LOOKING FROM THE OUTSIDE

 Steve was a homeless fellow at Myrtle Beach when one of the hurricanes came through a few years ago. Huddled in a corner alone and frightened he cried out to the Lord for mercy and said, "Oh God, if you will bring me through this thing safely, I will get rid of my cigarettes and my false teeth!” Then having made it safely through the storm, he got rid of his false teeth and went around toothless, but hung on to his actual sins, such as profanity and whoremongering.

When I asked him about his logic in the matter, he told me that it is a sin to wear false teeth because the Bible warns us about things that are false. He told one of his friends, “You don’t want to be wearing false teeth when Jesus comes back. But then again, you just as well go ahead and smile and look pretty because it will be too late then.”

This story is true, and we smile at the strange logic involved. However, the world often sees the church in this light. We often "strain at a gnat and swallow a camel." I think this is what Jesus meant when he said the sons of this world are often wiser in their generation than the sons of light (Lu.16:8). When the church gets religious it ends up like the children playing games in the marketplace, irrelevant and not touching people in the realities of their lives (Matt.11:16-17). It also loses touch with the heart of God.

I learned in a sociology course in college that one of the unspoken requisites for being an accepted part of a group is that everyone in it consciously and subconsciously ignores the inconsistencies of the group. I pastored for many years, but I think I saw the church more clearly while being in a "secular" profession for a few years. Being on the outside gives a different perspective. Sometimes we “can’t see the forest for the trees.”

Therefore, we should not quickly dismiss our detractors. They may see us in a distorted light, yet very often they see and point out faults that our friends cannot see.

That season of being on the outside caused me to cry out to see the real church. What will the church be like when the Holy Spirit is allowed to develop it without all our impositions.

God is going to work according to the eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. He is going to do exceedingly, abundantly above all that we can ask or think, and He is going to do it in, with, and through the church.

It will be really interesting in the years ahead to see what God does in the church and in the world. The analogy of the woman in labor seems appropriate for our time, not only for the world but also for the USA. Like animals that sense an earthquake before humans are aware of it, we know something is about to happen. We can't define or describe it fully, but we see travail in the world, and we sense that the Lord wants to make the church effective and relevant in it all.

For me this means to hunger for His presence. I pray every day from Psalm 90, "Let your work appear to you servants, and your glory unto our children." I also pray Isaiah's prayer, "Rend the heavens and come down to make your name known..." We pray as David, "When I am old and gray-headed forsake me not, until I have shown your strength to this generation and your power to everyone who is to come." 

I do not understand apathy and complacency in those who know God. How can we sleep when so much is happening in both the spiritual and natural realm. The time in which we live is not a time to be "at ease in Zion," but a time to intercede and enter the council room of the Lord. The church as God intends for it to be will emerge because of people who hear His voice, because of the sovereign and providential hand of God that administrates each season in the church and history (Eph1:10), and because of the distress and circumstances that will press upon us in society. God moves comprehensively in history and society, not just in the four walls of a church and not just among Christians. But I know He will raise up the church to reflect His nature, presence, power, and purpose, and to be an instrument in His hand to reach the world. May we have an honest and sincere heart to know and do the will of God. May we have a genuine desire for Him to lead us into what we could not find on our own.

It is nice to be able to analyze and re-evaluate our paradigms and methods and to ask questions without being accused of already having the answers. Sometimes people do have honest questions and are genuinely searching. Even so there will be those who are threatened by our questions because they perceive them as maneuvers designed to manipulate them to our predetermined conclusions.  

I have ideas, but I don't have the final answers. I can search out the Lord's path for me without attacking or being critical of others who are content with what they are doing. I don't have to pull down anyone else's house in building my own. However, as God works in the church and in history, I think we will be surprised at what actually comes forth.  

We want to be a part of and not apart from what God is going to do. Here are some biblical principles for us to consider: 

Mark 7: 1-13.
We should not let our traditions blind us to the word of God.
Traditions of men are rules, ceremonies, methods, and practices created by “man” and passed down as if they are God-ordained and unchangeable. Our traditions often blind us to the word of God and to the apostolic traditions as seen in the Gospels and in the book of  Acts..

Luke 5: 26-39.
We must be open to receive the “new wine.”
This represents the fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit and the renewal of spiritual gifts and the living presence of Jesus moving in and through the church.

We must be open to allowing the development of “new wineskins.”
Wineskins represent the structure, practices, and how we do things.

Our traditions and our structures become frozen and concretized. They hinder us from seeing what God is saying and doing, and make us deaf, blind, and inflexible to the promptings of the Holy Spirit.

To move with the Spirit of God in the season ahead, we need creative obedience and sanctified flexibility. May the Lord help us.