The distant church

September 2005 (John)

What did I see today? Am I wrong, because it seemed like I saw a man drowning. Desperately pulling out all the old catch phrases that used to work, trying to hide even from himself that the old magic had gone. An emotional appeal, ‘don't let them steal that from you', the look of grief, the mention of the rattle of car keys. The bodies are still in the seats but things are not as they were, the expensive fittings have only taken away the heartfelt desire to give and so now everything must have a price tag. A lot has been lost; surely I'm not the only one who notices – probably not, I sense in conversations afterwards a bid to assure us, or perhaps themselves, that all is as good as before.

I wrote this in my diary in March 2004. Since then I believe I've observed many Pastors struggling against feeling discouraged with the state of their congregation. The signs take many forms. I've seen men trying to make up for it with their own energy; trying vigorously to stir people up. I've watched as more and more programs have been introduced to institutionally drive what once was powered spontaneously through the Holy Spirit. I've heard the mild joking sarcasm creeping into their speaking. I personally believe that another sign of the problem is churches rapidly increasing use of technology to try and harness all the latest ideas on creating what the education industry would call a 'stimulating learning environment'. At a humanistic level this is effective, but at a spiritual level I wonder if it's only making things worse. No one seems to want to admit it, but in churches everywhere real spiritual life is dying. I'm not saying it is dead, but I do think it's dying. If we are willing to admit to it, if we are willing to stop and look at the situation objectively, then we must ask ourselves what is wrong with today's churches. We could do a lot of hand wringing and analysing and we could come up with lists of issues and solutions but I don't think it would do any good. Perhaps the reason that the whole problem often goes so unspoken is that a Church is really just a group of Christians. If we were honest we would end up having to ask ‘what is wrong with us?' Why do we experience so little of God's power in our lives and in our meetings?

Because you say, I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing, and do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked,

I counsel you to buy from Me gold purified by fire, so that you may be rich…

(Rev 3:17–18, NKJV)

The church of Laodicea* is characterised as being a materially wealthy church that is lukewarm in their relationship with God and needs to buy righteousness purified by adversity (gold purified by fire). Their great blind spot is their subconscious trust in their material wealth, which has left Jesus standing outside the door of their hearts knocking to get in.

I believe that in the west there are huge cultural impediments to a deep Christian walk and a deep appreciation of the full implications of the Christian life, in particular the way of the cross. We are mostly born into comfort and convenience and taught to expect the best this world has to offer. Even our idea of minimal is a very high standard of living. So even if we intellectually grasp the message of the cross it usually remains hidden from the deeper places of the heart because we can't accept it. In comparison, those who live in the two-thirds world and are more acquainted with suffering and loss are better placed to comprehend what true Christianity is.

It is impossible to be Gods servant unless we can accept suffering in the flesh. Suffering is the place of the flesh, but for those of us used to this molly coddling society that seeks to eliminate all suffering, inconvenience and uncertainty this is very hard to take in.

Can we even think about accepting possibilities like poverty, hunger, lack of security to our person, overwork, illness, overtiredness or being misunderstood for our faith? Most of us feel hard done by if we have to trade down our car or endure some other minor loss or disappointment. The real messages of the New Testament are often not getting through any more. Christianity is a very high calling to holiness, separation from this world, serving others and yes, I say it again, suffering in the flesh.

And whoever does not bear his cross and come after Me, he cannot be My disciple .

(Luke 14:27, NKJV)

We don't tend to think we trust in money because we rationalise so much as necessity. Fiscal responsibility is a good and Christian thing, however it is possible to kill Christian endeavour in the name of responsibility, because ‘long term' planning easily becomes the opposite of living by faith. So although better than foolishness, the exaltation of material wisdom can undermine divine priorities and eternal fruitfulness. A Christian planning for a comfortable retirement is a possible sign that they have already retired from service and the cross. (Many are retired before they even start). I believe it is better to plan only for eternity, even if that results in loss and suffering in this life. A practical example would be to redirect retirement savings to supporting native missionaries or other genuinely fruitful mission activities. The rewards of doing so will, in that place of our true rest, greatly outweigh any loss of comfort here.

And what about our Church institutions? Are they trusting in money to uphold their testimony? In our age of total materialism what could be better guidance for churches than to ‘love not the world, neither the things that are in the world'. Yet in a classic case of ‘the medium is the message' churches are acquiring every new gadget they can to ‘enhance' the worship service. But isn't the underlying message that these churches love the things of this world? Certainly when I look around and see $50,000 or more tied up in data projectors, laptops, digital video cameras, sound mixers, amplifiers and more I think about the fact that in the two thirds world this amount could build half a dozen church buildings with enough left over to supply hundreds of bibles, provide clean drinking water for a village and support a full time native missionary for a number of years. Do we love toys more than we love the lost, and are these toys making our worship services more spiritual or less?

In western Christianity the importance of money has taken on new proportions to the extent that some people have come to measure the progress of Christianity quite differently to the materially poor Christians of the first few centuries before dedicated Christian buildings even existed. You see, in a way you could say that Christians have never been so committed as they are today to ‘building' the kingdom. Building it with wood, concrete and steel that is; pretty much wood hay and stubble and little more at times that a visible testimony of our ‘success' in making the gospel worldly.

Sometimes I wonder if Christianity is in the process of being made over ‘in our image' such that what will eventually be worshipped will be little more than the cumulative tenets of our culture embodied in a God that exists only in our own imaginations, or even turns out to be Satan disguised as an angel of light.

I believe that we cannot revive a nation or church, only ourselves, which happens to be the area we prefer to avoid. Yes, revival can come to a nation or church but true revival is bottom up not top down. Also, revival is not about spreading the Christian way or worldview, but about showing Christian love and righteousness and continuing the gospel testimony. Revival often doesn't have a political companion; often it is more powerful when the political climate is adverse, even persecuting it.

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