There WILL be comments! By Matthew S Butler

Tag: Jesus Following

  • The LGBTQ–Islamist Alliance: A Dangerous Contradiction

    • The Unholy Alliance: LGBTQ Activism and Islam
    • Strange Bedfellows: LGBTQ Activists and Islamic
    • The LGBTQ Paradox: Supporting Those Who Would Persecute and KILL You
    • When Tolerance Becomes Self-Destruction
    • The Enemy of My Enemy Is Not Always My Friend
    • The Deadly Irony of the LGBTQ–Islamist Alliance
    • LGBTQ Rights and Islamic Enforcement: A Collision of Ideologies

    Ethics seem hard, but they aren’t. But when agendas that seem opposed start preaching the same hate, things can get confusing. How can LGBTQ people be for something that will destroy them, given the opportunity?

    Alan Turing is a great example of where Christian-based Western ethics went wrong. He was a closet gay man and brilliant mathematician who helped break the Nazi Enigma code and allowed the Allied Forces to intercept and decipher German military communications during WWII. It made a HUGE difference in the Allied victory.

    Strange how nobody from sub-Saharan Africa took that one on during the war, but let’s not get into that rabbit hole in this post. Post coming…

    Being a closet gay man was the issue. At the time, homosexual acts were actually illegal in England. After making a major scientific contribution to winning the war, Turing was convicted of gross indecency in 1952 and chose a year of probation and chemical castration rather than 2 years in prison. He died at the age of 41 from cyanide poisoning, in what was ruled a suicide.

    A man who should have been acknowledged as a national hero was shunned by the very society he helped preserve. That is an on-point example of when Western culture has failed the LGBTQ movement. What happened to Turing was wrong and brutal.

    Take that to America today and our modern cultural struggle with the LGBTQ world. I personally want nothing to do with living inside queerworld. But I’m not for punishing homosexuality. I’m not for chemically castrating kids or surgically mutilating them, which, ironically enough, the LGBTQ world is for. That is a die-on-a-hill issue for me personally.

    Homosexuality in the Bible is SIN, as clear as day and night. No matter how much trickery is involved in bending theology to its will, anyone who is literate and willing to listen to God’s conviction knows it is a SIN.

    But then again, looking at a woman with lust is a SIN. Cussing is a SIN. Being DRUNK is a SIN. Gathering wood on the Sabbath, under the Mosaic Law, punishable by stoning, was a SIN. A lot of things are SIN. We are all sinners.

    LGBTQ people are not special in that sense. SIN can be a personal struggle and its most important job is to show us that we are unable to fulfill God’s law to be in the presense of his rightiousness. But Jesus gave us a way, a free gift, of being in His presense and the devil HATES that. So he twists the minds of sinners to believe that God is a punisher, when in reality, He is actually Rightious and the Free Gift of His LOVE is what allows humans to be in his presense. But, like the Nehustan of Moses, you must believe. If you believe, you natually become very concerned with being pleasing to Jesus, mostly because you become intimately aware of what you have been saved from. Hell…

    But let’s talk about the fundamental difference between Christian ethics and Islamic ethics. Both trace their lineage to Abraham. Muslims are not God’s chosen people. They are the brother who hated the other brother who was chosen. Islamic ethics are HORRIBLE and twisted. Fundamentally, they involve submission or death adn killing in the hear and now as being faithful.

    If you are gay in the Muslim world, you will be killed for it, plain and simple. Alan Turing might never have had a chance to solve the Enigma problem if he had lived in an Islamically controlled society. He could have been killed at a young age or been so intimidated and afraid of being killed that he would have repressed those feelings out of fear rather than asking God to transform him through repentance. What England forgot about is Grace, the ultimate solution to every sinners plight.

    I spend a lot of my online time pointing out that Islam is something any Westerner should want NOTHING to do with. It is a barbaric structure that uses intimidation, submission, and fear as its Gestapo-like tactics to motivate hatred and compliance. Hatred of the West and Israel (the chosen brother) are its fundamental battle cries, and I personally do not trust any of them, even the ones who say they’ve found Jesus. Maybe they have; maybe they are blowing smoke up our collective skirts to play the long game. Only time will tell.

    We don’t want that way of life anywhere near us, and believe me, it’s an all-or-nothing game. The West does NOT want our cultures polluted by something hell-bent on destroying us. In easier days, people would understand that clearly. Tolerance, in this case, is stupidity, because no amount of tolerance will change the mind of someone who wants to kill you. It just makes it easier for them to kill you.

    So the LGBTQ world should LOVE America, Western culture, and Republicans because, although horrible things have happened in the past and will happen in the future, the right to exist is not in question. There is also the opportunity to receive God’s grace through understanding God’s righteousness, which defines what sin is, and God’s grace, demonstrated through the work of Jesus Christ on the Cross.

    Through His death and resurrection, He gives us the FREEDOM to be. We who know Jesus are all 100% rescued SINNERS without exception. The difference is, we know it and accept it and for the truly faithful, we aren’t negociating sin with Jesus moment by moment, we are asking to be sanctified. But he allows those who negociate sin, even if for their entire lives. But, he does send away people who have done things in his name that he does not know.

    It’s mind-numbing to see that the LGBTQ world has aligned itself with the Islamic world. My experience is that most gay people are usually pretty smart and motivated, but burdened with guilt that is shifted onto societal judgment rather than recognized as conviction from God.

    Whatever the case may be, an LGBTQ person’s right to exist in Western culture has mostly been worked out. Chemical castration and child mutilation are a hard stop for conservatives, but ironically enough, accepted within LGBTQ ideology as a horrible example of where LGBTQ has become that which once punished it, in the name of its own freedom. Now that is some maniacle twisted stuff.

    But for almost all, what you do behind closed doors, I don’t really care about. I am more worried about your eternity than I am about your now. You have to be LOST to be FOUND. So get lost!

    I believe John 3:16–17. His grace is sufficient for everyone, even the theif on the cross.

    16 “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.”

    Take that in: Jesus did not come here to judge us. We are already judged. That part was in place when Eve ate the forbidden fruit. What is amazing is that God, by fulfilling His own mysterious roadmap of creation, came into the world so that we could know Him, and through Him, He would SET US FREE and SAVE US!

    If you are part of the LGBTQ world, I don’t want to be in your world, but I stand for your right to exist because you don’t have a stated purpose of killing me. But if you are Muslim, I don’t want to be in your world, and I will stand against you at every turn because your book says to kill and/or enslave me, and I’m not letting that in my front door.

    In my view, there are two types of Muslims: the so-called radicals, who have read the Quran, and the cultural, who have not. The cultural, once they read and understand what the Quran says, will either become apostates or become radicalized. The apostates are marked for being killed, even by their own family, the radicalized are turned into terrorist looking to dominate the world through the barbaric ways of Islam. No good choices… Saudi Arabia is the crown jewel of Islamic government. Believe me, no American wants to live in Saudi Arabia and especially not a LGBTQ person.

    So this is my question to every LGBTQ-loving person in the world:

    Why would you support a totalitarian dictatorship masquerading as a religion that plainly says it hates you and demonstrates that by publicly killing people like you in countries where its form of government runs the show?

    Please wake up to the reality of what you have aligned yourself with, because even though I don’t want anything to do with your lifestyle or culture, as long as you don’t want to kill me, I’m okay with coexistence. I’m sad for you and I do judge you if you hurt people along the way. But if you have a stated purpose of killing me, which all Muslims do, I’m an over-my-dead-body stand against that ideology and its a hill I will die on.

    How a cultural movement can align itself with something that says it will kill you, given the chance, really, truly has me questioning the mind of any LGBTQ person.

    What in the world are you thinking?

  • The Obligatory Guilt and Shame Driven Christian

    I keep encountering Christians whose faith seems driven by obligation, guilt, and shame: I should be doing more for God. I’m not doing enough. I’m disappointing Him. I need to try harder. Christianity becomes a continual evaluation of their own performance.

    It seems the mental equivilant of the catholic/orthodox practice of Flagellantism within Evangelical Christianity. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flagellant

    But that seems contrary to the freedom Christ gives us:

    “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.”
    — Galatians 5:1 (ESV)

    Most importantly, Obligation, Shame and Guilt especially post acceptance of Jesus are NOT from God, they are form the accuser.

    1And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers[a] has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God.

    — Revelation 12:10 (ESV)

    If the desires you have create obligation, shame and guilt in you, they are NOT from God, they are from the flesh, as noble as they may appear. Desires from God might be scary because they are more than we think we can handle, but they never include God putting us to shame.

    Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.

    — Psalm 37:4 (ESV)

    In you, O Lord, do I take refuge; let me never be put to shame; in your righteousness deliver me!

    — Psalm 31:1 (ESV)

    The good news is that anywhere there is SHAME God’s plan is to sanctify that into HOPE.

    3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

    — Romans 5:3-5 (ESV)

    The New Testament does not teach that good works are unimportant. Jesus desires obedience, holiness, service, sacrifice, and fruit. But Scripture repeatedly shows that these things flow from our relationship with Christ rather than the individual creating or maintaining it.

    Jesus says:

    “Abide in me, and I in you… Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit.”
    — John 15:4–5 (ESV)

    The order matters. The branch does not anxiously manufacture fruit so it can remain attached to the vine. It remains in the vine, receives life from it, and consequently bears fruit.

    Jesus similarly says:

    “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.”
    — John 14:15 (ESV)

    He does not say, Keep my commandments sufficiently so that I will love you. Love precedes obedience.

    That distinction also helps us understand heavenly rewards and “crowns.” Scripture genuinely teaches that believers will receive rewards for faithful service, but even our good works ultimately begin with God:

    “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”
    — Ephesians 2:10 (ESV)

    Think of Moses, Noah, or David. None woke up one morning and decided, I’m going to become a great man of the Bible. God called them according to His purposes, and their responsibility was to respond faithfully. As Paul asks:

    “What do you have that you did not receive?”
    — 1 Corinthians 4:7 (ESV)

    The crown passages therefore emphasize faithfulness, perseverance, love for Christ, self-control, endurance, and willing service—not accumulating religious accomplishments to prove our worth.

    And Revelation gives us a powerful picture of what ultimately happens to crowns: the twenty-four elders cast their crowns before God’s throne, declaring Him worthy to receive “glory and honor and power” because He created all things (Revelation 4:10–11).

    That captures the proper posture toward every heavenly reward. Whatever God may commend in us, we recognize that He called us, equipped us, sustained us, and gave us the opportunity to serve.

    The crown is not ultimately a monument to human greatness. It becomes another reason to glorify the God from whom everything came.

    We are His servants and instruments. The glory, honor, and praise belong to Him.

    In fact, one of the clearest crown passages tells Christian leaders to serve:

    “not under compulsion, but willingly.”
    — 1 Peter 5:2 (ESV)

    Peter then speaks of receiving the “unfading crown of glory” (1 Peter 5:4). Scripture therefore does not support the idea that Christians should motivate themselves through guilt and compulsion in order to accumulate heavenly rewards.

    Paul makes another crucial distinction in 1 Corinthians 3:10–15. A believer’s work may survive God’s evaluation and receive reward, or it may be burned up and result in loss—yet Paul can still say of the latter person, “he himself will be saved.” Salvation and reward are not the same thing.

    God also evaluates more than visible productivity. He “will disclose the purposes of the heart” (1 Corinthians 4:5). Jesus similarly teaches in Matthew 6 that an outwardly good religious act can lose its reward when performed for human recognition. God is not operating a heavenly productivity spreadsheet.

    This is why the difference between conviction and chronic shame matters.

    Conviction says:

    I sinned. God is right. I confess it, repent, receive His forgiveness, and return to walking with Him.

    Shame says:

    My failure demonstrates my inadequacy before God. I need to work harder so I can finally become the Christian I should be.

    But Romans 8:1 says:

    “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

    Freedom does not mean freedom from obedience. Paul immediately guards against that misunderstanding:

    “For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.”
    — Galatians 5:13 (ESV)

    Notice the progression:

    freedom → love → service

    rather than:

    obligation → performance → approval.

    Two Christians may perform exactly the same act of service while living from completely different motivations.

    One thinks:

    I should do this. Good Christians serve. I haven’t done enough lately. God expects more from me.

    The other thinks:

    Christ has loved me enormously. I love Him and this person, and I have an opportunity to help.

    The outward action may be identical, but the heart is entirely different.

    Paul then describes the fruit of the Spirit as “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (Galatians 5:22–23).

    That raises an important question about a Christianity characterized primarily by guilt, anxiety, comparison, inadequacy, compulsive self-evaluation, and fear of not doing enough. There is no finish line to that system.

    You can always pray another hour, give another dollar, volunteer another day, read another chapter, or help another person. If peace with God depends upon answering “Have I done enough?”, there can never be a confident yes.

    That is the prison.

    The sanctifying breakthrough occurs when the fundamental question changes from:

    “Am I doing enough for God?”

    to:

    “Given what God has already done for me in Christ, how does He want me to respond to Him?”

    Paul says:

    “For the love of Christ controls us…”
    — 2 Corinthians 5:14 (ESV)

    And John says:

    “We love because he first loved us.”
    — 1 John 4:19 (ESV)

    The motivation increasingly becomes love rather than fear, comparison, obligation, or shame.

    This does not eliminate duty. Mature Christians sometimes obey when they do not feel like obeying. Taking up one’s cross is not always emotionally pleasant, but it always buttressed by a desire to please God.

    So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him.

    — 2 Corinthians 5:9

    But duty is no longer an attempt to establish our worth before God. Sometimes love says, I don’t want to do this right now, but I love Christ more than I want my own way.

    The person also becomes less preoccupied with measuring himself. Instead of continually asking How am I doing? Am I doing enough? Look what I did! How many rewards will I receive? attention increasingly moves toward Christ Himself.

    Paul’s great desire was not merely that I may accomplish enough, but:

    “that I may know him.”
    — Philippians 3:10 (ESV)

    And paradoxically, knowing Christ produced an extraordinarily fruitful life.

    The deepest change may be how the believer sees God. God stops appearing primarily as an employer reviewing productivity and is increasingly known as Father.

    The Christian stops living like an employee trying to satisfy the Boss and increasingly lives like a beloved son or daughter who wants to please their Father.

    So the Christian life is not:

    works → enough works → God’s approval → peace.

    It is:

    grace → acceptance in Christ → peace → security → love → gratitude → God implanted desire → obedience → fruit.

    That changes the believer’s heart. They can serve without keeping score, rest without guilt, repent without collapsing into shame, stop comparing themselves with others, and pursue holiness because they love the One they follow.

    The movement becomes:

    Christ loved me → Christ saved me → I belong to Him → I am free → I love Him → he gives me my desires → I obey Him → His Spirit produces fruit → others are blessed → God receives the glory.

    Rather than:

    I should do more → I haven’t done enough → guilt → harder work → self-evaluation → failure → shame → harder work.

    Galatians calls Christians away from that kind of slavery. And make no mistake, Galations 5:1 says clearly, thinking that way, IS SLAVERY.

    The breakthrough isn’t learning how to produce enough fruit.

    It’s understanding where the fruit comes from.

    I do not obey Christ in order to become free.

    Christ has made me free—and from that freedom, I am finally free to love and obey Him.

  • The Band Meeting – The lost art of honesty and vulnerability for Jesus Followers

    James 5:16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much.

    The Christian church LOVES the idea of forgiveness, but, IMHO, avoids healing, unless they are off the deep end with the supernatural.  Healing requires vulnerability and a capacity, usually requiring training and education, to hear anything without judgement or fixing.  Look at the entire structure of Catholics around confession, it is ALL about judging, fixing and pennenace, which is NOT a biblical idea.

    When Jesus gave me faith, it was supernatural and it was pretty dissorienting.  I then had to process 50 years of my life had been lived completely LOST.  When I went to the church to try and find that safe space to talk about it, mostly I didn’t find it.  As I got to know the church, it became apparent to me, that it is avoided and on purpose.  It certainly is not given specific structure or time.

    It is my conjecture that there is a HUGE HEAPING MOUNTAIN of healing that has been left on the table by Jesus followers in the name of looking good.  Healing that would change the world, if the church would get real about what healing vs. forgiveness actually is.  They are two seperate things.  This is a letter I wrote to my church to suggest a structure for healing.  It was met with a no thanks and we are not going to do that.  They will know we are Christians by how we love one another.  John 13:35-36.  There is a lot of room for improvement!  Enjoy my letter to my church about the Band Meeting!

     

    Background

    In the modern church, talking about how our walks with Jesus are occurring, struggles, victories, confessing sin is almost a dead art. I am ok, you are ok seems to be standard fair.  If you are asked, are you ok? Do you feel there is genuine interest to hear an answer that is not, yeah everything is great?!?!

    Mostly the modern church has turned into performance-based worship and either topical or expository teaching that is largely personality driven. The space to delve into our lives in response to these teachings is usually left to the individual in isolation. James 5:16 tells us that following Jesus, healing and the process of sanctification is a team sport.

    The mantra of the modern Evangelical church seems to be, learn about the bible and/or what the bibles says about an issue, but keep the personal impacts both derogatory and victorious to yourself. If you need to have an open, honest, safe, and real conversation about something, then mostly, one is referred to “counseling” ministries. Again, more isolation. The priesthood of the believer has been outsourced and it is time to bring it back home, to our own hearts and our own ministries to those around us.  It should be a standard part of the education of what it means to follow Jesus.

    I assert we have returned to a yoke of slavery discussed in Galatians 5:1 – It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.

    The work of Christ is about FREEDOM. Freedom is bringing that which is in the dark, into the light. What that looks like on the court is confession and sharing with a heaping dose of self-awareness, emotional capacity, language, and integrity. Hiding sin and/or shame with no safe space to confess and seek prayer, looks like returning to a yoke of slavery. When a believer is set FREE, that is cause for CELEBRATION! We should want a Celebration of FREEDOM for our Jesus family siblings more than anything.  We should also question the I am okay you’re okay mentality.  It is a façade by which the truth of people’s lives are mostly hidden.

    It could be said that the structure of the modern evangelical church is a structure of hiding, while acting like everything is ok. It is the exception that someone stands up, tells one on themselves and self-promotes being FOUND OUT outside of a pastoral care situation.  If they do, it’s an interruption.  Everyone is a sinner, not being found out is a problem.  Being found out should be a VICTORY in Christ!

    In community, if someone confesses and receives prayer, forgiveness and the peace that surpasses all understanding there are usually things to do.  If they harmed others asking forgiveness with them.  If they damaged the community, with the community. Mostly, it is swept under the rug and ignored out of what probably is communal fear. A sad indictment of the body of Christ and a sad witness to what we believe the power of Jesus does and can do, but it does keep the I’m ok your ok standard in place.

    The confession of sin can be messy, however James 5:16 is a formula. Corporate Confession + Prayer = Healing.  It is one of the most direct statements in the Bible.  It is a promise!  Is Jesus big enough to fulfill on that promise even if it is messy? 100% YES! A mountain of healing is on the table because Evangelicals have become afraid to get real with each other and seemingly have removed intentional spaces by which to spur on James 5:16.

    The way that has been accomplished is through Bible study. Studying the Bible is never a bad thing, but it is not an intentionally created space by which believers can be known, discuss and process their relationship with Jesus, experience the confession of sin, the gift of forgiveness, the cleansing of the holy spirit, sibling prayer and ultimately healing.  That INTENTIONAL space mostly does not exist. More Bible studies are not the answer. If they were, James 5:16 would already be evident.

    The acquisition of Bible knowledge is not getting real about what is going on in your life. When initially practiced, it might take considerable time and the development of language and structure by which to process, share and confess. In many ways, we are starting at ground zero. We have become so remedial at this practice as the body of Christ, it warrants an elevated level of guidance and structure to bring it back into the fold.  It is not happening organically at Bible studies.

    The Man Box

    What have been the impacts of suppressing James 5:16?  I assert it impacts men more.

    Men are more than lust machines.  That simplification of men is offensive.  I believe that there is ignorance running the show when distinguishing between attraction and lust.  Attraction is not lust.  It certainly is the first step, but another step towards lust is a decision we all have.  Lust is indicative of the thoughts of a person.  It is the hidden shameful thoughts that create the desire and want.  Attraction without the need to possess, lust, is 100% possible.  It is a developed skill.  I fully believe that Jesus felt attraction, but it did not supersede his compassion or commitment to the soul of the person.  He never lusted.

    It is completely possible to be attracted to someone and not cross the line into lust.  That means viewing them as a child of God and a fellow human who needs the love of Jesus in their life.  As a man who before becoming a follower of Jesus spent years inside strip clubs, chasing women and fulfilling every sexual fantasy I could, I can experientially say, it is 100% empty.  It is a hotbed of lost and hurt people. There is nothing over there accept people who need Jesus.  As Ecclesiastes says, it is The Futility of All Endeavor.

    It was not until I did the work of developing my emotional capacity and language, that beautiful women turned into people.  I now can be with any woman, no matter how attracted I am to her, without the thoughts in my mind being about carnal things.  I can be with a beautiful woman as a fellow human.  A skill which astounds men.  I gained that capacity before becoming a follower of Jesus.  Beauty is full of people, hurting people, who Jesus loves just as much as he loves me.

    Men feel shame for attraction which is sad.  Or they do not have the distinction between attraction and lust, which are NOT the same thing.  God invented attraction for a reason.  However, since it is NEVER discussed how would a man ever know that is possible?  According to the church, every man is a lust machine.  Let’s be fair, 99.9% seems to be the accepted number.  So, there is a remanent of men who possess the ability to not let lust run their mind.  But the message is, that you probably are not one of them.

    The focus on lust with men, seems a self-fulfilling prophecy.  If lust is the only socially acceptable way for a man to confess something, then where are the conversations about pride, sloth, greed, money, being a man of God in the workplace, being a good father, being a good husband, being a good single person and many other facets of our daily lives exist?  Mostly, they do not exist around a context of confession. It seems, you are a porn addict, or everything is rosy.  And we wonder why infidelity is rampant and why clergy can at any moment hit the porn addict button to tap out of the ministry.  I assert, because the lack of emotional training of men in the church creates a hiding place for the darkness.  That is mostly done through ignoring James 5:16.

    Men are not off/on switches and women are thirty-two channel sound boards. A woman is from man, we have every capacity she has, because we are the root of her creation. Men are emotional.  To say they are not is a lie.  A disservice to God’s creation.

    One only need to study David, a man after God’s own heart, to realize that a poet, song writer, worship leader, psalmist, warrior and shepherd is who God choose to promote.  David wrote most of the psalms.  A MAN was used to create the love language of man to God.  David was more than a lust machine and lust was one of his biggest failures.  I am not saying lust is not dangerous, it is, but having it be all that a man can be, is a remedial viewpoint of God’s creation.

    David danced naked when the Ark of the Covenant was brought back to Jerusalem.  Image a modern celebration where men shed their cloths and danced in praise to God.  It could happen because under that suppressed surface, those emotions exist.  Denying them is missing being all that God means a man to be.  Men only need a forum by which to understand their emotions, to give them language, to understand that they are more than lust machines.

    The Band meeting is a time-proven structure for implementing James 5:16 in an intentional, real, and practical way where any facet of life can be taken to the throne and placed on the altar hand in hand with siblings in the faith.  It is a practical place for people to process what it means to follow Jesus.  What does it look like in our lives when the rubber meets the road?

    Why did I highlight this about men?  Because women naturally live out James 5:16 more easily than men.  This happens because they are culturally trained, that having emotional language and capacity is acceptable, while for men, it is not.  When a man possesses these skills, other men mock him as feminized.  When in fact, the reason women have those types of emotions, is because they came from the rib of a man. I wonder what Jesus thinks about all that?

    History of the Band Meeting

    The band meeting was created by John Wesley in the 1700s. John Wesley was an Anglican at that time and saw that an intentional structure for living out James 5:16 did not exist in the Anglican church. Sound familiar? John Wesley was the founder of the Methodist Church considered the 3rd largest Christian denomination on the planet. Fundamentally, the Methodist church, which has mostly lost this practice, but is seeing some revival in it, is built on the foundation of the band meeting.

    What is a Band Meeting?

    The band meeting is an intentionally created space for the express purpose of living out James 5:16 that is same-sex and no more than 6 people, 4 is best with a developed leader, who also is a participant. In practice, at least 15 minutes of time should be given to each member of the group. In the early days or in certain situations, more time may be required. Age does not matter, but can be utilized to form groups as long as a seasoned leader is in the mix. Disparate ages are beneficial as they naturally provide wisdom to the group for those who are younger and exemplify that sanctification never ends until we shed this mortal coil.

    Each member in the band, they are asked several questions during their time.  The number of questions is time dependent, it might only be one question.  Many times in bands, how is your soul, prayers and requests is good enough. They answer those questions, the group then prays for them and then the next participant goes. Repeat until everyone has had a turn. Simple!

    When a band is formed, every person as witnessed by the group must explicitly and individually give their word to the following at the first meeting or when a new member joins the band. Call it a right of initiation. If any individual is unwilling to make these promises to the group, they should not be allowed in the band.

    • Do you promise to keep everything shared confidential?
    • Do you promise to never use anything shared to harm anyone?
    • Do you promise to be open and honest with the group about your own life?
    • Do you promise to not try to fix anything for anyone when they share?
      • If you feel you have something for them and want to share it, you can approach them outside the meeting and make a request to share what you see. If they are not interested, that is respected and not held against them.
    • Do you promise not to dominate the conversation?
    • Do you promise to respect everyone’s time during the meeting?
    • Do you promise to do the work to develop what might be lacking to gain the language and insight to uncover previously undistinguished obstacles, sin, emotional capacity, and false identity?
    • Do you promise to immediately restore your integrity with any of these rules should you break them with the group?
    • If you break a rule and it causes harm, do you promise to clean up the mess you made to the satisfaction of the person it hurt?
    • Will you abide by the leaders coaching, navigation and monitoring of these rules?

    What are the questions asked in a band meeting? The fundamental question of every band meeting is, how is it with your soul? Great Question! This is a nonexclusive list of other well-known band meeting questions.

    1. How is it with your soul?
    2. Where have you been walking in the flesh vs the spirit?
    3. What scripture is currently challenging you and why?
    4. What known sins have you committed since our last meeting?
    5. What are you struggling with?
    6. What temptations have you met with?
      1. How were you delivered?
    7. Who are you sharing the Gospel with?
    8. Who have you shared the Gospel with?
    9. What have you thought, said, or done, of which you think it might be sin?
    10. Do you desire to keep something secret?
    11. If yes, will you tell the secret or just acknowledge that you have a secret.
    12. Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am better than I am? In other words, am I a hypocrite?
    13. Am I honest in all my acts and words, or do I exaggerate?
    14. Do I confidentially pass onto another what was told to me in confidence? Can I be trusted?
    15. Am I a slave to dress, friends, work, or habits?
    16. Am I self-conscious, self-pitying, or self-justifying?
    17. Did the Bible live in me today?
    18. Do I give the Bible time to speak to me every day?
    19. Am I enjoying prayer?
    20. What am I praying for?
    21. Do I pray about the money I spend?
    22. Do I get to bed on time and get up on time?
    23. Do I disobey God in anything?
    24. Do I insist upon doing something about which my conscience is uneasy?
    25. Am I defeated in any part of my life?
    26. Am I jealous, impure, critical, irritable, touchy, or distrustful?
    27. How do I spend my spare time?
    28. Am I proud?
    29. Am I slothful?
    30. Do I thank God that I am not as other people, especially as the Pharisee who despised the publican? Do I think I am better than others?
    31. Is there anyone whom I fear, dislike, disown, criticize, hold resentment toward or disregard?
    32. If so, what am I going to do about it?
    33. Do I grumble and complain constantly?
    34. Is Christ real to me?
    35. Am I rejoicing always?
    36. Am I praying without ceasing?
    37. Am I thankful in any circumstance?

     

    Assuming James 5:16 is happening within a Bible study where the point of the space is to understand scripture is not individuals talking about their lives. If the Christian life is a team sport, if James 5:16 is true, healing is available to all on the other side of confession and prayer.  Does that not require the church, the priesthood of believers, to create an intentional space to live that out?  I say yes, and my prayer is that by reading this, your response will be YES and AMEN!

     

    Sharing Ground Rules

    A time of sharing is time-sensitive.  Especially when everyone needs to share.  Sometimes, especially in difficult circumstances and trying times, someone might need to extra time to vent, which is cathartic, but we want to be sensitive to not take so much time that others are left out of their turn to share.  These are tried and true sharing ground rules that are used across many groups.

     

    • 100% Confidentiality, what is said here, stays here.
    • Land the Plane
      • The point of sharing is to convey an experience, an emotion, a win, a fail, not necessarily the details. When sharing, and this takes practice, how can we say what we need to say most expeditiously and with as few details as possible?
      • In High School, a good and funny friend taught me about “Shaggy Dog” stories. A shaggy dog story is a story that goes on and on and on and on about how shaggy a dog is.  After someone is about 5 minutes into the shaggy dog story, they are like, is there a point to this story?  No, there isn’t, the gage is, how long can I get you to listen to me talk about how shaggy my dog is.  Sometimes you might hear it said way, as they were spewing a stream of consciousness.   It was a funny joke at the time, but when adulting it can sometimes be exhausting and borderline disrespectful of someone’s time.  It doesn’t take much to get to the core of what you want/need to share and again, we all get better at this with practice.
      • Assume if someone is here in this group, they are FOR you. We want to create a safe space for people to share, so don’t feel like you are being judged or have to be perfect at it and there is beauty in succinctness.  I have found, as I become less enamored with the details and more able to share my experience, the details deflate.  Which is kind of amazing!
    • NO Fixing
      • When people share, they are sharing to be accepted and validated. They are being vulnerable, maybe the most vulnerable they have ever been.  They do not need a fix.  If you think about it, presenting a fix for a situation distracts from the experience of sharing it and can be invalidating.
      • Fix’s can have great intentions, but they miss the point of the sharing. A fix redirects everyone away from being with the share.  The point of sharing is to be heard, not to find a fix.
      • Sometimes the best thing to do is to rest in the life stew and just be with it. If you have a burning desire and see an opening to help, after the group is the time to request permission to offer that.
      • Fixing can also become a distracting time sink taking away from others’ time to share.
      • No fixing can be hard, especially for people who love to encourage. People who are encouragers see someone who is hurting and want to give them a metaphorical hug.  That is all well and good, but during group sharing, it’s just about being in the space of whatever is being shared, not trying to fix it.

    If you are interested in becoming part of a band meeting, drop me a line!