Posted on 04/19/2015 5:51:16 PM PDT by massmike
DURHAM The conference at Epworth United Methodist Church on Saturday was one participants said they couldn’t have even imagined happening not so long ago.
In speeches, panels and small groups, 80 people gathered to discuss how to fully welcome the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community into the United Methodist Church.
“It’s a conversation that we couldn’t have had,” said Jimmy Creech, a former Methodist pastor who lost his position at Fairmont United Methodist Church in Raleigh in the wake of his outspoken support for gays and lesbians in the late 1980s.
Years later, as a pastor in Nebraska, he was defrocked by the church after he performed a same-sex wedding.
At an annual meeting of the North Carolina Conference in June, church leaders from Epworth will present a resolution calling for all discriminatory language to be removed from church teachings, with a focus on language against homosexuality. The conference covers 56 counties in the eastern half of the state.
The actions at the June meeting are a lead-up to an international church meeting in 2016, where those in favor of amending the church’s policies hope to gain ground.
The Rev. Frank Schaefer, a Methodist minister who was defrocked and then reinstated into the church after performing a same-sex wedding for his son, urged participants at Saturday’s conference to be vocal supporters of those changes, with resolutions, letters to their church representatives and posts on social media.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsobserver.com ...
That's just great! Maybe they could call themselves the Church of Christless.
These defrocked ministers are seeking more the approval of man. They should be seeking God’s will.
Sadly, they’re leading many in the wrong direction.
I was born a Methodist a long time ago. Finally just couldn’t stand it any more and went to an Evangelical Presbyterian church.
I was born a Methodist a long time ago. Finally just couldn’t stand it any more and went to an Evangelical Presbyterian church.
My cousin became a minister of a Methodist Church in Maryland years ago and I attended a few services. The church was in a middle-class neighborhood and built in the 1960s to a high standard....easily able to handle 700 people. Today? At best, they have around 200 people showing up. I sat in the far back and observed that over seventy percent of the crowd are over the age of forty. In terms of lacking youth....they are unable to sustain this situation.
My humble guess is that some members think they can regain some momentum by going after the LGBT crowd....thus building up youth membership.
Any Calvary Chapels?
Bible Fellowships?
The minister/pastor of any church is often an excellent leader, Bible-preaching person whatever/despite, the church’s affiliation.
There is some wonderful expository teaching available online. I’d encourage you to separate from apostates rather than to keep going.
Nazarene or Wesleyan, both derive from John Wesley theology.
Much less liberal influence.
My sympathies to the still conservative Methodists out there in the UMC
Don't you guys have the Westminister confessional which lists out details?
What a contradiction.
You can’t “want” all you want but it has to pass at General Conference.
I would suggest orthodoxy.
I tell all my ‘home church’ friends “You will find a church when it becomes a priority for you.
Biblical Christians in the UMC have defeated this again and again over many years. It will probably be defeated again.
Having a confession didn’t help the Presbyterians.
Personally, I think it has more to do with having an unaccountable hierarchy.
>>Having a confession didn’t help the Presbyterians.
>>Personally, I think it has more to do with having an unaccountable hierarchy.
The PCUSA officially de-adopted the Westminster Confession years ago. Now, it is just a historical document for them. That was when their hierarchy began to become unaccountable.
That’s because it would cause the churches in Africa and Asia to leave the church without providing any real benefit to the US churches.
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