[...]Cheap Grace: Pimp my gospel! via BlogRodent[...]…

I found this on a website and just really liked it I must admit the title caught my eye but its so true Cheap Grace: Pimp my gospel!
…

But I also agree with Jim and Rich: as long as you have people you potentially have problems. The great hope for us, is that Jesus took 12 men who were not qualified by the religious standards of their day and turned the world right side up! And the hope we have today is that God will hear our cry and our prayers and somehow use some of us to turn our world right side up!

“While reading a friends blog I was directed to the following two provocatively and accurately titled posts: Cheap Grace: Pimp my gospel! and Pimping Jesus: consumerism and the red-light gospel. I hope you all enjoy these insights into the modern evangelism/gospel presentation paradigm…”

I offer something I’ve written in one of my Bible’s taken from another blogger along the way: “Whatever our disappointments witht he Church, whatever its intransigence, or illogic, whatever ways we have been hurt by it, even exploited, whatever its humanity…we cannot ignore the presence which underlies its existence and gives us reason, always to hope. The failures of the Church do not negate the reality of God, But do we cut it loose? Should we all become religious free-lancers? This is not an option. For the nature of God’s relationship to us is also revealed in our communion with each other. This communion must be sacralized as a sign, not so much of God’s intention, but of our own. By declaring our intention, we can begin to receive the fruit of His”….

Hope…It is, indeed, one of the elements Scripture declares involved in our salvation (Romans 8:24). I believe it. Peace, my friend…..

As you note, we could too easily fall into a trap of criticizing the critics and being bit by the same poisonous snake.

I don’t know about other bloggers in general or about the author of the blog post I cited in particular, but for myself, in my 24 years with the A/G I have lived in four cities and regularly worshipped at six different A/G churches. I have probably become familiar with another two dozen or more on top of that due to travel, friends and family in other churches, visiting churches while looking for a “church home” in a new city, or visiting for special events. Additionally, having attended an A/G bible college and worked in the A/G headquarters I was exposed to a stream of visiting pastors, preachers, evangelists, and missionaries pounding pulpits in our daily or weekly chapel services. I’ve been to three General Council meetings, and several “campground” meetings held at district retreat centers. I try to keep in touch with what’s happening in the A/G. In my work at Christianity Today I’ve come into contact with various church leaders from different denominations and traditions, both as colleagues and as correspondents and acquaintances.

I don’t say this to brag (because my experiences are nothing special–you probably have similar and more varied experiences than I do, in fact), but simply to say that even though I’m not terribly well-travelled and even though I am a committed, single-church attender, it’s not hard to pick up on trends and issues when you have your ear to the ground and interact with a handful of church leaders over time.

I don’t know about other bloggers, but I know that it is possible to have an opinion about trends. And it’s more likely that someone will leap up and yell “Fire!” when they smell smoke than they would leap and yell “Peace!” in its absence. It’s the nature of “guardians” to point out the dangers they perceive–whether they are self-appointed guardians or not, and whether the danger is real or not.

In peaceful regard, and thanks for commenting…

Rich
BlogRodent

I don’t mean to complain overmuch. I just suspect sometimes that our perspectives, about the overall condition of things, are somewhat skewed and we’re not seeing the complete picture. I’d like to suggest at least one possible reason why this is so: much of what we think about the overall church derives from what gets printed by the “xtian book publishing” industry and magazines, sections of which are owned by solidly secular corporations whose number one goal is enhancing profits and measuring up to Wall Street expectations. There is a definite tendency from such an arrangement to publish whatever will sell, and what sells is the senstional or controversial (witness how well professional “heresy hunters” always seem to sell their books).

For example, when I see bloggers go on and on about various “problems in the church”, I often wonder “Good grief. Just one church (theirs) can’t be having that many problems? Don’t tell me, are they actually hopping around different churches, going church to church, for the purpose of observing these things? Or are they mostly reading about them in books or from other blogs?”

Anyhow, comment boxes are not the best place to carry on a lengthy dissertation, but I think you see my gest here.