1. The music did not bring us under its power. We were not gyrating in hedonistic abandon in the service like you seem to think. We stood in worshipful adoration of a soverign creator who saved us by the power of his marvelous grace.
2. We feel that our worship is expedient. The Psalms tell us to worship God with music of all kinds. They tell us to sing new songs with a loud noise. Since it is expedient to obey the scripture, our worship passes your second test.
3. Since most of the lyrics in the songs are based on scripture or quote directly from it, you can see that our songs are edifying.
4. Beause our music is upbeat and encouraging, we are attracting people to church. We are drawing them in with our lively spirit and sharing the gospel with them. Far from causing others to stumble, we are seeing souls saved nearly every week. In fact, we have seen more people come to Christ in the last month at The Agora than we saw the entire time we were at your church.
   

Since you were kind enough to send me the Four Tests, I though you would appreciate it if I applied them to one of your favorite activities – The Carry-In Dinners that your church hosts every month.

1. Does it bring me under its power?
Since you seem pretty addicted to fried chicken (even encouraging people to bring plenty to the dinners) you have obviously fallen completely under the power of the red & white bucket. You should cancel your next Carry-In Dinner and announce that instead you are going to have a church-wide fast. This should free you and your members from satiating your fleshly lusts.

2. Is it expedient?
Since the Bible speaks often on the subject of fasting, it is clearly not expedient to have church Carry-In Dinners. Nowhere in the Bible are you admonished to eat so much that you have to “let the old belt out a notch or two,” as you say after nearly every meal. In fact, 1 Corinthians 11:22 warns against this very thing, telling you to keep your feasting at home.

3. Does it edify?
I admit that eating second and third helpings of sumptuous dinners on a monthly basis may build you up. Unfortunately, the only part of you it will build up is your waste size and the reading on your bathroom scale. I doubt that your gluttony builds you up spiritually. In fact, satisfying your stomach most likely hinders your spiritual growth.

4. Does it help or hinder my fellow man or cause him to stumble?
The fact that your church hosts those Carry-In dinners on a regular basis indicates to me that you, in your capacity as pastor, are causing plenty of people to stumble at the sin of gluttony. You are a hindrance to their continued spiritual growth by failing to cultivate, demonstrate and encourage the spiritual discipline of fasting.

Since you are so spiritual, I am confident that you will be ending the wicked, sinful, gluttonous hedonism of Carry-In Dinners at your church. I believe your warning against practicing things that appeal to the flesh is timely and I look forward to seeing you put your own warning into practice by abstaining from church-sanctioned gluttony. Let me know when you have finally stopped engaging in this dangerous practice of appealing to the flesh and we might give thoughtful consideration to your warnings. Only then can you write to me and tell me how bad the Agora is.

Respectfully,
Gaius

As you can tell, he is an impertinent, disrespectful and unrepentant reprobate. He is rude and judgmental. I find it to be the height of hypocritical hubris for him to think he could possibly judge me or my preferred style of worshipping God through celebratory feasting. His condemnatory tone was unconscionable. I decided to shake the dust off my feet against him and leave him to continue his inexorable slide down the slippery slope to hell where he is bound.

Let this be a warning to you all. Once you begin to exercise your liberty, it inevitably leads you deeper and deeper into sin. A girl who petitions her parents to wear slacks will not stop there. If her parents give in, she will then ask to wear capris. Her parents, thinking it is just a tiny step that makes no real difference, will relent. Next she will ask for loose shorts, then tight shorts and eventually she will end up dressed in nothing but a thong – all because her parents first let her put on a pair of slacks.

A young boy who starts out wanting to listen to contemporary Christian music (because of it’s “uplifting message”) is doomed to end his days at a heavy metal rock concert strung out on alcohol or drugs and covered in the blood of live chickens who have had their heads bitten off on stage.

Don’t let this happen to you! Avoid any church that appears to have even the merest hint of fun.

The inspiration for this post can be found here.