Sermon Video: At the Last Trumpet: We will all be changed

When Christ returns, we will all be changed. All those who have faith in Jesus Christ, whether then living or already dead, will be resurrected or gathered (as needed) by Christ and will receive the transformation to Christ-likeness that has been promised. But when will these things occur? There is not on single interpretation of the totality of prophetic literature, some view the Rapture as the next event (Pre-tribution, pre-millenial), others see the millenial kingdom being established first (amillenial or post-millenial). However one interprets the Scriptures, this much is certain, Christ WILL return, and we won't know about it ahead of time. God has not given us the time, lest we look at the world with excessive optimism or pessimism, only the knowledge that these things will one day occur; and that's all we need. We can safely ignore those who claim to see signs of the impending End, and those who offer advice based on those supposed insights. Instead, let us continue to serve the Kingdom of God, and continue to live as though today may be our last day (as it may be for any of us) and plan as if God has many things left for us to accomplish here on earth.

* In addition, the message touches explains the flaws in the notion that COVID-19 is a sign of the End Times as well as the error in equating a potential vaccine with the Mark of the Beast.

To watch the video, click on the link below:

All-or-nothing morality complacency refuted by Gandalf

My congregation knows that I will use an illustration from the Lord of the Rings whenever one comes to me, its either a gift to them or a curse, depending upon one's view of Tolkien's masterpiece.  That being said, while I was re-reading the LOTR for the 15th+ time this past week, I was struck by the wisdom of a conversation between the wizard Gandalf (who is actually an immortal Maiar named Olorin {nerd alert!}, akin to an angel), and the leaders of the resistance to Sauron (also a Maiar, i.e. a fallen angel or demon).  Gandalf tells Aragorn, the next king of Gondor, Eomer, the next king of Rohan, Prince Imrahil, and the sons of Elrond that, "it is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till.  What weather they shall have is not ours to rule."

What, then, is the relevance of the advice of a fictional wizard given to fellow fictional characters regarding a fictional moral and existential threat?  As it turns out, a great deal.  J.R.R. Tolkien's mythology, while embracing at times a Norse attitude of fatalism influenced by a belief in Ragnarok (seen in the ride of the Rohirrim to battle to aid Gondor, despite the near-certainty of defeat), remained fundamentally an ethos that reflected his own Christian worldview.  Tolkien believed in God as Creator, in God as Savior, and in God as the ultimate judge of humanity.  He believed that our actions, and our attitudes, matter.  He believed in the reality of Right and Wrong.  And so, when faced with a seemingly insurmountable evil, the advice of Gandalf, a voice that could double as that of Tolkien himself, is to do our best with what is in front of us.
It has become common in politics, and more frighteningly, for some within the Church, to look at global problems, national problems, or even localized problems, as being too big to solve.  If the problem cannot be 100% fixed with any particular attempted solution, then the effort is dismissed and nothing is done.  In other words, if the whole problem can't be solved in one fell swoop, don't bother trying.  This myopic pessimism is both morally reprehensible and extremely dangerous.  If 1,000 children were starving in the midst of a famine, and you only had food enough to save 10, how would you explain to Almighty God that you decided to do nothing, not even save those you had the power to save, because you couldn't do everything?  To do nothing is an act of moral cowardice, to do nothing is a violation of what has been entrusted to us by God.
What moral evil is starring you right in the face?  What problem is in your very neighborhood, as an individual, a church, or a community, that you could impact with the resources you already have?  Do something, try, make an effort in the battle between Good and Evil.

Consider the words of the 18th century philosopher Edmund Burke, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."  We must act, we must strive, for evil does not sleep.
With more authority, a few examples of the call to action from Scripture:
 Matthew 25:14-46, the parable of the Talents (in which the one who is condemned buries his responsibility in the ground and does nothing) as well as the famous line, "I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mind, you did for me."
Ephesians 6:10-13, Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. 11 Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. 12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13 Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.
Hebrews 12:1-3, Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, 2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3 Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
James 2:17-18, 17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.
18 But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.”  Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds.

Steven Spielberg uses this same notion as the capstone of Schindler's List, a variation of a quote from the Talmud (Sanhedrin 4:5) spoken by Ben Kingsley's character, Itzhak Stern: "Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire."

Pastoral ministry, Apologetics, and Optimism for the Church

One of the things that I sometimes do while working at my desk during the week is listen to Dr. James White's online program The Diving Line from Alpha and Omega Ministries.  These Youtube videos often deal with topics that interest me, in particular Biblical textual issues.  One of the things that I have noticed of late, is that Dr. White's perspective, as an apologist who spends a lot of his time debating, is as a result at times negative about the state of the Church today.  When you spend all of your time and effort combating error and heresy within the Church, and fending off assault from those who are supposed to be on your side, as well as those who are not, it is no wonder that Dr. White doesn't get the chance to see the positive things that are happening in the Church that I have the good fortune of witnesses on a regular basis as I go about pastoral ministry here in my little corner of the world.
It may be that there is theological rot in many of the seminaries, some of which have wandered away from Orthodoxy, but here on the local level, at least in my own experience working with the 50+ churches that we've come into contact with through Mustard Seed Missions, I've only worked with men and women who are preaching, teaching, and living the same Gospel message as our ancestors in the faith.  If certain denominations are heading into danger, and that's something an apologist like Dr. White should be focusing on, that same trend is not evident here on the local level.  Working here in Venango County these past four and a half years, has given me a tremendous optimism about the work that God is doing, an optimism that stems from our ecumenical work for the poor through Mustard Seed Missions, as well as the food pantries, the cross walk, the 40 Days of Prayer, and all the other ways in which God's people here in this place have been working hard for the kingdom of God.
Just today as I listened to yesterday's program while working on my PowerPoint for Sunday, James expressed some of his own frustration after spending the first 45 minutes talking about some of the struggles the Church is facing by those who are wandering from orthodoxy, he said, "And I know in my  mind, God is still on is throne, I'm only seeing a small portion of it.  We've seen all sorts of people brought out of error...I know all that, sometimes you just start getting tired."  After that, Dr. White commented that he takes a long ride on his bike to help clear his mind of the weight he feels on his shoulders when fighting day after day on these issues, a sentiment that I can wholeheartedly agree with (for me, it is running on our awesome running trails in the woods at Two Mile or Oil Creek State Park).
I know that a lot of you are worried about the future, about the future of our nation, and the future of God's Church here.  There are things worth worrying about, trends that need to be countered, battles that must be won.  When that fight ways heavy on your mind, the antidote that I have found may offer you solace.  Find your fellow Christians who have a passion for those in need, and get busy doing something to help in the name of Christ, and get together with your neighboring churches to worship together.  You're not in this alone, and neither is your church.  God has brought revival to this nation through his Church before, he can do it again.  Instead of waiting around for that to happen, get started on kingdom work today, who knows, you may end up being a part of how God turns that blessing of revival into a reality.

{Update 11/21  The James White that I used to listen to while working no longer has the same ministry.  In the past 3-4 years he has followed Eric Metaxas down the road of political 'sky is falling' conspiracy theory laden hysteria.  I no longer recommend listening to his messages with the exception of the older material related to textual criticism}

Another day, another mass shooting, is the world going to hell in a hurry?

If you watch the news, diligently, you will hear a story about a mass shooting and/or an act of terrorism somewhere in the world each and every day.  There will be a weather related crisis, or perhaps an earthquake, or a man-made disaster too.  There are plenty of things going on in a world with over seven billion people that demonstrate the inhumanity of man toward our fellow man and the corruption of human endeavors.  We could be pessimists without much prodding.  We could despair of the future and throw our hands up in the air and say, "Come Lord Jesus!"  Many Christians do just that, they're convinced that the United States, the West, even the World is spiraling out of control and the return of Christ is imminent because things are "worse than they've ever been".  This isn't a new phenomenon, it isn't particularly surprising either, but it is sad and unnecessary because by any indication, whether that be violence, poverty, life expectancy, responsible government, and especially the growth of the Church, we are living in the most prosperous and secure generation in the history of mankind.  It doesn't seem like it, not when ISIS is shooting up restaurants in Paris or new polls show that less Americans are going to Church than in prior generations, but it is true.
Our ancestors one hundred years ago, and especially further back than that, lived in a world that was more dangerous, poorer, more corrupt, and a lot less Christian than it is today.
Your gut may be fighting against that claim, you may not want to believe it, especially is you have a lot emotionally invested in thinking like a victim or claiming that the sky is falling, but not wanting to believe a fact doesn't make it untrue.  Five hundred years ago, to pick a random spot in history, the average person lived hand to mouth, always one bad harvest or pestilence away from starvation, and always worried that a marauding army was just over the horizon, not to mention pirates and their own rapacious nobility.  The average person was illiterate, had very few possessions, may never have traveled more than an hour or two away from the place where he or she was born, could expect to bury several children who didn't make it out of infancy, and aside from Europe, lived in a world where the vast majority of the people knew not the name of Jesus, let alone believed in him.
Today, by virtually every measurable statistic, things have improved, and not just a little, by leaps and bounds.  There are still pockets of poverty, endemic bloodshed, and resistance to the Gospel, but they're pockets now, not whole continents.  Africa has been transformed in the past fifty years, millions have been lifted out of poverty and the Church has not only conquered the animism that once thrived there, but is pushing back the frontier of Islam as well.  Asia is following suit, with India and China seeing hundreds of millions of people lifted out of abject poverty and the amount of Christians in their midst growing rapidly.  The world's largest Christian population will soon enough reside in China.  The Church may be declining in the West, but it is exploding in the South and East.
We have many reasons to be optimistic about the future, and many reasons to not despair about the present.  Remember, Jesus spoke of a Church against which the gates of Hell would not prevail, but if the Church is to conquer even the stronghold of the enemy, it will be on the offensive not cowering behind high walls and a moat.

I'm not a pessimist, not because I choose to be an optimist in the face of contrary evidence, but because my faith in the power of God agrees with all of the good things that are really happening in our world today.  The future is in the hands of God, and those hands are capable indeed.

For an excellent detailed examination of this issue, please read the article below by JD King.
Why You've Been Duped Into Believing The Myth That The World Is Getting Worse and Worse

The peril of fear mongering among Christians

In a recent interview with Time magazine, the president of Faith and Action, Rob Schenck, a noted anti-abortion activist, spoke of the danger posed by fear mongering when it is used by conservative politicians and pastors, he said this: "Within our conservative ranks, there seems to be an almost rampant fear mongering that's used as a device to build audiences and readership.  And I think it's contrary to the optimism of the Gospel."  It doesn't take much searching to find a self-proclaimed conservative or evangelical politicians whose primary rhetorical tool is utilizing fear.  The same holds true, sadly, for several prominent conservative and/or evangelical pastors, and many less prominent ones.  Many congregations are given a steady dose of fear from the pulpit, fear of the government, fear of persecution, fear of the future.
There are two major problems with this use of fear, first that it doesn't represent reality, as Schenck went on to say, "Christians, especially evangelicals, often fear persecution by government.  And that does occur in other places.  So we project it here."  I've heard many a well-meaning Christians, and perhaps some not of noble purpose, speaking as if America is one small step away from being Nazi Germany, as if the government were compiling lists of Churches to raid and shut down, as if storm troopers will soon be in the streets.  There are things that require legitimate concern about our culture, our government, and our future as a Church and a nation, but when such fantastic claims are made, when the spectre of persecution is raised to frighten those who don't know better, not only are the real issues buried by fear and obscured, the far too real and deadly persecution of Christians around the world is trivialized by American whining and paranoia.
The second problem inherent in the fear mongering is that it is used primarily by those interested in your vote or your money.  The motive behind the appeal to fear is almost always a dark one, the response that it breeds in people is far more likely to be hatred than love.  It is contrary to the Gospel.  In the first century, the Church faced far more difficult circumstances, Paul was beaten and left for dead, unjustly jailed, and ultimately put to death, but he did not give in to fear, nor did he spread it, he responded with hope.
As I have said many times before, and will continue to say as often as need be, the Church is not a castle under siege, a timid force hiding behind a moat; the Church of Jesus Christ is an army, conquering in his name, by his power, a force that the gates of hell will not prevail against.  Why, oh why, do we let ourselves be led by men (and women) whose pessimism and appeal to fear is leading the Church from proclaiming the Gospel proudly to hiding in fear, fear of a persecution that isn't even real.
Lastly, Schenck's interview ended with a sentiment that deserves an amen from anyone who believes in the necessity of the Gospel as the sole path to salvation for humanity, "the deepest of moral, ethical and spiritual questions can't be answered by a political party."  Nor, I might add, by a politician or pastor looking for votes, book sales, or donations.

Sermon Video: "How many will be saved?" Luke 13:23-30

In this passage, Jesus responds to a very important question that is asked of him, "how many will be saved?"  Will the grace of God be triumphant, bringing in vast multitudes of the Lost into the kingdom of God, or will only a tiny remnant be saved with many who thought they were following Jesus disastrously mistaken?  Those within the Church who tend toward universalism see the grace of God as victorious, perhaps even beyond the boundaries of the Church to include other religions and philosophies.  On the opposite end of the spectrum from this optimistic viewpoint, lies those whose pessimism sees the holiness of God as victorious, even within the boundaries of the Church where they look and see mostly apostasy.  Which is the correct view, should we expect a Church that is overcoming the World, or one that is hemmed in on all sides and persecuted?
Jesus doesn't, as usual, directly answer the question, but instead he offers an analogy about entrance into the kingdom of heaven, declaring that it is only through a "narrow door" that requires "every effort" to walk through.  There are several ways in which the "door" to heaven could be thought of as "narrow".  That there is only one door, one way to heaven, is one way, and that the door is only accessible to those who have been washed clean of the impurity of sin is another.  It might also be that the door is narrow because only few will enter into it.  While it is true that Jesus speaks negatively of the chances of the rich entering through such a narrow door, the end of his answer makes it clear that heaven will be filled with those who have come to accept the Gospel from all over the world.
The universalist is too optimistic, for there is only one door and those who have not put their trust in Jesus won't find it, but the pessimists on the opposite end of the spectrum are equally wrong, for the grace of God will surely save all those whose trust is in Jesus.  After all, our hope is in Him, and in what He has done, not in our own imperfect understanding of it.  The wisdom of Jesus' answer to the question is that heaven will be missing people who expected to be there, for whatever reason, but failed to trust in him, but at the same time, heaven will be overflowing with those who were written off by men, only to be redeemed by God.

To watch the video, click on the link below:

Looking to the future: The Terminator movies and Christians

With another installment of the Terminator movies about to be released, I am once again reminded of the harmful attitude of fatalism that permeates much of Evangelical thought about the future.  In the Terminator movies, both a hero and a villain are sent back from the future to try to change what is coming.  The villain wants to prevent the good guys from winning after a horrific holocaust, and the good guy is hoping to not only preserve that victory, but somehow make the entire dystopic future null and void.  Each of the Terminator movies ebbs and flows back and forth with the future fate of humanity hanging in the balance.  What has this to do with the attitude of Christians regarding the future?  Quite a lot actually.  Christians ought to know what the future holds, God has given us a broad outline of what will one day happen along with a variety of difficult to understand pieces of the puzzle.  What we do know, for certain, is how the story ends; it ends in the complete and total victory of Jesus Christ over all opposition: sin, death, and Satan.
So why are so many Christians walking around with an attitude that the future is doom and gloom?  The answer is simple enough, they believe in a Pre-Tribulation Rapture, and thus believe that the future of humanity is a downhill slope that cannot be altered.  Those who believe in a post-Tribulation Rapture, or a Post-Millennial Rapture are far less pessimistic because in the first case, Christians won't be taken away before the trouble starts, in other words, we're going to have to deal with it, and in the latter, the next thing to come on God's cosmic plan is the 1,000 year reign of Christ, a time of glory not tribulation.  Because many Evangelicals firmly believe in a Pre-Tribulation, Pre-Millennial Rapture, they almost welcome bad news in the world. looking at it as a sign that Christ's return is closer.  Why try to alter the world we're living in if it is inevitable that it will decline, and why try to slow the decline if it must reach its nadir before Christ can come back?
In the Terminator movies, when the heroes know that the future is bleak, they are willing to risk anything and everything to try to stop it.  For some Christians, they believe that they're interpretation of Biblical prophecy is the correct one, and therefore there is no point in trying to stop it.
I don't know which interpretation of the Scriptures is right, those willing to have a pinch of humility will agree, so why would I live like a pessimist?  It is our job to do what we can, with what we have, where we have been placed.  We do know how the story ends, but keep in mind, we have no idea how long it will be until the final chapter begins.  Christians need to ditch the pessimism, embrace the final victory of Christ, and roll up their sleeves and get to work trying to claim our world for the kingdom of God.

The Dangers of Assumptions about the Future.

One of the things that most people don’t realize is just how much the underlying assumptions in their thought processes affect the way that they look at the world around them.  From this point I could illustrate what I mean using any number of fields, from politics, to philosophy, from current events to pop culture.  The area that I’m going to focus upon is the affect that a pre-millennial and pre-tribulation interpretation of the portions of Scripture that refer to the End Times can have upon Christians who subscribe to them.  A term that encapsulates these beliefs and others related to the relationship between Israel and the Church, Dispensationalism, likewise carries with it implications for how those who hold to it look at the world around them and how they interpret Scripture.

            This is not intended as a critique of Dispensationalism, although the notion often associated with it that the Church (or even America) has replaced Israel in God’s Covenant deserves to be critiqued, rather I am simply pointing out the affect that such a viewpoint can have upon one’s outlook even without the person who thinks these things being aware of where those notions originate.  Nor is this a refutation of pre-millennial or pre-tribulation interpretations of the End Times, I myself hold to both of them, though certainly not with dogmatic fervor due to the very strong warnings in Scripture that the End Times will come like a “thief”.  I have always maintained that anyone who claims to know anything about when the Second Coming of Jesus is going to happen is either trying to sell something or woefully misinformed about Scripture.

            So, what is this viewpoint altering phenomenon that happens to those who hold to pre-millennial, pre-tribulation, and/or Dispensational beliefs?  Pessimism, pure and simple.  Anyone who believes that human history MUST greatly decline BEFORE the return of Jesus Christ while not be surprised by news of tragedy in our world, will not have much hope for the future, and may even welcome news of woe as a sign that the end is nigh.  I have witnessed this twisted welcoming of tragedy, be it wars, pestilence, natural disasters, or the Church supposedly slipping toward Apostasy, on the part of people whose belief that the future can only be a downward curve precisely because they are convinced that Scripture predicts just such a trajectory to history.

            Forget for a moment that history moves in vast swings, from good to bad, from prosperity to want, and from liberalism to conservatism, such that storms could be on the horizon now, and yet sunshine could be just around the corner.  I say that because Christians continue to convince themselves that Jesus Christ will return in their own lifetimes, despite the warnings from Scripture, because we can’t help but think of our own generation as the pivotal one in history.  Even if the next hundred years are a mitigated disaster, as anyone looking at 1914-1945 would have to conclude, who is to say that the decades to follow wouldn’t be one of peace and progress?

            The point that I’m hoping you will see is that those who look to the future and see only woe before Christ will return can’t help themselves when they read the news, they see signs of decline, skip signs of good things, and confirm their own assumption that the future must be bleak.  Of course this attitude has vast implications as those who don’t believe that the future holds any hope won’t be very keen to invest themselves in project or efforts designed to alleviate things such as world hunger or disease and are likely to care little about the environment, just to name a few. 

            In regards to the Church itself, a similar pattern of pessimism unfolds.  Those who believe that the Church MUST be in a state of Apostasy BEFORE Christ can return are forever looking for signs that the Church is failing in its mission.  How can this not have a negative effect upon missions, church unity, and ecumenism?  There are far too many Christians who believe that they can write off all of the Orthodox, Catholic, mainline Protestant, and plenty of other people who call themselves Christians, who have put their faith in Jesus Christ, and who seek to be his disciples, simply because a worldwide Church that is succeeding and triumphing doesn’t fit their own viewpoint.  In essence, they look at 95% of all of the people who have called upon the name of the Lord, as Paul says in Romans 10:13, and conclude that the grace of God is incapable of saving them because only a tiny minority of the universal Church is not in a state of Apostasy.  Needless to say, I cannot understand how the Church of God, empowered by the Holy Spirit, can be thought of as being so impotent. 

            If pre-millennialism and pre-tribulation beliefs, along with Dispensationalism, tend to lead to these fatalistic and pessimistic viewpoints, what can we do about it?  Do we have to adopt a post-millennial belief in order to be optimistic and therefore anticipate the triumph of the Church BEFORE Jesus can return?  We don’t have to do that, unbridled optimism has similar pitfalls (such as not thinking anything needs to be done because the future of necessity must get better), although without the doom and gloom mood.  Being aware that such attitudes are a danger is the beginning of keeping yourself from falling prey to them.  I have no idea if the next 100 years are going to be a golden age or a wasteland for America, the Church, or the world; but neither do the pre-millennial OR the post-millennial advocates.  What we think the future holds, affects how we view today; since only the Father truly knows the future, why don’t we stop acting like we have inside information.

Are the End Times near?

This past Sunday morning as I was eating my breakfast I did something I don’t normally do, I turned the channel to catch a few minutes of a well known TV preacher.  If SportsCenter hadn’t been talking about auto racing this never would have happened, but they were, and it did.  It turns out that the whole series that this message comes from is about the End Times and how it somehow, in his opinion, relates to the recent financial crisis that began in the US several years ago.  It only took a few minutes of watching for this preacher to proclaim that he sees the signs described by Jesus in the Gospels happening in our world today.  This “insight” culminated in his prediction that he feels confident that he will be alive long enough to see Christ return.  If there is one cardinal sin of interpretation of apocalyptic literature it is erroneously concluding that the events described are being fulfilled in one’s own lifetime.  This same error has been committed again and again throughout Church history, notably at the arrival of the first millennium, and again as the year 1,500 approached.

            There are several things wrong with anyone who claims to know when Christ is going to return, most obviously that Jesus himself declared that “No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father” (Matthew 24:36).  If Jesus doesn’t know when the Father will bring the Church Age to an end and begin the End Times, how can anyone living here on Earth think that he/she has somehow cracked the code and recognized the signs?

            This predictive folly is dangerous on several fronts: it discourages Christians from investing in the future and allows them to take a guilty pleasure in the misfortunes of our world as they seem like signs that Christ is coming soon.  For that reason alone, such pronouncements need to be countered by preachers everywhere who takes Jesus’ warning that it will indeed be a surprise seriously.  {I don’t have time to get into the Dispensational assumptions that this preacher is using as he interprets the Bible, these too are coloring the conclusion and have him looking for evidence of decline and ignoring evidence of revival.}

            On another level, this sort of thing bothers me personally because of the assumptions that underpin it.  Two primary assumptions that I believe are both false are part of this assessment  that the End Times are near: #1 The United States is in the midst of a moral decline.  #2 The Church in the US is the primary focus of God’s work in our world.  Is there evidence that the U.S. is in some unprecedented moral decline that will end in the ruination of the Church in America?  No, but there are plenty of negative statistics and anecdotes for those looking for such evidence.  This entire line of thinking about America isn’t based on factual analysis anyway, but rather upon a mistaken identification of the US as the new Israel in God’s plans (relates to #2).  People who takes this view are always talking about how good things used to be in some past near-utopia before the current group that is bothering them the most supposedly ruined the country.  That such a prior time of super-virtue never existed is hard to point out when memory is rose colored.  As a student of history, I know that nations as well as institutions like the Church have life cycles; that like a pendulum they swing back and forth from highs to lows.  Are we in a period of decline?  Maybe, maybe not, but I don’t see it; everywhere I turn I see Churches fighting in the trenches, working together as never before, with capable leadership and committed lay people.  Even if decline happens, why can’t God send a revival?  God blessed America with the First AND Second Great Awakenings, why can’t God do something like that in this generation?  The pessimism of those who insist that our days are numbered is certainly not helping the kingdom of God.  I have fought against those who are intent upon a pessimistic view of our nation’s future, but it seems like I’m talking to a wall; instead, I’ll simply keep working for that future by the grace of God.

            The second assumption has pride and racism mixed in with it.  If, and in my mind that’s a big if, America is in decline, doesn’t the rest of the world count in God’s evaluation of humanity too?  Even if America becomes a godless land (which it won’t, but follow me on this), does that necessarily mean the End must be near?  What if God’s work in the Church in South America, Africa, and Asia vastly overshadows the decline in the West?  Here’s some real truth that those hoping for the End Times won’t want to hear: it already does.  The growth of the Church in the Third World, among poor non-white peoples, has greatly overcome the losses in Europe and America that the Church as a whole has experienced in the past few decades.  The balance of “power” for the Church is shifting, much as the global political and economic balance of power has shifted somewhat away from the West toward the rest of the world.  According to God Word, God doesn’t value a white American believer more than a poor African.  How much of the pessimism of those who bemoan the future of the Church is really just misplaced American pride and a bit of latent racism?

            I shouldn’t have starting watching a TV preacher, I know better, 9/10 it just makes me angry; but maybe my insight here will help some of you realize that the future of America is not set, the work we here today do for the kingdom of God will help determine what the next generation of Christians have to work with.  If we screw it up, and leave them a Church that is weaker than the one left to us, it still doesn’t preclude God’s ability to send revival and restore his Church.  Likewise, the growth of the Church in the rest of the world is a cause of celebration in Heaven, as new souls come to accept the saving power of Jesus Christ, this is after all what the missionaries who set out from England and America had hoped and dreamed to see realized.  Is the End near?  I have absolutely no idea, and anyone who says otherwise is full of it.

I'm building a bridge while they're digging a moat.

I often get the feeling these days that as I labor in the trenches, working on a regular basis with governmental workers who are trying to help the poor and with un-churched people that know next to nothing about God that far too many of the people on our own side would rather dig a deeper moat around the Church than help me work on this bridge.  Why do they feel the need to be defensive all the time, fighting a rear-guard action instead of attacking the enemy on his own turf?  There are many reasons why a Christian living in America in the 21^st Century might become a pessimist, but in the end they all boil down to this: they think we’re losing. 

It hurts down deep, to the core of who I am as an American, when I hear the “woe is us” doom and gloom of my fellow Americans who believe that the best days of our nation are behind us.  This isn’t a rational conclusion based upon evidence, it is simply a gut feeling based upon far too many frightening anecdotal reports spread by politicians and preachers with an agenda who are profiting financially off of the fear of those who listen to them.

It hurts me even more when I hear Christian parroting this line of pessimism.  The Church founded by Jesus Christ has triumphed over, through, and in spite of circumstances far more challenging and desperate than anything faced by the Church in America today.  Why are we filled with such despair?  Men like Dietrich Bonhoeffer who faced down the Nazis and refused to compromise the integrity of the Church to serve political masters would be ashamed of our lack of resolve and courage.  The Word of God is the same yesterday, today, and forever.  The victory of the Son of God has already been accomplished; his final victory of sin, death, Satan, and hell is likewise assured.  So why do those who profess faith in this all-conquering Son of God believe so little in the next generation of their own Church?  Are they so eager for the Second Coming of Christ that they’re willing to accept, even welcome, a downward slide of humanity to make it happen?  Forget for a moment that this is one particular interpretation of Scripture’s teachings on the End Times, and also that Jesus repeatedly said that the End will come as a thief, when nobody expects it.  If you’re wrong, if Jesus tarries for another two thousand years, or more, don’t we need to persevere; don’t we need to build the Church by engaging with our world both now and in the future?

I, for one, will keep working on the bridge.  I’m trying to get as many people as possible to see the Light of Christ, come over the bridge of faith in him, and enter in his kingdom.  I just wish more people in his Church were willing to stop working on the moat long enough to help.

The previous “rant” is not an indictment of the wonderful people I’ve come to know and love here in Franklin, especially those I shepherd at First Baptist, my fellow ministers in the Joint Ministerium, and my fellow workers with Mustard Seed Missions.  They understand the need to work together to reach the Lost; they haven’t given up on the future.  Who will join us?