[MorningWeeds, 2008, JAVanDevender]
God's Church has more in common with a field of weeds, I think, than a grape vine trained on a trellis.
It appears to me that the sprouting is much more haphazard and spontaneous ( at least from a human perspective) than orderly and consistent. This is not, may God forbid, to criticize the work of the Holy Spirit. It is His Church and He does what is best. But if Revelations 2 & 3 have anything to teach us, a plethora of churches, having wildly divergent orientations, is not always desirable.
First off, I believe that denominationalism is a good thing and that, within certain limits, it is necessary to have diversity within the broader church. I believe that there is not only room but blessing in the fact that different communions have different emphases within them. We need to challenge each other with our views of worship, with how the sacraments are to be understood and practiced, with what constitutes preaching, with how a scriptural ethic plays itself out in everyday discourse, etc. etc. Apart from this dialog flowing from sincere differences in perspective, the Church grows moribund and sterile... I think.
However, that divergence which is present and which reflects fundamentally different orientations toward Scripture, is not desirable and is deadly. The "weeds" in the field, often the ones bearing the most seeds, are often those who have departed from Scriptural authority... who understand the Scriptures as functioning, if at all, within a narrow band of spirituality which allows for most of the church's life to be governed by pragmatism, bureaucratic formalism, or even worse - impulsive innovationism. The desire to be "exciting" and "relevant" often means bending Scripture to our will or even ignoring it - making excuses for the parts that don't quite fit with what we think modern minds want to hear. That divergence which concerns me most is that which is growing out of a sense that Scripture is not God's Word for today... that it does not regulate the Church today... that it only gives us the history of what God has done, how He did it, and very little about how what He did and how He did it has any bearing on "now." There are those who clearly espouse this idea. There are those who practically espouse it though giving lip service to a different view. There are those who go beyond this. The bottom line... God's field is overgrown with weeds... and the rising sun reveals them glistening in its light.
It's about time for something to be done about this situation and Christians ought to be a bit apprehensive about what God may decide that to be. At the very least we ought to be heeding the Spirit's call to return to Christ as Head of the Church and discover in Scripture His voice calling us back to a more consistent, more unified voice and witness, even within our diversity. I am convinced that such is not only possible but is, in fact, God's intention for us. We need to repent and return to the Word of God, both Ruling and Inscripturated. We need to make His Word central in our lives, our worship and the governance of our churches.
It seems so simple and so plain. Why is it so hard?
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