132 thoughts on “X Marks the…Divorce?”

  1. They clearly worship the IFB trinity, though in this case, the Bible comes before the Father and the Son. So heresy! Much heterodox! Very wow!

      1. So it does! LOL! I’ll attribute it to my Friday night dyslexia. I don’t want new glasses.

    1. It doesn’t say what the pay is. Or I might apply. Oh right, I was divorced 28 years ago and later remarried. And I can’t sign their doctrinal position. Screwed out of another promising career opportunity 🙁

        1. I was in my tropical environs last week ( where I’m moving) and it was -20 with a wind chill factor of -47. So there, Lady Semp..

        2. Ha! You’d probably have heat stroke in Michigan. It only gets to -15 there. It also gets warmer than 40+ in the summer.

        4. The climate is one big reason to go there. Also there are no trees (pesky things) blocking the view of the frozen Arctic Ocean and the tundra.

        6. “The climate is one big reason to go there. ” BJg, I’m so glad I’m drinking a margarita right now.

          Perhaps when it’s 95 here with a dewpoint of 72, yeah, the Arctic Circle is a great destination.

          I like trees. One day I flew east out of Midway. As we headed past Ohio it was so nice to see TREES. I think they are outlawed in Illinois and Indiana. New York has a lot of faults, but trees ain’t one of ’em.

        7. Uncle Wilver, mosquitoes are well, bad any where in my state in the summer. The further north, the mosquitoes are smaller, faster, and hence more difficult to swat.

          Lady Semp, I love trees (seriously). On my property here in the south central part of my state, we have hundreds of trees, and of course I’m keeping this house and property.

        8. Oh, and to the Illustrious Inimitable Lady Semp,
          I’d have to go 300 miles south to get to the Arctic Circle. I would have to travel 1100 miles north by air to reach the actual North Pole.
          BJg

        9. I’ve fed mosquitoes in the Boundary Waters area of Minnesota, the Montreal River area of Canada, the Amazon region of Brasil, and the Okefenokee Swamp in South Georgia (among others). I look forward to feeding Alaska mosquitoes one day.

        10. I’ll stay here in Margaritaville. It’s pleasant and sans bugs at the moment.

          The more you talk of Alaska’s charms, BJg, the more convinced I am that staying in the lower 48 was one of the best decisions I’ve made.

        11. We have a fair amount of trees in the desert. Seriously. Mesquite, palo verde, ironwood, cotton wood, and several other fairly low water trees thrive in the Tucson area.

    2. Technically “divorcee” with two e’s at the end means a divorced woman. So is a divorced man OK?

    3. Dear rtgmath:

      I’ve got half a mind to contact Mr. Swain and ask for more information on the pastoral weirdness expected at Grace Bible Church. But then, I never did have more than half a mind…

      Christian Socialist

  8. I had looked it up, so saw that too, rtgmath. But the way they put it on their poster needed a little clarification, hay-men?

    1. Since it was posted at GRTS it seems they might be hoping for seminary. As it was already mentioned, it seems unlikely that someone from there would be interested.

      the Admiral

    2. Only a man (which is common for Fundy churches) and only a divorced man (which is very uncommon).

      1. CS,

        I find it amusing, in a sad sort of way, that the first thing we are inclined to seek out is a MAN to guide us and solve our problems.

        Just like Israel demanded a king, so we demand our own king, the PASTOR.

        B.R.O.

        1. Dear BigRedOne:

          … and then we dress him in a suit and tie, rather than a robe and stole, so that he could walk into any other boardroom and pass as a CEO. BigRedOne, you’ve given me some food for thought… Thanks.

          Christian Socialist

  13. Why bother with the non-denom “Bible Church” name/branding if you are gonna blast out that you are KJVO?

  14. Perhaps the x in the circle is meaning not divorced? IDK.

    But my favorite is “Jesus was conceived in Mary’s womb by the Holy Spirit.” Test tube babies are something rather new in the history of the world…..weren’t all babies until the 20th century conceived in a womb?

    3. My guess is that the virgin birth may hit close to home with somebody’s infidelity. Along with the “no divorcees” afterthought.

      Years ago we were visiting fundy churches in advance of a move. Visited with one pastor and got something of a creepy vibe from him, but attributed it to cultural differences. When we came back a month later, he was gone — having run off with the church secretary. The church was reacting strongly with a new pastor, yelling, screaming, jumping on pews, loud haymens, and other attempts to show their spirituality.

      People tend to focus on items that hit fairly close to home. Maybe in surprising ways, but usually the focus has a reason.

      I wonder what went on before the old pastor left?

      1. It’s a pretty common thing for Virgin Birth to be used as a stand in for the fundamentals as defined by Machen. Rob Bell and others will use the Virgin Birth to undermine the fundamentals as not necessary for the traditional faith. Many conservatives conversely use it as a litmus test if you believe the 5 fundamentals or not. It seems to me to be the most controversial of the 5, with the least “hard” scriptural centrality, and the easiest to doubt/question.

        1. Even with it being a doubling down on the Virgin Birth–those who do not see the Virgin Birth to be necessary do not believe that Jesus spawned from a rock by the River Jordan. They still believe Mary is the mother of Jesus. So i am still finding the whole “conceived in Mary’s womb” to be very odd.

        2. Even if Christ were man only and not God (albeit a very good man for his time!), he still would have been conceived in the womb of his mother. It would be rather remarkable if He were conceived outside of the womb. Think test tube or petri dish.

          But perhaps what they are trying to say is that God didn’t rely on sexual reproduction, where the Act deposits the sperm in the vagina and wriggles into the uterus and thence to the Fallopian tubes. The fertilized egg travels to the uterus (the womb) to be implanted there.

          Of course, since fundamentalists are so sex obsessed, one wonders why they settle for the start of it all at the implantation stage instead of the fertilization stage. But the messiness of biological considerations with the virgin birth leads to a short-circuiting of mental processes. It has to be all miracle, unnatural and totally mysterious.

    4. My favorite part as well, Leanne. I’m glad we all have the womb issue clarified. Wouldn’t want any “virgin birth stomach conceivers” slipping through. Hay-men?!

      1. It seems to me there was one case in medical history where a woman had a baby after having had a hysterectomy. The embryo somehow implanted in her intestinal lining, or something like that.

    5. “… weren’t all babies until the 20th century conceived in a womb?”

      Technically, you can have a tubal pregnancy (although that doesn’t result in a live birth), but I don’t think that’s what they have in mind here.

    6. Oh, I thought “by the Holy Spirit” meant beside the Holy Spirit. This is all so confusing! 😉

  16. The “No divorcees” is very interesting to me due to it’s specificity: I wonder if they would accept a single man for the position? My BJU experience indicated that in Fundy circles, only single women were allow to minister, and only overseas.

    1. I’m not a minister, but I am a single guy, and from what I’ve heard and seen firsthand, it’s rather unlikely for a single guy to be hired as a pastor in conservative evangelicalism. Because, you know, single men might have an affair, and that totally never happens with married men, of course.

  17. I thought circle X was the X-Men™ trademark symbol?

    I believe Wolverine would do this church wonders…

    1. Wolverine’s religion is (choose one)

      (a) Quaker
      (b) Karate or something
      (c) the Uniting Church of Canada
      (d) Triune Understanding

      But Cyclops is interesting in this connection. In the 1970’s, he was portrayed as socially awkward outside of the X-Men, and who basically dated (and slept with) only one woman, Jean (who died in the early 1980’s–or so we thought). After that he married (a) Jean’s clone, (b) Jean herself, and (c) a former villainess called the White Queen. By the 1990’s he was depicted as a very macho, militaristic type with big muscles and a natural leadership ability. Anyway, I suspect this church would have approved of this evolution…

  18. I’m actually going to go out on a limb and say it a reasonable request to only have men, and specifically those who have not been divorced, as pastoral applicants. Whether you agree with that position or not, it is a reasonable interpretation not exclusively held by IFB’s.

    1. This is a legitimate view of the standards Paul set up for the church and I don’t fight that viewpoint.

      But allow me to play Devil’s advocate here….

      As an IFB member, I was taught:
      Husband of one wife = not divorced
      I was also taught to read the Bible literally. So literally:

      Husband of one wife = no more than one wife, no less. Divorce is not mentioned or implied. What are your thoughts on this? (Not being obtuse, just trying to better understand this)

      1. There are many churches who won’t hire a pastor who doesn’t have a wife (and, it probably goes without saying, is a man).

      2. It’s not clear whether Paul meant “only one wife at the same time” (no polygamy) or “only one wife ever” (no remarriage).
        Given the plurality of customs in the first century, he may have meant either one.

        The Eastern Orthodox churches have the latter interpretation, which is why those churches will ordain a married man, but if his wife dies, he is supposed to remain celibate thereafter.

        2. rtg has the correct historic background. A couple of the ante-Niceane fathers wrote about this; basically the idea was that the bishop was a model of Jesus, who has and is faithful to only one bride (the church), therefore the bishop can only ever have been married once. A lot of what later became a kind of legalism originated with the idea that the bishop was to model Jesus, more or less.

      3. I have a “linguistic” reason for believing it was most likely referring to a man who had never been divorced, as opposed to the other common view often cited about simply not being a polygamist. 1 Timothy 5:9 uses almost parallel language referring to a woman being a true widow and calls her “the wife of one husband.” Culturally, it would have been highly unlikely that he was talking about a woman who had many husbands at the same time in a polygamous relationship, so I think it is reasonable to infer the other time Paul uses similar wording, by saying “husband of one wife”, he is not talking about a polygamous man.

        Having said that, I respect other views and realize not being divorced is not spelled out in black and white as a qualification, and we can differ in our opinions.

  19. Maybe this church needs to quit stressing out over divorce ans start making sure the pastors won’t start using the youth group as their own personal guilty pleasure. *ahem* Wait, when sexual abuse is involved, Fundies don’t feel guilty.

    1. A man who has been guiry of sexual abuse, even of minors, can be reinstated into ministry, if suitably repentant but someone who has been divorced, even 28 years ago, and due to events that may not have been entirely his fault is barred from ministry ministry forever? I suppose that makes sense, because divorce in mentioned in the bible and sexual abuse of minors is not.

      1. Jesus did say something about those who would offend the little ones who believed on Him and millstones, though.

      2. It’s an idea borrowed from the Roman Catholic Church, where you don’t get kicked out of the priesthood for sexual abuse, but you do for a monogamous marriage to an adult woman.

        1. An aside….there are married Catholic Priests, normally in the Rites outside of the Latin Rites and certain converts who were Priests in other liturgical traditions such as the Anglican church who are married may be admitted to the Priesthood. Father Dwight Longnecker is an example of a married priest convert and he is still a priest with a wife and kids and everything. He is also a Bob Jones graduate.

        2. I’m told most of the converts to episcopalianism are from the Baptists. At least two of the priests I know converted from the baptists.

        3. Elfdream:
          All true, but those are definitely exceptions to the main rule.
          Priests are still being put out of the RC priesthood for getting married. It happens practically every day.

  20. Wait, wait. According to Wikipedia Grand Rapids is evangelical, and the Wikipedia article doesn’t mention anything about Bible version, so I suppose they aren’t KJV only. How would this church get the pastor they’re looking for from there?

    1. Pastors from many denominations train at GRTS, but it is unlikely that one training there would want to pastor that church. But that job board is available to the general public, so if you lived in GR, as some 300,000 people do, and were looking for a pastorate, that would be a good place to look.

      the Admiral

    2. Big Gary,

      The main rule in the Latin Rite perhaps but that is not the ‘main’ rule of the entire church.

      I do agree that they should be kicked out for sexual abuse though.

  21. A divorcée is a divorced woman. A divorcé is a divorced man.
    So when they say they want a man (x-divorcée), they must mean they will only consider a man who used to be a divorced woman.
    They have narrowed down the pool of potential applicants quite a lot there, but on the other hand, there may not be many other Fundamentalist churches open to their ideal candidate.

    1. Good catch! I am sure that the pool of divorced FtM transgender fundamentalist KJV-only ministers is minuscule.

    2. In any divorce there’s going to be a divorcEE and a divorcER. What they don’t want is the passive kinda guy who can’t even control his own wife–they’re looking for a take-charge leadership type who knows how to tell a women to hit the road!

  22. Anybody else find it odd that their only firm requirement for becoming a pastor is that the person be a non-divorced male?

    There are a LOT of non-divorced men out there.

    I’m sure that they’re going to pick all potential candidates to shreds while choosing a new one, so why is non-divorced the only qualifier that they put in the ad?

      1. Not yet, he isn’t. Perhaps he should send a resume.
        Although his stance on the KJB is that it’s the preserved word of God, not the inspired, so they may not want Schaap.

        2. The divorce isn’t much of a surprise, but how is it in North Carolina?
          I thought that Jack and Cindy Schaap were both Indiana residents.

        4. Actually, I think they used to live in Illinois, but I don’t remember. I’m not sure how it happened that they divorced in NC. I thought he was in jail in Kentucky or Tennessee. Not the kind of stuff I track, ya know?

  23. This made me LOL. Literally.

    Bless their hearts.

    The guy could be a mass murdering, wife beatin’ pedophile, but as long as he’s KJV only and not divorced…..

  24. Don’t want to get bogged down on trivial stuff like decency and all that fluff. KJVO and X divorced. That’s what is needed in this church.

      2. Not “Brother” Ray, but “Bro. Ray.”

        Hence, I’m changing my customary Name and sign-off to BigRed1 and B.R.1 so as not to be confused with Bro. Ray.

        I figured if semp could go through all these life changes, so can I!

        B.R.1

  26. Forum domain seems to have expired. Donate to Darrell so he can get it up & running again!

  27. According to the Amazon ad on the sidebar, GBC can get “A Few Good Men” for the low, low price of just $7.99. I’m not sure how many “a few” is, but you can probably get just one for the even lower price of a penny plus S&H (not the green stamp kind of S&H). The church should try that option.

  28. I would guess that x divorcee means they’re looking for a pastor who initially married his wife, divorced her, then remarried her.

  30. From Bro. Ray’s online ad at ministryconnect.cornerstone.edu–

    NEEDED:

    A man (not divorced) to pastor our church: Grace Bible Church in East Jordan, MI.

    I guess the X-Men logo really means “not”.

  31. Its fascinating that the KJV only is top on the list, more important than salvation or the virgin birth. A few years ago I was looking for a pastorate and received a list of churches to call. When I asked the representative to describe their church, most chose to start with their view on women wearing pants. What in the world…

    2. They used to have that in their church name, but “Pantsless Baptist Church” gave too many people the wrong idea.

      (Or the right idea?)

    3. They emphasize what makes them different from other churches – being KJVO or insisting that women wear skirts – but the sad result is that these things become THE identifying mark and thus the focus of their Christianity instead of Christ and His Gospel.

      It ends up warping the church as the focus twists from what Scripture says to being rants and attacks and diatribes in which more attention is spent criticizing people wearing tattoos or churches not having PM services than is spent vocalizing about the evils of sex trafficking or cruelty or greed. The result is a church full of members that pride themselves on following a made-up list of rules while never recognizing that they have huge blind spots toward some very serious moral issues.

      1. Serious moral issues starting with pride in Exclusivism, thinking it is a good thing instead of realizing that it means shutting out most of the people on earth.

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