children. You give them rules and guidelines to live by. When they mess up … you forgive them and love them anyway … just like God the Father does for us through Jesus Christ.

As such, I argue that Christianity is far more responsible than the pagan view and closely resembles an actual parent/child relationship.

In our lives, hind-site is twenty-twenty, right? In her article, Wiggington argues that multiple sex partners are okay as long as everything is consensual. Let’s put this concept to the test. Let’s say a married couple decides the wife should have a fling … everything is consensual, everyone’s adults, and what matters most is that everyone remains true to their own values and ethics. So the wife goes ahead and does it two or three times (now keep in mind that this whole time the Christian God is screaming that it’s wrong and begging her to stop). Somewhere along the way, the husband regrets his decision and finds that it is painful to know his wife has been intimate with another man. He asks her to stop and she does even though she was enjoying herself. Do you think the husband will ever get the image of his wife cheating out of his mind?   

This is a case of a human being’s values and ethics changing. We do it all the time. This is why as we grow older we often regret the choices we made in the past. Meanwhile, the one true God has never changed His opinion on sin. Adultery was wrong before the wife did it and it is still wrong now. But even after such a mistake, Christ wants to draw us near, help fix it, and restore our relationship with God the Father.

Wow … God loves us just like we love our own children.

From the Fields of Grace website:

One of the primary biblical models guiding the providing of these services is the New Testament image of compassion for all persons (Matthew 14:14). For those whose personal lives, relationships, or covenants would benefit from a conversation with a competent pastoral person, I am here to assist you on a journey of change, growth, and transformation in the context of Christian faith.

I’m excited to see how the Lord is using Mike and I think his services are needed and highly valuable in the stressful world we live in! I am requesting that the readers of this blog support Mike’s endeavor with prayer and have placed a link to Fields of Grace in the sidebar.

Good luck Mike!

The scenario is that a single mother is a member of your local church. For several years she seemed to be living faithfully for Christ. She was present on Sunday morning and often during other church events. It was difficult for her at times and the church even helped her financially and with food when she needed help.

Then, to your surprise she moved in with a non-Christian man!

Church leaders begged her to repent and to move back out and get out of her relationship with this man. She would not. Several months went by.

Finally, it was time to vote as a church. The time had come to affirm or deny whether or not she continue to be included in your local church.

What do you do – affirm or deny her? (Depending on your local church this would mean denying the Lord’s Supper and/or being considered a member until repentance. Cf. Matthew 18:17, 1 Cor. 5:9-13)

If she is denied, but continues to occasionally attend afterward how would you treat her? What would you say to her?

First, I’ll preface my response with this prayer: Lord, I pray that should I err in my response to this scenario that I err on the side of grace and represent Christ and His Word faithfully.

Okay, there are a few points within the scenario that I feel are worth noting. First, this woman is already a member of the church and was voted in as a single mother with all the struggles that apply to such a situation. Despite her struggles, the scenario suggest that she has been faithful in attending church regularly, and I assume that her loyalty has included service within the church family in some capacity. It was after this history the woman has built with her church family that, “To [our] surprise she moved in with a non-Christian man!”

Perhaps I’m reading a little too much into the exclamation point at the end of this last sentence, but it seems to suggest that her actions shocked the congregation to the point that it became scandalous; if so, I would suggest that a healthy church family would turn that scandal into genuine, heartfelt prayer – but this is beside the point.

According to the scenario, the leaders of the Church then begged the woman to give up her new lifestyle and repent. Let me affirm that it is their right and duty to offer counsel to the members of their church and motivate others to inspire sanctification among the congregation. I have no problem with the leaders providing pastoral care provided it is done in an edifying manner.

After the leadership has been ignored by the woman for several months the scenario then asserts that the time has come to “affirm or deny whether or not she continues to be included in [the] local church.” This leads me to ask a couple of questions. First, who decided it was time to affirm or deny this woman’s membership? Was it a decision of the leadership or rather brought about by the popular demand of the congregation? I’m not sure if these questions have a bearing on my answer, but I would humbly suggest that a congregation that demands a woman in this situation be affirmed or denied (especially if said congregation finds her actions so shocking that it is filled with scandal and gossip) has problems that run very deep.

Okay, now that I’ve rambled on far too long, I will get to the heart of the presented scenario. Do I affirm or deny this woman’s continued membership within the church? Personally, I would be chagrined that there was a vote in the first place and definitively vote for this woman’s membership to continue; should she be forgiving enough to remain. Here’s my reasoning:

• Romans 3:23 clearly teaches that all of us are sinners. The only difference between this woman’s sin and the sin of the church’s leadership and other members is that hers has been allowed to become the subject of scandal and gossip. The scenario offers no reason to believe this is the result of anything the woman, or her boyfriend, has done. Rather, it may be appropriate for the leadership to address this issue with the church as a whole.
• The leadership of the Church and its members have been ordained by Christ to love each other as Christ loves them (John 13:34-35). While there are precedents for “church discipline,” I fail to see how revoking this woman’s membership displays the love of Christ.
• By revoking this woman’s membership, the leadership of the church is displaying a woeful lack of confidence in the Holy Spirit. Rather than kicking her out of the church, the leadership should remain faithful to preach the Word of God within its services (especially those passages that define marriage and the appropriate roles of men and women) and be confident that the Spirit will convict her. Heck, perhaps they should begin the long process of befriending and ministering to her boyfriend in the confident hope that he will also be saved. This may be a difficult and lengthy process, but the effects of revoking her membership may create a roadblock that keeps her from attending church for a very long time.
• I believe the church leadership should be grateful to face a situation that allows them model faithfulness to this woman that mirrors the faithfulness of God to believers. Considering there is no indication that this woman has turned her back on her faith; it is evident that she is still within Christ’s flock. John 10-27-29 clearly indicates that nothing (not even this woman’s living arrangements) can pluck a member of Christ’s flock out of God’s hand. Romans chapter 8 teaches that no amount of distress can separate a believer from the love of Christ. If this woman’s sin hasn’t caused Christ to give up on her, who is the church to cast her out?

Next, I’ll respond to the Scriptures referenced (within the scenario) that may suggest discipline in this scenario is warranted:

• 1 Corinthians 5:9-13 does indicate that the sexual immorality merits expelling a member from the church community; however, verses 1 thru 8 in the same chapter spell out the exact sexual sin Paul is speaking of. Apparently, there was a man within the Corinthian church who had practiced sexual immoralityworse than even that practiced by the pagans by taking his father’s wife as his own lover (verse 1). The question we must ask is if the woman’s sin in our scenario really compares to the sin depicted in 1 Corinthians chapter 5. Is her sin worse than that of the unbelieving world around us? Is her sin really of the same heinous type as that Paul is writing about? I’m not justifying her actions nor arguing that they aren’t sinful; however, I do believe a case can be made that her sin is no more heinous than many of the other sins that can be found in any church. After all, if we kick all the sinners out of church, no one will be left to hear the gospel!
• Matthew 18:17 does say that if a brother (or sister) refuses to listen he should ultimately be treated as a pagan or tax collector, but this is contingent upon Matthew 18:15 that states, “If your brother sins against you … .” Has the woman in our scenario sinned against anyone in particular within her church? I think it can be argued that her sin is against God rather than any member of the church. If the more sensitive members of the church are “offended” personally by the scandalous nature of her actions, they need to reevaluate the ease with which they are offended.

In summary, by the information we have been provided in this scenario, a revocation of this woman’s membership is not warranted. While she has sinned, she has not sinned in a manner grotesque enough to warrant discipline; nor has she committed an offense against any particular member of the church. The leadership of the church will be rewarded if they remain faithful to God’s Word and continue ministering to the woman’s needs as there is no doubt she will be in great need of God’s Word considering the choices she is making. Furthermore, considering the situation, there is a great likelihood that God’s power will be made evident as the Holy Spirit convicts the woman; in which case, everyone will know her life was turned around by God alone!