We recently have had
several studies concerning these variations of worship that have come
into the churches all over the area around us. The reality is that in
the Wichita area, we have seen churches offering everything from rock
music to bribes in order get people into church. Here, the liberal
churches of Christ have been embracing more and more of these behaviors
and bringing shame on all of us… whether we participate or not.
Last month one of those liberal churches… the South Emporiachurch of Christ (Wichita, Ks) invited our young people to some kind of wing ding. . . They promised to give them all free pizza and dilly bars if they’d come! The social gospel has so eclipsed the gospel of Christ in these churches that they don’t even recognize the damage they are doing… Perhaps even more tragic, I doubt that many of that church’s members realize that I have raised a doctrinal objection to their behavior with their leadership. They are still blindly following along.
Jesus said…”They are blind guides of the blind. And if a blind man guides a blind man, both will fall into a pit." Note how the focus of the invitation is blatantly social/worldly. Notice further what this says about their young people… they assume that their young people are not interested in godliness… they are therefore luring them with worldliness. Dilly bars, special appearances, entertainment etc.
Let me ask a practical question. When you picture Jesus’ cross… Do you envision the apostles working the crowd offering free pizza and dilly bars? Me neither! So… Is Jesus the Head of this church?
All over our country, the older generation in many of these churches is feeling left out or disenfranchised in the very congregations they helped to build. They helplessly have had to watch as their congregation has moved further and further toward these liberal social/entertainment fads they call churches. It is important to note that an alternative exists… Jesus’ church is still out there!
(Eric Hamilton had this thought to add to my statement above concerning the older generation… Have they really been helpless? The fact that they've just watched has been partly their doing…. They haven't really taken a stand until things get out of control. Then they don't know why so they begin to actually search. This may be beyond the scope of this email, but perhaps by these liberal trends, some of these older members have been awakened to the fact that they need to do more than just watch.”)
To church leaders on this list who insist on going down this “wide road” to destruction… If you insist on continuing, we’ll take good care of the Christians that you run off! (I know their dilemma well, I lived it when I left the Christian church in the 1970’s)
Dennis and Veronica are one of our recently converted couples. They at one time had come out of the church of scientology and were looking for the truth. To make a long story short they went to one of those new fangled 'Contemporary" services recently. (They visited a more advanced Christian church version.) Veronica wrote us Sunday evening after returning home. She gave a review of her experience. Sometimes it is hard to see the relevance to our studying some of these things if we are not doing them.
I asked Veronica if she'd mind me forwarding this to you all. This kind of brings home the need for these particular studies. What is the recommendation to folks as they keep running into things like this? Picture the cross of Jesus... then ask yourself if this is really what Jesus died to establish.
Enjoy this young Christian’s review of her experience. Let me request that while you are reading it…. Consider how it parallels this event from the life of Jesus:
"And when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying in the temple, and saying, Hosanna to the Son of David; they were sore displeased, And said unto him, Hearest thou what these say? And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?" (Matthew 21:15-16)
A new Christian seeing clearly what many far advanced beyond her years refuse to see.….
Last month one of those liberal churches… the South Emporiachurch of Christ (Wichita, Ks) invited our young people to some kind of wing ding. . . They promised to give them all free pizza and dilly bars if they’d come! The social gospel has so eclipsed the gospel of Christ in these churches that they don’t even recognize the damage they are doing… Perhaps even more tragic, I doubt that many of that church’s members realize that I have raised a doctrinal objection to their behavior with their leadership. They are still blindly following along.
Jesus said…”They are blind guides of the blind. And if a blind man guides a blind man, both will fall into a pit." Note how the focus of the invitation is blatantly social/worldly. Notice further what this says about their young people… they assume that their young people are not interested in godliness… they are therefore luring them with worldliness. Dilly bars, special appearances, entertainment etc.
Let me ask a practical question. When you picture Jesus’ cross… Do you envision the apostles working the crowd offering free pizza and dilly bars? Me neither! So… Is Jesus the Head of this church?
All over our country, the older generation in many of these churches is feeling left out or disenfranchised in the very congregations they helped to build. They helplessly have had to watch as their congregation has moved further and further toward these liberal social/entertainment fads they call churches. It is important to note that an alternative exists… Jesus’ church is still out there!
(Eric Hamilton had this thought to add to my statement above concerning the older generation… Have they really been helpless? The fact that they've just watched has been partly their doing…. They haven't really taken a stand until things get out of control. Then they don't know why so they begin to actually search. This may be beyond the scope of this email, but perhaps by these liberal trends, some of these older members have been awakened to the fact that they need to do more than just watch.”)
To church leaders on this list who insist on going down this “wide road” to destruction… If you insist on continuing, we’ll take good care of the Christians that you run off! (I know their dilemma well, I lived it when I left the Christian church in the 1970’s)
Dennis and Veronica are one of our recently converted couples. They at one time had come out of the church of scientology and were looking for the truth. To make a long story short they went to one of those new fangled 'Contemporary" services recently. (They visited a more advanced Christian church version.) Veronica wrote us Sunday evening after returning home. She gave a review of her experience. Sometimes it is hard to see the relevance to our studying some of these things if we are not doing them.
I asked Veronica if she'd mind me forwarding this to you all. This kind of brings home the need for these particular studies. What is the recommendation to folks as they keep running into things like this? Picture the cross of Jesus... then ask yourself if this is really what Jesus died to establish.
Enjoy this young Christian’s review of her experience. Let me request that while you are reading it…. Consider how it parallels this event from the life of Jesus:
"And when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying in the temple, and saying, Hosanna to the Son of David; they were sore displeased, And said unto him, Hearest thou what these say? And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?" (Matthew 21:15-16)
A new Christian seeing clearly what many far advanced beyond her years refuse to see.….
--------------------------------------------
A Young Christian’s Assessment
of a Contemporary Worship Service
I thought I'd share my observations from the Church service today. (Riverlawn Christian Church)
We
attended the contemporary worship service, which refers to the music.
The earlier traditional service uses hymn books but at our service,
young men went up on stage (notice I call it a stage rather than a
pulpit) with their instruments and rocked out to contemporary Christian
music. The congregation sang with them, reading the words from the
screen behind them. While this was exciting and entertaining, it left
me feeling hollow.
The sermon was based on 1 Corinthians 9: 24-27 and he compared training for the Olympics to training to spread the word of God. The weird thing was that he read more factoids about the Olympics than he did Bible scripture. And he actually showed us a clip from Rocky IV to show the hard training Sylvester Stallone's character went through for his match against the Russian. OK, what was the point of THAT? It was entertaining, but it was distracting and completely unneccessary. It almost seemed like since the pastor didn't have enough subject matter from the Bible to fill his sermon, he had to fill it in with secular comparisons. Or maybe I'm judging too harshly b/c I'm "biased" to Christ's Church--the true Church. Anyway, I felt like I was learning more about training my body than training to serve God.
The craziest thing the pastor said was, while holding the Bible up, "Nowhere in the Bible does it say, you have to do this or else. It's about your heart--your decision." Is he kidding me? God did give us the freedom to choose to follow him, but the consequences of NOT doing what he wants are all over the Bible.
Another thing was that at the beginning, he told us to fill out visitor's cards and they'd mail us a "prize." So essentially he was offering a bribe in hopes of gaining new members.
They gave us these pre-filled note papers with blanks to fill in with info from the sermon and space to take notes. So this is my note page:
One truth: Training is necessary for a fully devoted Christ follower!
Be in the word.
1 Tim 4:7-8
2 Tim 3: 16-17
Be in prayer.
(I either missed the scripture he read here or he didn't read one)
Be involved.
Rom 12:10
John 13:34-35
Be faithful.
Phil. 3:13-14
I had no problem with the subject of his sermon, just the way it was presented. The pastor was young--in his early 30s, a very good speaker and injected a lot of humor into his sermon but it just didn't feel "meaty" like those at our Church. It didn't seem to have much substance. Again, I may be judging too harshly since I'm feeling sort of "high and mighty." I know I shouldn't so I'll try to climb off of my throne. Soon. :)
Oh, get this. The lead singer came up at the end and played his guitar during the closing prayer, making it sound like some motivational speech from a movie with a soundtrack. Again, WHAT WAS THE POINT OF THAT? To make the prayer more meaningful? I just don't get it. It was a distraction.
It saddens me that this is considered a "normal" service. That we're the ones that have to defend ourselves with the Bible. It should be the other way around. Usually when I cry at Church, it is b/c I'm so grateful for all God has done for us--namely, the sacrifice of his son for our sins. Today I was crying with repentance for worshipping in a manner displeasing to God and I had to send up a prayer asking for forgiveness. Isn't that so sad? That I had to ask for forgiveness for worship? I will definitely watch my mouth from now on (not agreeing to attend a Church I know nothing about) b/c I have no desire to step foot in another "normal" Christian Church for worship service again.
Thank you for helping us find the truth.
Love, Veronica
Hi I am glad you stopped by our blog. These articles are from an emailing that we did several years ago. Today most of our work is on facebook
You can follow my personal page on Facebook by clicking on this link ...
Jerry Blount
You can follow the postings on the congregation's page by clicking on this link....
Las Vegas church of Christ
If you wish to worship with us....
Las Vegas church of Christ
709 Dora Celeste
Las Vegas, NM 87701
Our meeting times are
10am Sunday morning for Bible study.
11am Sunday morning for the worship service.
6pm Wednesday evening for Midweek Bible study.
If you wish to contact me...
yakipreacher@gmail.com
Be well
Jerry Blount
The sermon was based on 1 Corinthians 9: 24-27 and he compared training for the Olympics to training to spread the word of God. The weird thing was that he read more factoids about the Olympics than he did Bible scripture. And he actually showed us a clip from Rocky IV to show the hard training Sylvester Stallone's character went through for his match against the Russian. OK, what was the point of THAT? It was entertaining, but it was distracting and completely unneccessary. It almost seemed like since the pastor didn't have enough subject matter from the Bible to fill his sermon, he had to fill it in with secular comparisons. Or maybe I'm judging too harshly b/c I'm "biased" to Christ's Church--the true Church. Anyway, I felt like I was learning more about training my body than training to serve God.
The craziest thing the pastor said was, while holding the Bible up, "Nowhere in the Bible does it say, you have to do this or else. It's about your heart--your decision." Is he kidding me? God did give us the freedom to choose to follow him, but the consequences of NOT doing what he wants are all over the Bible.
Another thing was that at the beginning, he told us to fill out visitor's cards and they'd mail us a "prize." So essentially he was offering a bribe in hopes of gaining new members.
They gave us these pre-filled note papers with blanks to fill in with info from the sermon and space to take notes. So this is my note page:
One truth: Training is necessary for a fully devoted Christ follower!
Be in the word.
1 Tim 4:7-8
2 Tim 3: 16-17
Be in prayer.
(I either missed the scripture he read here or he didn't read one)
Be involved.
Rom 12:10
John 13:34-35
Be faithful.
Phil. 3:13-14
I had no problem with the subject of his sermon, just the way it was presented. The pastor was young--in his early 30s, a very good speaker and injected a lot of humor into his sermon but it just didn't feel "meaty" like those at our Church. It didn't seem to have much substance. Again, I may be judging too harshly since I'm feeling sort of "high and mighty." I know I shouldn't so I'll try to climb off of my throne. Soon. :)
Oh, get this. The lead singer came up at the end and played his guitar during the closing prayer, making it sound like some motivational speech from a movie with a soundtrack. Again, WHAT WAS THE POINT OF THAT? To make the prayer more meaningful? I just don't get it. It was a distraction.
It saddens me that this is considered a "normal" service. That we're the ones that have to defend ourselves with the Bible. It should be the other way around. Usually when I cry at Church, it is b/c I'm so grateful for all God has done for us--namely, the sacrifice of his son for our sins. Today I was crying with repentance for worshipping in a manner displeasing to God and I had to send up a prayer asking for forgiveness. Isn't that so sad? That I had to ask for forgiveness for worship? I will definitely watch my mouth from now on (not agreeing to attend a Church I know nothing about) b/c I have no desire to step foot in another "normal" Christian Church for worship service again.
Thank you for helping us find the truth.
Love, Veronica
Hi I am glad you stopped by our blog. These articles are from an emailing that we did several years ago. Today most of our work is on facebook
You can follow my personal page on Facebook by clicking on this link ...
Jerry Blount
You can follow the postings on the congregation's page by clicking on this link....
Las Vegas church of Christ
If you wish to worship with us....
Las Vegas church of Christ
709 Dora Celeste
Las Vegas, NM 87701
Our meeting times are
10am Sunday morning for Bible study.
11am Sunday morning for the worship service.
6pm Wednesday evening for Midweek Bible study.
If you wish to contact me...
yakipreacher@gmail.com
Be well
Jerry Blount
