A Church has completely closed down a whole branch for choosing gay (LGBT) over Jesus Christ.
The Evangelical Covenant Church last week, voted to expel a pastor and the entire congregation from its denomination due to a disagreement over LGBT policy.
When the final vote was called, over three-quarters of the more than 1,000 delegates decided to remove the church. Currently, the denomination has 875 U.S. churches with roughly 300,000 members.
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First Covenant Church was officially removed from its parent denomination for being “out of harmony on human sexuality,” and pushing a policy of LGBT inclusion and approval.
First Covenant, an historic church located in downtown Minneapolis, was a founding member of the 134-year-old denomination.
The Minneapolis church came under the microscope on the issue back in 2014, when the music director performed an off-site gay wedding. The final decision, however, was made after the church announced that active LGBTQ members could now be fully-fledged members of the church, that they would be allowing married gay clergy to serve on the leadership, and would also be open to facilitating same-sex marriages.
In addition to the expelling of the congregation, the church’s lead pastor,
Rev. Dan Collison, was also taken off the register of ministers officially serving in the Evangelical Covenant.
The Star Tribune reports the church’s vote ended a five-year conflict with Rev. Dan Collison and his First Covenant Church over allowing same-sex marriage.
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Collison was voted out of his position by a 77 percent vote at the ECC’s annual meeting in Omaha, Nebraska. It was the first time a pastor and a church have been involuntarily removed in the denomination’s history
For some years, Rev. Collison had been engaged in a perpetual battle with his denomination over issues of pastoral ministry with regards to the LGBTQ community.
“I’m deeply saddened this ecclesial body doesn’t make room for openly LGBT individuals, other than to say you’re welcome but we won’t treat you equally,” Collison said in response to the decision, according to Religious News Service. “Ultimately, it becomes a question of what is love about and what is inclusion about. It breaks my heart.”
Collison has served as First Covenant’s pastor since 2009. He will continue serving as lead pastor, according to the local church.
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The ECC, however, believe that each of its member churches must hold to a clearly-defined standard when it comes to issues of marriage and sexuality.
“There is now a movement seeking to subvert the historic trust we have placed in the discernment of the Annual Meeting,” the ECC’s
President John Wenrich wrote in a letter to denomination members. Wenrich believes that certain churches are attempting to overwhelm the decision-making bodies with LGBT issues, instead of focusing on other matters of equal importance.
“If these groups are successful in such efforts, we will continue to devote time, energy, and resources to conversations we have held now for more than 20 years, diverting our focus away from topics such as immigration, mass incarceration, justice and evangelism—matters that have never needed the presence of the faithful more than they do now,” Wenrich added.
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In a statement released on the denomination’s website, Wenrich added that he “grieved the loss of First Covenant Church of Minneapolis from the roster of Covenant churches.”
He did, however, hope that the situation would eventually be turned around and that the church would ultimately be welcomed back into the fold.
“I respect the discernment of the Annual Meeting,” he added. “I hope this historic church someday changes its mind and then returns to our family.”
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It’s very unfortunate that some of the Christian’s of today wants to be called children of God but don’t want to pay the price.
Hi Miryam, I take it that you mean that some Christian want to be called Christians but they do not want to stop sinning. Is that right?
If the Catholic Church does this I move
You are free to go now. If you support buggery you are not Christian let alone a Catholic: buggery is as bad as cheating on his wife, theft, rape murder and other serious crimes – it is sin. You can go titillate you on a wooden broomstick if you like, but, you are not to do it near me or my family. You may not pretend in a church of God. You may pretend that it is the will of God that bumbandits bugger each other, but it is not true. When you repent from sin I will be the first to give you a smile and a hug and even a job. Until them “Out damned spot!”
Thank God.
But of a truth any building or group of people calling themselves The Church are false.
The Church of Christ Jesus is made up of people who Are Called Of Jesus Christ who He alone adds to when He so chooses. He will bring them together and where two are gathered ln His name there is a part of the Body of Christ.
Any building bearing a name, church, is a man made organisation and you need to Come out of Babylon now.
In this Laodesion hour Christ Jesus our Lord speaks to the individual. Please read the message. Let The Spirit purge you and make you whole by His Fire.
Now is the time to have our lamps full of the oil of His Spirit for as He calls us out unto Him we require His Life that suos with Him and He with us to sustain us until we meet Him Face to Face to receive the fullness of our salvation that allows us to continue on in Him and with Him and Part of His Body. Jesus Christ being The Head from which every part ……