I become more and more amazed at how circular the history of church culture in America seems. The protestant ethos that many claim is an important element of what it means to be 'American' grew from a desire to escape an all-encompassing church from a centralized authority and get back to "the real way God wanted it." Fast forward 500 years and the cycle continues to repeat itself with suburban America standing in for Rome and disillusioned evangelicals starting home churches, missions, and non-denominational organizations like The Simple Way.

Meanwhile the dwindling number of members of mainline protestant denominations that have for generations been teaching the importance of social justice, redemption, and community-building are left scratching their heads wondering why another new church has to get started when they've been around for hundreds of years.

Probably more vicious than we realize.

The tumble into error of the American church started witht he reintroduction of Pelagianism as espoused by the Greatest Modern Heretic, John Wesley who started back up the works theologies and spawned the upwelling of the major cults like JWs, Mormons, 7th Day Adventists and all the other Arminian congregations to which most Evangelicals belong as does the Catholic church, Buddhism. Hinduism, Paganism, Mohammedism and all the rest of those who consider themselves a cut above their fellow man and somehow worthy of earning their salvation when another is not.

The Holy Spirit will not continue long with a congregation who clings persistently and stubbornly to deliberate doctrinal error for they preach a lesser Christ, not the Christ of the Bible.

"We preach Christ and Him crucified. Foolishness to the Greek and a Stumbling Block to the Gentile."

Churches rise on this foolishness and become something else when they see it as foolishness and try to explain it away in manner that makes sense to the damned, the spritually blind. The church that succeeds is obedient so it preaches this Christ Crucified in season and out, constantly with no embellishment or detraction. The Simple Truth is so powerful and elegant, it will bring the elect to their knees and make disciples of all nations, but only the elect will believe it and only by the pure Grace of God in the ministry of the Holy Spirit dispensing Irresistible Grace upon the Totally Depraved for His Own Good Reasons and not because of anything in ourselves but as a matter of His own gracious Election. Such a person, so saved, is saved ireversibly, because God is sovereign and Almighty and never breaks His Word.

The only time He broke His Word was on the Cross, actually, and it was the Word only to HImself and only to countenance through infinite mercy corrupted goods made new through the sacrifice of That Very Word.

Dd

Lift up Christ and him crucified and he will bring them in.

And they will be the true church. There is no other way.

I agree with OhNoNotAgain. I don't think the Holy Spirit is with these churches (most any way). Some other spirit.... certainly.

Jesus made personal connections & relationships with his followers and those around Him. You can't do that via a screen. What a waste of time, money, effort, etc. The road to Hell is paved with good intentions!

Well, it's easy to answer the question of the mainline protestants - but very hard to answer the deeper question of 'what now?'

The question of the mainline protestants is best answered by looking at their most ill-fated representative, the universalist/unitarians, formerly known as congregationalists. They originally relied on a sort of mob rule to perform 'church discipline' - but they quickly found themselves on the road to the lowest common denominator when it came to orthodoxy and orthopraxis. Every standard became hollow. Community even became hollow, with no demands placed on the individual. Social justice became another word for 'being nice to people in a thoroughly unobjectionable fashion' and redemption lost its core as suddenly nobody had anything to be redeemed from. People were even told that the things they didn't like about themselves, they should accept.

'People' saw through this. They continue to see through it. Offering nothing - with the occaisional big argument over nothing - the universalist/unitarians even declared in the early part of last century that they weren't a church. They lost most of their members and quickly backed away, deciding to call themselves churches again, just to keep people with a christmas and easter minimalism in the fold.

Now, the problem for the evangelicals is the temptation to try to get everybody 'through the door' and 'praying the prayer' and 'born again.' When your sole reason for being (purpose of purpose driven, like Rick Warren) is getting as many people through a door, the temptation is to multiply the number of doors, move it forward, make it larger, and double count people who come in, go out and come back in again...

All of these are supported by the theology of assurance - once saved always saved; so just getting that one little prayer becomes a one-way trap, a sort of religious roach motel. No matter that the person goes on to practice buddhism... still saved.

This has the problematic effect of watering down community, making it hard to tell what being 'saved' really means, etc. It means evangelicals following the mainstream denominations in their own arc of irrelevance and getting another group chasing in their tail. Ironically, it seems that one of the groups chasing them is the orthodox neo-catholics.

The pentacostals also had their own arc in all this, peaking it seems in the 70s and 80s, before folding into the evangelicals to a degree.

It can all be a bit mind boggling; and yes, largely it doesn't make much sense. Alot of the problem is that organizations never die, they just fade and fade and fade. Splits stay, unity never seems to return. But who knows.

BenK, what do you mean that statement?

It means that I've seen many (ok, a dozen, but still... for personal experience, that seems like quite a few) of the most stalwart among young evangelicals leave the typical 'evangelical' pack and become more or less conservative Roman Catholics - the sort that read encyclicals carefully, go to penance or reconciliation or whatever, and don't really like guitars and despise womanpriests.

This is counter to expectation because in the past, whenever a purity movement came up, it would cause additional splintering into the many disconnected elements of a new movement; now we have 9000+ denominations. Circling back around to the (not quite unified) Roman church is sorta mobius; an unexpected result.

Maybe, just maybe the problem with churches (mosques, synagogues et all) is that they are based on men interpreting the writings and teachings of other men from centuries ago, and those teachings fly in the face of all the knowledge we have accumulated in those intervening centuries. Not to boil things down too simply, but if all men are fallible, why would anyone trust the writings/words of another man who claims divine inspiration? All of your knowledge of a god comes from some other fallible creature, so all religious institutions are built on an inherent rationalization of our common sense. So to those who say their way is the one and only way to true enlightenment and salvation, I ask you to find the man who originated your church/religion, and prove that he was above error.

Amen.

Dd

I would not condemn a church out of hand just because it has a TV ministry. Benny Hinn and Kenneth Copeland would be my primary examples of Masqueraders. Certainly the Spirit that energizes those ministries is bogus, but Jesus said of those who were preaching Christ without knowing Him, that we are to let them preach, only we aren't to give them our pulpit.

Coral Ridge Ministries and Charles Stanley often preach on TV and no one is more astute and in tune with God than they. I was helped greatly by a TV Program Sunday Line by a preacher lady named Bernice Gerrard. The Holy Spirit used her mightily in my walk. Radio Preacher J. Vernon McGee is fabulous and I liked the Walter Martin debates for the Christian Research Institute. On the edge is John Hagee and Perry Stone, each has a great perspective to share, but their hob-nobbing with Benny Hinn makes them suspect, likewise with Pat Robertson who I think does considerable good with his TV evangelism but rubs elbows with the Benny Hinn vipers and other such wolves in sheep's clothing.

Of course, there is the Grat Billy Graham who, up until he got Alzheimers was a total straight shooter, although he was Arminian. I suppose any great Evangelist must believe that men make decisions in their heart and so make the most heart rending appeals.

"Like my daddy said, "It's in your heart not your head. You gotta give and give and give."" - from It'll Shine When It Shines, Ozark Mountain Daredevils.

Dd