In place of gospel preaching, this “new-and-improved” variety of Christianity was substituting amusements. Spurgeon warned that many were turning the church into a “play-house,” allowing the values and techniques of the theater to invade the sanctuary of the Lord.
Spurgeon noted that many churches were no longer having prayer meetings. Spiritual fervor was dwindling, congregations were thinning, and enthusiasm for the gospel was quickly becoming extinct. “Alas! many are returning to the poisoned cups which drugged that declining generation. . . . Too many ministers are toying with the deadly cobra of ‘another gospel,’ in the form of ‘modern thought.’”[26]
Who was chiefly to blame for the decline? Spurgeon believed it was the preachers: “The case is mournful. Certain ministers are making infidels. Avowed atheists are not a tenth as dangerous as those preachers who scatter doubt and stab at faith. . . . Germany was made unbelieving by her preachers, and England is following in her tracks.”[27]
Spurgeon made no effort to disguise his contempt for the modernists: “These destroyers of our churches appear to be as content with their work as monkeys with their mischief. That which their fathers would have lamented they rejoice in: the alienation of the poor and simple-minded from their ministry they accept as a compliment, and the grief of the spiritually-minded they regard as an evidence of their power.”[28]
http://www.spurgeon.org/downgrd.htm
THE DOWN-GRADE FORCED SPURGEON TO LEAVE THE BAPTIST UNION,THEY LOST,”THE PRINCE OF THE PREACHERS”.
WOE TO THEM,THEN AND OF COURSE NOW THEY ARE APOSTATE.
MY PRAYERS FOR YOU MY BRETHREN,IS SERVE THE KING,FEED THE FLOCK AND IF ANY MAN-CENTERED WALLS ARE CAUSING DIVISION WHERE YOU PRESENTLY ATTEND WORSHIP,LEAVE!
Ac 13:51 But they shook off the dust from their feet against them, and came to Iconium.
DO NOT JUST GO ALONG,TO GET ALONG!
SOON I’LL START TEACHING A NEW SERIES,TITLED “THE MARK OF A SAINT”
I appreciate all of the recent posts quoting or citing Mr. Spurgeon, a clarion voice for two full centuries.
“Spurgeon warned that many were turning the church into a “play-house,” allowing the values and techniques of the theater to invade the sanctuary of the Lord.”
This was the ring in the preaching of Bible-believing Baptists, Plymouth Brethren, and other prophetic preachers of his day.
Search the Internet for THINGS TO COME, A JOURNAL OF BIBLICAL LITERATURE, published periodically in England from 1894 to 1915. In every issue there were brief pieces exposing the worldly trends in the churches even in that day. Using the world’s entertainment to attract people is nothing new. In those pieces you will find interesting parallels to what is happening today in the megachurches in America and elsewhere. It is the APOSTASY. It was recognized and innunciated by the true in-depth Bible students and preachers at the turn of the 20th century. The warnings have been ignored by the denominational churches and their training institutions since that time, especially since 1950.
P;ease remove me from your ping list
gulfcoast6
Thank you for this ping! This is the church the Lord used to awaken me from the dead. Yet I have not been back there since 9 months after I was saved because it was nothing more than colostrum for me. I probably will never step foot back in there but it does my heart good that maybe they will “feed the sheep” more than they have desired to for many, many years.
To God alone be the glory!!!
With real hardship looming on the horizon, there may be cause for optimism on the spiritual front. Consider: in a climate wherein the very real possibility of economic disaster comes to dominate a people's thought, the light and fluffy amusement motif of Willow Creek and others will be pushed aside by real believers who will instead turn inward and do some real honest-to-goodness soul searching, as the dependence -- not on man, his ingenuity, or his "buying and selling" in the stock market -- on God for our daily bread becomes more and more "real" to us.
Let us pray that the Santa Claus-like Baal will be overthrown and replaced by the great and terrible God Who worked wonders before Pharaoh, Who traveled in a pillar of cloud by day and fire by night, whose precepts through Moses told us of Himself and His attributes, and whose unspeakable mercy is penned by real men in simple words on ink and paper - in short, the God who can save. This is the God we know and the God I want others to know, the God who loves and saves us from our own wretchedness.