A famine in the land

(I am reprinting this post from December of 2007 because it still resonates with me. It was a time in my life when I was pretty angry, more than usual, almost exclusively angry with myself. I was in kind of an ugly place in my life, so keep that in mind. My thinking on the church has changed quite a bit since then, but much of this still captures the heart of the issue. I don’t care where or how you worship, if you are not focused on the Word of God you are wasting your time.)

"Behold, the days are coming," declares the Lord GOD, "when I will send a famine on the land-- not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the LORD." Amos 8:11 ESV

I love this verse and hate it. I love it because it is so true, I hate it because it is so true. It is not the Word that is at fault though, but the church. It is the church that has been established and ordained as the dispenser of the Word, and it is the church that has sought to replace the Word of God with anything else, anything but the Word.

Dr. Steve Lawson is one of my favorite preachers. I heard him in person in the Spring of 2007 at the Toledo Reformed Theological Conference, and his sermons on John 10 and the Good Shepherd were absolutely dynamite. Though Steven Lawson sounds, and kinda looks, like the elder President Bush, he is a powerful preacher and a prophetic voice in our day. I came across a sermon he gave on Amos 8:1-11, and it struck a chord. You don't hear a ton of preaching like this today, and we are poorer as a people for it.

His message is pretty simple, as is true of all good sermons. All is not well. The modern church gives off an image of successful evangelicalism, but it is at it's heart rotten to the core. Churches not only don't transform lives, they hardly even raise eyebrows. The simple proclamation of the Word, Thus sayeth the Lord, has been replaced by slick marketing campaigns. I am all for slick marketing campaigns in the business world. In fact I often benefit quite handsomely from them. But these aren't balance sheets and stock prices we are talking about. These are the eternal souls of sinners standing condemned before a just and holy God.

Our mooring point is not in the infallible Word of God, but in our programs, in our outward success, in our influence over the political process. Our churches measure their faithfulness not in the making of disciples, but in the number of bodies in the pews, the size of the budget, the number of paid staff or the magnificence of their audio-visual system. We ought to grade churches based on their fidelity to the Word of God, and yet that is in many cases the last concern. Far more important is the music style, or the personality of the preacher, or the size of the youth program or what translation of the Bible is used (not whether or not it is a faithful translation, but whether or not it is the right faithful translation.)

The people cry out to be fed, and spend more time and money on "Christian" books and music than ever before, but those same people are being slowly starved to death, starved in the hearing of the Word of the Lord. We starve to death in a land of plenty. Worse yet, it is the church, established and ordered by God, that is withholding the feeding. People come, and what they hear is anything but the Word in so many churches. There is little wonder that so many people are so ambiguous about church, because there is no power when the Word is absent. A church that neglects the Word becomes nothing but a social club or a self-help therapy session. Once people get over their hang up du jour, they move along.

Another of my favorite passages is found in Ezekiel 3, and Dr. Lawson rightly brings it up...

And he said to me, "Son of man, eat whatever you find here. Eat this scroll, and go, speak to the house of Israel." So I opened my mouth, and he gave me this scroll to eat. And he said to me, "Son of man, feed your belly with this scroll that I give you and fill your stomach with it." Then I ate it, and it was in my mouth as sweet as honey. And he said to me, "Son of man, go to the house of Israel and speak with my words to them. Ezekiel 3: 1-4 ESV

What value is the Word of God if it is relegated to dusty tomes sitting unused and unopened in the racks on the back of pews? There is nothing magical about the cover and the paper, about the ink on the pages. The power of the Word of God comes from reading it and devouring it. Why should God send forth the Word when people reject it? This sermon from Dr. Lawson and these ancient words from the prophet Amos are required hearing and reading for the church today. May we weep, as I have and I do, for how we have failed in carrying out the mandate of God to declare His Word.