The following is from the CoG forum Ambassador Watch. I thought the poster made some good observations:
Dennis said...
In my experience, ministers react badly to questions when the questions cannot be dismissed out of hand. Most questions like that are never asked to begin with. When a student myself, WCG had a large tome that answered "difficult scriptures." It was really a book that prooftexted it's way along to uphold already understood beliefs by the church. In hindsite, the book showed a terrible lack of even knowing what questions to ask. Dave Pack loved this tome and I believe adopted it in RCG.
Churches don't exist for growth...they exist to perpetuate sameness. I would love to return to former classes knowing what I know now. Of course they would be former classes never completed by me thrown out.
Every minister and member adopts a story about what they Bible says. That's what denominations are and why they exist as there is no one way to see it all clearly. When you begin to see it more clearly and question the mythological vs. historical or literally true vs. Midrashically true, well moving on is not far in your future. WCC and COG ministers, along with most, are not well able to sincerely say, "Now that's a good question."
For example, I had a client who lost an only daughter to a car wreck recently ask me, "why is it such a big deal that God gave 'his only begotten' son as a sacrfice for us, when he knew he'd get him back in three short days, fully God again? My daughter is still dead." Now that's a good question. She asked, "should a real sacrifice not stay dead to be a real sacrifice?" You see her question was born of real pain and real life and it made her think about the stories she had been told about how hard it was for God to give Jesus. Maybe not as hard for God as it was to her after losing her only begotten. It is a good question and that's all I said to her as we talked about how to cope. If you ask that kind of question in a COG setting, well somehow you are going to marginalize yourself a bit with others because it shows you think and are willing ask hard questions. It also challenges core beliefs. It probably will catch up with you eventually in any setting that demands sameness.
Never close your mind to a better answer and never think you have the final one. We're all here to learn and while most churches claim we are to "grow in grace and KNOWLEDGE," they seldom like it when one actually does.. The translation of that is .."Grow in the Grace we permit and the knowledge we have for you to memorize." Life is not a game and truth should actually be encouraging to those who seek encouragement.
So, how would you have answered this woman?