Morning News (my version) June 11, 2024

 It is a gloriously cool and clear morning in Northwest Georgia--low humidity, cloudless sky, and a chorus of birdsong (I really recommend the Merlin app from Cornell University, so you can know that both a Canadian Goose and a Blue-Gray Gnatcatcher is making noises in your backyard; the Gnatcatcher weighs .23 ounces--how is that possible!)

Christianity Today tells me Tony Evans is stepping down from his ministry due to the need to repent and recover from an "old sin."  David French's New York Times column is about how the PCA cancelled him by rescinding an invitation to speak on political polarization at their conference. 

Examples of humility v. pride, maybe? Who is to say that the PCA was wrong in their decision?

And then CT also tells us the SBC abuse prevention work is not done. 

My thought is, what's all this airing of dirty laundry about? Do the readers of the NYT really need to know about David French's tif with the most conservative group of Presbyterians? (confession, I attended a PCA church for 7 years). David French and his wife have also written widely about a church camp where some pretty nasty sexual abuse was tolerated and then covered up for years.

Should church business stay in the church? Is there a Biblical precedent or directive for keeping such things within the body or for being open about them and letting the world know?

There is such a thing as privacy. We don't have to know everything about everybody; or I guess we do nowadays. I mean, we are in a month of pride about who some people have sex with, with seems to be none of my business and is definitely something I don't care to know about.  

Doesn't all this airing of grievances and conflict and sins just make us Christians look bad? (as if we have a reputation for perfection already?)

Then I argue the other side; Paul would have known that the shenanigans in the church at Corinth would go "viral" (slowly) in the ancient world.  We are not a company concerned about our public realtions programming.  We are something vastly different. 

In David French's case, though, I am disappointed, just like I am with Russell Moore, two men whom I really have respect for but think they could back off some. I mean, Dr. Russell, what's with the Enneagrams?  Come on?  And Counselor French, how much of your writing is to cover your own trail instead of .... whatever it is you are trying to do?  

And I turn the finger on me and ask why I am even writing this on this glorious morning when I should go walk the dogs. I journaled this morning on why do we write books? More on that tomorrow, I suppose. It' a hard question for someone who feels so driven to produce another book to, as Annie Dillard put it, "choke the world with." 

 

 

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