With apologies to those of you who usually look for my blog at two or three in the morning, here is today's post.
Let's briefly reflect on the postmodern "shifts": Pastor Steven spoke about one on Sunday night, and I propose the second one based upon my own reflections.
The church is being refined. We have shifted from "watching" to "doing". Services are no longer spectator events, they are events where the congregation is expected and encouraged to participate through the singing of hymns and choruses, through prayers, through giving, and through responding to the preached word during altar calls. Beyond services, the church community is being formed, fashioned, and discipled into the image of God. This occurs through our individual relationships with God and through the ministry of His Spirit.
The church is being rebuked. You really would have to be a simpleton not to realize that, over the past few years, the LORD has been sending the same message through several pastors and prophets: abandon sin and turn to the LORD with all your heart. Further, a clear warning has been sounded: those "in" the church who have not submitted themselves fully to God's refinement process will be removed.
Yes, refinement is painful. And it is humbling to be rebuked. But the only alternative for those who bypass these two processes is to be removed. Remember the parable of the wheat and the chaff? And remember that great line from an old hymn: "The flames shall not hurt you- I only design thy dross to consume, and thy gold to refine"... Let's embrace the refining fire and endure the rebuke!
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