Disquieting: Day 10

Word Count: 60,011

Summary of Events:

On Thursday Matthew went to Mr. Millard's house, hopeful that the other people he'd meet and the topics they might discuss would help him to figure out which church Mr. Millard attended and why he and these other people were inclined to seek a replacement for their current pastor — as Kirk had told him there was no church in town which was lacking a pastor. After dinner the men grilled Matthew on a variety of topics that Matthew felt, for one thing, were matters on which individual Christians were free to come to their own decisions on, and, for another, weren't the sort of things that were relevant when it came to the purpose, function, and mission of the church…

Excerpt of the Day:

“You seem to me to be avoiding the questions,” Mr. Franke snapped derisively.

“Whatever do you mean?” Matthew asked.

“The Bible speaks on these matters quite clearly,” Mr. Franke replied. “But since you don’t know your Bible, you’re not addressing the questions.”

“I am well-versed in the Scriptures, I can assure you, Mr. Franke,” Matthew replied. “But if you would kindly apprise me of the references I’ve not been recalling relative to these matters, I would certainly be inclined to study them.”
Mr. Franke glared at Matthew. “If you know your Bible you shouldn’t need me to tell you where they are.”

“As much as I have read the whole Bible and committed portions of it to memory, my memory is not perfect, and I very well could be missing things,” Matthew replied.

“Not that the Bible needs to definitively speak to every single thing in order for the rightness or wrongness of each to be determined,” Mr. Franke snapped bitingly.

“Mr. Franke, the Bible is my guide,” Matthew said. “Where the Bible speaks strongly, I speak strongly, where the Bible speaks quietly, I speak quietly. I cannot make or endorse laws within the church which are not made or endorsed in the Bible.”

“The Bible doesn’t need to be invoked in everything.” Mr. Franke snapped.

“But the Bible declares of itself that it is given by the inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction, and instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works,” Matthew replied. “It is to be preached instant in season and out of season, and to be used for reproof, rebuke, exhortation with all longsuffering, and doctrine. Thus I, as a pastor, believe that the Bible is authoritative in all contexts, and that I cannot draw lines any more clearly or deeply than the Bible does, nor can I draw lines any less clearly or deeply than the Bible does.”

“You sound like a legalist to me,” Mr. Franke snapped.

“Mr. Franke,” Matthew replied. “I have been called to preach the Bible, thus I must submit to the authority thereof, as must any pastor, and any pastor who does not submit to the authority of the Word which he has been called to preach cannot be much of a pastor at all, for a pastor is a servant of God and a proclaimer of His Word as truth.”

Mr. Franke glared at Matthew, but made no further comments. Matthew looked at the other men gathered around him and had to admit that he had a sinking feeling that none of them were terribly pleased with what he’d said.

It seemed to him that these matters which they’d discussed with him so far were matters on which they disagreed with their pastor — not that Matthew was sure what they really had to do with the church — and believed were far more rigid and clear than they were in the Bible.