REVIEW OF ROBERT WATERS’ POOR ATTITUDE

By Brother Hafley’s Good Attitude

It is with tears from a torn and bleeding heart that I make these remarks gently reviewing brother Waters’ Poor Attitude. This is especially painful since we are on the same team. We are fighting the same fight. Forgive that imagery of "fighting." Perhaps I should say that we are playing patti-cake in the same nursery. Yes, that sounds better, doesn’t it boys and girls? Those barbaric, belligerent expressions used by the Holy Spirit which speak of "fighting," "warfare," and "wrestling" are a real "turn off" to those of us who have overcome such carnal words (2 Cor. 10:3-5; Eph. 6:12; 1 Tim. 6:12).

This, too, forms part of our objection to our brother’s article above. Inadvertently, he has given those hateful, namecalling preachers a weapon to wield against us. If brother Waters may use contemptuous satire against them, why can they not use it against others? He has used their mocking sarcasm and ridicule to discredit them. However, that simply spurs them on. They take his words as a compliment, for they see him using Elijah-like parody and conclude that God is in them of a truth!

We are trying to get away from the biting, caustic derision of men like Elijah when he "mocked" the prophets of Baal (1 Kings 18:27). We are striving to eliminate the use of scathing, scalding contempt as used by the Lord in Matthew 23. Paul is perhaps the worst of all. His writings are filled with unkind, impolite, intemperate references to his opponents (Acts 13:10; Gal. 5:12). Worse still, he bids us follow his example with such language as he uses (1 Cor. 4:17; Phil. 4:9)! We know our brother Waters joins with us in wanting to banish all such talk. Yet, he employs the same methods to assail those we are trying to reach!

It is likely they will turn brother Waters golden rule sarcasm against him. They may ask, "Brother Waters, were you applying the golden rule to those harsh brethren when you made use of your golden rule illustration? Brother Waters, if the golden rule condemns those who use abusive language, as you and I both believe it does, what will you say to them when they ask you the question above? You see, your stooping to their level has you going against the golden rule, for you would not want someone to rebuke you as you rebuked them, and as they rebuke false teachers. Thus, your sarcastic use of the golden rule against them unwittingly has caused you to break the golden rule. (Of course, Romans 14 allows us to break it and still be saved.)

Brother Waters used his Poor Attitude very effectively when he had a hard preacher say, "How great it is to stand before you gospel preachers and proclaim the pure and unadulterated gospel of Christ." That is an arrogant statement. It well describes those brethren. They think they have a corner on the market of truth. Brother Waters surely agrees with us when we say that we should begin our sermons with words to this effect: "How humbling it is to stand before you fellow fallible gospel preachers and proclaim the generally pure and mostly unadulterated gospel of Christ." This statement has the advantage of letting others know that we teach some false doctrine. Hence, one may preach what he desires without fear of being assaulted by some self appointed brotherhood censor.

We of the Good Attitude party warmly applaud our founder and president, brother Waters, when he shows the true nature of those loveless preachers among us. For example, he has them say of a poor, unfortunate false teacher, "We who preach only the truth must expose his false teaching and totally discredit him in the eyes of all." It is the hard preacher’s mind-set. That is just the way they think. Brother Waters obviously can read these brethren’s hearts, for he knows their real motives. We believe they probably adopted this sorry attitude from Paul’s personal exposure and embarrassment of the apostle Peter in Antioch. There Paul brutally abused and humiliated Peter for not walking uprightly according to the word of the truth of the gospel. Paul was trying, as some brethren do today, to "totally discredit him in the eyes of all" (Gal. 2:11-14). (The apostle John did essentially the same unbrotherly thing to Diotrephes in a letter--3 Jn. 9-11.) Note, too, that Paul said Peter "stood condemned." This is judgmental. We are sure that brother Waters would never speak in such a fashion, not even of the Pope.