The Choice Before Us - Part 1
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
September 2, 2012 - Pastor Dale
Scripture Reading: Matthew 20: 20 – 28
Key Text: verse 20: “...just
as the Son of Man did not come to be served,
but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for
many.”
How would you complete this sentence? The central driving force of
North American culture is...........
Today I am beginning what I think is going to
be a rather protracted series of messages on this theme: The Choice Before Us.......Consumerism or
Discipleship.
You need to know that I am being very deliberateand intentional
in this presentation and the intention is to dust off and clarify the core
defining value of this faith community. And yet it goes far beyond the life of
this faith community; it goes to the heart of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the
purpose of that
gospel.
This is why I have been reading for the past
several Sundays from John’s record
of the prayer of Christ. And I would remind you again that what
He prayed for is the very thing He died for just hours after that prayer.
Based on that prayer we must understand that the purpose of the gospel goes far
beyond personal salvation and heaven by and by.
What we discover is that the present purpose
is not believers of the earth going to heaven. Rather it is heaven coming to earth through the believer
– and the only place on this planet where that is truly happening is where there
is a true covenant relational community that reflects the covenantal unity and
oneness of the Godhead Himself.
When, in this series of messages, I use the
term – Christian discipleship – I am
not talking about some abstract, undefined or mystical idea; I am talking about
Christian discipleship worked out,
walked out and demonstrated in the very practical, nitty-gritty realities of
relational covenant
community.
In what is known as the Great
CommissionChrist left with His disciples just before He was taken up in the
clouds, He did not instruct them to go
and make converts, but to make disciples. Obviously discipleship begins with
conversion, but the great failure of the church is that we seldom take it
beyond conversion. We count converts to determine the success or failure of the
church.
I have a great deal more to share about
Christian discipleship later in this series, but for this morning I want to turn
our attention to what I honestly believe to be the number one enemy of true
Christian discipleship. It is challenging enough that the culture around us is
driven, defined, shaped and formed by this dynamic, but the real tragedy lies in
the fact that the great majority of the North American church culture is also
driven, defined, shaped and formed by this same
thing.
What makes this so difficult is that it is so
subtle; it has this way of becoming fully and deeply entrenched without us even
knowing it was happening. It easily dresses itself up to look totally Christian
– even quoting chapter and verse to validate and justify its identity and
definition. Ignorance of it – to be unaware and uniformed – is our worst enemy
and leaves us wide open and vulnerable to it.
Does this sound
familiar?
Getting what we want is part of daily life in our culture. Our
satisfaction is PARAMOUNT. If we don’t like this television show, we hit the
button. If we don’t like this song on our iPod, we hit the button. If the
church stops meeting our needs, we hit the button. Every day, we are told that
what we have is insufficient. We are bombarded with messages to upgrade, trade in and borrow to
buy. Our economy thrives on
perpetual discontent. The long-term consequence of this relentless marketing of dissatisfaction is
that we become accustomed to having our needs met when and how we want. We
become experts at “dissatisfaction remediation.” (FROM: Renovation of the
Church)
The issue at the heart of everything I hope to communicate over the
next few weeks is the issue of spiritual formation. Every moment of our life we are in an ongoing process of spiritual formation; we are being
spiritually formed into something. The question at the heart of this formation
is a simple but profound one: What am I being formed into – a mere “spiritual consumer” OR a true
disciple of Jesus Christ? And the plum line by which this is measured or revealed is a simple
one – revealed in the words of Christ which were presented at the head of this
presentation, words I will just briefly reference in a few
moments.
From our earliest remembrance we in this country have been trained
to be consumers. Our entire economic system is built upon the consumption of
goods and services that we, for the most part, don’t really need at all.
By the time our children reach elementary school, they are fully
formed and informed consumers. It may not be a conscious thing – in fact for the
most part it is not a conscious thing at all – but the reality remains, they
view and interpret their lives through the lens of consumerism. Consumerism is
to the culture of our lives what water is to the culture of the life of a fish.
At the heart of consumerism there are really only two entities,
obviously very interracially related. There must be a consumer and there must be a producer of goods and
services. The consumer’s role is simple; he or she lives for the single
purpose of consuming; the defining reality of all things is consumption. Success
and failure are determined by the measure of consumption. The producer’s role is
equally as simple; he or she exist to produce, to
manufacture.
In the evolution of this madness we are no longer just consumers
but we are now instructed to be “demanding consumers.” We are told that the dynamic that keeps our economic system working
at peak efficiency is an endless army of demanding consumers who reward the best
producers/providers and punish the poor ones. And best vs. poor is judged by the met
expectation of the consumer; who’s the fastest, most efficient and
cheapest. In a nutshell that is capitalism at its finest.
As an economic reality of our age we cannot escape it; we live in
its presence and are compelled to deal with it every day. However when it
becomes the defining reality of spiritual formation – when it becomes
the definition of church culture and the community of faith, we have a serious
problem. And make no mistake about it; we DO have a problem in the“American”
church.
That problem begins right at the front door of the church; all who
come there (unbeliever and believer alike) are already fully formed or fully
fledged consumers. That is not intended to be a heartless, mean spirited
judgement –rather a simple statement of obvious reality. We have all been shaped
by this culture of consumerism. If you thought that statement was cruel it’s
about to get worse.
How often is it that those who appear at the door of the church
(and by “church” I am referring to the North American church) do so with a core
view to the goods and services, the ministries and programs designed to meet
their perceived needs as individuals
and families?
And perhaps what tops this whole thing off – and this is extremely
subtle – is that person who shows up and announces, “I am here to do nothing
except serve this community of faith.” Somewhere in the process you discover
their commitment to serve was based on the personal need to be needed. This
means their service is actually their means of consuming what they perceive they
need to validate their identity and existence.
With that phrase – perceived need –
we have touched the heart and core of consumerism; we will look at
it in greater depth next week.
I can tell you that something happened in the decade of the
eighties that broke the dam wide open and this spirit
of consumerism poured into the church. And by the way, make no mistake about
it – there is a strong and highly demonic spirit that drives consumerism. It is
akin to the spirit of mammon, that attitude, mindset or nature of raw
self-centredness.
We were told in the eighties by the church growth experts that
consumerism was here to stay and rather than resisting it we should embrace and
harness it and by it build large churches. We did, and the fruit to this day is
that we more concretely formed believers into mere consumers – “spiritual
consumers.” Perceived need, rather
than true Christian discipleship, shaped our ministries and our message. We have
come to the place now where to even suggest – much less preach – that to
make a decision based on anything other than how
it benefits me is seen as countercultural at best and heretical at
worst.
Despite this reality of church culture I am compelled to declare
right now, it is impossible to create authentic Christian community with
people whose commitment is dependent on having their perceived needs perpetually
and continually met.
Fit these few comments on consumerism into these few words of
Christ: “...just
as the Son of Mandid not come to be served, but to serve,
and to give His life a
ransom for many.” Consumers live to be served. True Disciples of Christ live to
serve. The choice before us – consumers or Christian disciples.
Scripture Reading: Matthew 20: 20 – 28
Key Text: verse 20: “...just
as the Son of Man did not come to be served,
but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for
many.”
How would you complete this sentence? The central driving force of
North American culture is...........
Today I am beginning what I think is going to
be a rather protracted series of messages on this theme: The Choice Before Us.......Consumerism or
Discipleship.
You need to know that I am being very deliberateand intentional
in this presentation and the intention is to dust off and clarify the core
defining value of this faith community. And yet it goes far beyond the life of
this faith community; it goes to the heart of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the
purpose of that
gospel.
This is why I have been reading for the past
several Sundays from John’s record
of the prayer of Christ. And I would remind you again that what
He prayed for is the very thing He died for just hours after that prayer.
Based on that prayer we must understand that the purpose of the gospel goes far
beyond personal salvation and heaven by and by.
What we discover is that the present purpose
is not believers of the earth going to heaven. Rather it is heaven coming to earth through the believer
– and the only place on this planet where that is truly happening is where there
is a true covenant relational community that reflects the covenantal unity and
oneness of the Godhead Himself.
When, in this series of messages, I use the
term – Christian discipleship – I am
not talking about some abstract, undefined or mystical idea; I am talking about
Christian discipleship worked out,
walked out and demonstrated in the very practical, nitty-gritty realities of
relational covenant
community.
In what is known as the Great
CommissionChrist left with His disciples just before He was taken up in the
clouds, He did not instruct them to go
and make converts, but to make disciples. Obviously discipleship begins with
conversion, but the great failure of the church is that we seldom take it
beyond conversion. We count converts to determine the success or failure of the
church.
I have a great deal more to share about
Christian discipleship later in this series, but for this morning I want to turn
our attention to what I honestly believe to be the number one enemy of true
Christian discipleship. It is challenging enough that the culture around us is
driven, defined, shaped and formed by this dynamic, but the real tragedy lies in
the fact that the great majority of the North American church culture is also
driven, defined, shaped and formed by this same
thing.
What makes this so difficult is that it is so
subtle; it has this way of becoming fully and deeply entrenched without us even
knowing it was happening. It easily dresses itself up to look totally Christian
– even quoting chapter and verse to validate and justify its identity and
definition. Ignorance of it – to be unaware and uniformed – is our worst enemy
and leaves us wide open and vulnerable to it.
Does this sound
familiar?
Getting what we want is part of daily life in our culture. Our
satisfaction is PARAMOUNT. If we don’t like this television show, we hit the
button. If we don’t like this song on our iPod, we hit the button. If the
church stops meeting our needs, we hit the button. Every day, we are told that
what we have is insufficient. We are bombarded with messages to upgrade, trade in and borrow to
buy. Our economy thrives on
perpetual discontent. The long-term consequence of this relentless marketing of dissatisfaction is
that we become accustomed to having our needs met when and how we want. We
become experts at “dissatisfaction remediation.” (FROM: Renovation of the
Church)
The issue at the heart of everything I hope to communicate over the
next few weeks is the issue of spiritual formation. Every moment of our life we are in an ongoing process of spiritual formation; we are being
spiritually formed into something. The question at the heart of this formation
is a simple but profound one: What am I being formed into – a mere “spiritual consumer” OR a true
disciple of Jesus Christ? And the plum line by which this is measured or revealed is a simple
one – revealed in the words of Christ which were presented at the head of this
presentation, words I will just briefly reference in a few
moments.
From our earliest remembrance we in this country have been trained
to be consumers. Our entire economic system is built upon the consumption of
goods and services that we, for the most part, don’t really need at all.
By the time our children reach elementary school, they are fully
formed and informed consumers. It may not be a conscious thing – in fact for the
most part it is not a conscious thing at all – but the reality remains, they
view and interpret their lives through the lens of consumerism. Consumerism is
to the culture of our lives what water is to the culture of the life of a fish.
At the heart of consumerism there are really only two entities,
obviously very interracially related. There must be a consumer and there must be a producer of goods and
services. The consumer’s role is simple; he or she lives for the single
purpose of consuming; the defining reality of all things is consumption. Success
and failure are determined by the measure of consumption. The producer’s role is
equally as simple; he or she exist to produce, to
manufacture.
In the evolution of this madness we are no longer just consumers
but we are now instructed to be “demanding consumers.” We are told that the dynamic that keeps our economic system working
at peak efficiency is an endless army of demanding consumers who reward the best
producers/providers and punish the poor ones. And best vs. poor is judged by the met
expectation of the consumer; who’s the fastest, most efficient and
cheapest. In a nutshell that is capitalism at its finest.
As an economic reality of our age we cannot escape it; we live in
its presence and are compelled to deal with it every day. However when it
becomes the defining reality of spiritual formation – when it becomes
the definition of church culture and the community of faith, we have a serious
problem. And make no mistake about it; we DO have a problem in the“American”
church.
That problem begins right at the front door of the church; all who
come there (unbeliever and believer alike) are already fully formed or fully
fledged consumers. That is not intended to be a heartless, mean spirited
judgement –rather a simple statement of obvious reality. We have all been shaped
by this culture of consumerism. If you thought that statement was cruel it’s
about to get worse.
How often is it that those who appear at the door of the church
(and by “church” I am referring to the North American church) do so with a core
view to the goods and services, the ministries and programs designed to meet
their perceived needs as individuals
and families?
And perhaps what tops this whole thing off – and this is extremely
subtle – is that person who shows up and announces, “I am here to do nothing
except serve this community of faith.” Somewhere in the process you discover
their commitment to serve was based on the personal need to be needed. This
means their service is actually their means of consuming what they perceive they
need to validate their identity and existence.
With that phrase – perceived need –
we have touched the heart and core of consumerism; we will look at
it in greater depth next week.
I can tell you that something happened in the decade of the
eighties that broke the dam wide open and this spirit
of consumerism poured into the church. And by the way, make no mistake about
it – there is a strong and highly demonic spirit that drives consumerism. It is
akin to the spirit of mammon, that attitude, mindset or nature of raw
self-centredness.
We were told in the eighties by the church growth experts that
consumerism was here to stay and rather than resisting it we should embrace and
harness it and by it build large churches. We did, and the fruit to this day is
that we more concretely formed believers into mere consumers – “spiritual
consumers.” Perceived need, rather
than true Christian discipleship, shaped our ministries and our message. We have
come to the place now where to even suggest – much less preach – that to
make a decision based on anything other than how
it benefits me is seen as countercultural at best and heretical at
worst.
Despite this reality of church culture I am compelled to declare
right now, it is impossible to create authentic Christian community with
people whose commitment is dependent on having their perceived needs perpetually
and continually met.
Fit these few comments on consumerism into these few words of
Christ: “...just
as the Son of Mandid not come to be served, but to serve,
and to give His life a
ransom for many.” Consumers live to be served. True Disciples of Christ live to
serve. The choice before us – consumers or Christian disciples.