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Worldly Church


10/11/18      Lauren and Laurelyn  (video)          20's?



Longtime friends Laurel and Laurelyn had a lot in common in their religious beliefs, having come from Catholic and Christian upbringings and now leaning toward reincarnation as an attractive alternative.  I asked what they didn’t like about their childhood religion, and they mentioned the defensiveness of church leaders in response to their sincere teenage questions, or their trite, simple or thoughtless answers.  Laurel also had bad experiences with church members being prejudiced, focusing on sin and having an unloving attitude.  She felt they were hypocrites because they weren’t Christlike in living out the loving message of Christianity.  Churchgoers like this can give unbelievers a convenient excuse to reject the gospel altogether.   This should not be, but Lauren and Laurlyn do have a point.

How can we have so many people in our churches who turn unbelievers off to the Gospel?  I believe Jesus' parable of the sower can help us better understand why.   

In this parable, a farmer sows his seed, which represents the word of God.  The seeds encounter various types of soil, but only some grows to maturity.  Some gets eaten by birds right away, while others begin to grow but don't last for various reasons.

So while all hear the word, some don't accept it.  It is left exposed, uncared for, and is soon snatched away.  I don’t believe the point of the parable is to blame the birds for snatching away the seed on the pathway and to see this type of soil as the victim of circumstances, but simply to point out that some receive the word with indifference and neglect.  These unbelievers may even continue attending church alongside believers for social or cultural reasons, but they continue to act in worldly ways because they don’t allow the word to influence them.  In fact, the church often changes to accomodate their worldly ways in the hopes that they will continue to attend and eventually be saved.  This is the result of a ministry mindset that wants the world to come into the church rather than the church going out into the world.  These people don’t come for Jesus, they come for the worldly enticements the church has to offer.

Other seeds don’t last for various reasons.  They begin to grow but fall away because of the different types of soil in which they are scattered.  Hebrews 3:14 tells us “We have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original conviction firmly to the very end.”  One sign of authentic salvation is perseverance.  The seeds that don’t last tell us that true and false conversions happen in response to the word.  Other parables, such as that of the wheat and the tares growing side by side, tell us that true and false believers grow side by side for quite some time, revealing not only the ease in which false believers can mimic Christians, but the immaturity of many Christians which allow them to so easily blend in. 

So yes, churches are full of many different types of people: unbelievers, false converts, and Christians at various stages of maturity and immaturity.  The question is, are we there for the people, or for the Word of God?  I believe a church whose leadership faithfully preaches the word, worships Jesus, and brings the gospel out into the world will attract people for the right reasons and will end up with a mix of people at various stages in their faith journey that doesn’t drive people like Laurel and Laurelyn away because of hypocrisy.




PS –Lauren and Laurelyn graciously allowed me to record our conversation (sorry, audio is really bad), which can be seen in its entirety HERE

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