Prosperity Gospel is Neither
John Piper on “Prosperity Gospel”
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10 Ways To Insult and Disrespect Churchgoers
It’s been a while since I first wrote about the numerous ways churches thwarted my efforts to discover them. I thought it was time for an update and so I’ve decided to share 10 ways pastors/churches insult churchgoers and the cities they are called to serve. I’ve experienced all 10 of these first-hand and some are more serious than others. My intent is to simply offer insight to the many pastors out there who always welcome a visitor’s perspective. So don’t take it too personally, unless of course I happen to be talking about your church, in which case I’m so sorry you made the list.
So here you have it, 10 Ways to Insult and Disrespect Churchgoers:
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Guest Speakers Gone Wild
A lot of first-time church visitors don’t pay much attention to guest speakers for various reasons:
- It doesn’t tell them much about the regular pastor
- The service flow and timing can be quite different than normal
- There may also be a guest worship team
- The visit may not benefit them in determining much about the church
The bottom line is that visitors usually need to attend a 2nd week to really learn anything useful about what a normal Sunday is like. Most people just won’t even bother to try again; first impressions and all that.
However, I believe that guest speakers can be very beneficial for church visitors (and even regular attenders). They have certainly been helpful to me. This past week, for the 2nd time in as many years, I walked out on a church service because of the guest speaker. Each time I was a relatively new visitor to the church. Both times were my last visit to that church. These speakers saved me a lot of time. Here’s why…
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A Distant and Diplomatic Love
In Matthew 25 Jesus lays down the mandate for His followers to feed, hydrate, welcome, clothe, nurse and visit the poor, afflicted and imprisoned.
“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.‘
“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’
Jesus goes on to tell the “righteous” who call him “Lord“, but do none of these things, they “are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” Up until recently the thing that was most striking to me about this story was that the cursed proclaimed Jesus as Lord. They are even called “the righteous”. We see this clearly explained to us in James 2 and the mantra that “faith without works is dead“.
But what may be even more striking is the personal nature of the mandate.
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Doing what is right
Two years ago I was faced with a situation where a teenage friend realized he was being groomed for sexual exploitation by an adult. For those of you not familiar with “grooming” in this context, it’s a process by which a predator gives affection and builds trust with a child (or parent) in order to increase access and decrease discovery. The teen looked to me for counsel and I took the burden of responsibility to do what was right. However, it was a very complex scenario that involved internet chats, an international component, the state department, foriegn law enforcement and a predator who was a youth minister, that had acted inappropriately with sleeping children under his care. Plus it honestly didn’t help my stress level that I considered this guy a friend.
During this period, James 4:17 was my mantra. “Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn’t do it, sins.”
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