De-Conversion (Psalm 16:11)

Introduction

Well, Dean had very little to go on in regard to my lesson, but that psalm sounded perfect. As I want to begin talking to you tonight about that path. The path of life. And Psalm 16, by way of beginning, which just so happens to have my favorite verse in all the Bible. Psalm 16 and verse 11. You will make known to me the paths of life. In your presence is fullness of joy, and at your right hand are pleasures forever. I confidently believe that this will be the result of walking God’s path. And it will be a glorious result. Fullness of joy. A joy that we’ve never known here in any endeavor of this life. A depth of joy that we’ve never known. A joy that will be the same, filling and wonderful throughout all eternity.

I wonder sometimes if we realize the depths of what awaits us in God’s presence. A joy so full. Pleasures so unending, instead of the temporary kind that we receive here. May the psalmist’s affirmation be ours. And may we realize, as he said earlier, there is no good. In fact, John prayed this. There is no good apart from you. He would say, I have set the Lord always before me. I shall not be shaken. Oh, but the things that want to shake us. Oh, the things that have shook so many. May we be so determined in our walk of the path of life. Verse 10. Not allowing the holy one to undergo decay would certainly anticipate our Lord’s body, quoted in Acts chapter 2 and applied to Jesus.

And so I simply want to say this by way of outset tonight, which is sort of the summary of the whole lesson. Don’t get discouraged. Don’t ever let go of the path of life. The path that is life indeed.

Let nothing take you away from the path. And the reason why I say that is because I know full well that there are things pulling us in a thousand different directions away from that path. We have an adversary that is real, and the last thing he wants for you is to discover that path, or once you have discovered that path, to stay on that path. He wants to take you off. He is a murderer. He wants to destroy you. And he will use all sorts of things and people to get the job done if he can. He will use, as I said last week, his minions. He will use our peers.

To divert us from the path. So know that there will be opposition to the path of life. Know also that there will be weariness that attends the journey. A fatigue not just of body, but a fatigue of mind, a fatigue of purpose that we lose our way in regard to the things that matter most. As we live our brief lives here.

So often when people go from the path, it is because there’s something out there that’s drawing them, something that they want, something that seems to be eluding them. And that if I can get this thing, if I can have this thing, then my life will be richer and deeper and better than it is now. But whatever that thing is that allures you, that wants to take you from the path of life, that which is life indeed, it will not deliver what it promises. And so as I bid you by way of introduction to embrace the path of life, to not deviate from it. Or if you find yourself off the path to return to it as quickly as possible.

1. Deconversion: It Is a Thing

Called deconversion. Yes, deconversion. It is a thing. And the article that I read on this subject was actually posted on Facebook by Brother Doy Moyer, was an article entitled Jen Hatmaker and the Power of De Conversion Stories. It was written by a man named Michael Kruger, who is a Christian author and president of Reformed Theological Seminaries, Charlotte, North Carolina campus. I had heard his name before, but don’t know a lot about Michael Krueger. But he has concerns about Jen Hatmaker and others and what he calls deconversion. Now, who is Jim Hatmaker? She and her husband Brandon are a couple of several ministers who work for the new Austin Church in nearby Austin, Texas. In April of 2016, two years ago, Jen Hatmaker called for the full inclusion of the LGBT.

Can we get more initials? The LGBQT community into the Christian community. And the article that spoke of her and others lumped her with Bart Ehrman, Rob Bell, and Peter Enns. You might have heard some of these names. Now, Ehrman went from fundamentalism to agnosticism. Now he’s not even sure there is a God, while the others left traditional evangelical ideas and views for more liberal ideas, and they now declare the errors of their former way as they embrace this new version of Christianity, a more inclusive version of Christianity. And that’s what the conversion is all about. Krueger says one of the most tried and true methods of evangelism is the conversion story. Everyone has their enlightenment story, and in this case, it is an enlightenment away from what they once believed.

It is a liberation from the shackles of a misguided past that involved stricter rules for morality. That’s why we now embrace all of these different sexual lifestyles. But here’s how deconversion works, according to the article. First, you recount the negatives of your fundamentalist past. Here’s what’s wrong of what I what I used to believe, but I am now enlightened. I now have a new truth. And this new truth is so much better than the old truth. And that’s the deconversion story. You position yourself as the offended party who bravely fought against the establishment. I tried to fight these old paths that were wrong in my new enlightenment. You portray your opponents as just overly dogmatic. While yourself, well, I’m just a seeker. I’m just looking for the truth.

You insist that your new theology is actually driven by the Bible. They found new texts that shed light on their new beliefs. And so they insist that this is all biblical. It is driven by the Bible and not a rejection of it. And deconversion attacks the character of the old group and of course uplifts the character of the new group, the enlightened ones. Now let me tell you why I preaching this. I really don’t know Jen Hatmaker. I only have a limited knowledge of Rob Bell, read a very little bit of one of his books. I’ve heard of Erman and Ends, but again, don’t know a whole lot about those people. But I do have a preaching colleague and friend who has his deconversion story. In fact, I saw a video last year of his baptism into a new faith.

And before he was baptized, his tearful confession of the sectarian group that he was leaving. And that saddened me. Great. And he’s not the only one. According to the article, Hatmaker has said things like, when I looked at the fruit of the non-affirming Christian tree. Now you would be non-affirming if I know you well. When I look at the fruit of the non-affirming Christian tree, the fruit was so universally bad. It was it was suicide and broken families, folks kicked out of their churches, homeless teenagers, self-hatred, depression, crushing loneliness. If we’re being honest, the fruit of the tree is rotten. Again, attack the character of the old group and uplift the character of the all inclusive new group. And I would just say about that, I don’t know what she had experienced, but that’s an awfully wide brush that she is using.

And my question is, would you exclude anyone on any basis whatsoever? Or would you just embrace anyone and everyone? No questions asked. Well, even Michael Krueger, and what I said about this article to Sherry is that we would have people like Jen Hatmaker way over here to the left. And we would have Michael Krueger here, who was even left of me. And yet he has problems with Jen Hatmaker. And here’s what he says.

And over the top, one hardly knows where to begin. Aside from repeating the cultural trope about evangelicals kicking kids out of the home with no evidence to back it up. And even if some church did that, is everybody who claims to be Christian doing that? And aside from judging every human heart that believes in traditional marriage as rotten after complaining how judgmental other people are.

Those people that embrace and are all inclusive except for the judgmental sort. They’re the bad ones.

She actually bases this whole argument on scripture’s teaching about good and bad fruit after declaring that scripture is not just clear about those things. But perhaps most troubling is hatmakers laying the blame for suicides, loneliness, oppression, and more, all at the feet of those who believe in traditional marriage. Those are serious charges. But it’s not just contemporary believers she is throwing under the bus. She is condemning two millennia of Christians who believe the same thing about marriage. Frankly, such rhetoric gives fresh meaning to Isaiah’s sobering warning. Woe to those who call evil good and good evil. So if you hold to a traditional view of marriage as taught in the scripture, you’re the bad guy. You created all the problems, and then if we just be more inclusive of everyone and accepting of everyone, all the problems magically go away.

Be conversion. How many people have left our fellowship? Not particularly Decker Prairie, but churches that we know like us who practice what we do. And it said things like, well, those people were a cult. You know, see, you have to disparage the character of the old group and uplift the character of the new group. I hear that word cult all the time. Those people in the church of Christ are a cult. Now, first of all, I can’t answer for everyone who worships behind the label Church of Christ. In fact, I know very little about my brethren in most places. And if there is a cult out there that worships behind the name Church of Christ, I don’t know anything about it. And if they are a cult, I disapprove of it.

But I’m going to recommend to you tonight and every time that I preach the path of life. But if you choose not to live it, if you choose to reject it, that is your choice. I would say that’s a horrible choice. We will not allow you to be a member here if that is your choice. But I’m not going to control everything about your life. I’m going to warn you about your friends, but I’m not going to say, well, because your parents are unbelieving, you need to cut them off. Have nothing to do with them. That’s what cults do. Oh, you can’t talk to them because they’re an unbeliever, and yet Paul talked about you can’t go out of the world. This isn’t a cult. What is cultish about this?

Most of you I’ve not talked with since Wednesday. Until today. This is not a cult. But again, we throw a label at, oh, it’s bad. Because they expect us to attend services three times a week in a cult. Disparage the old.

2. Disenchantment With the Old Paths Is as Old as Man

I just want to make a few observations about this kind of thinking. And about the path that we’re treading as God’s people. We must not wander away from the path of life. And it has always been true. And I affirm that it will be true. That a good many folks on the path over time become disenchanted. And they fall short of God’s rest. Disenchantment with the old paths is as old as man. It was Jeremiah’s plea, stand in the way and see and ask for the ancient paths. Where is the good way and walk in it? That was the plea of God’s prophet. And others didn’t say it exactly like that, but that was the plea of Isaiah. That was the plea of Moses and Joshua earlier, when he said, For me and my house, we will serve the Lord.

3. The Rigors of the Road

He was saying, walk in the old paths. Walk the paths that God has defined for you. And yet, so often throughout history, people have said, like the people in the days of Jeremiah, we will not walk therein. Disenchantment and falling short of God’s rest has been typical throughout the centuries. And I simply state the reason why is because of the rigors of the road. Going against the grain. Living differently than those around you, choosing differently. Having to exercise self-control. Remember when Paul preached that to Felix and he trembled because he knew that he was not ready for the judgment day. I’m sorry. I can’t take self-control off the path. Let’s just throw that out. Self control isn’t necessary. Whatever you feel like doing, whatever you’re impassioned about, that’s what you want to do.

And that’s what really Jim Hatmaker and others are wanting to include. If you want to go down this route with this relationship, then by all means just go for it. And we still call it Christian.

Because it’s a fruit. It’s part of the fruit of the spirit.

I cannot take away times of disappointment.

Will divert from the path and disappoint while claiming to walk in the path. Or troublesome moments of your life. But that’s really what the Hebrew writer is saying in Hebrews chapter 3 and chapter 4. When he says, do not come short of the grace of God. There is a Sabbath rest that remains for the people of God in chapter 4. Do not depart from a living God with an evil heart of unbelief. And that whole section from chapter 3 and verse 6 through chapter 4 and verse 11 is a plea. Don’t give up on the path. And people that did not enter God’s rest. It is because the message was not united by faith in those who heard. We’ve got to believe, like we talked about in Psalm 16, that this path is the prescribed course for our lives, and it will eventuate in glory far beyond our dreams.

The passage we were looking at in our Bible class this morning in Matthew chapter 10. That’s what Jesus was saying. The rigors of the road. A slave is not above his master. They persecuted me, and they’re going to persecute you. You confess me before men, I will confess you before my father who is in heaven. You deny me before men, and I will deny you before my father who is in heaven. The very hairs of your head are all numbered, he said. Why even make that statement? Because somebody is going to want to take off your head. That’s why.

In Matthew chapter 24. In the process of all of that, and the rigors that would come even upon the righteous who might still be living in Jerusalem when that destruction comes. He says, Because lawlessness abounds, the love of many will grow cold. I get concerned about a statement like that. Because we live in a time when lawlessness abounds. And when that lawlessness is always trying to take us away, to think like it does, to embrace that kind of philosophy about life. Over time it can diminish and distinguish, extinguish our love for God. But then he says in the next verse, and this is always the case, that he who endures to the end shall be saved. What a verse. Endures to the end. Let’s see. He doesn’t tiptoe through the tulips to the end.

He waltzes and skits and dances to the end. And I think that’s the way we want it. We’re not going to walk this path of light unless we can just skip along and dance and take it easy and tiptoe through the tulips that we talk about. You mean the rigors of the road? You mean I have to endure the onslaught of opposition and difficulty as a Christian? Absolutely yes. And sometimes you have to take one step in front of the other in pain. There’s a challenge to it. So often when the friction starts to develop between what I want to do and what I’m called to do.

4. The Old Paths Don't Have to Grow Stale

When people get disenchanted with where they’ve been or what they have believed, and embrace this new liberating theology. Without all the shackles of requirements and obedience of all things, and actually listening to God who defines the path. Whether we like the definition or not, that is the path. So often, people find the old path, as they did in Jeremiah’s day. They get stale. I guess young people, it’s it’s I’m telling you’re just starting. Some of you are just starting the path. There are other people in this assembly who’ve been on the path for a long time. Of course, a lot longer than I’ve been on the path. But here’s what I want to tell you. You know, we sometimes look, here we go again, you know, three services a week for how many weeks of the year.

All we have to do to come here like it’s that hard. You know, I had to go to my closet at 4.15 and find a suit to put on. Oh, I had to wear a suit of all things. We make this out so, and you’re all finding suit. Some of y’all, very few of you guys, some of you guys are. But we make this, it’s such a hard thing, and we find that the worst drudgery of it all. What we do here does not have to grow stale. Sometimes I get a little frustrated. And I’ve said this to the song leaders, and Dean, boy, good thing you and Daniel were on your game today. I get really discouraged when the songs get really slow. It’s like I can’t even sing them.

There’s so much time in between each note. And our guys, I love the way they pick up the pace. And some of the songs that we sing here, I say to myself, this is exactly the effect the songwriter envisioned when he or she wrote the song. That what I’m feeling as a result of the way we’re singing this tune, with the words that we’re singing to God and to each other, this effect is exactly what they intended. That’s what we need to seek in our singing. I think it’s such an important part of our worship. And what that means is that we were singing songs that have lyrics that are written way back, and some of them are relevant even though they’re two or three hundred years old and good and good lyrics.

But sometimes we sing those songs. What did that even mean? Some of the newer hymns have a more contemporary sound. Our young people like to sing them. And that means I’ve got to learn some new songs, and that makes that’s a little discomfort for me. But I gotta tell you, I might wish to have a little discomfort. And to keep the young people interested in what we’re doing. And enlivened by what happens in this place. I can take one on the chin for that. Even though I love the new songs, I don’t know. But I sometimes older folks they say, I don’t like all the new songs. I love them. If it mentions Hosanna, I like it.

It doesn’t have to get stale. You know, we can do some different things. On Sunday night, we could have five or six different speakers. You know, that’s we could do that.

It didn’t hurt anybody, did it last week? To have six different speakers and a song after each thought and a prayer. And they were shorter prayers. Wow. We can do that too. We don’t have to grow stale in what we’re doing. And I’ll say this. It is an unnecessary obstacle to love traditions to a fault. When some of what we do is simply expedient. It’s been expedient. It’s been proven to be expedient in the way that we do it. But there are other ways to do it expediently. Like we saw last week. We don’t have to do it the same way every time. And some folks get all men out of shape. God, here, never seen it here. But I’ve been places where any kind of deviation from the norm, oh well, we’re going liberal.

5. Grace Has Never Been a Substitute for Holiness

I don’t think they even know what that means. People call things liberal, they don’t even know what it means. If it’s scriptural and right, it’s not liberal. So beware of that. And I think there is a clamor for the sensational to be entertained. But we need to find a passion and zeal for what we do based on the fact that we serve a holy God. And we’re impressed with him and his amazing deeds. The old paths don’t have to grow stale. One more point quickly, and the lesson will be yours tonight. Grace. Grace will never be. Has never been a substitute for holiness. Whenever someone starts talking about a wider fellowship that includes all sorts and all kinds of behavior, almost every kind of behavior. There is always talk of grace and what grace does.

But we talked last week from Jude chapter Jude verses 3 and 4 that some who deny the master do so because they try to turn the grace of God into licentiousness or lawlessness. That’s always been what people shall we continue in sin. That grace, maybe let’s let grace really do its thing. Let’s sin more. That’s not the idea here, folks. That’s not how it works. Grace has never been and will never be a substitute for holiness. Yes, we need to strike the balance between God’s magnanimous grace and wonderful mercy and his righteous requirements. And I want to, I’m going to be talking more about that in upcoming weeks and months. I think we struggle with this concept.

But I’ll tell you, I can’t get around passages like Hebrews chapter 12 and verse 14. Remember, we saw in Hebrews chapter 3 about people coming short of the rest of God. When he comes to the end of that in Hebrews chapter 12 and verse 14, he says, the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. You know, just like I can’t take self control out of the equation, I can’t take holy living out of the equation. He is the author of eternal salvation to all those who obey him. And then I just want to throw in quickly here at the end. If you want a passage that speaks to the requirements, the grace of God instructs us, according to Titus chapter 2 and verse 11, to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly and righteously and godly in this present age.

But in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, this is the will of God, your sanctification or your holiness. You’ve been set apart for God’s purposes because you walk this path, not in lustful passion, he says in verse 5. For God has not called us for the purpose of impurity. Now let me tell you the problem with those who get enlightened, like Jim Hatmaker. There’s next to nothing that is impure. Everything’s on the table, everything’s okay. But God has not called us for the purpose of impurity, but in sanctification and consequently, he or she who rejects this is not rejecting man, but the God who gives his Holy Spirit to you. When you reject the path that has been outlined for you to live, you are rejecting God. You are rejecting the Holy Spirit who has delineated this path for you.

More on that verse. Wednesday night.

There are times where I am challenged in regard to that very thing. And I know you are too. Where our wants, where our desires, where our passions are wanting to take us. And it is just easier to let it happen. Put it in full throttle. Let it go. Regardless of the weight of destruction that it will bring, the hurt that it could cause, and even more importantly, the damage that it brings to your soul, potentially, eternally destructive courses that we take. It is easier to just let it fly. But we must remember, ours is a holy calling. God calls us to discipline. Paul said, I buffet my body and make it my slave lest after I have preached to others, I myself should be disqualified. I cannot circumvent around the fact that I must reign in myself to the holy purposes of God.

Conclusion

Remember the path that we’re on. The path that we’re trying to walk together and encourage one another to walk together. Don’t give up on the Lord. Don’t give up on his people. And don’t give up in the pursuit of worship and goodness in your thinking and behavior. Because the path of life will pay off in ways that you can’t even begin to grasp the depths of. In his presence is fullness of joy, and at his right hand are pleasures forever. We invite you to embrace the glorious path of our Savior Jesus. You need to respond. Come now as we stand and seat.