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Archives For November 30, 1999

News of interest to Illinois Baptists

Three takeaways from the ERLC Summit on the Gospel and sexuality

Meredith Flynn —  April 23, 2014

ERLC_Summit_logoNEWS | Meredith Flynn

Nashville, Tenn. | The Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission’s summit on the Gospel and sexuality drew to a close this morning. Much was said on a variety of topics related to sexual ethics, and we’ll cover the conference extensively in the May 5 and May 26 issues of the Illinois Baptist. For now, here are three threads that ran through the conversation in Nashville this week.

Same-sex marriage isn’t the only threat to biblical marriage, and may not be the biggest. In a breakout session this week, Andrew Walker of the ERLC outlined 11 contemporary threats. Same-sex marriage was #6 on his list that also includes economic pressures, divorce, singles aspiring to find their soul mates, and the rise of “professional marriages,” in which spouses have individual bank accounts and separate social lives.

Closing speaker Kevin Smith summarized it this way: “I don’t know what homosexuals shall do or can do to the institution of marriage in the future, but I know marriage is jacked up right now in America in the popular culture and among believers because of heterosexuals.”

The call to reclaim biblical marriage is more urgent. Summit speaker David Prince probably raised some eyebrows when he said that as a pastor visiting new parents, he prays over their babies, and specifically for their future spouses. One grandfather in a hospital room expressed his disbelief that Prince was praying that way already, the Kentucky pastor said. But several leaders this week echoed the principle: At a time when marriage is being redefined, and fewer people are getting married in the first place, it’s up to evangelicals to reclaim and profess the biblical meaning of marriage.

Embrace the strangeness. One of Moore’s main messages during his first year as ERLC president has been that Christians will be increasingly strange – he has even used the word “freakish” – as nominal Christianity falls away and culture continues to move away from previously held values. Twitter proved that point this week, as posts with the hashtag #erlcsummit poured in during nearly every session. The majority of the feedback was negative from those watching online or following along on Twitter, but that’s not surprising, Andrew Walker said.

“We are talking about the Christian sexual ethic being more unique and distinguishable in society, and we’re trying to warn Christians, ‘Hey, the ground has kind of fallen out from beneath you. The culture has changed on this issue. And one way to really gage that is to see what social media is saying.'”

The correct response to our increasing strangeness, Moore said, is an awareness of what’s happening in the world and a commitment to speak lovingly into the culture. “We have to understand that as we speak prophetically within the church and outside of the church when it relates to issues of sexuality or any other issue, we have to do that in a way that opposes the devil, without acting like the devil.”

 

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Blessed, not defeated, by the Proverbs 31 woman

Meredith Flynn —  April 22, 2014
The example of the Proverbs 31 woman has been misused in the past, Trillia Newbell said. But there's wisdom to be found in her story too.

The Proverbs 31 woman was excellent not because of what she did, but who she adored, Trillia Newbell said.

NEWS | Meredith Flynn

Iconic TV moms June Cleaver and Clair Huxtable were products of their times – 1950’s idealism and 1980’s feminism. The matriarchs from “Leave it to Beaver” and “The Cosby Show” have been idolized by women and by culture as ideals of femininity and, basically, having it all together.

But idolizing those examples, or that of any other cultural icon, leads to condemnation, said Trillia Newbell. The Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission’s consultant for women’s initiatives spoke today on biblical womanhood to women gathered at the ERLC’s summit on the Gospel and sexuality.

The June’s and Clair’s of television might see their influence wane as the culture changes, or at least they’ll be replaced by other ideals. But what about the one many Christian women have heard about from the time they were old enough to find Proverbs in their Bibles?

“I already know that many people are tired of the Proverbs 31 woman,” Newbell said of Scripture’s ideal wife. “She too has been idolized. It hasn’t been helpful.

“But no worries,” she assured her audience, “I’m not merely going to be talking about how excellent she is.”

Instead, Newbell talked about why the Proverbs 31 woman is held up as an example of excellence in the ancient poem. It wasn’t because of what she did, but rather who she loved. Near the end of the chapter, we discover she fears the Lord.

“If the call to be a God-fearing woman completely freaks you out, God provides the grace for it,” Newbell said. For Sarai, who laughed when He made her a promise. For women throughout Scripture. Even for the woman in Proverbs 31.

 

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An almost-Gospel is no match for the sexual revolution.”

Russell Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission

Posted on April 22, 2014 In News , ,
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A gentle and quiet spirit is not about volume.

“Woo-hoo! Otherwise, I’d be in trouble.

“It’s about a heart that fears and loves the Lord.”

Trillia Newbell, speaking on biblical womanhood

Posted on April 22, 2014 In News , , ,
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When I die, I want my children to be able to say that was the godliest man I ever met. And I want my wife to be able to say I would marry him all over again.”

Pastor Matt Carter, on his two life goals

Posted on April 22, 2014 In News , , ,
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“Satan would love for your children to be morally pure, as long as that’s not the fruit of the Gospel.

…With Satan, any path to self-righteousness, any path to self-exaltation is a good one. Satan doesn’t hate morality, he hates the cross.”

David Prince, on teaching your children about Gospel-centered sexuality

Posted on April 22, 2014 In News
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Our approach to teaching our children about Christian sexuality cannot be, ‘Just say no. Just don’t do it.’ That’s not a Christian sexual ethic. …We want them not to just have a right view about what to say no to, we want them to have a comprehensively Christ-centered, Christian view of sexuality.”

David Prince, pastor of Ashland Avenue Baptist in Lexington, Ky., at the ERLC summit on the Gospel and sexuality

Posted on April 22, 2014 In News , ,
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You’re not defined by your temptations. You’re not predestined by your temptations. You’re not necessarily sinning by your temptations.

“We have to show people what it is to take up their cross and follow God.”

-ERLC President Russell Moore on exhorting people struggling with sexual temptation

Posted on April 22, 2014 In News
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ERLC Summit: How should churches talk about sex?

Meredith Flynn —  April 22, 2014

NEWS | Meredith Flynn

Nashville, Tenn. | There are few things that make the Gospel more offensive and more out of sync with culture than what the Bible teaches about sex. But the church has to keep talking about it.

J.D. Greear, pastor of The Summit Church in Raleigh-Durham, N.C., told leaders gathered for the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission’s summit on the Gospel and sexuality that the church can’t surrender the “high ground” in talking about sex, and also shouldn’t avoid hard topics like homosexuality. Greear also stressed that the root of sexual sin is idolatry, and the Gospel is powerful to deal with it.

“Our message cannot simply be, ‘Stop having sex.’ Our message has to be, ‘Behold, your God.'”

Encouraging leaders not to avoid hard topics, Greear said he had struggled two years ago with whether to speak publicly in favor of his state’s attempt to define marriage as between a man and a woman. He did and was met with harsh criticism, including one blogger who published the Greears’ home address.

For three weeks, Greear thought he and his leadership team might have made the wrong decision, he said. But now he has little doubt it was the right thing to do. Teaching his church to think “Christian-ly” about the issue was the goal; also, his church has seen several people come out of a homosexual lifestyle, accept Christ, and be baptized.

Greear’s message and the first day of the ERLC summit got a lot of attention on Twitter; by Monday evening, #erlcsummit was one of the social media site’s top trends. Posts from conference attendees were positive, but others watching from home or following the tweets expressed different views. The Twitter traffic seemed to increase when several leaders joined Greear on stage for a panel discussion on the Gospel and homosexuality.

There were light moments, like when Florida pastor Jimmy Scroggins told pastors to reject “redneck theology” when talking about homosexuality. No more “Adam and Steve” jokes, he said. But the conversation was serious when the panel talked about what pastors should do when gay people or couples want to join their church, or how to counsel a Christian who still feels attracted to members of his or her same sex.

“There are things that are broken because of the curse of sin that you becoming a believer doesn’t automatically fix,” Scroggins said. That’s why pastors have to preach the second coming of Christ, he said, and the transformation of all believers who are in Christ. “In some mysterious way that I can’t comprehend, He is going to put Humpty Dumpty back together again,” Scroggins said. Breaking into a grin, he added, “Can’t wait to see these tweets.”

Watch the ERLC Summit online at live.erlc.com.

 

 

 

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Pornography is ‘silent killer’ in churches, ERLC Summit speaker says

Meredith Flynn —  April 21, 2014

ERLC_Summit_logoNEWS | Meredith Flynn

Nashville, Tenn. | The first Leadership Summit hosted by the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission kicked off this afternoon at the SBC building in Nashville. The meeting of 180 church leaders is focused on how the Gospel applies to human sexuality, especially in a culture that’s changing fast.

“So many of the questions that pastors grapple with today deal with situations that would not even have been possible a generation ago,” ERLC President Russell Moore said when the summit was announced a few months ago. “As technology advances and the culture changes, the questions that we have to grapple with are often increasingly complex.”

The meeting’s first speaker, Heath Lambert, tackled one of those digital age issues with a keynote address on pornography. Lambert, executive director of the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors and a professor at Southern Seminary, said porn is a “silent killer” in churches.

“I think that pornography represents the greatest moral crisis in the history of the church,” Lambert said. It is “something that evangelicals can do in a dark room behind a shut door after they’ve railed against homosexual marriage and talked about conservative theology.”

Redefining marriage is a threat to the church, he added, but “a greater threat to the church today is the Christian pastor, the Christian schoolteacher, the Christian Bible college and seminary student, who exalts sound theology, who points to the Bible, and then retreats to the basement computer to indulge in an hour or three of internet pornography.”

Using Proverbs 7 as a backdrop, Lambert likened pornography to the Scripture passage’s “forbidden woman.” The Bible gives strategies for dealing with sexual temptation, and the church should too, he said. But the first call is to cling to the Gospel.

“I’m pleading with the church to have practical strategies…but those behaviors won’t be enough if we are not teaching people to draw near to Jesus Christ,” Lambert said.

He closed his message with three charges to church leaders concerning pornography: First, pursue accountability. 75% of pastors are accountable to no one for their internet activity, Lambert said.

Second, address your people. “If your job is to preach the whole counsel of God, here it is,” Lambert said. “You’ve got to talk about it. If we do not share this, if we overlook it, it’s folly. It’s foolishness.”

And third, awaken the world to the problem. “Evangelicals have tenderly and tenaciously taken up many causes…I want to ask that together we would begin to take up this cause, that we would begin to say, ‘Enough is enough.'”

Marriage, purity, human trafficking, and pastoral care for sexual sin are among the topics the Leadership Summit will explore through large-group sessions, breakouts and panel discussions. Check back here for updates, and watch it at live.erlc.com.

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