Tuesday, May 12, 2015

FEED ME, Seymour, FEED ME!

            In an old classic favorite movie of mine, “Little Shop Of Horrors”, Rick Moranis owns a plant store that receives an exotic plant one morning that develops a serious appetite – for human flesh and when it gets the slightest bit hungry it cries out "FEED ME, Seymour, FEED ME!"
That movie came to my mind this past week as I was listening yet another teaching, like so many these days, being taught out of pulpits all around the developed world these days. In that moment I realized something. I realized that this is the tenor of far too many sermons and sermon series in our culture. I hear them talk about how God “wants” to bless us and how if we just have
enough faith and obedience that our lives should be a steady uphill climb to victory in every area, especially our finances, our morality, and our health. This school of thought has created a gigantic group of ill-informed Christians who believe if they put in their money and attend church services whenever the doors are open then they can feel good about “their walk” with Jesus and expect God’s blessings to follow. Unfortunately, this is a faith that dwells on self and not those we are here for, less on works and more on blessings, less on Jesus and our desperate need for Him and more on what we need to do to earn God’s blessings in our lives. It is a shallow, self-absorbed faith that determines success by the earthly blessings (or lack thereof). As I have seen somewhere before – that’s not the Gospel, folks – that’s karma.
            These theologically bankrupt teachings all seek to do the same thing – to improve people’s lives; which sounds like a good thing - however it operates from a flawed definition of the word “improved”. As Christians, isn’t growth in Christ what it really means to “improve”, and because of that we know that growing in Christ is not a life, nor should it be, of continuous blessing. I learned that when I was about five, the first time I heard the old adage, “no pain, no gain”. The Bible says that God works ALL THINGS for good to those who love Him and are called by Him. Growth through pain is a normal part of every human experience – Christian or not.
It is fairly easy to determine whether or not you are in one of these churches. When you go to Church this week and hear the teaching – when you leave ask yourself this one question – Was Jesus and what He has done for sinners like us the main focus of the sermon or was He hardly even mentioned? In too many of these sermons He has been taken out completely (or almost completely) and hardly anyone even noticed. If you listen for a month and realize this is true for your church, ask yourself this: “When I leave church each week am I thinking more about what I must do for God or more about what God has already done for me?” If it’s the latter then something is wrong.
            Even the witness of these believers is tied mostly to material or health or other blessings God has given to them and just comes off as bragging, and often when they are not being blessed physically or financially, then not only do they feel like a failure, but other believers, like Job’s friends, believe they must be doing something wrong and God is “correcting” them. Of course almost none of these “brothers and sisters” will say anything either way in the shallow, passive-aggressive
version of Christian love found in too many places these days. The Christian “love” on display in many of these houses of worship is like Facebook Christianity - 20 miles wide and four inches deep. In fact, we still have friends from a church we used to attend that will call us for help or to talk when they feel scared and alone, or are in need instead of people from the church because they many times feel judged (and rightfully so) by people there when hard times fall. These poor saints are not free to be who they are because they know that they will not be accepted by most in the congregation so they hide away, never experiencing the deep relationships, or the freedom that Jesus offered to those who get to live the true Gospel, in all it’s magnificent splendor. This is a Gospel that not only explains the sacrifice of the Son of God for our sins, but also our inescapable and overwhelming need for that sacrifice to be available to us every day of our sinful lives.
            We want to believe we are getting better, and sometimes we are, but we’ve already seen how “better” may not mean what we think, and since we know we are not made better by having more stuff, or better health, why do we believe that our stuff or our health are a sign that we are living right in God’s eyes? Think about this - if Jesus had believed this pervasive false doctrine of pay-as-you-go Christianity - then we would ALL be in a lot of trouble. Fortunately He endured pain and suffering for us – Doesn’t it only seem natural that following Him would bring suffering of it’s own – just because He knows that is what is “better” for us?” It does if we realize that He is good and He is smarter than us and knows what is best for us – whether it’s pain or pleasure.

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