Keeping the Church Pure

[MaxPC]

Keep in mind, God offered grace and salvation to all who desired it. Not just the elite.

I think the underlined phrase here is the demarcation point. One should desire it, pursue it and consistently repent when failing. Purity is a part of a process, purification, that is only complete once we reach heaven. While we live, we are all in process - IF we desire to continue that process and work against our own sinful natures with assistance from the Holy Spirit, Grace, and the brotherhood.

These are my thoughts. As always, YMMV.

The next step in my opinion is to identify those behaviors/sins that kill our discipleship walk. I think most all of the denominations agree that addictions (drugs, cigarettes, alcohol, internet, porn, food, sex, etc.) interfere and even kill our walk as disciples of Jesus. Adultery in any form is also considered a discipleship killer. Murder and the all the other "big sins" mentioned in the Ten Commandments are of course, included.

I think it is interesting that the Beatitudes that Jesus taught are both counterpoint and expository to the Ten Commandments.

[Josh]

So, how important is it? Do you kick out anyone with a porn problem?

Someone who is abusing sex workers has a serious problem, and needs to either overcome their problem, or they need to accept they aren't interested in living a Christian life or being part of a church that follows Jesus.

Followers of Jesus don't look at porn, and nobody will be looking at porn in heaven. Using porn is something that people do who are hellbound.

[Szdfan]

A church that understands itself as “pure” is not a church I’m interested in being a part of.

Yea, I wouldn't want the church I attend to be called, Purest Fellowship Mennonite Church either. However, should a church try to remove members, to pursue purity of some form, or for any other reason?

In general, I think churches should welcome people who are struggling with sin, which I think is pretty much all of us. In my experience, congregations that emphasize purity also often have a lot secrets. I do think churches should be able to determine their own boundaries — it’s just that a church with a high emphasis on purity is not for me and I think “purity culture” is often dysfunctional and harmful.

When I was a pastor, I actually did kick someone out of church. There was a man who started attending who didn’t respect personal boundaries and touched people in ways that made them uncomfortable. At one point, he was charged with unlawful sexual contact for an incident outside the congregation and so my elders and I asked him to leave. I still maintained a relationship with him for several years after that, including going with him to court and visiting him in jail after a second incident that violated his probation.

The line for me is safety — people who threaten the safety of others.

[Josh]

To be clear, "pure church" doctrine usually isn't focused on sexual immorality, but is focused on a lot of other things. Pure church doctrine originated with Dutch Anabaptism, and often included things like nonresistance, plain houses, not living ostentatious lifestyles (sometimes to an extreme).

Obviously, a down side of pure-church church structure is that disagreements about what constitutes pure lifestyles can result in divisions.

[Lonny90]

I draw the line at any continual sin that won't be repented of, stopped, carried on purposely without struggle.. etc.

Examples:

Sin struggles like pornography - a growing problem, so long as it is condemned by the "user", worked on, battled against, and the struggle is real... (this includes drugs) and the person fails, tries, fights, begs for help, etc etc. They are my brother or sister in Christ. They can fail and fail again... Seventy times seven.... So long as the fight is real, they pull for Christ, and ask for help.

A person who has murdered, and had true repentance, is my brother or sister in Christ.

But if a person simply whispers profanity at somebody and refuses to apologize/repent..... We have a real problem on our hands. This is up for excommunication.

Chris, I like this, and ultimately this seems to be where Jesus drew the line, as far as how he related to others.


To all, what do you do with doctrinal differences though? For example, over half of the church might say the divorced and remarried couple is living in adultery, the couple says that they are not, because they interpret the teaching differently. Do you then accept the couple as they are, giving them the benefit of the doubt, or do you remove them for refusing to accept, the church position on it?

[RZehr]

Wanting a “pure” church has been the desire from the beginning of the Anabaptist movement, in contrast with the idea that everyone is a “Christian”.

From “The Anabaptist Vision” by Harold Bender:

The world would not tolerate the practice of true Christian principles in society, and the church could not tolerate the practice of worldly ways among its membership. Hence, the only way out was separation ("Absonderung"), the gathering of true Christians into their own Christian society where Christ's way could and would be practiced. On this principle of separation Menno Simons says:
”All the evangelical scriptures teach us that the church of Christ was and is, in doctrine, life, and worship, a people separated from the world.”
In the great debate of 1532 at Zofingen, spokesmen of the Swiss Brethren said:

“The true church is separated from the world and is conformed to the nature of Christ. If a church is yet at one with the world we cannot recognize it is a true church.”

However, this vision is hardly helped when we have leaders who are not completely interested in leading in purity. Maybe we’d be more successful if we were described as below.

In Zwingli's last book against the Swiss Brethren (1527), for instance, the following is found:
“If you investigate their life and conduct, it seems at first contact irreproachable, pious, unassuming, attractive, yea, above this world. Even those who are inclined to be critical will say that their lives are excellent.”

Bullinger, himself, who wrote bitter diatribes against them, was compelled to admit of the early Swiss Brethren that

“Those who unite with them will by their ministers be received into their church by rebaptism and repentance and newness of life. They henceforth lead their lives under a semblance of a quite spiritual conduct. They denounce covetousness, pride, profanity, the lewd conversation and immorality of the world, drinking and gluttony. In short, their hypocrisy is great and manifold.”

...... As we review the vision of the Anabaptists, it becomes clear that there are two foci in this vision. The first focus relates to the essential nature of Christianity. Is Christianity primarily a matter of the reception of divine grace through a sacramental-sacerdotal institution (Roman Catholicism), is it chiefly enjoyment of the inner experience of the grace of God through faith in Christ (Lutheranism), or is it most of all the transformation of life through discipleship (Anabaptism )? The Anabaptists were neither institutionalists, mystics, nor pietists, for they laid the weight of their emphasis upon following Christ in life. To them it was unthinkable for one truly to be a Christian without creating a new life on divine principles both for himself and for all men who commit themselves to the Christian way.

The second focus relates to the church. For the Anabaptist, the church was neither an institution (Catholicism), nor the instrument of God for the proclamation of the divine Word (Lutheranism), nor a resource group for individual piety (Pietism). It was a brotherhood of love in which the fullness of the Christian life ideal is to be expressed.

[natashaasbj]

That's why,in my opinion, we need strong membership and real concern for our brothers and sisters. We should choose accountability and transparency....We should be close friends and "know" life of each other to help each other on the way to holiness... I know I need to have friends like that.
Usually church is obliged to excommunicate those who live in sexual immorality, adultery, thieving etc... If you tell them and they repent, they are included again...Also if they have a gun and go and kill in the war or somewhere else,they should be excommunicated...
As for small sins, like "yelling", loosing temper, gossiping, lying etc,,, we have to reprimand, to point out these things without fear to offend them, encouraging brother and sister to change their behavior... that's why true brotherhood is so important to challenge each other to grow and change. These need more accountability rather than excommunication...Just my humble opinion....

[barnhart]

I know a man in his late 30's who has been a member of five evangelical churches. In all five, confessed his addiction to pornography to the leaders. Not once was he encouraged to repent of his sin. All five times he was told his sin was covered by the blood of Jesus, God cannot see it, so it does not matter. Only in random encounter with a believer was he asked, "have you repented?" I don't know the extent to which this anecdote is representative of general evangelical theology but it tracks with my observations.

[Fidelio]

I think most all of the denominations agree that addictions (drugs, cigarettes, alcohol, internet, porn, food, sex, etc.) interfere and even kill our walk as disciples of Jesus.

Whew! I was worried for a second that coffee was going to be in that list.

On a serious note, I always thought that certain sins would actually drive the holy spirit from us, such as fornication/adultery/murder. Not to say that other sins are not equally serious, but those seem particularly grievous.

[Ernie]

I think it is possible to have a church with repentant saints as compared to a church with known sinners. Just like there is such a thing as clean water and dirty water.
We could get legalistic and point to impurities in the clean water, and to humanness in the church. But I don't think that is what the New Testament is aiming for when it talks about "so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish."