WHAT HAPPENED TO THE CHURCH

As a Christian one of the hardest things to do is find a good Bible believing doctrinal church. I can remember talking to my Bible Teacher Charles Haun about this in the late 1990s and he too was experiencing the same problem. If you think finding a place to worship God in "Sprit and truth" with people was tough in the 90s, well 28 years later has only severely limited our choices. Now I do believe God wants us to join our lives with a local body of believers (not a church because we are the church) not to receive a blessing, but be a blessing. To add in our skills, talents, abilities, and spiritual gifts to be "fitly joined" our hearts as one evangelize the community with the Gospel and then helping the down and out who needs a hand up not a hand out. So what happened to the church? In Matthew 28:19 we get a mandate from, "Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:." (Matthew 28:18), but we are making buildings organizations, foundations, business, corporations, anything to make money. We are to go, teach (make disciples) and baptize. Where did the church get off track? Maybe from the seeker sensitive humanistic movement from books like "The Purpose Driven Life" not wanting to offend people, maybe from the word of faith, "blab it and grab it" or "claim it and game it" crowd, or maybe from the hyper-spirituality folks looking for a devil under every rock. Whatever happened to the churches that were doctrinally sound teaching the word of God as presented in the Scriptures without embellishment? Okay I am going to go ugly right up front, if you think things are okay in most churches you have no spiritual wherewithal. Okay please let me eat my words (God is good at making us eat our words) not all churches are misguided and off track. The churches we visit overseas seem to be more on track doing those things Jesus has asked us to do. Maybe the common denominator of poverty, persecution, and daily struggle has made it so. And maybe that is why we always feel welcome and the presence of God is present in their services. Paul lays it out to us in Ephesians, "From whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love." (Ephesians 4:16), but before this all can happen Paul tells us what must be established in our heart to make it all happen. "With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love; 3 Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 4 There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;" (Ephesians 4:2-4) The problems with the "church" of today are many. There can be no "unity of the Spirit" and all of the great things Paul tells us about unless we can walk in "lowliness and meekness with longsuffering forbearing one another in love." Whatever happened to these qualities in the church? There are three things (in descending order of importance) I would like to discuss in trying to answer the question what happened to the church. As the church goes so does the country. Make no mistake my friend unless the church is set in order America's best days are behind her. The first reason the church has missed it is losing sight of the main teaching of Christ. Jesus told the disciples, "And as ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand. 8Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give. 9Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purses, 10Nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves: for the workman is worthy of his meat." (Matthew 10:7-10) We have lost track of the message we were told to "preach (like at the end of Chapter 28), heal the sick (not pray for the sick), cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, and cast out devils." I see no words from Jesus that says build buildings, start denominations, or collect money for salaries. Oh no Jesus said "as ye go" do all of these things. The church of today has lost the original vision of what Jesus told the disciples by substituting some good works (which is needed) and mixed it with religious tradition and ritual while the countless masses of people in the world perish right before their eyes. Remember, if you feed and clothe people around the world and never give them Jesus then what you will have is well dressed and well feed people in hell. It is no wonder people reject the message of Jesus they have learned the messenger really does care about them they have learned time and time again they only care about themselves. Sadly I have seen and heard this year after year and even sadder it still is on display today. Unless you have the right heart condition for the lost you will do things for yourself and make no mistake people know sincerity when they see it. Jealousy, arrogance, and vain glory will be the heart condition of the pastor and church leadership. And notice Jesus said, "Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purses," well how could that be? Take no money with you? No that is not what Jesus was saying. Jesus was saying God will provide your needs as you go in His will because it is His idea so He will provide and because, "the workman is worthy of his meat." If we do things with the right heart condition, according to His will we are worthy (not what we have do but how we have done them) and God will provide. I have seen this truth in ministry play out since April 1996 when we first went to Germany. God ALWAYS provided everything we needed for our church in Stuttgart and every time we traveled. Even today when the LORD sends us out He provides or we do not go. It is God's idea, it is God's will so He will make it happen. When you get over in self promotion and self funding we are on shaky ground my friend. Over the last 22 years of ministry through Beholding His Glory we have never had a denomination and only two churches (one a Presbyterian and a Baptist) for a short time support us. All of our support has come by way of a hand full (and I mean hand full) of people. Even today this holds true. All that BHG does is provided by a hand full of people who have clearly heard from God and have a heart condition of obedience to God's word. The next reason the church has missed it is lack of relationships. Few relationships within the church and a lack of desire (make people feel uncomfortable) to share the Gospel message with family, friends, and with the lost in world. In most churches 80 percent (known as the 20 to 80 rule) of the work is being carried out by 20 percent or less of the people. We have become a church of spectators. Lack of relationship and not because of the excuse we are too busy, but we do what we really care about. According to my own personal research, the problems are even bigger than the 20/80 rule. Only 39 percent of active believers consider the Bible as the literal word of God. Less than 20 percent of professing believers follow the biblical principle of giving. Only 5 percent have shared their faith with a non-believer. More than half of all church members attend church once a month or less all lack of relationship. If there was a real relationship between the pastors and the people things would be different. People would be inspired and find value in investing their resources in the church and more importantly the people in the community who are almost always forgotten in most churches of today. Resources are spent on people inside the church (the fortress) first (they pay their tithes right?) and if anything is left after paying: salaries, building programs, utilities, property maintenance, maybe mortgage, mission funding to the denomination (instead of people going as Jesus asked), the list goes on maybe the people in the community who the church is to reach may get something. Casual attendance and the belief that others will serve, give, and share the Gospel are tearing down churches across our country brick by brick. Can you imagine what would happen in our personal walk of faith and in our community of believers if we established real relationships with each other? What if every believer exercised generosity? What if everyone served in their God-given purpose? What would happen if we stopped simply believing and started belonging to each other? What if we changed our approach to Christ and established a real relationship with our families and friends; the blessing, the reward, the joy, the fulfillment, the purpose, and the increase would radically transform our lives and the world. Recently we were attending a denomination church in the local area and the pastor (a good, dedicated pastor who really cares about his people in the church) never understood my writings. When I would write about an issue affecting the "church" globally and corporately he would take offense and get upset at us. In defense he was not the only pastor of a church (we attended) who got offended at us. In the past we have invited the pastor (of the church we were attending) and his wife if married over for dinner to explain BHG, our motives, and even tell some in time they too would probably get offended at us. The offence, jealousy, and envy in these pastors, well I will leave this alone. You might ask why then go to church? Again I believe we are to share what the LORD has given us, but when the pastor sees my light might be a little brighter than his, disagree with our writings, or often times think we are trying to break his rice bowl and take over, well the end is near. Knowing this I tried really hard to keep a good relationship with the pastor and the people, after all this is what Jesus asked us to. I understand I am not a card carrying member and will always be an outsider, but we have always honored and supported any pastor of any church we have attended. When we would host friends from overseas we would have the pastor and his wife if married for dinner to get to know our friends better especially if they were to speak at their church. Sometimes we would just have them over for dinner to talk. We even took some out to dinner and others to events trying to establish a Godly relationship. All Godly ministry comes out of Godly relationships When we would travel we would always bring the pastor and some of the people gifts. We worked hard at keeping a good relationship. The last pastor even commented how we were more faithful in attending services and helping out than his members yet because he disagreed with my writings and when I questioned how he handled some Scriptures we were asked to leave. Now Karen and I are not perfect and make mistakes, but our heart has always been in the right place, so too here. I thought for some time what did we do wrong? To be honest I was shocked when the pastor emailed me, yes emailed me and did not call. That is right he emailed me. He did not call or be manly about it by talking to us face to face. I then realized we had no relationship. Oh no I misjudged our relationship. All of the times he thanked us for helping and said he loved us (and he did many times) was not true. I guess love to some is situational dependant. As long as we did and said what he wanted we were in his good graces, but if we question well . . . you know what happens. I thought our relationship was strong enough (after years) to sharpen each other, but I guess I was wrong. Sadly today the church is full of people with no relationships. People come and go every Sunday and Wednesday (if they have a service) like strangers in the night. Show up for their traditional ritual and disappear. Whatever happened to getting to know people? Having dinners and programs never will help you to get to know someone. As they say, "no one cares what you know until they know how much you care." Now I am not talking about the leadership within the church this goes without saying there will be a better relationship there, but I am talking about the people who come, who are faithful, and are expected to show up every service or things fall apart from lack of finances. Most churches have failed to express themselves in any meaningful way to the community. A quick hello, slight smile, and a how are you doing while the heart of the people is begging for more. I have seen this in the last church (and in its community) we attended, but like a man a church cannot give what it does not have. What would your community look like if the people in your church really cared about each other and the people in the community? Lastly the biggest reason I know the church has missed it is the lack of spirituality. Everything is explained by human reasoning. There is almost never a move of God's Spirit (it has been years since I have heard a message in tongues and an interpretation) everything is routine and religious. I can remember growing up in more Pentecostal (Assembly of God and Church of God) Churches suddenly without warning or being prompted the Spirit of God would fall in great power and manifest Himself is spiritual ways, but it has been many years since I have seen the Spirit of God fall in unmistakable ways knowing this was God reaching His people. And why not? People do not pray the pastor prays. When was the last time you were given an opportunity to share a testimony? Oh no start at 11:00 out by 12:30 maybe 1:00 pm or the people look at their watch and the pastor knows what that could mean, maybe the door the next time his job comes up for a vote. Most services are scripted, controlled, and manipulated leaving no room for the Holy Spirit to move. No spirituality in the people because in most churches they have not been taught, just a lot of feel good sermons. One Wednesday at a local church we use to attend I cast a demon out of a lady, how the small crowd was amazed, but even sadder they did not even know the lady was demon possessed. After all (at the church) most Christians never bring their Bibles which means they probably do not read their Bibles at home so how would they know to recognize a demon? The signs were obvious, but the entire church missed it well I did not and the lady left with a clean face and a different woman. Her language (strange sounds and volume), her mannerisms, even her dirty face told me she was possessed. You know as we looked back Karen said she believes this one event was the straw that broke the camel's back for us at this local church. Most churches today have been dumb downed to keep the people happy with songs, but ignorant to the Spiritual realm. The local body of believers is not a building – it’s a body of believers fulfilling God’s purpose in our lives and these purposes and the fulfillment is spiritual. Strangely enough people will follow someone to hell's door if they are "truly" spiritual, yet they are few in the world of many. Churches that are unspiritual that can be fully explained in terms of the natural, although ever so attractive and competent, will result only in spiritual fruitlessness, corruption3 and immorality. We often see this based on worldly logic and methods, but John tells us, "that which is flesh is flesh and that which is Spirit is Spirit." (John 3:6) we can never substitute or mix flesh with Spirit and expect to get something spiritual it just CANNOT happen. In Proverbs we read, "there is a way that seemeth right . . . " (Proverbs 14:12) the world says you can use worldly ways and means in the Body of Christ and get the same effect, but this will never work. Most pastors and churches do not want to devote resources, time, and effort to teach their people about spiritual things (not a demon under every rock like some churches), but the truth how the Holy Spirit moves, manifests, and functions within each member and then throughout the church to the world. For this to happen the pastor (first) and the church MUST have a real revelation of God. And revelation is spiritual. We are measured by God by the amount of revelation we have received from God. Revelation is God’s evaluation and measuring stick. God's spirituality is built on God’s revelation and His estimation of a person is according to that revelation. If God gives revelation then is His spiritually is established and when His revelation is withdrawn the man is rejected. If we want to learn to be spiritual we must pay attention to our relationship before God. If God desires to have communion with us face-to-face no one can eliminate us. But if our communication above is severed, and the heavens are shut, all we do will be for naught. An open heaven is the seal of God and is God's main credential of the testimony of Sonship. Revelation is therefore the evidence of authority and spiritually. The true manifestation of spirituality is wisdom not power nor knowing right from wrong. God tells us what is right and wrong in the Scriptures, but revelation is God's words to us. The wisdom alone comes from God. You know Jesus felt the church was worth dying for – it should be our mission as Christians to value living for it. Written by David Stahl