Fom Mike Ratliff at Possessing the Treasure:
“When the Gospel is preached correctly, it divides. Men like Joel Osteen and Rick Warren know this and that is why they do not preach it. They want large crowds. They want large numbers of unbelievers to be attracted to their ministries. They attract them by attempting to meet their felt needs then give them a feel good sermon to keep them coming back. They absolutely NEVER give them the real Gospel that begins with the Law and original sin and the need that every man has for a Saviour. No, they never go there. Why? That offends people and these men and all those who emulate them are ashamed of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ and the offense of the Cross offends them. They will not preach the whole Gospel. Therefore, they preach the easy-believism version that results in something eternally tragic.”
Read the rest of the article here: When the Gospel is preached correctly, it divides
The Narrowing Path 
The problem I found was that those who teach the truth fully, don’t live it fully. We need people and fellowship with others to grow in love for God as well as for people. In my experience, Puritans teach the truth and go home. Fellowship is unimportant to them, and so the churches you criticize have gone too far the other way. We prepare for heaven HERE and Puritans forget that. God doesn’t go in for cold fish, as he made very clear in the Gospels. Thei leadership which I found in fundamentalists is impersonal and that is not biblical at all. In finding a church, it seemed that I had to choose between love and truth, and here too the Gospel says love is the most important thing we learn. We don’t learn to love all alone. God intended a church family, not an audience for a learned man.
LikeLike
What kinds of deficiencies in fellowship are you referring to? Based on your first comment I would have to say a hearty amen. I have never met a Christian that lives the truth fully. It is part of the sad reality of life this side of heaven.
I am reminded of our Lord Jesus Christ’s high priestly prayer, wherein Jesus beautifully points us to the love of God for his people, but is also clear about the primacy of the Word of God for our sanctification. Therefore, we cannot trade truth for love. Love without truth is not godly love.
John 17: 6-26
“I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. 15 I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one.a 16 They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. 17 Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. 19 And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.
20“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, 21 that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, 23 I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. 24 Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. 25 O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. 26I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”
I’m sorry that you have had disappointing experiences in supposedly solid churches. Sometimes they aren’t actually as solid as they seem on the outside, and that can be very discouraging! What kind of church do you attend now?
In Christ’s service, Sherryn
LikeLike