She Gave Everything for Her Church, Will You?

I was moved by an article on Fox News about a couple who made a great sacrifice for their church.  The Chinese government has been increasing persecution of local churches.  This has included sending bulldozers to destroy church buildings.  A couple bravely stood in between a bulldozer and their church building.  The bulldozer pushed them into a ditch.  The husband managed to crawl out.  His wife, Ding Cuimei, was killed.  You can read the story here.  This story of courage and sacrificed led to a series of thoughts I would like to share.

Your Local Church is Very Important to God

Local churches are central to God’s plans to spread the gospel and to transform us into the image of Christ.  The New Testament teaches this in many ways:

Most of the books of the New Testament are written either to a specific local church, a group of local churches, or with instructions for someone overseeing a local church. The book of Acts tells the story of how the gospel spread and a big part of that story is how new churches were started and grew. Throughout the New Testament the role of local churches is pervasive. See for yourself (if you hold your cursor over a verse, it should pop up):

Matthew 18:17, Acts 8:1, Acts 11:22, Acts 11:26, Acts 12:5, Acts 13:1, Acts 14:23, Acts 14:27, Acts 15:3, Acts 15:4, Acts 15:22, Acts 15:30, Acts 15:41, Acts 16:5, Acts 18:22, Acts 20:17, Acts 20:28, Romans 16:4, Romans 16:5, Romans 16:16, Romans 16:23, 1 Corinthians 1:2, 1 Corinthians 4:17, 1 Corinthians 5:12, 1 Corinthians 7:17, 1 Corinthians 14:4, 1 Corinthians 14:5, 1 Corinthians 14:12, 1 Corinthians 14:26, 1 Corinthians 16:1,1 Corinthians 16:19, 2 Corinthians 1:1, 2 Corinthians 8:1, 2 Corinthians 8:18, 2 Corinthians 8:19, 2 Corinthians 8:23, 2 Corinthians 8:24, 2 Corinthians 11:28, Galatians 1:2, Colossians 4:15, Colossians 4:16, 1 Thessalonians 1:1, 1 Thessalonians 2:14, 2 Thessalonians 1:1, 2 Thessalonians 1:4, 1 Timothy 3:5, 1 Timothy 3:15, 1 Timothy 5:16, 1 Timothy 5:17, Philemon 1:2, James 5:14, 3 John 1:6, 3 John 1:9, Revelation 1:4, Revelation 1:11, Revelation 2:1, Revelation 2:7, Revelation 2:8, Revelation 2:11, Revelation 2:12, Revelation 2:17, Revelation 2:18, Revelation 2:29, Revelation 3:1, Revelation 3:6, Revelation 3:7, Revelation 3:13, Revelation 3:14, Revelation 3:22, Revelation 22:16

The above verses are not talking about a vague concept of church.They are talking about local churches.  Those local churches were filled with struggling, imperfect people just like my church and your church.  Those churches had problems.  Some had really serious problems, and others were doing relatively well, but none of them were perfect.  Just like our churches today.

Are the verses I listed the only evidence of how important local churches are in God’s plan?  Not even close.  The “one another” verses found throughout the New Testament are more evidence of the importance of Christians serving and worshipping together.  In the letter of 1 John, one of the main points is that true Christians have a deep love for other Christians.  We’ll see more evidence below.

Living for Your Church is as Important as Being Willing to Die for Your Church

Most of us will never be called to die for our church as Ding was in China.  But God calls all of us to do something which in some ways is just as challenging.  Once we are saved, He asks us to live our whole lives for His Church.

Last month I had the honor of leading our church and community as we celebrated the life and mourned the loss of one of our long time church members.  Ann had been an active member of our church since she moved to Severn with her husband around 1950.  She attended, and served, and worshipped, and used her gifts, and gave, and loved for over sixty years in her local church.  I usually encourage people to come to church more.  Ann was so weak her last few months, that part of me wanted to encourage her to stay home.  She could hardly keep awake or keep her head up.  But she wanted to be there so much.  I wish more people loved their church and lived for their church as much as she did.

Some Ways We can Live for Our Church

Practically speaking, how can you live for Christ by living for a local church?  Here are some ways:

1.  Attend.  Show up!  Every Sunday.  If you’re out of town, attend another church.  Make it clear to friends and family that you really love them, but for you Sunday morning is for worshipping God together with other believers.  If you have a job which requires you to work on Sunday mornings to provide an essential service, then go to a type of church meeting on a different day.  There are lots of church meetings and Bible studies all through the week, so there really is no excuse.

2.  Do more than just attend worship service on Sunday morning.  Be involved in some type of small group:  a Sunday School or Bible study or prayer group.  Many of these groups will be connected to a specific local church, but it is also fine to be involved with groups connected to a ministry where people from different local churches work together (Christian schools, ministries to the poor, Christian crisis pregnancy ministries, and more).  These should be in addition to, not in place of, weekly worship at a local church.

3.  Give.  Churches need money to serve and carry out God’s work.  Give sacrificially.

4.  Use the gifts and abilities God has given you to serve and build up your local church.  Whether it’s singing, playing a musical instrument, teaching children or adults, encouraging the downtrodden, organizing events, providing leadership, running a sound or video system, keeping up with the church bills and finances, or many other abilities, God wants you to use the gifts He has given you to serve His Church.

5.  Invite others to attend with you.  Don’t give up.

6.  Pray.  Pray for your church leaders.  Pray for other church members.

7.  Guard your church from evil.  I wish there was a magic barrier to keep evil out of churches.  I hate conflict.  But sometimes God will ask you to fight the good fight to protect your church from evil, or at least to support your leaders who God calls to watch over His Church (Acts 20:30-31).

What if My Church is Messed Up?

Don’t give up on church because it has problems.  Most of us have had a bad experience in church at some point.  I doubt that many of you have been hurt as badly by a church as me and my family were hurt at a previous church.  Here’s the thing.  When we finally felt we had to leave that church, the very next Sunday we were sitting in a pew worshipping in another church.

The churches in the New Testament also had problems.  Some of them had severe problems.  God’s solution was never for His people to give up on church.

Sometimes God may call you to stay and work to correct problems and bring healing to a broken church.  Other times you may feel led to leave.  If you leave, find another church.

Jesus also Died for the Church.

Ding Cuimei was not the first person to die for the Church.  Or the most important person.  It is true that Jesus died for you individually (Praise God for his amazing love and grace!).  It is also true that Jesus died for His Church, which He loves and cares for:

Ephesians 5:

²⁵ Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her

 ²⁶ to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word,

 ²⁷ and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.

 ²⁸ In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.

 ²⁹ After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church--

 ³⁰ for we are members of his body.

Hebrews 13:16 And do not forget to do good and to share with others . . .

Prince’s Confused, Backwards Theology

Like many people my age, I remember listening to Prince on the radio in High School and college.  I wasn’t as discerning back then.  I am glad I listened to some really great stuff for my soul (lots of Keith Green and other Christian music).  I regret that I also listened to a lot of worthless stuff.  When I heard that Prince died, a few lines from some of his most loved music (“Purple Rain”, “1999”) started to play in my mind.  I didn’t remember more than a line here and there, so I found a couple of them on YouTube and listened to them.

When I listened to “1999” and “Let’s Go Crazy”, I quickly recognized something that was far less clear to me as a high schooler.  I saw how sad and backwards some of Prince’s theology was.  Before I discuss that theology . . .

A Couple of Disclaimers

When I discuss Prince’s “theology”, I am looking mainly at the content of the songs I remember most (which seem to be the songs most people remember most).  These songs go back some thirty years.  I do not know what Prince believed more recently.  I have no idea whether or not he believed the true gospel before he died.  I read that he became more “religious” at some point.  If I was ministering to his family or close friends who knew him personally, I would certainly be thinking about what he might have believed his last years.  But that is not my purpose in this blog post.  Here I’m writing to people who, like me, mainly remember Prince in light of his most popular songs.

Also, when I write below about Prince’s “theology”, I am not referring to what you may think of as a “formal” theology.  Everybody has theology.  Everybody has beliefs about God, about where we came from, about what is wrong with the world, and about how all this will turn out for us personally and for our world.  Some people can express these beliefs in a clear, systematic way.  For others, these beliefs are confused and jumbled. Even “I don’t care about that stuff” is a theological view with profound implications. Whether it is based on the Bible or on a mix of pop music and TV talk, each person’s theology deeply affects how they live life each day.

The Theology of Some of Prince’s Most Well Known Songs

Most bad theology is a mix of half-truths added to lies.  In songs like “1999” and “Let’s Go Crazy”, Prince includes some important truth:

1.  He recognizes that this life is going to end, and it might end sooner than we expect.

2.  He fears judgment day.

3.  He talks about a future life which will be better than the one we have now.

That all sounds pretty good.  Sadly, he comes to the exact opposite conclusion that the Apostle Paul came to when considering these truths.  Prince’s response to the truths above is to encourage everyone to party a lot and have all the fun we possibly can before we die.  By fun, it appears he mainly means sex and partying.

Paul says that a philosophy of “party while you can” only made sense if there was no resurrection:

If the dead are not raised, "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die." (1Corinthians 15:32b NIV)

Apparently, Prince did not have all the pieces of true Bible based theology.  Perhaps he felt that there was no hope for him to survive judgment, so he might as well have fun now.  If he thought like that it means he did not really understand the deep love and amazing grace of God which led to the atonement Christ made for our sins. 

Or perhaps Prince thought that he would go to Heaven no matter how he lived.  If he thought like that it means he did not understand the holiness of God who rightly hates all sin.

We’ve all seen people who foolishly lived according to Prince’s “party while you can” philosophy.  It is a destructive lifestyle which may bring a brief period of “fun”, but quickly produces brokenness and despair.

But we might fail to notice a less severe form of the same life philosophy.  It seems to me that most people, including many who claim the title “Christian”, live life with the goal of getting the most comfort, pleasure, and happiness for themselves as possible in this life while avoiding danger and suffering at all costs.  This type of “comfortable life philosophy” is really based on the same broken theology that was sung by Prince.  It is a lifestyle which practically ignores the reality of God’s grace, judgment day, the seriousness of sin, and the promise of eternal rewards for those who choose to follow Christ.

And by follow Christ, I mean obeying His most radical commands:

"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. ²⁰ But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.” (Mathew 6:19-20 NIV)

"Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” (Matthew 16:24b NIV)

Christ calls us to live a life on earth that involves loving others sacrificially and also involves saying “no” to the sinful desires of our flesh. If we do, He promises eternal rewards. This is the exact opposite of “party while you can”.

It’s too Late for Prince, but not for Us

Again, I don’t know if Prince found salvation in Christ before he died.  If the initial reports about a drug overdose contributing to his death prove true, that will be a tragic illustration of the outcome of the theology he sang about.  Prince was given an extraordinary gift.  I wished he had consistently used it to glorify Christ.

But for myself, and for all of you reading this, God is still giving us grace.  If we look back at our lives and see times and ways in which we lived for this world instead of living for Heaven, all of that can be forgiven.  Really.  God’s grace is enough.  There is no sin you’ve committed that is so bad that the blood of Christ is not sufficient payment!

And not only can we be forgiven, with God’s help we can live in a new way based on a better theology.  A theology that takes seriously both God’s wrath and judgment as well as God’s grace and mercy.  A theology that understands the reality of both Heaven and Hell.  A theology which calls us to imitate a far better example than our pop icons:

Ephesians 5:1 Follow God's example, therefore, as dearly loved children

 ² and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

 ³ But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God's holy people.

Hebrews 13:16 And do not forget to do good and to share with others . . .