What’s society abuzz about these days?
Fresh and local.
What’s the church abuzz about these days?
Fresh and local –
Local ministries done by local believers in our local area. We’ve redefined the Great Commission to be about loving our local neighbor. And we’ve redefined it to the extent that our millions of dollars of missions giving in the church has been redirected to social effort in our communities.
Loving our neighbor is obviously a command in Scripture. It’s a good thing. It’s a great thing. But it is NOT the Great Commission. And it is NOT missions.
The Great Commission commands us to go to the uttermost. Section 8 housing in America is not the uttermost.
It’s the reason why Nate and I and other peers who are going into unreached missions have been denied funding from churches. After 7 months of asking for church support, we’ve only been backed by ONE church. The overwhelming reason: “Our missions budget is used up” or “We focus on our local area first.” Thank God he has used individuals to carry our finances to the point where we have almost 50% of what we need to reach a new tribe in Papua New Guinea.
Obviously fresh and local is not a sinful philosophy, but it’s a philosophy from the world that Christians have been sold on. When we as the church want exactly what secular society is touting, however harmless it seems, we need to take a step back and evaluate.
Satan has used something silly and off the radar to deceive us. It’s brilliant, really. We’ve taken a totally amoral societal trend and used it to neglect the Biblical command to go to all the nations. And people are dying and going to hell because of it.
Remember that Paul told the Corinthians to not be ignorant of the devil’s schemes.
And before you think that what I’m saying is absolutely ludicrous, just think about it for a second.
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