A church in Florida has taken the radical love that Jesus brought into the world and is attempting to put it into practice. Of course the self-righteous indignant Christians are having a hissy-fit.
"Calling people scumbags, that's just not right. I was raised in a Christian home and I was raised not to insult people," said passerby Bradley Lord.
Residents of the telephone area code do not like it either and have complained mightily. It resulted in the city checking the sign for code violations. None were found and the sign stays, much to the dismay of angry residents.
The City of Tavares had code enforcement take a look at the large message after the city received complaints from residents. A spokeswoman said the church is well within its right of free speech and had no other comment.Armstrongism has never liked scumbags wither. In Pasadena we used to have guards on all the doors of the Auditorium, College gym and the Imperial gym to keep out scumbags. The only people allowed in were the righteous, the chosen ones, the special ones. At one point in time we even had a super deacon who carried a gun.
Walk-in's were never permitted. You had to have special dispensation from the minister or had spent several months reading all of HWA's materials before you were allowed in.
That all came to a crashing end when Tkach Sr. said to stop it. Some of the super-deacons were not happy and still tried to do it, till JT forced them to stop. These guys soon jumped ship to Flurry and Meredith's cults where they continue to do this to this day.
We have seen in the last several weeks the abject rage James Malm has towards the grace of Jesus. Like all legalists he claims grace is a license to sin over and over and over and over and over.
Brennan Manning has some great comments about grace:
Jesus spent a disproportionate amount of time with people described in the gospels as: the poor, the blind, the lame, the lepers, the hungry, sinners, prostitutes, tax collectors, the persecuted, the downtrodden, the captives, those possessed by unclean spirits all who labor and are heavy burdened, the rabble who know nothing of the law, the cowards, the little ones, the least, the last, and the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
In short, Jesus hung out with ragamuffins (Scumbags).
The saved sinner is prostrate in adoration, lost in wonder and praise. He knows repentance is not what we do in order to earn forgiveness; it is what we do because we have been forgiven. It serves as an expression of gratitude rather than an effort to earn forgiveness. Thus the sequence of forgiveness and then repentance, rather than repentance and then forgiveness, is crucial for understanding the gospel of grace.
The sinners to whom Jesus directed his messianic ministry were not to those who skipped morning devotions or Sunday church. His ministry was to those whom society considered real sinners. They had done nothing to merit salvation. Yet they opened themselves tot he gift that was offered them. On the other hand, the self-righteous placed their trust in thew works of the Law and closed their hearts to the message of grace.
Because salvation is by grace through faith, I believe that among the countless number of people standing in front of the throne and in front of the Lamb, dressed in white robes and holding palms in their hands (revelation 7:9), I shall see the prostitute from the Kit-Kat Ranch in Carson City, Nevada, who tearfully told me she could find no other employment to support her two-year-old son . I shall see the woman who had an abortion and is haunted by guilt and remorse but did the best she could faced with grueling alternatives; the businessman besieged with debt who sold his integrity in a series of desperate transactions; the insecure clergyman addicted to being liked, who never challenged his people from the pulpit and longed for unconditional love; the sexually-abused teen molested by his father and now selling his body on the street, who falls asleep each night after his last 'trick', whispers the name of the unknown God he learned about in Sunday school; the death-bed convert who for decades had his cake and ate it, broke every law of God and man, wallowed in lust an draped the earth.
"But how?" we ask. Then the voice says, "They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of hte lamb."
There they are. There we are-the multitude who so wanted to be faithful, who at times got defeated, soiled by life,and bested by trials, wearing the bloodied garments of life's tribulations. but through it all clung to the faith.
My friends, if this is not good news to you, you have never understood the gospel of grace.
From The Ragamuffin Gospel
I am glad to know a God who loves scumbags, the ragamuffins, the despised and the rejected!
