The Purpose of This Blog
Since I am now at a new chapter in my life, I feel it is necessary to re-establish what exactly the purpose is of this blog. Often, a blog's original vision gets distorted or changed as it becomes more widely read. Since From the Pulpit's inception, the purpose has never changed:
"What an avenue to share the everlasting, life-changing message of Jesus Christ! My focus on this website will be to share with the world my views on the theological, cultural, and moral issues of the day. My primary goal is for others to come to the revelation and knowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord."
Discussion is nice and always welcome (indeed, some bloggers will post anything for the sake of discussion), but any discussion that I feel impedes my goal of growing people in the knowledge of Jesus Christ will be censored. That is why I have decided to moderate comments. If your comment does not appear, it has been censored for one of the following reasons:
1) It is incendiary, or antagonistic in nature and seeks only to belittle the blogger or another participant.
2) It uses inappropriate language for any reason (archaic Bible translations not included)
3) It fosters a spirit of discord of any kind.
This is a Christian blog. Therefore, it's primary goal is to bring glory to God. As Christians, we are called to do everything in a most excellent way - including our speech. Anything that does not bring glory to God will not be tolerated. There are many many many sites in the blogosphere (many of them Christian) which foster and even encourage this type of behavior. From the Pulpit will not be one of them.
Therefore, I encourage my readers, church members, and friends to freely read the blog and comment and participate in discussion. Differing views are welcome! However, if the discussion turns to one of not glorifying God it will be stopped.
As the associate pastor at a wonderful church, it is my goal to help lead those members into an edifying and encouraging walk along their spiritual journey and this blog will part of that process.
posted by Charlie Wallace at
10:12 AM
4 Comments:
I see what you're doing here Charlie. You figure, "Hey, I just got my first job as a pastor and I don't want to upset the church officials." So you decide that you should no longer intelligently discuss issues, and only talk about things that would make the church happy. I think that this is doing a disservice to all who read your blog.
What good is faith if one has not questioned it? I used to enjoy reading your blog. You and your peers gave me insight as to how christians see certian issues. I read and respected you guy's views.
But apparantly because everything I say does not "glorify god" it's not allowed to be posted here. Are you that afraid for you job? I think it is important to discuss issues using every viewpoint possible. Apparantly you do not.
This is exactly the reason I stopped going to church. In sunday school, the teacher would say something along the lines of "homosexuality is wrong because the Bible says so." I would ask "well what about Exodus 21:7 "When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go free as male slaves do." Does that mean it's okay to sell my daughter as a slave?" At this point I would either be told to leave or to be quiet.
How does intelligent discussion not glorify god? One could say that god gave us the abilities to discuss all issues in an intelligent manner, and to disallow this gift would be doing a disservice to god.
I don't see how telling a story that is pertinant to the discourse that contains the word d*mn is worse than an entire post about porn conventions and jesus.
Yall shouldn't be so ashamed of those that are not exactly like you. You have let me down. And your actions make me believe that the southern baptists sterotypes may be true.
You must do what you feel is appropriate.
McFeely,
""Hey, I just got my first job as a pastor and I don't want to upset the church officials.""
My position at my church is very secure. There are no officials to upset. God is in control of where I serve and when I serve and only He decides when, or if, I leave my position. If you'd like for me to extrapolate on my decision, e-mail me.
"What good is faith if one has not questioned it? I used to enjoy reading your blog. You and your peers gave me insight as to how christians see certian issues. I read and respected you guy's views. "
I agree with you about what constitues good faith. Our discussions have increased mine, so I thank you for your intelligent discourse. I respect your views as well, and welcome your continued questions and concerns, but comments will be moderated from now on...and you are not the reason for this decision.
"This is exactly the reason I stopped going to church. In sunday school, the teacher would say something along the lines of "homosexuality is wrong because the Bible says so." I would ask "well what about Exodus 21:7 "When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go free as male slaves do." Does that mean it's okay to sell my daughter as a slave?" At this point I would either be told to leave or to be quiet. "
I'm sorry you stopped attending church because of a rude Sunday school teacher. I'm sure the pastor of the church would have loved to entertain your questions, as long as they were posed in a respectful manner. There are many people trying to tear Christianity down and those who believe in it as well, and as one who has experienced personal insults and persecution, I understand when many Christians choose not to tolerate that. I'm not saying that is how you were. As to your question, Exodus 21:7 does not apply to Christians. If you'd like a detailed explanation why, e-mail me and I'll be happy to explain.
"How does intelligent discussion not glorify god? One could say that god gave us the abilities to discuss all issues in an intelligent manner, and to disallow this gift would be doing a disservice to god. "
Intelligent discussion certainly can glorify God as long as it is done in a respectful way. The longer discussions go and become more tangental, most of the time, they end up not glorifying God because people start arguing pridefully to 'win' the argument for themselves.
"Yall shouldn't be so ashamed of those that are not exactly like you. You have let me down. And your actions make me believe that the southern baptists sterotypes may be true."
I'm not sure what you mean here. Ashamed of who? Sorry I have let you down. I would be interested in understanding what stereotypes you are talking about.
Why do we take blogs so seriously?
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