Episode 23
Faithfulness Redefined: It's Time to Rethink Our Spiritual Lives
Today, we're diving into a critical discussion about the role of church membership and its impact on personal spiritual growth. Many churchgoers find themselves stuck in a routine of merely attending services, leading to a concerning sense of indifference and complacency in their faith. We explore how this phenomenon can be attributed to a culture that equates church attendance and financial contributions with genuine spiritual health, often neglecting the true essence of devotion and personal growth in Christ. As we unpack these ideas, we’ll also reflect on the early church's model, where daily engagement in teaching and fellowship fostered a vibrant spiritual life, contrasting sharply with today's more transactional approach. Join us as we challenge the notion that simply clocking in at church is enough and discuss what it truly means to be an active, engaged member of the body of Christ.
Takeaways:
- The podcast emphasizes that a mere three hours of church attendance each week may contribute to spiritual indifference, as it fosters a routine rather than genuine spiritual growth.
- We discussed how many church leaders mistakenly equate faithful attendance and monetary contributions with true spiritual health, sidelining deeper personal devotion.
- The need for personal accountability in one's faith is highlighted, as each individual is responsible for their relationship with God, not merely the institution.
- The episode suggests that a vibrant spiritual life requires continuous engagement beyond the four walls of the church, encouraging a community of believers to gather regularly in homes for prayer and fellowship.
- A significant point made was that spiritual growth should reflect the same diligence we apply to secular education, questioning why we allow our children to prioritize schoolwork over biblical studies.
- Lastly, we explored the early saint's example of daily devotion and how modern practices often fall short, urging listeners to rethink their spiritual commitment and involvement.
Transcript
Good morning and welcome again to our study.
Speaker A:We are going to be talking in the next couple weeks about the work of today's saints and the effect of the institution on God's people.
Speaker A:Many church members have become so lackadaisical and indifferent, really become lazy in their personal growth and their service.
Speaker A:And I, I contribute that because they have conditioned themselves to commit to three hours of church service and a routine that they've been, have had all their lives, they've scheduled to pull away from the world, the world of mammon and the pursuit of things below for just a few hours a week.
Speaker A:If that some of us have set aside less time than that for their personal, our personal needs and if the daily life reflected their love for the Lord and for His Word, then this amount of time scheduled for church would be inconsequential.
Speaker A:But it's not just the mere time.
Speaker A:It's not just that limitations of time that are involved in church membership that I think precipitates this lazy indifference to spiritual things.
Speaker A:Because the sad truth is, is that there are many leaders of those churches who recognize the problem, but they still convey the thought that these are still in good standing with the Lord simply because of their church attendance and their faithful membership, their faithful giving to that church.
Speaker A:In other words, faithfulness and the barometer for faithfulness.
Speaker A:The measure of faithfulness is how good a member they are.
Speaker A:And so a measure of membership that is in good standing is how faithful they are and what they do for the church and how much they give.
Speaker A:It's a sad thing when faithful attendance and generous giving and some small participations is all it takes to arrive at that kind of status.
Speaker A:Why the day that they die and they there's a funeral service held for them, there'll be something nice said about the fact that fact that they were faithful members of a such certain, certain church.
Speaker A:Anything else that is focused on the true spiritual character of God's people, anything relating to their devotion to the Lord outside of the four walls of their membership.
Speaker A:That's I guess, considered to be kind of extra, not necessary, just extra.
Speaker A:They are, have gone above and beyond the call of duty.
Speaker A:The level of participation, the sacrifice of time for fellowship and prayer will be increased if one practices the thoughts taught in the Bible and the things that we've been discussing in the last several months.
Speaker A:Good spiritual health should be established in our daily home life.
Speaker A:They should be set in our household with a gathering of multiple Christians.
Speaker A:Even that that would be a common event and that would be a blessing of fellowship with Those of like mind.
Speaker A:Our lives and the lives of our children should be wrapped up in this way of life.
Speaker A:Why?
Speaker A:Because it creates the needed environment for growth and love of the Lord.
Speaker A:The effect of this focus on church life is that the organization now becomes responsible for the teaching of their men, women and children.
Speaker A:For all practical purposes, the church attendance is designed to give a spiritual boost.
Speaker A:It's going to carry them through the week until the next appointed time when they get together and meet.
Speaker A:They need that.
Speaker A:Rubbing of shoulders with the spiritual giants and the leaders of that church organization.
Speaker A:And hearing of some dynamic sermon seems to be what it takes to keep them going.
Speaker A:This really isn't too far off from the mother of institutionalism, Catholicism.
Speaker A:Of course, there are numerous side effects that we've already covered elsewhere and in the past, and we won't repeat it here.
Speaker A:But I just want you to think about what's important to you in your life.
Speaker A:And what is the measure?
Speaker A:Faithfulness.
Speaker A:And faithfulness, exactly.
Speaker A:To whom?
Speaker A:I mean, who are we serving?
Speaker A:Whatever it is, you will expend a great deal of energy and time, perhaps money, in pursuing it.
Speaker A:It's really not that difficult to examine oneself and to make a conscious effort to think about what it is that occupies our time.
Speaker A:What is it that we think about throughout the week, and what is it that we're willing to spend more time and money on than anything else?
Speaker A:You see how much emphasis is placed on this life with secular education and the jobs that we have.
Speaker A:You think about the kind of emphasis that's placed in this pursuit of things down below, things about life, just.
Speaker A:Just the ordinary goals of going to school when we get out of college or get out of high school.
Speaker A:You get a degree and get a job and all these aspirations that we want our children to have and to be successful.
Speaker A:That's probably something to be expected.
Speaker A:Secular education, we expect that kind of effort, that kind of extra effort.
Speaker A:In fact, we demand that even that teachers would teach their students so that they'll be able to understand and recall and convey the same things on a test, or be able to write a term paper or give a speech.
Speaker A:I've had some teachers who lecture the material and expect the students to take notes.
Speaker A:And others will tell the class that if they'll just come and listen to the lecture every day while they'll pass the class.
Speaker A:Still, there are others that encourage a continuous dialogue with their students.
Speaker A:But however class is taught, any class in which the students are merely required to attend without really giving any attention to what's being said, Whether it's taking notes or any kind of class participation, you can be sure that they won't keep it long.
Speaker A:If they remember it all, it will be of very little value to them.
Speaker A:Any class in which the students are merely required to attend, they haven't invested anything in it.
Speaker A:And anything that you don't put into, you're not going to get too much out of.
Speaker A:We've all witnessed this.
Speaker A:We've seen the consequences of students who just attended class and the results were not so good.
Speaker A:And why would we expect a different outcome then in comparison among those who are just as careless with their spiritual growth, while they somehow think if they can just attend a church service for an hour a week, well, they'd be just fine.
Speaker A:And why is that so different from the early disciples?
Speaker A:Well, it's very different.
Speaker A:They continued daily with one accord in the apostles teaching and the breaking of bread into prayers.
Speaker A:So why do we not expect as much homework and much diligence in Bible study and prayer as we do in any secular activity or study?
Speaker A:What I'm getting at is, is it not strange that we consider it more appropriate to have our teenagers study all night for a test the next morning than giving them 20 minutes to answer current questions or some kind of answer book for a weekly class on Sunday morning?
Speaker A:What is being taught when children stay up all night to finish a book report for school, only to have their parents rant and rave it when somebody from their local congregation asks for a term paper on the authority of Christ?
Speaker A:Why is it inappropriate to not expect the same diligent work in our knowledge of the Bible?
Speaker A:Is this treasure not an indication of where our hearts are?
Speaker A:Did not Jesus tell us in Matthew 6 that where our treasure is, there our hearts will be also?
Speaker A:Is there any connection between the lack of diligence given to spiritual pursuits and the number of people unequipped for service?
Speaker A:Not only that, but it is interesting by comparison once again, and what we put our focus on, that we would require children to go to school, they'll go five days a week to prepare them for life and give them the best opportunities for a good future.
Speaker A:And yet, when it comes to the spiritual training that often consists of merely going to church at least once a week, maybe two, so that we can prepare them for service and eternal life.
Speaker A:I mean, church members are giving the right hands of fellowship to other church members who are spiritually dead if they were ever alive.
Speaker A:And if all the learning that are required, that's required is to just get them, you know, you know, to have this commitment, this feeling of acceptance, maybe baptize them and become active church members.
Speaker A:I suppose meeting every day would be overkill if that's what people thought.
Speaker A:And so in other cases, the only time that is really unacceptable is if a child wants to be a preacher.
Speaker A:Well then we want to encourage them to go a step further.
Speaker A:It's okay if they don't get their Bible class on Sunday morning and they don't spend time preparing for it.
Speaker A:But if they really want to be a preacher now, that's something different.
Speaker A:We expect them to give a little bit more if we want them to be successful in that ever that endeavor.
Speaker A:And then you'd better really buckle down, do a lot of reading, do a lot of studying.
Speaker A:You need to be prepared to teach people in one of these local churches.
Speaker A:As you prepare to do that, you've, you're going to have to commit to it.
Speaker A:And so this really translates into what I call a pastor system.
Speaker A:It requires more study for an up starting preacher than required for anybody else.
Speaker A:I don't see that that level or that distinction being made in the Bible.
Speaker A:And yet the division of labor is not supported anywhere in the scriptures.
Speaker A:So what is to become of our young people when our focus and our attention is given to things down below and not on things above?
Speaker A:One thing is for sure, friends, where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
Speaker A:And so what we want to focus on now for a few more minutes is the work of God's people today and what it takes to be equipped for that work.
Speaker A:One of the concepts of the New Testament teaching is that when we talk about the ekklesia or the called out, often translated and most often translated church in our Bible is really referencing a class of people.
Speaker A:It's not talking about an institution or an organization he's talking about and when he does mention it in the local sense, he's just talking about the saints who live in that city.
Speaker A:There isn't anything in the text that supports this idea of a local church organization.
Speaker A:Now we use these passages to support our present practice.
Speaker A:But when we think about the concept of the kingdom or the body of Christ or God's people, there is a role that each of us plays in this body.
Speaker A:It's descriptive of a living organism.
Speaker A:It's not an organization.
Speaker A:The idea is that each member is a functioning part for the spiritual health of that body.
Speaker A:The Bible doesn't describe this organization that meets twice a week to get, you know, charged up for the week and to contribute some physical or material asset for the congregation's growth and add numbers to it so it can continue contributing money to keep the organization's budget on schedule is as foreign to New Testament teaching as creating a gymnasium for fellowship.
Speaker A:These things just are on the carnal side, things that perish with the using.
Speaker A:In addition, the New Testament saints, they were not deceived into the notion that all good deeds should be suspended by the individual so that it could be done through a church institution and let the church get the glory.
Speaker A:That was one of the phrases that I heard in my tradition for years.
Speaker A:Because the genuine ecclesia is the saved assembly of individuals.
Speaker A:Each saint lives a godly lifestyle whereby God is glorified.
Speaker A:Whether anyone else is serving God, each one of them should be committed their lives in living for the one who died for them.
Speaker A:That should be their purpose.
Speaker A:That is their mission, not the glorification of the church.
Speaker A:God is the one being glorified in and through his people.
Speaker A:When each part commits his life to that service, such service isn't rendered by filling some church role, and certainly not by sitting in a particular seat each week, each time that they meet.
Speaker A:In addition to this, nothing is done through proxy or representatively in the New Testament.
Speaker A:In other words, each person takes seriously his stewardship and his accountability to God.
Speaker A:All that is done is done as unto the Lord, so that each one is first and foremost a servant of the Most High God, who gives his or her body as a living sacrifice.
Speaker A:There's a sense of awe and duty that.
Speaker A:And it's heightened because he or she is aware that they've been bought with a price, the precious blood of Christ.
Speaker A:The mind is set on things that are above, not on things that are below.
Speaker A:Colossians 3 would say, and so he or she does not compartmentalize their life into these four separate vocations.
Speaker A:That adds church life to business and government and family.
Speaker A:And he can just sort of like the psychologist used to say, or talk about putting the work tape cassette in the tape recorder back in the days of cassettes.
Speaker A:And now he's.
Speaker A:He's at work, and when he gets off work, he puts another cassette in.
Speaker A:It might be now it's family.
Speaker A:He's a different person, you see.
Speaker A:He has different roles and different hats that he has to wear.
Speaker A:But the truth of the matter is, if he's a child of God, he wears one big hat.
Speaker A:It's one umbrella under which all of these fall.
Speaker A:So that if he's a husband, he does what he does as unto the Lord as a husband, whatever role he's in whatever obligation, whatever responsibility that he has, he does it as unto the Lord, and in doing them, he is serving the Lord.
Speaker A:The mind is set on things above, not on things below.
Speaker A:And so instead of thinking of compartmentalizing these areas of our lives, each person's service to God would encompass all areas of life.
Speaker A:So that in every one of them, Christ reigns.
Speaker A:He does it.
Speaker A:He really doesn't control the decisions he makes, so he can say yes or no.
Speaker A:But once he said yes to Christ and made him the king and ruler of the life, their life.
Speaker A:Then it's just a matter of carrying out what the king says.
Speaker A:It's just a matter of living under his authority and surrendering our wills to him.
Speaker A:Isn't that really what being a Christian is all about?
Speaker A:And so Christ would reign in that life, and it would affect their decisions on the job.
Speaker A:It would affect their decisions and their actions in the home, their obligation in the government, in their communities and in all relationships.
Speaker A:The result of this daily focus, this pursuit in life, is that each child of God becomes that bright shining light that glows in a dark world and thereby shows forth God's excellencies.
Speaker A:It glorifies him.
Speaker A:But the church organization should not be the picture to receive the glory, only Christ.
Speaker A:And if any man glory, let him glory in the Lord, not in the church.
Speaker A:Each individual should not accept the glory, nor should they think in terms of the church getting the glory.
Speaker A:Jesus Christ is the one that gets the glory.
Speaker A:In short, each individual saint who has been crucified with Christ as described in Galatians 2:20, he has entered into this new life.
Speaker A:And it's a life that is lived.
Speaker A:It's controlled by his Lord who loved him and gave Himself for him.
Speaker A:And Paul could say that, because when Paul wrote, he said, it is no longer I that live, but Christ that lives in me.
Speaker A:God's people, the Ecclesia, the called out, are a class of people, a body of individual saints whose personal work and labor of love confirms their identity as his disciples.
Speaker A:It is not determined by which church you're members of or by where you went to school, what seminary you went to.
Speaker A:If today's so called saints are identified by their membership instead of their personal life, they'll become immobilized in time by the expected norms of faithful church membership.
Speaker A:And it won't require much of them, I'll guarantee you.
Speaker A:In addition to that, when church leaders are put in positions of authority that we've given them, like a hireling preacher, and you add that to the mix, then the majority of members become just mere spectators.
Speaker A:They sit in the pew for a few while hoping to be somewhat entertained by what they here members would oftentimes, after service, get into the car and on the way home, in front of children and all, they talk about what they do and what what they have done or what they should do.
Speaker A:And so it's all about the they and the them and the those of it.
Speaker A:Not the us, not the we.
Speaker A:Because they're really not a part of that class.
Speaker A:They're just members.
Speaker A:They just want to be good people, go to church on Sunday, put in their time like you would, you know, go to work and clock in.
Speaker A:They've clocked in.
Speaker A:They put their time in.
Speaker A:And now when they leave, it's.
Speaker A:It's set aside too.
Speaker A:Now they put on a different hat.
Speaker A:All of that is foreign to the New Testament, and we know that it stunts the personal growth and development of individual saints, too.
Speaker A:I say that because if that's the only thing expected of people, then that's all that they're generally going to do.
Speaker A:They're just going to be good, faithful church members.
Speaker A:An efficient and wise leader.
Speaker A:The Holy Spirit.
Speaker A:He involved all saints in the first century when he equipped them for service, each one receiving a gift that involved them in some area of productivity, whether it was encouragement, some use of their gift.
Speaker A:And as already noted in previous studies, the obligation was always reciprocal.
Speaker A:They were interdependent on one another.
Speaker A:We are all our brother's keeper.
Speaker A:And in connection with the individual accountability and the responsibility of work, the first thing that I would say as we describe that work is that we would and should refuse to allow anyone to Lord or become lords over our faith.
Speaker A:In Galatians 2, we have a perfect example of this when in verse 3 the text talks about Titus and the fact that there were some teachers from the Jewish tradition who were trying to impose circumcision on Titus.
Speaker A:This is how the reading is in verse three.
Speaker A:Even Titus, who was with me, was not forced to be circumcised, though he was a Greek.
Speaker A:Yet because false brethren severely or secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy out our liberty, our freedom that we have in Christ, so that they might bring us into slavery to them.
Speaker A:We did not yield in submission, even for a moment, so that the truth of the Gospel might be preserved for you.
Speaker A:In verse 14 of that same chapter, Paul withstood Peter to his face because his conduct was not in step with the truth of the Gospel.
Speaker A:In his rebuke, he adds, if you, though A Jew live like a Gentile and not like a Jew.
Speaker A:How can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews?
Speaker A:It makes little difference who's trying to be lords of our faith.
Speaker A:They may have a reputation of being a good teacher, they may have a good reputation.
Speaker A:But if they're not leading by example and showing great care, do not give in for a moment.
Speaker A:Peter's describing, or Paul rather is describing, their unwillingness to be coerced and forced into doing something that does not have heaven's approval.
Speaker A:It wouldn't have been anything wrong for Titus to have been circumcised.
Speaker A:After all, Paul advises and has Timothy circumcised, so there wasn't anything wrong with it.
Speaker A:But when someone makes it a matter of law and wants to bind it on others, then you've entered a different situation.
Speaker A:Peter describes the leaders as leading by example rather than under compulsion.
Speaker A:First Peter, chapter five of the first three verses.
Speaker A:In other words, they're not domineering over those in their charge.
Speaker A:They're being examples to the flesh flock.
Speaker A:Each Christian was responsible for their own decisions and their own actions, despite the teaching of the shepherds.
Speaker A:Even while there was greater confidence in these spiritual leaders than we can have in today's leadership, each individual was still responsible.
Speaker A:Galatians 2 shows two examples of an individual standing for truth, even while other leaders failed to preserve the truth of the Gospel.
Speaker A:In that case, some teachers were demanding that Titus be circumcised, and Paul didn't give into this pressure.
Speaker A:Peter, on the other hand, had failed to provide a living example of it giving into the pressures of certain Jewish teachers.
Speaker A:Well, why didn't Paul just follow Peter's lead like Barnabas?
Speaker A:Why didn't he just give in to these teachers and bow to their demands to have Titus circumcised?
Speaker A:Well, if he had, it would have compromised the truth by sending a different message.
Speaker A:The action, the practice would have been inconsistent with what was being taught.
Speaker A:And so Paul was responsible for himself, just as Peter was, and he was responsible for his teaching.
Speaker A:And he couldn't hide behind Peter's cloak and justify himself based on Peter's actions.
Speaker A:He couldn't have said, well, Peter did it.
Speaker A:No, he's going to have to be held accountable for his own actions.
Speaker A:And I think it's sad to think that some would elevate Peter as the first Pope when he was just a man aided by revelation.
Speaker A:No doubt, but he was responsible for his own actions.
Speaker A:He was withstood to to his face because he stood condemned.
Speaker A:Imagine that the first pope being condemned.
Speaker A:Strangely, he was not fired from teaching in churches, as he would be today if this had any public notice, and no doubt it would today.
Speaker A:We have seen from our study that there were neither churches nor employment in them.
Speaker A:Nobody was hired to do a work.
Speaker A:His teaching in the fifth chapter of his first epistle wherein he discusses the elders, it doesn't describe the actions of an institutional pope.
Speaker A:Likewise, we should have no lords over our faith.
Speaker A:Anyone overtaken in a fault should be restored.
Speaker A:Galatians 6 teaches, and even the elders who sinned, they were to be reproved.
Speaker A:Before all.
Speaker A:There was a great need to handle sin appropriately and correctly, and they needed to be reproved when they sinned.
Speaker A:But that didn't mean they had to step down from some authority position because of their reputation has been tarnished by sin.
Speaker A:Nothing indicates that they had to do that.
Speaker A:You see, we're all subject to the same potentials, and that is, we all can potentially sin, but how we handle that and the examples that are set before God's people, as when Ananias and Sapphira lied and they were held accountable for their actions, so that the whole ecclesia feared in Jerusalem, and they should have had that kind of reaction.
Speaker A:And so the source of instruction is taken from the New Testament, and any spiritual person able to wield that sword, to convict and to teach, and to come alongside and gently bring another brother or sister into a fellowship, then they have that responsibility.
Speaker A:And at the time of the first century, it seems to have been especially at the disposal of the apostles and prophets, evangelists and pastors.
Speaker A:Ephesians 4, verse 11.
Speaker A:They had the inspired word of the Spirit, and we have that word today which is produced by the same Spirit, his inspired word in written form.
Speaker A:A second area I think is not that we would not, or that we would be sure not to let anyone become lords over us, but we also need to differentiate between first century gifts and today's leaders.
Speaker A:And while I won't have time to get into that too deeply in this study, I do want to say that we have numerous people who assume that everything written the Bible has direct application and relevance for us today, or it wouldn't have been written at all, is the argument.
Speaker A:And concerning the guidance of the Holy Spirit and the spiritual gifts that were very common part of that time, a majority of churches are searching for its application in our time.
Speaker A:And as a result of that, men unaided by such direct power are making claims that are too obvious to question.
Speaker A:And their disciples are being led by the thoughts and the imaginations of their own mind.
Speaker A:And this is, I think, a serious problem.
Speaker A:I want to come back to this then for next Lord's day and the next time we gathered together and to discuss this differentiation between the first century gifts and today's leaders.
Speaker A:Until then, I trust you have a very good day and a pleasant week.
