Early one morning this week as I was headed to work I stepped out my front door and felt something that I hadn’t felt in a while……a chill in the air…a harbinger of the winter to come.
It was quite refreshing and somewhat comforting as my mind wandered over the past weeks of hot and humid weather. You know, the weather isn’t the only thing that can “give us a chill”. Sometimes people describe getting “chilled” by a movie seen, a news story or a section of a book. I’m sure you’ve experience this. It is that moment when you are experiencing something and you just pause and feel a strange unsettling mix of anxiety and dread that seems to run right down your spine. I had this experience the other day from a most unlikely source……a devotional book.
There I was happily reading a devotion based on Luke 18:8 which reads:
8
I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” and then I came across this quote from William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army who said,
“The chief danger of the 20
th
Century will be religion with the Holy Ghost, Christianity without Christ, forgiveness without repentance, salvation without regeneration, politics without God, and Heaven without Hell.”
And there was the chill…..
I don’t know about you but I feel Mr. Booth’s words have carried themselves into present day and are being played out in the sanctuaries of many places that are called “churches”. In such meeting halls man made religions are thriving that have no initiation or leading by The Holy Ghost. Jesus may be mentioned but only as a “good man” of “wise teacher”. Hundreds may walk down the aisles of these gathering places proclaiming God’s forgiveness without a shred of repentance in their hearts. The leaders of such establishments proclaim salvation, but without even an eye lash being batted at the cross or the new creation God promises He will make each new believer who truly is saved. People in these false churches rejoice in their salvation from……something other than eternal separation from God in Hell because in their worship services Heaven and Hell do not exist. Indeed the congregants gather and talk about God’s sovereignty, but not over political leaders, or the world, but only over what they say God should be over.
Brothers and Sisters do not despair, because there are many good God-glorifying churches that still exist. But Booth’s words (and much more so God’s word..)call us to be on guard. Heretical teaching, divisive language, and subtle falsities can permeate any church if those who lead and those who attend do not hold to the truth of God’s word. This is why my heart rejoices in The Blue Church, not that we are perfect, but that for well over twenty years I have been walking through the doors of that church and I have
never
heard a message or encountered a teaching that even got close to fulfilling Booth’s words. Yet, as an Elder, I know that I / we must never put down our guard. We are a church that I am convinced is still a light on a hill and that light cannot be compromised.
So is there a role for all of us to keep out the chill of cold, barren, powerless teaching that deceives many and leaves people further from God than when they first heard it? Yes. It is to hold fast to the truth of God’s word and carry it wherever we go and to bring it out into the light when the darkness of false teaching appears.
Can you hear the call believer? You carry the truth of God. You are called to preserve it. To cherish it. To keep it as a fire burning in your heart. To keep out the chill…….
For God’s glory,
Rob