primal urgency

over the years i have tried to understand the trends of faith in our country. i have been lured into thoughts that seemed right, only to be reminded of the deception. post modern, modern, traditional, contemporary...all thoughts to salve our personal agendas. if it is old, it can't be right. we are special, this is how it is supposed to be.

it seems that the further we get from the cross of jesus (in time and focus), the further we are away from the actual teachings of Jesus, the further removed we are from ancient, the more willing we become to dilute and demean the gospels and scripture over all. sometimes i place on scripture what it does not place on itself...but it is a guide, a plum line, a cornerstone to hold as examples, doctirne and surity.

i have noticed as i read certain writings that a great deal talk about the acceptance of sin as hang ups and lifestyles, there exists a double standard of sorts. but the same people will write of an all encompassing love that makes it ok as long as you just love. at the same time any one who tries to dialogue about scripture, they are demeaned and dismissed as lacking in gnosis. like they have been enlightened. so love can't be there starting point...it must be agenda.

as we all know this is nothing new. for thousands of years people have rose from the ashes of orthodoxy and stated that the early fathers of the faith had it wrong. if they were influential, they were not at all right in their thinking.

we now have the benefit of hindsight, but we are as blind as ever.

most of the discussion comes at the thought of the american doctrine of ease and non confrontation. live and let live. don't judge, jesus did not so we should not. we are not allowed to stand against any teaching on love because to do so states that you are not loving.

we twist and manipulates words found not only in scripture, but make op thoughts and schemes to justify our own desire to be accepting for all BUT those who would be attempting to live in accordance with the morals found in scripture.

the sad thing is that it will get worse.

within 20 years the american church will lose it's non profit status. ministers who are now supported by the gifts of their congregation will become forced to hold jobs and preach. we should lose 75% of pastors then. members will stop giving when it does not become a tax issue.
people by the thousands will be rocked by some event that will send the membership fleeing from our churches because their faith will be thought to be proved wrong.

we will loses our influence in government. which will be a blessing, and then our faith will cease to be a political party, only to come to the realization that we have been whores since the days of Constantine

we will be forced back underground where we belong. returning to a movement that rises up to effect real change. not from the glorious houses of worship we now sit in, but from street corners and in ally ways and inner cities. not from the halls of government, but inside the skin suit.

our hope is only found in jesus christ. not the made up jesus we are hearing about, but the ugly one who was hung on a stick for the glory of his father.

we must conform to him as told in the old and new testaments, not our american version we have made into a cross between a rock star, a psycologist and mother teresa. we cannot pick and choose what we shall believe just to justify our sin and unwillingness to live in holiness.

our churches are filled with men whose egos are larger than the buildings in which they sit. the majority of us who serve on staff do none of the things we ask those who sit under our leadership to do. unless it is directly related to our career as ministers, we seldom are sharing jesus with others, we seldom look for accountability, we seldom are involved in any ministry that would bring us into community.

yet, we talk down to others who fall from grace as it were, who did not have the checks and ballances we tell our people to have (or us for that matter), look with pity on those who fail to reach the stature we have.

these rambelings come from a frustration in my own life for my own lack of passion for the kingdom of jesus. how dare me not be involved in a life or people around me outside my job.

come now...let us return to the lord. though we are as scarlet, he shall make us white as snow.

stand by the ways and see and ask for the ancient paths,
where the good way is, and walk in it;
and you will find rest for your souls.