Is the role of a Church to make people feel more sinful?

Question

I read this comment in an article regarding a local Presbyterian church which is joining another more conservative denomination.

"In his sermon on sin and forgiveness, the Rev. Howard spoke of the Reformation movement that Martin Luther started in the 16th century. In Luther's day, he said, the problem was that the church and culture stressed sin to the virtual exclusion of grace. The problem now, he said, is that sin is given so little weight that it's hard for people to feel the need for salvation through Christ."

This makes it sound like they have to make peope feel more sinful in order for them to need the Church. Isn't that guilting people into belonging?

Any comments?

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07253/816134-85.stm

I mean, I have thought that before, it was just odd to hear a Presbyterian minister voice that opinion.

Answer 1

By the way i understand it, religion and spirituality are two totally and entirely different things.
Religion, and going to church is a way of belonging to the community, being "a part of" for lack of a better phrase.
I have a problem with any entity that uses guilt as a motivator. I think we need to seek our own spiritual path and come into a relationship with a god of our understanding to fulfill a deeper more intrinsic void in our hearts, life and soul. This may include religion to some....but not for me.
I would not want to be a part of anything that had threats of violence and preached anything like the jonathon edwards sermon, "Sinners in the hands of an angery god"

My god is one of love, patience and understanding...allowing me to make my own choices and suffer the consequences of those choices...until i come to a basic truth and understanding.

just my humble pagan thoughts

blessings
)o(
trinity

Answer 2

The report speaks for itself.

In the early church the priests kept the "good bool" and the church service in Latin that only priests knew.

All the little-informed believers were told was that they were sinful, in need of forgiveness.

The early church had no bibles in congegation's everyday language so they could not go "back to Bible fundamentals" depending solely on the priest as a go-between to God.

This reminds me of the old testiment, where bloody sacrifices were incessant, and no one dared say G_d's name.

Now people have learned "God IS Love".

This was a central teaching of Jesus in the New Testiment.

But people have lost site of God's wrath.

Folks think they are "OK", because they imagine a God of easy forgiveness, so soft that maybe hell is empty and every low-life is so loved that they get into heaven on a free pass.

This is like Dr Spock's child-raising advice to not spank. although the Bible said you can.

Ironically, Spock's own grandchild (not his son as some believe) commited suicide! So much for his theory of "sparing the rod".

Well, sometime a little "pop on the bum" keeps an unruly child ALIVE, when the kid foolishly insists on darting into traffic.

There is a hell, and people do go there, foolishly like an unspanked child darting in front of a car, of their OWN free will.

Their sadly "unforgiveable" sin is rejecting The (only) Way, across that great divide between life on this sin-cursed planet and eternal paradise with God.

Answer 3

Wow! Good point! We see it on here all the time, how people do not like to be preached to about their sins or the 'fire and brimstone' teachings of days gone by, but no one has brought this up, have they? I don't think it's making people 'feel more sinful' as much as laying a 'conviction on the spirit' for one to recognize the need to correct a sin in their lives. You know how sometimes you go to church and lo and behold somehow the preacher seems to be directing his sermon right @ you? I feel that's my conviction of my spirit telling me to recognize an area of my spiritual growth that needs help. Ministers I've asked about this, agreed, and said you wouldn't believe how many parishioners remark to them, "How did you know to preach that sermon today that was exactly what I needed to hear?" So I don't think we do need to say , "Repent or go to hell." If a discussion touches the heart of someone, that's all they should need to sit up and take notice that something may be amiss in their lives.

Answer 4

When I read the quote that isn't what I thought- that is just me though. I took it as people are doing whatever they want and don't seem to care if it is right, wrong or impacts anyone else as long as they feel good for the moment- people need to start focusing a little more on things other then themselves. I can see though how people would take that comment as you did; I don't like the way he puts it in the end- "it's hard for people to feel the need for salvation through Christ," to me that does sound like he is trying to sell the church...

Answer 5

First of all I'm not about guilt at all. However, there are some good things that the church does:
*It makes people feel a sense of belonging to a community.
*It teaches discipline, (for instance not eating meat on Fridays) and in doing so I feel it shows us that we don't have to follow the crowd.
*It should teach people to be compassionate and loving toward one another. Since we are people and fall short of our goals, sometimes this doesn't happen, rather what I see is if you are not a part of "my church or community" I judge you.

In most Christian churches there is no argument whether or not we are sinners and that we need a higher power of sorts to forgive us for what we are. It is up to the individual what they want to believe. Like I said I don't subscribe to guilt. God made me with the same stuff he made the most perfect of all creatures. To say that we are not what we are supposed to be because of free will is to insult God in my opinion. And to believe there is a huge war going on in the heavens to me is insane, as if God could lose.

I do believe that religion is political and a big money making industry, especially when I see the homes that some pastors live in. There's definitely no oath of poverty there. Things are so twisted imho Is there any getting back to what Christ really taught? I don't think he asked his followers for a 5% tithing and got rich off his followers. He taught us to give but not in the twisted way that we are being asked, not to get something in return like I hear at many churches. I've heard, "when you tithe it is returned to you." I want to shout, is that really giving if you think you destined to have it returned to you?!

Yes, the church actually had a buy your way out of hell, (look up indulgences) for a large fee you could be guaranteed not to go to hell, yey. You could light a votive for someone's soul for a small fee if you were poor. Yeah, history repeats itself only not as blatantly.

Answer 6

First, No one can make you feel sinful. If you are not convicted by the Holy Spirit and regretful, you simply are not. If you dont feel you have done anything wrong how can someone make you feel like you have done wrong? Secondly, it is not right to point our fingers (Christians) at non-believers (Matthew 7:1-5) Thirdly, I do believe that people are more open to alternate lifestyles now than they ever have been (although there is still a LOT to overcome be it race/sexual orientation/religion) and so what one might have considered a sin before is seen as "old fashioned thinking" and not a sin. Maybe this is what he meant? It is not our place to judge, only God can do that.
Peace and Blessings

Answer 7

More sinful. I don't think we can become more sinful, but then of course we can. What we do need is to have pastors and preachers and priests teaching that sin must be dealt with and when we ask forgiveness we must turn from it and ask the Holy Spirit to take it from us. We grieve the Holy Spirit instead of surrendering to the Holy Spirit. The Judgment of God is falling on the church and God is requiring that the church be clean. We tolerate sin and God does not tolerate sin.

There are 7 churches in Revelation and we are given examples of what our church must look like. We have wolves in the churches who pollute the flock. Some ministers are ministers of Satan, they don't even serve God. One of the best examples is LUKEWARM. If you go to church once on Sunday and do your own thing the remainder of the week how can you say you are nothing but lukewarm. If you don't recognize these days as the latter days, how can you say that you know the Word of God. You are commanded to know God's word. God is to be first in our lives. Who or what is first in your life?

For me, the only righteousness in me is Christ Jesus. Without Christ I am nothing. The Holy Spirit convicts me of sin and helps me remove it.

Most people don't even know that they need Christ or that they are sinning, because the church doesn't tell them. Churches have become social events and people pay $20.00 bucks to attend because that is what they would spend on entertainment. The priest,pastor or preacher is afraid to mention their sins because they won't come back for the social event. What they don't realize is at this moment people are yearning for guidance in a troubled world. God has given us His Word and the preachers must preach it. Their word means nothing. The Word of God is powerful.

How can the Holy Spirit convict if the preacher is not preaching the Word of God? Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Preach sin, preach love, preach it all. It is all the gospel of Jesus Christ. From Genesis to Revelation it is all about Jesus.

Answer 8

The Presbyterian Church in the U.S. is apostate. This statement above is nothing more than a justification of going overboard the wrong way.

The whole comment shows an utter lack of understanding of the role of the Holy Spirit in the life of a Christian.

Run, don't walk, away.

.

Answer 9

You're thoughts are acceptably logical. The church thrives on the do's and dont's of God. And without people feeling the need of doing/following God's rules, leaves the church powerless.

Sin is not defined by society but how a person sees what is sinful or not.

The church can be seen as to guilting people as you said, to make the church be needed by society.

Answer 10

"Sinner's in the Hands of an Angry God", was not preached by a man trying to guilt people into giving him money.

Oh how I long for the days when preachers taught that to believe is to repent. The first the devils can do, they cannot, however, repent.

Easy believism reigns, and so many think they have a security that was never offered them by God.