It’s bad enough when a person
does this – but, it’s even worse when it’s an entire church.
When an individual or a church is
in touch with God - there is no need for any substitute. As long as a congregation
has God - it is well-equipped for every need imaginable.
Of course if this is lost,
substitutes will be sought. In the
early church when the Holy Spirit came upon the people:
"They were pricked in their hearts and said
unto Peter and the rest of the apostles, "Men and brethren, what shall we do?"
(Acts 2:37).
The Holy Spirit brought
conviction upon the unsaved and He will do the same today. There was no trouble
about attendance in the Acts-era church!
“Now, when this was noised abroad the
multitude came together...” (Acts 2:6).
They didn’t need socials, floorshows,
movie nights, special singles nights or any such to get a crowd. No! God was there
- in their midst - and the people
came - but now? In many places God is so crowded out that some activity or event must be substituted in an
endeavor to get the folks in the doors and then keep them “gotten”.
Apostatic activities have been
adopted by many congregations in a frantic effort to take the place of God, but
all in vain. It will not be necessary, if we keep God at the center and forefront
of all we do and are, to need to perform a song-and-dance to get the people to attend.
Like David, they will say:
“I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go
into the house of the LORD” (Psalms 122:1)
The local church should be the place
where we love to go for it should be the place where we meet God in fellowship
with our brothers and sisters.
But what about money? “We need money to run our churches and the
good programs we have that help people! We can’t do without that!”
Again, when God is at the
forefront, finances come. A Spirit-filled and led people will be a liberally-giving
people. When the original disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit at
Pentecost, we can read that:
"They sold their possessions and goods and
parted them to all men, as every man had need" (Acts 2:45).
Some churches have even gone so far as to resort
to such things as “auctions” that sell off the services of men and women,
either to perform some act of service, or even to serve as an escort to some
church function for the winning bidder! Jesus Christ said, “I have come to… set captives free” (Luke
4:18) Does an auction sound like captives being made free? Or is it the Name of
Christ that is being made free of, instead?
This kind of thing is an abomination
to God! Christ said:
"...unto them, ‘It is written, My house shall
be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.’
"(Matthew 21:13)."
This type of activity is a “child
of apostasy” – ie: a symptom of the falling away taking place in these latter days.
The apostasy of the last days spoken
of in the New Testament is unquestionably here. It is becoming more
far-reaching as the age closes. Its “children” are being adopted more and more
in our churches as God has been crowded out by these substitutes that seek to
take His place. But - there is no substitute for God. Satan's counterfeits
may try to be substitutes but they fail
every time. They are delusions; they deceive and damn millions to Hell each and
every day - Satan's “counterfeit church” is a curse and will damn more souls than
any bar/ tavern!
A
Modern Parable
A
worldly woman of position and substance; who had been relying upon her church
membership and faithful, weekly attendance and participation on many church “boards”,
“committees” and activities, instead of a personal experience of repentance and
grace; was dying. One of her caretakers had left a Bible on her bedside table,
and, in a moment of sheer boredom, the woman picked it up and began to read in
the Gospel of John.
Later,
her pastor, a man who had charge of their large church that was much given to
worldly social functions and activities, and who insisted these things were all
right, came in to pay an obligatory visit to her. Having spent the afternoon
reading the Word avidly, for the first time on her own, rather than relying
upon being taught from the pulpit, when the woman saw the pastor entering her
room - she screamed at him "Get out
of here! You go right out of that door, you deceiver of men! I am lost, and
going to Hell because you told me the pursuits of pleasure and the enjoyment of
my wealth were alright, that these were signs of God’s blessing upon me! You
told me I only had to give some money to you and the church and then sit in my cushioned
seat every week and I would be saved, but now I know better and know I am
damned! You deceived me! GET OUT!!"
We must have God. Moses knew this - Israel had sinned and God told
Moses that since sin had come “into the camp”, He could no longer journey with
them. Moses insisted that God shouldn’t go, begging God and pleading that God's
presence was indispensable and He must
go with them. Finally, God agreed to send an angel along in His place. Now, if
there ever could be an adequate
substitute for God it would be one of His angels, right?
Oh no! Moses would have none of
it! He said:
"If your Presence does not go with us,
do not send us up from here." (Exodus 33:15 NIV)
In other words, we cannot accept
an angel or a substitute of any kind for God! After this most
earnest prayer by a deeply affected Moses, the Lord reassured him, saying:
"My Presence will go with you, and I will
give you rest." (Exodus 33:14 NIV)
God declares:
"...them that honor Me I will honor..."(1
Samuel 2:30)
In Revelations 3, Christ speaks
of the state of the church of Laodicea and its destiny. The Laodiceans said
they were rich with material wealth and had no need of anything. In other
words, they had made having money, or material things in general, the test for
whether or not they were doing God’s will! This we see today, in many false
teachings and gospels, in many local churches and in the desire to have more
and be bigger than any other group of Christians. Some insist that our greatest
need in the church is money, so that
we may do the work of God. Do we?
As the Laodiceans found out, our
greatest need is God! While this early local church was certainly very rich and
had no need of anything materially, they didn’t have enough spiritual
discernment to see that they were actually wretched, miserable, poor, blind and
naked. They didn’t realize that they were neither cold nor hot, but lukewarm
and God was going to vomit them out of His mouth! Like it or not, this is the way
this church is described to us by the glorified Jesus to His servant John. This
is also a description of the apostasy of the modern church that would come
about in the last days.
Christendom, as a whole, has
largely become apostate these days. An emphasis on “worshiptainment” has
replaced genuine exposition of the one and true Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Churches rely more on snappy presentations and peppy “praise bands” than on the
Word of God. Frenetic activities and reliance on an exclusionary “Christian
culture” have replaced genuine Christ-centered and Christ-modeled sacrificial
living, the teaching of the Gospel and the doing of good works amongst our
brethren, and the world at large. It is a sad fact that many of our churches
have desperately poor people right outside their doors, while members who drive
up in $30,000.00 vehicles wearing $200.00 shoes to put their $50.00 in a
collection plate walk right past them – or even sit beside them in that same church,
and do nothing to assist them.
The question is: Will we continue like this? Will we permit the devil to let us adopt substitutes for
the true preaching and teaching of the Gospel of Jesus Christ? Will we permit
the Spirit of Mammon to be the Spirit of the Church?
Some insist that there is no
danger in these worldly activities, indeed, that it is actually needful in this
day and age to have such things in order to compete with the world and draw
people to Christ. Some even go so far as to say that it is actually
un-Christian to even speak such things.
The church at Laodecia thought it
was okay. They "worked" for the Lord, and they were rather contented
and comfortable - they had enough money, enough food - things were really pretty
good. They didn’t suffer the persecutions and privations that some of the other
churches in Asia were dealing with and they simply went on about their business,
telling one another how blessed they were of God to be so well off!
But - they made God want to puke.
Pretty harsh reaction!
This local church thought they
were doing alright, not even realizing that they were lukewarm in their love
for the Lord – and He didn’t like it. In fact, Jesus’s message to them was
this:
“I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.” (Revelation 3:18 NIV)
“I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.” (Revelation 3:18 NIV)
In their blindness to their own
shame, they didn’t realize they had lost their first love – the love that Jesus
told us was to be paramount in our lives – to love God with all our might.
Instead they had substituted the love of comfort, ease, material possessions and
wealth for the foundation stone of their lives – rejecting the True Foundation –
Jesus Christ.
They needed to repent of their
faithlessness; their adultery and pursuit of other loves before the love of the
Groom. Jesus said to them:
“Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent.”(Revelation 3:19 NIV)
“Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent.”(Revelation 3:19 NIV)
In the pursuit of more “Christian”
recreational activities and “stuff”, many lose their “first love” and begin to listen
to false teachers and are swayed by every new teaching that comes along. False
teachers that teach false gospels rake in millions upon millions, while local
churches that are intended to feed those who attend also have their hands out
to build bigger buildings to hold even more activities, so they can draw in
even more people. In the meantime, we exchange our families for even more money,
for that bigger paycheck. So, we send our children down the street to be raised
by the woman watching soaps or the daycare center that treats our children like
a commodity to be bought or sold. And all because we need a bigger house, a
bigger car, designer clothes, a Prada bag, etc.
So often, I hear my Christian
brethren talking about their latest cruise, the boat they just bought, the
wonderful gourmet dinner they had at the local hot-spot – and then politely say
they “will pray” for someone whose daughter is having a baby out of wedlock,
the woman who has ended years of abuse by leaving her husband and now has to
find a way to support herself and her three children on a McDonald’s-worker salary,
the man who just lost his wife of over 30 years to an exhaustingly long bout
with cancer, or the young family facing eviction and possibly living on the
streets because the father’s job was sent overseas and he can’t find work,
while the mother works two part-time minimum-wage jobs just to put food on the
table and they can’t make their rent payments.
I’m not saying that it’s wrong to
want some recreation. I’m not saying it’s wrong to be rewarded for hard work.
Nor am I saying that dressing nicely is necessarily a mark of selfishness. What
I am saying is that many Christians are just like the Laodecians when it comes
to their possessions and their faith. They do not “put their money where their
mouth is”.
Can anyone honestly say that they
are following the example of Jesus if they pass by a homeless person and don’t
offer that person a meal? Or if they pat the shoulder of that woman and tell
her that they’ll pray for her, never minding the fact that she has to feed her
kids on the cheapest macaroni and cheese she can find, just to fill their
bellies – and then don’t help her out with groceries at least? Or don’t bother
to call or visit the man who lost his wife, or offer to help the young unwed
mother, or give the struggling father at least odd jobs he can do, to help out?
The apostasy of the modern age is
definitely upon us, hard and fast. We wallow in our own goodness while we
ignore the cries of the hungry, the lonely and the poor all around us. We say, “God
will provide” when He’s already put the means in your hand to help that person
out!
Time to re-evaluate where we are.
Time to re-assess our “walk”. Time to get back to what Jesus taught us, and not
“keeping up with those (insert name of denomination)’s down the street”.
-Heidi Roberts, April 12, 2011
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