The hypocrisy of the modern church

I remember hearing preachers declare that "Jesus is the answer". Jesus was the answer to all of life's problems. Meaning of course that the gospel provided wisdom and direction for whatever situation mankind found himself in, and that deliverance from trouble and danger was provided by God in Christ.

So I heard.

But does the modern church believe this?

1. Many believers, and many preachers, believe we are in the "end times". They believe there is coming soon a time of unprecedented horror and tyranny upon this earth, replete with a satanically empowered "police state" known as the "Beast" and a tyrannical dictator who will persecute believers to no end. These last days are to make the Holocaust of Nazi Germany, or the Bolshevik reign of terror in the former Soviet Union, look like nice walks in the park.

BUT, these same believers continue on in their lives, blithely living AS IF no such thing was going to happen. They make no preparations, either spiritual or even physical, to deal with such troublesome times. I suppose they excuse their apathy by calling it "faith". They believe God will "take care" of them, so they have no need to prepare, either spiritually or physically. They think their church attendance, tithing, and nightly prayers before bedtime qualify them as "spiritually prepared" for anything that may come.

But notice,

Noah was a man of faith. He found grace in the eyes of God. He was chosen by God to be saved. He was made aware of the coming judgement upon the world. And what did he do? Did he simply relax and carry on, nonchalantly passing the time, AS IF there were no danger ahead? Not at all, rather he HEEDED GOD'S WORD and BUILT AN ARK. He PREPARED for what was coming.

The modern church? Well, Jesus declared that the coming of the Son of man would be LIKE NOAH'S DAYS. The problem is, the modern church is largely like those fools who ate and drank, and married and gave in marriage, until the flood came and took them all away, rather than being like Noah who spent his time doing two things: warning the world of the coming judgement and preparing for it in accordance with God's Word, living AS IF there REALLY WAS A COMING JUDGEMENT and time of trouble.

2. The nation is sinking deeper and deeper into oblivion. We are on the brink of total financial collapse. The border is gone. We are being invaded by foreignors, literally. It is in fact a replay of Judges 5-6, in Israel's history. We have been engaged in numerous wars, that never really amount to much in the way of victory - one has even resulted in plain out and out defeat. Victory is nowhere in sight, it seems, in all these wars. In fact, we don't seem to get into these wars with a CLEAR goal and objective, whereby victory is plainly described. We are in debt beyond our ears. The entire nation is in debt to international financial powers and greed and corruption run rampant among our "leaders". Immorality from the slum to the Capital. We engage in all these programs - war on poverty, war on drugs - but the people are slipping further into poverty and the drugs keep rolling in.

And what does the modern church offer to the nation? Is there no balm in Gilead? Does not Jesus have the answer? Why are there so few preachers, indeed, so few believers, loudly proclaiming to the nation the source of its ills, namely sin and apostasy from God, and the solution, namely NATIONAL repentance? No, the modern church would rather send forth a message of get rich quick by sowing a seed of faith, or (if they are not that jaded) the message is essentially that the nation is going to hell in an handbasket and the only hope is to just pew and tithe until the rapture.

The church commits a bait-and-switch when it claims the Bible holds to the key to our problems, but fails to deliver that key, choosing instead to offer people building programs, bake sales, peanut brittle, and DVDs of pep-talks for sale (operators are standing by!)

3. The family has been practically destroyed in the last 50 years. Divorce tears apart about 1 in every 2 families among the lost. And among those professing to be saved and delivered, living in the RECONCILING power of God, the divorce rate is... well, identical! Children turning against their parents, abandoning the faith as soon as they can get out of the house, adults praising Jesus on Sunday having forgotten to visit Mother in the nursing home for the 8th week in a row....

And in the midst of all this BLIGHT upon society, this PLAGUE that is killing families left and right, what does the modern church offer? Why, segregated church services. No children allowed in the "real" service, they must be shuttled off to "children's church" or "youth power hour" or whatever else it's called. At least the coloured folks got to sit in the balcony back in the day....

Church programs are offered and marketed on the premise that the family will be strengthened thereby... never mind the growing number of families who are abandoning church because they feel these programs are DIVIDING their families even more. The world by its ungodly anti-family culture teaches youth and adults to SEPARATE, to view each other as strange and alien... and the modern church perpetuates that cursed deception, while all the time passing out flyers saying "your family needs the church"....

Men take precious little oversight of the church, have precious little ministry in the church, and are not tapped as leaders and examples to the younger men and boys... women's ministry often amounts to little more than baking the peanut brittle... no wonder young ladies drop out...

Where are the men who take the younger men and boys and show them by example what GODLY MANHOOD is all about? What godly LEADERSHIP in the home, in the church, and in the "gates of the city" are all about? Where are the women teaching the younger women to love their husbands and raise their children...

Speaking of men in the gates...

Seems the church has decided that separation of church and state requires church men to stay out of the gates of the city....leave that business to the ungodly...

4. The Christian religion teaches that material wealth is at best a worrisome bother, more likely a snare of the devil. But the modern church teaches that poverty is at best a curse from the devil, at worse a sin against God! Jesus is presented as if He sported around Galilee in a gold plated chariot with platinum wheels, drawn by a team of the finest 1000-shekel horses, practically tossing bags of money to the folks (like Bagwan Shree Rajneesh used to do from his Rolls Royce in California?)

The Bible does not teach that poverty is fun, nor that it is somehow holy in itself. But the warnings against seeking to have wealth go unheeded in much of the modern church. "No man engaged in warfare entangles himself in the affairs of this world" seems to have been forgotten.

Jesus' early disciples could say honestly "Lo, we have forsaken all to follow you" but the modern church can only say "Sow a seed and get a 100 fold financial blessing! Credit cards accepted!"

The Bible teaches those blessed with money, "rich in this world" to share that money with the poorer brethren, and to finance "good works". But there are too many churches with wealthy believers sitting in the same building as other believers who don't even know if they can keep the lights on for another month... and ne'er the twain shall meet, it seems. I know of one poor sister, a single mom (her children would Biblically be called "the fatherless") who stated her desperation, and was told by the elders of the church to get on welfare.

The modern church is full of hypocrisy. Sure there are good people in the modern church. Sure there are good churches, doing the right things. But there seems to be a tsunami overflowing this world at present, a flood tide of APATHY and CARNALITY.

We look at the sinful world, and preach that people should flee the wrath to come, and escape the coming judgement...

But, have we forgotten, that "judgement BEGINS AT THE HOUSE OF GOD?"

[Praxeas]

Originally Posted by Eliseus

And in the midst of all this BLIGHT upon society, this PLAGUE that is killing families left and right, what does the modern church offer? Why, segregated church services. No children allowed in the "real" service, they must be shuttled off to "children's church" or "youth power hour" or whatever else it's called. At least the coloured folks got to sit in the balcony back in the day....

You probably had a lot of good points to be made I am sure those here would agree, but when they hit this part they are probably scratching their heads and writing you off as just ranting. The crack about colored people just makes this "point" all the more absurd. All races are welcome and ALL ages are welcome

For starters, what is "real church"? Are you saying that youth and kids can't possibly have "real church" unless they are surrounded by adults? Most churches I know of have services where it is specialized for kids and youth AND where ALL the members, adults and kids, are together in "real church"

Church programs are offered and marketed on the premise that the family will be strengthened thereby... never mind the growing number of families who are abandoning church because they feel these programs are DIVIDING their families even more.

The growing number of famlies? Who did the poll and where can I find the results? Why don't those families just ignore the programs and go to the all included services most churches have?

The world by its ungodly anti-family culture teaches youth and adults to SEPARATE, to view each other as strange and alien... and the modern church perpetuates that cursed deception, while all the time passing out flyers saying "your family needs the church"....

Really? You know early Pentecostal believers very often had services where women were on one side and men on the other? Billy Sunday started the Sunday School paradigm a long time ago...are you saying he was influenced by an ungodly anti-family culture that views each other as strange and alien?

The rest of what you posted I either agreed, did not understand your point or did not understand why you made it an issue of THE modern Church and not rather an issue of many modern churches. Not all churches are preaching a prosperity gospel

Originally Posted by Praxeas

You probably had a lot of good points to be made I am sure those here would agree, but when they hit this part they are probably scratching their heads and writing you off as just ranting. The crack about colored people just makes this "point" all the more absurd. All races are welcome and ALL ages are welcome

Decades ago, a lot of "churches" segregated by race. The "coloured folks" as they called them had to sit in a separate section, usually a balcony or some such thing. My point was, folks are mor esegregated now in many churches than what was going on 50-100 years ago. Obviously, you completely missed that point.

Oh, and I have long ago accepted that 90% of the posters here consider me to be ranting every time I hit "submit post".

For starters, what is "real church"? Are you saying that youth and kids can't possibly have "real church" unless they are surrounded by adults? Most churches I know of have services where it is specialized for kids and youth AND where ALL the members, adults and kids, are together in "real church"

"Real church" is the "big people's service". The pesky childen must be whisked outof sight and out of mind so as not to interfere with "real church" (ie, adult church), contrary to Jesus' explicit instructions.

The growing number of famlies? Who did the poll and where can I find the results? Why don't those families just ignore the programs and go to the all included services most churches have?

You base everything you know on polls? I meet people all the time who quit going to church specifically because they feel the church divides their family, because they object to the family segregation, the pressure to turn their kids loose to the "youth program" and the "youth camp" and yada yada yada.

Really? You know early Pentecostal believers very often had services where women were on one side and men on the other? Billy Sunday started the Sunday School paradigm a long time ago...are you saying he was influenced by an ungodly anti-family culture that views each other as strange and alien?

I could care less what Billy Sunday did or did not do, and I could care less what "early Pentecostal believers" did or did not do. The Bible does not instruct the church to segregate families as is so common nowadays. Modern family segregation in the church is counterproductive, encourages a worldly paradigm regarding the family, and fails to counteract the destructive influences of the world that divide and destroy families. The modern church PARADIGM is not designed to build strong, godly families for the Lord, in spite of advertising to the contrary.

The rest of what you posted I either agreed, did not understand your point or did not understand why you made it an issue of THE modern Church and not rather an issue of many modern churches. Not all churches are preaching a prosperity gospel

Did you use a number two pencil to fill in the bubbles? lol

"THE modern church" is the whole of Christendom with the Oneness Pentecostal movement largely trailing along blindly. I specifically stated there ARE good churches doing right, and good believers doing right.

But they are a remnant in the MODERN church culture, unfortunately.

BTW, my primary point was that the modern church culture is not providing the answers this world needs to hear, by and large.

Many are doing a good work, no doubt.

But many, many more are living lives that testify to the EXACT OPPOSITE of what is often preached.

[Sister Alvear]

Why is the modern church not providing an answer? Most do not even know we exist because most stay hidden within 4 walls...those early disciples went EVERYWHERE preaching the gospel...

One thing I'm learning in this life is that there's a way to get your point across to the people you're trying to get it across to...

And ranting isn't the way to do it effectively...




You're going off on this diatribe about how awful the modern church is, yet you forget to realize that you're posting it on a forum where most of the people consider themselve part of the modern church.

If you barge into someones house with a baseball bat and begin to trash the place screaming and yelling about something you think they need to change, how receptive to your message do you think they will be?


Think about it for a little bit, Mr. Self Appointed Prophet of Calling the Church to Repentance.


Your "primary point" was to come in here like gangbusters and tell us all how horrible we are. That was your primary point.

You lost your audience, bubba.

Try another method... maybe that will work.

[MissBrattified]

I have to agree with Prax and Ron. Your overall points are good ones, but when you bring what most are going to view as utterly silly examples in to prove those points, you lose credibility.

When you are addressing a huge problem, and then you relegate the cause to something such as kids having a separate class from adults once a week...well...that's just laughable.

By the way, in our church children are welcomed and cherished. However, in order to teach them about Jesus at the earliest age possible, we give them their own class with stories that are on their level, without big words and confusing adult-like examples. Good teachers teach on the level of the audience. Jesus did that. It has nothing to do with segregating families and keeping parents apart from their children.

Also, there are things that sometimes ought to be discussed in adult classes that children don't need to be present for, IMO. I do not know of any churches that:

1. Don't allow children to be in the main services.
2. Force children to attend Sunday School classes if they don't want to or if their parents don't want them to.

[Felicity]

Didn't take the time to read Eliseus's whole post but I think I got the gist of it. The truth is the church isn't much different than the world really. That has to definitely be part of the problem.

Like I've said God doesn't depend on the Church to reach the world. He often reaches outside the established church in wide sweeping moves to reach those who will say "yes" to the message of salvation.

Originally Posted by Felicity

Didn't take the time to read Eliseus's whole post but I think I got the gist of it. The truth is the church isn't much different than the world really. That has to definitely be part of the problem.

Like I've said God doesn't depend on the Church to reach the world. He often reaches outside the established church in wide sweeping moves to reach those who will say "yes" to the message of salvation.

There you go, barging in here, ranting with a diatribe ....

Originally Posted by Ronzo

One thing I'm learning in this life is that there's a way to get your point across to the people you're trying to get it across to...

And ranting isn't the way to do it effectively...




You're going off on this diatribe about how awful the modern church is, yet you forget to realize that you're posting it on a forum where most of the people consider themselve part of the modern church.

If you barge into someones house with a baseball bat and begin to trash the place screaming and yelling about something you think they need to change, how receptive to your message do you think they will be?


Think about it for a little bit, Mr. Self Appointed Prophet of Calling the Church to Repentance.


Your "primary point" was to come in here like gangbusters and tell us all how horrible we are. That was your primary point.

You lost your audience, bubba.

Try another method... maybe that will work.

I don't think you were part of the intended audience, actually. lol