Entries Tagged 'Church' ↓

I find it interesting that Christians will often make big, life decisions without consulting the ones who could best counsel them. For example, if they have an issue with the church and are thinking about leaving, they don’t talk to the pastor about the issue and ask for help. They talk to the people who agree with them and then leave. It seems they treat church like a service or product being offered by the pastor and elders and they can choose when and how long they will use the product.

Although this sounds normal in our capitalistic society, the Bible describes the church differently. The church is not a product, but a body. It is a body of people of all ages who have unreservedly given their lives to Jesus Christ. The body meets together in order serve one another. In other words, Sundays are not to get your needs met, but for you to meet the needs of others. Each believer has been entrusted with a spiritual gift and the church is the garden in which these tools are used.

It seems that if someone sees a weakness in the body, he treats it like a messed-up fast food order. He is displeased and complains to those around him. He may just deal with it for a while, but if it happens week after week, then he decides to leave and never come back. He may leave without talking to anyone, but he may also ask to see the manager to give his two cents about how he thinks it should be done and then storms out.

A beliver in the church should realize that he is not being micro-managed for greatest productivity, but his pastor is keeping watch over his soul and caring for him and will one day be judged how he did so. He puts his whole heart and soul into shepherding the whole body of Christ. So why would one not go to such a leader when there is conflict, dissatisfaction, or any other issue. If for nothing else, we need our thoughts and desires tested to see if they align with the will of God and who better to test them with than the men who spend their time studying the Word, praying, and caring for souls.

It’s sad to me to see people actively a part of a church and then just disappear because they think they found something better. Although the issues are different in every case, I hope they will seek counsel from their elders, who aren’t worried that they are a dissatisfied customer but are concerned that a part of the body needs help.

I found this phenomenal quotation from D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones. He preached it in 1927 and yet it sounds like something the church today needs to hear. He gives us some needed insight into the emergent debate as we think about how the church should sit within the pagan culture. He had a well-articulated ecclesiology that stemmed from a deep understanding of the power of the Spirit of God in the life of believers.

“The world expects the Christian to be different and looks to him for something different, and therein it often shows an insight into life that regular church-goers often lack. The churches organize whist-drives, fetes, dramas, bazaars and things of that sort, so as to attract people. We are becoming almost as wily as the devil himself, but we are really very bad at it; all our attempts are hopeless failures and the world laughs at us. Now, when the world persecutes the church, she is performing her real mission, but when the world laughs at her she has lost her soul. And the world today is laughing at the church, laughing at her attempts to be nice and to make people feel at home. My friends, if you feel at home in any church without believing in Christ as your personal Saviour, then that church is no church at all, but a place of entertainment or a social club. For the truth of Christianity and the preaching of the gospel should make a church intolerable and uncomfortable to all except those who believe, and even they should go away feeling chastened and humble.”

I wondered today why so many of our songs that we sing in church are first-person singular in their pronouns. I’m not referring to the object of the songs, but the subject who is singing the song. The expression of the worshipper is usually not first-person plural. For example, consider My Jesus, I Love Thee, which is a well-loved hymn.

My Jesus I Love Thee

My Jesus, I love Thee, I know Thou art mine;
For Thee all the follies of sin I resign.
My gracious Redeemer, my Savior art Thou;
If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.

I love Thee because Thou has first loved me,
And purchased my pardon on Calvary’s tree.
I love Thee for wearing the thorns on Thy brow;
If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.

I’ll love Thee in life, I will love Thee in death,
And praise Thee as long as Thou lendest me breath;
And say when the death dew lies cold on my brow,
If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.

In mansions of glory and endless delight,
I’ll ever adore Thee in heaven so bright;
I’ll sing with the glittering crown on my brow;
If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.

While singing this song, I realized that in my own heart I was pulling inward in my thinking and I was virtually the only person there pouring out my heart before the Lord. Although this isn’t wrong, I don’t think it is what Christ intended to happen when His people met together. The question I asked myself is: What makes my worship with all the other believers on a Sunday morning different than when I sing on my own before God? Should our worship of the Lord look different when we gather together than when we worship on our own the other six days of the week?

I don’t know the answers to these questions, but I do think that it would have a different affect upon my soul if we exchanged all the I’s, me’s, and my’s with we, us, and our. Although it messes with some of the poetic nature of the song, a few rhymes and such, here’s what this hymn would look like:

Our Jesus, We love Thee, We know Thou art ours;
For Thee all the follies of sin we resign.
Our gracious Redeemer, Our Savior art Thou;
If ever We loved Thee, our Jesus, ’tis now.

We love Thee because Thou has first loved us,
And purchased our pardon on Calvary’s tree.
We love Thee for wearing the thorns on Thy brow;
If ever We loved Thee, our Jesus, ’tis now.

We’ll love Thee in life, We will love Thee in death,
And praise Thee as long as Thou lendest us breath;
And say when the death dew lies cold on my brow,
If ever We loved Thee, our Jesus, ’tis now.

In mansions of glory and endless delight, We’ll ever adore Thee in heaven so bright; We’ll sing with the glittering crown on our brows; If ever We loved Thee, our Jesus, ’tis now.

Last night, Grace Bible Church honored my parents for serving 25 years in ministry. It is quite a milestone and I am privileged to be their son. Ian and I were asked to record a message of congratulations and appreciation for Dad. I have posted the audio files of those testimonies and a rough transcript of what I said. I am so thankful that the Lord God Almighty has, within His gracious providence, chosen for our family to walk in His ways.

Ian’s Testimony

Micah’s Testimony

Dad,
Congratulations on 25 years at Grace. Even though I haven’t been alive that long, I still appreciate your commitment to this body of believers through the years. And as I think about why this occasion is worthy of celebrating I am brought back to the biblical concept of faithfulness.

You were the first example of faithfulness that came to mind.

I remember when I was first interviewing to be on SLC. I had just entered 7th grade and you had just become the administrator of the school. One of the questions they asked me was: How would you describe faithfulness? I couldn’t think about to put it into an abstract definition, but I could only think of it in action. And you were the first example of faithfulness that came to mind. Faithfulness to me was seeing you show up at church every week and teach your Sunday school class. I also saw that faithfulness wasn’t about doing something consistently with no heart in it, but you did what you did happily and without one word of complaint.

It is now a few years later and I can say that you are still the first example of faithfulness in my mind. You have remained faithful to the local church and it is a non-negotiable. I learned from you that the church was a priority and that serving in it was worth it. I saw you faithfully pursue people, counseling them and loving them. I have seen you faithfully love the Word of God, as you read it and teach it.

I have seen you faithfully love your wife and family. Mom was the love of your life and you never once wavered from that. You loved her through service and you served her in front of us kids. You continue to remain faithful to discipline, encourage, teach, and guide us. And for that I am grateful

Your faithfulness is simply a shadow of God’s faithfulness.

Of course, this celebration would not be possible if it were not for the faithfulness of God. It is He who has sustained you. It is He who was strong when you were weak. And it is He who has crafted you into the faithful man that you are today. Your faithfulness is simply a shadow of God’s faithfulness.

Thank you for loving Jesus Christ with all your heart and for being faithful and steadfast in his work, in the church and in the home. I love you, Dad. Congratulations.

I just realized that I have posted many quotes recently, but I guess that’s because [1] I’ve been reading a lot, and [2] these men say things better than I ever could. Such is the case with this quotation from John Walvoord, in which he gives the importance and implications of the pastor preaching the Gospel.

If those who are shepherds of the flock never make clear the necessity of the new birth and do not proclaim accurately the depravity and sin of the human heart and the divine remedy provided alone in the salvation offered by the crucified Christ, one can hardly expect the church itself to be better than those who lead it. The result is Church-ianity, membership in an organization without biblical Christianity and without membership in the Body of Christ accompanied by the miracle of the new birth.