Christianity of Tomorrow

Christians of course believe many things but not necessarily the most essential things. We know, for instance, they no longer hold to the faith because they no longer live out the faith. What we belief inevitably affects what we do. Situations and statistics have leaked this out to public notice. The church is having a rough ride trying to hold on. She is about to fall off.

The question is what do we believe? What are we offering the people? Are we merely a refuge to hide from the world's problems or do we have the solution to their problems?

When we body surf, we have the advantage. We choose the place, the time and the waves. The church, however, does not have this advantage. Out in the world, she is like a tossed ship being hurled to an untested coast. We can't blame her in a sense. She is only reacting to the desperate situation she finds herself in, shifting her sails and trying to survive the moment. Her real hope, though, is in throwing an anchor deep to the ground and be held by her Lord. Here tied to her Lord, she will begin to reflect Him rather than adapting to the engulfing waves.

The church in the West is in retreat. She is hiding. She is hoping that when she awakes everything distressful will have disappeared, and that all will be well as before. We might be happy with our theological statements, doctrinal distinctives and apologetical arguments, but they are no longer impressing the world or delivering the help God's people themselves need. God's people are so bruised and battered about that they are beginning to believe the church has nothing of substance to offer them. They are filing for divorce.

This is precisely what we are discovering. God's people no longer believe. We might look to our recent census to confirm our judgment about our cultural decay and the falling apart of the family, but frankly, we need only look at our fellow Christians, our neighbors and hear what people watch and hear.

Many of us have been caught off guard. We have heard of post-modernity but didn't realize that it was not just another trend but a major retooling of mankind's perspectives linked up to the influential world culture. The conservative traditions of our Christian-influenced culture served as a crutch to the answers we have been giving the world. We could always say, "Be like us." But the church of Jesus Christ is now more like the lame offering to help another to move. Undoubtedly, certain needs were met. But we were not radical enough in challenging our own culture. We were not forced to go deeper to depend on the truths of God's Word.

Some might want to chide the church as having lost the game, but though the people in the stands are leaving, there is still sufficient grace on the clock to turn around. Our response today will shape the Christianity of tomorrow. Are we going to do anything about it? Before I share some hope for our bleak situation, I would like to illustrate how three generations of Christians in the West has succumbed to responding to the world rather than to her Lord.

The three major 20th trends in Protestant North American Christianity went only as deep as the perceived need. Their responses have become like patches on rotting garments. Once the garment rotted, the patch came off. We comfort ourselves by holding up our patches! From our present perspective it doesn't matter how much these trends have helped millions of people. Because of our own people's involvement in the worldwide mission movement, the church worldwide has been significantly infected by these weak attempts of proclaiming the gospel.

These movements are like boats being lifted up on a massive wave called world culture. That wave has picked up each Christian movement along with its anchor and is perilously being thrust toward the rocky shore. Their anchor of faith has not held them in safe waters. Their anchor has been their solution. Let's take a brief overall look at these three trends.

The first major movement consisted of what we now call the mainline churches. Their movement centered around meeting the needs of justice and equality. The scriptural principle of love etched its way into their lives by their demand for love and fairness in the church and society. But they didn't realize that the spirit of democracy in the world had more strongly defined and energized their sense of love and justice than the scriptures. Not much time passed before the culture defined their goals and objectives though protected behind great walls of old church buildings.

The evangelicals gained their momentum by developing stability. They defined and protected God's truth – the Holy scriptures. They knew that if people could get more enthused about some teaching than where that truth originated from, then their faith could easily be uprooted.

The battle for the truth is past however, at least for many. In a sense one might say that the stability the scriptures were to bring into their lives was failing to do its job. They saw their families disintegrate around them. An onslaught of personal problems created doubt whether the scriptures really could help them. Although acclaiming God's Word as their foundation, they seem to have based more of their roots in the conservative Christian ethic than the Holy scriptures. The truth has not vanquished; Bibles are widespread. However, their belief in it has greatly weakened. They wonder why the knowledge of God's Word has not helped them more.

The charismatic churches responded to this knowledge-oriented Christian life with a much needed experience-oriented Christian faith. Their movement brought not just a knowledge of God but the experience of God. Each Christian had a spiritual gift and therefore was important. This renewed understanding and usage of spiritual gifts satisfied their deep longing of meaning by emphasizing spiritual experiences. Many gifts but one body. Their focus did not go deep enough, however, and they are wondering why the spiritual experiences at church are not helping their marriages and families at home.

Although we can still ignore our failures because of the glory of a small number of big churches, we will soon see that the underpinnings of faith have largely been swept away by the great wave of world culture. The world culture has so uprooted our traditions that we no longer get our values from the scriptures, churches and families but from the internet, video and Library. Our faith is no longer 'saving' us.

The development and success of a number of large churches have enabled us to still pretend that all is fine. The small church made us accountable to each other. We knew each other. But when we saw so many inconsistencies in our small churches and in our own lives, we became disenchanted. The big churches easily swept up some these people because these Christians could still pretend to be fine and not have to give up their faith. Their faith was no longer intact; but they could ignore their little faith questions when everything was done with such professional elegance.

The longer we pride ourselves in a few success stories, the longer we will prolong our detection of our great problems. God has placed before us an opportunity to seek Him for restoration while our organization is still rather strong.

The one anchor of common trust in truth has been pulled up and the boats of our churches are soon going to be smashed in the rocks. We need to send up an emergency flare to show the churches worldwide how God's Word is relevant to modern man or there will be great and irreparable damage to God's people and testimony.

"Deliver those who are being taken away to death, And those who are staggering to slaughter, O hold [them] back.
12 If you say, "See, we did not know this," Does He not consider [it] who weighs the hearts? And does He not know [it] who keeps your soul? And will He not render to man according to his work?"

Proverbs 24:11-12 (NASB)

Is there a solution? If there isn't, then we indeed have lost our own faith! Many pastors are just perpetuating their positions and their institutions. We need to let the care of God's Name and His people shape our next important steps and chase us from the sin of complacency. We need to take the offensive. This new millennium offers us by God's grace and mercy a great opportunity to correct ourselves and take the offensive fight against the malaise of the world culture.

We need not have any specific answers, but we do need a great faith to make this brave step. The great army of the world has challenged us. We are either going to trust God and fight or hide out and be accountable for dropping the baton.

Some church watchers already have begun to hum the dirge for the Western church. They have turned their heads to the church in the developing countries. The statistics of Christian growth seem to affirm their perspectives. But we must be careful. The world culture which has uprooted our 'Christian' culture is making certain inroads to uproot all the cultures. We need to stand with our brethren. Let's not give up but take up the challenge. Now is the day for regaining our vision for working together with our brethren. They will face many of the same problems partly because our mission effort has initiated many of their own churches.

God has an answer for us if we humbly seek Him. He is ready but are we? This seems to me to one of those grand challenges of a huge invading army. We can sell ourselves to another army to fight them. We can hide and hold out for awhile. Or we can gloriously engage the Lord of Lords to fight for us and bravely lead us into this millennium.