Guideposts just sent me a press release because the editors are excited about this new article called, “Pet Worship.” It seems that the pastor couldn’t get people to church to worship the Lord, so she was inspired to include dogs, and now people are willing to come. Worshiping God just wasn’t a big priority for these folks until they found out they could bring their pets. According to the article, the dogs now even join in the hymn singing. The Holy Spirit wasn’t needed at this church, because dogs succeeded in getting people excited to come to church.

“But folks just weren’t coming to church as much anymore. Too many sporting events on Sundays and too little faith. I looked out at the half-empty sanctuary one Sunday and thought, Lord, what can I do to get people as excited as I am about coming to church?”
–Pastor Rachel Bickford, Pilgrim Congregational Church

For the youngsters who read Slice, an LP or “album” was a vinyl record. Think of them as giant CD’s. I was once hired for a summer when I was a teenager to go through “albums” for Christian radio and pick out cuts that might work for the station’s music format. Some of the albums at this website bring back memories. It just goes to show that trying to be cool and relevant in one decade will have people rolling on the floor laughing only a few short years later. So all the cool hip churches/musicians/emerging leaders who think they are cutting edge will soon provide rich fodder for hysterical laughter. Remember that, Rob Bell.

P.S. Note that the link is to a secular website. When the Bible instructs us to be a “peculiar” people, I don’t think this is what was meant. It’s one thing to be ridiculed for Christ and His cause. It’s another to get laughed at because you’re wearing a dog collar and trying to look like a metal head so you can have street cred as a Christian. The laugher, sadly, is warranted.

Here’s a report about a supposed shake-up in the Southern Baptist denomination. It appears the shake-up is an attempt to restore big numbers and fix a 30 million dollar shortfall in their missionary budget. But wait! There’s no mention of prayer and the role of the Holy Spirit, only replacing numbers as baptisms and memberships decline. Johnny Hunt wants to get back to getting bodies pouring through the door and having those membership cards filled out by visitors.

I have seen first hand just how meaningful those kinds of memberships can be. As a young adult, I attended a Southern Baptist church. Every Sunday an “invitation” was given as a matter of ritual. A few would straggle down the aisle each service for one reason or another. One Sunday, a heavily tattooed man headed down to the front. Everyone was excited because he was a visitor and surely, his trip down that aisle meant a new convert. The man signed the membership card and the very next Sunday, was put right into “service” at the church. The only problem was, nobody really knew him before they handed over the keys to the Sunday School bus. An hour later, the police pulled the reportedly new convert over along with the bottle of Jack Daniels under his seat. The bus had been weaving all over the road. Tragically, nobody ever saw the man again. Welcome to the numbers game, where warm bodies, signing membership cards, walking aisles and instant baptism with no discipleship are the norm.

Johnny Hunt needs to repent for his numbers idolatry and realize that the real reason the churches are declining is spiritual in nature. Real converts produce real churches, no matter the size, where Christ is honored, and lives are transformed by the preaching of the Word. The article reports that Hunt is calling for the “relaxing” of rigid worship standards to draw more people. Based on what I’ve seen in SBC churches, a lot of them have no worship standards to begin with, so I’m not sure how much farther down he intends to go in that regard. Pleasing goats has never been the purpose of worship. Worshiping God and pleasing Him alone is our duty as believers.

Church by the Glades is promoting its latest sermon series, World’s Largest Strip Club, using the tagline, “Come get naked with 5000 of your closest friends without taking off your clothes.” An opening “hymn” suggestion would be the original MTV video of “Private Dancer” by Tina Turner. That should set the mood rather nicely.

Church by the Glades made Slice headlines in the past by featuring a 9,000 pound Indian elephant named Judy one Easter Sunday, handing out Hannah Montana tickets, and giving away iPhones and Nintendo Wii’s.

HT: A Little Leaven

The desperation in the Church of England is palpable. Disturbed by the lack of men attending the COE, someone in leadership had the brilliant idea of handing out beer, bacon rolls and chocolate to lure in the males for Father’s Day. Chocolate eating, bacon chomping, hooch drinking, once-a-year parishioners definitely herald a bright future for the church. Onward Christian soldiers.

Compare this pathetic effort with the spirit of this Church of England missionary hymn from 1866.

Lord, her watch thy Church is keeping:
when shall earth thy rule obey?
When shall end the night of weeping?
When shall break the promised day?
See the whitening harvest languish,
waiting still the laborers’ toil;
was it vain, thy Son’s deep anguish?
shall the strong retain the spoil?

Tidings, sent to every creature,
millions yet have never heard:
can they hear without a preacher?
Lord almighty, give the word!
Give the word! in every nation
let the Gospel trumpet sound,
witnessing a world’s salvation,
to the earth’s remotest bound.

Then the end: thy Church completed,
all thy chosen gathered in,
with their King in glory seated,
Satan bound, and banished sin;
gone for ever parting, weeping,
hunger, sorrow, death, and pain;
Lo! her watch thy Church is keeping;
Come, Lord Jesus, come to reign!

–Henry Downton, 1866

Phil Johnson at Teampyro has a good post up about the end of evangelical innocence. He writes:

Sermons with graphic sexual themes and church-wide sex challenges are merely symptoms of a much bigger problem. In short, the church is fornicating with the world and intoxicated with the spirit of the age. Some of neo-evangelicalism’s favorite jargon—missional, contextualization, authenticity—has been tortured and misappropriated in order to justify and institutionalize gross worldliness.

This worldiness and sensuality comes with a price tag, even for the pastors. Pastor Gary Lamb of Revolution Church did a series called “Creative Sex” using secular rock songs like, “Your Body is a Wonderland by John Mayer and “Feel Like Makin’ Love” by Bad Company. Tragically, Gary Lamb resigned from the pastorate of Revolution Church yesterday after having an affair with his personal assistant. The spirit behind these R-rated churches is one of disobedience, rebellion and ultimately, destruction.

Russia’s news service, Pravda, has an editorial that takes your breath away as it describes America’s descent, including what they call “Sunday circuses.” Read it here.

So, church leadership designs worship services to be an experience akin to attending a Pacer game. A pervasive “need” seems to exist amongst congregants to get excited over excitement. I presume that’s why churches call their Sunday morning services, “celebrations” (Remember the tune, “Celebration,” by Kool and the Gang?). But I often wonder how the attendance numbers would fare if the Pacers did away with all the extra-curricular excitements? What if the atmosphere became like that of those old semi-pro Tacker games I attended as a kid. How many people attend games to just watch the game? Or, must there be other inducements? Similarly, how many people really attend church to worship God? I remember reading where A.W. Tozer once questioned how many people would attend church if the only attraction was God. Seemingly, vast numbers of Christians want to attend, “The Church of What’s Happening Now.” For any to young to remember, during the early 1970s this was the comedic church pastored by a con-artist named Reverend Leroy, who was played by the comedian Flip Wilson (1933-1998) on a TV program named after him.

Read more

The empty church photos at the Christianity Today blog are an interesting commentary on the modern evangelical circus church. Most churches like this are not putting on shoddy, third-rate stuff. They have the highest quality sound and special effects systems available. It is professional-grade entertainment. That explains why so many Americans attend these churches. They have a lot to offer in the way of shows and fun.

Advertising Age has an article on Christians and marketing of their churches. The United Methodist Church is big on this.

The United Methodist Church launched a $20 million campaign last week to specifically reach 18- to 34-year-olds with a “Rethink Church” message. The UMC has done national advertising for several years, but this effort is aimed at not only the younger generation, but also at changing the image of the church from passive to an active community of believers “redefining the church as a 24/7 social interaction,” according to Rev. Larry Hollon, the general secretary of United Methodist Communications.

Advertising Age gets it right:

Indeed, part of the problem is that they’ve been outmarketed for years. The megachurches and seeker churches are packing the pews by offering professional-level entertainment, while traditional churches struggle to drum up enough in the collection plate to pay expenses.

“Why go to the old boring stale church down the street when you can drive 15 miles out to the suburbs and feel like you’re pulling up to Target? They’ve got music, lights, sound, things for the kids to do. It’s DisneyWorld inside..

The magazine said it well. Disney World inside.

The Christian Post reports that Christians today “struggle” to define what  spiritual maturity even looks like anymore.  That’s not a surprise considering that so many of today’s males seem to be struggling with maturity, period. Here’s a glimpse of some of evangelicalism’s finest at a recent pastor’s conference. The evangelical church, long informed by the culture around it, illustrates how destructive it is when manhood isn’t expected to make an appearance until middle-age, if ever.

Mosaic Dancers – EPIC from j tru on Vimeo.

“Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered Him, saying, ‘Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.’ But He answered and said to them, ‘An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign shall be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet . . .’” (Matthew 13:38-39, NASB).

No stranger to controversy that comes from standing for God’s truth amidst a multitude’s cravings for show-time religion, Methodist evangelist Rev. Mr. Beverly Carradine (1848-1931) perceived that, “The whole demand for signs springs from unbelief.” He then continues,

We are referring to a spirit of doubt that will not take God’s word nor move forward as He directs without some peculiar display of the divine presence and power, which in our conceit we dictate to the Lord and also decide as to its fashion, form and continuance . . . The Lord seeks to bring His followers into a life of such faith in Him that they will not ask nor care for strange sights and sounds . . . If we want to please God we must throw away every doubt when He has spoken; quit asking for strange tokens and wonders; and, resting on His word, say, “No matter what happens, I believe God; and though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.”[1]

Question: Given the present cravings for spectacle spirituality amidst the pan-evangelical movement, how much of the “we-gotta-feel-it” atmosphere aroused in our worship celebrations indicates that, like the religious people of His day, Jesus might also consider us to be an evil and adulterous generation?

[1] Rev. Mr. Beverly Carradine, Gideon, Master Christian Library (Ages Software Version 8, Albany, Oregon, 1997) 18, 19. Carradine’s life is portrayed by Gene A. Long, Time and Location Line of the Life of Rev. Beverly Carradine, (http://wesley.nnu.edu/wesleyctr/books/2401-2500/HDM2475.PDF) 2005. He refers to Carradine as, “The Prince of Holiness Writers.”

The Rock Church in San Diego has an upcoming event that illustrates the problem in the church today. It explains why so many Christians – I’m hearing from many of them today, believe me – have no problem with the sins the Bible clearly addresses.

I quote from the church’s ad about the purpose of their church’s “mime ministry.”

“The Rock Mime Ministry purpose is to use the art of movement and gestures to win souls for Jesus Christ.”

We have mimes in the pulpit. Silent, miming pastors equal biblically ignorant flocks and false converts. The Apostle Paul didn’t mime the Word. Jonathan Edwards did not have this problem. Charles Spurgeon didn’t mime the Word of God either. They preached it. It reminds me of a poem I read years ago in a lit class. These are our mime pastors today:

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats’ feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death’s other Kingdom
Remember us—if at all—not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men…

“Only in America would the notion of a nearly-naked fundamentalist Christian beauty queen tossing her processed hair as she parades brand new, pageant-bought plastic breasts across a Las Vegas stage in front of millions of television viewers with all the modesty of a blue ribbon heifer at a county livestock fair (the same fundamentalist Christian beauty queen who would later tell a television reporter that she heard God whispering in her ear as she answered a celebrity-worshipping Internet gossip columnist’s question about gay marriage) be treated as anything other than an occasion for high comedy and mirth.”

–Huffington Post

I think Rob Bell may have gotten into some wheatgrass juice that fermented into something else altogether. USA Today is reporting that he is now on the anti-nuke bandwagon. Here’s his latest quote:

“Nuclear weapons are a direct affront to God’s dream of shalom for the world,” Bell said Tuesday. “Life is beautiful, and nuclear weapons are ugly.”

Bell believes that nuclear weapons should be gotten rid of, all of them. So how would Bell propose to do that? Maybe Bell could try his line out on North Korea’s Kim Jong iL. “Hi Kim, uh, your honor, I’m an American emergent guru and life is beautiful and nuclear weapons are ugly. Would you mind dismantling your nuclear weapons for me?” Yes, that would absolutely be the answer to North Korea’s nukes. Then, if there’s anything left of him after that trip, he can fly to Tehran and try the same line out on Ahmadinejad.  Picture Mr. A coming in, fresh from his latest holocaust denying speech where he called for the utter destruction of Israel.

“Hi, I’m Rob Bell, and I’m an American emergent guru and I’m here to say that life is beautiful and nuclear weapons are ugly. Would you mind dismantling your nuclear weapons for me?”

Bell is the hidden ace up Obama’s sleeve to change the world. You read it here first.

Nuclear weapons are certainly ugly, but so is communism and totalitarianism. Soviet communism fell because we in America had a powerful deterrent in our own arsenal. In short, we were stronger than the thugs. And that is something only a fool would attempt to change.

The Covenant Theology blog has a new post about Driscoll’s take on Song of Solomon. There are a growing number of voices that are publicly objecting to Driscoll’s teachings and handling of this book of the Bible.

Chris Rosebrough of Pirate Christian Radio has sent out a press release regarding Joel Osteen’s dubious new distinction: the winner of the first ever ”Worst Ever Easter Sermon Award.’ You have to work really hard to get there in this day and age. Christian Newswire has the story.

Joel Osteen Wins First Ever ‘Worst Easter Sermon Award’

INDIANAPOLIS, April 28 /Christian Newswire/ — Chris Rosebrough, captain of internet based Pirate Christian Radio and host of the Fighting for the Faith Radio program announced on Monday that Joel Osteen is the winner of the “Worst Easter Sermon Award” for 2009. 

“Every Christmas Christians whine and complain about secular and atheistic efforts designed to take Christ out of Christmas yet more and more Christian pastors have committed an even worse offense and have removed Jesus Christ and His victorious resurrection from the grave from their Easter sermons,” said Chris Rosebrough. “Far too many pastors have played the role of Judas and have betrayed Jesus. Rather than being paid 30 pieces of silver, these pastors have sold Jesus out for the fame and adulation that accompany having a ‘growing, relevant ‘man-centered’ church’.” 

Said Rosebrough, “These Churches have stopped preaching the offense of Christ Crucified for Sins and His resurrection for our justification and have traded the Biblical Gospel for empty feel-good platitudes, and self-help mythologies that scratch itching ears.” 

Rosebrough decided that it was time to raise awareness of this serious and growing problem within Christianity and to call these pastors to repentance by holding a contest on his radio program whereby his listeners would decide which sermon was the Worst Easter Sermon of 2009. 

In preparation for this contest, Rosebrough screened nearly 100 sermons from churches across America and picked the 5 worst ones to be contestants for this new ‘award’. 

The sermons Rosebrough picked for this year’s contest included: 

A sermon that explored the “deep” spiritual lessons of the movie Slumdog Millionaire . 

A sermon entitled “Beer Babes & Baseball” 

A sermon entitled “Livin’ Venti” that encouraged people to live life to the fullest. 

A sermon entitled “You Have Come Back Power” 

And a sermon entitled “Easter in the Octagon” 

This year’s winner of the first ever, Worst Easter Sermon Award went to Joel Osteen’s sermon “You Have Come Back Power”. 

Commenting on Osteen’s sermon Rosebrough stated, “Jesus didn’t die and rise again on the cross so that you can have ‘come back power over life’s set backs’. Osteen completely missed the point of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection and as a result he missed the entire point of Christianity.” 

Said Rosebrough, “I wasn’t surprised that Osteen was the first winner of this award. Osteen is like the Tiger Woods of heresy, he takes false teaching to a whole new level.”

Christian Newswire

The sex-crazed churches are starting to have a problem. It seems that when they choose public elementary schools to hold their sex-a-palooza services, they’re running into secular opposition. In short, they’re getting booted from their rentals because of their porno flyers to the community advertising their sex campaigns. It’s happened to a second “church”, this time in Florida, where the church’s “lease is now under review.” Fox News reports.

I suppose they think they are being persecuted for righteousness sake. They have that wrong. No, they’ve managed to offend non-Christians because of they have actually out-pornoed the world. Bowing low before their god named Relevance, they’ve been given over to such blindness that they can’t see what idiots they have become with their little “have great sex” flyers all over the neighborhood.

Would you want your children’s elementary school taken over by wingnuts mailing out flyers that read, “Great Sex for You”? If my minor child has this message thrust in his/her face by pastor perverts when they go to the mailbox  for me, I’m calling the police. It’s porn distribution to mail that publicly without a brown wrapper. Not even Playboy ads are that rank.

Yes, yes. Hide the children. The new pastors are here.

P.S. Note that in the news story, the pastor claims that the church has been “shamefully silent” on the issue of sex. Well, Pastor Heffner, if you mean that most churches aren’t handing out flyers with exciting new sex tips, distributing condoms from the offering plate or using a Power Point presentation to describe what goes where, than you are correct and thankfully so. In reality, the evangelical church isn’t “shamefully silent” any longer. It’s just shameful.

Elmbrook Church in Waukesha, Wisconsin (suburb of Milwaukee) is on the horns of a dilemma. As one of Wisconsin’s original megachurches, their huge auditorium has long served as a community center as the church has rented out for things like the Lawrence Welk Reunion Show, Veggie Tales shows, the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and so forth. For nine years, they have also allowed a public school graduation for their district to be held in their sanctuary without a hitch. Until now. Our local NBC affiliate reports.

The real issue here is not that of the school district’s choice to hold a public school graduation in a Christian church. The real issue is whether the separation-of-church-and-state group now suing the district will be able to accomplish what they really want—the veiling of the giant cross in the sancutary and the removal of Bibles and other Christian materials from the back of church seats. What a coup that would be.

The news story is interesting in that the church actually admits to already covering up the cross in the sanctuary in the past. That a Christian church would so value the income and use of their property as a public auditorium that it would agree to cover up the chief symbol of our faith, the cross of Christ, is amazing. It is hopeful that their elders also saw the outrageous nature of this. But this paragraph in the news story is troubling:

Gibson also admitted there were complaints in some years about the site, saying people were asking the district to veil the cross inside the church.

“The first year, the church responded and did veil the cross. Then they had a meeting of their elders and decided they would remove anything that was not permanent, but they wouldn’t remove or veil anything that was permanent if they rented the facility out.” (emphasis added)

So the church would still remove, say, the Bibles in the backs of the seats to please non-Christian and unregenerate parents. Imagine removing the Bibles from your church so you could collect the rent money from a government school district. These aren’t really Christian “sanctuaries” at all then, are they–if assorted atheists, Buddhists, Sikhs, Muslims and other religionists can strut in and demand you remove God’s Word, and you’re willing to comply because they’re paying you rent?

Elmbrook Church should turn down the rent money and send the government school district elsewhere so they can rent a different venue. This isn’t about evangelism as the article clearly states. They like the building because of, and I quote, 

“The reason they like Elmbrook Church? Space, amenities, and the bottom line.”

In other words, they get good parking and a good financial deal. That’s about all the church seems to be able to offer the world these days—great rentals.

“Haul out the Bibles, veil the crosses, we have somebody who wants to rent!” How sad.