Written on May 5, 2017 by admin in Collide Blog
In a culture where consumerism causes the selling point to be about me, myself, and I, I’ve come to face the fact that as a believer, Jesus is not a capitalist. And before you get upset, this is not a position paper on capitalism. Hear me out. Even within our church culture around the world, we’ve begun to build ministries that entice this generation with what we can do for them. We pick churches because we like the community, or the children’s ministry, or the style of worship, and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that in and of itself.
But I want to propose a thought. What if we, as a church, are building Christians that are not Biblical?!
I’ve recently noticed a trend in Christian worship songs. When I was growing up, most of the songs were solely about the glorification of Jesus. They were songs directly written to Jesus. I’m not knocking the modern worship movement, which I love, but I’ve noticed that the writing has changed. More and more, worship songs are about what Jesus did for ME, and how He blessed ME, and how He loves ME. I even heard a popular worship song with the lyrics, “…we are a mighty generation.” It seems as though worship is becoming less and less about Jesus and more and more about us in relation to Jesus. We have somehow become the main focal point in our worship.
Even sermons are becoming less and less about dying to self and coming alive to Christ. A lot of the popular sermons that I hear now, can be summed up with hard hitting one liners about how to fulfill one’s purpose in life. Our preachers have become amateur untrained pop psychologists who weekly spit out rhetoric about figuring out how to make our personal lives amazing and bearable.
When did our Christianity become about fulfilling our purpose in life? Our whole life is to be called according to HIS purpose (Romans 8:28). Quite often as believers, our heart-felt desires to fulfill a personal mandate in life must be nailed to the cross for the benefit of God’s purpose and plan in the earth. I know this is hard for our generation to believe, but sometimes God will call you to do something that sucks or doesn’t fulfill you on a personal level. The fulfillment of our life should be derived in the pleasure of God. Now, calm down, because I’m sure by this part of the blog, you’re thinking about stoning me. But check this out…
Almost everyone that God calls in the scripture seems to be the most unqualified and uncomfortable person ever. Gideon explains to God what a punk he is. Mary explains how young she is. Moses explains what a bumbling fool he is. John the baptist explains to Jesus how unworthy he is to baptize Jesus. And the list goes on and on. I think our generation has to come to grips with the fact that our life is most fulfilled when His purpose is fully accomplished through our lives.
In coming to the realization that this life is only a vapor in the span of eternity, I have to ask myself, is my personal fulfillment really priority?! If I knew then what I know now, I would do high school all over again. Why? Because in high school I was consumed with peer pressure, hanging out, and enjoying momentary fun. After having been an adult, I realized that I could’ve made so much more of my high school career. I realize that life is bigger than my high school years, and even though I did alright, I could’ve done so much better if I had a bigger perspective. The same is true in life. In perspective to eternity, life is so small. This life is not and can not be about me. It has to be about something more.
I want to challenge you. What areas in your life do you need to die to? What sacrifices do you need to make, in order to see God’s kingdom established in your life? Maybe it’s a career or academic situation. Maybe it’s a relationship or material thing. Whatever it is, I encourage you from eternity’s perspective to realize that your sacrifice is not in vein. As you continue to build God’s kingdom, and deny yourself, heaven’s history books will speak well of you.
Don’t miss your opportunity to make your life all about God.