Are 'Celebration SDA Churches', new path to God, or away from truth?

[B/W Photodude]

4 hours ago, The Wanderer said:

I also have news for you re spiritual transformation. If you are not involved with it, then you are part of the problem. If you are not allowing God to transform you, then you are part of the problem.Spiritual formation is Biblical:

While it is true that the Scriptures talk of transformation, I think it would be wise to consider just what hobie is referring to by his use of the word spiritual formation. Just because you are using the same word does not mean you are talking about the same thing.

So, if hobie would like to explain what he is referring to as spiritual formation, where it came from(who is promoting it), and perhaps even some links to videos, that would be great. And possibly some video links could be provided, but they may be longer than the attention span of most.

I personally believe that there is a very serious problem going on with this thing called "spiritual formation", but would rather hobie answer for himself.

[JoeMo]

6 hours ago, GayatfootofCross said:

Do the folks here see troubling responses?

Or is it just me?

 

Not just you.  I'm troubled by this line of thinking as well.  I'm not an active member of a "celebration church" (that terminology is so 1990's!);  But if people fall in love with Jesus at a celebration church, who am I to judge them?  I fell in love with Jesus at an ultra-conservative "independent ministries" camp meeting.  I thank God that I have evolved away from such strict and judgmental legalism; but I'm still in love with Jesus more than ever.

[JoeMo]

20 hours ago, B/W Photodude said:

I personally believe that there is a very serious problem going on with this thing called "spiritual formation", but would rather hobie answer for himself.

Good thought.  Having experienced the gamut of what is loosely called "spiritual formation", some of it is very troubling (e.g., the amillennial attitude that we are already living in the millennial reign of Christ, uncontrolled hooting and hollering in the sanctuary, "faking" being slain in the spirit, what appears to be group hypnosis through neurolinguistic programming).  Some of it, however is very useful; and a huge blessing (e.g., learning to distinguish God's voice from all the other voices running around in your head, meditative/contemplative prayer, using prayer as a conversation tool with God rather than a text message or voice mail).

[phkrause]

19 hours ago, The Wanderer said:

If a Christian is hated because of his good works, and for following Christ, he will have a reward. But if he is hated because he does not take a course to be loved, hated because of his uncultivated manners,

Excellent 

And the bold words remind me of someone

[hobie]

On ‎6‎/‎2‎/‎2018 at 10:00 PM, JoeMo said:

Not just you.  I'm troubled by this line of thinking as well.  I'm not an active member of a "celebration church" (that terminology is so 1990's!);  But if people fall in love with Jesus at a celebration church, who am I to judge them?  I fell in love with Jesus at an ultra-conservative "independent ministries" camp meeting.  I thank God that I have evolved away from such strict and judgmental legalism; but I'm still in love with Jesus more than ever.

Well the end result was it emptied out our original new church, and didn't bring in any of the people they were trying to reach, and their 'new' elders began a 'Sunday' church at another site, and I don't think many are falling in love with Christ in any of this.

[JoeMo]

6 hours ago, hobie said:

Well the end result was it emptied out our original new church, and didn't bring in any of the people they were trying to reach, and their 'new' elders began a 'Sunday' church at another site, and I don't think many are falling in love with Christ in any of this.

Sadly, I've seen this happen to a couple "celebration" churches as well.  I personally think that the problem is "church on Saturday" for most people - at least that's what I've seen.  Unfortunately, the temptation to minimize Sabbath and maximize celebrating Jesus becomes too strong; so they change to Sunday church to bring in more people.  The celebration churches I've seen here that have done that have grown significantly; but they are hardly SDA churches any more, no more preaching of the Law or eschatology, just "Jesus loves you" every week.  While that may be true (and faith in Jesus and His grace and forgiveness given to us by the penalty for sin He paid on the cross) is the basis for salvation, these people are sacrificing the riches contained in scripture and instruction on how to recognize and respond to end-time events. Nonetheless, they are as good of Christians as most traditional SDA's are

 I'm no judge; so I can't say what God thinks is more important.  For me, I'll stick with a "whole" church that worships an the Spirit AND studies the whole Bible and through faith tries to abide by its precepts.

[B/W Photodude]

5 hours ago, JoeMo said:

... but they are hardly SDA churches any more, no more preaching of the Law or eschatology, just "Jesus loves you" every week.  While that may be true (and faith in Jesus and His grace and forgiveness given to us by the penalty for sin He paid on the cross) is the basis for salvation, these people are sacrificing the riches contained in scripture and instruction on how to recognize and respond to end-time events.

While the love of God is infinite and so is His love, He also is perfect and has a perfect sense of justice also. Jesus told how one day He would say to people, "Depart from me. I do not know you." His justice is that the universe will one day be free of sin forever, and that also means the vast majority of those who have ever lived will be destroyed in the last great judgement. They will be so completely annihilated that those saved will not even remember them anymore.

[B/W Photodude]

Rather than start a new thread, I will put this here:

Florida Hospital Church Hosts Disturbing Children's Christmas Program

http://www.fulcrum7.com/news/2018/12/23/florida-hospital-church-hosts-disturbing-childrens-christmas-program

So, is this where the Celebration movement has taken us?

[JoeMo]

17 hours ago, B/W Photodude said:

"Depart from me. I do not know you."

Here is another sign of the times in which we live:

"For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 4 They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths." (2 Tim. 4:3-4)

[phkrause]

Well I thought it was interesting, I pray they have learned about the birth of Christ!!