Disinterested in the Gospel and Tired of the Church

I can't help but feel that lurking beneath the surface in much of the current disillusionment with the church is a dis-ease with the traditional message of salvation. People are passionate about the poor, the environment, and third-world debt. But they seem embarrassed by a violent, bloody atonement for sin, let alone any mention of the afterlife that hangs in the balance. Everyone, it seems has a vision for the church that Jesus talked about in Matthew 16:18--the church against which the gates of hell shall not prevail. Many people read this today as a word about the church's role in liberating the oppressed, bringing shalom, or storming 'the authority structures and control centers of evil.' But the reference to the 'gates of hades' is a Jewish euphemism for death (see Isa. 38:10, which uses the Hebrew term sheol). Jesus' initial description of the church focused not on changing the world but on the hope of eternal life.

My observation is that as people grow tired of hearing about the atonement, salvation, the cross, and the afterlife, they grow tired of church. Because the more that sin and redemption and heaven and hell recede into the background, the more the church becomes just one among several options for making a difference in the world.

So as much as the church as been nothing but a holy huddle at times and as much as I admire zeal for good works, there is a danger in much of the missional literature that the gospel of God's grace toward sinners gets swallowed up in urgent calls for world redemption and cultural transformation. There is a danger of centering our churches on adopting schools and offering parenting classes instead of being centered on the message of a heavenly Father who adopts unworthy children of wrath through the work of His Son on the cross. There is a danger that we find our unity in doing good missional deeds for our community and not in the good news of the gospel. There's a danger our Christianity becomes all imperative and not indicative, all about what we need to do with God and little about what God's done for us. There's danger that when people get disinterested in the gospel, they get disinterested in the church. And once they leave the church, they've left the only institution whose mission aims for eternity and whose gospel is truly good news.
~Kevin DeYoung and Ted Kluck, Why We Love the Church

Worship With All Your Might

"What you do in public worship do with all your might.  Shake off that slothful, indifferent, lukewarm temper, which is so odious to God....Think it not enough to present your bodies before the Lord....The worship of the body is but the carcass of worship; it is soul worship that is the soul of worship.  Those that draw near with their lips only shall find God far enough from them; not only lips, and mouth, and tongue, but mind, and heart, and affections; not only knee, and hand, and eye, but heart, and conscience, and memory, must be pressed to attend upon God in public worship.  David says, not only "my flesh longs for Thee," but " my soul thirsts for Thee."   Then will the Lord draw near, when our whole man waits on Him; then will the Lord be found, when we seek Him with our whole heart."

~David Clarkson, The Works of David Clarkson

Ready for The Lord's Day

"Likewise, we must also work at getting ready for Sunday. We cannot worship if our hearts are full of secular responsibilities, bitter anguishes, old guilts, and aching sins. We cannot praise with equanimity if we are harried by unfulfilled commitments, distraught over incomplete promises, unsettled because of the Sunday morning fracas. We must ready ourselves physically. We must ready ourselves spiritually. We must ready ourselves emotionally and psychologically. This takes practice which will at first seem difficult. Establishing new disciplines is always exhausting."
~Karen Mains
Making Sunday Special

"McSabbath"

"McSabbath is here--worship services that are quick, easy, convenient, and user-friendly. No muss, no fuss. Little or no sacrifice required. Consumers can be in and out in under an hour. McSermons may not be as nutritional as the real thing, but, like Big Macs, they have a predictable quality that fills a void at least for a while. The question is, however, do they fulfill the purpose of worship, which is to please God?"

~Celebrating the Sabbath by Bruce Ray

(italics are the author's)

The Sabbath~"Just Too Busy"

"Many people see the Sabbath, or Lord's Day, as an infringement of their personal liberty--a day that God has taken from them instead of a gift that He has given to them for rest, worship, and celebration. The modern world, they argue, is too complex to set apart a whole day for rest and worship. There is too much that we need to do and too much that we want to do to give up one day in seven for God. We are just too busy."

~from Celebrating the Sabbath by Bruce Ray