Morey Renounces His FIRE Membership
By FD StaffCategory: From the Desk of
During the Downgrade Controversy, Spurgeon found himself faced with a ministerial organization that refused to submit to Scripture. When it became obvious that they had devious motives in their persecution of him, he resigned. They, of course, did their best to avoid their clear violation of Scripture. But, in the end, church history vindicated Spurgeon’s resignation and the shame eventually rested on those pastors who attacked his character and motives.
In the same way, Dr. Morey has voluntarily resigned from a small ministerial organization that was supposedly set up to “enhance fellowship among pastors.” With such an innocent description as that, Dr. Morey joined FIRE. He only attended one meeting, and that was it.
The Board of FIRE recently became involved in the internal employee affairs of Faith Community Church, the church Dr. Morey pastored, without that church asking them to do so. The issue was regarding an ex-employee whose resignation statement admitted his non-compliance. Thus they had no biblical warrant to deal with the internal employee affairs of this church.
Once Dr. Morey demonstrated from Scripture that FIRE had no right to interfere with the internal operations of any independent church, they secretly switched the issue to ad hominem attacks on his character. They now wanted to “kill the messenger.”
In their slander campaign, they claim to have “evidence.” “Evidence” of what nature? We don’t know! Evidence from whom? We don’t know. Even after we asked for a copy of the so-called evidence, FIRE refused to send us a copy of the so-called “evidence” so we could answer it.
Dr. Morey demonstrated from Scripture that, if the accusations do not involve doctrine or morals, they had no right to sit in judgment of any church or pastor. Internal issues such as church discipline should not be judged by other churches.
Dr. Morey demonstrated from Scripture that FIRE is forbidden to “receive” any accusations that do not meet the standards set forth in Deut. 19, Mat. 18 and 1 Tim. 5:19. Any “single witness” accusation or hearsay evidence was not admissible. FIRE tried and convicted him without ever sending him the accusations! Amazing! See Acts 25:16.
The FIRE smear campaign referred to “abuse of pastoral authority.” Thus the issue is not doctrine or morals. It concerns church discipline administered by the elders of a local church in conformity to the Bible and their constitutions and creed. When it became obvious that FIRE was in clear violation of Scripture, Dr. Morey admonished them for being so gullible and then resigned his membership.
We are sad to say that FIRE has refused to send Dr. Morey’s resignation letter to its membership. FIRE should let the membership hear from Dr. Morey as to why he resigned since they sent an email to all their members accusing Dr. Morey of the erroneous accusations.
In this light, we have made Dr. Morey’s resignation statement public for all to read. Anyone with a Bible and a brain will see why he resigned from FIRE.
No further response will be forthcoming from us concerning this issue. Dr. Morey resigned in order to avoid wasting any more time on unbiblical nonsense.
