I've complained a lot about the charismatic church we sometimes attend. I'm not going to do that today. Today, I'm going to complain about the Baptist church.
Our kids attend AWANA at the Baptist Church where I first came to God. It has been, by and large, a blessing. We've bounced around a lot in the last five years, attending two home churches, two large churches, and visiting many others, but most of the time just skipping it. But the kids have been at AWANA every Sunday come hell or high water.
Why would a person, such as myself, who hates all that is religious, choose to put her kids in a program that is hugely religious? Well, first of all because the kids are memorizing scripture. And, while I do not always agree with how it is used at AWANA, the kids are banking it away, and it often pops out of their mouths as we explain spiritual principles to them. Secondly, it has provided stability in their "church" sector when we couldn't. They have several close relatives at the Baptist church. Since we homeschool, I felt like it was important to keep something like this going in their lives.
So, I preface my complaints with the utimate conclusion that the overall experience is a benefit to us. Some claim that the kids have been a blessing to others in the program, too, but I have a hard time buying that.
Today was the annual AWANA Grand Prix, a pine box car race wherein the dads compete to see who can most artistically fulfill their children's dreams of speed and victory. And being a religious activity, the program is arranged such that you cannot receive your trophy without sitting through a sermon. This year's edition was delivered by the church's youth pastor, who was about 20. This frustrated me to start with—don't teens deserve someone with some maturity and experience and wisdom? Not that he wasn't a nice 20 year old, maybe a good Bible student. But what did any of us know at 20? I don't think I know much at 38.
In any case, they gave the floor to this young man, so that he could share the wisdom of his years. Which isn't a kind thing to do to someone who is 20. (Or even maybe 38!)
The content of this young man's speech made my heart sink. His main point was that you could tell God when you mess up because he loves you. Which is a good and valid point. But his support for it revealed a very faulty foundation for his understanding. He illustrated his thesis with a couple personal stories, wherein he struggled to admit he had done something wrong. In both cases, his guilt was not very certain since they were accidents, and in both cases, the person to whom he confessed did not respond with grace. Not exactly a home-run in illustrating repentance and confession, but that wasn't the worst of it.
The worst was the allegorical story that he told that related the story of salvation:
A king had a lovely and happy kingdom that he ruled with wisdom and kindness. But one of his cities went renegade on him and stopped obeying him and didn't want him to be their king. They started to be rude and cruel to one another. And their city got worse and worse. The king had to do something. He couldn't just let them go on destoying one another because he loved them. He couldn't destoy them out of hand, because he cared too much for them. So, of course, he went and lived among them and showed them love and kindness, and they learned the error of their ways and started being nice again. But they were afraid to come back to the king, because maybe he wouldn't want them any more since they had been so bad. Then he showed his ring—I am the King! I am not mad! I still want you! Group hug, happily ever after.
There is so much wrong with this. Let's start with the nature of God. God has, in the past, gone right ahead and obliterated towns and peoples because he would not tolerate their faithlessness. He is not all that nice. And he will, ultimately, condemn most of the people he has made. They will suffer because of their rejection of him. It isn't safe to ignore him. We are his creations, and his rightful “property”, in the crassest sense. And while he is apparently letting some kind of story run its course, every sin will be paid for, one way or another.
Ex 34:6-7 "The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, 7 maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished.”
If the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, then we cannot neglect this element of his character, even with our tender children.
Another problematic element of the story is the mistaken hope that being a Christian means Now I Get to Be Good! Jesus was not primarily a moral teacher. Yes, he did come and model a perfect life. What was the essence of this perfect life? This is so, so important. Jesus perfect life was NOT NOT NOT the fulfillment of a list of right behaviours. It was a life lived in perfect step with everything the Father directed. The book of John is FULL of this. Here are a few snips:
John 5:19-20
"I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.
Note: SEES, active and happening at that instant, not something he once saw, but the current action of the Father.
John 8:28-29
I do nothing on my own but speak just what the Father has taught me. 29 The one who sent me is with me; he has not left me alone, for I always do what pleases him."
John 12:49
For I did not speak of my own accord, but the Father who sent me commanded me what to say and how to say it.
John 14:10-11
Don't you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work. 11 Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me.
Jesus was full of God. And through faith in him, all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in us also. Think on that for a moment. Because Jesus died and was raised, he could send the Holy Spirit to live in us, if we will. We are offered what he had—a live connection to God, to empower and direct us in living a pleasing life, no longer stupidly wallowing without power or wisdom.
Read this section of John with that in mind:
John 14:19-24
Before long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. 20 On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. 21 Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him."
22 Then Judas (not Judas Iscariot) said, "But, Lord, why do you intend to show yourself to us and not to the world?"
23 Jesus replied, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 24 He who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.
If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. That can be a command or a statement of something that happens. If I let go of this brick, it will fall to the ground. God first loves us, we respond by loving him, and the natural fruit is obedience. Note that love comes first, the relationship comes first. In the story, the people did not love first. They figured out that living clean is good for you. This is not repentance, it's just common sense. Nice, but purely carnal. It has nothing to do with being saved or indwelt by God. In the end, they will still be destroyed because they refused to be owned.
What Jesus offered was Life. He was alive because the Father was IN him. We have that same chance, to be IN Christ, and to be alive in the same sense that Jesus was. What Jesus offered was emphatically NOT a pattern to copy, beyond his relationship to God.
So, I was disappointed that the church leadership inflicted this sermon on this kid, and on us. Why would a year or two of Bible School equip someone who is so young to shepherd teens? And how did he go to Bible School that long without, apparently, hearing the Gospel? If the role of leaders is to equip the saints to do the work of the ministry, why aren't there a large crop of older men to fulfill this role?
Apostasy, I tell you! ;-)
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment