The message today, at the church we are visiting, was about getting back to the fundamentals. The pastor gave many statistics about how many Bibles are in American homes, as well as about how few people actually read their Bibles. Of course we can expect the lack of reading from unbelievers, but the statistics about how few Christians actually read their Bibles is quite disheartening.
Read the Word; peruse it and study it. And then live it.
2 comments:
I have to agree with your post, Glen. As the music became more influenced by the band atmosphere, thus creating more of a party spirit, the focus of our worship has evolved from worshiping our LORD Jesus Christ, to basically worshiping the worship leader and his family, the worship band and praising them for all of the time they have dedicated to the "show", and to worshiping man with songs that focus on "I, I, I", "me, me, me", accompanied by physical gestures that "prove" we are more spiritual that those around us.
Case in point, I had a member of the worship band once say, and I quote, "I can tell from the stage, who is more spiritual in their worship. The ones that raise their hands are more into the worship than the ones that just stand there." So the worship band now judges who is more spiritual by outward physical signs, how interesting.
Also, Glen, this may not directly apply to your post, but may offer some insight as to the state of our 501c. 3 churches in this age. In attending most churches these days, the Bible is rarely lifted up as the final authority amongst the masses. For when we began attending the last Baptist church, the women began to indoctrinate me with their favorite flavors of authors/books, speakers and conferences, cd's and tapes, magazines/publications, and pet manifestation doctrines not found in our Scriptures. Another words, in order to fit into this type of church, especially the women's groups, I had to become one of them, and the most broken aspect of the whole church experience was,
no one, no, not a one promoted God's Word as the final authority in all matters of life. Not one person said "You must read your Bible, study and meditate on it daily to grow in our faith in Jesus alone."
So while I agree that party music is leading us into apostasy, I will also confess that men and women within the 501c. 3 have become addicts and slaves to men and women, in worshiping their writings/works far above our LORD. It breaks one's heart when during the sermon message, the pastor focuses on his life stories with only one Scripture read and no expounding upon God's truths. So tired of hearing of pastor's cute little stories about themselves and their families when he could be teaching us what the parable mean, as an example.
And just because I chose not to follow the Todd Bentleys, Larry Hucks, Paula Whites, Benny Hinns, Joyce Meyers, Smith Wigglesworths, Yongi Chos, John Pipers, John MacArthurs, Francis Chans, Mike Bickles, Ron Luces, Chuck Pierces, and every Christian band out there, does mean that I am a born again Christian made in the image of God. It grieves me to no end how the evangelical subculture looks like the rest of this world.
And when you hear an elder stand up in church during praise and blessing time and say, "God spoke to me and told me to get a tattoo with this Scripture verse," then you shall know that it is time to run, run, run far away from that building, for now the spirits are leading that church, and not the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit.
Well, like I said, music is only PART of the problem. The main problem is that the Christians themselves don't know their Bible - have forgotten the basics (or never learned them) - and so can't tell if the guy in the pulpit is a shepherd or a wolf.
And I agree that a major problem is the virtual worship of the writings of all these other people rather than going to the source - the BIBLE.
As the pastor yesterday said, sometimes we just have to hold a Bible up and say, "THIS IS A BIBLE," and start from there.
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