Are you the Pastor in the story? You seem to be spending a lot of time and words justifying him.
He-heh, no. I am his brother in the LORD, and I am a tired saint; tired of people who say they love my Jesus running down my brothers and sisters who love Jesus. I'm tired of seeing the Body of Christ beat on itself; we got the left hand sockin' it to the right eye, and the right hand tearing at the left ear, and the left heel kickin' at the right knee, and all the time the mouth is proclaiming "Oh, how I love Jesus!" It's just too much.
And it's GOT to STOP!
Or do we think Jesus was just blowing smoke when he said, "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another." (John 13:34) NASB
Now. You go back to all the posts rippin' this pastor a new one over the ways he's goin' about providing a culturally relevant context for folks to hear the Good News of The Kingdom, and you answer me this:
Where's the 'love one another' part? Where's the post where we love the man in Christ Jesus, instead of taking opportunity to surmise and invent all kinds of evil intent and spiritual vacancy just because his particular strategies don't meet with our fleshly approval or mesh with our preferred kind of church service?
Yeah, there are some who've given him the grace from God he's due because of the cross. But it shouldn't just be some; it should be ALL of us who name the NAME of Jesus as savior and LORD. Why? Because of Jesus' commandment to us that we love one another.
Even if we have solid biblical grounds for disagreement, that doesn't give us a pass to not love, it only necessitates that we communicate that disagreement in a gracious and loving way. In no way does it allow for some of the desparaging things that have appeared on this thread.
I tell you: it's shameful. Shameful behavior on the part of God's people who oughta know -- and DO -- better.
So, if I spend a lot of time on this thread defending the man, then -- fine. It is for the love of Christ that I do it, that His NAME would not be profaned because of a few unwise members of The Body.