Get the sinners out?

“God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.”

Has anyone noticed that our churches are full of sinners?

Someone wrote to me in a Facebook forum that up to half — half! — the United Methodists in “conservative” annual conferences would leave the UMC if the bishops do not put down the rebellion by 900 pastors who say they will perform gay marriage ceremonies.

They cannot tolerate, I am told, any besmirching of the Word of God by pastors who would do such a thing.

As I’ve written many times, I believe the UMC rules should be followed, and I have not yet heard a biblical argument that makes sexual sin less of a sin. Pastors who knowingly violate the discipline and their vows of ordination should be disciplined.

But this outburst of zeal for all things holy seems rather odd when I look at the people in our pews. We have a lot of sinners taking up the places that are apparently reserved for perfected saints.

And, while we’re on the topic of sin, I’d like to bring up the subject of money. I don’t know what the Presbyterians, Baptists, and Catholics teach about chasing after wealth and storing up cash and property, but I do know what John Wesley said. I know what he preached time and time again from the plain words of the New Testament.

For instance, here are some passages on the command of Christ that we not lay up treasures on Earth.

In what Christian city do you find one man of five hundred who makes the least scruple of laying up just as much treasure as he can? — of increasing his goods just as far as he is able? There are indeed those who would not do this unjustly; there are many who will neither rob nor steal; and some who will not defraud their neighbour; nay, who will not gain either by his ignorance or necessity. But this is quite another point. Even these do not scruple the thing, but the manner of it. They do not scruple the “laying up treasures upon earth,” but the laying them up by dishonesty. They do not start at disobeying Christ, but at a breach of heathen morality. So that even these honest men do no more obey this command than a highwayman or a house-breaker. Nay, they never designed to obey it. From their youth up it never entered into their thoughts. They were bred up by their Christian parents, masters, and friends, without any instruction at all concerning it; unless it were this, — to break it as soon and as much as they could, and to continue breaking it to their lives’ end.

What in Wesley’s view is the difference between reasonable and sinful wealth? Wesley taught that we should gather enough money so that we are in debt to no one, we have the basic necessities of life (food, clothing, shelter), we can provide for our families their basic needs, and we can pursue our work and whatever expenses that requires. In all things, the key distinction is between what we need and the luxuries that we often want or desire. To go beyond our needs, Wesley taught, was to deny Christ.

Consequently, whoever he is that, owing no man anything, and having food and raiment for himself and his household, together with a sufficiency to carry on his worldly business so far as answers these reasonable purposes; whosoever, I say, being already in these circumstances, seeks a still larger portion on earth; he lives in an open habitual denial of the Lord that bought him. He hath practically denied the faith, and is worse than” an African or American “infidel.”

And one final quote:

“Lay not up for” thyself “treasures upon earth.” This is a flat, positive command; full as clear as “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” How then is it possible for a rich man to grow richer without denying the Lord that bought him? Yea, how can any man who has already the necessaries of life gain or aim at more, and be guiltless? “Lay not up,” saith our Lord, “treasures upon earth.” If, in spite of this, you do and will lay up money or goods, which “moth or rust may corrupt, or thieves break through and steal;” if you will add house to house, or field to field, — why do you call yourself a Christian? You do not obey Jesus Christ. You do not design it. Why do you name yourself by his name? “Why call ye me, Lord, Lord,” saith he himself, “and do not the things which I say?”

And yet, despite all this, how many United Methodist pastors and laity still insist on calling themselves Christians while ignoring the commands of Christ? How many more empty seats in our churches would we have if we stopped letting in the sinners and the people who twist the Word of God from its plain meanings when they are at cross purposes with our desires?

Sure, clever people can make clever arguments about the way that the plain commands of Christ regarding money don’t really mean what they seem to mean. They can explain that Wesley was something of a crackpot who should not be taken seriously. (He said bad things about the Pope after all.) They can bring in all kinds of suspect claims about first century Galilee and the meanings of Greek words. They can invent facts to help out their argument. They can say the context we live in is different than the one Jesus and the apostles encountered. They can explain how what the Bible calls a sin  — laying up wealth and loving riches — is not actually a sin for us.

Of course, we United Methodists could never allow such people among us. Not in our churches. Not in our pulpits. Not in the seat of the bishops.

Or maybe we allow — even honor — lots of people just like that. We have lots of open sinners in our church, open sinners who would be insulted to be told they are sinning, open sinners who have no desire to change. We should be as charitable to each other as possible as we exhort each other to go on to perfection.