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Wow if I had only known sooner that to succeed at church planting I need to make fun of women, hippies, gays, gamers, and the mentally handicapped. Oh yeah and be at war. And instruct people in the way of
I don't know what is the saddest thing here - that people actually listen to and defend this guy or that he is indoctrinating men into planting churches like this.
From his video -
People walking in tend to think that a church planter is … a pastor. He’s not yet a pastor: he’s trying to build a church so that he can be a pastor. A church planter has a different skill set. He’s got a different mission that he has to be on – to gather men.
To gather the best men that he can find. To gather men who are willing to be trained, willing to repent, willing to learn. Willing to learn both doctrine and practice. That’s why Paul tells Timothy to watch his life and his doctrine closely.
The sad, hard, painful truth is that most churches are struggling, dying, and failing, and most church planters will just be part of the rising body count of failed church plants if they are unable to gather, to inspire, to correct, to discipline, to instruct MEN.
And this is particularly important for young men. The least likely person to go to church in the United States of America is a young man in his early 20’s. These are guys who have absolutely made a wreck of everything. They’re banging their girlfriends. They are guys who are blowing all their money, staying up all night playing World of Warcraft, finding free porn on the internet, and trying to figure out how to get a bigger subwoofer into their retarded car.
Those are the guys who must first be gathered, they must get a swift boot in the rear, they need a good run through boot camp, they need to be told that Jesus Christ is not a gay hippy in a dress, and that they’re dealing with the King of kings and Lord of lords, and there’s a mission that he has called them to.
60% of all Christians today are female. I’m glad that the ladies love Jesus. But if you wanna win a war, you’ve gotta get the men. And once you get the men, you must know what to do with them.
They wanna know how to get married. They wanna know how to have sex with their wife at least once a day. They wanna know how to make money, buy a home, how to have children, how to pay their bills, how to father their sons, how to encourage and love and instruct their daughters, and so in addition to being to being the right kind of man, he must clarify the mission that he is on. And he must understand that his first priority is to gather men, and to, by God’s grace, force them to become the kind of men that are needed for God’s work and God’s kingdom so that that church can actually be established, those women can actually be loved, those children can actually be raised, and that that city will have an example of the difference that Jesus makes.
Labels: Gender Issues
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At 5/02/2007 09:39:00 AM,
Mike ClawsonNo grace, I'm not afraid to comment on Mark's latest round of offensive comments. I'm just not giving anymore attention on my blog to someone like him. I've already denounced him several times and frankly I don't think he deserves anymore of my attention. He only has influence because everyone keeps paying attention to him. Maybe if enough people stop caring what he has to say, he'll eventually just fade away.
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At 5/02/2007 10:10:00 AM,
LindaMike,
I'm sorry. I didn't mean to suggest that the men are afraid to address the issue. I agree with you that in the framework of Mark Driscoll and his antics, it is an issue that is getting too much attention.
There are many men who I highly respect who are remaining silent about this, and I think their reasons are similar to yours. That is what I mean by it being a lose/lose situation.
Perhaps it is an issue better addressed apart from the Driscoll controversy. Or perhaps it is an issue that needs to be addressed because of leaders like Driscoll. I don't know. -
At 5/02/2007 10:43:00 PM,
Juliehaving fun disagreeing with my husband on this one... (i'm sure mark would have a few things to say about that!)
There are a lot of people of there in the church world that I disagree with and some that are downright hateful at that - and I have no problem ignoring them. What really really gets me are the guys who either don't get how Mark's words are sexist and hurtful and/or who say that his sexism doesn't matter because he does all this other stuff so great (not that I would consider a guy who teaches this sort of church planting as having a great ministry). As Lily has so wonderfully put it - "If you are a male in any form of Pastoral leadership and you don't call this man to the carpet, not only on specific beliefs but entirely as a leader who is damaging the place of women in the world, I hold you accountable. If you are not *AGAINST* him, then you are *FOR* him." -
the most hateful emails i've gotten as a blogger are when i posted something I called "mark driscoll is a coward"
i did this after calling him, his assistant & leaving messages for the elders at his church
i've also emailed folks at the companies who publish his books, as well as people who share the stage with him
the sad reality is that this man is clever enough to know how to stoke the echo chamber
thank god for folks who are either (a) ignoring him or (b) flanking him to address the core issues of patriarchy & change/fear
"and by God's grace, force them..."
What is he like? When did Jesus ever force anyone to do anything? And you're right all the values, the things he reckons Christian guys want to know, he lists are not Kingdom values.
He said somewhere else that church planters need specific skill sets but I don't remember reading that Peter, James and John were particularly good strategists. Wasn't it the Holy Spirit who empowered them?
I really feel his thinking is pretty warped.