Promise Keepers: Friend or Foe?

Transcript

GRM 536
6/24/1997
Promise Keepers: Friend or Foe?
Selected Verses
Gil Rugh

(This is a recording of a workshop presented by Gil Rugh to the General Association of Regular Baptists.)

Let’s have a word of prayer and then talk about the issue of the Promise Keepers.

Lord, thank You for Your grace, the richness of Your work in our lives as Your people. Thank You for not only calling us to Yourself, but calling us to the ministry of Your word in these days. And I praise you for this association of Bible-believing, Bible-proclaiming churches. Lord, thank You for these days, these men and women have to be together to be encouraged, to be strengthened, to conduct your business, to be refreshed in preparation for returning to ministry. I pray that even as we talk about a subject of concern, we talk about matters of being critical, being discerning, Lord I pray that it might be positive in that Your word is the focus of what we do. We are strengthened to know that there is sufficiency and adequacy in every situation and every circumstance because You have provided everything necessary for life and godliness for us in Christ. And the revelation of Him is found in Your word. Bless our time together. We ask in Christ’s name, amen.

What I want to do is talk about some general principles and then back in to Promise Keepers specifically. I think where we get into trouble with an issue like Promise Keepers is we lose the anchor of our doctrine and our theology. We begin to grapple with an issue like Promise Keepers as though we are hanging in the air when really my doctrine of the church and my understanding of the Scripture should make it a relatively simple matter to evaluate. First Timothy chapter 3 verse 15, Paul writes, and says he is writing to Timothy and expecting to come shortly. But in case he is delayed, he writes so that Timothy will know how to conduct himself in the church. He identifies it as “the pillar and support of the truth.” So, to me that is foundational as I look at the church. Now I think in this context we get into difficulty by a confusion over the universal Church and the local church. I don’t mean confusion in knowing what a universal church and what a local churches are. But in the emphasis and in the way we carry out the ministry.


Years ago Earl Radmacher, who for years was president of Western Conservative Baptist Seminary, wrote a book. I believe it was first called The Nature of the Church, published by the seminary. Moody picked it up and it was republished under a different title. It slips my mind now. But in that, he had a section where he listed all the uses of the word ekklesia in the New Testament. And there are what, 114 of them? He demonstrated that around 90 of these 114 uses (and I rounded that off) are for the local church. Now statistics in and of themselves don’t prove anything. But that should tell us where the emphasis in Scripture is. It is on the local church. The local church is the expression in the world today of the universal Church. So when our local church meets together in Lincoln, Nebraska, we are the Church of Jesus Christ. We are not all there is of the Church of Jesus Christ, but we are the Church of Jesus Christ When Paul would write to the Corinthians, he told them that they had received all the gifts necessary for the ministry God had called them to as a church.

Now I mention that because I think sometimes with the rise of parachurch movements (I am not critiquing parachurch movements) but I think some of it has moved into what the church ought to do and has blurred the responsibility. It is in the local church, God intends that the ministry be focused and carried out. We often view the local church as weak, ineffective and so we are drawn to larger movements, those numbers, those powers. Now we have a church that would be relatively large. We have around 1500 people on a Sunday morning. Does that make us more effective and stronger than a church that has 150? Not necessarily. Because God’s work is not carried out and not dependent on the strength of numbers. God’s work is dependent if you will by the sovereign choice of God, on the faithfulness of God’s people in carrying out the ministry He has given to them in the proclamation of His word.


Now there is a number of things that have come up before the Church I think that have blurred the issue and have brought a compromising spirit. Let me give an example or two. The expression “all truth is God’s truth.” Well, I don’t know that I disagree with that statement. “All truth is God?s truth.” I would probably put it in the context of James 1 where “every good and perfect gift comes down from above from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation.” He is the source of all truth, sure. The problem that causes in the church is that only biblical truth is salvation truth. Only biblical truth is sanctification truth. We have thrown out the phrase, “all truth is God’s truth” therefore that means what? We should be open to psychology for example because the truth of psychology will make us more effective in the ministry God has given us. I believe that is an attack on the sufficiency of the word of God and its adequacy. But “all truth is God’s truth”? Well, there is a general truth in that statement, but it has been devastating for the Church. Only biblical truth is salvation truth. Only biblical truth is sanctification truth. The whole doctrine of sanctification has been given over to the experts because we as pastors only know biblical truth. What about Romans 6,7 and 8. I was invited by a man who leads a Christian Counseling ministry that our church become a center in our part of the country for training men and women for biblical counseling. I said, we are training our people in biblical sanctification. We are training them in Romans 6, 7 and 8. Thank you.

Another area. “The message doesn’t change, but the methods do.” There is an element of truth in that. I am using a PA system today. Paul didn’t use a PA system. That is a change. But in the biblical sense, not only does the message not change, the method does not change either. We are using this expression, “the message doesn’t change, but the methods do” to open the church to all kinds of things. We have seeker services today. People have gone out into the community to ask people, “what do you want in a church?” And then they have tried to structure a church for them. What do you end up with? A man-centered church. They don’t want to hear about sin. They don’t want to hear about hell. Quite frankly they want the church to be built around them and not God to speak to their needs. Well, I’ll tell you about God and that meets your needs.

Let me turn you to a passage. We are going to the Promise Keepers. This all fits. Stay with me. Colossians chapter 1 verse 28, “We proclaim Him.” So, our message is Christ. “We proclaim Him.” That message is the word of God that unfolds Him. The method, proclamation which is elaborated, admonishing, teaching which is the negative and the positive side. We proclaim Christ. He is the subject. He is the message that we had. What is the method used? Proclamation, admonishing, and teaching. Our motive is to “present every man complete in Christ.” And the manner we follow is toil and striving. We would see this if we went over to 1 Corinthians where we were taken in I believe it was our study Sunday night with Romans 1 and 1 Corinthians 1. “We proclaim Christ.” It is foolishness to the world, but we proclaim Christ. Now, that’s the method. And we say well, there’s different methods. I stand up and preach verbally. They give out printed materials. Yes, but at the root of all we are doing is what? Giving forth. I mean we give out printed material. We do it with the printing press, but we are studying the letters that Paul wrote. Nothing new. Proclaiming Christ. Now what is God’s plan in the local church for producing godliness. I say we go back to the basics. One of the major problems I have with the Promise Keepers movement is how you produce godliness.


So I want to start with what to me is the most basic problem and the most basic issue. You know of the seven promises of a Promise Keeper, with five of them I don’t think I have any problem. With two of them I do have a problem. Let me read you the Promise Keepers before I follow along with the godliness. “A Promise Keeper is committed to honor Jesus in worship, prayer and obedience to His word.” Well, to me that’s a Christian. I mean you replace Promise Keeper with the word Christian in most of these, could you not? I mean are you not committed to honor Jesus in worship, prayer and obedience to His word? Second: “a Promise Keeper is committed to practice spiritual, moral, ethical and sexual purity.” Three: “a Promise Keeper is committed to build strong marriages, families through love, protection, biblical values.” Four: “a Promise Keeper is committed to support the mission of his church by honoring and praying for his pastor, by actively giving his time and resources.” Number five: “a Promise Keeper is committed to reach beyond any racial, denominational barriers to demonstrate the power of biblical unity.” I have a problem with number five. Number six: “a Promise Keeper is committed to influence his world being obedient to the great commandment of Mark 12:30 and 31 and the great commission. (Matthew 28)” Number seven: “a Promise Keeper is committed to pursue vital relationships with a few other men, understanding he needs his brothers to help keep his promises.” I have a problem with number seven.

But five out of the seven I think well that’s just simply what every Christian ought to be among other things. But my real problem is this is not God’s plan for producing godliness in a life. Now here is where I have a problem with some para-church organizations. They don’t see the local church getting the job done, so they come up with plan b. I go and read the letters to the seven churches in Revelation chapter 2 and 3. Most of them weren’t getting the job done. But there is no plan b. Since you are not getting the job done, I have started another organization. No. Get it right or I’ll snuff you out. But there is no plan b. This is the biblical plan for godliness.

Second Timothy chapter 3 verse 16 and 17. “All Scripture is God breathed.” That is what God has provided to make me everything God wants me to be and to equip me to be everything God wants me to do. I take it that is a godly person. God’s plan is His word. Look over in Ephesians 4. Now, as you have picked up by now, all we are doing is looking at the basics that we would assent to. Ephesians 4, God’s plan, the gifts given to the church. And you have the speaking gifts that I take it communicate the word of God. In verse 11, “apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastor-teachers.” I would see apostles and prophets as gifts of the early church for the foundation of the church. Evangelists, pastor-teachers proclaiming the word today. They what? Give forth the word of God for the equipping of the Saints for the work of serving. My ministry as a pastor is to feed the people, give forth the word of God that they might be nourished in the word so that the Spirit of God might take the nourishment of the word and develop and fit them to do the work of serving, carrying out the ministry of the body together. “To the building up of Christ.” So as I teach the word, the body serves having been nourished in the word together then, the body is built up, “until we all attain to unity.”


Buzz word today, “unity.” How is it done? Setting aside our doctrinal differences for a higher goal. No, it is through the ministry of the word isn’t it, the truth. When my people see me jumping off all thrilled about the stadium where they are going to all clap for me when I walk down to the front as a pastor, they ought to be scratching their heads. What happened to him and Ephesians 4? The sound teaching. “Until we all attain to the unity of the faith, the knowledge of the Son of God to a mature man.” As a result we are not tossed here and there by every wind of doctrine, the trickery of men. But, verse 15, “speaking the truth in him, we need to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ from whom the whole body being fitted together and held together by that which every joint supplies according to the proper working of each individual part causes the growth of the body to the building up of itself in love.” There’s God’s plan for developing godly men, for developing godly women, for developing godly young people, for developing a godly church. So, I do not disagree with the goals that are established by an organization basically like Promise Keepers. But my understanding of Scripture is God has not only ordained the ends, the end which is godliness, He has also ordained the means to the end. And the means to the end is the functioning of local churches where the word of God is taught in its purity, where believers function together as the body of Christ in ministering to one another. The end result of that is godliness. And you know what? When I am a godly man, I will treat my wife the way I should. I will treat my children the way I should. I will relate to other people of other races the way I should.

But you know we live in the day of shortcuts. The 12-step program. Neil Anderson, he’s got the seven steps for dealing with demons. Now, we’ve got the seven promises. What does this say about our God? That He gave the Scripture in a day when he didn’t know how to simplify things? Can’t you teach some sermons on how to raise teenagers? I teach them to you every week. You know the secret to raising teenagers? Be a godly man, be a godly woman. Be godly parents. I know, I know, I know, but give me something more specific. Well, when you are a godly man, a godly woman, the Spirit of God works in your life and your life honors Him and He works in and through you. There is nothing else. Well, how do I get to be godly? First you have to get saved. How does that happen? Well, we are born again by the living and abiding word of God. Then we have the sufficiency of Scripture for salvation and Peter went on in 1 Peter chapter 2 and said what? “As newborn babes, long for the pure, unadulterated milk of the word that you might grow with respect to your salvation.” What we are willing to sacrifice is the purity of the truth, supposedly for a good end: men who are to be what they are supposed to be.


And how can you be against that today? In our world, in our society with men not carrying out their responsibility and worse than just not carrying out, actively undermining it, we say just thankful for anybody. Well, wait a minute. My role here is not to reform society. Our role here is what? To bring about regeneration through the proclamation of the truth. You know I don’t like this hand ringing, oh, men are failing in their responsibility. Oh Lord. I am grieved that men are failing in their responsibility. I am grieved the women are. You know why? It doesn’t grieve me that the world does that except that the world needs my Savior. It grieves me that I see professing believers not carrying it out. I say, the only solution to that is what? The ministry of the word in the context of the body.

So my first problem with Promise Keepers is I strongly disagree with the means to the end that they offer. You can keep all seven promises and not be a godly man. I have some quotes here I will mention in a moment from like Mormons who declare themselves fully in agreement with all seven promises. Well, I declare to you, Mormons are not godly men. So, you can keep the seven promises and not be a godly man. I think sometimes we as Christians are just glad to take the pressure off and feel like we are part of a broader movement. No. I want them to know, you don’t accomplish anything that way. Number one, how do you produce godliness?

Number two, the ecumenical nature was referred to in the study about Roman Catholicism and Evangelicals. Ecumenism pervades everything. John 17 was mentioned where Jesus prayed that “they be one.” My understanding of John 17 where Jesus prays that “they may be one even as we are one” was fulfilled. Ephesians 2, Ephesians 3, He brought Jews and Gentiles together into one body. Now we have the responsibility to “preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace,” but what we are running around trying to do has already been done by the work of the Spirit and what has been done in God’s plan of salvation. The ecumenical nature of it. You know in the late 70's I was visiting some ministries in southern California, at Melody Land which was then the center of the Charismatic movement in the United States. Rodman Williams was a theologian of that movement. He just published a multi-million book of theology from a charismatic perspective. And I was visiting with him about the Melody Land School of Theology. He was telling me about the different professors. He is Presbyterian and they had Lutheran and different. I said there is something that troubles me. You are a Presbyterian. You talk about this professor who is Lutheran and this professor who is that. I said there is obviously strong theological differences among you men. What gives unity to your school of theology with that diversity. I’ll never forget what he said. He said, “our common experience in the Holy Spirit.” I said, “oh, experience overrules doctrine.”


So you have a charismatic movement with that ecumenicity about it that we play down our doctrine. We emphasize love out of the context of truth, and it has played a major movement in softening the Church to an ecumenical attitude. I see that happening with the Roman Catholic-Evangelical Accord. We will emphasize where we agree, not where we disagree. The point was made so clearly and effectively in the last hour. I remember Alex Dunlap, when I was a student at Philadelphia College of the Bible in the early 60's. He had a ministry to Roman Catholics in Philadelphia at that time. He said something I have not forgot. He said, “You must remember, when you witness to Roman Catholics, it is not what you agree on that is significant, it is what you disagree on.” Somehow we have lost sight of that. Our desire to all get together, to unite, to work together. We have our prayer summits, which are for everyone, revival prayer meetings in our city where we are not going to emphasize what our differences are.

You know there is a reason that there is an association of G.A.R.B. churches. Here are churches joined together with common commitment and beliefs. That doesn’t mean that people who aren’t part of your association aren’t saved. But it means many of them would not be able to work together with you in ministry and should not. There are some Charismatics in our city who I believe are saved. Fine, I don’t question their salvation. But I say, we could not join together in ministry. You will have to serve the Lord with the convictions you have before Him. We discuss sometimes our differences. But I have to be true to my understanding of Scripture and I can’t set aside that. Every time we get together you are going to do a combined thing with men of differences, you have to decide what will we give up. Well, one pastor in my city said to me, the trouble with you Gil is you would die for every dogma. My response was, the trouble with you, you wouldn’t die for any. You know I don’t want to do battle like the “fighting fundys”, where your sleeves, as a lady go to the top of you elbow or under your elbow or the style of the clothes they wear. I may have convictions on this, but I do believe that once I have come to a conviction that the word of God teaches this, I am responsible to it. Otherwise where does that stop?

So the Promise Keepers. We want to reach men. Bill McCartney, I hope he was truly saved. I read his testimony as many of you are. I know he was Roman Catholic, converted to the Vineyard movement. You know I look at an organization like this that wants to give leadership and direction to people. Would he qualify as an elder or deacon at your church? Many of these organizations end up with men leading them that influence your people, but they don’t meet the spiritual qualifications of 1Timothy 2 and Titus chapter 1 for spiritual leaders.

James Ryle, have you read his book, “Hippo in the Garden”? Absolutely absurd! A man who believes God is speaking to him, that his dreams give vision. And he is on the board of Promise Keepers, as Bill McCartney’s pastor. And I realize with a Promise Keeper there are some areas where he would be stronger, other areas where he would be weaker. Like I said, five of the seven promises I think are good. The problem is that’s not all there is to being godly.


I mentioned the Mormons. Some of you have seen “Promise Keepers begun by Protestant Evangelicals, attracted Catholics and Mormons as well.” I will skip the Catholic thing. I am going to mention something about that later on. “Chip Rawlings and fellow Los Angeles Mormon leaders urged members of the Latter-Day Saints to participate in the movement. “Promise Keepers seven promises are like something right out of the men’s priesthood manual for the church,” he told the Times.” That doesn’t make them wrong, but it does tell you it is like the Apostle’s Creed. There’s not enough there. You can agree all seven promises and be a Mormon and a good Mormon, a good Catholic. What’s the church about? What are we?

The newspaper of the archdiocese of Los Angeles, “Promise Keepers promises Spiritual Renewal for Men” had a picture of our leading Evangelical Pope, I understand from the cover. That’s not what I believe. Here is a Roman Catholic newspaper. “Promise Keepers is a basic program of evangelization for the faith begun among more fundamentalist and evangelical Christian communities, but now being expanded to include Catholic congregation” and I am skipping things. “While noting the Evangelical roots, Father VanLeague says there is no doctrinal issue which could cause concern to the Catholic church.” Now there is nothing in this group that causes concern to the Catholic church? There is plenty in it that causes concern to me then! And on we go. And they are encouraging the local churches in this paper to become part of Promise Keepers and get actively involved. Bill McCartney says his goal is to have a Roman Catholic on the governing board of Promise Keepers. The person here who did the interview with several Mormon leaders in different parts of the country and there was ongoing support for it there. The ecumenicity of it I do have a problem with it. My basic problem is not its ecumenicity. That’s a resulting problem from having moved from a biblical program of developing godliness among men, among women.

The leadership of the program I mentioned is a concern. I mean you have to look at the leaders. Does James Ryle qualify? Is Bill McCartney qualified? I am not questioning their salvation. With some people it is clear they are. With some people it is clear they are not. With some people I just can’t say. But I can deal with their doctrine. I can deal with their teaching. I am well familiar with the Vineyard movement. I have read Ryle’s material among others. I’d say the leadership of it does not qualify to lead.


Let me say something else. In our own church we have moved toward more of a practice of not dividing men and women. I have strong convictions from Scripture on the role of men and women. In fact we use men to teach all the way from first grade in our church. I am not saying that is required by the Bible but our people felt that we ought to model that for our young people so they came and suggested that, those working in that area. But I do not see a program that is different for men and women for development to maturity and godliness. This was the conviction I had years ago when I used to teach a ladies Bible study on Tuesday morning. That Bible study grew and grew and grew with many ladies backing in. This is wonderful. You know I began to be troubled. Here I am teaching this group of ladies on Tuesday morning. Their husbands are out doing what the Bible says they should, providing a living by the sweat of their brow. Now their husbands are supposed to be the spiritual leaders in their home and in the church, but I am there giving their wives the doctrinal input. The husband gets off of work at night. The wife has a biblical question, and she should ask her husband at home. Now she can tell her husband what Romans chapter 3 mean because Gil told her. And how is he going to compete with me, because I am given the privilege to devote my time to the study of the word. What he is doing is undermining the very thing I want to see accomplished. I want to encourage men to be the spiritual leaders in our home and I don’t want to hold back women. But you know what? If we are not giving enough spiritual input to the women, we are not giving enough spiritual input to the men. I am saying this because I think we ought to be wary of movements that are going to develop men. I don’t think we ought to pull the men aside. We try to have enough Bible studies and opportunities for men and women together that nobody is going to say I need more of the word taught.

I mentioned I didn’t agree with number seven. Let me mention it. “A Promise Keeper is committed to pursue vital relationships with a few other men understanding that he needs his brothers to help keep his promises.” You know the Lord has provided a perfect compliment for me. That is a brother. It happens to me his sister who is his wife. And I praise the Lord for Christian men who are friends. But my growth is not tied to that relationship. My growth is tied to my relationship with fellow believers, men and women in the body of Christ according to Ephesians chapter 4 and the ministry of their gifts to me and my gift with their gifts. Once a year at our church we do have a men’s retreat. We have a women’s retreat. It is great to get together as men. I am sure the women get together. But our basic program of developing and maturing God’s people is in the context of the body of Christ.

Our responsibility is to teach the whole counsel of God. So in Acts chapter 20 verses 30 and 31 Paul told the Ephesian elders “his hands were clean of the blood of all men”, why? Because he taught “the whole counsel of God.” I cannot be part of these broader movements that want to limit the teaching. You have to if you are going to incorporate them. All of this to come back and say I think what we really need is to come back and say I think what we really need is to have more confidence in the ministry of the local church. We need to build that confidence in our people. The amazing thing is there may only be a handful here. But God has raised us up and brought us together. And what has to be the emphasis of our life and ministry together is faithfulness to Him. And you know we have to preach the word in season and out of season, when it is popular and when it is not.


Thankfully in the 70's it was in season. And I was privileged to be developing our church. And we only had about 60 people down there. I just went in and started teaching the word. People started pouring in. And they would come and half hour early and want to get a seat. And pretty soon we were growing and we are building and we are growing and we are building and I had to tell my parents. Now I don’t know what a real revival is but it seems to me it’s got to be something like this. People are getting saved all over the place. They are getting here early to get seats. We are going from one service to two services to three services. All I am doing is teaching the word. Some said at that time, the guess for that church will be when teaching the word is not popular, will they still be doing it. It is not popular today. I trust before God we are still doing it. In the process we are about 1000 smaller than we were at one time. That’s fine.

You know what are we about? The verse that has shaped my ministry, and I realize we have been all over the track here, is out of II Corinthians chapter 2 verses 14 to 17. “Thanks be unto God who always leads us into His triumph in Christ, even making manifest the Savior who is the knowledge of him shown by us in every place. For we are a savor of Christ to God both among those who are perishing and among those who are being saved.” I try to keep that before my mind in my ministry. Success is whether I have given off the fragrance of Christ. That is pleasing to my God. When my God is pleased, I am a success. The numbers may not show it. It may look like we are shrinking. Maybe numerically we are. And when we are, I want to look. Is it something I am doing? But if it is simply that the word of God is offensive and driving people off, I cannot do anything about it.

So I put the Promise Keepers in this whole perspective of the faithfulness of the ministry of the local church. What are we? Do I have to be looking every time a new movement is raised up? Are our people going to be part of it? And it always comes up. Oh, Indian Hills won’t be part of it. They always have to do their own thing. God has called me to build a church, to pour my life into the church. That’s what we are. Let me open it up for questions.

Question: Let’s roll the clock back fifteen years and he may have walked into your church. I’m Bill McCartney and say I am interested in having a men’s seminar and tells what he’s doing now, that he is in a local church setting. Don’t have it ecumenical. Now, what?



Answer: Well, number one we don’t bring from outside unless it is someone we are doctrinally sure of. Number two, it would have to be part of what our program as a church is. I wouldn’t say we have never had a meeting where it is just for men. Once a month I meet with the men on Sunday afternoon. All the men of the church are invited. And the purpose of it is open. Sometimes I bring an article and share. Sometimes they have questions. It is called a leadership meeting, so the ladies aren’t included in it. But our goal is not to develop a men’s ministry. Our goal is to develop men and how do we produce godliness. My question that he wants to come in and do this with men. I would say that’s what we are doing. We are already producing godliness. We teach them the word. We nourish them in the word. When we bring a Bible teacher in, he teaches the men as well as the women and we do bring Bible teachers in from time to time. I am gone for five Sundays from here. There are different Bible teachers from different places in the country in teaching. So, it is not that I am afraid of that. For Bill McCarthy to have any kind of ministry, he would first have to be nurtured and nourished in the church. This idea you become a famous college coach. You make the jump. Now you have been saved supposedly, now you are leading a major ministry. The income last I saw had passed 120 million dollars a year. How does that fit with your denomination, your association? You get steam rolled. Our view would be we grow from within. I would be reluctant to have anyone come in. Pastors come to us and say how do you get so many men involved in your church? We have men teaching from every age beginning at first grade. We have men who take their vacation in July so they can teach in Vacation Bible School. So we have to elevate the importance of the local church. We have more women involved in our church, percentage wise, not numerically than most churches that I know. I mean they are doing everything. Our church. We have 1500 people on a Sunday morning. It is cleaned by volunteers. These are people that divide out the church and clean the auditorium. They clean the halls. They clean the Sunday School rooms. And it is an active church, something going on all the time. We have to elevate the importance of the ministry. We don’t have women in leadership positions or women teaching doctrine. But that doesn’t limit them. That leaves everything else open. We want to free people to ministry. And you are freed to carry out the ministry God has called you to. When others carry out their responsibilities. The local church has got pushed into the position. It ought to be the feeding ground for everything else. In the early years of our ministry we had the leadership of Campus Crusade in our church, the leadership of Inter-varsity, the leadership of Navigators, Lincoln being a university town. You know I had all kind of appeals for money but they never wrote and asked could we help you with the church. They never offered to make a donation. In fact they never asked me how their staff were doing spiritually. There is something out of kilter here. What’s the local church to be? We need to elevate in our people’s lives the importance of the local church, the importance of God’s truth and we as pastors need to model that. You know my responsibility is to teach the text to my people, teach the truth. They will get nourished and nurtured. Too often we are beating on them. You ought to do this. You ought to do this. You ought to do that. But if you don’t feed them well. We have all seen malnourished people. If you don’t feed them well, it is hard to do anything. But well-nourished believers want to function. There are no short cuts. There’s no way to get that five-year-old to be a 21-year-old except to grow him. There’s no way to get an immature Christian to a mature Christian but to grow them. And they must be grown God’s way. That’s why I come to the word of God. And here’s God’s way. The ministry of His truth in the context of his church. That’s not so difficult. How do we keep losing it? We lose our grasp on the basics. I ask myself, Gil, when your ministry is done, will you be able to say like Paul that my hands are clean from the blood of all men? I taught you the whole counsel of God. That’s all I can do. I prayed for you. I loved you. Big church, little church, well known, not known, all irrelevant. I think sometimes we as pastors and leaders have to take the responsibility. We get the idea to our people that the church isn’t most important. And you are going to get a chance for another question, honest. I was in a church in, well I won’t say the city, last summer. And I went out with one of the leaders in the church after lunch. He was telling me. He was involved in this church, had been for years, and he was also involved in a para-church ministry. And I talked with him and his life was really involved with para-church ministry. I told him you couldn’t be a leader in our church, you now why? It takes every ounce of your strength. It takes all you have to be devote it to the ministry. It is not easy to build the body. I think we sold the church short and groups like Promise Keepers just add to that. What am I? A hundred and twenty million dollars a year compare that to our church budget, hundreds of thousands of people in meetings, and us on Sunday? It’s God’s work, He does it His way. Keep our service biblical and simple. Another question.

Question: Have you ever heard of any person that had a good response from Promise Keepers?

Answer: Many.

Question: What I have a problem with is that we have a young married class, many unsaved come to this class at this church and he is trying to lead them to the Lord one by one by preaching. When Promise Keepers came up he thought I am going to take a bunch of these men and take them away and into the Silverdome. Fifty of them were saved under Louis Cloud’s message. They have now been baptized in a local church and are teaching and are deacons.


Answer: That is wonderful. My mother was saved under the ministry of Katherine Kuhlman in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and a result of my mother getting saved my dad got saved, I got saved. And I teach the word today. That does not validate Katherine Kuhlman’s ministry. Now we want to be careful, you may not be familiar with Katherine Kuhlman, she was a faith healer in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, back in the 40's and 50's, 30's. So I want to be careful with that. Billy Graham’s ministry, I praise God for everyone that was saved, I have people in my church who were saved through Billy Graham’s ministry. That does not alter the fact that Time or Newsweek here a year or two ago did a multi-page article that he has been the greatest force for ecumenicalism in this century. Obviously there are good things happening in these movements or they wouldn’t impact us. That is the hard thing I have to deal with. People come back and it seems they do get turned around, they do get changed. That is why I have to come back to the word and say that still does not justify what is being done there. I praise God for everybody that gets saved, every life that is changed, but it is still not the biblical pattern that God has set down. So the end result of it will be, not good. Otherwise we do get into pragmatism, is it working? Bill Hibbles is affecting churches all over the United States with Seeker Services, because it works. My question is, is it biblical? The Lord knows I am trapped with my narrowness, I hope I am a captive of the scripture as Luther was.

Question: Probably most of us think . . .saying guys go back to your churches, your pastor doesn’t get paid for this, you know it is the case. What then is that biblical sanctification or is that arrogance?

Answer: When they wanted us as a church to get involved, they were starting a Promise Keepers chapter in Lincoln. The man who is the full time staff member there, wrote me a letter and explained to me what the problems were and what was wrong at Indian Hills and why they would be corrected by us being come part of it. You know, I realize in my own ministry there are times when I have been arrogant and all I can do is repent, but I wouldn’t want to give the impression that those men are arrogant and I am not or I never am. I hope that is not the character of my life, and it is not a character of all those men’s lives either. For me it comes back, what is the biblical pattern and plan God has set down for producing godliness in the lives of His people for reaching the lost, and I’ve got to stay with the plan. They had the circus and all those things involved in Paul’s day but there was no alteration. I preached a sermon, I think the last sermon before I took this break, a month or so ago from my church, and in it I quoted from Spurgeon’s article, “Feeding the Sheep or Amusing the Goats.” How many of you have seen the article? If you would put your name on that list I will include that with the booklet I send. You ought to read that, it is a one-page article. But you realize that was written over a hundred years ago, so you realize nothing is new under the sun. Today we praise God for the faithfulness of a man like Charles Spurgeon who ministered the word in a day when many were “amusing the goats.”

Question: As a pastor you have cause to be concerned if people continue to flock out to Promise Keepers meetings. Would you feel like in your heart or your teaching staff?


Answer: How do I feel when people flock out to these things. You know the Lord does what he does with His people. We’ve lost people in our battle of the late 80's over the issue of “all truth is God’s truth.” We lost a number of our staff, ten years ago, staff people, over 400 people. In my church I had a man who came week after week and every time I mentioned Robert Schuller he wrote me a note to tell me how much Robert Schuller had helped him in his life. What can I say? You always have that. I was talking with a well-known Bible teacher and he was talking about some people who left his church. He said, “you know they sat under my ministry for 15 years and didn’t learn one thing.” I thought when we get into a conflict over “all truth is God’s truth” one thing the people who sat under my ministry for 10-15 years would do, would be stand for the truth. I mean the whole issue got changed from the truth to my personality. Lovable as I am, I couldn’t believe it. They don’t want to do battle over truth, they want to do battle over how you say this. So I don’t think you can do anything about it. It hurts, it always hurts to lose people. You know one of our staff people three years ago took another several hundred people down the road and started a new church, on the same road we are on. You know that hurts. These are people who got saved under my teaching and all that. And it is a good reminder for me to say, Lord they are not my people, they are yours. I try to warn the people early. I feel as a shepherd I am not only to exhort in sound doctrine, I am to refute those who contradict. I felt when the “all truth is God’s truth” is Psychology I let it get too much a hold in the church before I addressed it. So, with Promise Keepers I addressed it before most of the people knew what Promise Keepers was about. I thought it is a lot easier not to get involved than it is to get involved and try to back track. I think on these things I don’t like to be negative any more than anyone else, but I want to be every bit as negative as God is in His word, and every bit as positive. Sometimes you know we get a little bit more of a dose, then we know “woe to you when all men speak well of you.” I had a staff person who is now home with the Lord, he said, “Gil, I am concerned that people hold you up as high honor and on a pedestal.” Well he went home to be with the Lord and shortly after that the Lord took care of that. Sort of knocked the pedestal and the people who couldn’t say enough good about me couldn’t find anything good. It all seems to balance out in the ministry. When all said and done, when Paul is in his last imprisonment what does he say? “Everyone in Asia has forsaken me.” It is not a measure of Paul’s ministry. You know the measure of Paul’s ministry is “I taught you the whole council of God.” I cannot be the Holy Spirit in your life. Only the Holy Spirit can change your life, and are you willing to have Him do that? But I am accountable and responsible to God to teach you the purity of His word to the best of my ability.

Question: I am a young man. Scripture tells me to look to you as my father, as my dad. So that is what I am going to do. I have gone to Promise Keepers for two years now with a group from my church. I am a pastor, have been a pastor for a few years. All men who have gone to Promise Keepers here, would you stand please? If you have gone to Promise Keepers. If you have had men in your church that have gone to Promise Keepers please stand. Men in your churches that have gone to Promise Keepers, please stand. Okay, you may be seated. Um, I have concerns as well with Promise Keepers, I have gone and I still have concerns. Especially concerns more so with the catholic movement and the catholic leadership I don’t like the sound of that whatsoever so as one of my friends said, I hold up the yellow flag. Hold on, this does not sound good. But I sincerely want to see my men grow as godly men and Jesus had a group of 12 men around Him that He poured His life into. When I think of parachurch ministries, well let’s get rid of RBD, let’s get rid of Cedarville College, Cornerstone College.


Answer: Okay, don’t get carried away here. Let me respond to you and then you can continue. That is why I said I use parachurch, but I don’t want to blanket that in the wrong sense. You know I went to Grace Seminary, I went to Philadelphia College of the Bible, I appreciate those ministries. I think they ought to be tied to local churches. So I would find myself if I was going to move to a local or denomination I would probably be comfortable with JRV for that reason. For the doctrinal reason and it is committed to a local church. That is different than campus crusade to me. Peter Wagner told me in the late 70's when I was visiting with him, he liked Campus Crusade, but you could walk in and talk to Bill Bright, and he gave me an example where he had done it and he said Bill Bright turned to the two men sitting with him and he said we will adopt it today, see that it is carried out. Bypassed the local church totally. Cedarville College can’t bypass the local church, I like that. So all parachurches are not created equal, but go ahead.

Question: One of the things that scares me though is that the feminist movement is totally against Promise Keepers, the homosexuals are totally against Promise Keepers. In a way we are getting on a side.

Answer: The Mormons are totally against homosexuals. See this has become a trap to lure us in to who is against abortion? Roman Catholics are against abortion, we are against abortion, so Chuck Colson says we need to stand together in this major battle. I say there is something more important than abortion. It is God’s salvation. And that is what transforms a life from the inside out. People who don’t get abortions are still going to hell.

Question: Well, I have got to tell you, the beauty to me of the Catholics and unsaved people going, the Mormons and all this is the clear gospel presentation. I volunteer as a evangelism volunteer purposefully because I wanted to see what they were teaching and how the training could lead people to Jesus Christ, and it was solid!


Answer: Let me respond then. I had a pastor who took his men that called me from the East Coast. He said they advertised a communion service, and it was a mass or a communion service. He called the leadership on it. They said well, it is a mass, it is a communion and that is in the Promise Keepers booklet written by Jack Hayford. The mass, the communion however you see it. I say what the Romans Catholics say about the mass, and what I say about it is totally different. And I am not saying there is no one in this movement that is saved. They have some outstanding Christian leaders, that is where the confusion is to me, the mix. You also hear Gary Smalley, John Trent. Psychology pervades the movement. It is not just Roman Catholicism. If 90% of the food on your plate is good and 10% has maggots in it you probably don’t figure you root around. And that is where quite frankly I am. I don’t root the garbage can and if there is some good in the garbage can. There is a mixture there that to me is unbiblical. And I don’t want to put you on the bad spot, I realize I am on the speaker’s platform and I don’t want to put you on the spot.

Question: I am but a young man, trying to do what is right.

Answer: Follow the scripture. What does the scripture tell you to do? What is God’s plan for the day? It is the church. Why do you have to take your people, why do I have to take my men out here to learn to become godly? What is the church for? If I am not producing Godly men they ought to shut us down and do something else. I mean it this idea that oh, I want my men to be Godly, I want these people to get saved. Well, I know what they need to do to get saved, they need to hear the gospel. I know what they need to do to grow to godliness, they need to be taught the word and function in the context of the body. I mean if they don’t want to do that I can’t help them.

Question: Yeah, but there is nothing wrong with conferences either. I understand that.

Answer: Right here, we are here at a conference.

Question: And it is a one year conference.

Answer: It is a conference built together though and I love the statement that you affirmed Sunday night after the meeting that is “doctrinally and biblically founded.” That is a movement that bypasses that, which general promises that Mormons and Catholics and others can assent to. So it depends on the speaker. If you get a good speaker you have a good Promise Keepers meeting. If you get a psychologist you get psychology. If you get a charismatic you get a charismatic.

Question: In no way, shape or form am I trying to cause dis-unity. I want to know what in the world to do because I have had guys go and they have been blessed by it. And they grow.


Answer: All I can do is tell you, you are going to have to sort it out. Either you have to be a discerning man, or you are not qualified to be a pastor. Now I don’t mean that to be hard, but I mean that is true for me and that is true for all of us. Let me read. Here is an example of a sermon that was preached at a Promise Keepers rally in L. A. A Genesis 17 circumcision. Here are the points of the sermon. “God wants to touch your very identity as a man.” That is what circumcision is about. “God wants to reach out and touch your secret and private parts. God wants to touch man’s creative parts. Therefore, since God touched man’s creative parts, men as God’s people need to be creative in witnessing to others.” I want to encourage my men to go and sit under that kind of teaching? Jack Hayford.

Question: ?

Answer: That’s right.

Question: ?

Answer: You got to sort it out. Is his theology any good? I wouldn’t have my people sit under his ministry.

Question: Why do we sell Howard Henrich’s book at . . .

Answer: Now don’t get me into stuff here. I don’t want to get in trouble. Do you want to know what we sell in our bookstore? Well, we have to be discerning. I am here to address Promise Keepers. It is not my role to address things of your association, so I don’t want to get out of line. Let me have a word of prayer because some of you I know have other things to do. I appreciate your graciousness in having me. Let me pray if you don’t mind. That would be more fitting. Let’s join together in prayer.

Lord, You are a gracious and loving God. And You have blessed us abundantly and we give you the praise. Lord, our imperfections are ever before us. And Lord we would acknowledge that and I would acknowledge it. Lord, I thank You for the way you have worked and blessed in a variety of ways, and You have honored your word. We thank you for every person who has been saved by Your grace and Your power. And Lord we recognize that especially as pastors and leaders and then Lord as your people generally, we need discernment. We need your wisdom. Lord we need to be anchored unsinkable on the word of God. So I pray Lord, for these your dear people that You will bless them and give them Your wisdom as they carry out the ministry of your church. But Lord we are thrilled to know it is not in our power but You have provided the power and the enablement that we might accomplish all You have called us to do. Lord, bless those who are in difficult and hard ministries in these days. We just pray that they would have Your encouragement. And Lord may for all of us our attention be upon what true success is as your servants, that it is faithfulness to the God who has called us. I pray your blessing upon the remainder of the meetings of this association and the fellowship that will take place on a personal level. May it all be used to accomplish Your purposes and bring blessing, honor and glory to the Savior that we love and serve and in whose name we pray, amen.


Some of you saw the Omaha World Herald, yesterday, Saturday, “The Gathering Steam.” It is about the Promise Keepers going to Washington from a million or a million and a half men gathering there, whatever it is going to be. Six-hour event which they are going to bring people. And they have got a list of you know where you can get buses and who’s chartering buses and airplanes from Lincoln and Omaha and all the people that are going to be going there. And you can go on the Westside Baptist’s red eyed bus special. You leave Omaha shortly after 6:00 am on October 3rd and drive 20 hours straight through to Washington to get there in time for the all-day meeting, then I guess you get on the bus and come back home. Somebody this morning gave me the brochure from Lincoln Berean on Promise Keepers and I commented on that before but they asked me to comment on it so I will re-comment. Some of you read the brochure, a couple of you. You know, with their position I am not picking on Berean, it just happens they put a brochure out on it and so that puts it in the public form and I was asked to make a comment on it.
There position is to not have a position right now. They say “the key word is balance, we believe that God has raised up Promise Keepers to meet a legitimate need of our society.” Well, I think you have established your position already. Your position is God has raised this movement up and it is His vehicle to meet the need of society. You have already established your position you are not neutral so I shouldn’t refer to you as a neutral position. You have already declared this is the work of God and it is God’s vehicle to accomplish at least part of His work in society today. It mentions good things have happened in Promise Keepers, and you know there have been good things that have happened. You know people have gotten saved and good things have taken place and I am sure they as a local church have benefitted. “This does not mean that we endorse every speaker or everything that is said, but overall we support what they are doing and encourage our men to attend.” The problem that I have with the brochure and much of what is done in this area, it goes out of its way to not be judgmental by grappling with what are the real doctrinal and biblical issues in view in an area like this. I mean to look and say “good things happen”, you know that could encompass a lot of things and that gets the church in trouble. They have to look carefully at where the problems are.


Dave Hunt’s newsletter, some of you get Dave Hunt’s newsletter. Okay, quite a few of you, his article on Roman Catholic involvement in this issue points out difficulties in that area. I don’t think we as a church have the option to gloss over, I mean we make a statement “God has raised it up.” That doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have error in it and we don’t grapple or warn our people of the theological error . And maybe they do, I am not aware of Berean I am just using this as an example of what seems to be the attitude. Good things are happening, men are excited. You know as I read this article of all those excited, churches chartering buses, Christ Community Church in Omaha has chartered an airplane. An 84 seat plane chartered by Christ Community Churches School. A hundred and forty passenger aircraft chartered by some men from Lexington and Kearney is jammed. For buses departing from Lincoln are packed. You know when we don’t grapple with the theological issue of a what is entailed number one, the theological foundation number two, how do you change men, how do you impact the society. I just don’t think it has any biblical foundation to say we are going to go and have a six hour rally in Washington and that is going to have an impact in turning our country. They do use Old Testament passages like Ezekiel 22:30, “I looked for a man among them who would build a wall and stand before me in the gap.” They want to be men who stand in the gap. I appreciate much of what Promise Keepers stands for; you know we would agree with them. But the fact that now the national organization of women doesn’t like them just makes me like them more. But I want to be careful that I don’t get tied in because of points of agreement that are not really soundly theologically rooted. Let’s face it. If the devil is going to entice the evangelical church he is going to do it with good things that subtly undermine or replace the best things.

Along this line I think it relates in reading a book that when I have read it I will bring it and talk to you about it more, but it is an evaluation of Bill Hybel’s ministry in Chicago. What is the name of the church, Willow Creek. The man is really sociologist. It was his doctrinal thesis, that 800 page doctrinal thesis with 1900 footnotes so it was a thorough examination. Even the staff of Willow Creek acknowledged it as a fair representation of their ministry. But he makes, I think, a very good observation on insight. He says you cannot classify a work like Willow Creek as a liberal church because they do not deny any of the major doctrines or theological beliefs of historic Christianity. By in large they just ignore them. So why they would hold to it in their doctrinal statement, and he attended there for several years in doing his analysis as well as hours spent interviewing staff and so on. He says “they just are not dealt with.” So you have a new, well new is not the right idea, but a serious erosion. You can’t. It is a little harder to get a handle on it because people say, what is wrong with them? You point out the doctrine, well, it is not what they are saying, but it is what they are not saying that is at issue. That happens sometimes in a case like this. And we say, yeah we agree, there are good things happening, people get saved. Well, that is fine as far as it goes. But there are things not being addressed, that need to be addressed, that need to be grappled with. That is just a general flavor of what is taking place in evangelical Christianity, and in the world today. Which makes those who take a position more unacceptable.


Some of you heard the radio interview that I did this week with the local program. And the lady that called in said she attended Indian Hills at one time and wanted to point out what was wrong with us, and we were judgmental. What do you say about this: I mean we are judgmental. We do believe certain things are right and certain things are wrong and everybody does. We may not agree on what we think is right and what we think is wrong, but I use the example from this magazine. Most people in our society thinks it is wrong for adults to have sex with children. They sentenced this psychiatrist to a number of years in prison. That was judgmental. Your behavior is wrong and unacceptable in our society and will be punished. Well, we say of course. Well, then everybody is judgmental. Now we have a foundation to go from. Now let’s talk about your foundation for being judgmental. What do you use to guide you in determining what is right or wrong? We use the Bible and we understand that to be God’s revelation without that it is a flowing tide. And that is why I say it could be like sex with children, that could change like homosexuality did. What changed? We just decided that it is was right now, and not wrong. That leaves a pretty fluid standard of right and wrong.