Pastor Paul's Message of the Month - November 2016
As I write this, it’s October 31st. The shops here in the UK and even more so in the USA, are filled with Halloween trash and it seems to get worse every year. Why people are so excited about ghosts, witches, vampires and demons is crazy - but we should not be surprised since “men love darkness rather than light” (John 3:19). I was out on one of my prayer walks the other day (I always pray better walking) and I passed by someone’s car that had been decorated with red paint to resemble blood pouring out of the windows all around the car! Why did they spend all that effort to do that? “It’s just harmless fun” they say. If that is all it is, and I am not convinced about that, then it is still a sign of the times that men love pleasure rather than God. The apostle Paul warned us that things would go from bad to worse in the last days (2 Timothy 3:1-4).
This time next year, October 31st 2017, many Christians will be excited on Halloween because that will be the 500th anniversary of the beginning of the Reformation (see the travel blog on the Resource page of this website). The Reformation is something to celebrate - but not as much as we might think. Luther, Zwingli and Calvin restored the doctrine of salvation by faith not works, the preaching of God’s Word and more accurate doctrine, but the Reformation did not take the Church itself back to the New Testament model. The groups of people in Europe who did want to do that, collectively known as Anabaptists, were persecuted not only by the Catholics but by the Protestants as well!
The Church went from being led by priests and the hierarchy of bishops, cardinals and pope to being led by preachers (often called pastors), and some Protestant groups including the Lutherans and Anglicans for example, also continued the hierarchy of bishops and archbishops. If we are really honest, all the other denominations including Pentecostals have remained stuck with a model of church that can easily be traced back beyond the Reformation to the Roman Catholic system (with modifications) but they did not go back far enough - to the New Testament Church.
The world today, speeding faster and faster to the end of the age, NEEDS THE CHURCH but most people in the world would totally disagree with that! Church is the last thing they want or need (they want pleasure and fun and some churches seem to want that too!). The world doesn’t want what they see or perceive the Church to be, but they do need the Church to be WHAT JESUS DESIGNED the Church to be. That is, lights in the darkness, demonstrators of the love of God to the world, people who offer hope though Christ to a hope-less world (Ephesians 2:12).
As Christians we are always in danger of being so focussed on Church, on how we do Church and on organising Church that we miss what we are really all about! We hear so much talk about “the Church, the Church” but it’s not about the Church it’s about the KINGDOM. The Church exists to bring in the KINGDOM OF GOD – the rule and reign of God - God’s will being done on earth through us! That can be done through each of us as God’s people, supported and nurtured by our brothers and sisters as we gather together each week to worship the Lord, pray for one another, fellowship and share God’s Word together. Then strengthened by that, we all go off individually on Monday morning to work.
For example let’s take John who works in a factory, how does he bring the Kingdom of God there? Well he starts by praying every day for his workmates, his supervisor and managers and by living his life in purity and holiness in the darkness that is surely all around him. Then on Monday morning his wife Mary, takes the children to school. How does she bring the Kingdom of God into her situation? Well she is friendly and loving towards the other mothers that she meets at the school gate. Then someone in John’s factory or one of Mary’s unsaved friends shows an interest in what they have got in Christ – faith, hope and love – and they receive what Jesus offers. Then it’s the Church’s privilege to help that person to grow in Christ. That’s called making disciples and that is exactly what Jesus designed the Church to do – and basically only that.
The major features of Jesus' ministry were the KINGDOM OF GOD (which he taught and demonstrated by healing and deliverance) and MAKING DISCIPLES. He spent 3 years with 12 men plus 70 others to eventually multiply his ministry millions of times over. That was His method and we are only truly effective if we do it His way. If we fail to make disciples we are failing to fulfil the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19) and if we are really honest with ourselves how effective has the Church been in making disciples? It is a time consuming process – Jesus took 3 years to do it – are we going to do it any quicker? Many times we don’t even get started because we are so consumed with doing Church - with our Church programmes and our Church business and keeping all the activities going, that we miss the very thing we are supposed to be doing, which is to work for the Kingdom and make disciples just like Jesus did.
October 31st - Hallow–een, is the day before, (the eve) of All Hallows day (All Saints day). Halloween, is traditionally when all the demons of hell are out in force to stop the saints (you and me) from being effective. Actually they are doing that all the time but we do not need to be intimidated by them. When we are working to fulfil Christ’s Great Commission they are highly intimidated by the saints - and so they should be - if the Church is doing its work for the Kingdom and making more and more disciples of Jesus!