America's Churches ...Lighthouses Or Lukewarm Fence Riders?

The Post Chronicle ^ | Feb 16, 2007 | Michael Westfall

[Alex Murphy]

Scripture is God inspired truth. It is not semi-historical literature. There are absolutes, and it doesn't take a PHD in theology to recognize that America has profound problems with each and every one of God's 10 Commandments.

America's churches have been our nation's lighthouses where our people could find spiritual meaning in life. Today the pews in many churches are far from being fully populated, and many preachers are financially stretched and under stress. The question is, why are so many people not feeling it important to attend services and worship God? What is becoming of the lost souls, the families, America's values and our culture? Do we care?

Since post WWII we have seen our country growing increasingly oblivious to important core morality issues. I suggest that America's churches have the highest responsibility for not only defending the doctrines of their beliefs, but for defending American values as well. I also suggest that some churches are failing in this regard. Just look around you. Without a strong vocal activist Church, everything becomes acceptable. Without absolutes, confused people do only what they deem is right in their own eyes. God has little bearing on their behavior.

Without a strong Church, liberal anti-biblical pressure groups increase their demands on legislators to replace moral laws that have served man from the beginning of recorded history. They desire the full integrity of the United States of America to back ungodly issues, lifestyles, living arrangements and beliefs.

If Americans respected God today, as they should, they wouldn't distance themselves from God's word. They wouldn't be using their tax dollars to pay teachers to indoctrinate their children into Darwin's atheistic evolution rather then God as Creator. Many Christians fail to understand or recognize the new disrespect towards their religious beliefs by vocal atheistic groups. The Church must counter the accelerating growth of atheism.

Church leaders need to begin to understand that under their watch nation is beginning to fight Christianity in meaningful ways that deny us the right to display our faith in God in public. Just consider the battle over nativity scenes at Christmas or the fight by powerful groups, like the ACLU, to curtail the public viewing of the 10 Commandments.

Today Americans don't value life. If they did, there would be no dreadful abortion issue staining this nation's very soul. The people behind these dark issues had no power but have came in like a lion, in part because of the "silence" of our church. They have usurped the power that belongs to the church, and this power needs to be reclaimed by the church.

Many desensitized Americans no longer place a negative value on the immorality their families see each day. You can clearly see this by the crude and profane entertainment that they expose their families to. It is in the movies, it is on the televisions and you hear it in today's music. Instead of rejecting this vulgar trash, Americans open up their wallets to it, which encourages its purveyors to produce even more of this graphic character destroying rubbish.

How many Americans or even professing Christians view pornography from their televisions or computers? As a Christian you can't ignore or disconnect from the Word of God on the issues that you know are wrong. If you do, you are only fooling yourself.

When church bodies refuse to get involved and take powerful stands against pornography, gambling and other moral and anti-scriptural social issues they are denying their responsibilities, and there is something wrong with the church.

If marriage between a man and a woman, which has been the bedrock standard since the beginning of humanity when God created and joined Adam and Eve together, doesn't matter, then who cares about family or the cultural acceptance of men marrying men and women marrying women for those who freely choose to practice homosexuality?

If our values don't matter, then who cares about the morality and disgrace of the pornography that hammers our families and nation daily, if not hourly? If our children don't matter, then who cares about the gruesome, painful, life shattering practice of abortion which is the unconscienable murder of America's unborn? If God doesn't matter, then who cares about the athiestic plague which is spreading across our nation like a wildfire and attacking our Creator and His Church? If Christianity, histories most important faith, has arrived to this dangerous delema, then what does this say for our country? What does the future hold for your children and their children?

While there are still some churches and Christian based organizations that are stepping up to the plate and doing their part, it has not been enough. This is because there are many other churches that have remained comatosely quiet on these godless issues. They let the others do it for them, and they refuse to perform their God given responsibilities. So what is happening in churches today, and are they white-hot or luke-warm for the Gospel? Do people believe in God or are they just Sunday morning Christians?

Let us start with worship. Has the Sunday morning worship in some churches become an exclusively predictable feel-good entertainment experience? Do many services begin with good music and a brief feel-good scripture passage followed with a honey-coated three point feel-good fluff sermon, catered by the preacher, that is totally devoid of the anti-God issues that we face in our lives, community and nation as a body of Bible believing Christians? If so, then this is very distressing for that church. Where is the hard-hitting worship? Where is the Holy Word relative to these critically important issues? Where is the activist church, and how is it taking on the issues of darkness in the communities in which it operates?

In such churches how many underpaid struggling preachers would dare spend too much time dwelling on the personal terms of sin, hell and judgment for fear of being criticized by some in their congregations? How many pastors must put up with controlling church leaders, and do some pastors feel compelled to pick and choose what parts of the Bible they do or don't preach seriously on so as to be politically correct? Do they feel compelled to go lightly on moral issues because some in their congregation might be morally liberal and, therefore, certain scripture hits to close to home, and they wouldn't like it?

Is this what the church is intended to be? Does this smack of some individual churches having become worldly themselves by being silent and capitulating to the ways of the world?

Has this method of preaching created a situation in some churches where today's moral issues are seldom, if ever, discussed and not preached on at all? Do some pastors believe in traditional marriage anymore? How many pastors or church leaders today would publicly take a strong position against anti-biblical same-sex marriage? God's Word calls the practice of homosexuality an abomination, and when a church refuses to take a stand against same-sex marriage or allows active homosexuals to become clergy, there is something wrong with that church.

Casual sex, infidelity and living together today without the benefit of matrimony have all become commonplace in adulterous America. Adultery is one of the 10 Commandments. Some people just live together, have children together and then move on to other people. It is a continuing cycle where the resulting confused children have no stability, no sense of what is right and wrong and torn loyalties between multiple parents. If a church doesn't clearly preach against adultery and the promiscuity that darkens humanity, then there is something wrong with that church.

Do you hear these issues covered in your church? If not, why not? If the Church won't speak out on these issues, then who will?

[stuartcr]

With or without absolutes, most people, confused or not, do only what they deem is right in their own eyes...that is why some people are criminals and some are not and some in between.

I think if there really were absolutes, then that would prevent people from doing some of the things that are absolutely wrong.