A Sound-Bite World

                                                                

A Sound-Bite World

 

Wow, we sure are busy. Have you taken time to notice how fast life passes by? Twenty-four hours seem to slip past in mere minutes. By the time we have had our morning coffee (as normal people do) the day has given way to the noon time sun. The end of the week is upon us just as Monday evening, with all of its hectic high paced chaotic bewilderment, slams the door and opens into Thursday. And June becomes October with little remembrance of the summer activities.

 

In fact, we are so fast paced that we do not take time to think. We do not want to think. Our evening news (which I actually refuse to watch these days) consists or snippets of events condensed in a way that the public can tolerate. Because the general population does not slow down long enough to listen to anything that requires more than 45 seconds of concentration.

 

Ours is a sound bite world. Speaking with our son recently he reminded me that today, people simply do not pick up a book for the purpose of learning. We have at our fingertips (literally, with phones and iPads) whole libraries of great literature and we refuse to learn. Our communication with others is not a complex lengthy discussion of matters concerning God and mankind or difficulties facing our communities and how we can make a difference. We do not converse with others on intellectual levels built by years of educational prowess. Instead, we send 127-character messages, misspelled and poorly constructed and believe we have communicated.

 

Our communication with God is no different. Our hurried days filled with simplistic blurbs thrown from one communication device to another, which we have the audacity to call communication, are perfect examples of our time spent with God.

 

A library of 66 divine books is bound and sitting on our end table or nightstand, untouched, unruffled and very carefully preserved from wear…the Bible. We simply do not touch it. It takes too long to actually read the Word of God for understanding. We may quickly read a 47-word devotional “about” the Word. And we may even include a single verse to highlight the thought. But, we are too busy to truly study the Word; to spend time thinking and meditating on its meaning. The same devices that allow us to communicate with anyone in the world within seconds, also have the ability to provide us with an in-depth study of any passage of God’s Word at any moment in time...but we have no time.

 

And that same expedited nature carries over into our worship services as well. Make it fast. Make it simple. Keep it moving. Don’t focus too long on one thing. Start here…quickly move to next event…stop…go home. What about worship? What about hearing a message from God? What about meditating on His Word so that it changes our lives?

 

We have allowed society to make God inconvenient. Satan has successfully moved us, the Church, into a fast-paced routine that has no time to study the Word, worship and serve God, or to be effective witnesses in this world today…we are too busy.

 

If I could make a simple suggestion to the Church today it might be, “Put the phone down and turn it off. Move away from the computer/TV and turn it off. Sit quietly for an extended period of time with God’s Word, and studies concerning God’s Word, open in your hands and read with the intent to hear.” Slow down in this fast paced world. Give God time.

 

Jesus will do one thing quickly, 1Corinthians 15:52 “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” Will you be ready or will you be ashamed?

JESUS’ FRIENDS

 

JESUS’ FRIENDS

                   Ever wonder about Jesus’ social life? Today our churches spend a great deal of time focusing on the social life of their members. We have it all. We schedule internal events ranging from baseball to basketball to bowling to hiking and to every form of in-home hobby or activity known to man. We have cookouts, camping trips, and even organize our own carnivals. But should we? I am not saying any of these are right or wrong in and of themselves, but I do want to ask that one basic question, “Should we be planning them with the saved or lost? Should they be social or evangelistic?

                   One of the most common arguments in favor of this type of church event is the evangelistic outreach that it has the potential to foster. Then I trust that every one of these events opens or closes with a clear presentation of the gospel and an opportunity to receive Christ as savior. When I ask people if they have lost friends they can invite, they always, without fail, respond positively. But, why do we have lost friends? We may well know people who are not saved, but we should not have friends who are lost, Amos 3:3 “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?”

                   If we agree with the unsaved, would it be that they have raised their moral standards or that we have lowered ours? Will the lost remain friends with us if we witness to them regularly? And if we do not witness to them then how can we say we care about them enough to be friends? “Wait” you say. “Jesus was the friend of sinners.” I don’t believe that. Listen closely to Matt 11:19 “The Son of man came eating and drinking, and they say, Behold a man gluttonous, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners. But wisdom is justified of her children” (also Luke 7:34). Notice “they say” or in Luke “you say” but it is not stated as a fact. It is stated by others as an insult. Was he also a ‘winebibber’? Then neither was he hanging out with sinners. However, he did reach out to them. At virtually every outdoor meeting he was preaching to the lost. He said to evangelize but he never said to socialize.

                   His private hours, those times when he was not standing on a hillside or seashore preaching, when he was not feeding thousands, were filled with the solitude and friendship of godly men. When he was resting after preaching to thousands, he and his disciples (not his unsaved neighbors) got into a boat to find privacy. Space will not allow me to reproduce the many examples that can be listed here. Suffice to say, Jesus is never seen ‘fellowshipping’ with the lost. The lost are all around him during his sermons or when miracles were being worked. However, all of his non-preaching time is spent alone in prayer or with his disciples, those who were of like mind. So why is so much of our social time spent with the lost?

                   The most common excuse for fellowshipping with the lost is evangelism. The example Jesus gave us is far different than what so many of us are doing today. If Jesus is alone with the lost, he is preaching to them. Is that true of us? If Jesus is alone and away from the crowds, he is alone with godly friends. Is that true of us? If we evangelize the lost, they will get saved or irritated. If our lost friends get saved, we are no longer fellowshipping with the lost but with the saved. However, if they get irritated, they will pull away from us. The fact that they are still our friends today is evidence that we are not evangelizing at all, we are placating instead because we fear losing their friendship. Risk losing their friendship today by offering them salvation.

                   The Bible makes it very clear. We must choose our friends. James 4:4 “Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.” Jesus had friends, godly friends. What kind of friends are we cultivating? Do we love them enough to win them to Christ? Or, are we content to watch them face the final judgment of God knowing we could have won them to Christ if we were not so afraid of losing their friendship here…today?

                   If we follow Jesus’ example, we will only have unsaved friends here very briefly. Either they will get saved or they will turn away from us.

Maybe we should end each of our meetings with lost friends the same way Jesus did so frequently, by saying "Go and sin no more." But telling friends to stop sinning might turn them against us.