Flock Is Now a Fight Team in Some Ministries

As I started reading this article and I read that John Renken, a pastor in Memphis Tennessee said, “Father, we thank you for tonight,” he said. “We pray that we will be a representation of you." I didn't think to much of this at first. I thought well this sounds like a normal things that a pastor would say to his congregation. But when I continued on to the next line and read how one of the members of the congregation had gotten in a fight and had John Renken encouraging him to fight I thought this is strange. This congregation along with other in the area took John Renken's words literally. To represent Jesus. I don't understand this. I don't understand how these people think that through violence they are doing what Jesus wants them to do. The article said that the members of this congregation thought that Jesus had to fight for what he wanted and what he believed in so that they should do the same. These fights aren't only taking place among one congregation. This idea of violence for Jesus has spread. We don't read stories or bible versus about Jesus beating men up to accomplish his goals. He preached about forgiveness and was said to be a healer but I don't believe he was violent. I could be wrong, I have not read the whole bible. I have my own views on Jesus and Christianity, but I don't think Jesus would want others being violent in order to live the way he did. As I wrote in my previous blog post I think that violence is never the answer, especially when trying to get close to God. In fact I think in order to get close to God or Jesus you must perform acts of peace and kindness.

 In this article a pastor in South Mountain Community Church in Draper Utah said, “You have a lot of troubled young men who grew up without fathers, and they’re wandering and they’re hopeless and they’re lousy dads themselves and they’re just lost,” I think this means that these boys growing up without there fathers want to make a conscious effort not to be like them, and maybe by an act of violence they can do this. If you are  violent and not scared to fight for what you want, maybe they think that it makes the fighting worthwhile. I understand fighting for what you believe in and working hard to get what you want, but I just don't agree with using violence to get there.