church

Whatever It Takes

September 30, 2019 By Jeff Leave a Comment

Why are we consistently doing the minimal as Christians? We see people head to the abyss without great concern. Christians are not doing whatever it takes for our culture and non-believers to not reach hell. We even raise hell upon them. Christendom isn’t a club. There is a culture out there that doesn’t allow for grace on social media. A culture without grace and love. We need to do whatever it takes for everyone to know Christ. You are not greater than persecution because our savior was persecuted for us.

Jude 1:23-24 (NASB):
"And have mercy on some,
who are doubting; save others,
snatching them out of the fire;
and on some have mercy with
fear, hating even the garment 
polluted by the flesh."

Our culture is constantly creating agnostics by horrible experiences at church. People, many times, have a bad experience at church. There is always a hypocrite that doesn’t exemplify the love of Christ. Many of these people doubt the existence of God because of how broken his people are. We need to pursue these people. Show Christ is greater then the sin’s of people. Shine a light on the heresy of the sin’s of the people who take God’s name in vain. When we don’t darkness wins. We have to keep pursuing whatever it takes.

This cancel culture is destroying us. It is even affecting the church. We offer no grace to people who have said horrible things on social media. These people get turned into foils for a belief we want to conquer instead of a heart we want to win. Don’t let the low hanging fruit of regretful post destroy your witness. Give grace when needed. Be relentless in the pursuit of forgiveness.

We have to be watchful to not turn church into a masquerade. Covering up you sin at church only makes it stronger and relentless away from church. A doctor doesn’t tell you to pretend a wound doesn’t exist. Why should we as Christians to the same for sin? This ties into what I talked about above. Only this time the world sees the church members roaming around in their natural habitat. We need to do whatever it takes to be accountable to each other, whether we like it or not.

We will be persecuted by doing whatever it takes to pursue others for Christ . When we are persecuted we should count it as gain. Jesus was persecuted as well as the apostles. Our church is afraid of push-back so our culture is pushed into darkness. You will meet opposition when you face the lies that our pagan culture has promoted. Look at the culture in front of you. Do you see the church doing whatever it takes?

Christians Not Knowing The Enemy

September 9, 2019 By Jeff Leave a Comment

Christians in our culture sometimes lack the understanding of the enemy. We face a culture where we value our own truth. Many times our own truth conflicts with the character of God. The real enemy is our own truth instead of not knowing the truth. The greatest threat to the Church and the world is God hatred verses unbelief. Ironically you see God hatred in church’s across the world. They reject the true nature of God and create their own version of God. If you hate the attributes of God you must, well you know.

Our fight is not against people who don’t believe in Jesus. The fight is against those who want to persecute him. I’m not saying the fight is against people but it is a fight against ideologies. Our church, at times, is good at equipping us to evangelize to the unbelievers. We are equipped to evangelize to an non-existent enemy. The culture decays while the people who persecuting the ideals of God are encountered without a fight.

People who are in opposition to God are offended by the truth. They hate the feeling that they are not God of their own lives. The enemy tries to destroy whatever takes away their pride. The truth is felt as a constraint instead of freedom from the bondage of sin. You hear celebrities and political figures state, “live your own truth.” On the surface that sounds freeing but it is far from it.

The phrase, “live your own truth,” is satisfying at first. If Christians define that as destructive they go to far with you. This saying becomes their ebenezer. God’s truth eventually is an assault of their secular religion. The Light is offensive. In the light they see their sins for what they are. Therefore, the Light is their enemy. The truth of Christ becomes their enemy.

The doctrine of, “live your own truth,” has infiltrated the Church. I seen scripture get manipulated to fit viewpoints. Many people say, “This is not my God.” This can be in reference to many things. Divine judgement, lifestyle, or anything in conflict with the Word of God. The is done by Scripture Hopping, eliminating parts of the bible as relevant, or just simply ignoring scripture. We should fear the church running in opposition to the Creator.

We need to confront the truth. The real enemy is hating the truth of God. We have to be aware of this problem in the Church. Our church needs to be equipping people to battle against the ideologies that oppose God. We are failing as a culture. We surely are in need of a revival.

Too Many Gods

May 21, 2019 By Jeff Leave a Comment

Some Christians in our culture worship many gods. This can be wealth, personality, doctrine, and many more. The passive nature of our church leads to worshiping gods. If we are not active in the great commission and centering your life around Jesus many things fill the gap. What do we value and how do we value it.

A big issue in our culture is the cult of personality. We don’t look at these people as human that can make mistakes. Once a leader in the church declares something as true people go along with them. They put the relationship to the person above the Truth. Everyone is bound to the truth regardless of personality or authority.

Another one of the gods people worship is wealth. They put success as a measuring stick of holiness. Wealth is shown as a reward. This is a trap. Wealth is viewed as an end instead of an opportunity. Living with Christ is the only real measurement of success.

If a church doesn’t have a central goal people will create there own. The goal should be equipping people for the great commission. When this isn’t the goal then we put practices and doctrine in place of the great commission. Soon these practices overshadow the One in which the church was made for. At this point we create gods. A truth we fail to see is that inaction can lead to this. We get so comfortable in the world we created that we forsake the real world. Not good.

The solution for this is to put Christ at the center of our church. Our goal is not to bring people to church. It is to make people part of the Church. This sounds like the same but it is far from it. Church attendance doesn’t increase Christianity. It may increase church income though. The latter part is us leading people to Christ to be part of His Church. Let’s not create gods in place of the one true God.

Fear To Preach

February 14, 2019 By Jeff Leave a Comment

We are living in a culture where we are afraid to preach the truth. Also teachers are afraid to turn away potential church goers. Teachers are in a constant state of fear. They give milk to the congregation because it is universally accepted. We don’t preach what is needed and what is relevant to convict us. Many people run to the darkness cause they are afraid of the light.

There is not an equal correlation from conviction to not accepting Christ. Church leaders are afraid to preach things that convict people. People who are not Christians don’t know the Truth. I’m not talking about preaching from generally held truths. One example: not to worship a carved image. That is not a cultural problem. One the other hand, worshiping Hollywood celebrities is a far too common practice. Church leaders do not get relevant in preaching out of fear of turning off people to Christ.

I have discussed in past blogs the problem of giving milk to the congregation. Many times the reason is also due to fear. Something substantial always has backlash. There are many church leaders who try to convict a pastor for the substance. Job security, unfortunately, is tied to given people what they want to hear. The job of the congregation is to make disciples. A pastor’s job is to shepard the congregation. His job is not equip the congregation for outreach. The pastor shouldn’t appease the lowest common denominator but to lead their flock.

Unfortunately, even Christians don’t like the truth. Anything that rattles us to the core we are afraid of and hate. We should constantly be rattled. Every time a pastor preaches we should be rattled. Our leaders should recognize this and understand it. We cannot truly change the culture and the world when we can’t preach convicting messages. Church should make us feel good about ourselves. It should make us equipped, to strip away all the filth we see in the Light of God.

Truth in the Details

January 24, 2019 By Jeff Leave a Comment

Many times teachers in the church leave out important details in passages in the bible. They connect verses from different passages that create a different narrative. It is easy to take a small verse and add your own context when you are teaching the gospel. Also it is easy to put a small verse on a projector for everyone to see. What is convenient isn’t always right.

Jeremiah 29:11 (NASB) is the best example to use for this post:
“‘For I know the plans that I have for you,’declares the Lord, ‘plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope.'”

This verse is the most predominate verse for the prosperity gospel. People think that that this verse is talking about all of creation. Also they think you will have a life that will be materially blessed. The pastor can use this verse and bend it to their own narrative. This verse is lacking details. When you read something with pronouns you have to ask yourself “Who is ‘you?'” “You” is referring to a reprisal of a time of judgement of Israel. Huh.

If you read a verse that needs more context you have to quote more verses. Pronouns that are not clearly defined need to be defined. Don’t define it by your own biases. Let the bible do it. Prosperity gospel is a by product of not showing the details of a biblical passage. It is destructive and leads people astray. The worst thing you can do is use the bible incorrectly to manipulate people.

Lacking details makes it very easy to use Scripture Hopping by linking small verses together. In church you have a topic that has multiple verses attached to it. It is like a river. One flows into another and creates the current that the preacher wants you to see. If individually the verses doesn’t highlight your point don’t use it. This is done many times in ignorance and laziness.

This is a big issue in the church. Be on guard by reading the whole passage when a teacher gives you a verse. If it alone has nothing to do with the topic disregard it. Do it to not be manipulated. I’m not telling you to disregard the truth in the bible. I’m telling you to disregard the false connection the teacher is guiding you toward. Also please read my older post, Scripture Hopping, to add more context to this important issue.