I have been away for a while, it is good to be back! I took a three month sabbatical from ministry and God has really brought some things to light for me.........
We organize this Thing. We name it, incorporate it, open bank accounts in its name, we train and hire staff to run it. We take up money for it . We devise campaigns to recruit more people to join it. We track attendance to it. We love it, we get mad at it, we resign from it, and leave it.
If we are particularly fond of it, we make up brochures and buy ads to market it.
We evaluate the Thing to determine its success or failure. "The praise service was good," we might say. "The sermon was okay." "The offering was poor." "The attendance was down."
Ask a Pastor how his church is coming along and he will answer with such comments as: "Oh our building program is great." "We are getting members left and right." "We've doubled our membership in the last year." "We are losing people out the back door as fast as they are coming in." Do you see where his heart is?? He is evaluating the Thing which he is the head over. The growth of his church reflects upon his success or failure as a leader.
If, on the other hand, he answers regarding the spiritual well-being of the people, he understands more about what it means to be the body of Christ."Well, many of them have endured some afflictions, but it has made them stronger in the Lord."
If he talks about his people in a possessive sense, he is snared by his own conceit. They are not his people. On the other hand, if he talks about the sheep that belong to the good Sheperd who is Jesus Christ, he may be free and more likely to set his people free.
Soon after a church is started, it nearly always takes on an existence of it's own and begins to exist for its own sake. The people in it exist to serve it rather than it existing to serve the people.Those dedicated to keeping the church going expect their members to attend it, support it, and serve it.
Some people are clinically classified as religious addicts. I am a recovering church-addict. I finally saw how this church Thing was an idolatrous system of men's traditions and ideas. I needed it. I had previously found my identity in it. I had presence, power, and position in it. I was joined to it, it was joined to me. We bond with that Thing we call church and thereby get in bondage to it. We join it and it somehow takes possesion of us. We do, in fact, get addicted to it.
How do we know it is addictive?? One way is that we all go through withdrawal when we leave it. I never felt anything like it until I resigned my position this year and took a three month sabbatical from ministry. That was the most difficult thing I have ever been through in my life! ADDICTED.
A few descerning people are able to break away from the bondage of church, but often leave damaged and resentful. I am not saying that you shouldn't go to church. What I am saying is that you need not make it an idol.
Let's talk about idolatry for a moment....
Idolatry is principally the response of personal adoration toward something less than Jehovah God, whether that something is Self, an object we made ourselves, or even a ministry we have started.... An idol is anything or anyone, including ourselves, that is given credit for the abilities that only God possesses.
We, as Christians and even church leaders, make things and accomplish things that we come to adore. We set these things before us and pay homage to them whether they are songs we write, businesses we build, sermons we preach, churches we plant. We live vicariously through the idols we have made.
We take such pride in our works. We allow them to control our lives, our emotions, and our relationships. We love them. We look at them and our hearts swell with pride. They are idolatrous extensions of ourselves....
All idolatry is the worship of Self. It is an extension of ourselves: our adored opinions, speculations, plans, programs, conferences, and projects: it is the self-exhalted work of our hands and the imaginations of our minds- all the things we do in our old man nature of flesh and sin that causes us to esteem ourselves higher than we ought to.
Whatever appeals to Self is not of God. Self is in love with Self. It seeks its own. It is vain, prideful, arrogant, self-exhalting, self-indulging, self-absorbed, power hungry, and lustful. It strives for independence, self-reliance, and self-management. How many times have you heard, "Protect this House!!??"
Do you not realize that the house is YOUR covering and should protect YOU?? You should not be expected to protect your covering, that is your covering's job to protect you. You don't serve the vision, the vision should serve you and pull out the potential in your life!!
Self lies, cheats, steals, manipulates, and uses and abuses others, if necessary, to achieve its own ambitions. It will blame, covet, justify and do whatever it seems necessary to save itself. It goes to any end to protect itself.It is addicted to more and is never satisfied. We create churches and ministries to save us, feed us, protect us, make us happy, give us our identity, and provide for us a better lifestyle.
Listen.... the idolatry of Self is seen in our drivenness to accomplish things in our own strength. We see things to do, and we must do them- another service, another conference, and so on. We are constantly distracted by the business we create for ourselves. Busyness is a distraction from intimacy with God. We would rather be doing something for God than spending time with Him.
Yet, He did not create us to do for Him, but to be as He is that we might have fellowship with Him and with one another in Him.
We enslave ourselves in the works we require of ourselves. Moreover, we enslave others to our works when they allow us to do so. WE adore our accomplishments. Our works become idolatrous to us when we use them to make ourselves feel like we have done something for God. Our idols have to do with those things that possess our hearts. Whatever we own, owns part of us.
We can be possessed by quest.
God created us for Himself. He wants an intimate relationship with us. He wants us to know Him, love Him, trust Him, depend on Him. He is a loving and faithful Father to us who believe and requires of us that we return love and faithfulness to Him.
He is profoundly jealous of anything we put between Him and us. Allow yourself to feel God's passionate disdain for our idolatry as you see the scriptures on this subject.
Who are you serving? God or the church?? Where is your loyalty? God Almighty or your ministry?
THINK ABOUT IT..........................
