So I have several churches and groups I follow by podcast. I spend a minimum of 3.5 hours a day in my car so this is how I am able to stay plugged in during the week. Several of these churches have revivals going on. Traveling revivalists or evangelists have come in to speak for a period of time. Over the first few days of listening to some of these I would find myself grinding my teeth. Stressed out would best way to describe the way I felt after listening. At first I thought perhaps I just had a critical spirit. However as I prayed I began to realize some things. I then decided to listen to a Sunday morning service from another group. I then turned on a podcast from a mega church so many of these evangelists would criticize. It's a big church with multiple campuses and a coffee bar, so it would be an easy target for those who bash the "American Sunday Morning Church". What I found a was wonderful sermon full of scriptural revelation. It was about Jesus, not about other churches. I felt a jump inside my spirit. I began to realize somethings.
The new revivalist/ evangelist scares church members by telling them they need more than Sunday morning Christianity. What they have now isn't enough! It also bashes other churches as not meeting enough or being spiritual enough. This is no different than the hell fire and brimstone guys who led to people thinking they need to be saved every alter call years ago. It is a tactic that creates a false response. People respond based off fear they will disappoint God or go to hell.
But Jesus says, do not be afraid, just believe. (Mark 5:36)
I am not saying Sunday morning is ALL you need. But showing up five times a week and calling extra services isn't going to do any good without belief and relationship. Fear is not the way to spread the gospel. Instead of worrying about what every church is doing wrong or how much better we are than someone else, how about we spend some time telling the world about Jesus. What the church looks like or how they do church is not as critical as why they do church. If church is all about Jesus it's really hard to have an unimportant or uninspired service. Had I walked into the last 2 revival meetings I listened to as a nonbeliever it would have made me want to walk away saying "if church people don't like each other why do I want to be one". We are often too critical of other churches or groups. We are arrogant sometimes in thinking relationship should look the same in everyone. In the same regards churches will not look the same either. Daniel did not look like David. Abraham did not look or act like Moses, Peter, or Paul. But all followed God. The reading of the scriptures and temple built in Nehemiah didn't look like the sermon on the mount in the New Testament. These are all examples of difference with same intent. All had an intended path. All point to Jesus and his redemption of man.
I hope we will learn that we should use opportunity for speaking to share about Jesus, not to promote ourselves as better than other believers. When we tell people about Jesus and they trust in him, then we must trust him to lead the people down the path he has for them.
As for me, from now on when a speaker begins to put down another group of believers. I simply delete the podcast and quit listening!
- MZG
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