A Microcosm in the Comments

Leadership's Out of Ur blog has a post by Spencer Burke on the consumeristic church. The article is notable for its un-notableness, but the comments seem to me to be a microcosm of contemporary views of the church. There are some good comments, some insightful comments, and some comments that can only be labeled as bizarre. To me, it shows just how juvenile our ecclesiology really is. For all our advancements in society and technology, for all our education in the arts and sciences, much of the church is still at a very early elementary level with respect to her nature and existence, as well as her mission.

I am sure I do not have all the answers, and in fact probably do not even know all the questions. I am not entirely sure what the church would look like if it was a fully-functioning NT church in the variety of twenty-first century cultures in this global age. But somehow, I do not think it takes a rocket scientist to recognize just how misguided some of these comments are.

One commenter says,

So pastors.... go charter a bunch of buses one Sunday morning, take your "members" to the local homeless shelter and feed some people. It'll will speak louder than 52 weeks of music, video clips, and alliterations.

Perhaps this says it all. If chartering buses to local homeless shelters on one Sunday morning speaks louder than the fifty-two preceding weeks, just how bad is your preaching? And your music? And your theology? It is hard to imagine that volunteering at a homeless shelter is an improvement, but given the state of modern (post-modern) ecclesiology and homiletics, it isn't that far-fetched.

And my concern is not with helping the homeless, which is a fine thing to do. (Given the other 167 hours in the week, I am not sure this pastor recommends Sunday morning as the time to do it, but that's another issue). My concern is with the immature view of "church" that can suggest that social service (however good and noble it might be) somehow speaks louder than the authority of the preached word and the gathered church. It seems to play into the (post) -modern idea that it doesn't matter what you believe or say as long as you do something that looks like giving back.

I have somewhat of a different view than many fundamentalists in that I believe the church should be more conscious of social needs and more involved in "ministries of mercy." I think we have too often given up our moral authority by isolation from the needs of our community. The world won't listen to our gospel because it does not appear to them to do anything for us. We exist too often as a fortress of escape rather than a hospital for help. I think that is dangerous, and something that needs more careful thought.

But somehow, in the contemporary church, there has come this belief that social consciousness is part of the mission of the church, rather than an outgrowth of the church's mission being accomplished. We can take comfort in that this idea of social consciousness and involvement isn't new. It was already tried and was part of the liberal-fundamentalist controversy of the early part of the 20th century as the "social gospel" quickly became more social than gospel. It failed then. Why is it different this time?

So long as the church is driven by what people think it should be, rather than what God says it should be, so long as the church is driven by people who get their notions from contemporary society rather than from Scripture, we will continue to have these kinds of assertions.

The church needs the church to be the church. The world needs the church to be the church.

We pastors need to confront these false views of the church in our preaching and teaching. But to do that, we need to know they exist. That is why I read blogs like Out of Ur. I don't always agree with the views espoused, but I find out what people are thinking. And that is part of effective preaching—knowing what people believe so we can bring the truth of the Word of God to bear on their faulty thinking, and encourage their biblical thinking.