Do You Have Ears?

Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent. Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.

To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I was victorious and sat down with my Father on his throne. Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. Revelation 3:19-22

This week we head into what is known as "Holy Week" in the church. In some ways, what we remember this week is a microcosm of what I've been talking about in this series on Laodicea. As Laodicea may have seen it, there is the triumphal entry, some lag time, community time, then a turn, because things didn't turn out exactly how we thought. To Laodicea, the church that began well but then got distracted by their own goals and desires and perhaps the every day, finding that what they thought would match their ideals turned out not to, so they refused it; "We are rich and in need of nothing" (from God). God's reply to them, "I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire..."

But what does it look like from God's perspective? Jesus told the apostles to go get the donkey upon which he would enter the city. That should have been the first clue that Jesus was not what many wanted Him to be in this "triumphal" entry. You see, a donkey is a symbol of one who comes in peace. Had Jesus ridden in on a horse, now there would be the image they wanted. A horse was a symbol of a war won, a conquering hero. Still they lauded Him as a king, but they still held to their belief that Jesus would be the conqueror and not the redeemer/reconciler bringing peace. And then He did nothing. For days, nothing. So they turned back to their own needs and desires and wrote off God. But God did not write them off. He gave them one more time to understand, the last supper. In essence, He once again offered gold refined by fire, His body and blood, a sacrifice for redemption. Some of those who had spiritual ears heard, others heard and were unsure of what it meant, and Judas heard that this Jesus was not the one He wanted. "His Jesus" would have been something else. And so he refused. But God was not done. Through pain and suffering and death, he sacrificed Himself for us, and then completed the salvation event through His resurrection, His defeat of death. And He gave us the opportunity to be one with Him.


So wake up from your sleep, Laodicea! Though we rejected Him time and again, He still says to us: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock..." and even Laodicea has the chance to repent and return and join in the victory won over spiritual death and into life in community with our father, as victorious heirs: "To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne..."

Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches.

Whitewashed Tombs

A few years ago on vacation, I entered First Mega-Church of the Love of Jesus and it was marvelous. Glass, lots of light, welcome center in the lobby (nobody came and greeted me, by the way) right across from the bookstore with posters of the pastor and his newest book release. Walking into the auditorium, I mean sanctuary, I took my seat up front. The music started, lights and sound were amazing. In fact, the worship team did everything "right,"  but there was something wrong with the sound. No, not the sound from the platform - that was fine. It was the sound from the congregation - or should I say the lack of it. It felt like a worship concert and not a worship service. It felt lifeless, like the congregation was going through the motions. It was, in fact, disturbing to me. There was no community prayer time, no attempt to connect the congregation. Follow that with another sermon about how "if you follow these steps, and here's how I support them from scripture..." and you have a very man-centered and not God centered experience. Where was the spirit? It was a cultural event, something we do because we were born in America between the '40's and the '70's.

A few months later, I was in another church with a membership of over 10,000. I walked in, and it looked very similar. There was a welcome center, and kiosks to tell of all of the small groups available, and I was greeted personally. I entered the sanctuary, referred to by the congregation as "the family room." Lighting, sound, platform, all the bells and whistles like the other church, even a cool follow spot that tracked an infrared device attached to the pastor's collar. They too "did it right." But something was very different -  the sound from the congregation was there - it was engaged, it was connected, it was worship! There was a prayer time for the community, not necessarily an altar call, but it included the option for people to respond to the movement of the Spirit - and the Spirit was moving.

So how does this connect to the title and to the series on Laodicea, the lukewarm church? Do not hear me saying that I am opposed to large churches, I am not. Its about what happens inside churches, large or small. Even ones that like the former one I described can be used by God as an entry point for new people, but it is about what happens after that. It should be fairly obvious if you "have ears to hear." You can look great on the outside, the trappings of worship can be there, but you can still be dead inside, Spiritless, powerless. It's not about what it looks like on the outside - it's what is happening on the inside, both on a church level and on a personal level. The Spirit does not come in, power is not unleashed because of appearances. It happens because people are connected, on a deep level, to their God. Here are two very  similar looking "Mega-Churches" but with dramatically different worship experiences. They both followed a model described by Sally Morgenthaller in her book "Worship Evangelism,"  but with a different slant. The service was not necessarily "Seeker Sensitive" in the second church, but very much so in the former. In the latter worship was focused on the movement of the Spirit in the family.

In a conference a few years ago, Sally announced that she was deconstructing her book because it wasn't really working. Then people argued with her about that - they were getting people in. But what were they doing with them? Its the whole milk vs. meat discussion:

In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God's word all over again. You need milk, not solid food.

Heb. 5:12 NIV

Laodicean churches are milk-fed churches. Lukewarm comes easily from an entry level understanding of the scriptures yoked to long-time attendance. When the early movement of the Spirit wanes because people are not discipled well and they are distracted by the world's cares, and not focused on God; when church becomes a place to go and not a place to grow, when we put God into a compartment of our lives and do not make Him the center of our lives, we become lukewarm. The Word of God is still revolutionary, still rings out against the cultural sensitivity of our ears. When we back away from the message because we are afraid to make people uncomfortable, because we are afraid that we might be labeled "intolerant" where Scripture speaks against sin, because we fear we may lose people from the congregation, we water down the message and we become lukewarm. Its comfortable, but its powerless. 

God will not have His Word come back void, so He says that to be lukewarm, to be fence sitting "Christians" is to be spewed out. God is powerful, His Word is powerful, culture changing, not culture absorbing; And it goes way deeper than appearances.

At Ease, Church

The church in America today, at least the one most non-churched people see, is one of ease. It is a cultural construct, just something people do. It doesn't seem to have much impact in changing the life of the churched people that non-Christians have experienced. You go in, have a great light and music show, someone talks to you about how much better, more blessed that your life will be if you just follow these steps, and "oh, by the way, here are some verses from the Bible that happen to support my points." Then we go our way and live out the other segments of our lives - for we are rich and have need of nothing.

"You say, 'I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.' But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked" (Rev. 3:17 NIV)

And those to whom God would have us bring His word see right through us; So we lose the power to impact our world.

As I logged in to the blogspot this morning, I noticed the scripture verse of the day posted, it was Phillipians 1:29 (NIV)

For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ 

not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for him

So what does "suffering" look like? The aesetics took it literally and deprived themselves of pretty much everything. I believe that, taken in the context of Phillipians, suffering means that we stand firm in the Gospel, no matter how we are opposed. For us in America today, there is not much in the way of physical opposition, but rather it is and intellectual or societal opposition. So how do we stand? Do we stand by the Gospel or do we become "tolerant" of things that scripture speaks against so that we don't ruffle any feathers and are considered enlightened? God has always been God and has not changed His commands in our lives, though it is not about the rules but about right relationship with Him. Today we struggle with that, we want it both ways, we want the benefits without the submission to the one who gives us the blessings. This is not a new issue. On Sunday mornings we are studying Hosea. It is odd that, as they say, the more things change the more they stay the same. In Hosea 10:2, scripture says "their heart is deceitful." The Hebrew word translated deceitful is hlq or halaq. This word can mean both smooth, as in a smooth talker, or divided, not being of one heart or mind. It's a really long story, Hosea is, but very informative for where we are today. God's people wanted both Yahweh and Baal, in fact, they called Baal, "Baal-Yahweh." And you wonder why God is so hard on adultery? But that's another story. In the words of Pastor Win, they wanted the blessing but not the blesser. 

So do we. we want the benefits without the commitment to be who God asks us to be. Just in case you wondered, God doesn't want us to be "rule followers" first, He wants us to be Yahweh followers. Israel, and religions ever since, have tried to boil God down to following rules, which is both easier and impossible at the same time. It's easier because we can feel if we can balance enough obedient behaviors against our disobedience we can feel good - even superior. It's impossible because we can never meet all of the rules (hence the need for a savior?) - and so it has to be about relationship, not rules, and relationships are hard. We divide our hearts still, we compartmentalize our faith to Sunday and Wednesday, and then we have the rest of our lives to live "normally." We become Laodicea because we want it both ways. We want the blessing without the blesser. We want to feel good, because that's what our world tells us we want. In the words of Paul to the Phillipians though, we need to take a stand for the Gospel:

Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the Gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in one spirit contending as one man for the faith of the Gospel without being frightened in any way by those who oppose you. This is a sign to them that they will be destroyed, but that you will be saved - and that by God. (Phil. 1:28-29 NIV)

So instead of "Church, at ease" with little to no impact, we need to be "Church at attention," focused, undivided, one in the Spirit. Then, instead of lukewarm impotence, we'll have the hot potency in Yahweh that changes the world.

To the Church in Laodicea - Today

“To the angel of the church in Laodicea write:

   These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God’s creation. ¹⁵ I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! ¹⁶ So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.

If we take a good look at the church in America today, you may be left with a feeling of "Uh, oh well." The Church seems to have no power today. Perhaps there is a reason for that - we are impotent because we are more ours than God's. We reshape the Word to be our words. We use scripture to support our own notions, we have created a Christian self-help message, supporting our ideas with quotes out of the Bible. Dilute God's Word and then question where the power is? Hmmm... it doesn't take Lloyd John Ogilvie to figure that out.

The next few blogs will take a look at this topic. I don't believe all of the church is here, but it does seem to be a major problem. By the way, a church does not have to look lukewarm to be lukewarm. Some of the most vibrant, high energy congregations still do not remain faithful to God's revealed word. For many, it is more important to attract people and keep them than to take people from milk to meat. So, we'll get a bit more specific in the next few spots. Stay tuned - and respond or question if you like - make it a discourse. I'm in - are you?

IM or I AM?

Have you noticed an interesting phenomenon that is occurring in our churches on Sunday morning? I'm talking about an electronic one. 3G, 4G, 5G, many people are using Kindle, Nook, various apps and internet weblinks to follow along during the worship service. Some congregations have begun to notice and address this issue. We discuss whether or not this is a positive development: Does this enhance or detract from our "worship experience?" Probably the answer is "It depends."

When I am listening to a sermon, I frequently find myself looking forward and backward in the bible, contextualizing the passage being dealt with, following references and the like and honestly, sometimes following rabbit trails that come up. I can't help it, I think that the Bible is pretty cool, but I am, at that point, distracted from the message the pastor is giving. Is that different from the distraction of the electronic device? I don't think so, at least in the case of a person using the device for the Bible app or concordance or commentary features. But what if it's being used for something else?

Last Sunday, as I moved through the congregation to get a note out to the worship team, I noticed several people using their electronic devices to access social media, or text, or check email and I thought "Seriously? Can you not stay with me one hour?" Are we in our churches on Sundays to be with the One God, to focus our lives for a short time solely on Him, or has our outside world interrupted that as well? Even when we are perusing the Bible separate from the sermon, it would appear we are still engaging with God. With whom are we engaging when we are on facebook? I haven't seen a home page for the Triune God. The enemy would love to distract us, to pull us from our attention to God and place the attention on other things, specifically on ourselves. In the movie The Fighting Temptations when Cuba Gooding's phone goes off in the sanctuary, the pastor remarks "Son, if that ain't Jesus calling, shut it off..." When do we take that approach? How do we address this issue?

I am all for the positive, effective use of electronic media. It is a part of our world, we effectively use technology to enhance worship. The technology itself is benign, it's the application that concerns me. Our world distracts and inundates us every day of the week. We are "connected" constantly. Don't you wish sometimes at work you could have a "no email" day? Why do we have to bring that to our places of worship? I think that we could at least take the time we are worshipping and commit our focus for even that brief time on the God who gave all for us. So what is it - IM or I AM?

The God in Me

Okay, so the title may be a little misleading, but in writing they say you need a hook. Really, I want to talk about self-centered “faith.” This week I had several conversations with people that included phrases such as “Well, it’s working for me...” or “The way I see it...” or “I feel that..” and then go on to describe how they can twist who God is to suit their particular needs or current place in life. I call that a “god of my own making.” By the way, I’m not talking about non-believers here, and it’s not a new problem. Historically, God’s people have made excuses, set our own agendas, tolerated sin because God’s word seemed a little intolerant about it, put our own rules in, applied our own slant, and so forth. We have tried to make God fit our system of beliefs, based on “what works for me.” The problem is, we are not God, so what works for me, where it conflicts with the Word of God as it is written, cannot be truth.

Let’s start with the easiest one: “I feel...” Stop right there. Feelings lie. That’s the truth of it. As I have said in other blogs, perception is NOT reality, reality is reality. Our feelings frequently get in the way of truth. That’s why text messaging can become the source of arguments. We read emotion and intent into the message we receive based on our immediate circumstance, emotional state, perception of the words, etc. Feelings are just that, feelings and, devoid of comparison with truth, relevant data, information, they lie! “I feel” is self centered. “I believe,” when based on evidence, is another matter and perhaps another blog.

In my everyday job, I am a science person. I know research, I know what makes good research and what makes poor research, and I know when research is setting out to prove a pre-conceived notion. A friend shared with me some, what I will loosely call research, which they said supports their new belief system about who Jesus is - I won’t go into those details here. The problem is, scientifically speaking, and they were purported to be science, these studies were filled with fatal flaws. No peer reviewed scientific journals would print the studies because they had so many errors in design, implementation and analysis. Yet these were being used to convince people of who Jesus really is - that if we can get past things in our mind, we can be the Jesus we need. Really? Is that what scripture says, in essence, that we can be God? Then why did Jesus show up on the scene? I thought it was because I was trying to be God and couldn’t, or trying to get there on my own and, again, couldn’t.

In chapter 3 of his book The Blue Parakeet, Scot McKnight talks about the puzzlers - those people who read the Bible as if it were a puzzle, if we put all the pieces together, then we will understand the mind of God. He discusses four basic problems with this, but in finality, the puzzle that we piece together is fraught with error and in the end, “my puzzle is not the puzzle of anyone’s in the Bible. It is my puzzle, not the Bible’s.” So, the “way I see it,” has its basis more in me than in the reality of God. It is difficult to read scripture without filters, because we are human, but we need to be keenly aware of it when we do apply those filters. Are our thoughts consistent within the context of the Word, is Holy Spirit guiding us, have we asked for that guidance, and are we listening?

A mantra of the Evangelical Covenant Church is “Where is it written.” This is our starting point. We need to read scripture as the story of God’s relationship with us, not as an explanation of God or a defense of a position or belief. We have to submit and take God on His terms, whether or not (and especially when not) it fits our system of belief. Until we do so, we will continue to be ineffective little gods of our own making.

Return

Well, It's been a long time since anyone found me here. It's been quite a year in my full time job at school. "Bi-Vocational" means I have a full time job as well as the pastoral one. This year I have given up coaching girls' soccer so that I could spend more time with the ministry. As the girls' season is just around the corner, I will use the time off to study, meet with people and prepare for worship. And I'll return to the blog business where I reflect on things I am learning, and talk about things I believe God wants me to say. Look for regular postings each week. The current plan is to write Saturday, but it may be sooner. See you here.