Empty Lighthouses
As a Christian, a blog-writer, and a pastor, I continue to feel the intense pressure from both culture and even parts of Christianity to soften Biblical beliefs. To stick to just the happy parts that don’t make anyone feel anything perceivably negative.
Of course we are to always carry ourselves with grace. The blunt object of truth without love indeed causes harm, but I see the ever-increasing cultural cues to shave off the hard truths of Christianity and to leave them out altogether. The thing I simply cannot get around though is, we can actually KNOW the creator. He has revealed Himself in His Word - which is crazy and amazing if you think about it. As Christians, our role is never to change it, hide it, alter it, amend it, or try to improve upon it. Simply, we are to believe it and proclaim it.
It’s devastating, but today there are churches who are ashamed of what God has declared is good and evil, and true vs untrue. To see these new hybrid religions using the name of Christianity, but replacing the true Jesus of scripture with an imposter who has no ultimate preferences or commands and willingly bends the knee to whatever current demands our culture has is strange.
But the true King, Jesus Christ, will never bend His knee to the world. Instead, one day every knee in all of existence will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord over all. The elect of God, the bride of Christ will be ushered into eternal peace and glory into the unadulterated presence of God forever, and all those who denied, resented, perverted, twisted, and abused the name of Christ to maintain, justify, enjoy, and walk in sin rather than trust Him to take it away will be ushered into eternal, unadulterated judgement, wrath, pain, and fire from God Himself.
SUPER heavy stuff, but it’s how deadly serious this all is. Put simply, we can’t use God’s church to ignore or twist His Word and push the world’s ideals instead. The church, while never perfect, is the city on the hill. Salt of the earth. Light in a dark world. It’s the intended vehicle that God is using to call His people to repentance. His Word is the real flavor, not our ideas or perception of what love is based on a few decades of being alive. What good is a lighthouse with the light turned off? Without the stark contrast of light in the darkness, you get confusion and shipwreck.
Instead of trusting, studying, and proclaiming His Word, many today use the name of Christ just to make people feel less self-conscious, or to get them excited to start that business, or even worse, to make them feel like their sin isn’t a problem - which ultimately isn’t love for people. It’s not love for God. It’s love and protection for self. An empty, dark lighthouse that matches the darkness of the night around it.
We have the holy Word of God.
We aren’t editors.
We are couriers.
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"You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet. - Matthew 5:13
