Here in western Kentucky they have a number of descriptions for people like Sean Feucht. “Dang fool” is one of the kinder ones. Both Kentucky and neighboring Tennessee are seeing a rise in new COVID-19 cases. In Tennessee the smaller counties are particularly hard hit.
Sean Feucht rolled into Nashville this past Sunday and held a large gathering for which he had no permit from the health authorities, a gathering where the attendees were jampacked together and few masks were visible.
Chances are that people from Kentucky as well as Tennessee attended that gathering. Chances are that a number of them were infected with the COVID-19 coronavirus and chances are that a number of them who were not infected with the virus when they arrived were infected with it when they left. They took the virus home to granny and grandpa and to the daughter, sister, niece, or cousin who is expecting her first child.
The Jackson Purchase where I live is about a two-hour drive from Nashville. Chances are that people from the Purchase attended that gathering. Chances are that they did not self-isolate when they returned from Nashville. Chances are that they will be shopping for groceries in the supermarket this coming Saturday without a mask. Chances are that they will be in church this coming Sunday if their church has reopened its building. Chances are that they will be barbecuing with family and friends on Sunday afternoon. And the COVID-19 infection rate will keep going up and up.
Who will they have to blame but themselves if granny gets real sick, grandpa dies, and Cousin Annie’s baby is born with birth defects. They were the ones who decided to attend the gathering. No one forced them to go.
As for Sean Feucht, he will be in another city and another state holding another gathering at which the COVID-19 coronavirus will be spread.
What is in these gatherings for Feucht. He claims that he is advocating for religious freedom. But to my mind he is getting a lot of publicity and attention from these gatherings. I would not put it past him that he is eyeing another run for political office. There is a lot of ways for making a name for yourself if that is what you want to do, ways that do not involve endangering the lives of others.
Jesus did not exactly have kind words for the Pharisees who did things to draw attention to themselves. He told his followers that the Pharisees would receive their reward in this life and not in the next. Their reward would be the admiration and attention of those who lacked discernment and could not see through what Pharisees were doing.
Pastor, don’t let yourself and your congregation be fooled and misled by people like Sean Feucht. Granny, grandpa, and Cousin Annie and her newborn are precious souls for whom our Lord suffered and died on the cross. Do not let people like Sean Feucht do them harm.
Jesus did not exactly have kind words for the Pharisees who did things to draw attention to themselves. He told his followers that the Pharisees would receive their reward in this life and not in the next. Their reward would be the admiration and attention of those who lacked discernment and could not see through what Pharisees were doing.
Pastor, don’t let yourself and your congregation be fooled and misled by people like Sean Feucht. Granny, grandpa, and Cousin Annie and her newborn are precious souls for whom our Lord suffered and died on the cross. Do not let people like Sean Feucht do them harm.
You cannot presume to assign this motive to Sean. (There are better ways to run for office, if that were his motive.) Also, a credibility gap was created when rule-makers gave a free pass to rioters, bars, Home Depot ...while restricting churches from singing or effectively assembling with precautions. Cooperation is demoralized in the face of this indefensible hypocrisy.
ReplyDeleteAlso, these worship events are meeting critical needs: people are getting healed, delivered from depressions --suicide-prone depressions-- and coming to Christ. Sean hears from these people. Would you take that away from them? Your shallow denigration ignores the deeper issues and the nuances. It appears that the Anglican pastors are not meeting the needs of these people. The Anglican church criticizes Sean Feucht while Anglican churches have failed to prevent the suicide spike. Sean's ministry has successfully intervened in remedying that spike. While Anglicans are not alone in this, the shallow denigration invites scrutiny in return, that wld otherwise be uncalled for. (Matthew 7:1 "... for with the same judgment that ye mete, it shall be judged to you again.") Thousands of ppl have come to Christ thru Feucht these past months. How can u fault this --your Q-R (quarantine-retricted) ministries entirely missed this harvest. The Holy Spirit did not restrict the ministry in these meetings, and you presume to fault it? Are you possibly more disturbed about masks than these ppl dying in their sins? ... a little pharasaical maybe? You weren't rushing to save these people.
Similarly... Jesus broke the law, illegally touching & healing lepers. This put Jesus at risk for contracting leprosy and becoming a 'leprosy super-spreader'. He instructed His disciples to do the same, following His example --- making them potential 'super-spreaders'. The purpose of the Q-R laws were to quell the public spread of leprosy. However, Jesus broke them and instructed His disciples to do the same.
Note, Jesus generally respected the laws that quarantined lepers and restricted anyone from physical contact with them: He did not daily touch lepers just to flout the quarantines and restrictions (Q-R). He respected the laws in their proper place, but deferred to God's laws when the pharisees' Q-Rs were in conflict. The pharisees also used Q-R as a weapon to stifle Jesus's ministry, They enacted Q-R for lepers and Jesus' ministry by restricting healing to non-Sabbath days. How absurd! --and morally wrong. They weaponized these laws,applying them only to Jesus' ministry (categorizing Jesus' healing as 'work'), but not faulting people who needed to 'work' on the Sabbath in order to ox which fell into a pit or some other emergency. They a pit or a child was hurt, the normal Sabbath restrictions did not apply.
Feucht does not disdain Q-Rs in general, but only when it over-reaches impeding God's commands: assembling together for worship, reaching needy ppl, etc. Feucht only took worship outside to facilitate Q-R rules against worshipping inside. His intent is not to rebel; just to obey God.
You also cannot ignore the malicious intent of Cuomo and other governors to impede churches; ... and similarly the malicious intent of the pharisees toward Jesus' healings. The pharisees weaponize the law to unleash their malice toward Jesus' ministry, just as these governors apply the law unequally against churches and Christians, expressing their malice. The malice of the radical left against Christians and churches is well-established. The real conflict is not about masks: the issue is the squelching of God and the work of the kingdom. You appear to agree with those who opposed Jesus.
To blithely echo criticism that ignores the deeper issues is more polarizing than meaningful. Please re-think this, considering the core conflict and nuances.
That is quite an elaborate rationalization of Feucht’s actions but at its core it is just that--a rationalization—how you have persuaded yourself that what Feucht is doing is not endangering the health and safety of the people whom he attracts to his so-called worship protests and the communities in which conducts them.
ReplyDeleteThe Pharisees were self-advertising and attention-seeking. They showed negligible compassion toward others. Feucht is also self-advertising and attention-seeing. He shows negligible compassion toward others. The state and local public health authorities are seeking to prevent the spread of disease that has been established as contagious and harmful to human beings. They are seeking to prevent human misery and suffering. When their actions and Feucht’s actions are compared with those of the Pharisee, Feucht’s actions most resembles the Pharisees’.
Whatever Feucht and his supporters like yourself may think, the gatherings that he is holding have a high risk of spreading the virus even though they are held outdoors. The people are crowded close together and are for the most part not wearing face masks If those present are singing along with Feucht and his band, these gatherings present an even higher risk. of spreading the virus.
As far as Feucht leading thousands of people to Christ, the people whom he is attracting to these gatherings are for a large part self-identified Christians. They are the people following him on the internet. They are the people who turn up at these gatherings.
Now who benefits from human misery and suffering? The state and local public health authorities? Or the devil. He delights in encouraging people to do things that cause misery and suffering to themselves and to others. He will take an honest desire to serve God and to do God’s will and twist it so that does not serve God or fulfill God’s will. He can also lead people into believing that they are doing God’s will when they are actually disobeying God. He is a student of human weaknesses and exploits them to the fullest.
There are other ways that Feucht could minister to people without advertising himself or drawing attention to himself. There are steps that he could take to reduce and alleviate the misery and suffering that the pandemic is causing. In his own mind he may think that he is doing the right thing but the human heart is deceitful beyond measure.
As for sharing the gospel, acts of kindness and compassion that show concern for the well-being of the non-believer and his family will go much further in preparing the ground for planting the seed than a concert, or revival. Remember the Parable of the Sower. A decision made in excitement of the moment at a concert or revival is just that—a decision made in the excitement of the moment. It does not mean that a seed has fallen on fertile ground, will germinate, grow to maturity as a disciple of Jesus, and bear fruit. The seed can be quickly gobbled up, sprout briefly and wither, or be chocked by thorns.
Gatherings like the ones that Feucht is holding, if they become superspeading events, will lead non-believers to conclude that Christians do not really care about other people. They can irreparably damage the witness of local Christians to their community and create mistrust of Christians in a segment of the population with whom we must establish trust in order for them to give us a hearing.