Sunday 6 April 2014

We Love You

We like you a great deal.  Talking to you is an incredibly gruelling, upsetting, nerve-racking experience, so you can't blame us for choosing not to do it.  We have judged you a wicked person to perpetuity.  Why do you criticize us?  We Christians are all members of the same One Body, and sub-distinctions of the Body into "churches" are extremely unscriptural.  You must realize that, unless you want back "in," there's really no reason whatsoever for us to bother dealing with you, as you are nothing to do with us, once we kick you out, unless you want to become one of us again.  The Lord uses you for blessing.  You have a lot to answer for.   There is One Body.  You have nothing to do with us and we have no obligation to you.  We love you.  Please go away.
  You were deeply wronged by us, your assembly, when it/us kicked you out and refused to discuss restoration to this day.  You are very guilty of having criticized us/your assembly for kicking you out and you have not submitted graciously to our/their assembly decision and reasons for refusing to discuss restoration.  You did nothing worthy of having been kicked out. You are not sufficiently repentant.  The stuff you write is truly horrible and upsetting and I am personally appalled at it, as would be any decent Christian.  We have never seen any of it and are deeply offended.  The paper you wrote was actually not that bad and I laughed at it.  You have deeply upset sincere, bible-believing Christians by writing it and have a lot to answer for now.  You need to learn to submit to groups of Christians who God has given power over you. I, of course, no longer believe in God, but still... It's not us shunning you; it's other Christians we must be one with.  We want nothing to do with them; we're not connected, really.  You're right.  Now apologize.  Your brethren love you.  They just want you to go away and not come back.
    Our assemblies have a responsibility to judge those who stray from the path and are in error; if we did not fulfil this obligation our gathering would be invalidated by that.  Our assemblies are weak, and cannot be asked to forgive people they have judged or kicked out, but will, of course, continue to judge and kick out people we feel no obligation to restore at any point. We care deeply for you and wish you all the best.  Please don't talk to us.
  We are no longer in fellowship with Wim Vanhoefwegan and his group, and have nothing to do with them and their completely unscriptural, incorrect actions of kicking people out all the time.  Of course if you were to want to have any judgment put on you by us when we were in Wim Vanhoefwegan's group lifted, we would need to somehow meet with his group to ask if it was okay to let you back in; this would require effectively undoing the division, and obviously that's not going to happen, so obviously we're completely unable to ever reverse Wim's decision now, as we have split from him, over the incorrectness of his kicking people out.  Apart from me, the other two leading brothers in my assembly are men directly involved in putting you under discipline, and the nearest neighboring assembly contains really only two men, both of whom were also directly responsible for putting you out, including bringing the pamphlet to the brother's meeting to begin with.  Your being put under discipline has nothing whatsoever to do with us or our assembly, or neighboring assemblies, so we don't understand why you're trying to involve us in your own very personal thing. You need to read your bible.  We refuse to discuss the bible with you.  We have cast you away forever.  Why don't you trust us?  We have shut you out of your birth culture.  Why do you criticize us?  We love you more than you know and care for you very deeply.  Now, go away.
   We are a valid group of Christians, because we follow scripture and we judge any and all evil in our midst.  We wrongly, evilly, put people out of our group all the time, leave them out for good, and then feel no need to judge that evil act, having "put out" far more people in the last twenty years than we ever "let in."  There is no "in" or "out" as we are just Christians gathered to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.  You aren't "in" and never will be; it isn't our job to discuss you being back "in," as the Lord judges them that are (with)out.  We have cried many bitter tears over your situation.  We refuse to discuss changing it.   It would be wrong to try to subdivide the Body into sects.  If people worship with any Christians who aren't in our sect, we put them "out" of our sect.  We judge unscriptural things that go on in our group, as scripture is our guide in all things.  We refuse to discuss the various ways we are going against scripture, as these are days of weakness, no one's perfect and you can't expect us to try to follow scripture at a time like this.  We pray for you continually and seek the Lord's will for you in your life.  Please go away.
  We are Christians and we are always here for you; you can ask us anything, and you know that.  We flatly refuse to discuss topics such as the bible, us, you, worship or anything controversial with you, whatever it is that you're wrestling with in it all, even if what you really need is to discuss it with someone.   What happened to you is in the past, and now everything has changed, so it is very troubling that you continue to act as if this is still an ongoing thing, rather than a past thing you seem unable to forgive, despite it being over.  You cannot come out to church at present and take communion, nor will you ever be able to, at any point in the future, and we will not be badgered about meeting with you to discuss it.  Our feelings and beliefs are nothing like they were back when you were still "in"; everything's changed.  We can't change anything; you know how it works and you know how some brethren are.  I feel horrible about your situation.  I will not help, no.  Feel free to discuss anything with me.  Please don't discuss you, or me or us or them.  We love you so much and feel horrible about what happened.  Now go away and don't try to talk to us.
   We have nothing to hide.  You need to stop revealing things we do and say to you and people like you.  If you really wanted to be allowed back "in," of course you could get back "in."  We refuse to respond to any and all requests regarding being allowed back "in."  We have no membership list.  You aren't on it.  There is no "in."  You are "out."  We love you.  Get lost.
   The division was horrible and wrong.  You are on the other side of it, so we won't worship with you.  Your father was always so kind to me; sorry to hear he's lonely and bored in his twilight years.  He's on the other side of the division, so of course I can't talk to him anymore.  We are free, now.  You know we can't do that or people will talk; you know how some Brethren are... When there are problems in your life, you must repent of them and deal with them if you want any blessing.  We refuse to deal with the problems in our group and certainly don't feel we would ever need to repent of anything ever, or make amends in any way.  We're so sorry that you're hurting.  Now stop talking about how you got hurt or we'll hurt you more.  We love every person we kicked out.  We just need them to go away and not come back.
   You are not honest and you do not follow the scripture and cannot expect to be received as someone who does; you cannot be trusted.  Stop being so idealistic and trying to hold people to a higher standard than they can attain to; these are the Last Days, after all.  We fear God, unlike you.  We are not afraid to hurt His children for our own benefit.  You have to deal with evil; you can't just move on and pretend it didn't happen.  Why can't you move on and pretend it didn't happen?  Why can't you just be happy; Christians are happy.  I've been struggling with depression myself lately.  We've been having lovely meetings. No, don't come out to them.  We care deeply for you and wish you all the best and think of you often.  Go away and forget about us.
  These men are our elder brethren, and that gives them authority to make assembly decisions for the assembly and we need to bow to their decisions, or we're going against scripture and not working toward Christian unity.  We have no elders or clergy or power hierarchy of any kind and are all equal; one with all Christians.  The scripture is our guide.  We refuse to discuss the scripture with you.  You are too clever and good at arguing for anyone to feel comfortable talking to you.  You are silly and immature and ignorant of scripture.  I love you, Mike.  Go away.
   We are not The Lord's Table, but are just one group seeking to partake of the Lord's Supper from it; there is no "we."  We have put you away from The Lord's Table, because we have the authority to do that and are not to be questioned.  What we did to you was very, very wrong.  It wasn't us; why can't you shut up and take it?  You were put under our responsibility and authority, and your spiritual well-being was our responsibility.  Now that we have put you out so we don't have to deal with you, we have no obligation to deal with you now in any way and will not speak with you about spiritual things. There is no "we."  We won't worship with you.  If it was up to me, I'd let you.  I will not let you.  We love you so much.  Go away.
  I believe the bible.  Stop quoting the bible around me.  Self is the enemy and must always be examined and judged.  Don't try to get to know me, analyze or examine me, and don't tell me who I clearly am; I don't want to know.  Hypocrisy is bad. Don't expect us to come through on our claims.  It is important for Christians to forgive; why can't you forgive us?  We refuse to discuss forgiving you ever.  You did nothing deserving of getting kicked out.  We do not forgive you.  We are a mess and can't be expected to function as any kind of unified system; to require that of us is unfair in the extreme because we're doing the best we can and we're just a bunch of people who fail.  We are united in barring you access to worship and fellowship.  You need to stop writing such horrible things.  I have no idea what you write; I would never read it.  We love you very much.  You can't have supper at our house.
   We have the utmost respect for you.  You're a bad person.  You have been of help to a lot of people.  You are dangerous and people shouldn't talk to you.  It isn't okay to go worship in a different church, because the Lord would not have you there, where the doctrine is so watered down and evil is not judged.  Go to another church right now.
  We love you and miss you so much.  Now, go away.

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