Struggles at Church . . .

My Sunday school lesson yesterday was on Acts 15 which serves as the historical account (perhaps the minutes) of the 2nd called business meeting of the New Testament Church. The Apostle Paul and his wingman Barnabas had ventured out to some remote regions encountered some difficulties and doubled back to Antioch. Upon their arrival back at Antioch, the missionaries learned that during their absence that some guys from Judea had visited the local Church (which was in stages of infancy). The young Church gave audience to the visiting men . . . and those visitors put a fly in the ointment. The visitors insisted that these new Believers still had not yet achieved the status of salvation as they had a few additional requirements to achieve or meet, and laid out some items enumerated in the Law of Moses. After some debate, the young Church decided that it ought to dispatch a delegation to Jerusalem to present the matter before the Apostles and Elders there. Thus, a special called business meeting was held. I referred above to this as the 2nd called business meeting of the new Church . . . believing that the first called meeting was when the first Deacons were elected to settle the issue do distribution of goods amongst the widows of the Church.

Those in attendance at the business meeting were the Apostles, Elders, a group of believing Pharisees (sticklers for details—men who thought they, and they alone, understood the rules and how things were supposed to be), members of the local congregation, Paul, Barnabas, and the Antioch delegation. The speakers at the meeting were: Simeon Peter, Paul, Barnabas and James, the half-brother of Jesus, who served as the local Pastor. After considerable debate, the Jerusalem council determined that the men who had caused the confusion at the Antioch Church were wrong in what they had put before those new Believers. The Council concluded that salvation was not achieved by doing stuff and keeping a set of rules . . . that salvation was accomplished by individual faith! In spite of the leader’s moment of clarity, they still permitted their long-held beliefs and traditions to creep forward and concluded that these Gentiles “would do well to abstain from blood, meat from animals that had been sacrificed in the pagan temples, and immorality,” and then put it in a letter to the Church at Antioch and sent the letter back by the delegation.

That event ought to serve as a model for dealing with matters within the Church, and thankfully, it most often does, but that is not always true. Tragically, there are occasions when a few forget that it is really the Lord’s business and begin to behave as if it is their own, personal business. That can become quite problematic.

I recall reading of a Church that split soon after completion of a building program. Rather than expend large sums of money on decorations in the new facility, the building committee decided to engage a number of artists to paint/draw murals depicting various Bible stories on the wall in different areas. One mural depicted Daniel in the lion’s den, another showed Noah standing on the deck of the ark surrounded by animals, still another showed Jesus walking upon the water, and a variety of others events. During the open-house, folks wandered through the lovely new facility and admired and enjoyed the clever art work; then a group stumbled upon a scene of Adam and Eve in the Garden . . . merely covered with fig leaves. As the crowd inspected the painting, someone commented that neither Adam nor Eve had a belly button! A debate ensued . . . some arguing that an umbilical cord would not have been appropriate for the pair as they had been created and argued that the artist got it right, as opposed to natural birth process that properly leaves one with a belly button. The debate heated up and soon thereafter split that Church body that had just earlier been growing and glowing.

I read of another Church . . . this one located in a small rural town in the Deep South that had strayed from normal building standards and build its new Church facility with logs and argued that the building-style honored the age of the Church and paid tribute to its Southern heritage. Before too long, a debate began and the Church split up. A group of angry rednecks drove out to the building site and using their chainsaws cut the new building in half! The group left “The Other’s” half of the log building on site, loaded their half up onto a trailer and smugly drove off!

While we might chuckle at such bazaar events, we ought to be ashamed.

The truth is that one can enter any Church facility and see some things that ought to have been made larger, others that ought to have been made smaller, some things that were painted the wrong color, and several areas where the wrong flooring section was made.

I want to never get caught up in such matters of insanity. I simply want to enter the Lord’s house with an attitude of gratitude . . . ever mindful that I have no right to even be able to stand upon that holy ground except that Jesus loves me and that He, and He alone, paid my price of admission.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.