Can’t See Jesus Because Of the Church
“Can’t see the forest for the trees.” Heard that before?
What about this one?
“What you’re living is so loud, I can’t hear what you’re saying.”
Ouch.
Ghandi said, “I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians.”
Double ouch.
I am about to misunderstood. I know that. But the point is too much worth making to skip it due to that risk.
But we’ve made Christianity in American too much about church and not enough about Jesus.
If you don’t believe me, just go witness to your waiter or waitress at your next meal out. Say nothing about church, just Jesus.
I can almost guarantee that within 45 seconds she’ll talking about church.
“I grew up in church… I know I ought to get back in church… I’ve been trying to find me a church…”
You’re talking about Jesus. Instantly, she’s talking about church.
Why?
Because for the last 60 years, we’ve made Christianity more about church than Jesus.
The fact is, so much of the world sees us get more bent out of shape over issues of style more than issues of substance. We’re far too often either energized or deflated by church-related stuff more than Jesus-related stuff.
And that sends a distinct message to the world about what’s most important.
When people in the church quench the Spirit and starting “walking in the flesh” over things like music styles, order of service and use of technology, something needs to be announced:
The greatest idol in the Church is the church.
We’ve degenerated to worshiping the form rather than the substance.
Don’t get me wrong—church is important. Enjoy church, go to church, serve at church, but don’t worship church. The Church is to worship Christ. He alone is worthy of our worship and followership.
Church is meant to be an organism and organization (yes, I said it) that is the expression of the fullness of Christ, not an entrapment of Him.
Too often Jesus gets trapped in the stained glass of tradition, religious forms and comfort zones… most of which are never mentioned in Scripture and have nothing to do with the Gospel. He is “dying to get out.” We should let him.
If we worship forms and traditions all while claiming Jesus, then the world won’t know where one stops and the other starts. That would be the equivalent of the “adding to” and “taking away” warned against in Revelation 22:18-19.
A dying world needs to see Him through us, not miss Him because of us. What they see of Jesus is determined by what we the Church does with Jesus and really, what we do with everything else surrounding Him.
We had better be careful about what we get mad, sad and glad about in church. Because THAT tells what we really worship.
Careful. The world is watching.
In light of the fact that the church is meant to be the place (rather, the people) where the world finds Jesus, it would be tragedy if the world lost Him there.
“Nice trees. You seen a forest around here anywhere?”
Tags: america, bible, christian, christianity, church, gospel, Jesus, ministry, salvation
November 3rd, 2009 at 3:30 pm
You are so right on! I have been talking with men from South Carolina to Texas and we have been discussing almost word for word what you said in this article. It is so cool to see conformation when God is leading you in a direction. Can’t wait to pass this on to my friends. I believe God is calling a group of men who love Jesus to get the church back about Jesus and not about a particular church or pastor but about Jesus.
Be Blessed,
Doug Blackburn
July 9th, 2010 at 12:32 pm
I couldn’t agree more. I have seen it in most churches in Canada and the Us.
My wife is from China and we have done some missions work there. Most of the Chinese Christians i have talked with seem to have it figured out correctly.
It seems that the older churches get, the more they focus on the program rather than the programmer (Christ). I have been a Christian for 30 years and i pray regularly for the innocence of my youth to return, when i was focussed on Christ and nothing else. North america seems to be wandering away from Christ like the Israelites wandered away from God in the Old Testament. There are still the faithful few, but it seems that there are less and less of us all the time. North America needs a revival. We need to focus on the programmer, everything else is details.
May God bless all who read this. Doug