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| Today's
"Feel Good" Religion
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Religion in our
time has been reduced in most instances to what makes you feel
good. Today’s religious scene is filled with invitations to
achieve an emotional “high” by coming to Christ. “God
loves you” today means that He wants you to be happy and
healthy, as well as financially sound. Much of the preaching
on television is little more than a health and wealth gospel,
one where you just “sow a seed,” and God will make a
bumper crop for you, one where you will not only be wealthy,
but conspicuously happy. The “ministry” may be different
on different TV channels, the evangelist dressed in varying
degrees of formality, ranging from fancy suits to open-necked
sports shirts and blue jeans, but the message is basically the
same. Just send in a “seed” and the multiplication of that
seed will net you a “bountiful harvest.” No word is given
as to how God will do it, just that He will.
Furthermore, if you have something that ails you, some nagging
physical malady, all you need do is call the prayer line, or
mail in a prayer request, or invest a little money for a
prayer cloth, or some Jerusalem healing oil, and you can be
immediately and completely healed of your sickness or disease.
Many TV programs join– in progress–a “healing service”
where the laying on of hands is being administered so as to
achieve the promised deliverance from pain and hurt. Some are
falling backward, some fainting, some are overwhelmed “at
the power of the Spirit.” Sometimes there will be
“testimonies” about how someone has been “healed” from
some malady. It helps, too, if you make a donation to the
“ministry” in order that the healing services may be
continued without interruption.
Definitive, distinctive Bible preaching is apparently out of
vogue and is not even contemplated as being necessary these
days. When the Scriptures are used, there is little or no
regard for context or proper exegesis. If the passage has the
word in it which fits the preacher’s need, he builds a
sermon on it without any consideration of the context or
accompanying language of the passage.
Even among the so-called “mainline churches,” the
preaching is no longer Bible-based. Rather, it is based on
what the people want to hear. For one thing, the preaching
being done today has little in the way of requirements
attached to it. Mostly, it merely copies some popular
televangelist’s motif, and guarantees the hearers freedom
from negative feelings, feelings of doubt and insecurity, and
a means of feeling good about who and what they are. Very
seldom is sin even mentioned. Sin is inherently negative, and
as a result tends to get in the way of the purely positive
preaching presently being propagated. After all, you can’t
feel good when you’re laboring under the consideration of
your own transgressions.
It has been deduced, by whom nobody seems to know, that any
sort of negative feelings are the work of the devil, any
feelings of insecurity are inherently evil.
Perhaps the most dangerous preaching, and the most cleverly
disguised, is the kind that says “it doesn’t make any
difference what you believe, just as long as you’re honest
and sincere–just come with us, you will be accepted no
matter what you believe.” Now that’s dangerous! And it’s
rampant in the Community Church Movement. It says
that truth is not definitive. Truth in today’s churches
marks off no boundaries, sets few limits, and has few
prohibitions. It says that a person just does what he “sees
as right in his own heart.” After all,“nobody has the
right to tell me what to do.”
The Bible nowhere promises a man that he will be financially
blessed for his faith. In fact, it teaches that a person may
have to give up his riches to follow the Lord (Luke 18:25).
Luke 12:15 tells us that “...a man’s life consisteth not
in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.” And
didn’t Jesus warn about “laying up treasures on earth”?
“Hearken, my beloved brethren, hath not God chosen the poor
of this world rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which he
hath promised to them that love him?” (James 2:5). None of
these passages suggests that it is sinful and wrong to have
this world’s goods, but each of them suggests the danger of
trying to “serve God and mammon.”
Furthermore, the Bible never suggests that because of your
faith in Christ you will feel good all the time. In fact, it
suggests that if you follow the Lord as you ought, you will
surely bring upon yourself ill will–often even ill
treatment. “My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into
divers trials, knowing this, that the trying of your faith
worketh patience” (James 1:2-3). Does that sound like the
“feel good” religion being produced on television screens
today? “All who live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer
persecution” (II Timothy 3:12). Does that sound like what
you’re hearing on the mega-church broadcasts today?
“Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial
which is to try you...” and “If ye be reproached for the
name of Christ, happy are ye...” “Yet if any man suffer as
a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God
in this name” (II Peter 4: 12, 14, 16). These passages
assume difficulties, not a “feel good” religion.
The truth of God is outside of man. Imperial or initial truth
resides only in God, not some religious group or some gifted
speaker. “Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make
you free” is not saying that you will be able to
subjectively perceive what is right, but that you must have a
truth that is outside yourself, that is objective, definitive,
and applicable in nature for the freedom you need from sin.
God has revealed His will to us, not the fact that we
each can win with our own will. “If any man speak, let him
speak as the oracles of God” (I Peter 4:11) leaves little
doubt as to where the truth is. It’s not in man’s heart,
no matter how sincere he may be; it is in God’s book. In
fact, Paul affirms that “eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither has it entered into the heart of man, the things that
God hath prepared for them that love Him.” Man, no matter
his ingenuity, no matter his sincerity, could never have
conceived the means for his own salvation. “But,” says
Paul, “God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit...so
that we may know the things freely given unto us by God (I
Corinthians 2:10, 12). It is His truth, His
revealed word. It is but ours to believe and obey.
Let us speak with our friends and neighbors about the glaring
errors being fomented on an uninformed and unsuspecting public
today. Let us get out our Bibles and show people God’s way.
“It is not in man that walketh to direct his own steps.”
Let us follow God, not men.
Dee Bowman
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Copyright (C)
2009
Southside Church of Christ
All rights reserved.
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