Good morning, Bible people. Today I'm finishing my chapter on the Church of England, which now has apparently adopted what the Bible says is not something that can be blessed and is thus going down the same road as the Episcopal Church in America. For all intents and purposes, the Church of England is now a secular organization. It's not serving the kingdom, it's serving itself. The problem began, it seems, in the theological colleges in the way in which people are trained for leadership in the church. Evangelism has taken a backseat to spiritual therapy of some sort. Few if any of their theological colleges are training people in biblical apostolic Christianity but have instead adopted a new Zeitgeist narrative. The result is a church that is characterized by feminism, relativism, and religion but that doesn't convert people. And to think: this is the same church that gave us Roland Allen, Lesslie Newbigin, Michael Green, John Stott, and James Packer. Stott (the unofficial leader of evangelical Anglicanism) once said, "Evangelicals are Bible people, and they are Gospel people." Thankfully, some Anglicans still are (think ACNA).
The lessons? One is surely this: Pay careful attention to your theological colleges. When more professors subscribe to politically correct culture than to the sufficiency of Scripture, you know you are in trouble.
I'm taking a break before I begin my chapter on Roman Catholicism. I just signed up for another race this weekend, this one in a town called Culpeper in Northern Virginia. The running community has become my new mission field. What I'm trying to do is to bring people on a journey to wholeness through Jesus Christ. He is the medicine I think this sick society of ours needs.
Blessings,
Dave