Will the real church, please stand up?

Dear Brothers,
One of the things I’ve noticed recently among the modern Evangelical movement is the way we try to market ourselves to both the Church and the world. The thought behind the changes come from the differences in generational ideas and the fast pace of change in our nation. In political terms, we have a president who has taken FDR’s fireside chats and created weekly blogs or podcasts to make the nation feel like he, the president, is “plugged-in” and “cares”. The church in its desire to stay current and relevant has done something similar. We’ve introduced all sorts of chique techniques to impress our audiences (whoever they might be) with how hip and cool we are. We’ve left the liturgy of our parents and sometimes parents’ parents (a preacher behind a pulpit expositionally communicating the Bible), to embrace a liturgy (yes, its still a liturgy though its different) with a style where the preacher paces up and down and often amongst the congregation as though they were on the Maurie Povich show.

Now I’m not at all averse to technology. Personally, I enjoy it and the easy access to information and opportunity to learn. I love ipods, podcasts, blogs, youtube, and Facebook. But at what cost are we so involved in the methodology that we’ve lost track of the substance. May I suggest that though some of these methods may be helpful in communicating information, what really communicates is substance. What is the substance of the church? Is it not Christ, Him crucified, and Him exalted? There is a business that my wife and I frequent where the only advertising they do is “word of mouth”. They have committed themselves both in regard to their product and their service to excellence so that all they need to do is bring in customers to taste their product, and that is not hard to find since they have a very good reputation. Now while we have no “product to market”, Christ and His glory, is the centerpiece of the life of the Church, in her doctrine. Nonetheless, may I ask about her service? Does the Church glorify the Son, that the Father may be glorified? Does the Church serve one another in love? We need not ask are we attractive to the Church or to the world, but to Him. Do we honor Him in our preaching, in our doctrine, in truth? Do we honor Him in the way we serve one another? If we focus on these elements of the Christian life, both in worship and community, the methods we use will not matter so much. Remember, it is not ipods, nor blogs, nor webinars, nor chat sites, nor podcasts that save but Christ. Let us embrace the sound Biblical teachings of the doctrines of grace, and love one another in service to one other. All the rest is fluff.