When I was in college at the University of Oregon, there was this knoll outside the EMU (Erb Memorial Union) and this couple from the Maranantha church would come and preach. Their message: We were all sinners and going to hell! Every time they were on campus a bunch of us would show up and watch the show!! They’d call the girls “fornicators” and the guys drunkards (which wasn’t far from the truth!). REPENT! The time was near!!
At the time we thought they were absolutely hilarious! Nobody took them seriously but they did put on a great show!
It’s been 40 years since I stood in the crowd laughing at these people and I realize that what they were trying to tell us was right! REALLY poor execution but the message about right and wrong, God’s ways vs. our ways, our sin nature, and how we were rebelling against God was actually spot on.
It is a well-known fact that I was not following Jesus during my college years. While I claimed Christianity as my faith – I believed all the doctrinal stuff – I lived a life completely different than what God called me to. My first day on a college campus (University of Missouri – Columbia) I joined a fraternity (AEPi) and indulged in all the frat stuff frat boys do – drinking, partying, drugs, cheating on tests – you know the regular stuff. When I transferred to the University of Oregon there was no frat but that didn’t stop me from my partying ways. I lived a very hedonistic life based on serving myself.
Dang those Marananthas!!
Today, I am a redeemed man. A new creation in Christ! I realized the errors of my ways, sought forgiveness, repented (turn myself around), and now instead of embracing my rebellious ways I actually hate sinning and I hate the evil men do in their blindness to the ways of God.
If you know me, you know that I am no “holier-than-though” person. I am a person, however, who has lived on both sides of the track so I know the difference Jesus can make in a life through forgiveness, healing, transformation, and redemption. If I can be redeemed so can everyone else!!
I say all this as a primer to follow up on a sermon I gave at my church a couple weeks ago regarding our current culture war in America. All those years ago back in college had I been watching today’s culture war I would have laughed and called people like me crazy! Now I don’t find it as funny.
Paul makes this very interesting comment in 1 Corinthians 5 versus 9-12. Look at this:
9 I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— 10 not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. 11 But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister[a] but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people. 12 What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? (Emphasis added)
I am particularly fascinated by his comment in verse 12. What business is it of ours to judge those outside the church? In other words, those who are lost – those who have rejected Jesus – they’re not our concern. But inside the church we are to hold one another accountable.
I’ve always gravitated to the Jesus model of evangelism! You tell people the truth and if they accept it that’s awesome!! If they don’t and walk away, well, that’s on them. Jesus did that with the rich young ruler, as well as with the 70 disciples who didn’t like his teaching. Jesus never ran after anyone when they left. In fact, He told his disciples to go from town to town and if they accept them stay and teach but if not shake the dust from their feet as they leave (which is an insult in that part of the world). Evangelically speaking, everyone must have a chance to hear about the saving grace of Jesus. But it’s up to them whether they repent of their sin and accept forgiveness or not. And if they don’t, they really aren’t our concern; we leave them to God.
So, taking a cue from Paul’s letter to the Corinth church, I think we need to call out the American church much of which is apostate.
Instead of holding to the truths of scripture a large part of the American church body now holds to the truths of the culture so people will like them. Instead of preaching the full gospel that starts with the fact we are all sinners who fall short of the glory of God and need a savior to redeem us from hell, today’s church solely preaches love, grace, forgiveness, mercy, inclusivity, tolerance, and acceptance. That’s not to say there aren’t churches who preach solely hell! There are they are just as wrong preaching their partial gospel! But partial gospel no matter whether you choose truth or grace is no gospel at all. Jesus preached a full gospel that told of the Father’s love, grace, mercy, and forgiveness but also explained that Jesus suffered and died because of our sins and that if we didn’t repent and accept Christ as our Lord and Savior all that awaits us is hell and eternal separation from the Father.
Okay, I know, not all churches are preaching partial gospel. There are some out there holding to the full truth of scripture but they are the minority today. I am thinking about a church just next door to my church. It has embraced the entire cultural position of welcoming and accepting pretty much everything out there. It proudly emblazoned its sign with the multicolored LGBTQ+ BLM flag so that people outside the church know that it is a church that accepts them just as they are.
That all sounds great doesn’t it! Aren’t churches supposed to welcome anyone who comes through the door? Aren’t we supposed to encourage people to come to the church! ABSOLUTELY. But there’s a catch: Everyone is welcome but your sin is not accepted or celebrated! Sin is something that is keeping you from reaching your full potential that God created in you, as well as keeps you blinded to the freedom you can truly have in Jesus! The church calls out sin not because we hate people but because we love them and want them to have the best instead of a counterfeit life that leads down the drain.
We see in scripture Jesus meeting and even eating with sinners. The religious people – primarily the pharisee group – had a real problem with that because in their religion they wouldn’t even associate with such people. But Jesus came to save sinners. He wasn’t just hanging out with them or embracing their lifestyles. No, He was calling them to repentance – a better life and afterlife! Think about the Samaritan woman, Matthew and Zecharia the tax collectors, Mary Magdalene, and the adulteress woman. No, He didn’t condemn them – meaning he didn’t call for their punishment – He did tell them plainly they were sinning and needed to stop! He didn’t call for their punishment because He was going to take their punishment for them…and us! But He was clear that there was no compromise in God’s moral law – not one jot or tittle (stroke of the pen) of the law shall pass away before all is fulfilled, He tells us.
Honestly, it’s a tough line to walk but one where we must follow the Jesus model. We must engage with people to share the good news of Jesus with them. But we have to share the truth of the full gospel: We all are sinners in need of a savior and that Jesus loves us so much that He took our punishment for us and we now can have peace with God through Christ as we fight to live a holy life.
By doing this, however, the culture will see the church as intolerant which for much of today’s church is a burden that is too much to bear. However, Jesus wasn’t tolerant of sin – it’s the reason He was nailed to a cross! We too are called to be intolerant of the things God calls sin. We must be if we are to follow a holy God. We cannot tolerate and embrace what God hates. As you can imagine, I get some pushback from some in the church over this stance. But there is an argument about this that has been swirling in my head for a few weeks that I want to share.
I see people in the church embracing various sins as okay now that the culture has embraced them as the norm. Let’s take the hot button issue of LGBTQ+. The culture embraces homosexuality, gay marriage, transgenderism, and the rest of that stuff. Because it has been normalized in the culture, many in the church also believe it is normal and that the church is wrong to preach against it. Those pastors who do preach against it are thought to be fundamentalists, legalists, and pastors who misinterpret scripture’s historical-cultural laws that don’t apply today.
Well, that’s not how we think at all. Here’s my argument:
If God is wrong about what He calls sin, then there is no God.
You see, if God is wrong then He’s not a god at all because a god cannot be wrong and still be a god! Nobody is going to worship a god who gets it wrong. That lowers God to our standards and makes God just like us – fallible. Honestly, I’m not going to worship a god who gets it wrong because how would I know what truth is if the god telling me stuff can be wrong? Just doesn’t make any logical sense. If God is wrong who says that I can’t be right in what I think? So, I’ll just choose to follow myself because if God can be wrong than my ideas are just as valid as His and I trust me more than Him.
And if that is true, let’s just fire all the pastors, sell our churches, liquidate our foundation accounts, and just meet on Sundays at our local restaurants to hang out and enjoy each other’s company because there is no god and we’re all just wasting our time. Instead, let’s just become like the Rotary club and do good works in our communities and feel good about how great we all are giving back to our neighbors!
But…if God is God – the creator of the Universe and everything in it who is perfect, holy, righteous, just, loving, forgiving, full of grace, mercy, and truth – then men truly are without excuse to worship Him and follow His ways not our own.
There truly is no other way to look at it. Either God is God or He is not. You have to choose.
One of the guys in town I really admire for his incredible work with the homeless has gone woke. We had a pride event in town last week and his church that does homeless work was smack in the middle of it embracing everything about it. In fact, I looked up his social media later and saw that they were also buying into the DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusivity) HR stuff. It broke my heart. Instead of helping the homeless find Jesus, he’s resorted to the partial gospel to fit in. I still support all the work he does to help the homeless but I won’t view his work as church work any longer. He’s now just another secular provider of services in my mind.
Harsh? Probably. But I think we conveniently forget all the times Jesus spoke about hell because it makes us uncomfortable. We like the cuddly, loving Jesus better than this guy:
51 Do you think I came to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but division. 52 From now on there will be five in one family divided against each other, three against two and two against three. 53 They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.” (Luke 12:51-53)
And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. (Matthew 10:28)
And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire. (Matthew 18:9)
And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than with two feet to be thrown into hell. (Mark 9-43-45)
But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him! (Luke 12:5)
And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.” (Matthew 25:46)
You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? (Matthew 23:33)
But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire. (Matthew 5:22)
Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. (John 3:36)
Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ (Matthew 22:13)
The dude was serious! When it comes to hell, Jesus was the person who spoke most about it in the entirety of scripture!
Most of us in the church are excited about the day when Jesus returns! But Jesus Himself had a warning about that when He told the parable of the wheat and tares:
24 Another parable He put forth to them, saying: “The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field; 25 but while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way. 26 But when the grain had sprouted and produced a crop, then the tares also appeared. 27 So the servants of the owner came and said to him, ‘Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares?’ 28 He said to them, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The servants said to him, ‘Do you want us then to go and gather them up?’ 29 But he said, ‘No, lest while you gather up the tares you also uproot the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest, and at the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, “First gather together the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them but gather the wheat into my barn.” (Matthew 13:24-30)
The point? Those in Christ will be living along side those outside of the faith and when Jesus returns, they will be separated with those in Christ go to “the barn” or heaven and those outside the faith are gathered and thrown into the fire or hell.
The church believes it is going to be going to the barn! But hold on just one second. Matthew 7:21-23 tells us a different story:
21 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. 22 Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ 23 And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’
These people who says Lord, Lord are Christians – or least those who call themselves that. And Jesus rejects them because He doesn’t know them – has no relationship with them, they don’t love Him by doing what He says. Instead, they used the church for their own purpose.
The church is further warned in Revelation as Jesus rebukes the seven churches of Asia Minor.
- Ephesus lost its first love – its passion for Christ died.
- Pergamum had members who were embracing a non-biblical view of the faith and were in danger of judgment.
- Thyatira tolerated sin.
- Sardis looked alive but was dead. The church had those embracing sin in their lives (soiled clothes) and was just a club.
- Laodicea was neither hot nor cold in its faith and relied on its wealth kind of like the prosperity gospel of today.
Sound familiar? See any of our current churches in this group?
The dual prophecy here is that 5 of the 7 churches in Revelation are apostate and about to have their “candle” removed from the temple. In other words, just under 30 percent of today’s church will hold the line on biblical truth while the others slide into the culture.
I see all this and want to put on a sandwich board saying, “REPENT!! The Time is Near!” and hang out on the knoll at the EMU and let all the college kids laugh at me!!
In my view, the largest evangelical mission field today is not those who have never heard the gospel; today’s largest mission field is the church itself! Those who have heard the gospel and either are “nominal” Christians not practicing their faith or those who are practicing a faith that deviates from biblical truth!!
So, what do we do?
That is a great question and I really don’t know the answer.
On the one hand, I personally have a holy discontent over what is happening in the American church and want to fight as hard as I can to bring my wayward brothers and sisters back into the biblical fold.
On the other hand, I know that scripture tells us plainly this is going to happen and we aren’t to worry about it but instead let it play out because the time is near.
Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13 this:
If I speak in the tongues[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Then he goes on to explain what love is. In verse 6 he writes, “6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. “
If we truly are to love our neighbors as ourselves then we cannot delight in evil – tolerate and embrace that which God hates – and must instead tell the truth. That is biblical love.
I saw a meme yesterday that cracked me up. It said that people don’t want to hear your opinion coming out of your mouth; they want to hear their opinion coming out of your mouth! So very true.
God calls us not share our opinion out of our mouths but HIS opinion out of our mouths. So, let us be bold and proclaim the whole gospel – the one that calls people to repentance and a life of forgiveness and grace. Let us hold accountable the church as it continues to slide into destruction. And let us continue to pray for the lost that one of the seeds that one of us threw will grow roots deep enough to save them upon Christ’s return.
Heavy, Deep & Real ministries 
Leave a comment