The Gospel Herald reports…
“After much attention sparked by Pastor Mark Driscoll’s visit to John MacArthur’s cessationist Strange Fire Conference in California, Driscoll has formally invited Pastor MacArthur to the national Resurgence Conference in Seattle in November.
Driscoll, who is a continuationist, was stopped by security from handing out free copies of his upcoming book, “A Call to Resurgence: Will Christianity Have a Funeral or a Future?”
This morning, Driscoll addressed a letter to MacArthur explaining in detail what happened at the Strange Fire Conference, and inviting him to dialogue about the person and work of the Holy Spirit.
He began by saying that he had gleaned much wisdom from MacArthur’s teachings as a new believer in Christ – “You have made deposits in my life through your ministry and for that I thank God and appreciate you,” said Driscoll.
Pastor Mark, who had tweeted that his books had been confiscated at MacArthur’s Strange Fire Conference last week, complimented the staff and seminary students he met there, saying they were very hospitable, gracious, and kind.
“The only difficult moments on my visit came during my interactions not with your pastoral staff, but with a few of the apparently staff security personnel,” said Driscoll, who had begun handing out free copies of his upcoming book to conference attendees.
“The pastoral staff said I was welcome on campus … however, there were two security guards who seemed to operate in a manner inconsistent with the permission I received from the pastoral staff,” he explained.
The security detail told Driscoll that he could not hand out any more books, and that they would need to be removed or the guards would have to “take it to the next level.”
They offered to take the books to Driscoll’s car – “It was at this point that I told the security guard that, since they were going to confiscate the books anyway, they could just keep them as a gift from me,” said Driscoll.
He wrote to MacArthur, “Out of respect for you, I said nothing unkind about you or your ministry to anyone on my visit … I am grateful I got to hang out for a bit and meet some of the pastoral staff and your son. I would’ve been glad to have met you as well.”
Driscoll then addressed the more important issue at hand – that MacArthur, who does not believe that the gifts of the Holy Spirit are present in the church today, claims that continuationists are offering “strange fire” – unacceptable worship – to the Lord.
“I would agree with you that error and excess are often perpetrated, tragically, in the name of the Holy Spirit. This grieves him deeply … I also think that, since the majority of Christians worldwide are not cessationists (believing that some gifts of the Spirit have ceased), it is unreasonable and unhelpful to broad brush faithful brothers and sisters in Christ along with those who may not be faithful or may not even be brothers and sisters in Christ.”
Driscoll invited MacArthur to the upcoming Resurgence conference so that the two can speak with one another – rather than about one another – in an attempt to break down the “tribalism” which exists between the different Christian schools of thought. “At this point, I believe what would honor Jesus is for us to sit down and talk,” Driscoll concluded – “Ours will be a dialogue on very important issues, and I pray by the Spirit’s power we can model some graciousness and clarify terms while striving to state what we believe to be biblical truth.”
Driscoll hopes that MacArthur will accept his invitation to both dialogue and set an example for Christians who may disagree on theological matters.
“I believe this could be a very profitable discussion-especially for young leaders who will be tuning in to learn as we model how to handle disagreement. In our day when online misquoting and Internet flame throwing hinder real progress, I truly believe we have a great opportunity to model a different way of dealing with important issues for God’s glory,” he said.”
Group Sects 
I dunno, though, Greg, pastrix sounds kind of cool to the lay person. If I were a chick preacher with tatts, and an attitude, and someone attempted to insult me with the title I’d probably wear it as a badge too.
Something like the methodist tag placed on Wesley, who always considered himself Church of England, or charismatic on John Osteen, who always considered himself a Baptist preacher.
I got your double entendre, Q, and it was worth a chuckle. I also thought your longer comment was legendary and very funny in a take notice kind of way.
There’s too much criticism and Christian slapping going on around the Body right now instead of getting on with the essential work of winning souls. We’ll have plenty of time to sort out schisms and differences when we stand before the Lord and answer for what we’ve been doing all this time. Are we so focused on blaming our brethren for this or that perceived error to realise we have disengaged form the great commission? Will the Almighty question us on this and our other motives?
The world’s breeding at a rapid rate, and ‘life is very short, and there’s no time for fussin’ and fighting’ my friends. I have always thought that it’s a crime, so I will ask you once again – try to see it my way, then you will see that if I’m right I can’t be wrong, while, to see it your way, there is a chance we’ll fall apart before too long. We can work it out.’
Good on this preacher girl for taking the pastrix, and for keeping her attitude in check when meeting her greatest critic. And good on him for looking at her with the eyes of Christ and not the accuser.
There is a lesson there I think.
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each to his own. 🙂
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I like pastrixes with tatts.
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btw, I like Yonggi Cho.
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@Bones
5.5 mill?
Huh? chicken feed! My pastor stole 15 million and made us triple tithe, and we had to lick his car clean after church. You young people have it easy!
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hehehehe…good for you Q
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who likes Yonggi Cho, and of course he’s bad because he’s charismatic
Maybe more to do with $5.5 million in tax evasion and $9 million stock loss he’s been indicted for.
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“here’s another update, you can make your own judgment as to my source”
Margot…..Margot….. I get it. I’m not defending the guy. I’m just surprised why this is the big news at the moment. Who is Mark Driscoll anyway? I never thought of him as some super serious man of God. He’s a guy who is great at speaking, communicating, and drawing attention to himself.
Is the blogosphere going to be going nuts until he makes some big public apology?
Quite frankly the whole thing is a laugh to me. Or something to cry over.
So there’s a big conference where some preacher is slamming half the body of Christ and selling books in the process. He’s also slammed Driscoll. Driscoll who spends lots of time slamming others and saying crazy stuff gatecrashes the convention and announces it on twitter.
and….
and???
in the meantime, most people think Christians are nuts anyway, people are dying and bushfires are racing out of control.
And the Christian world is upset about some young loud mouth preacher having fun at the expense of some super serious guy who thinks he needs to set America straight about other people?
eh….who cares?
Driscoll’s a punk, and mccarthur is a sourpuss. ANd they both think Joel smiley Osteen is bad, and Mccarthur doesn’t like Piper anymore, and people don’t Driscoll because he hangs out with Rick Warren who is terrible because I think he talked to Osteen, who as you know is really bad and had coffee with Brian Houston, whose wife said Kingdom women like sex, and she’s also been known to say hello to Pringle who likes Yonggi Cho, and of course he’s bad because he’s charismatic, and their fire is strange because…
Okay, everyones bad.
Except Jesus, Q and Greg – but he has tattoos. So it’s me and Jesus, oh and Margot. But I’m not reformed, so Jesus and Margot and that Chris guy who goes through sermons line by line.
Okay, Chris Rodenschoden and Jesus.
iow, is it really that much of a big deal?
It’s like the whole Christian world is spending it’s time trying to prove who is the one true pure ministry and who isn’t.
Anyway, I still think it’s lame. I wanted to see Driscoll body slam someone, and then see the security guy hit him over the head with a box of books.
In the end, it was all pretty tame. Boys will be boys. That’s why we need women in ministry.
Cat fights are more interesting.
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Well that’s not ever going to happen – as they never owned or operated our blog…its just named in honour of the blog they ran, so they can’t take it back anywhere. As far as popularity is concerned – we don;t have the same number or diversity of commenters, but we get a very large number of individual visits each day. You’re infrequent visits must have been recent for you to know what books I buy.
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@ Q – here’s another update, you can make your own judgment as to my source 🙂 ……
http://www.parkingspace23.com/open-letter-mark-driscoll/
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Nobody got my double meaning joke.
Unless it was just too lame…
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@ Greg – if you have an issue with me, why not private message me and explain? This is hardly the place. Opposing views should up for healthy discussion not strange accusations of “vileness”?
Visits to SP02? Occasionally, one comment in 14 months.
I guess I live in hope that one day Dan & Phil McCredden will pick up the reins and take the blog back to its former popularity.
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Of course your comment just goes to show that mothing has changed with you – you can’t even tell a good true story!
“Pastrix” is a demeaning term used to refer to female ministers by certain Christians who believe in male-only pastoral ministry. But Denver-based Lutheran Rev. Nadia Bolz-Weber, a tattooed yet traditional liturgist, has reclaimed it as a title for her brand of faith. “It was an insult, and anytime you can reclaim an insult as a good thing, you win,” says Bolz-Weber.
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Oh and Margot – SNAP! Baited, hooked and reeled you in like an amatuer fisher
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No, she doesn’t call herself ‘pastrix’ because of him..the title of the book is called that as a laugh at all those who would deminish her call to ministry as a pastor, and yes, I did konw that she and Chris are friends, and it was good to read that. you on the other hand seem to still be unable to stay away from signposts02 – just a lurker – loking for amunition for your vileness on churchwatchwhateva.com
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@ Greg – 🙂 🙂 🙂 That’s funny coming from a guy who likes Nadia Bolz-Weber enough to buy her book. I suppose you realize she’s good mates (in a love /hate sort of way) with my other “hero” Chris Rosebrough. She calls herself “pastrix” because of him. And its the difference between how she reacts to the “kool aid” people and the way you do……
“Jesus tells you to love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, not so that you can be good, but so you can be free!
This is freedom from the corrosive distortions of hatred, freedom from having to protect yourself, prove yourself and preserve your rightness. This is the freedom of the gospel, the freedom of God who loved God’s own enemies enough to die for them.
I’ll end with a story about how you just never know when God might make your enemy your friend.
Chris Rosebrough hosts a conservative Christian radio talk show titled “Pirate Christian Radio.” He once spent two of his shows talking about me and how I am disobeying God by being a female pastor, I’m a heretic because I have gay folks in my church, etc., etc. You get the idea.
A few months later he showed up at a conference I was speaking at in Minneapolis-St. Paul.
You should know that I’m a fighter and my first response to situations is not always my actual final response, but initially, I’m upset. Usually God quickly moves me to deal with the situation graciously, but initially I’m wired as a fighter.
So when I heard he was there I went into a mini rage: “He shouldn’t be here! Don’t show me who he is, I’m not talking to him!”
Clearly he was my enemy.
But the next day a middle-aged guy with a beer gut and a bad goatee walked up to me after I had spoken, extended his hand and said, “Hi. I’m Chris …” I swallowed hard, extended my hand, said a quick “help me” prayer and we proceeded to have a conversation about our need for God’s grace, forgiveness of sins and the Eucharist.
A conversation in which he cried twice. At the end I said, “Chris, I have two things to say to you. One, you are a beautiful child of God and two, I think you and I were desperate enough to hear the gospel today that we might even be able to hear it from each other.”
Now Chris calls me every couple of months and we talk for an hour. He hasn’t written about me or talked about me on his radio show and he’s gotten into a lot of trouble from his followers for calling me his friend.
Did this happen because I managed to make my heart feel really nice, warm, fuzzy feelings toward him?
Clearly not.
I can’t stand the guy.
This was a loving-my-enemy that only could flow from the heart of a forgiving God.
The same God who in the book of Ezekiel says, “I your God will give (you) a (new) heart and put a new spirit within (you); I will remove (your) heart of stone and give (you) a heart of flesh” (11:19).
And that is what freedom feels like. May it be so. Amen”
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Too late Bones, Margot has already held that conference. Q, just so you know, Margot has drunk all the Kool Aide there is to be drunk as far as John Macarthur and his bullshit reformed nazis are concerned – I personaly mistrust any of her sources
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@Margot. that’s exactly what I thought happened. I just don’t think it’s the end of the world.
And it doesn’t surprise me that Driscoll would do that. He’s a publicity hound.
@Bones. If you wrote a book called the Missionary Position, Greg would probably attack it for being symptomatic of archaic Judeo-Christian male dominance thinking and counter it with something like
On Enabling Christian Women to Ascend to their Rightful Place
oh forget it. Too much bad news has warped my brain.
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“I’m also looking at running a conference titled “The Remnant”. I’m running it in my lounge room. Basically it’s about how I’m the only real Christian in the world.”
haha, I’ll gate crash with my book. If nobody turns up maybe we can just have a few beers.
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Brian Houston and John Bevere should have turned up as well to flog their books and DVDs.
Next time I’ll turn up with my book tentatively called The Missionary Position and Greg can turn up with his tattoo shop.
That’s what conferences are for.
What happens when one pastor desperately promoting a book clashes with another pastor desperately promoting a book?
I’m also looking at running a conference titled “The Remnant”. I’m running it in my lounge room. Basically it’s about how I’m the only real Christian in the world.
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@ Q – just so you get what really goes (don’t rely on Steve, be Berean and do your own research) 🙂
http://mennoknight.wordpress.com/2013/10/19/driscoll-macdonald-strange-fire-and-leslie-nielsen/
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Rats. No fight? I was hoping Driscoll would have body slammed some people.
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