A Church of Clowns and Goats

A time will come when instead of shepherds feeding the sheep, the church will have clowns entertaining the goats

C.H Spurgeon

We are now living in this time.

Echoing Paul Washer; the problem with most churches today is that when we enter them, we don’t know what’s going on. In seeking to attract and retain the world, they now resemble it more than Christ. Instead of churches drawing the lost with their light, they have dimmed it to blend in with the darkness.

Church services today bear little to no resemblance to the services of the early church. They look so much like worldly events that a non-believer could unknowingly attend a church service and not even know it is one.

First, we have worship, which is no different from a secular concert.

I remember taking my catholic sister to my former seeker-sensitive church, and she couldn’t comprehend why we sang worship songs in the dark. It made me pause because I couldn’t think of a good reason why they do it.

But isn’t that what a lot of churches do today?

They designed worship as an experience to appeal to our senses and our flesh. It includes changing lights and special effects all in the name of drawing us closer to God. But is that necessary? Can’t we worship God without all these fanfares?

Moreover, are all these theatrics drawing us closer to God? Or are they distracting us from reflecting upon the knowledge and truths in the worship song? Assuming they choose doctrinally sound worship songs that exalt God.

A pastor once said his church would invest in state-of-the-art light and sound systems to produce a better experience for worship. His rationale was, if we are going to do it for worldly buildings and events, we should similarly equip the house of God.

But I wonder, is the church supposed to conform to this world? I do not object in equipping church buildings well, but I question the wisdom of spending large amounts of money to create a so-called inductive environment for worship.

Next is the sermon, which can best be described as a motivational speech sprinkled with some bible verses that may or may not mention the topic at hand.

It seems the overall goal of these sermons is to hype people. You will frequently hear the pastor change voice levels, speak fast, read the Bible dramatically, etc. to get people to laugh, clap, shout and, have a good time. I guess they do it to trick people into believing they hear good preaching, even though it’s false. And at the same time, the crowd’s applause makes the pastor feel good about himself and convinces him he is doing a good job.

But they aren’t. The content of the sermons is rarely about Christ or even the Bible. When the pastor isn’t telling stories of his personal life, he talks mostly about us, our struggles, our problems, and our importance. Jesus, if mentioned, is a supporting character whose main job is to give us the power to defeat our troubles and have a better life. The preaching becomes a matter of how God can serve us rather than how we can glorify God, what great things God can do for us instead of what we ought to do to please God.

As a result, instead of growing in the grace and knowledge of Christ, we are growing in the grace and knowledge of man; our pastor and ourselves.

We come out of these services as we come out from a movie, talking about how it made us feel and quoting the different parts of the sermon we liked. We feel motivated and pleased with ourselves instead of grieving about our sins and repenting from it. We learn more about the pastor and grow in awe of Him than we do of Jesus.

Is it any surprise some people worship their pastors?

Oh, what must our God think when He looks at the mockery we have made of His body!

It’s time we restore Jesus on His throne and make Him the center of church services. We don’t need theatrics, production, special effects, or props to worship God and learn from His Word. Jesus is the living bread, and if He is preached faithfully from the Bible, people will be satisfied.

I used to be one of the goats eagerly looking toward Sunday for my next fix of entertainment. But the Lord opened my eyes and delivered me from it. My heart breaks for the thousands still deceived and ignorant of the truth.

On judgment day, I think the most tragic group of people won’t be those who rejected the Lord; but the ones who sincerely believed they were Christians only to realize they were goats and clowns.  

  Grace and peace to you!