I heard a reference to this on the radio today:
When I lived in Atlanta, several years ago, I noticed in the Yellow Pages, in the listing of restaurants, an entry for a place called Church of God Grill. The peculiar name aroused my curiosity and I dialed the number. A man answered with a cheery, "Hello! Church of God Grill!" I asked how his restaurant had been given such an unusual name, and he told me: "Well, we had a little mission down here, and we started selling chicken dinners after church on Sunday to help pay the bills. Well, people liked the chicken, and we did such a good business, that eventually we cut back on the church service. After a while we just closed down the church altogether and kept on serving the chicken dinners. We kept the name we started with, and that's Church of God Grill." This incident is not unlike many churches, denominations, and individuals who over time, have drifted away from their original purpose. -- Charles Paul Conn
[Borrowed from Swindoll's "Dropping Your Guard," p. 53 -Holwick]
Have you drifted away from God's purpose? Are we in the church just teaching, preaching, and doing the things that are 'popular'? Are we thinking that if we get a good turnout that we are doing God's will?
If souls are not saved and lifes are not changed we are just serving chicken dinners.
3 comments:
Very true... but then again...
I think we need to be very careful. Yes, we are in the soul saving business. But we are also in the discipling business. I have come to realize that what takes place inside the 4 walls of the church should be primarily the training and/or making of disciples, so that they in turn go out and reach the lost.
Sadly... very few ever do that, as they would rather have a shouting good time in church and feel good about themselves than actually go into the fields to bring in the harvest.
You are correct Darrell.
Discipling is the lost practice in most churches. I was thinking of discipling when I said "changing lives" so I agree with you completely. Just getting conversion and them tossing them to the world just causes worldly, defeated 'christians'
Oh Man! Playing church is death! Amen? or OH MY?!?!?
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