The Scriptures are written for our edification, to build us up as well as
guide us while making known the will, ways and nature of our creator.
They are indeed what Paul described them as to Timothy, a treasure.
They are described in many ways. The Psalmist says, Your word is a
lamp to my feet and a light to my path (Psalms 119:105). The Word of
God as it is spoken and taught lays before us a path upon which to
walk.
It is now somewhere between 49 and 51 A.D. and the Apostle Paul has
penned the words we find in I Thessalonians. Words of thankfulness
and appreciation. Words of instruction and reaffirmation. But I would
draw your attention to chapter one verses 6 and 7 where Paul writes a
word of reminder and says, “And you became imitators of us and of
the Lord, for you received the word in much affliction, with the joy of
the Holy Spirit, so that you became an example to all the believers in
Macedonia and in Achaia.” This we must remember was written
following Paul’s being in Thessalonica.
And what is the significance of that? Simply this. The Thessalonians
had no Bible; their scriptures were Paul himself. They were able to
read with unmistakable clarity the infectious and contagious message
of Christ. The scriptures they read was the life of Paul himself. He
made God visible and they simply copied him — Copy-Cat
Christianity. The way Paul lived embodied the sum and substance of
the Christian message. It was something to be imitated because it was
worthy of imitation.
Is your life filled with that kind of power?
We have shaped our churches to be a success-oriented, culture
obsessed with image and power and influence, and to worship the
current day idols of Health, Wealth and Pleasure. What we want to
produce is people with an image — not character — and it often has
little to do with the Christ of scripture.
In his well-known book, “To Change the World,” James Davison
Hunter (a sociologist) argued that the way to change the world is (1) to
gather elite people (2) who are close to the power, (3) who are part of
large networks and (4) who have abundant resources (5) to press for a
cause.
This is pure elitism and image building, and it sickens God himself.
John Nugent, in his exceptional new book “Endangered Gospel,”
contends the way of Jesus is the exact opposite: it is to gather the
unlikely who are not part of the systems of power and who are in
small networks and who have few resources but who embody the
gospel.
Many churches today say they know the gospel is the message of the
church, but they whittle it down and repackage it and market it as
being conservative laced with moralism or values. They fear the actual
gospel knowing it will trim their membership cash.
“The most dangerous religion is not Islam, nor is it atheism. The most
dangerous religion is a form of Christianity that uses the name of
Jesus to keep people happy and healthy, but doesn’t call them into a
form of fellowship that showcases God’s Kingdom before the
watching world.” — John C. Nugent
We love a designer religion, a look, a shape, a form, style. Attractional!
We have become the Burger King Church, “have it your way.” We will
give you more of what you want and less of what you need.
If it’s not Designer it is “Purpose Driven” and if not that it is “High
Tech.” We are getting quite used to the high tech, with a quick
satisfaction of every need. Fashionable, elite and the list goes on, but
what has it brought us? What kind of people is the church producing
today? I ask you. Are you just a Christian by current standards, or a
disciple of Jesus Christ?
A church without community — we have traded community for an
atmosphere of clubbiness and conviviality. A gospel without Lordship,
that has sentimental appeal marked or governed by feeling, sensibility
or emotional idealism rather than reason or thought or most of all
reality (truth). A lifestyle without discipleship.
As evangelical faith becomes secularized, its interests have been
blurred with those of the culture. The result is a culture-led church.
Christianity Today printed a quote from one John Fischer:
“As the church today gets more and more hip —more and more need-
oriented, responding to the buttons that people push in their pews —
I find myself longing for more of a historical faith. I find myself not
wanting to have everything explained to me in simple terms. ... I’m
not even sure I want all my needs met as much as I want to meet God.”
(Christianity Today, April 26, 1993, page 37). We have created
consumers, we focus on what will sell, image, whether it be
reputation, appearance or status, health, wealth or pleasure.
Professor David Wells has said it best.
“The fundamental problem in the evangelical world today is not
inadequate technique, insufficient organization or antiquated music,
and those who want to squander the church’s resources bandaging
these scratches will do nothing to stanch the flow of blood that is
spilling from its true wounds,” Wells said. “The fundamental problem
in the evangelical world today is that God rests too inconsequentially
upon the church, his truth is too distant, his grace is too ordinary, his
judgment is too benign, his gospel is too easy and his Christ is too
common.” I might add simply, the church is often about the ABC’s —
Attendance, Buildings and Cash.
Now before some may criticize let me say, I am for bigger (and better)
but not at the expense of the best, truth unchanged, unchanging. I
have rarely pastored a church that didn’t grow (measurably). But I
must say that numbers only show something is going on, not that it is
good or bad, just something is going on. So, be careful how you judge.
Paul’s preaching to the Thessalonian Church was with great power. It
was not just impersonal information about God; it was more than
facts and studious explanations. Paul said to the Colossians in 1:28,
“We proclaim him, warning every man, teaching every man, that we
may present every man mature in Christ.” Preaching today has little
warning in it. Paul said we did not come to in words only, but in power
(I Thessalonians 1:5).
Much preaching is on hard times; it is often no more than filler. I like
the words of Halford Luccock as a student at Union Seminary
preached a sermon in chapel on keeping his sentences picturesque “so
that the ear was turned into an eye.” The Thessalonians imitated Paul
because they heard and saw a man worth imitating, a message
undeniably believable and a God Man — Jesus — worth everything
they had, were and more, their all, and that has not changed.
Remember, “The aim of preaching is not the elucidation of a subject,
but the transformation of a person.” In Part II we will see what it was
about the Thessalonian Church that made them a Model Church.
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