Cheering For Failure

[Radical Dreamer]

This is an entry from the blog of one of my pastors, Steven Furtick, of Elevation Church. I thought it was pretty relevant and well-said, so I thought I'd post it here and share it with you guys!

[quote="Pastor Steven Furtick"]It’]

[Nate]

Well...I hate to rain on the parade but...I don't agree. Not completely, anyway.

First I'll get my dumb comment out of the way.

It’s a sad day when you’re more excited to see the team you hate lose rather than the team you love win.

How is that sad? In the NFL, or in most sports, the team with the most wins makes the playoffs. If your team wins a whole lot but doesn't get as many wins as the team you hate, guess what? Your team is eliminated. That kind of requires you to be excited to see the team you hate lose.

Anytime we get to the point where we’re rejoicing over the failures of other churches, we should weep. And then repent.

I wonder if the problem is that it’s hard for us to accept the fact that Jesus Christ loved and died for the church down the street just as much as He did our own. The church across the nation, too.

See here's where my real problem comes in. I don't think we should weep and repent if we rejoice over the failure of other churches. I think sometimes, that it is appropriate.

I know the mods get upset a bit whenever these guys are brought up, but imagine if tomorrow, Fred Phelps was arrested for fraud or something. Imagine that this would lead to WBC disbanding and dying as an organization. We should be happy about that, shouldn't we? We should be praising God that such a hateful group of people as that failed. We should be rejoicing about it. I don't think we should weep if their church fell apart. It would be GOOD if they did.

It's not that it's hard to accept that Christ died for other people. I don't even see how that's relevant to the discussion. Christ died for non-Christians too. That just seems like a false argument to muddle the topic of debate.

And before He died for all of us, he prayed that all of us would be one. Not that we’d rejoice when one of us fails.

If one group of Christians is trying to spread hatred and lies, and they fail, I think that requires rejoicing. Obviously I won't judge any group or denomination and say "Well they aren't Christians" but I will say that there are denominations that do things that are plainly un-Christlike. If they fail in these things, then I'm going to rejoice. I'm going to praise God that they failed and failed hard in their attempts to spread hatred.

We have to get to the place where we see the success of the church down the street as our success. And their failure as our failure.

If the success of the church down the street is directly opposed to what our church is trying to do, then it's not our success. Let me put it this way. During the Civil Rights era, if a church succeeded in getting blacks treated as second-class citizens, would it be a success for a church that was fighting for equal rights of all races? No, it would not be. It would be a massive failure. Conversly, if that same church failed to get blacks treated as second-class citizens, would that be a failure for a church fighting for equal rights? Again, no, it would not be, it would be a fantastic success.

We should pray for one to happen everywhere. And the other to happen nowhere.

I will pray for success of those doing the will of God, and the failure to happen to any who are not. That's plain and simple. If the people trying to not do the will of God are a church or group of Christians, I will pray for their failure, and not feel guilty or ashamed.

When you see other churches fail, even if it’s because of their own sin or stupidity, don’t praise God for their failure. Pray to Him for their restoration and redemption.

I don't see why you can't do both. I can say "God, thank you that these people didn't do something terrible that would hurt people. But at the same time, I pray you will show them their mistakes so they can be closer to you." I can do BOTH you know! They're not mutually exclusive actions.

So yep. While I do agree that churches should be more unified, believe me I do, it's probably not going to happen. While that doesn't mean we shouldn't try, it also means I'm not going to feel bad at rejoicing when hatred is defeated by a church failing.

And that's the end of my show, DONK!

[Radical Dreamer]

Well, I didn't post this to have it nitpicked from top to bottom, but I'd like to point out that I don't think he was talking about churches that exist solely for the purpose of spreading lies. Note the churches he lists:

That includes the church that fell apart because their pastor had an affair.
The church whose music you abhor that’s failing.
The church that went bankrupt.
The church that tries too hard to be relevant or the church that you think caters to a traditional crowd. And neither is growing.

Maybe this is a more localized issue and I just didn't realize that when I posted it. Because I've seen an attitude amongst a few people who get really stoked about what God is doing in their church and start looking down on other churches where they don't see a similar movement of God happening. This entry is not talking about WBC or anything that's preaching outright heresy. I'm assuming that was just a misunderstanding on your part, but anyways, the entry is really just an overall message to be united with other members of the Body of Christ, regardless of denomination or church size.

[Nate]

Hmm, maybe it is a localized issue. I dunno. Well I mean I know about churches that just preach outright lies, but I meant...um, other issues that I won't get into because y'know. Politics. I'll probably write more in depth about it on my LJ. CAA just ain't the place for it.

But I do agree that rejoicing because "Ha ha I hated that pastor and now he had an affair and he's not going to be pastor anymore" is pretty terrible and definitely not a cool thing to do.

[goldenspines]

I suppose it can't hurt adding a thought. Good article, btw. I think it's very encouraging.

Though, I wonder, are failure really failures sometimes? God can work all things out for good, therefore, he can teach a lesson to either the whole church or something different to each person affected through a "failure". Obviously, a church failing is not something to rejoice over (or rather, in the context of hatred), but I don't think we should weep either. We should praise God even in trials and failures (our's or other's) and thank Him for His ever present faithfulness.

Something I did like about the blog post was that he addressed the topic of disliking other churches for non-important reasons directly (like the music or the preaching style, etc...), which, of course, as you and Nate mentioned, is not good at all.

Overall, I think we all agree anyways, but I just wanted to add a few thoughts in case they help. ^_^;

[Peanut]

This entry is not talking about WBC or anything that's preaching outright heresy. I'm assuming that was just a misunderstanding on your part, but anyways, the entry is really just an overall message to be united with other members of the Body of Christ, regardless of denomination or church size.

While I don't think that was the author's intent, honestly I think the message that's being pushed does extend to churches which are preaching "outright heresy." I put that in quotes because, honestly, "heresy" is a very slippery term that is still used to persecute denominations whose belief's really aren't that far from traditional Christianity. I say this namely because he says this:

You may not agree with other churches, their methodology or even some of their theology. But we’re all Christ’s bride. And before He died for all of us, he prayed that all of us would be one. Not that we’d rejoice when one of us fails. Do what you will, but I’d rather not be opposed to the prayers of Jesus. He had a rather effective and powerful prayer life. I’m not going to waste any breath or energy trying to subvert it.

Without knowing individuals within said churches, you cannot say for certain whether they are or are not a part of the body of Christ. You can also not say what that church has done for them in terms of their spiritual growth. An example which is not the WBC would be a church within the town my college is in that advertises itself as a gay church. I remember looking over a bulletin from it with some friends and laughing at how ridiculous it seemed. Then it struck me, it could be that this church has had a greater impact on the homosexual community then any other church in the region. Since I am not God and cannot see the hearts of those within it, I cannot say and probably shouldn't judge. Nor should I hope and cheer for that church to be torn down.

Anyway, the message of that post seems to me to be more along the lines of "Don't let your hatred for a ministry or Church impede the work of God's kingdom." If you are so obsessed with it that you can't see the good that God is doing around you within your own community, then you are like the fan of the 11-0 college football team who chooses to watch and laugh at your rival loosing in a blow out instead of watching and rejoicing about your own team winning a game that they should win.

[KougaHane]

I know the feeling. I'm not a big sports fan, but being in Alabama I am subjected to all kinds of fan wars between Alabama and Auburn fans. (For those who don't know, The University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, AL and Auburn University in Auburn, AL have a notoriously huge and vicious rivalry.) Well, Auburn won the game this year, which put my mother, who has a great love for sports, in a foul mood for a while, and some things she said fell in those lines. My brother commented and said, "If Auburn wins the national championship, I'll be happy because that means teams from our state will have won national championships two years in a row." to which my mother replied, "They could be from *name of my town* and I wouldn't care. I hope they lose." And I have seen no end of similar comments ending up on facebook. Why is it that movies about a man getting revenge sell so well? Why do people enjoy revenge?It's a rather twisted form of justice I think. People have this idea that everything in life should be fair to them for no reason at all, but don't think twice about starving children in Africa, yet complain about life not being fair because their steak was not as rare as they wanted and complain to the manager of the restauraunt to get even with life. Nowhere in the Bible are we guaranteed a fair life. In fact, I don't know of any religious text that guarantees fairness. We get the idea because we have everything we need and when something gets taken we lose comfort because we place our faith in emotions and possessions. Where your treasure is, there your heart lies also.

[ShiroiHikari]

Man, I know I get mad when I see that a church down the street from my church has a higher attendance than mine and is doing more work in the community. I hope they fail.








That was sarcasm by the way.

I also think it's kind of funny how pastors often make football analogies.

[Htom Sirveaux]

Man, I know I get mad when I see that a church down the street from my church has a higher attendance than mine and is doing more work in the community. I hope they fail.








That was sarcasm by the way.

That's fine, but I think the correct perspective, given the context, would have been looking down on churches with a lower attendance rate, doing less for the community, So I don't see how sarcasm is warranted here.

I often have to check myself though, when I think of my old church. The pastor had this "vision" of making a predominantly white church more "racially integrated" (i.e. "blacker"). I've got nothing against racial integration, but it's not something you can force. Especially on a church, especially if you do it badly. He also would often momentarily mistake the pulpit for a political soapbox. I could expand on this whole situation, but I'm not gonna. I don't hope the church fails, but I'm not sure I don't hope that vision fails.

[Htom Sirveaux]

(Double-posting because my PS3's web browser likes to be a punk and put a limit on how much I can type in a forum post)

And yes, I'm aware of the irony of my statement as it applies to my current avatar. I like the funk. So sue me.