Deutero Q

As I watch the shenanigans being played by our denominational bureaucrats (I purposely do not refer to them as “spiritual shepherds”), I am becoming increasingly convinced that the Presbyterian Church (USA) is a dying institution. The signs are everywhere. For example, the PC (USA) continues to decline by tens of thousands of members every year; sadly, such has been the case for decades.

In the 1960s, mainline churches (i.e., theologically moderate to liberal denominational bodies made up of Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Methodists, Lutherans, Congregationalists, and others) accounted for about 40 percent of all American Protestants. Today the number is closer to 12 percent.

Further evidence of the final gasps of a dying entity can be seen in the draconian measures our leaders are employing to stop churches from exiting the denomination.

We mainliners (more appropriately, “sideliners”) embrace a governing structure that is locked in a 1950s time warp. I think here of American car manufacturers with their overpaid executives, plethora of middle level managers, and outdated manufacturing structures. The parallels to mainline/sideline Protestantism are striking.

Just like many corporate officials, 21st-century denominational bureaucrats are out of touch with their constituents and the times in which we live. Unwilling to respond to their “market audience” (grassroots Presbyterians), mainline institutionalists are also unwilling to exchange outdated “business” practices for more streamlined and effective ones.

Our rulebook, The Book of Order, grows more and more bloated and is cited and discussed ad nauseum at our presbytery "business" meetings, while Scripture is largely ignored. Pressing issues such as evangelism, church growth, moral and spiritual revival, etc., are rarely if ever addressed.

While conservative, Bible-believing churches continue to grow, the membership of mainline Protestantism continues to shrink. Amazingly, the number of ministers—at least in the liberal Presbyterian Church (USA)—is increasing!

Unless the Lord intervenes from on high, I fear that mainline Protestantism will continue to wither away … or sink deeper into the sea of irrelevancy … or go the way of dinosaurs … or, well, you pick your metaphor!

The words of Jesus are certainly instructive in this whole matter: “I am the true vine and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful” (John 15:1-2).

May the Lord have mercy upon us.

God formed us

Sin deformed us

Christ transformed us

Back in the sixties Bob Dylan wrote a song called, “The Times, They are a Changing.” And of course Dylan was right. The times are indeed changing, even in the church. Especially in the church.

One of the changes I have noticed in mainline churches is a shift from Christocentric theology to theocentric theology. In other words, people are talking less about Christ and are talking more about vague and fuzzy notions about God and spirituality. “Spirituality” is the trendy word for our time. Christ is being removed from center stage as people try to construct a god of their own design.

In the 1990s a radical Presbyterian minister preached a sermon titled, “What’s the Big Deal about Jesus?” That sermon created a firestorm in our denomination, as Bible-believing Christians such as myself stood up and said Jesus is a big deal. After all:

1. He is the center of God’s self-revelation in history. What do we celebrate every Christmas? The incarnation--that is, God became man. Jesus is God in human flesh. That’s a big deal!

2. Second, Jesus is the very center of God’s self-revelation in the Bible. The Bible is all about Jesus, from Genesis to Revelation. That too is a big deal!

3. Third, Jesus is at the very center of God’s redemptive work. In other words, Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead for sinners. He shed His blood for us. That also is a big deal!

Jesus is a big deal, and there is just no way that Christians can leave Him out of our discussions about God.

In Exodus 32, we read how Aaron and the Israelites turned away from the true God to worship a "god" of their own making. And that is what many people in the world and in the church are doing in our time. People want God on their terms, and so they construct in their minds a “god” of their own making, a "god" who often looks suspiciously like themselves.

But the Bible reveals no such God. If we want to know what God is like, we look at Jesus Christ, who is "the image of the invisible God" (Colossians 1:15). At the center of Christianity is God in Christ. In fact, the theme of Colossians is the preeminence and supremacy of Christ. And the theme of Colossians ought to be the theme of the Christian's life as well; Christ should be supreme in the lives of His people.

In these changing times, may those of us for whom Jesus is a big deal allow Him to reign supreme in every area of our lives.

"And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy." --Colossians 1:18