One by one, as each 1 minute testimony unfolded, a common thread was weaving its way into a telltale tapestry of a broken church. I got saved as a child, grew up in church and in a very strict religious home and because of the legalism, I eventually hated God. Then when I got older, found out He actually did really love me and it changed my life. As I sat in that circle with other ladies Bible study leaders I was reminded of someone very close to me that recently came to Christ after loosing everything. They also had the same testimony. Unfortunately for them, it cost their marriage, their job and nearly their life to understand the truth of who God is and how He really feels about them. The God that had been presented to them their whole life was a lie. They also confided in me that when trying to reach out with the love of God to hurting friends, find it hard to break through because people say, why would I want God in my life when He hates me? When asked where they got this idea, they usually respond with, that is what everyone who says they know God or about God has ever said to me. What the what? God hates them?! Oh sure, maybe no one ever actually said those words, but point still taken. It seems to me we have a problem here. Seems a bunch of churchy people are out there with "expert" opinions on why the church is dwindling away. While there is a lot of clamor and commotion inside the church about what so and so is doing, what worship style their congregation is using, what this mega-church is hyping, what that micro-church is promoting, what this denomination is believing, people are blind to satan slithering through it all like the snake that he is. Bottom line is he has us bound and we are binding others right along with us. Blasphemy! Christians cannot be bound! I'm not even going to bother going through all the scriptures that say this is indeed possible and very real. I don't have time. Listen here, it will lay it all out. Back to my point. So what are we bound by? Sin. No news there. Well, here's a news flash, it's not necessarily that sin has us bound, it's the knowledge of it that has us bound... "the knowledge of good and evil" to be exact. It's a result of the fall the church, as a whole, has never rejected mainly because we don't even realize there is a problem. But it is a big problem that is leaving death in it's wake. (Gen 3:22-24)
Let me ask you a question...what is more important? Showing someone their sinfulness or showing them the grace that covers that sin? Sure, hit them with grace first, then when they love Jesus enough, hit them with their sin, right? No really, we can't have people in church who cuss like sailors, or smoke like chimneys or drink like fish! What would people think, what would God think? We have to be righteous, we have to be holy! God demands holiness! Right? We have taken the name of God and applied it to sin like a bandaid. We say, stop sinning or God will turn His back on you or bad stuff will happen to you or you will go to hell instead of Jesus died to save you from those sins and the way He loves you will help you stop doing those things in His perfect time. Oh and hey, I happen to love you too and if you need help with that in the meantime, I'm here for you. Can we trust God to handle the sin problem or do we need to make a citizen's arrest? While we are busy playing law enforcement, we are steadily creating lost generations of great Pharisees (Matt 23:15) or hopeless rebels. While we are preoccupied with blaming this church or that denomination for why young people are leaving the church in record numbers, they really are walking out wounded and bleeding. We are our own worst enemy and satan is loving it.
Yes, we are bound by sin. The preoccupation with it that is. By the way, sinners are not God's worst enemy. The power of sin was canceled on the cross. Jesus either paid for all of our sins or He didn't. The Bible says He did. God either sent His Son to die for us because He loved us or He didn't. The Bible says He did. Either God loves us even in our mess or we will have to perform for His love. Maybe if we actually looked more like Jesus (the tree of life) than we look like Pharisees (that other tree) people would come running back to the church. Maybe if we stopped telling people how they need to behave as Christians and started telling them about how precious they are to the One who died to save them, they would want to get to know Him a bit better and maybe, just maybe they wouldn't have to try to fill that void by sinning. Hum...maybe.
Resource for further understanding of the two trees: The Problem Jesus Came to Solve
