Is it time to abandon ship?
Evangelicalism is a mess. Anyone who is paying the slightest attention to it realizes that it is broken from a human standpoint. He is still sovereign and in control, but we have made a mess of the church. Our churches are full of people who don't know Christ, who couldn't find the book of Genesis without referring to the index. Our pulpits spew all manner of trite and fluffy heresy designed to appeal to sinners instead of confronting them. Many, if not most, churches have lost or abandoned the Gospel. That may sound harsh, but spend a couple of Sundays in a random church and you will probably agree.
That things have gone wrong is unquestioned. The question is how to respond, and that is where things get dicey and people go in every direction. The direction is pretty much never to go back to what the Bible says but rather to figure out what we think, what makes sense to us.
For some the response is to turn the church, quite frankly, into a circus. Whatever it will take, WHATEVER it will take, to get people to show up and give. It doesn’t matter if it makes a mockery of the worship service and by proxy makes a mockery of the God who ought to be exalted. The Gospel is a product to be marketed, programs need to be developed, evangelism is a system designed to appeal to the emotions. Being God honoring is getting decisions from people who never show fruit and are clearly not regenerate. Any of the rough edges (which Christianity is full of) whether talk of judgment or wrath or miraculous events are filed down, and what is left is slick, comfortable and empty.
Some go in the opposite direction completely, and flee the church entirely, choosing instead to stay home and either worship in a “house church” (which to be unkind I think is a code for a couple of disgruntled families gathering because no church is perfect enough for them) or just get their spirituality from TV shows or the internet. If you have watched virtually anything that passes for “Christian” TV lately and have even a single discerning bone in your body, you will know that heresy has found a new method of propagation, one that is far more effective than the old creeping heresy. Now it is packaged on TV and beamed right into homes, often the homes of the most vulnerable and desperate among us.
If I am straying into heresy, and I am in my house just doing my thing, who is going to check me? Who is going to rebuke me? My cousin Eddie who worships with me?: "Declare these things; exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no one disregard you." (Titus 2:15) I have been proven to be a pretty poor example of self-rebuking in the past, so I need someone and we all need someone to hold us accountable, for our walk, our piety and our doctrine. As I know all to well that applies to laity and pastors alike.
Just because the church doesn't always work the way it should, it doesn't mean we should abandon the church and just stay home. That is a recipe for disaster and heresy. Sure I could stay home and read or listen to sermons from Piper and MacArthur and Sproul and get solid, Reformed preaching. But that cannot, and should not, replace the gathering of the saints. The church body is more than fellowship meals on Sunday afternoon and VBS. It is the sheep gathering together, to hear the Word proclaimed and to worship Christ. Most importantly it is how we are commanded to assemble together with one another, because God's people should want to come together with their brothers and sisters in Christ and worship Him. If you can't stand to be around other Christians, if you have no desire to gather with them, what does that say about your heart as a Christian?
It is the foolishness of preaching that God has determined to use to propagate the Gospel message. It may not seem like the best method, but it is how God has ordained it precisely because when done properly, Biblically it leads to salvation for the elect that can only be attributable by God. No one will stand before the judgment seat and hear “My good and faithful servant” because of a clever presentation or a snappy music service or a PowerPoint presentation, but only by the Word of God.
The same is true of the church. Like it or not, God has ordained the church to be the gathering place for worship of His people. The fact that the people of God gather together in what is visibly the church, to exhort, to preach, to pray, to baptize, to partake of the supper, to support and love on another, to be under authority and rebuke and correct one another when needed. We don’t get to change the model because it is hard, frustrating or we just don’t like it.
The church is a wonderful and flawed institution. It will never be perfect; it will never be completely pure until He returns with His threshing fan to separate the wheat and the chaff. We should constantly strive to rein in the church, because man by nature will constantly seek to tweak and remold the church into our own image. The need is there to constantly go back to the Word to make sure we are being faithful. The same institution that giants of the faith like Edwards, Whitefield, Spurgeon and Calvin labored in still works today. It is not the church that has failed us, we have failed the church. You may say "Well those were different times, people were different. Today people are selfish, greedy, sinful! How can we have a church today?" Guess what, the people were no different in Spurgeon's time or in Calvin's time. They were sinners who were self-centered, prone to idolatry who needed to hear "Repent!"
Evangelicalism is a mess. Anyone who is paying the slightest attention to it realizes that it is broken from a human standpoint. He is still sovereign and in control, but we have made a mess of the church. Our churches are full of people who don't know Christ, who couldn't find the book of Genesis without referring to the index. Our pulpits spew all manner of trite and fluffy heresy designed to appeal to sinners instead of confronting them. Many, if not most, churches have lost or abandoned the Gospel. That may sound harsh, but spend a couple of Sundays in a random church and you will probably agree.
That things have gone wrong is unquestioned. The question is how to respond, and that is where things get dicey and people go in every direction. The direction is pretty much never to go back to what the Bible says but rather to figure out what we think, what makes sense to us.
For some the response is to turn the church, quite frankly, into a circus. Whatever it will take, WHATEVER it will take, to get people to show up and give. It doesn’t matter if it makes a mockery of the worship service and by proxy makes a mockery of the God who ought to be exalted. The Gospel is a product to be marketed, programs need to be developed, evangelism is a system designed to appeal to the emotions. Being God honoring is getting decisions from people who never show fruit and are clearly not regenerate. Any of the rough edges (which Christianity is full of) whether talk of judgment or wrath or miraculous events are filed down, and what is left is slick, comfortable and empty.
Some go in the opposite direction completely, and flee the church entirely, choosing instead to stay home and either worship in a “house church” (which to be unkind I think is a code for a couple of disgruntled families gathering because no church is perfect enough for them) or just get their spirituality from TV shows or the internet. If you have watched virtually anything that passes for “Christian” TV lately and have even a single discerning bone in your body, you will know that heresy has found a new method of propagation, one that is far more effective than the old creeping heresy. Now it is packaged on TV and beamed right into homes, often the homes of the most vulnerable and desperate among us.
If I am straying into heresy, and I am in my house just doing my thing, who is going to check me? Who is going to rebuke me? My cousin Eddie who worships with me?: "Declare these things; exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no one disregard you." (Titus 2:15) I have been proven to be a pretty poor example of self-rebuking in the past, so I need someone and we all need someone to hold us accountable, for our walk, our piety and our doctrine. As I know all to well that applies to laity and pastors alike.
Just because the church doesn't always work the way it should, it doesn't mean we should abandon the church and just stay home. That is a recipe for disaster and heresy. Sure I could stay home and read or listen to sermons from Piper and MacArthur and Sproul and get solid, Reformed preaching. But that cannot, and should not, replace the gathering of the saints. The church body is more than fellowship meals on Sunday afternoon and VBS. It is the sheep gathering together, to hear the Word proclaimed and to worship Christ. Most importantly it is how we are commanded to assemble together with one another, because God's people should want to come together with their brothers and sisters in Christ and worship Him. If you can't stand to be around other Christians, if you have no desire to gather with them, what does that say about your heart as a Christian?
It is the foolishness of preaching that God has determined to use to propagate the Gospel message. It may not seem like the best method, but it is how God has ordained it precisely because when done properly, Biblically it leads to salvation for the elect that can only be attributable by God. No one will stand before the judgment seat and hear “My good and faithful servant” because of a clever presentation or a snappy music service or a PowerPoint presentation, but only by the Word of God.
The same is true of the church. Like it or not, God has ordained the church to be the gathering place for worship of His people. The fact that the people of God gather together in what is visibly the church, to exhort, to preach, to pray, to baptize, to partake of the supper, to support and love on another, to be under authority and rebuke and correct one another when needed. We don’t get to change the model because it is hard, frustrating or we just don’t like it.
The church is a wonderful and flawed institution. It will never be perfect; it will never be completely pure until He returns with His threshing fan to separate the wheat and the chaff. We should constantly strive to rein in the church, because man by nature will constantly seek to tweak and remold the church into our own image. The need is there to constantly go back to the Word to make sure we are being faithful. The same institution that giants of the faith like Edwards, Whitefield, Spurgeon and Calvin labored in still works today. It is not the church that has failed us, we have failed the church. You may say "Well those were different times, people were different. Today people are selfish, greedy, sinful! How can we have a church today?" Guess what, the people were no different in Spurgeon's time or in Calvin's time. They were sinners who were self-centered, prone to idolatry who needed to hear "Repent!"
The church stands or falls on Christ, and Christ is revealed in His Word. His Word must take center stage, every moment and every service in preaching, reading and singing. We must insist on the Word preached not preaching that mentions the Word in passing, Christ exalted in the songs and the Sunday schools, leadership that is Biblical (i.e. plurality of elders) and leadership that is Biblically qualified. We must accept nothing less than frequent and somber celebrations of the Lord's Supper, and Biblical baptism of professing believers coupled with integrity in membership including loving, restorative church discipline.
Don't abandon the church, because Christ hasn't and never will.
No comments:
Post a Comment