The instant Christianity morphed into the business of
religion, its reason for being was deformed, butchered, and mutilated into some
grotesque apparition of what it was intended to be. Once it became a business,
Christianity was no longer governed by the higher calling of saving souls but
by the laws of supply and demand.
We had a product that most consumers tended to avoid, so we
retooled it to make it more palatable. We did away with the requirements such
as repentance, holiness, and righteousness and increased the benefits and
bonuses. Finally, a new religion where you can have your cake and eat it too.
And, for a limited time, if you sign up today, it not only applies to the great
beyond but to this present life as well.
Remember not so long ago when the entire world collectively
decided that the three things it couldn’t do without were hand sanitizer, face
diapers, and toilet tissue? The demand went through the roof, supply dwindled,
and people were selling hand sanitizer on Facebook for the price of a used
Hyundai.
Soon everyone got into the act because they saw the demand
outpacing the supply. Companies that once made adult beverages now made hand
sanitizer by the gallon, and every granny in North America suddenly became a
seamstress making face diapers from their old, unused bloomers. As far as
toilet tissue is concerned, well, it’s pricy starting up an entire tissue
enterprise, but people were offering their services hoping to teach others what
they can use around the house in lieu of Charmin’s extra soft. The one I liked
most was pulling the two-ply toilet tissue you had apart and making it into one
ply. That would make it last twice as long.
The point I’m trying to make this morning is that there’s
enough blame to go around as to why modern-day Christianity is in the decrepit
state it’s in. The supply would never have materialized if there had been no
demand for watered down, lukewarm, libertine doctrine.
If every Christian demanded Biblical exegesis and Scriptural
doctrine, you wouldn’t have gotten the rash of Joel Osteen wannabees, the
Creflo Dollar pimpologists, and all the other jet-setting mansion dwellers who
have at this point foregone fleecing the flock and are just skinning them
alive.
It’s not as though we weren’t forewarned; we just chose not
to heed the warnings. Paul was very explicit in his second letter to Timothy,
warning that men would not endure sound doctrine and heap up teachers according
to their desires. However, we turned it into a business model rather than take
it as the warning it was intended to be.
Give the people what they want, and they’ll love you as
you’re shepherding them toward hell. Give the people what they need, and you
will be called every name under the sun, not by the godless or the heathen, but
by the very people you were tasked with shepherding.
The situation may look hopeless, but there is one glimmer of
hope. The other day I went to my local supermarket and noticed that they were
giving away bottles of the selfsame hand sanitizer they had been charging $5 a
few weeks earlier. Why? Because the demand had dried up, nobody was buying it
anymore, and they were stuck with excess inventory they needed to be rid of.
The same principle can be applied to all the purveyors of
humanistic, self-centered, flesh-obsessed doctrine that omits Christ, the
cross, and the Bible altogether. The supply is exceeding the demand, and what’s
worse, more and more people are waking up to the reality that though they may
sound good and empower the flesh, the newfangled doctrines don’t work.
A sea change is on the horizon, and men will begin to search
for truth anew. The one unanswered question is, when they begin to search for
truth, will there be anyone left to offer it to them? Or, as Jesus put it when
the Son of Man returns, will He find faith on the earth?
With love in Christ,
Michael Boldea, Jr.
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