Strengthening Faith: Navigating Church Challenges and Scripture

I remember some years back reading an article, a very insightful article I thought at the time, by some sociologists of religion. Normally, I'm not big on sociologists, but these people said as a sort of conclusion to an article on what happened to the careful observance of the Lord's Day in American Protestant churches, "Was it the seminaries that failed in their teaching? Was it the ministers who failed in their preaching?" And they concluded in America people get what they want, and when churches are weak it's because the people want churches that way. [00:01:13]

I do think that we've noticed something over the last few years that when the church tries to make the gospel relevant to our current society and the introduction of woke-ish elements to the gospel simply in the name of relevance. At some point the message then becomes irrelevant and I can't believe that we're discussing some of things that we're discussing when Scripture is very, very clear on some of these issues. And I think when you compromise the message that's when the church begins to decline and eventually in a generation it will cease to be. [00:03:59]

I think the loss of the second service has had a monumental impact on the evangelical church for a number of reasons. One is most of us aren't really spiritual enough to use that one day in the week well if the church isn't helping us to. That's one point. Second point is that we have an extraordinary arrogance if we think we can live the quality of Christian life that Reformed Christians have lived in the past on the basis of a fraction of the diet of ministry that they have had. [00:05:00]

We are so undernourished in terms of the Christian character that we are producing, partly because we have assumed we can do it like an In-N-Out Burger in an hour on a Sunday. And that doesn't necessarily mean that the second service should be six o'clock, but our Reformed tradition that built real character was never without those helps to all of us to be garrisoned by a firm ministry of the Word, fellowship with God's people, opportunity to linger with them, and the climax of worship being not the first service but the second service. [00:06:11]

I would just draw attention to the sufficiency of Scripture and the lessening of that. We speak of the authority of Scripture, but, sort of where the rubber meets the road on our view of inerrancy is the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture. And if we're talking about a weakness in the American church, if we go back three, four, five generations of American culture, we see an increasing hostility towards Scripture in culture and a challenge to Scripture in American culture. [00:10:06]

There was a time where the Bible was a good book in American culture. For many today the Bible is a dangerous book because of what it teaches. And so, it's so outmoded and so not with the current scene. So, that's happening in American culture. And so sadly as the culture goes, so oftentimes the church goes. And so, we wonder, "Is this ancient book sufficient for life in the twenty-first century?" and so we look elsewhere for guidance, we look elsewhere for wisdom, and pulpits are full of preaching that is not about the Word of God. [00:10:52]

It's a romantic myth that there is doctrinal unity in the Roman Church. I now get my news from my phone in my pocket, which is deplorable, but I won't look right now. But I have been amazed just recently at the reports that even make it to my phone that the German Roman Catholic bishops are defying the advice of the pope on whether to bless same-sex relationships or not, to the point where the Pope has actually said to the German Roman Catholic bishops, "We already have one Protestant church in Germany. We don't need another." [00:13:02]

I do think part of what is attractive to some Protestants in Rome is a fatigue with personal responsibility. As Protestants we have a personal responsibility to study the Scripture, to know the Christ, to grow in grace, and it can get exhausting. And there can be a kind of attraction to say, "I don't have to think about these things anymore. I don't have to think through them anymore. I can just rest in Rome. I could just let the bishops and the priests have the responsibility." But you won't find that attitude, I believe, anywhere in the Scripture. [00:21:28]

Well, it depends on who is saying it, because we are called to love sinners. We are called to love our enemies. I find it fascinating that when people want to narrow the definition of who our neighbor is when the Bible calls us to love our neighbor as ourselves, they find it difficult to narrow that definition of who our neighbor is when they run to the Sermon on the Mount when Jesus says you are to pray for your enemies and love those who persecute you. [00:23:17]

Our consciences are easily seared by our sins and the rationalization of our sins, but the answer is really very simple: you have to pray. You have to pray and you have to continue praying fervently asking God to make you sensitive to your sin, to convict you of your sin. That is a daily prayer of mine. It's a weekly prayer of mine with a friend of mine that I've been praying with for many years every week. We pray that for each other, something he requests regularly, that we would hate our sins as much as God hates our sins, that we would see our sins. [00:33:04]

I've seen so many Christians who think they've arrived. They think because they've got into a certain age and they've just sort of settled into their ways. They've even got their wives' conditioned to say, "Well, that's just the way he is." They've got their children to think, "Well, that's just the way he is." And I think we should live our lives in such a way where we never presume upon the grace of our loved ones, never presume upon the grace of God, and always be constantly striving to mortify every sin, not just the big ones, but the little ones, that we as Christians would be the most repentant people that unbelievers know and that we would live our lives with daily repentance. [00:34:50]