Learning to hear the voice of God is no easy feat in today’s spiritually anemic church. To be clear, I’m talking specifically about the church in the United States of America.
It’s hard to hear God with all the static - believing the right doctrines, defending the faith against cultural infidels, supporting God’s chosen political party, and cult-like conformity to “our camp.”
Hitting the bullseye is worthless if we are aiming at the wrong target.
And speaking of static, that’s a pretty good description of the church in America today. Frozen. Rigid. Anything but the dynamic, living, life-giving church that Jesus is calling us to be.
In my last post, I began focusing on these misguided emphases in all too many of our churches, beginning with our obsession with believing the right doctrines. You can read that post here . . .
Today, I want to say a word about what is so often a militant, menacing, mean-spirited attack by followers of Jesus against the so-called cultural infidels in our land.
Just a few days ago on Twitter, one of our superstar evangelical leaders responded to a comment made by Pink regarding the abortion issue. I can’t say that Pink exactly demonstrated the compassion, kindness, and grace of Jesus. But neither did this guy. His comment was haughty, condescending, and graceless. This kind of fighting fire with fire - or maybe I should say fighting flesh with flesh - attitude is typical and demonstrates both the evangelism and discipleship prevalent in today’s church.
We don’t win others to the one who said, “God has not sent his son into the world to condemn the world but to save it” by condescending and condemning attitudes. We are called to be salt and light, and that means reflecting the heart of Jesus to a lost world. When are we going to realize that these so-called cultural infidels are human beings for whom Christ died? They are not, as some self-righteous Pharisees in Jesus’s day imagined, cordwood to keep the fires of hell burning.
Jesus was and is a friend of sinners. He reached out and welcomed those considered to be society’s despicables. He is calling us to do the same.
In Christ,
Dan
Check out my podcasts from Church on the Edge and my books on Kindle.
You can listen to my weekly messages at Embrace Church, High Point.
Powerful! 👏