Adrian Rogers held a theological view that was no help for Paul Williams. Some people are beyond the help of discipline. Paul Williams harbors a tortured soul. He has a psycho sexual disorder. He has a psychopathic personality.
1 Corinthians 6:9-11 (NASB) Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God.
Such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.
When I was young I heard the words from the pulpits: "...a form of godliness but deny the power thereof." That is what our preachers would say about Adrian Rogers. He had a form of godliness to build a great church and an international radio and TV ministry but he lacked the power to help Paul Williams. The result was a post death catastrophe that has marred his legacy.
It seems to me there is latent Pelagianism in Dr Rogers theology and that contributes to his naivete. He and Joyce built a fence around themselves that kept out the negative elements. He allowed others to deal with the problems, not a complementary statement for him. He was a benevolent dictator who could financially construct a naive worldview. The very man who led the SBC in the battle for the Bible left us with the contradiction of how can a good man, Paul Williams, embrace such perverse evil. He left us suffering with a biblical enigma. He muddied the waters of what the Bible teaches about human depravity and the root of evil. When we should rely on the Bible for our reasoning we have a Bible depending on human reasoning.
Perhaps God has allowed Paul Williams to be a demonstration of this human reasoning.
The discipline that Dr Rogers and by extension most of the American evangelical world can be purchased with money! With money you can purchase a "bsafe" program. If you have money you have friends and they will assist you in accountability. You can buy books and software to built a fence about yourself. With mental ability you can construct a "success" spiritual outlook.
Today's discipleship is a pyramidal industry. It can be purchased from Florida or Colorado, on-line or by mail. At all levels of the pyramid you will have to give money under the pretense of giving to God.
None of this fits in with an exercise unto godliness. I Tim 4:6-10 It is the bodily exercise that has some earthly value in this life but it offers nothing for the life to come. This exercise failed with Paul Williams and I am sure he spent enough money to purchase the product. After all he sat under the master disciplier. I mean who would not want to have sat personally with Dr Rogers and be discipled!
Who disciples me? The Holy Spirit.
Barbaric Baptist
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About Me
- WatchingHISstory
- Collierville, Tennessee, United States
- New Years eve 2005 God healed my personality and released me to be the kind of person he wants me to be. This was not a born-again experience because I had become a Christian at age 10 and was baptized in water, trinitarian, as an outward sign of an inward work of grace. During forty seven years I had stumbled through Church experiences seeing the humiliation that God himself endures because of the faulty theological views of Christ's atonement. God is mocked from the pulpit. Preachers have the audacity to obligate God to be a God of love. They rule by their own self-determination. Their behavior reflects their arrogant self-centered theology. While He is a God of incomprehendible love, He is also a God of wrath far greater than the human mind can understand. God is mocking American fundamentalism and it's lukewarm gospel. He is spewing it out of his mouth.
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16 comments:
A disciple is someone who is disciplined, wouldn't you agree?
I encourage to exercise such. Be disciplined in your approach to share sensitive information. Be disciplined in expressing opinions that would antagonize others. Be disciplined about respecting others opinions and boundaries. Be disciplined in recognizing when you are causing others to stumble.
Being disciplined doesn't mean one lacks zeal or conviction. Being disciplined doesn't mean our opinions lack credibility.
As a disciple then, do you have discipline? If so, would you agree that it has to be a tangible quality?
Anthony Johnson
a disciple is born a disciple through regeneration.
Anthony
should I be accountable to you or the Holy Spirit?
gotta go to work!
Charles
Disciples aren't born full grown, are they? Aren't disciples being discipled...a work in progress?
I encouraged you to exercise discipline, not be accountable to me. But if one is a disciple of Christ, taught by the Holy Spirit, shouldn't they be exercising discipline, thus evidencing their accountibility to him?
Exercising discipline might be manifested in the cessation of provacative posts featuring graphic explanations and opinions about a sensitive issue that has been well chronicled and universally condemned. If bloggers would rather not discuss it, discipline might also be shown in respecting their desire not to.
If they choose to respond to you in a coarse fashion, then they are responsible for their actions...but to deny any accountability for provoking them to this is disingenuous on your part and aggravated further by attributing the provaction as holy spirit directed.
Anthony Johnson
Matthew 23:27-36 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness.
Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous,
And say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.
Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets.
Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers.
Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?
Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city: that upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar.
Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation.
"Exercising discipline might be manifested in the cessation of provacative posts featuring graphic explanations and opinions about a sensitive issue that has been well chronicled and universally condemned. If bloggers would rather not discuss it, discipline might also be shown in respecting their desire not to."
Would these provocative comments meet your demand for discipline?
I demanded nothing...I encouraged you to show some discipline.
As far as quoting Christ...great, and I'm sure you did not write that to somehow compare Christ's 'provocative' words to yours. Somehow, I don't believe Christ was trying to provoke them to anything, but revealing that their false righteousness had condemned them already.
Anthony Johnson
Anthony
This foolishness can go for ever. I am disciplined, though not to your aproval.
Yes I posted Christ's words as a template for my own words. He is my example.
This can be an endless circular exchange. I'm not sure what interest you have in all this.
Comment to my post, please.
The template of Christ's words and what you post on other blogs are not remotely familiar.
Ok, your post...
-Was AR a free willer? yes, and like most free willers, he couldn't see the deadness of depravity
-Could the molester have felt more comfortable under his ministry?
very possible, but so do all manners of people in a mega...most like to fly under the radar
-Was AR concerned about building a mega first and foremost? probably, and most members didn't take the ride kicking and screaming...even the ones who left refer to it as 'the SBC flagship'...no pride there
-Did the size of the church and the $$ flowing through give him the impression that all was well? Listen to 50 preachers on TV and
49 will say about the same
As for 'what interest I have in all this'...just interested. Came across the blogs a couple of months ago and read along before I recently posted.
You know, if you wish, you can continue this blog to your final breath. You can write every jot and tittle about Adrian Rogers you can muster...but why do you insist on forcing it upon those who have told you they do not wish to hear it. Irregardless of whatever reason, you should respect their choice.
Anthony Johnson
--so, 'grumpy old man' was really the worst insult in your eyes on that thread?
Why aren't you speaking out against Ar's theology? You are articulate enough to do a good job. Better than me. it's not so much about AR as it is his theology which by extension represents most fundamentalism. (freewillism)
I bow to your wisdom. I suppose that I am finding it difficult to follow Christ's template, knowing when to knock the dust off my feet. I want to stay and quarrel.
This morning I decided to do that very thing. I had the best day at work. There was so much love with everyone. I freely told people about Jesus and the response was terrific. I believe I have found my "gentiles and lost sheep of the house of Israel"
I haven't scratched the surface on my blog, there is easily two more years of things to say! And eventually more people will catch on and contribute and we will have a revolution in American evangelicalism!
well, yes "grumpy old man" is the only insult that can stick. I am old already (I feel it in my bones)
and I could easily be grumpy.
I mean how can I be insulted by "pervert" when Paul Williams is the topic of discussion?
However I asked everyone at work if I was a grumpy old man and they assured me I wasn't. They ask me who said that and I said some stupid Christians on the internet! ha ha
As long as you hold up Adrian Rogers as the primary example of the theology you oppose, it will be viewed as an attack on Adrian Rogers, whether it is your intention or not. Those among his church who disagreed with his theology still cherished the man.
It will nearly always be personal if he is seemingly always in your crosshairs. If you continue to mention him, I believe that what follows is going to be ignored. There will be a bias against whatever you say because they will be roused by the preceding offence.
When one expresses what they believe with scriptural evidences there will still be disagreement, and there will still be those offended, but there may be a deeper consideration and investigation as opposed to an immediate dismissal as when one is personally offended.
As of right now, the perception is there is a preoccupation with the man and not his theology even though your admittance is to the contrary. I believe the same can be said about the molester also. When this is brought up, you can with almost certainty know what it is going to release.
The declaration and promotion of the truth as it is in Christ is a lofty goal and a worthy occupation of one's time and energy. This will expose error, shine light, and yes, bring despisings. But it will be about what and Who you believe as opposed to 'who you are attacking'.
I hope that you may be able to tread a path that accomplishes this. Being salt and light does not mean that the salt has to be perceived as being rubbed in wounds. Being salty will still greatly offend the masses apart from that.
And for the record, the only stupid christian to dub you a grumpy old man was myself. Don't go giving credit to those to which it is not due. If you're not grumpy, then how about disgruntled, you know, like a postal carrier?
Anthony Johnson
Charles, in case you missed reading my post on one of your former blogs, I will duplicate it here:
If Paul Williams is the only "voice" that claims he visited Elmer Bailey, confessed his sin, and Mr. Bailey exclaimed, "Well...let's just keep this our dirty LITTLE secret," then I challenge it. Personally, I find it EXTREMELY difficult to believe the words of a Southern Baptist homosexual child rapist.
Charles I would like to know if you have an answer to any of these questions:
1. Do you know where it is documented that Adrian Rogers realized he had made an error in judgment by picking Steve Gaines to be his successor?
2. Who were Paul Williams' FEMALE victims?
3. When was the decision made by Adrian Rogers to pay a disgruntled former minister off with a half mil? Was this unbelievably satan-led "church" decision ever revealed to the Bellevue congregation? IMO, Adrian Rogers and everybody involved with this decision should have been terminated.
4. Isn't it quite safe to reason that Jim Whitmire, the Music Minister, MUST have known of the evil plan to pay off a former minister?
Charles:
Whoever is posting as Anonymous and criticizing your outward appearance is cowardly and rude. Your blog picture is quite attractive and winsome and you don't look 61. (I am not being FRESH, btw). I just hope your farewell to your former blog buddies is for real. At times you were just playing the part of a pin cushion.
Charles:
I am extremely busy and my time is limited. I have noticed you post new blogs frequently. I hate to pile all my new remarks on just one blog, so please check your last five for new commentary. Thanks.
I don't know that it is documented and if AR did say it, it would be something I can't believe he would do. He would not make public his displeasure of his successor.
I am only aware of GMOMMY's complaint that his counseling was inappropriate and she felt he was after her son. I have heard statements of other ladies.
This statement needs to be backed up by facts. It is hard to believe that AR would just pay off someone that much money. Were proper Church guidelines followed. No pastor should be able to disburse 1/2 mil with just his say-so.
This story lackas credibility.
Jim Whitmire remains a mystery to me in all this.
You are too sweet! You are not being fresh. Does an old man good to hear a lady compliment him. We all need compliments, don't we?
o yes, my farewell is for good.
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