What if we in the American Church, when doing foreign missions . . .
Instead of living in houses like this and building houses like this
We lived in houses like this and built houses like this?
What effect would that have on the Gospel? Would our love for the Church abroad be better demonstrated? Would the world view Americans and American Christianity in a different light? We likely will never know.
For anyone who has read even a few of my blog posts, you probably have noticed a trend in them: I do not think too highly of the present state of the American Church. In fact, I believe that our state is so terrible that even those among us whom we would label as the “best” of Christians are unwittingly ensnared by money and materialism. Our problems as a Church are exponentially compounded in the South where tradition regularly trumps Scripture and where we have been explaining away our disobedience to the Word so shrewdly for so many decades that we do not even view it as disobedience any more. This indeed is a great tragedy—that we sincerely believe that our disobedience is obedience and our loving the world is loving Christ.
But rather than perpetually play the role as diagnoser of the American Church’s ills and never offer a cure, God through his Word has convicted a number of us locally to form a group that we haved called “The Acts Forum” that is seeking to address two foundational doctrines of Christianity that we believe the American Church has crassly ignored: 1. The selling of possessions and living impoverished lifestyles for the sake of Christ and 2. The daily gathering of saints for fellowship, prayer, and the “breaking of bread.” My hope in writing this post today will be to challenge your minds to think outside the box of the materialism of American Christianity and to encourage those of you with similar convictions to submit your thoughts, talents, funds, and even your lives to help make this a possibility in our country and hopefully, by the pleasure of God, spark a revival to obedience in the American Church.
1. The Selling of Possessions and Living Impoverished Lifestyles
One of the clearest teachings in Scripture is God’s demand for his creature’s to delight in him over the riches of the world. This is even more explicit in the Gospels where every instance that Jesus Christ mentions the action of “storing up treasures in heaven” it is directly tied to the action of “selling all that one has.”1 Also, whenever Christ mentions the phrase “store up treasures in heaven,” it is not clearly distinguished from salvation in general. As in the case of the rich young man of Matthew 19:16, the man asks, “What good deed must I do to have eternal life,” and Jesus replies, “Sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” And in Matthew 13, in the parable of the hidden treasure, Christ says, “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.”
As I mentioned before, these are texts that we as American Christians have been shrewdly explaining away for decades. We first throw out the “This command is applicable only to the rich young man” excuse, forgetting that most of us probably have more possessions that the rich young man ever did. Then we throw out the “This is a works based salvation” excuse, when James clearly writes, “Faith without works is dead.” And then we conveniently ignore passages like Luke 12:32, 33 where Christ says, “Fear not, little flock [i.e. poor disciples in the context and the Church in the greater context], for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give to the needy. Provide yourselves with moneybags that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys.” Or we ignore examples like the Macedonians who gave joyfully to the saints out of their own extreme poverty (cf. 2Cor. 8:1-6). The testimony of Scripture is there, if we have ears to hear it.
Now I will get to the point, for I know that I am, for the most part, preaching to the choir. What we have seen in the Acts Forum in these Scriptures is not the selling of possessions just for the sake of getting rid of them (though that would be a great start), but it is the selling of possessions to give them to the poor and thereby demonstrate the love of Christ. Because of this, our chief focus is to minimize our consumption so that we might maximize our giving. Looking at all of our budgets, we determined quite easily that the highest percentage of our income goes to housing, and therefore determined that our first project would be to come up with ways to live as cheaply as possible. We have since tossed about ideas that have included the affectionately named, “Church Trailer Park,” and other similar ideas that involve constructing a Church community on a donated piece of land made up of low cost living structures that would cost not a penny more than $30,000 a piece (preferably less). This price point is set for several reasons: 1. To allow people to give more to the Church and to the spreading of the Gospel, 2. To allow people to work less so that they might serve more, 3. To make it so that a mother can stay home with her children instead of having to work to help pay a mortgage, and several others.
2. The Daily Gathering and Communion of the Saints
You might have already picked up on this aspect in the “Church Trailer Park” concept, and it is the idea of a community that consists of members of the Church. In an age of freeways and long commutes, it is quite often the case that we live so far away from other members of our local church that we only see them once or twice a week. The Acts Forum seeks to remedy this by making the Church those whom we go home to not the place where we go on Sunday. In such an environment, accountability and edification would be daily occurrences and would be constant reminders to us that our home is not in this present age.
I would like to challenge you to pray for us who make up the Acts Forum—to pray that God would provide the means and the ingenuity to glorify his Name in America and in the nations through the giving up of material wealth for the sake of the Church and the spread of the Gospel. I would also like to challenge you to get involved with the Acts Forum. We meet weekly (for the most part) on Saturday mornings at Hephzibah Baptist Church in Wendell, North Carolina for a time of prayer and discussion about the Kingdom. You can stay up to date with the Acts Forum events by joining the Facebook group linked here. Thanks and God bless.
1 Matt. 6:19,20; 13:44; 19:21; Mark 10:21; Luke 12:33; Luke 18:22
And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?” (Luke 9:23-25).
As American Christians, we try to live in a G-rated fantasy world. We surround ourselves and those around us with things we like to call “Christian,” which are in reality more sanitized worldliness and “family friendly”-ness1 than they are things that are of Christ. From the doctrinally poor music that is piped to us through “Christian” radio stations to the “Christian” children’s shows that are scared to mention Christ (yes, I’m looking at you VeggieTales), our Christianity proves to be far from Christian.
And it is not just our music and children’s shows that have been “family friendly”-ed and watered down, it is our entire religion. Take for example the Scripture that heads today’s post: “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” If you have ever heard a sermon or had a Sunday school lesson on this verse, you have probably heard this command interpreted in hundreds of subjective ways, most of which include one’s “cross” being a person’s diabetes, his old klunker in the mechanic’s shop, or his broken marriage—none of which capture the point of the text. In a world where crucifixion does not exist any more, what does taking up one’s cross daily mean?
1. Taking Up One’s Cross Means to Have One’s Mind Set Continually on Death
If we read Christ’s command for what it is actually saying, the vivid imagery is inescapable. We must call to mind the road that Christ treaded to his appointed death—his lashings on the back, his stumbling through the stony streets of Jerusalem bearing on his shoulders the instrument on which he would die, the mockings, the jeerings, and finally his death and immediate presence in Paradise. If we thought of carrying up our crosses daily as the imagery dictates, I believe that we would live radically different lives. If our minds were set upon our death each day and our future presence in Paradise, I doubt that we would be so concerned about storing up for ourselves treasures here. Also, I do not think that we would find so many patriots in our churches or listen to horrible music that could as easily be directed toward some girl’s boyfriend as they could toward Christ, or tolerate children’s stories that leave Jesus out of the picture unless they make him a cartoon character. No, we would live each day for the things that matter most in life—loving the Church and preaching the Gospel.
2. Taking Up One’s Cross Means to Deny One’s Self of Worldly Satisfactions
Though the imagery of Luke 9:23 brings us to this conclusion by itself, not to mention it explicitly as the context does would do it injustice. Christ says in the following verses, “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?” Taking up one’s cross therefore is to lose our lives here in this present age so that we might gain life in the coming age. What does it mean to lose one’s life? The context is quite clear: “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul?” The gaining of one’s life is put into contrast with one who gains the whole world—all of its riches and satisfactions, and yet loses his soul, and Christ says, “What profit is this?” Indeed, it is no profit, for Eternity bears incomparable riches to this present age in the presence of God, and a lifetime of worldly riches can never recompense the torture of eternal Damnation.
In spite of the unfair tradeoff, even people who know this text by heart defy its teachings. They might go to “church” during the week and might “serve” there regularly, but their life’s focus is gaining the world and not taking up their crosses daily. Into what group do you fall? Do you fall in with those who love the world and its pleasures or in with those who forsake those treasures for the sake of Christ? You must have an answer for this, for the destination of your soul depends upon it.
I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me (John 17:20-23).
In being a part of a good ol’ Southern Baptist church and having outlasted several professors at Southeastern Baptist Seminary, I have heard a great deal said on the Great Commission and foreign missions. And before you hear me incorrectly, I believe that that is a good thing. The Southern Baptist Convention sends out more missionaries than any other denomination in the world (even though it is well below our means as Americans), and for that I praise God. However, as is often the case, emphasis on one front often leads to neglect on another, which is one reason why I believe the American Church is in such dire straits as it is.
Our problem is that we do not see the American Church’s state as dire, and even if we do, we do not see it as our fault. We are much more likely to place the blame on the wickedness in the country and on evil politicians than on ourselves. Yet it is not the world’s fault that Baptists are more likely to get divorced than atheists and agnostics (Source), and it is not their fault that we tolerate immorality in our congregations and say nothing against popular antichrists (e.g. Joel Osteen, T. D. Jakes). And it is not the world’s fault that ninety-nine percent of the American Church is in love with the world and money, and go to “church” on Sunday for a show rather than to worship the Almighty.
In spite of all this, we send out missionaries all the same. But what we do not realize is that our neglect of the American Church is stifling our global missions. Christ, in his prayer in John 17, prays twice for the unity of the Church, and each time that he prays for its unity it is so that the world will know that God sent Jesus Christ into the world. Earlier in John 13, Christ makes a similar statement: “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” Therefore, according to Christ, our effectiveness in evangelizing the world flows directly from our demonstration of love and like-mindedness within the Church.
I know what you are thinking: “How does the moral state of the American Church have anything to do with its unity?” Much indeed, for all of our problems in the American Church come from our disunity. As Christ demonstrated in his prayer to the Father that they were united by his perfect submission to the Father’s will, so we would be united if we submitted perfectly to Jesus Christ, our Lord and Head. Yet we do nothing of the sort. Our disobedience to the Word proves it; our denominations prove it; our divorce rate proves it; our total lack of Church discipline proves it; our new cars and big houses prove it; and our lack of love for the Church proves it.
Therefore, our greatest commission as Christians is the unity of Church, for the Great Commission is dependent upon it. If we as a Church do not submit to Jesus Christ in everything and do not love one another as we ought, why should we expect anyone in our country or in the world to submit to the Gospel that we ignore?
I am no so well today (due to a bad first experience cooking a turkey), so I will not be writing a post today, but I do have a good one planned for tomorrow, Lord willing of course. In the mean time, feel free to enjoy some John Donne with me.
Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock ; breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurp’d town, to another due,
Labour to admit you, but O, to no end.
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captived, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betroth’d unto your enemy;
Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me (John Donne, Holy Sonnet XIV).