Where I recently moved there is a now closed 111 year old Presbyterian Church.It is a beautiful and majestic building.
The Presbyterian denomination, like the Episcopal Church and others, have been profoundly effected by disagreement over many issues, not the least of which is the acceptance of homosexuality
I would be remiss not to add that there has been other issues such as the inerrancy of Scripture that have caused division.
There are two things that have happened related to these conflicts: #1.Churches(Christian faiths) have changed to meet society's changing views or, #2.Churches(faiths) have split, with some remaining traditional and others going modern. We see this happening in most Christian faiths and denominations today.
I think of my former faith from many decades ago,The Episcopal Church USA, which in the very early 70's started its decline into modernism with the acceptance of women priests(1Timothy2:12), later the acceptance of homosexuality, and then the acceptance of homosexual priests and bishops, and finally, allowing heretics like "Bishop" Shelby Spong to publish blasphemous books denying the deity of Jesus and stating that the Apostle Paul was a repressed self-loathing homosexual.
Is it surprising that the numbers of worshippers in the Episcopal Church has plummeted in recent years?
And doesn't it follow that if your faith teaches nothing but 'everything is OK if it is done in love', and the Bible is a book of analogies more relevant for the time in which it was written, that many people won't see the purpose of even bothering to belong to a Christian faith?
The proof of the Bible is irrefutable. For those doubters out there I would direct you to the excellent book byJosh McDowell entitled, Evidence That Demands A Verdict which gives secular and Biblical proof of the Bible.
To close I will give you a quote by A.W. Tozer which is more relevant today than when it was written over 50 years ago.It pertains to who is supposed to be changing who in society. It appears that far too many modern faiths and churches have it wrong.
"Religion today is not transforming the people; rather it is being transformed by the people. It is not raising the moral level of society; it is descending to society's own level and congratulating itself that it has scored a victory because society is smilingly accepting its surrender."
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