What? Sloppiness in the Church?
For some time now, I've been burdened for the Church.
My heart's been heavy with grief from seeing increasing sloppiness in the Church.
You say "What? Sloppiness in the Church?" Yes.
There's sloppiness everywhere around us: in business, in education, at home, at school -- and even in the Church.
We've become "the sloppy generation".
Look at the way people dress for work, for schools, in public.
Baggy pants with waistlines below the hips and crotches at the knees, pregnant women with tight jerseys above the belly, necklines mid-breast and men's pant legs bundled up at the ankles for lack of length adjustments.
Torn and ripped up jeans are fashionable.
That's not to mention the new dishevelled hairdos that have been passing as "cute", and all the rest of it.
I even saw a woman at a supermarket store in her pyjama! I once attended a service where people worshipped up and down the aisles, dancing barefoot, in T-shirts, collection plate in one hand and a Tim Hortons coffee in the other.
I see women - both slim and fat -- with short skirts ignorantly 'mooning' when sitting or bending down.
It is odd to see people in shorts and t-shirts in a Sunday Church service - it is unnatural and irreverent.
Sure I'm happy they are in the Church at all.
And we are not to be judgmental of un-saved folks coming in that way.
But when we know the Lord, when we are saved and become ambassadors for the Kingdom of God, we have a responsibility to set the example.
We've lost our fear of the Lord.
We've lost our reverence in the Church.
It's a difficult thing to bring out but when the Holy Spirit keeps stirring your heart to talk about it, you just can't run away from it.
What's wrong with the Church? Well, firstly, in many Churches there is the lack of qualified leadership - that is qualified in people skills.
There is a lack of "leading by example".
There is a lack of preaching the hard issues of dress and personal presentation.
The famous sales and personal development trainer and motivator, Zig Ziglar, for one, said it is a demonstrated fact that people who are dressed up perform better at school and at work.
Remember what lawyers do when defending their clients? They have them trim their hair and shave, and dress them up to change the impression of the public.
Some time ago, as I was thinking about all this, the Lord led me to an article by David Wilkerson on a sermon he made to a group of pastors in a denominational headquarters chapel service entitled "The Dangers of the Gospel of Accommodation".
In it he described at length, what the Lord is saying about His Church.
He said that a Gospel of Accommodation has been creeping into the Church, especially in America and the Western World.
The description of "accommodation" is: "to adapt, to make suitable and acceptable, to make convenient.
" This was exactly what another message, from another servant of the Lord, was saying from a completely separate platform.
And basically what the Lord has been showing me in the past many months.
In speaking with other concerned Christians, I also have heard similar comments.
Many of these folks have stopped going to Church.
Yet, they love the Lord.
But they all have similar stories, that there is sloppiness in the serving of the Church.
According to Wilkerson this "new gospel" has influenced many ministers of every denominations and given birth to many churches who serve thousands of people who come to hear a "non-confronting message".
These messages are geared to keep everyone happy and unruffled, seeking to be friendly and inoffensive.
However, the true Gospel of Jesus Christ is confronting to sin and sinful living.
But many people today don't want to talk about sin.
The Gospel is not friendly to sin.
It is friendly to the sinner but if sinful living will destroy the life of a person, it needs to be confronted.
Jesus said he came to fulfill the law of the Old Testament, not to condemn it.
I like the leadership style of Pastor Pat Francis of the Kingdom Covenant Ministries which is just that - teaching folks to be their very best in every way.
Not confronting sloppiness in the Church is to accommodate self-denial, irresponsibility, and the lack of living by example.
One pastor was heard to say after a service, 'We're not here to offend people, but to make church comfortable for everyone".
That too is sloppiness -- sloppiness in Gospel delivery.
Indeed we have heard many times, people say that they don't want to "offend" others.
This has come to the point now where we avoid telling them they should live holy and respectful lives before God, in fear and trembling, in awe of a God who will judge our every detail of our lives, one day when we stand before Him.
In the book of Ezekiel, we read: "Son of man, I have made thee a watchman unto the house of Israel: therefore hear the word at my mouth, and give them warning from me.
When I say unto the wicked, Thou shalt surely die; and thou givest him not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life; the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand.
" (Ezekiel 3:16-18, King James Version) Sounds harsh? Problem is, if we have become sloppy on the outside, we have become sloppy on the inside.
And on the inside is where character and worship comes from.
In Matthew 16:24, Jesus says that any man who will come after Him will have to deny himself, take up his cross and follow Him..
Do we self-deny our current status-quo regardless of respect for life and for others in order to be "comfortable", or do we do everything we can to make ourselves presentable to God and to our fellow human beings?/dmh
My heart's been heavy with grief from seeing increasing sloppiness in the Church.
You say "What? Sloppiness in the Church?" Yes.
There's sloppiness everywhere around us: in business, in education, at home, at school -- and even in the Church.
We've become "the sloppy generation".
Look at the way people dress for work, for schools, in public.
Baggy pants with waistlines below the hips and crotches at the knees, pregnant women with tight jerseys above the belly, necklines mid-breast and men's pant legs bundled up at the ankles for lack of length adjustments.
Torn and ripped up jeans are fashionable.
That's not to mention the new dishevelled hairdos that have been passing as "cute", and all the rest of it.
I even saw a woman at a supermarket store in her pyjama! I once attended a service where people worshipped up and down the aisles, dancing barefoot, in T-shirts, collection plate in one hand and a Tim Hortons coffee in the other.
I see women - both slim and fat -- with short skirts ignorantly 'mooning' when sitting or bending down.
It is odd to see people in shorts and t-shirts in a Sunday Church service - it is unnatural and irreverent.
Sure I'm happy they are in the Church at all.
And we are not to be judgmental of un-saved folks coming in that way.
But when we know the Lord, when we are saved and become ambassadors for the Kingdom of God, we have a responsibility to set the example.
We've lost our fear of the Lord.
We've lost our reverence in the Church.
It's a difficult thing to bring out but when the Holy Spirit keeps stirring your heart to talk about it, you just can't run away from it.
What's wrong with the Church? Well, firstly, in many Churches there is the lack of qualified leadership - that is qualified in people skills.
There is a lack of "leading by example".
There is a lack of preaching the hard issues of dress and personal presentation.
The famous sales and personal development trainer and motivator, Zig Ziglar, for one, said it is a demonstrated fact that people who are dressed up perform better at school and at work.
Remember what lawyers do when defending their clients? They have them trim their hair and shave, and dress them up to change the impression of the public.
Some time ago, as I was thinking about all this, the Lord led me to an article by David Wilkerson on a sermon he made to a group of pastors in a denominational headquarters chapel service entitled "The Dangers of the Gospel of Accommodation".
In it he described at length, what the Lord is saying about His Church.
He said that a Gospel of Accommodation has been creeping into the Church, especially in America and the Western World.
The description of "accommodation" is: "to adapt, to make suitable and acceptable, to make convenient.
" This was exactly what another message, from another servant of the Lord, was saying from a completely separate platform.
And basically what the Lord has been showing me in the past many months.
In speaking with other concerned Christians, I also have heard similar comments.
Many of these folks have stopped going to Church.
Yet, they love the Lord.
But they all have similar stories, that there is sloppiness in the serving of the Church.
According to Wilkerson this "new gospel" has influenced many ministers of every denominations and given birth to many churches who serve thousands of people who come to hear a "non-confronting message".
These messages are geared to keep everyone happy and unruffled, seeking to be friendly and inoffensive.
However, the true Gospel of Jesus Christ is confronting to sin and sinful living.
But many people today don't want to talk about sin.
The Gospel is not friendly to sin.
It is friendly to the sinner but if sinful living will destroy the life of a person, it needs to be confronted.
Jesus said he came to fulfill the law of the Old Testament, not to condemn it.
I like the leadership style of Pastor Pat Francis of the Kingdom Covenant Ministries which is just that - teaching folks to be their very best in every way.
Not confronting sloppiness in the Church is to accommodate self-denial, irresponsibility, and the lack of living by example.
One pastor was heard to say after a service, 'We're not here to offend people, but to make church comfortable for everyone".
That too is sloppiness -- sloppiness in Gospel delivery.
Indeed we have heard many times, people say that they don't want to "offend" others.
This has come to the point now where we avoid telling them they should live holy and respectful lives before God, in fear and trembling, in awe of a God who will judge our every detail of our lives, one day when we stand before Him.
In the book of Ezekiel, we read: "Son of man, I have made thee a watchman unto the house of Israel: therefore hear the word at my mouth, and give them warning from me.
When I say unto the wicked, Thou shalt surely die; and thou givest him not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life; the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand.
" (Ezekiel 3:16-18, King James Version) Sounds harsh? Problem is, if we have become sloppy on the outside, we have become sloppy on the inside.
And on the inside is where character and worship comes from.
In Matthew 16:24, Jesus says that any man who will come after Him will have to deny himself, take up his cross and follow Him..
Do we self-deny our current status-quo regardless of respect for life and for others in order to be "comfortable", or do we do everything we can to make ourselves presentable to God and to our fellow human beings?/dmh
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