Folks, my middle daughter Katie has been sharp as a tack, as of late. At one point I asked something like, “When did you start using your brain?”
Anyway, she just updated her Facebook status with the following opinion piece. I was so impressed, how could I not share it?
When you’re done, show her some love, will you? Enjoy.
I have an opinion with which you might not agree. I have come to discover that I do not hold to the same values and morals of the masses, and that is quite expected as I am a believer in Christ.
My opinion today is thus:
Church gatherings are LESS LIKELY to spread the virus than going to Walmart.
Katie Marie
The people who want to gather in these churches wear masks and spread out while they are there. Families sit together while friends sit several pews away. After each meeting, I know that, in my church at least, most people leave promptly while a group of designated individuals disinfect the pews and all surfaces that may have been touched, including and not limited to the podium.
The people who are at risk stay home. The people who have children usually stay home. But when you go to the grocery store, you will find people who don’t wear masks, or they wear masks with their noses sticking out, therefore projecting to society their ignorance.
Furthermore, you have individuals who wear gloves inappropriately and cross-contaminate everything as they use gloves in the store, touch their phone, put the phone to their face, take the gloves off, touch the INFECTED PHONE again in their car…… all the while feeling as if they have done something well. In actuality, all they have done is further the pollution the world suffers from every day. Where is that glove going? Not in recycling, I’m sure. It’s going to either pollute the ground or it will pollute the ocean (WHICH, FOR YOUR INFORMATION, produces more oxygen than the trees).
So, KAREN, gather. Go to church if you feel like it. Just be smart. Be safe. Think through your actions.
But hope all the while the people who still shop for nonessential items in crowded stores will cease fire on the church’s doors and quench the fires that burn the buildings to the ground because of the so-called “hypocrisy.”
– Katie Marie
The Recovering Legalist 
Ask dear Katie to read what happened at the Baptist church in Catoosa. 🙂
If that is the church that was burned down, that’s probably what she was referring to in her opinion piece.
Oh, wait, you’re probably talking about the church where everybody got sick.
Yes. But it’s recent. And they did everything right. I would have felt very safe there.
So what does one do?
I don’t know. Maybe do what Jesus did and preach outside?
I honestly don’t know. You know Anthony, for a legalistic IFB such as myself, this opens up the entire universal church versus local church Pandora’s Box.
I think the thing for me is this: (or things rather, is that older people wear it as a badge of honor to not miss church.
You know that’s double and triple times true in IFB’s, which this church in Ringgold is.
IFB’s also have the added problem of feeling shamed by the body if they miss church. Or shamed from the pulpit.
Sadly that’s a fact of life in IFBism. (But unless the SBC comes back to the KJV I’m going to stick with the IFB’s. Plus my pastor is really cool and isn’t like that.)
But going to church “no matter what” is generational in IFMism.
Knowing that scares me personally.
I have a child that broke their leg in February, still can’t walk and hasn’t been in school, the public, or the sun except maybe 3 days. I know that immune system is low.
I don’t want to expose that child.
So personally, I’m going to sit out church for a while longer.
I don’t envy the folks like yourself being faced with making the choice.
I really do feel for the quandary this puts you in. No joke.
I don’t have any qualms or guilt about not going for now.
But in my younger days I would have definitely worried what people thought of me!
I think it helps that my pastor was not raised IFB. He was Catholic.
Isn’t that cool!
All that having been said, I’ve only been to Walmart once and didn’t buy a thing.
Only because they were out of bread machines….
Oh, yes, I do understand that “what are other people thinking?” feeling. Got plenty of t-shirts.
Grace. That’s all I’m saying.
But is it grace to have church if people die because of it?
That’s not what I was referring to. I was referring to the critical attitudes of those who pass judgement without knowing the heart and the wounded people who live in fear of them.
I don’t think you have to be wounded to be influenced by your peer group. That’s just common to human nature.
True. But do you not suffer stress, fear, the inclination to keep things to yourself around people who are supposed to love with an agape love? The wound, for me, is the PTSD I still experience.
Once I understood that the specific local church I was in was cult-like, I was able to be disdainful of them.
Which I know is not very Christian of me, but it gave me the space I needed to judge them, instead of worry about them judging me.
It took a very specific event happening for that to be possible.
Then I gained more space mentally, emotionally, and physically from that one specific high-control church and I knew what to look out for.
Reading David Cloud materials helped me a lot because he wasn’t afraid to call out the monsters of the movement, like Hyles.
Jack Hyles isn’t the only one, but he sure perverted quite a lot of people and churches.
But yes, at the time, it was hurtful because I really wanted to be accepted by that group.
And possibly a number of them meant well. (I look back and see how so many of them actually walked in fear and I feel sorry for them.)
But you know how it is. The clique was “full time Christian service” versus everyone else.
I realize for you it was probably much different, especially if you grew up in it.
I know PK’s get judged so harshly by all sides.
For me, the issue is less about IFBism now. I’m more married to the idea that God’s Word is the KJV.
So my tent is not pitched towards defending IFMism at all.
But I’ve lived long enough to realize that all churches have cliques and hurtful things, wolves in sheep’s clothing’s and the whole 9 yards of things that are the antithesis of Jesus Christ.
After all, they’re all only human.
I agree with Katie. Most church members are at least as responsible as Wal-Mart shoppers. As for Catoosa, my reading of the AJC article shows that the prick in cases started prior to the church opening. When the church realized the increased in cases, they promptly closed again.
Thanks, Ken.
Should have been “uptick” in cases. I hate autocorrect!
I was wondering. I just figured, being a scientist and all, you must have known a few word uses of which I wasn’t familiar.
The thing about Walmart is that I can get in and out quickly and not sit inside a building for an hour with 100 other people.
There are several serious issues. Its a Pandemic. Its not a fashion show or game show. Its an actual pandemic. Going to the grocery store or Walmart is a significant risk.
Every handle you touch every breath you take could infect you. its a pandemic, an actual pandemic. The kind kings used to fear putting their food through fire before they touched it.
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That said because we are modern, have masks, stayed home, have hospitals we thumb our noses up at the pandemic suggesting we win because we are smarter. But we are not.
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In the grocery store they do not sanitize their hands between customers touching everyone’s goods and then the next guys transferring germs, including the flue and H1N1 and anything else that is out there.
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The best thing that happened was that we all stayed home for weeks. People otherwise do a terrible job. We might 99% of the time do OK but then we touch something or forget something.
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Going to Church in a pandemic or to a store is a risk. IF you “mitigate” risk, you can thumb your nose up… Great. But don’t be fooled. if someone has it and your dad gets it. You might be going to his funeral a week later. Good bye Dad. It was nice to know you.
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So, I am all for getting back but we are living among a bunch of fools who touched a thousand things others have touched. I literally carry a wet chemical filled rag into the grocery store so I literally do not touch a door with my own hands. And tell the cashier etc..etc.. I spray my groceries and put them away with wet hands that have chemical on them. I try and wait two days before I use them or wash them because I might have missed an area someone might have touched. This is not a game show its a pandemic.
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So. In church every time someone goes to the bathroom. Every door that is touched is a transfer spot. every time someone touches their face their hands are no longer sanitary. every singer generally will hit 8 ft not 6 ft. and mist can stay in the air and float for several minutes.
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Lets face it. the only reason you do not have it is because no one around you does. So, take full measures out of love for others. Have church outside, better yet, have it in a parking lot with people staying in their cars. And raise the roof. have some great singing and preaching. But do not use the bathrooms. Or have someone cleaning every part every time… And check peoples temperatures. give them information. Tell your people to stay out of walmart unless they can do several things and even then do it as little as possible. let others be stupid.
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It still support touch-less burger picnics. But with precaution. And It was nice knowing you Anthony. Your unfortunate death will sadden us all. You will be sorrily missed. Who would have thought that person it would affect would be you. take care! see you on the other side.
“So, take full measures out of love for others.”
Grace.
Yes, Love not in word but in deed. And we should be back in church, but only in a way that will protect people. Far to many are to bull headed and short sighted. We should have never let this get into 8 weeks and more. after some segregation we should have been back at church with over the top precautions. Its time the church contacts the Mayors and Politicians and says we are going back to church with Full mitigation. first in the church parking lots. Then in alternate services 3 or 4 if needed to keep crowding down and no use of public bathrooms and doors propped open for touch-less church. Even sanitation between services. Or delay services so there is one every other night of the week so that 2 days pass and the virus dies IF it was on a pew. and wipe it down anyways. don’t use hymn books etc. it can be done. but its a pandemic. Not a game show.
Grace is unmerited favour. Love is putting others ahead of your own needs. we are commanded so it is merited that we love. the grace is that we deserve judgment and god loved us anyways and provided a way of escape.
Maybe grace is when a elderly person cleans the whole church when others should be doing it. They are doing something for others they do not deserve. That is love beyond measure.
Unfortunately some will let that person die and say Opps. Oh, look they got covid. and they themselves did not stick their neck out to help. Sober conversations need to be had and church needs to come back for reverence to Christ but also so that peoples faith can be supported. Jesus has gone away for 2000 years. Some are weaker than others. we need to strengthen those feeble knees…knowing we are spiritually frail. If Peter could turn back out of fear of a girl calling him out. any of us could abandon the faith. But who is worried about that. Who worries that the sheep are scattered. they could die if you leave them out there but they could die if you bring them in.
Here is a news flash. Churches have a lot of old people in them. Among others but a lot of old none the less.
As God as my witness. I have seen people to totally oblivious to the seriousness and others having panic attacks not yet leaving their houses.
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I am working for a guy right now who is 74. I take measures every day. Or, I could kill him. The thought that I would say that I am not my brothers keeper and just rush in suggests that I might as well get a steak knife and use it.
I am the first to say lets move it. And sure, but more than most, I look at all the options.
When a hot water tank bursts and a customer calls, I run out the door to save the customer. Someone else might say, well I am busy now, how about Monday. We have a mix of people with all kinds of attitudes. So, while you and I might be careful, some may say, to H (hospital) with you I will not protect you I will just protect myself.
As leaders we need to anticipate the most idiotic and take measures to protect the vulnerable.
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Trump rightly says Church is an essential service. But Lord Help us all to take measures, or find someone who is a good thinker to help us plan to protect people.
someone might say, well we will put the Old people in one area. But that doesn’t do anything. It just plays chairs with them. We should take actual measures that make things touch-less. Using gloves and touching 50 things still spreads the virus to everything you touch.
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If you sanitize your gloves while you wear them you can divide that up. But better not touch. And assume everyone has failed to do their job properly.
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If you get hand sanitizer for people how much? if you don’t have enough and someone dies, then will it matter? So, someone might either have to buy a massive amount or literally pump one to see how many uses it has. And assume someone might use two pumps. When failure to act leads to death, which most are not used too, then you have to be sure of your actions.
Its amazing how people on the CN tower are cautious. They feel the risk, but with this pandemic. The sun is still warm when you go out side. it does not feel like a pandemic.
I write this because I, we have a judiciary duty as Christians to warn others to protect others even if its not our business. We need to warn one another share Ideas with one another. This is my Command not stupid stuff. This is my command that you love one another. What good is it if you tell someone be well and fed but do not supply for their needs.
In the same way are we so dull that we cant appropriate that? Are we so slow not to see that this applies to all our conduct including protection of peoples health.
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If someone smoked in our church we would call them out from the pulpit. But if someone kills your board members will you pat them on the back? We need to have strait talk with people. That they will not be coming in to the church or doing this or that to risk anyone. Its no different than them waving a gun around. Its 90,000 thousand people serious.
In my mind, we should see to it that there is 100% compliance and no death from church attendance. And its going to be a tough time getting back. But maybe the first 2 years the preachers can talk about being your brothers keeper. that might help.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/community/organizations/index.html