Welcome to the Faith Debate on News Radio 930 WFMD. It's our pleasure to meet you today. How you been? I'm Troy Skinner, host of the Faith Debate and pastor of Household of Faith in Christ, online at HouseholdofFaithinChrist.com. Joined this week by David Forsey. If you want to get in touch with him, you got to get in touch with me because he doesn't have any sort of legitimate, like significant anyway. It's not that he has illegitimate presence online, but he doesn't have any significant presence online. And he doesn't even have a consistent location that he meets. They kind of do a rotisserie. They meet at a different place every single week for his house church. Another house church in the area is shepherded by the Rasbys, Imran and Daniel, and they are online at conqueredbylove.org. I got past that mental block for a while, but it reared its ugly head again. Conquered by Love Ministries online at conqueredbylove.org. Pick up where we left off last week. Where was that? We were grappling with an article written by a pastor who left the church and told us why he was departing. His name is Alexander Lang. He's with what we would call a liberal denomination, the PCUSA, the Presbyterian Church of the United States of America. They have been a far left theologically and Late it means far left politically as well for what that's worth for a long long long time now and he wrote an article explaining why he was leaving and Daniel Razvi did a a word search to see in this lengthy lengthy article It's almost seven pages that they printed it out and how many times the word God show up four times four times Oh in like one little section at the end. Okay talking about a poem and Not even this thing. All right, and so he's not focused so much on God, which explains why he doesn't feel like he's ultimately, as a pastor, responsible to God. He's responsible to a whole bunch of people. In fact, anybody who walks through his door. So he was walking, we left off last week. Oh, you wanted to say something? No, that was basically what you were about to say. There's seven skills. Yeah, yeah, there's seven things he says that pastors are expected to be able to do, and we talked about a few of them last week, and now we're picking up where we left off. He says you have to be a professional fundraiser Maybe. Yeah. I'm going to pause there for a second and say that you don't have to be, and you shouldn't have to be, but practical realities make that the case in too many situations. I don't think that people should expect that the pastor would be a fundraiser, but they have to understand then that he's going to be a tent maker. And he's not going to be available to drop off a hat because he's going to have to earn a living making tents. And he might not be able to respond exactly when you want him to because he's funding the ministry another way. But anyway, let me finish reading this and we can all participate in conversation. Not only are you raising money for your own salary and whatever staff you might have working with you, but you're also raising money to maintain the building and help people who are struggling financially. You're also expected to be a counselor for people who need help. Sometimes you act as a confidant, other times you're helping people mediate conflicts and disputes. In a church like mine, I'm also acting as a human resource director, multiply responsible for hiring and firing, as well as creating a positive workplace culture. Beyond all of these day-to-day tasks, you serve as a master of ceremonies at baptisms, weddings, funerals, which means you rarely get a break, as these events often happen on the weekends. Your thoughts? Well, yeah, I mean that whole thing about you don't get breaks because it's 24-7, that's kind of true. Pastors don't get a rest even if you hold to a traditional Sabbath rest. A lot of times pastors are not getting that, so they have to find other places. You know, maybe if pastors weren't expected by our culture to be participating in making the weddings happen, that would alleviate some pressure, because I think really it should be between the two fathers in the family doing the marrying, but that's a topic for another day. In general, that part's okay, but I mean, he's acting as HR director, CEO, fundraiser, all these titles which have nothing to do with God or the ministry. He's saying these are the things a pastor should be doing. In a church of his size, there should be a number of other people in leadership, and he's alluding to that. He's saying, I'm hiring and firing people, so why aren't these people doing these other things? Fundraising and advertising and stuff. It sounds like he's saying these are all the things that are typically expected of a pasture right over the primary pasture and I mean part of the part of the I think what that kind of reveals is that that people, right, that means that people in general just view the church as another kind of business. If that's what people in general are expecting the pastor to do and need to be, right, then, and so that's just, that's already, that's entirely upside down. That's the voice of David Forsey. Before that, you heard the voice of Daniel Razvi. The other voice you'll be hearing on today's show, besides mine, is Imran Razvi's. And the other thing that struck me is, you know, you gotta worry about maintaining the building and fundraising and financial concerns, but there's a prescription for that in scripture. Who's supposed to handle that? The elder, the pastor, right? The overseer, the bishop? Or the deacons, yeah. So he's taking on responsibilities that aren't his. That's a problem. There's a leadership model problem here that would have alleviated some of these issues that he's arguing about or complaining about. Part of what seems to be a theme here is he's leaving a church because it didn't work. And I think we could say, okay, yeah, maybe it didn't work. Sure, for the church it doesn't work because he's not operating within biblical model for the church. Amen. Hear, hear. The next section is kind of a continuation of this part of things he's talking about, and then he's gonna move on to something else. But here's what he's finishing out his thoughts on this topic. People also look to the pastor as the keeper of the Bible and the guardian of orthodoxy, meaning they depend on you to correctly interpret the Bible. Duh. I'm trying to keep a straight face. This one is actually really important because if your interpretation crosses a line into what others deem heretical, you risk members of the church questioning your authority. Finally, you're expected to be a pillar of virtue, meaning you must be blameless or morally pure. Too much pressure. Your spouse and your children should all be perfect or close to it. Most importantly, and he's overstating the point making a straw man here, but anyway. More importantly, you must be unconditionally loving, meaning you have to love everyone in your congregation and show them grace and forgiveness, no matter how poorly they treat you. Putting it all together, you can see how crazy it is. You gotta be a professional speaker, CEO, counselor, fundraiser, human resource director, master of ceremonies, pillar of virtue. In a normal company, You would have a different person doing most of these jobs, sometimes multiple people. Nobody is capable of being sufficient at all of these skills, and yet pastors are expected to do all of these things and do them well for $55,000 a year. So first of all, one thing real quick. He says about, in a normal company, and I know we're all laughing hearing that, but let's just pretend it's a company for a second. One of his seven things is CEO. In a normal company, yes, the CEO leads all those things and hires people to do them. And that's what we've been talking about. If you're going to run your church like that, yeah, you need to have multiple people. He's putting this article out there like most churches don't have this or won't have this and never have. I don't know that that's really the case. In successful churches that are kind of run like companies, they actually do have people in all those roles. Also talk about that pillar of virtue that last thing you must be blameless or morally pure your spouse and children should all be perfect or close to it. No the whole point of Christianity is that you're still having a sin nature What makes you different when you're saved is how you deal with sin when you find out that you're doing it, right? You stop doing it, you repent, and I don't think, I agree with, I think people, he may be correct, that people expect the pastor to be perfect, But that's a wrong expectation. You should not expect that. And the best pastors that I've heard preach from the pulpit say, look, I make lots of mistakes. Please call me out if I'm doing something wrong. Also on that, the people look to me to interpret the Bible for them. Well, yes, but you should also be a Berean and search the scriptures. And then when it's not true, raise your hand and say, pastor, that's not right. Because he's worded this the way he has, he's been a little hyperbolic, it seems to me, and he's built a bit of a straw man, and he's used this, like, okay, if you're gonna put it that way, I have no choice but to agree with you. And that's what Daniel's reacting to, and I agree with the way he's phrased this. But I think what he's really saying, I would disagree with. I don't know if David agrees with, or maybe going on that. Are you reading my mind? I don't know yet. So he's saying that people expect that the pastor is going to be the keeper of the Bible, meaning you can correctly, orthodoxly, interpret the Bible. Yeah. That should be expected of every Christian, honestly. Right? But it should be expected that the pastor is leading the congregation in that. Yes. And you're not going to be perfect or absolutely morally pure, but you should be an example to and example for the congregation. Yes. And you should not have active, ongoing patterns of sinful behavior. Sure, you will sin. We will all continue to sin, but to have something that is, you know, ongoing, undealt with… is not acceptable for a pastor. You're to be unconditionally loving by showing grace to those who aren't treating you well. You know what? Yes. Now sometimes being unconditionally loving means you're saying things they don't want to hear and they will accuse you of being a hater, but you're telling them those hard truths out of a place of love. Christ set that example. I mean, again, good riddance. Don't let the door hit you on the way out. This guy should have never been a pastor if this is the way he's conducted himself for the last 10 years. Right? Am I wrong? Yeah, no, I just I think you're right and yeah, but I you know again, I think what's revealed here is it's not just you know his He's he's not in a in a situation where he is actually a pastor or where the church is actually being a church, right? Yeah And in fairness, he's in a denomination that maybe there are some exceptions, but 99% of the congregations are sure they're not churches, really, by a biblical standard. So he fit right in, maybe. I don't know. I think we'll see that, actually, as I continue. Now, if you're reading along at home, I'm jumping way ahead, I'm skipping a whole section here, because he goes on to tell the story of another pastor, and it's relevant, it's supposed to be an illustration of his problems, but they're not his story, so I'm skipping ahead. Basically he's saying he's got PTSD. Pastors have PTSD from all this difficult stuff they're dealing with. And so the solution is to go see a therapist or a psychologist, not another pastor or elder or brother in Christ. And then he gets into this psychobabble. He picks, he continues on this psychobabble thing, talking about growth mindset versus fixed mindset. And I'm going to skip the first part of that and pick up in the middle of that where he writes, when I became a pastor, I thought the reason why this group of people gathered every Sunday was to explore deep questions about life and to push ourselves to become better humans. Anybody wanna raise their hand and volunteer? Why do the Christians gather together every week? I mean, yes, if he's speaking in code for, you know, seek to know God more. You are giving him way too much credit, David. And to repent and turn from sin. Well, this is one of those places where I'm looking, nope, this is not one of the four places he mentions God. Nope. If you're gonna mention God, that'd be a place to mention him. We gather together to worship God. Nope, that's not here. Okay, well, maybe I'm wrong. Instead, you're to explore deep questions about life and push yourself to become better humans. Now, there is an idea that you are to progress in your sanctification, become more obedient to God, but that's not what he's saying. But anyway, he says, what he's learned over the last 10 years, my assumption was wrong. I could have told you that. Took you 10 years to figure that out, okay. No, no, look at what his assumption is wrong by. We disagree with this one too. Anyway, now he talks about a bunch of stuff here that I think I can skip by because he kind of repeats himself a little bit. So I'm going to jump ahead a paragraph and he says, although I've always tried to end my messages with a sense of hope, my goal is to make you think. Nothing was off limits. I have no problem dismantling the traditional Christian belief system in service of, logic and reason, particularly if it helps us to make sense of the world. Hence, I eventually came to the conclusion that my particular skill set and perspective is a mismatch for the institutional church. You think? What I offer is not what most Christians are looking for, which is another reason I've decided to move on. I realize if I spend the rest of my life fighting a system that's not designed for someone like me, I'm gonna end up angry, bitter, broken, and a shell of a human being. He doesn't know what the church is, he doesn't know what a pastor is, right? He doesn't know what the gospel is. He just described himself as a wolf, so that would be good for him to not be a pastor. He didn't use that word. He said he had no problem dismantling traditional Christianity. And he said, he doesn't give people what... I don't know if he would define Christian the way we would define Christian, but I'm gonna take him at his, just the words on the page, and he's saying, I've discovered that I don't give Christians what they expect from a pastor. No Christian would expect what this guy brings to the table as a quote-unquote pastor. So he's right. No actual Christian would expect this sort of nonsense. He does say most Christians expect the pastor not to push them to grow but to reassure them they're already on the right track and be supporting the party line. That may be what most people going to church actually expect, but that's not what most Christians expect. That's a He Gets Us campaign we were talking about a couple weeks ago. That's the chosen version of Jesus. So we need to get to his final service. Yeah, so his final service. I'm going to leave some of this out because he gets into details about the final service that aren't going to be relevant for us to talk, but the portions that are relevant, at least that struck me as relevant, I'm going to read. He says, I preached my last sermon this past Sunday. Again, this was back in September, I believe, or late August, late August. He wrote this in September, but his last sermon was in August. I was actually blown away by the number of people who came out to say goodbye. More than 360 people were in attendance and 80 online. A church of a thousand, by the way. So only about a little over a third of the people showed up. That's interesting. Blown away. And here we go. The music was awesome. This is what he says. And he puts in parentheses Coldplay. That's a rock band, by the way, for those who don't know. U2, another rock band for those who don't know. And The Beatles, a pop rock band that everybody knows. And I would say probably everybody knows U2 as well. Coldplay probably. Wonder what songs they choose. And I would say, well, probably streets with no name, all you need is love. And imagine there's no heaven. In fairness, that was a John Lennon solo effort. He says, I would say that I gave one of the best sermons they've ever preached. It was called Change. And then it says he ended it with a poem that he wrote specifically for the sermon. That's how he ended this message. It says, the poem represents my hopes and dreams for my church going forward. I wanted to leave them with something beautiful. Catch this. Because I believe through experiencing beauty, we encounter God's presence in our lives. As for what I plan to do next, I believe one of the most important ways we encounter God's unconditional love. Now that's, We are to be unconditioned on our love that we show people, but I think it's a mistake to say that God's love is unconditional. It's conditioned upon repentance. I think we've got to be careful. We can talk about that maybe if we want. We can talk about unconditional election maybe at some point. Let me finish this. So anyway, beauty and sort of things is an important way to encounter God's unconditional love and relationships with others. I'm going to be investing all of my energy into a business that helps people find a form, find and form these kinds of relationships so they can experience God's love in their lives. More to come on that in future articles, because he's a blogger and stuff now as well. And then here's the poem that he wrote. And I wasn't gonna read it, but I think I should in this context. I think it helps us to understand his heartbeat a little bit. It's called And. And though we may stumble, and though we may fall, we shall tarry amidst the tides, seeking the better angels of our nature. And as we bid farewell to friends who journeyed before us, our hearts eternally whisper, aching for the timber of their voice. And when our lives are but memories, long lost like the breath of wind, we shall find each other once again, consoled by the tears of our long embrace. And beauty, though piercing, will not leave us undone, for our love will bind us together, and we shall always know that we are truly one. If this were the 1980s, I would right now say, gag me with a microchip, man. Gag me with a spoon, man. Come on, are you kidding me? What kind of trite nonsense was that? Did Hillsong write it? Is this a Bethel music song? Come on. It's not that good. It's not about God. Nothing in this is about God or Christ. It's about the better angels of our nature. Yeah. Our nature, there's nothing better about our nature. Oh my gosh. He sounds, I don't know about like, more Buddhist than Christian. Yeah, new agey, probably an amalgam of Buddhism and Hinduism and some of the esoteric psychology stuff. I wonder if he does yoga. Yeah, we're gonna be talking about that on a future show. In fact, I'm not 100% sure, but I think our very next episode of the Faith Debate might be talking about that kind of issue, yoga and Reiki and the Enneagrams and that sort of stuff. All bad, by the way. Spoiler alert, all bad. Okay, now we can't even do the show. People are going to be hanging on the edge of their seat. Is it good or bad? I gotta know. I disagree with Daniel. Do you? You think it's good? Well, he said all bad. All bad. Oh, okay. Interesting. I think we have to, I think it has to be parsed out. Wow. Look at this. David Forsey bringing in a little nuance. Okay. But anyway, back to the main thing here. This guy who has, if he was ever approximating a, look, I agree with the Apostle John, which is a good place to be. I agree with the Apostle John when he writes in his first epistle that those who were with us but then left us were never actually really with us from the start. So this guy was never actually a Christian. But if at some point he gave a better appearance of actually being a Christian, right, he checked a lot of the right boxes initially, even if he didn't really truly believe them his heart of hearts, At some point along the line, he did what is called deconstructing your faith. So, anybody wanna talk about? What do you mean by that? What is deconstructing your faith? So first, I wanna say, because I'm pivoting right now, by the way. Pastors, if you've heard what we've said this show and last week's show, be warned, this could be you, it could be any of us if we're not careful. We could make a joke of being a pastor if we're not careful. you know, if it weren't for the grace of God, we might travel down that same kind of path. Maybe if we're saved, we're not going to go hopefully as far as this guy. But now I want to transition to just the average professing Christian and warn you, this Christian deconstructionism, it starts with little compromises. And it's little things like, well, I'm not so sure that Jesus actually fed all those thousands of people with the bread and fishes. That's probably just a story. You know, I'm not so sure that God actually created everything out of nothing. I think that things just kinda came along by some sort of spontaneous combustion, big bang. Troy, what you're saying reminds me of a serpent in a garden. Yea, hath God said. And it starts with these, and following his pattern, it starts with, yeah, and that's exactly what happens with these guys that deconstruct their faith. So they claim to have a faith, they profess to be Christians, but then there's that doubt. Did God really say? And Troy, this is different. than asking the question why. I often tell people, if you believe XYZ doctrine, I really should ask you, why? And you need to think about it. And if you can't answer why, then go back and study, because you need to know why you believe all the things. But that doesn't mean change your belief if it's actually in scripture. The metric is scripture. If it's in there, it's true. But you need to know why your specific doctrine is true. So that's not the same thing as what you're calling deconstructing the faith. Asking questions or struggling with doubt, that's one thing. But to Entertain for too long or to entertain to the point of well God didn't I mean it says it's a miracle It's not really a miracle. I mean God doesn't intend for us to really understand that miracles happen. Oh, yeah Well, then how did Jesus raise from the dead and ascend to heaven right? How do how do we have the miracle the presence of the Holy Spirit within us? How did the incarnation happen? You lose everything if you lose the idea that miracles can happen. So So that's what starts, there's a doubt. But then what was the next thing that Satan, the serpent, did in the garden? First it's like casting doubt. Did he really say? The next thing he just directly contradicts. You will not surely die. So that's what happens in these instructions. It starts with some doubts that you allow to become part of your biblical quote unquote worldview, your faulty biblical worldview, and then you start denying flat truths. Things like homosexuality isn't really a sin. It's okay to have women as elders and pastors in the church. I know these are third rail issues, I get it. But these are flat black and white things that are talked about in the scripture. You start denying all that stuff too. Well, the only thing left is the last thing, which is to completely reject God and make yourself a God, which is what Satan invites Adam and Eve to do. You will be like gods. Just take this tasty fruit. That's the path of deconstruction. And that's how you can get to a point where you can write an entire seven page article about being a pastor and not mentioning God once. to the very end and in totally different contexts. I'm going to be as accurate as I can here, because in fairness to this so-called pastor, he mentioned God over and over and over again from his point of view. His God is I. No, no, his God is me. It was his congregation. Remember? He's all right. Well, yeah, he's beholden to them, right? He's accountable to them. Yeah. Yeah. So he's a weak, well, I still would say that he's his own God, but he's a weak God. He would still be there. He's a weak God. But because he's his own God. Yeah. I guess if he's his own God, he's those worshipers. And if they don't worship him anymore, then he's not a man. So be warned. I'm not saying that you have to agree with everything that I would say or even the four of us on this panel say week in and week out on this show. We get things wrong. I'm not sure what those are because if I knew what they were I would change them and fix them immediately. I'm sure I get some things wrong, so don't misunderstand me. But there are some things, Christian hear me, You can't get wrong. There is a Creator God, and the fact that He's a Creator God who made everything means He is a miracle-working God, because the creation itself is a miracle. And the center and the foundation of the Christian belief is that God took on humanity through the incarnation, miraculously, died and rose Himself from the dead, miraculously. I mean, you can't lose that. If you start to doubt those kinds of things, you might still call yourself a Christian, you gotta re-change your thinking on that. You got some stinking thinking, and you gotta fix that immediately, or you're gonna end up like this pastor, who's not only not a pastor, but Imran said it, I've said it, I think all of us agree, he's not even a Christian, much less a pastor. So, I guess I got the last word, sorry, we're out of time. I didn't mean to do that, I just looked over and we had like 30 seconds. The gospel is always good to end with. Yeah, absolutely. That was Daniel Razvi giving me an attaboy. I appreciate that. Imran Razvi who's on the show today, David Forsey, I'm Troy Skinner. Thanks so much for listening online at Household of Faith in Christ. That's where you can find us. Till next week, God bless. Past editions of this program are available in the audio vault at wfmd.com.