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Christian be revived in the true gospel and in understanding how to be complete in Christ.

Our discipleship does not determine our salvation, rather, our salvation determines our discipleship

[a quote from Steven’s book Take Up Your Cross]

Listen to this sermon: February 6, 2022 – Colossians 2:6,7

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Doing Church

The one thing that we need when it comes to doing church is to sit at the feet of Jesus, as Mary did, to be refreshed with a sense of His presence as we worship and hear His Word. So often the church service is made into an event no different than the Martha syndrome. There is a prevailing busyness, distracting so many with things that seem to be necessary, but are not that ‘one thing [that] is necessary’.

It is this simple blessing that is being lost in so many churches that profess to be evangelical bible-believing churches of the Lord Jesus Christ. See below that God’s People have always been facing the same threats to undermine biblical worship. No wonder that Satan is doing the same today.

Please take a moment to take seriously this message.

A fundamental problem with so many Evangelical churches is that the focus is not really on God, as it only should be, but on pleasing men. Christians are left with a feeling that is totally unsatisfactory because they are being forced to make church relevant to the world. So many are missing out on a church service that has its face focused upon God and that means that it is not what church is supposed to be about. It is for this reason that many Evangelicals are converting to false representations of church, such as Roman Catholicism and Anglicanism, and other high church forms, because there is a focus firstly on “God”. The problem with high churches is that the gospel has been replaced, by the authority of men, with ritual and artificial acts of what is truly spiritual.

This is why we need to keep church simple, serious, and earnest.

Christians are being ripped off because they are not able to meet together as Christians, with their traditions. Instead, we are burdened with things that are supposed to make us relevant before those who find the things of Jesus boring.

Christians are burdened with all sorts of responsibilities designed to help church leaders have a smooth running and consumer friendly service.

But what about your needs and what are you really contributing to? Is this what church is supposed to be like?

• Churches are reducing worship to mere entertainment
• “Successful Outcomes” are reducing church to a business model
• Too many church leaders and pastors are burdening the people of God with legalism or false teaching
• These are problems all to common in places where Christianity is not openly persecuted
• The fear today is being ashamed of doing truly spiritual Christian worship
• Marketing is determining the names of churches, such as Elevate, Dream, Rise,  Collective, Solid Rock, Create, The Pursuit, Legacy, Relevant, Journey, and the like, to appeal to a non-church feel
• Everyone should be welcome, but it is often advertised by these churches that all can belong – which is either a lie to bring people in or a sign that there is no true fellowship in Christ [Clearly no need for repentance and faith to belong!]

The majority of Christian churches in countries that do not openly persecute Christians subject believers to a worship service specifically intended to make non-Christians feel more comfortable. Maybe non-Christians really need the church to be completely different to the ways of the world, rather than like the world?

Churches that meet under the real expectation of persecution are not tempted to embrace this false practice.

The reason why there is this difference is simply because Christians are wanting to avoid a different kind of persecution. Churches in places without open persecution are afraid of not being relevant in their modern and prosperous societies. Christians have become ashamed of doing truly spiritual worship for fear of being labeled ridiculous and meaningless.

Defining the Terms: Traditional Baptist Church

‘Traditional’ means being simple and biblical in worship. The biblical meaning of traditional, not the worldly, ritualistic, or elementary way of men according to the flesh.

‘Baptist’ means the doctrinal perspective that God’s Kingdom is spiritual and entered into by means of the new birth alone and not by religious ritual.

‘Church’ means that we are about being a local assembly, with the blessing of the gospel of Jesus Christ, under the authority of Christ and His Word, in union with His universal church in heaven and on earth.

The Meaning of ‘Traditions’ in the Bible

Can we do whatever we like when it comes to church or does the Bible have something to say about how we do things when we meet together in the name of Jesus?

1 Corinthians 11:2 Now I praise you because you remember me in everything and hold firmly to the traditions, just as I delivered them to you.

2 Thessalonians 2:15 So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught, whether by word of mouth or by letter from us.

2 Timothy 1:13,14 Retain the standard of sound words which you have heard from me, in the faith and love which are in Christ Jesus. Guard, through the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, the treasure which has been entrusted to you.

‘Traditions’ are simply everything that are mentioned in the New Testament as a taught practice.

Acts 2:42 They were continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.

Biblical Traditions:

• everything done for edification
• orderly worship
• no idols
• no adulterating the Word or speaking with reliance on persuasion
• preaching and teaching the Word
• reading the Word
• singing hymns and spiritual songs
• women prohibited from teaching in the general assembly
• Lord’s Supper to be taken with due recognition and worship

Is it really so important? Paul thinks so. He commands Timothy to ‘guard’ what has been entrusted to him by the Holy Spirit. Do we think of the Christian ministry anymore as those guarding standards and traditions or has the Christian ministry become more identified with entertainment and strategies associated with the corporate world?

We Have Been Warned

Consider again the above passage, 2 Thessalonians 2:15, that we should ‘stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught’. The context are the signs before the coming of our Lord, namely the apostasy and the man of lawlessness being revealed. In light of this Paul exhorts them to do that which is in contrast to the apostasy (i.e., the falling away from the faith). So long as the church stands firm and holds to its traditions the apostasy shall be avoided.

Leaving off our traditions is nothing less than that very apostasy that will come before the return of our Lord Jesus Christ.

2 Timothy 1:3-5 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. But you, be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.

Notice how Timothy was to guard against this – by thinking rightly (being sober in all things) and by enduring hardship in the ministry. In other words, that it takes a right way of thinking and hard work to avoid this from occurring. The reason why modern leaders are turning away from holding to traditional worship is simply because they want to avoid saying that “this is right” and that “this is wrong” and because they want to avoid hardship in the ministry.

Mark 8:15 And He was giving orders to them, saying, “Watch out! Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.”

Our Lord Jesus warned His disciples about the threat of leavening within the church. The text actually says that He gave us orders!

Most everyone is familiar with Jesus’ warning about the leaven of Pharisees, which is legalism, but we must not forget His warning about the leaven of Herod. The leaven of Herod refers to pragmatists who justify whatever means so long as the outcome is good. Herod only cared for maintaining what was in his best interests, hence Jesus referred to him as a fox. All too often, modern day ‘Executive Pastors’ don’t care what brings in the numbers and what keeps them coming so long as they maintain their position over a church that continues to grow numerically.

Jeremiah 6:16 Thus says the LORD, “Stand by the ways and see and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is, and walk in it; and you will find rest for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’”

Simple Church

Has evangelical worship lost its simplicity because of too much of a concern for what the world thinks or because of false teaching?

2 Corinthians 11:3 But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.

The context of this warning by Paul was when false apostles were affecting the church in Corinth with a different gospel and spirit. Today there is the same concern for false leaders and teachers who create things that burden God’s people instead of ministering to them that blessing that comes from a ‘simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ’.

Christians are being cheated from the simplicity of worship that they should have fully afforded to them. Instead of simply getting on with prayer, the reading of Scripture, biblical hymns and songs, and the ministry of the Word, Christians are being subjected to all sorts of things. There is a focus on inclusion and relevance rather than on devotion. Going to church has become too complicated with all sorts of programs and lists to commit to, rather than being committed to sitting at the feet of Jesus for that one thing needful.

Serious Church

Luke writes that the disciples ‘were continually devoting themselves’ to this tradition. A seriousness had gripped their hearts and they rightly understood that it was necessary to protect something very special. So Paul exhorts us to ‘stand firm and hold to’ these things.

1 Peter 4:11 Whoever speaks, is to do so as one who is speaking the utterances of God….

The world is constantly mocking God and His Word. It is a shame that His churches often do the same by not communicating a seriousness about God and His Word. There is no place for jokes from the pulpit. Jesus never made a joke, nor can anyone find a joke anywhere in the Bible.

Too many Christians have responded to the church being serious by going to one of two extremes:

• The first are those who have adopted the world’s thinking that we should not take these things too seriously, because they are ashamed of God and His Word
• The second equally wrong response has been to make seriousness an act of self-righteousness

Why be serious? It is about why we meet together. We meet in the name of Jesus with the hope of sensing His presence. The one who longs to meet with Jesus does not beat around the bush, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.”

As a guiding principle, Paul says that all things are to done for the sake of edification in the church. Jokes may be fun, but they do not edify. A man of God, who is burdened with God’s Word, does not have time to communicate anything but the ‘utterances of God’. A pretender has to fill his sermon with other things because he does not have a burdened message from God.

If we are serious about meeting with God and sitting at the feet of Jesus, there is no place for anything that is not about that very thing.

This requires…

• Obedience to God’s Word in how we worship, by God’s people and the leadership
• Faith in what God has given to us and that He will bless us

Earnest Church

The New Testament church was not only simple and serious, but it was also earnest. The whole point of holding to and standing firm in the traditions is because these things are the only things that we have that are about Jesus. You cannot make an idol and hope it will bring you close to Jesus. You cannot busy yourself in any other thing in order to be blessed in Jesus but in prayer, the Scriptures, doctrinal songs, and fellowship.

Hence, we are to be earnest in church, in the keeping of these traditions, because it is what the Lord has given to us to keep us close to Jesus and His will for our lives.

Instead of being ashamed of the things that Jesus has given to us, let us embrace them earnestly. Though these are the things that are counted “traditional” they are in fact the only things that we have that Jesus has given to us.

We Need to Cry Out to God

Time and again the church of the Lord Jesus Christ needs to ask, “Where is the Lord?”, as even the priests of Israel failed to do so in the past. Being earnest is about using the traditions of prayer, the Scriptures, and hymns, [i.e., the things of Jesus] to be revived in the Lord, instead of walking ‘after things that did not profit’.

We Need to Realize that God’s People will Always Be Facing the Same Threats to Undermine Biblical Worship and True Christian Ministry

The movement to become “relevant”, due to perceived changes in what people want and need, stems from the mistaken idea that our age is different and unique.

The Old Testament Prophets who rebuked Israel for her idolatry and Baal worship would be grieved to see the unashamed tattooed worship leaders and the effeminate looking pastors with their pierced ears and worldly hair styles.

• We face the same demonic opposition that aims at the same outcome, which is to confuse good and evil and to infiltrate the house of God with the wicked
• The solution is the same, which is the demonstration of the Spirit in power as the Word of God is preached – it is still by means of the foolishness of the message preached that people will be impacted for Christ
• The Word of God itself warns us about worldly methods and that bad leadership will always be an issue for God’s people

Psalm 74:2-4 Remember Your congregation, which You have purchased of old, which You have redeemed to be the tribe of Your inheritance; and this Mount Zion, where You have dwelt. Turn Your footsteps toward the perpetual ruins; the enemy has damaged everything within the sanctuary. Your adversaries have roared in the midst of Your meeting place; they have set up their own standards for signs.

Psalm 79:1 O God, the nations have invaded Your inheritance; they have defiled Your holy temple; they have laid Jerusalem in ruins.

Jeremiah 50:6 “My people have become lost sheep; their shepherds have led them astray. They have made them turn aside on the mountains; they have gone along from mountain to hill and have forgotten their resting place.”

The Solution: Ministers of the Gospel who are Willing to Stand Alone

The direction of the church is always in the hands of those called to the ministry. It is not up to the sheep to cause change. The return to biblical ways has always been by God sending prophets and men of God, not something that is accomplished by the congregation of the Lord’s people. The problem is that such men must be willing to make a stand and that means standing alone.

Philippians 2:19-21 But I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you shortly, so that I also may be encouraged when I learn of your condition. For I have no one else of kindred spirit who will genuinely be concerned for your welfare. For they all seek after their own interests, not those of Christ Jesus.

Paul faced the same shortage of ministers of the gospel who were genuinely concerned for the people of God. We must not think that our age is any different. Have a look at Jeremiah about bad shepherds. If it was the case in the Old Testament age and in the New Testament age, why should we think that the devil is not undermining true Christian ministry in our day? If he is, what does it look like? I think that what we see in so much of evangelical Christianity today are churches that overly complicate the church service, are not serious, and are not earnest for the gospel.

The gates of hell will not prevail against the true church [Matt. 16:18] and God will use true men of God to restore what was lost in our generation, and again and again, throughout the generations, until our Lord shall come.

Isaiah 58:12 Those from among you will rebuild the ancient ruins; you will raise up the age-old foundations; and you will be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of the streets in which to dwell.

The Final Outcome

I am convinced that this worldly method of “doing church” is having a direct impact on God’s Word being made known to the people of God. Just as meaningless ecclesiastical ritual has for many years deprived the people of God with a direct and personal understanding of God’s Word, so also, in our age, the adulterating of the Word for the sake of business and relevance will also necessarily distance us from God’s Word.

Amos 8:11 “Behold, days are coming,” declares the Lord GOD, “When I will send a famine on the land, not a famine for bread or a thirst for water, but rather for hearing the words of the LORD.”

What is Our True Relevance to the World?

There is only one thing that makes the church of the Lord Jesus Christ Relevant to the World.