Posted on 03/21/2018 7:22:40 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
People are fleeing the institutional church and there should be no question as to why this exodus is happening. The vast majority of people who claim to represent God in the United States have been perpetuating a Biblical misconception that has been leading the church into decline for decades. That erroneous notion is Escapism Theology.
Escapism theology is the concept that humanity needs to get away from this mess we call Earth and go "home" to Heaven. I hear this kind of verbiage all of the time from church leaders almost everywhere. They say things like: "Accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior and reserve your place in Heaven."
Most will be dismayed by the fact that the popularization of Escapism Theology in the modern era was advanced by one of greatest Christian evangelists in history, the Rev. Billy Graham. Rev. Graham is well quoted as saying "My home is in Heaven. I'm just passing through this world." He is renowned for statements like: "The Bible says that as long as we are here on Earth, we are strangers in a foreign land. There are enemies to be conquered before we return home. This world is not our home; our citizenship is in Heaven."
The difficulty with quotes like these are that, while they are emotionally compelling and provide great media sound bites, they don't offer the bigger picture of the Biblical message. Generally speaking, most people are not going to question Rev. Graham's ability to lead people to Christ or his tremendous value to humanity. But we also know that God is an agent of reformation and redemption, and the church (made up of called people) is the object and catalyst of God's reforming and redeeming work in Jesus. As such it is pretty straightforward to believe that we Christians, to whom folks like Rev. Graham have faithfully passed the mantle of Christian stewardship on to, have a responsibility to evaluate what we are doing presently in order to continually strive to make things better via the grace of God. And upon such assessment it is clear that things are not going well with the institutional church in the United States and Europe.
That is because people have been led to believe that all they have to do is "accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior" and then they are "good to go" to Heaven. But the problem with this kind of thinking is that it isn't Biblical. And because we have perpetuated unbiblical theology for decades the church has effectively become spiritually impotent.
One of the problems with Escapism Theology is that it is an incomplete expression of humanity's future. Yes, the Bible says that there is a place called Heaven. But the existence of that place doesn't mean that humanity is called to flee the Earth. Instead we are called to participate in the redemptive purposes of Jesus to help redeem and renew the world, in Jesus' own words "on Earth as it is in Heaven." The end game of our participation in these redemptive purposes, from a Biblical perspective, is that it will bring about the creation of a new Heaven and a new Earth in Christ that will intersect/interlock with one another.
Why does this matter? Because it means that instead of escaping from the world we are called to engage it. Our divine calling is literally to strive to make the world and all of humanity better with God's help. That means that we have to choose over and over, day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute, in every context, to open the gift of grace given by God to walk in the formational teachings of Jesus. Yes it is difficult, but the alternative, regardless of your religious background or belief, or lack thereof, is literally a living hell.
When we fall prey to Escapism Theology it opens up a bunch of excuses for humanity. It allows us to ignore how we care for the Earth because "it's all going to Hell in a hand basket" anyways. Escapism Theology implies that humanity isn't staying here so go ahead and pollute the atmosphere, pour oil and dump plastic into the oceans, cut down the rainforests, bring other forms of life to extinction, because this isn't our long term home "we're just passing through."
Escapism Theology reduces our relationship with God to transactional theology. When we ascribe to escapist notions our public witness to "accept Jesus as my Lord and Savior" is effectively reduced to us bargaining with God to "save us a spot." Such theology is nothing more than a works righteousness hangover disguised as grace.
Beyond this, Escapism Theology has bled into culture causing people to lose hope that there actually is a redeeming way forward. I've written about this previously in articles like — Stephen Hawking is wrong about the Future of the Earth. For instance, the late Professor Hawking believed that we need to make plans to flee the Earth because we are going to destroy ourselves using technology. People like Elon Musk are so worried about AI that he's literally reinvigorated the global space program so that we can one day escape to Mars.
To make things worse, much of the global church has embraced Escapism Theology instead of being God's agent of change and redemption in the world. The institutional church has, in many instances, retreated from engaging culture only to become a failed coping mechanism for people. Veiled in poor theology, much of the church has simply become an isolationist way for people to flee the harsh realities of the world while waiting to cash in their Jesus-ticket to Heaven.
The difficulty with this way of thinking is that, of all the ways that humans have to disengage reality, the church is not a good option of escape because that is the opposite what Christ created it to be. Consequently, being a poor alternative to other ritual forms of self-medication, and not living into its life-giving purpose, people quickly find alternatives to the church. When the church fails to articulate its divine purpose, people understandably leave in mass looking for other founts of ultimate meaning.
What is particularly interesting about this recent exodus though is that polling indicates that, even though people are leaving the institution of the church, they haven't stopped believing in God. They just properly understand that something isn't quite right. What they seem to intuitively know, but struggle to find the words to describe, is that when the church fails to engage the world and change it for the better, the church fails to be Christ's church.
Pastors like Billy Graham had the unique gift of gathering people together and convincing them to listen. He made the world sit up and take notice of humanity's rescuer Jesus. Now the time has come to pivot the larger body of the church from just intellectually confessing that we believe in Jesus to actually showing what it means to live out the formational teachings of Jesus.
In the modern technological age this task will take some creative thinking in context. It will require bold new approaches implementing time-honored virtues. It will take people willing to risk their comfort and security to work to make sure our tomorrow is better than our past. It will demand humanity work together to confront the realized Hell that so many people experience daily in the world.
But the Good News is that the end result is a goal worth pursuing. The end result is a future worth the risk. That is because, if we submit to live the teachings of Jesus, the end result will be an Earth that is heavenly and a humanity that is godly.
From my own point of view, there is no need or purpose for a church. It doesn’t stand for anything, it’s full of evil people who hide behind God as a disguise, and it’s corrupt and greedy. I was born a Catholic, and the pope is truly horrific. Something ain’t right there.
There’s no fixing it, I’ll just take a pass, I don’t need this. I relate with Jesus on my own. Just Him and me, and that’s the way it will be.
Actually, I think people are fleeing the Church because they want to have sex without feeling guilt. As somebody once said, we are in an era of moral heresy.
"The Bible says that as long as we are here on Earth, we are strangers in a foreign land. There are enemies to be conquered before we return home. This world is not our home... - Rev. Billy Graham. Rev. Graham
Graham was right - and the guy who wrote this piece is attempting to get a larger reading than he deserves by playing off the Graham quotes. Shame on Christopher Benek .
LOL
“That is because, if we submit to live the teachings of Jesus, the end result will be an Earth that is heavenly and a humanity that is godly.”
No, it won’t, not on this earth at least. God has made it very clear that this earth is not going to end well, and a lot of humanity is going to be judged harshly.
When you wrote about his “transhumanism,” this immediately popped into my mind:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_Transhumanist_Association
I wonder, who is embracing whom?
“I have a friend who, when talking about the state of the world, ALWAYS ends up at “well, maybe Christ will return soon and put an end to it.” My gut feeling is that is the easy way out.”
Well, Jesus did tell us he would return soon and put an end to it, and taught us to pray for that (”thy Kingdom come, on earth as it is in heaven”). Are you complaining that you would like God to make things harder for you instead?
“I believe the Lord would expect us to do our best to overcome evil. He wants us to be victorious.”
We are nothing outside of Christ. Any victory we would have would only be through him any way. The true victory for us, though, is to be reconciled to God, not to crush some external enemy on His behalf.
“It would be easy for our Creator to just scrap it and start over (or not), but that would be letting Satan win. It must be shown that God’s creation is ultimately mightier than Satan.”
Everything is easy for the Creator, and the Creator doesn’t have to show anyone anything. He is sovereign. He’s already told us what He will do. Take Him at His word and just trust in His plan.
“Beating up on a straw man.”
Succinct analysis.
Well, Christians ARE called to change their hearts and minds and conform to God’s laws through Christ...and we’re commanded to preach the gospel and make disciples....but the bible is pretty clear that our goal isn’t to “change” the world. Our goal is to prepare ourselves and others for the coming kingdom of God that will be formally instituted when Christ returns.
Wow So much wrong here I don’t know where to start
Our divine calling is to go into the world and make disciples of all nations. Marching orders directly from Jesus. Our concern is with souls not with the world
Works are a response to salvation not the causative agent of it
Thanks, helpful label.
The evil within ourselves is our challenge. We must speak truth and walk with God... We know what evil is - the challenge is to do the opposite...
“Instead we are called to participate in the redemptive purposes of Jesus to help redeem and renew the world, in Jesus’ own words “on Earth as it is in Heaven.” The end game of our participation in these redemptive purposes, from a Biblical perspective, is that it will bring about the creation of a new Heaven and a new Earth in Christ that will intersect/interlock with one another.”
That is not biblical. The whole of the bible is about YOU and how you are improved by improving your relationship with G-d beginning with accepting Yeshua as Christ the Messiah.
Yeshua never asks YOU to “redeem this world” and scripture does not say YOU will build the kingdom of heaven on earth; that only Christ will do.
Revelation is totally compatible with what Yeshua said when tempted by Satan who said he could give Yeshua the keys to all the kingdoms (secular powers) on earth and Yeshua rebuked Satan telling him they are not part of HIS kingdom. Revelation confirms this reminding, us that Satan, not Christ will have a world largely enthralled to his powers when Christ does come to redeem it. After that CHRIST, not our human societies, will make for “heaven on earth”, not before.
Could only force myself through 6 paragraphs before I couldn’t take anymore.
What a bunch of horses hit. This JERK couldn’t be more WRONG! Moron.
Any church I can’t carry in, I don’t stay in.
Another plug for programs backing big government, to “redeem human society”. Another call to get out and make government perform the “redemption” of “this world”, and believe YOU can “redeem this world”. Yeshua never told you you could or that you should think you can. You can make the relationships you personally have better relationships for your beliefs in Christ. You cannot “redeem the world”. It rejects you. Instead of being eaten by the world spiritually, which it can do, Christ offers salvation from that. That does not make YOU Christ nor does it make you, collectively, the “redeemer” of the world.
The screed in the Christian Post is another screed enticing the belief that Christ is just a collective of the human consciousness.
Sounds like he is espousing dominion theology even though he doesn’t come right out and say it.
>Spot on. His spiel is typical of all “Kingdom Now Dominionist” (KND) types, they NEVER “come right out and say” that is what they are. They are also Preterists, which goes hand in hand with KND, who are even more “shy” about saying that is what they are.
Theologically and eschatologically, This fellow, with the rest of his KND preterist brethren, are the worst kind of deceivers. We have only just begun having to deal with them, their lies will increase more and more among those who don’t know their Bibles.
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