In “Trembling Joy,” Pastor Ryan Speck answers the question, “What if worship style were more than a matter of personal taste?” by showing how the Bible’s own definition and description of worshiping God should impact the church… Presenting the teaching ministry of Rev. Eric Alexander, “Hear the Word of God” has joined the Alliance’s Podcast Network.

The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals announces the release of its most recently published book, “Trembling Joy,” by Pastor Ryan Speck, and the launch of its newest podcast, “Hear the Word of God,” featuring the teaching ministry of Rev. Eric Alexander.
“We are delighted to provide these excellent new Reformed and confessional resources for Christian pastors, elders, and laypeople,” said Alliance Executive Director Bob Brady.
Trembling Joy: A Biblical Defense of Traditional Worship
In Trembling Joy, Pastor Ryan Speck answers the question, “What if worship style were more than a matter of personal taste?” by showing how the Bible’s own definition and description of worshiping God should impact the church.
The pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Columbia, Mo., Speck wrote the book “to challenge a new generation of worshippers to examine the spoils of a quickly won revolution, and to reconsider modern worship critically and Biblically.”
Rev. Terry Johnson, senior minister of Independent Presbyterian Church in Savannah, Ga., says, “In this book, Ryan Speck has provided a thorough, well-organized, comprehensive case for worship as historically understood by the Reformed church. The friends of Reformed worship will be encouraged, the rest would do well to consider how their practice of worship might be strengthened by the content, forms, and methods that Speck advocates.”
Hear the Word of God Podcast
Presenting the teaching ministry of Rev. Eric Alexander, “Hear the Word of God” has joined the Alliance’s Podcast Network. Well known to many through the Alliance’s annual Philadelphia Conference on Reformed Theology, the podcast begins with Alexander’s study in the Epistle to the Hebrews, guiding listeners through this sometimes difficult-to-understand book of the Bible.  As with the other seven Alliance podcasts, “Hear the Word of God” is available at alliancepodcastnetwork.org and on all major podcast providers.  Alexander was a minister of the Church of Scotland for over fifty years and a Council Member of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals.
Grant Van Leuven is the Community Engagement Coordinator of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals
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Polyamory is a particularly apt illustration of how the sexual revolution encourages us to try to have our cake and eat it too—to have not just pleasure, but also the joys of love, while keeping our options open and never really giving all of ourselves to anyone. This is also why it is so destructive.

For fearmongering hicks, conservative Christians are remarkably prescient. Our latest prophetic triumph is seen in another New York Times puff piece pushing legal recognition for polygamy. Correction—another New York Times puff piece pushing legal recognition for polyamory. The difference is that while polygamy traditionally consisted of a man having more than one wife, polyamory consists of a group of men and/or women all having each other in various permutations.
Once again, we have gone from “you’re a bigot for suggesting that this will ever happen” to “you’re a bigot for not supporting this.” The subject of the Times piece is Somerville, a city in Massachusetts that has spent the past few years creating new legal rights for polyamorous partner groups.
As the Times notes, “Interest in nonmonogamy seems to be on the rise across the country.” Once again, the conservative Christian alarmists were right. And they were right for precisely the reasons they gave at the time. The poly movement’s champions see their cause as a natural extension of the LGBT movement, which has been all-conquering in Massachusetts.
Thus, the NYT describes how “Somerville is alive with events like Indecent, a fetish- and kink-positive party, and Boudoir, a queer underground dance party. There are polyamorous speed-dating evenings, drag shows at the venue Crystal Ballroom and a gender-neutral CrossFit gym.” If that is not clear enough, the Times reports, “There is a significant crossover between those who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and pansexual and those who practice nonmonogamy, according to multiple studies.”
Oh.
Apparently, the math is more complicated than those equal-sign bumper stickers made it seem. On the one hand, there is marriage as one man and one woman, which unites the two halves of the human race and provides a stable basis for begetting and raising the next generations. On the other hand, there are relational webs such that of one “Mr. Malone, who … currently has a nesting partner, a long-term partner, two long-distance partners and a kink-based relationship with another person.” I guess that love is love is love is a kink-based relationship.
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As the reader probably has noticed, there is now a great divide between Evangelicals and Progressives. Can that divide be bridged? It is impossible to know, though it doesn’t appear likely at this time. Our understanding of God and His word are very different.

In our book, A Matter of Basic Principles: Bill Gothard and the Christian Life, the Epilogue, “Fear of Flying,”  was included to help the readers understand how those in cults and high-demand authoritarian groups can feel trapped. They have been given a view of God as a malevolent being that is on the lookout for them to step out of line – whereupon He will happily crush them. Many of these people give up or “deconstruct” their abusive faith and opt for atheism or agnosticism. “Joshua Harris – Kissing WHAT Faith Goodbye?” was one who followed that path.
Still, others adopt a faith system that gives them what they believe is greater personal control over their lives – and so they cast off their harsh view of what they thought was the Biblical God and embrace Wicca or some other New Age belief. Many cultists and some former Evangelicals fall into this camp.
We have helped many that have left such groups unwind their false beliefs and embrace grace. It takes time, patience, and availability. There will be many questions the person has to sort through, and it may be some time to begin to trust the word of God again to discern what is true from what is false. Jinger Duggar Vuolo’s book, Becoming Free Indeed: My Story of Disentangling Faith from Fear tells, her story of growing up under the authoritarianism of Bill Gothard’s Institute in Basic Life Principles.1 Jinger’s transition did not cause her to abandon the Christian faith and the Bible. She instead learned to recognize false teaching, legalism, and authoritarianism and gain a spiritually healthy understanding of the biblical faith.
Many people who leave authoritarian groups or churches are rejecting the very dark view of God they were taught and shifting toward progressivism. Brian McLaren, Rob Bell, Rachel Held Evans, Kristin Kobes Du Mez, and others made that trek – and have taken many with them – over a relatively short period of time.  Richard Rohr has been the pied piper for many of them. Progressives give a nod to the Bible but adopt what they view as a kinder, more inclusive idea of Jesus –while ignoring or outright rejecting His exclusive claims. As sociologist and professor of sociology at Baylor University, George Yancey points out:
It’s not surprising that the image of Jesus for progressive Christians differs from the image of Jesus for conservative Christians. For progressive Christians, Jesus is the model of inclusion and tolerance. For example, one progressive Christian drew a cartoon of Jesus saying, “The difference between me and you is you use Scripture to determine what love means and I use love to determine what Scripture means.” Progressive Christians focus on the actions and teachings of Jesus that reinforce their values of tolerance and inclusion, which they see as examples of love.
For conservative Christians, Jesus is interpreted through a traditional historical framework. They have less of a problem interpreting Jesus as teaching an “intolerant” faith that excludes from salvation those who don’t follow him. Both progressive and conservative Christians affirm the majesty of Christ, but they greatly differ on what values they see emerging from his life and ministry.2
For Progressives, determining the meaning of Scripture has little to do with what God has said in the historical-grammatical context. They judge and understand scripture by the individual’s personal “social values.” One consequence is that Biblical justice is abandoned and replaced with Marxism’s Social Justice.
For one example, Martin Luther King’s maxim of judging someone by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin is rejected by Progressives today, replaced by completely judging people by their skin color and according to their loyalty to all progressive issues.
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