Just what attracts us to the church we attend? What a question to ask, especially from a pastor. Still, after nearly 41 years of walking with the Lord, and after 38 years of ministry, the things Tozer says are things I and many of my fellow pastor friends see quite regularly. Is the church you attend helping you to really know Jesus and His word? Tozer says it well, and what he says should be heard clearly. Here you go, may the Lord minister to us all!
Failure and Success: The Great Goddess Numbers
Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each one's work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one's work, of what sort it is. --1 Corinthians 3:12-13
The emphasis today in Christian circles appears to be on quantity, with a corresponding lack of emphasis on quality. Numbers, size and amount seem to be very nearly all that matters even among evangelicals. The size of the crowd, the number of converts, the size of the budget, the amount of the weekly collections: if these look good the church is prospering and the pastor is thought to be a success. The church that can show an impressive quantitative growth is frankly envied and imitated by other ambitious churches.
This is the age of the Laodiceans. The great goddess Numbers is worshiped with fervent devotion and all things religious are brought before her for examination. Her Old Testament is the financial report and her New Testament is the membership roll. To these she appeals as arbiters of all questions, the test of spiritual growth and the proof of success or failure in every Christian endeavor.
A little acquaintance with the Bible should show this up for the heresy it is. To judge anything spiritual by statistics is to judge by another than scriptural judgment. It is to admit the validity of externalism and to deny the value our Lord places upon the soul as over against the body. It is to mistake the old creation for the new and to confuse things eternal with things temporal. Yet it is being done every day by ministers, church boards and denominational leaders. And hardly anyone notices the deep and dangerous error.
2 comments:
I think you're right Pastor David. People can have megachurches, with hundreds and hundreds of churchgoers, but the real question is, are these people being helped and healed?
That's what Jesus did, went around healing people. Even when He didn't physically lay his hands on people, when He spoke, it brought healing. The truth of God's Word can set people free.
I agree with you Pastor Rosales.
I had just mentioned this to another blogger that I comment on, it's not in the numbers.
Even in God's Word, I forgot where it is, but the man had thousands in his army, and then the Lord told him that it was too many. God told him to tell them, that those who are afraid, to go back. Then the Lord told him to make the ones who drink like a dog from the stream, to go back. I think at the end, he had only 300 in his army to work with.
So even God knows..it's not in the numbers.
What matters is if people are getting healed, and helped and changed and transformed.
Thanks for this post.
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