Will the Real Church Please Stand Up?
2 Chronicles 7:14 says, “ if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land”.
One thing that is always especially traumatic for someone who moves to a new city is the ”project” of finding a new church. Now admittedly, sometimes God orchestrates circumstances and situations so that it is an easy thing. Other times, we have to pray a lot, and seek God’s will as we should, but it seems that we just can’t seem find the place where we feel we are ”home”. Church should be a place where we are loved by the people, and where we can love the people too. When you finally are where God wants you then it DOES become an easy thing to know that you are right where the Lord wants you. Don’t ask me why sometimes it is easy and sometimes it is hard. I don’t know the answer to that one. All I know is that it is.
Sometimes God has to arrange things at your destination to allow you to ”Fit In”. Not through any fault of yours but maybe the timing is just not right yet. Sometimes, the Lord has to move people, or alter situations, or a thousand other things that we may never know until we are at home with Jesus. All I know of a certainty is that when you have ”Arrived at your God designed destination” you will know it, and so will the church.
There is a lot of joy associated with finding your place in God’s service. Things that may have seemed were moving at a snail’s pace can all of a sudden go into hyper-drive! You may have felt that it could take years to accomplish something great for God and then it happens in days instead. It is all by God’s timing and according to His plan. Be patient, or as folks used to say, ”Let go and let God”.
What you must do if you find yourself in these kinds of circumstances is to make sure that your heart is prepared and that you are right with the Lord. It may even be possible that some of the delay could have been God giving you time to work on your own life first, and to ”take care of business” so to speak.
Once you are sure that you are where the Lord wants you in your personal relationship, then you set out to find the Church where God wants to plant you. (Just don’t take too long in getting on the journey or the devil will start telling you that it is OK to lay out of church, and you may start believing him!). Okay, you start out searching for ”your church”. Then, all of a sudden, you realize that Church is not what Church used to be and you are faced with something you didn’t expect or envision.
Church in some cities these days can run the gamut of staunchly traditional and legalistic, to wildly ”Loose” with regard to God’s Word and Worship. Some churches I have found to be very ”Scriptural” as one friend used to say. They are as Jude puts is in Jude 1:12 b, ”trees whose fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots;”. Yeah, there are plenty of those out there. Dead churches are increasingly becoming the norm in some denominations sadly to say! Now I don’t normally criticize churches but friend I have seen enough deadness in some churches to last me a lifetime! In our efforts to be ”Scriptural” we have left God, sadly to say (at least in my opinion) in a lot of cases!!
On the one hand we have the dead, dry legalistic traditional. How do you recognize them? It’s easy. Folks come into these churches, sing a few songs, turn it over to the preacher why expounds a little scripture, gives an invitation, prays a benediction and sends you home. Folks rarely get saved, and when they do, as one fellow used to say, ‘They have to backslide to get into fellowship with the congregation”. No wonder good people are leaving ”traditional” churches in droves. I will take a little life any day over the deadness I have seen in some churches. The sad thing about it is that they do not see it. They have done it so long that it has become the norm and the Spirit left long ago. God left, the Spirit left, they continue to have church and don’t have a clue! The church is nothing but a social club.
In some more ”Progressive” dead churches, they may even try to sing a few praise and worship songs or a chorus or two interspersed with the same old things they always sang, so as to keep everyone happy. When they sing these songs, there is no true worship. There is just a mechanical experience. They pause between songs while everyone waits on the leader to decide which song to do next or in some cases waits on the media person who is totally unqualified, and severely lacks the knowledge and the anointing to realize that the flow of worship must be maintained to keep folks plugged into the worship experience. We visited a church one time where the leader would yell out to the person in the sound and video booth, to go to page so and so or would fuss at them telling them to basically ”get it together”. It was a real ”Spiritual” experience. Just don’t think it was much of the Holy Spirit! There was nothing but dead, dry, and mechanical services with no anointing at all. Used to have a friend who would say, ”They did not have enough anointing to blow the fuzz off a peach!” And some folks there would wonder why people were leaving and the church was dying! Go figure!
Then there is the other side of the extreme. These are the churches that in an effort to, as they say, ”Reach People” have lively services but have thrown morals, decency, and faithfulness to God’s word out the window. Nothing is ever wrong in these churches. Live like you want to, come any way you want to, forget the Bible, as long you show up and pay your tithes. ”We do not address social or moral issues in an effort to not offend anyone”, they will say. They will ignore the scriptures that talk about decency and morality, and camp on the things that make folks ”Feel Good” about themselves even if they are living in gross sin.
A word of warning here…be careful preacher or Christian in trying to tell people what God’s Word says! You might find yourself in a lawsuit from someone who doesn’t agree with what you preach even if it is in accord with God’s Word. You could end up in jail! Well beloved, you would join fine company. The Apostle Paul and many others spent a lot of time in Jail because of standing up for God and His Word. You know what dear friend, God was always there with them and God was always glorified!! If you stand up for the truth and right living He will have your back too!
We live in the midst of a nation and a people who have totally turned away from God and His Word and are bent on destroying anything and anyone who stands up for righteousness. Friends, I don’t know about you, but I think it is time that the real church takes a stand for Jesus and starts living what they say they believe!
In the middle of these two extremes, I believe true Christianity still thrives. It is still pointing people to Jesus. Lives are still being changed. Drug addiction, immorality, and all kinds of sin are still being broken. People in bondage are still being set free. Sick folks are still being healed. The bondage of sin and the enemy are being broken. Preachers are still standing up for truth and the principles of God’s word. Yes, Charlotte, there is a ”Real church”! Thank God for that! If your church is not telling you the truth, if they cannot worship in Spirit and in truth, then go somewhere that they do! It may not be the biggest church in town, but I will bet you that that folks who go there have a story to tell about how the Lord changed their lives and they are happy to tell you about it! They will also love you too. They may not love the sin but I promise you they will love the sinner and point him or her to Jesus! I think it is time we started fasting and praying for deliverance from the lifestyles and from the Churches that say, ”Anything goes”!
2 Chronicles 7:14 says, “”if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land”.
Will the Real Church Please Stand Up? (Oh, and send us your address so we will know where to find you!) 🙂
Blessings!
Bro. Tommy
