style="font-size:15px;"> Another foundation stone in the building of the Church is a great sense of compulsion. You and I cannot keep the gospel to ourselves, but we are commissioned to share it with other people. Emil Brunner says that “the Church exists by mission just as fire exists by burning.” When a fire ceases to burn, it is not fire. When a church ceases to be concerned about other people, and stops sharing the good news of the gospel, it has become only a social club. Without a sense of compulsion to share the good news, the Church is not a part of the body of Christ. In Christ’s name we are willing to go, to be, and to serve. In the Great Commission of Jesus, the statement is expressed in the Greek not as imperatives but as participles. It reads more exactly, “As you are going...” Jesus is assuming that those who have felt and experienced his redeeming grace will be sharing the good news with other people. Not to share the gospel is to leave the blind man in his darkness, the deaf person in her silence, the beggar at the gate, to pass by on the other side of the man hurt on the Samaritan Road, and to leave those who hurt in their pain.
We cannot be content to receive the good news, but we must also be willing to share it. We must not be content to receive salvation but to become agents of reconciliation. We must not be content to receive love but to become lovers in the world so that other people can see the power and grace of Christ through our lives. We must not be satisfied to accept the labor and sacrifices of our ancestors and be unwilling to labor in Christ’s Church ourselves. In 2 Samuel 24: 19-25, we have the story where David approached a stranger, who was not a Hebrew, and asked him if he could buy a certain field and build an altar to God. The man offered to give the field to David, but David declined his offer, and said: “No. I will not offer to the Lord my God that which costs me nothing.” We have to remember that it often can be costly to be a part of the community that worships God, and we do not want to offer God “that which costs us nothing.” It is not “cheap grace,” as Dietrich Bonhoeffer reminds us.
It will cost you and me time, energy, and possessions as we commit them in Christ’s service. In the Church of Christ there is a sense of compulsion to go and share the good news of Christ with others. We are commissioned to build the Church of Christ. We are knitted together and bonded together as his people. The Church as “living stones” is a living, growing organism. The Church is always a living body because it is a living God who directs its mission.
A painting depicted Satan and Faust engaged in a chess match. Underneath the painting were written these words, “Checkmate.” If you know anything about chess, you know that the word “checkmate” means the game is over. The king can make only limited moves, while the queen is the most versatile player on the board. Other pieces on the board have limited moves. One day a world champion chess player came into the art gallery and studied the painting for a long time, and, then, he exclaimed so that everybody in the gallery could hear him: “It’s a lie. Both the king and the knight can move!”
There are a lot of people who are trying to tell us that the Church is dead; it is checkmated. That is a lie. The Church of Jesus Christ is alive and at work in the world. We are a part of his Church. We are the people of God. Let Christ build us, mold us, and make us into the kind of people that we should be. May God grant that we shall be his living Church in the world.
3
The Challenge of Change
Several years ago, a nine-year-old boy died of old age. He was suffering from Progeria, a disease described as rapidly advancing age. At nine years old he had all the symptoms of a person ninety years old. He was bald. His skin was very wrinkled. He suffered from hardening of the arteries and other difficulties of people in advanced age. You may have seen reports within the past few years on television or in the newspapers about several other young people who were suffering from this same illness.
I first read about this illness in Alvin Toffler’s book, Future Shock. He used this boy as an example to describe the rapidity of change in its impact upon the world today. Just as a small nine-year-old boy seems to have lived ninety years within his short nine years, so many of us feel that time has been compressed by the changes which have taken place so quickly. It is difficult to adjust to the rapidity of the changes happening all around us in our world today. It is astounding what has happened so quickly. Look at the areas of medicine, science, and technology over the past few years. The changes that have occurred have been astronomical.
The Rapidity of Change
Two writers, Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner, have used the metaphor of a clock face to depict the changes which have happened within civilization. The sixty minutes on the clock represent the three thousand years since writing has been used. Each minute stands for fifty years. These two men then set some figures on that time clock, so we could see how close we are to many of the great events in world history. Only nine minutes ago on this kind of time clock, the Printing Press was invented. Three minutes ago, the locomotive, the telegraph, and the phonograph were invented. Two minutes ago, the radio, motion picture, rotary press, the telephone, the automobile, and the airplane were invented. The motion picture, which was invented just a few moments ago, added sound only a minute ago. Within the last ten seconds television and communication satellites were invented. Within the last five seconds computers came into existence; and within the last fraction of a second the laser, microchips, open-heart surgery, heart by-pass surgery, and transplants have been introduced. We are told that more has happened within the last split second scientifically, medically, technologically, and educationally than has taken place in all the rest of known history. And we wonder why we are shocked by the rapidity of the change all around us! Many simply do not know how to adjust to it at all.
I am old enough that I can remember the “B.T.” days, “before television.” There are days when we would all like to be free of television. Television, though, has rapidly changed our society. Our homes are often geared around it. Politicians now run their campaigns around television exposure. Many are elected because they are good at public relations and promotion and may be weak in political savvy or insight. It is the image that sells them. Television has changed sports, made it available for instant consumption, and holds an ideal of ability that will forever elude most of us. Television determines products we buy, where we go for vacations, clothes we wear, cars we ride in, and so many other things about our whole lifestyle. This is true even to the point of what has happened in religious services on television. Entertainment is now the chief religious sales pitch and, if we are not entertained, many feel that they have not had a religious experience with God.
The automobile has also changed our society. Our landscapes have mountains of old cars piled high. Cities have been built around automobiles. Courting habits have been changed by automobiles. Businesses and their job markets are determined often by the accessibility of automobiles. Computers, e-mail, fax machines, cell and smart phones and other forms of technology have forever changed our lifestyles. Yes, our society has undergone a great deal of rapid change, and some of us really do not know how to adjust to them.
Snoopy is seen lying on his doghouse in a peanuts cartoon. The night is black; the stars are shining brightly. As he is looking up into the heavens he says, “I am always impressed by the constancy of the stars. It gives me a feeling of security to look up and know that the star I see will always be there. And will ...” Suddenly he sees a shooting star fall across the sky. In the next frame, you see Snoopy lying across the top of his doghouse with his head down and with a droopy look of dismay. We are beginning to discover that even the stars fall and do not last forever.
Some have exclaimed: “Alas, alas the times now are not what the times used to be!” That inscription was written six thousand years ago in Babylonia. Even then times were changing. One of the popular songs of a few years back declared: “The times, they are a-changing.” It is difficult for us to imagine what people tomorrow will think about the changes that will take place in the tomorrows ahead of us.
We Often Prefer the Familiar
