Does complexity fuel complacency? When looking at the local church, that question enters my mind. I have been in the local church for all of my life. I have seen different church sizes, different styles of worship, and different visions and dreams. When it is all said and done, I have found that most churches are stuck in a lifestyle of complacency. I wonder, what is the reason behind this complacency?
Does the complacency fuel from complexity? The complexity that I am talking about is the complexity of the church's programming and function. If you take just a little glance at a churches calender you will find it very full. Small Groups, Sunday Morning Worship, Evangelistic efforts, Upwards; just to name a few, are scribbled all over the calender in a frantic effort to "fit everything in and make everybody happy". So, the question comes about. Do these events that keep us busy and stressed out bring out our complacency? Does it give us an excuse to be effortless in our relationship with the Lord, lazy in our approach to evangelism, and careless about our relationship with our brothers and sisters in Christ? Is the church being THE CHURCH? The church that was in the New Testament. The church that so many have died for. The church that our forefathers suffered to bring about.
Maybe we would be better off if we cut out a few programs and events that don't allow us to love God and love people, but just keep us busy. What would happen if we walked away from our complexity and rose up to be the church that Christ seeks to enter into a marriage with and the church that Christ shed His' blood for? Maybe then, and probably only then, will we see the great revival that we say we long for.
love God. love people.
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2 comments:
Andrew,
Very insightful post. Things will not change until we stop thinking about church as an orginization or a building and really start believing that it is a body of individuals who are united together in Christ as the body of Christ.
I believe we are so fractured because we really don't love, trust , and respect each other they way Jesus has called us to.
I also believe people would be more open to the truth of the Gospel if they saw a geniune love for Christ and a genuine love for each other. I am not sure that love currently exists in most churches. People are to wrapped up in other stuff to really be passionate about Jesus or His body.
“The revelation of God in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit is the judging but also reconciling presence of God in the world of human religion, that is, in the realm of man’s attempts to justify and to sanctify himself before a capricious and arbitrary picture of God. The Church is the locus of true religion, so far as through grace it lives by grace. “---- Karl Barth / v.1.2 / p.280 / Church Dogmatics.
Andrew, I think Karl Barth was right when he saw religion as man's attempt to create a system where he can work his way to heaven. Hence, the programs that keep us busy. We fulfill the duties of our religion and God owes us. By doing this we try to make God serve us. The church needs to start preaching and teaching Grace again. Most church members cannot accurately define it. I love Mark Dever's 9 Marks of a True Church. Practice those 9 Marks and I believe people will easily see through any program that is simply a waste of time and developed to make the church look good. Every program should be aimed at magnifying Christ!
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