The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Heresy, Apostasy and Hypocrisy

Posted on | May 11, 2019 | 1 Comment

One should not speak ill of the dead, and so I will not name the person whose death at age 37 prompted commentary from Greg Smith, Seth Dunn and Elizabeth Prata. While this person was alive, I never commented about her because I did not wish to publicize her existence, and now that she no longer exists, I have nothing good to say about her.

Clearly it is wrong to call yourself a Christian and advocate teachings that directly contradict the Bible. It’s heresy, and would not have been tolerated by previous generations of Christians, but nowadays anything believed by liberals will find some “Christian” advocates, who will be showered with praise (and book contracts, etc.) by all those institutions that promote liberalism. So if you want to advocate abortion, homosexuality and socialism, and claim to do this as a “Christian,” you’ll be applauded for doing so by, e.g., the New York Times and CNN.

The 21st-century church has many problems, including an appetite for innovation and entertainment. Just preaching the Gospel won’t do anymore. No, you need a rock band and a light show in your megachurch, with lots of different ministries and “outreach” programs. Folks have “itching ears” and “will not endure sound doctrine.”

Meanwhile, Dalrock calls attention to an apostate named Dave Gass, who was pastor of a Southern Baptist church in Missouri until last year. Gass used Twitter to publish a long rant about how his whole life was a lie; he harbored doubts about Scripture for the entire 20 years of his career as a pastor and is now an atheist. Gass’s rant might have been the last word on the subject, except that a deacon in the church told the truth — the real reason Gass left the church was that he had an affair with a married women in the congregation. Gass then deleted his Twitter account.

Hypocrisy, it has been said, is the tribute vice pays to virtue. Sinners don’t want to be recognized as such, so they try to act like saints. Ordinary sin is bad enough, but heresy and apostasy? These are quite strongly condemned, because they constitute an attack on the church as such. It would be smarter, really, for people like this to just quietly leave the church, rather than to teach perversity (the heretic) or to openly denounce their former belief (the apostate). But we can’t expect fools to act wisely, and so these scandals happen from time to time.



 

Category: Religion

Comments

One Response to “Heresy, Apostasy and Hypocrisy”

  1. Sunday, 12 May 19. – Dark Brightness
    May 11th, 2019 @ 9:40 pm

    […] We can and should pray that we do not face these times. That we are not led to the temptation of apostasy. But times of persecution have been, in some places are, and in others will be. So we need to pray that God will preserve us, so that we do not fall into apostasy. […]