Chapter 4
Amplified Bible:
Ephesians 4:14: So then, we may no longer be children, tossed [like ships] to and fro between chance gusts of teaching and wavering with every changing wind of doctrine, [the prey of] the cunning and cleverness of unscrupulous men, [gamblers engaged] in every shifting form of trickery in inventing errors to mislead.
We will no longer be children — Children are beautiful in their innocence and simplicity. Jesus said to suffer the little children to come to Him. You see, the problem is not that we are children. It is that abusers abound trying to confuse and mislead. That is what happened in the Garden of Eden. The Accuser distorted God’s very own words to confuse and mislead the Garden children. We are spiritual children, and we now find ourselves in this world of error. We need a teacher (Christ) who is simple enough for children to understand. Given that, His teachings gain depth as we mature. The truth will be understood in direct proportion to the study of it.
Paul has been leading us through the great grace and love of God and Jesus Christ. Now, he wants us to be aware…be careful of the things that can trip us up on our spiritual journey. He writes about being tossed about and wavering with changing winds of doctrine. Below is information that shows us how valuable Paul’s counsel is…and wise. There are so many ways to be tossed about and wavering with changing winds of doctrine. We are seeing unscrupulous men; inventing errors to mislead. Let Paul’s counsel sink deep into our hearts and make for wise choices in what we face today.
The Barna Group researchers have been studying church attendance trends for over twenty years. Barna is a Christian concerned about what he has been seeing. Many reasons are given for this trend. It is a complicated mess that the church is in. From self-centeredness/entitlement mentality to a pulling away because people are in search of depth, truth, and spirituality instead of just religion and religious rhetoric. Some say that church has become a production that has nothing to do with real spirituality. Society's entertainment orientation has been brought into the church. It is not working. Can you see Jesus taking a “needs” assessment when He can meet every need of mankind?
The following is quoted from a Barna article: “Six in ten young people will leave the church permanently or for an extended period starting at age 15, according to new research by the Barna Group. Today's young adults are marrying later, if at all, are technologically savvy, and hold worldviews alien to their upbringing. Barna Research president David Kinnaman says that church leaders are unequipped to deal with this ‘new normal.’
Do you know that roughly 10 million born again Christian adults (in the US) are unchurched. (www.barna.org). Reasons given for this trend include that the system is unfulfilling, misleading and full of error.
Quoting the Barna study:
“The early church leaders didn’t have the things we now consider essential for our faith. They didn’t have official church buildings, vision statements or core values. They had no social media, radio broadcasts or celebrity pastors. They didn’t even have the completed New Testament. Christ-followers were often deeply misunderstood, persecuted and some gave their lives for their faith. Yet they loved and they served and they prayed and they blessed—and slowly, over hundreds of years, they brought the empire to its knees.”
How could the early church capture the imagination of the Roman empire while we, with all our resources and rigor, are slowly losing influence in our culture?”
I encourage you to read the entire article at the following website:
No comments:
Post a Comment