1 Cor 1:17-18 (Amplified Version)
17 For Christ (the Messiah) sent me out not to baptize but [to evangelize by] preaching the glad tidings (the Gospel), and that not with verbal eloquence, lest the cross of Christ should be deprived of force and emptied of its power and rendered vain (fruitless, void of value, and of no effect).
18 For the story and message of the cross is sheer absurdity and folly to those who are perishing and on their way to perdition, but to us who are being saved it is the [manifestation of] the power of God.
Having just returned from another Quest, it breaks my heart to see how hurt, how angry, how fearful and how deceived the Body of Christ is. These are the good guys. These are the church going folks. Their story is just like mine was almost 3 years ago. “The heart is more deceitful than all else, and is desperately sick. Who can understand it?” (Jer 17:9) I was just as jacked up because I didn’t really understand my own depravity and just what a cesspool that is before the Lord.
I wonder if our “verbal eloquence” has deprived the message of the Cross it’s power in the body of Christ? It’s no wonder the big-C Church is so jacked up. We’ve built denominations and churches and philosophies and beliefs on smooth talk, catchy quips, neat-o illustrations, and persuasive arguments.
The cross of Christ has lost it’s power in the church because not many are willing to speak the simple truth, the confronting truth, the uncomfortable truth, the absolute truth, the politically incorrect truth of God that shows our deceitful and desperately sick hearts, that only Father God can understand and heal. Too many people want to make it palatable and appealing to the masses. God help us.
Verses 18 -31 go on to explain that God’s ways are not our ways. God calls the wise through foolishness, the strong through weakness, the significant through insignificance, and the rich through poverty – in order that as Jer 9:24 states, “…let him who boasts,… boast in.. the Lord…”
So, then the question remains – and I’ll ask it before anyone else does – How do we get The Church back to the simple truth that heals wounds, calms fears, and transforms lives here on earth?
its kind of funny shoe, after years of hearing and seeing all the bells and whistles, i actually think that’s how church is supposed to be. i think that part of the answer to your question actually comes from JG’s blog tonight, we forget about ourselves. we have to quit focusing on us and how our church looks or whatever and focus on others. that’s what i think