When the Church Quit Preaching Lordship Congregations Started Living Like Hell — E.A. Johnston

I'm afraid the church of your day and mine, friend, doesn't look or act much different from the world. Just go hang out with some church folks today, and you'll soon learn that they love to watch the same movies non-Christians watch.

They love to drink the same beverages non-Christians drink. They love to cuss and use filthy language the same way non-Christians do. And morally, they are not much different than non-Christians. In fact, they're living like hell and enjoying it just like non-Christians do, but it didn't used to be that way.

I remember when I joined a church in the 1960s, the church folks back then dressed differently than the world. They spoke differently than the world, and they behaved differently from the world. You could actually tell the church people from the rest of society back then.

They stood out. They were different. They did all they could to live above the world and not be contaminated by it. I have observed the church for the last 50 years. Yes, 50 years. And I have observed her sad decline in her daily living.

It has been a steady descent downward for the last five decades. Why is this? Why is the church of our day such a laughingstock in society? Why does she lack power and influence and authority? I believe I can trace the sad demise of the church back when the church quit preaching the absolute lordship of Christ.

That's when congregations started living like hell. And that's the tale of my message this evening, friends. When the church quit preaching lordship, congregations started living like hell. In my Bible, in the Gospel of Luke, in chapter 2 and verse 11, there is an announcement from on high, the angel of the Lord brings good tidings to the shepherds and mankind by proclaiming that a Savior has been born.

My Bible states, for unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. Did you hear that, friends? Christ the Lord, not Christ your servant like you think he is. We have shrunken God down to man's level in the last 50 years or so and removed his other sovereignty over man.

But listen, friends, God has not changed his stripes to keep up with modern pagan society. God has not changed the title of his dear son from Lord in order to be more politically correct in our day of a court-run society.

No, friend, Jesus Christ is Lord. He is a sovereign Lord. He is a living Lord. He sits at the right hand of the Father, and he earned that right by way of a bloody cross. And if you want him savingly, you must come to him where he is.

He is a reigning Lord. He's not some little Jesus you accept as a free ticket to heaven and then go on living in your sins. There are no rebels in God's holy heaven, but there are plenty of rebels in a devil's hell.

Why the Church Abandoned the Lordship of Christ

I want to list some reasons why the church quit preaching the Lordship of Christ. And after I list them, perhaps we'll have a better understanding of just what's transpired in the last 50 years and why the church has eliminated the doctrine of the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

And I might add that when they did that, they changed the gospel message and allowed people into the churches who were yet unconverted from their sins. Here's this list. That's an indictment against the modern church in our day.

Easy-Believe-ism Replaces Repentance

Number one, the emphasis of the modern church has shifted from the Lordship of Christ to easy-believe-ism. We can thank a big Baptist seminary for that one. When the churches in this land adopted the easy-believe gospel, they murdered the doctrine of the Lordship of Christ, and then they buried it so no one could find it.

And when they did that, they broadened the way to salvation, which our Lord Jesus Christ never did. Suddenly, we had big crusades, filling big stadiums with a big evangelist, making it awful easy for people to come to Jesus, just get up out of your seat and walk down here to the front of the platform and decide for Jesus, and you will go to heaven.

And multitudes did just that. And when they broadcast that all over the televisions and pastors saw the immediate results of masses of people apparently coming to Christ, they adopted the exact same methodology into their church services on Sundays.

But in order to do that, they had to quit preaching the following doctrines. They had to quit preaching on sin, because you can't be a popular preacher if you preach against sin, while you just won't be accepted by the masses.

So they quit preaching against sin. Next they quit preaching on the fires of hell, because hell is a controversial subject and you mustn't do that, while it's not necessary to preach on hell's punishment for sin if you've already quit preaching against sin.

And if you don't ever mention sin or hell from the pulpit, friends, then it's not necessary to preach on the doctrine of repentance either. Why does a person need to repent if they have no sin and there is no hell?

All they have to do is just accept Jesus, just believe. It's as simple as that. And if you preach that kind of gospel, which is a compromised gospel, a diluted gospel, a perverted gospel, you will get your crowds for sure.

You will be popular and you will fill up your churches with new members. Then you can begin your building program. You can add on to your already bulging campus and grow a bigger church, because it's the pastors who have the biggest churches, who have the biggest voices within their denominations.

Did you know that, friends? It's a fact. I was sitting at a board meeting for a big Christian university, and around the room were a table of men in ministry. And we were told by the moderator of the meeting to go around the table and introduce ourselves.

One by one, each man stated his name and his church affiliation and his position in that church until they came to the big dog seated at the table. This man had the biggest church in his denomination.

He needed no introduction. He was the power broker at this meeting. All eyes were on him. All ears were bent in his direction. Us little preachers had no voice in that meeting for what the big man stated.

Everybody went with, because he had the biggest church, he had all the marbles. Do you get what I'm saying? The reason why the churches are in such a sad spiritual shape today, friends, is because the church quit being a rescue mission for the lost, and it became big business.

Megachurch Consumerism and Entertainment-Driven Worship

Your typical pastor of a megachurch is nothing more than a CEO, and the church is run like a business from top to bottom. And if you are a pastor, and you want to measure your success within your denomination, then you will measure it by the brick and mortar, the size of your church and the number of your church members.

And if you want to grow a big church fast, then you must be like all your competitors within your community and have a seeker-friendly church that is a smorgasbord of delicacies you can offer folks so they can join your church.

That's why churches today look more like health spas and country clubs than they do houses of prayer. This is what's happened to the church and its country friends during the last 50 years. I have been around, and I have watched it go to hell in a handbasket as it invited the world in and changed their worship to rock music, and pastors started wearing blue jeans up in the pulpit, and they just dialogued with their congregations to get them to feel good with their smooth, feel-good messages.

That's why people join a church today, to feel good about themselves and to fit in and to be entertained by the church service. But back in the days when the pulpits were more honest with folks, back in the days when pastors were true shepherds and not CEOs, back in the days before the gospel was compromised for dollars, people joined the church because they'd been convicted of their sins at the foot of a bloodstained cross, they'd been converted from their sins by a bloody Jesus, and they were joining the church back in those days because they had decided to count the cost of becoming a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, and they gladly forsook their sins and picked up their cross daily and followed their crucified master by living crucified lives.

The Older Gospel of Sin, Hell, and Conversion

Why? Why? Why the difference from that day and our day? I'll tell you why, friends. Because the church back then had men standing in their pulpits wearing crisp white shirts and suits as they represented Almighty God, and they feared God, and they preached hard against sin, they warned sinners to avoid going to a place of misery and punishment for sin called hell, and they proclaimed the utter and absolute lordship of Jesus Christ.

And if you wanted him as your savior, then you must bow to him as your lord, and it was necessary to repent of your sins to be saved. It was necessary for God to perform a work of grace on your heart through the supernatural act of regeneration through the new birth.

And if you wanted to become a Christian, then you must be separated from the world by taking up your cross and living a crucified life under his absolute lordship because he was a crucified savior. They preached that if you claim to be a Christian, then you must have experienced a real change in your life.

You've bowed in utter surrender to Christ the Lord, and holiness was now your desire as you lived for the Lord Jesus Christ. I actually went to church with Christians in the 1960s. I was a member of a church in the 1960s where the members did not own television sets.

Worldliness in Christian Families

The Christians back then lived above the world, not wallowing in the pig pen of it like most church members do today. The young people of the churches in our day listen to the same music the world does.

They watch the same Hollywood program and the world does. They cuss and swear like the world does. They sleep around with each other like the world does. They drink alcohol and do drugs just like the world does.

Yet they sit in church on Sunday morning and sing about Jesus. And I can tell you why, friends, they do. Because their parents act that way in the home. That's their example. The parents live a lawless life and live like the world and still call themselves Christians.

And the parents live that way because the church quit preaching the absolute lordship of Jesus Christ. I know some of you want to pick a fight with me over this, but I'm right, friends. I've seen it for the last 50 years.

I have witnessed the sad spiritual decline in the church because of the failure in the pulpit to preach the hard doctrines of the gospel that convict a sin and bring a lost sinner to see his or her need for a bloody sin substitute in the person of Jesus Christ.

Christ as Lord, Not a Ticket to Heaven

522 times in the New Testament, Jesus is called Lord. The early Christians testified about the Lord Jesus Christ. They began the gospel with a risen Lord sitting on a throne, ruling in all authority and sitting at the right hand of the Father and telling folks that he earned that right by way of a bloody cross.

He is Lord. He is Lord. He is Lord. He's not your servant, friend. He's not your happiness guru. He's not your free ticket to heaven so you can still live in your sins. He is Lord. And if you want him, friend, you better go to him there and kneel and bow in utter surrender to his lordship and turn from your sins in repentance toward God if you want any hope of heaven.

That's the gospel. It's a bloodstained gospel because of sin. It's a gospel because of the law. If there was no law, there'd be no need for a gospel and a remedy for sin. You better throw down your shotgun of rebellion and come to the King of Kings in utter surrender of all you are and all you have.

If you don't bow to him now as Lord, you will at a future day of judgment when he will put his foot on your neck as he makes his enemies his footstool. He is Lord, Christ the Lord. And when the church made the decision to become big business, when the church made the decision to let the world in, when the church made the decision to be a house of entertainment rather than a house of prayer, when the church quit preaching the absolute lordship of Jesus Christ, that's when people joined the church and accepted a Jesus they knew nothing about.

Unconverted Church Membership

They were baptized and put on the church roll, but they were never awakened to their lost condition, never convicted of sin, and never converted from their sins through the act of regeneration upon the heart from a holy God who hates sin.

They joined the church and kept on living like hell. And that's the very reason, friends, why the church of today is in the sad and laughable shape she is in. It's mainly an apostate church with mostly unconverted members who don't let their Christianity get in the way of their daily living and they sin all they want to on their way to heaven.

That's it in a nutshell. As we say in the South, I have given you the oil straight from the can. I have not diluted it. My gospel is the gospel of my Lord Jesus Christ. It has power to save. And my gospel, friend, has Christ's blood all over it.

His blood washes all sins away. And I will make a statement to you now. If your sins have not been washed in the blood, and if you have not been born from above, then you are still yet in your sins. And I don't care if you are the chairman of the deacons.

You're on your way to a devil's hell. And let's repent of your filthy, rotten sins, which cost Christ his precious blood. Now, that's not a popular message. I won't be growing a big church with that message.

A Final Call to Repentance and the New Birth

In fact, there aren't too many churches who would even open their pulpit to me to preach that message today, because it's a counter message and a counter gospel to the one they've been feeding you. I've done my duty as a preacher of the gospel.

I have warned you of your duty of repentance and the necessity of the new birth. I have called sin black and hell hot, and my hands are free from your blood, for I've warned you to flee from the wrath to come, which is a future judgment for all mankind.

I'll never have a big church. I'll never get a big love offering. But maybe, just maybe, somebody will hear me proclaim the truth that it is found in my Bible, and God's Spirit will attend it, and bring conviction of sin, and awaken someone to their lost condition, so they can see their great need of Christ the Lord, and bow their knee to him, so he can rule in their life as their Lord and Savior.

Maybe if enough pastors in this country would stop all this foolishness that we call church on Sunday morning, and get back to preaching the great doctrines of the gospel, maybe more folks would start getting saved.

After all, isn't that what church is supposed to be? A rescue mission, where the lost are saved from perishing.