Trends That Are Anti-Church

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the

Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.�

In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you.

By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the

Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King. Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.

Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry. Steve Cooley is here. Steve, this is going into our sixth year of No Compromise Radio.

Really? Yeah. Now is there going to be any kind of plaque or award or a ribbon? They�re given retroactively.

Oh, nice. Yeah, so you can expect one in the past. Well, that�s pretty much the

Sheriff�s Department. We used to get like our 10 -year pin, you know, how many years do you have for an apartment?

14. That�s so true. Well, I want to redo the intro and stuff like that since we�re not on WVNE, but it�s just hard to get all that stuff done and you were saying off the air that maybe our friend

Gil could record a magic message moment tune so we could play that.

Yeah, this magic, instead of this magic moment, it�d be this message moment. Now I think,

Steve, with this mixer that we have, that we could actually plug the computer into it and then if we saw something or heard something online that we liked, you know, the magic moment, we could just play that little

YouTube clip and it would go through the recorder properly, but I�m just old school.

You know the YouTube clip I�m really stuck on these days? Is that Joe Biden one I�m saying? Oh, you know what?

I have not clicked on it. Dude, it�s so good. Buy a shotgun. It�s him singing.

You know, it�s pretty impressive what they did there. Is that kind of like the Tony Blair or George Bush ones where these guys have, they�ve spoke so many times that they can just take the words and�

No, no. No, it is, it�s actually pretty spectacular and the video, they�ve actually put another guy in there sitting next to him and it looks like a little bit of a duet.

It�s pretty special. Steve, speaking of the message moment, I mean, don�t you think we should have one?

Oh, absolutely. You know, I think we should do a best of magic moments.

You know, I mean, that would be� We just need somebody to go through all those shows, but I think there�s like 1 ,500 shows, so that�s a lot of work.

How do we do that? Well, or maybe you could even, you know, like, we could just set up like 10, the 10 best mangling of scripture.

Well, I know I�ve talked about this one before, even on the NoCo videos, �God, God, my

God, why did you dump me miles from nowhere? Doubled up with pain, I call to God all the day long, no answer, nothing.�

Psalm 22. �All I get is your answering machine.� Dude, what�s up with that? Well, you know what�s so nice about this,

Steve? When I�m reading the gospels and I�m in Matthew and there�s a signal in my mind, a stitch, if you will, a literary stitch, then when

I see, �God, why did you dump me miles from nowhere ?� when Jesus says that, then it makes me think of this

Messianic Psalm. It�s called a literary stitch. Uh -huh. Why have you forsaken me?

Why did you dump me out here in the middle of nowhere? Makes me think about Death Valley, you know. Baker, California.

Yeah. With Bun Boy. That�s the name of the restaurant out there. It�s so true. Did you ever go to Bob�s Big Boy?

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Did you like that? I think it�s still around. Uh, there�s only a few of them left. I mean, very few of them.

You have to, if you go to the south and they have Shoney�s Big Boy, but out in L .A., there�s just a, there�s like one near the

Burbank Airport, but there�s very few of them. See, you, with your 20 years of police work, don�t probably like these shows like I do because you�ve experienced it all firsthand.

But I like the cop shows, and Santa Barbara Police Department has their own show. And so they�ve got three seasons, and so I was watching those.

They�re about 22 minutes long, and there�s some crime in Santa Barbara and some gang stuff going on, and they are some attack, somebody attacked someone else at Sambo�s.

And I thought, there are not too many Sambo�s around, and I�m amazed that there are actually still one left in Santa Barbara.

Yeah. I mean, I used to go, listen, they put, I think it was in February and maybe a couple other times of the year, they put the

Big Boy Combo on sale for a buck 99. So it was, you know, the Big Boy hamburger and French fries and a salad, which was just lettuce with, you know, dressing on it, for a buck 99.

Follow that up with a piece of their lousy cheesecake, mm -mm -mm. We were talking last night at dinner, and one of the gentlemen that I was speaking to, we�re talking about growing up poor, and he said, we had for our salads growing up, and this was, this guy�s probably 55, he said we had lettuce, and then our salad dressing was ketchup and mayonnaise mixed up together.

And it kind of looked maybe like Thousand Island -ish. I guess you could put some relish in or something. Well, you know, talking about growing up poor, we used to make our own maple syrup out of water.

Some brown sugar. Yeah, and mix in a little white sugar and then some maple extract.

Yeah, I remember grandma, she would make pancakes, and she, I thought her pancakes were wonderful, but she didn�t have syrup.

She couldn�t even, you know, maple syrup, forget it, but she couldn�t even afford the Aunt Jemima kind of thing.

So she would make her own. Yeah. Same thing. Yeah. Uh -huh. She also tried to convince me to eat her scrambled eggs, which weren�t like my mother�s scrambled eggs, and I wouldn�t really want to eat them.

And so I was over to her house regularly because both mom and dad were working, and she said there�s a

Tarzan kind of guy on TV, but his name was Bomba. It was just a spinoff.

It was not a spinoff, but it was a ripoff. And it was not Tarzan, but Bomba. And so she said, these are

Bomba eggs. That�s what he eats. And I gobbled them down. That�s a wise grandma. And she was the grandma, that�s

Nona. That was Heno. Oh, it�s all in the marketing now, right? Bomba, said the

Tarzan. It worked. So we have in front of us today, set apart, Arkand Hughes.

He�s written a book, and he gave six anti -church trends in American Evangelicalism in Chapter 10.

Now, it�s just been reposted on the Aquila Report. I kind of like the Aquila Report once in a while. It�s good fodder for NOCO.

Yes, it is. How do you say Aquila in New Englanders? I don�t know. Aquila, I think is fine.

Okay. And talking about spectator Christianity, and so Shane Lems has put this together so we can see

Arkand Hughes, and we�re just going to go through these six today. It�s always better, I think, Steve, we see somebody else�s good work, and then we just expand on it.

Steal it. Yeah. It�s not redaction -ary work. It�s not editing.

What is it? Is it amplification? We�re like the Amplified Bible. Yeah, okay. We�re like the message. I know.

Okay, number one, hitchhiker Christians. These are some trends that a lot of people are getting involved with, anti -church trends.

You go to the meetings, this is what people say, serve on the boards and committees.

You grapple with the issues, do the work of the church, and pay the bills, and I�ll come along for the ride. But if things don�t suit me,

I�ll criticize and complain and probably bail out. My thumb is always out for a better ride. I think this is descriptive of way, way too many people who are ready.

They�re not going to be involved. They�re not going to serve at the church. But they want to just get, like, it is like they�re watching it on TV or something else.

It�s just something to pick apart. You know, the easiest thing to do is complain. We were talking about this a week or two ago, you know, instead of the kind of Ephesians 429 thought, you know, where you�re going to stop doing that very kind of thing and start edifying and building up and everything else, they just can�t wait to tear down.

That�s what they seemingly live for. In fact, let me just read Ephesians 429. �Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.�

And by the way, it is not edifying or building up or in any way positive to say, well, that�s a really stupid decision or who made that, you know, or these are not helpful.

Steve, it is helpful, though, if you put it on Facebook. Pete Oh, okay. Yeah, that�s good.

How do you, how do you Christianize something? How do you spiritualize something where you just put it on Facebook for the whole world to read?

Steve Yeah, I think we could make our own Facebook, but in a Christian fashion, see? We could make a lot of money. Pete Well, yeah,

I don�t know if we could. It would be churchblast .com or something like that, you know.

Steve, when you look at Ephesians Chapter 4 that you were talking about earlier in verse 1 of the same chapter, �I therefore, a prisoner for the

Lord ,� Paul writes, �urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the

Spirit in the bond of peace.� And so, walk in a manner commensurate with what the

Lord has done for you, and if he�s graced you, which he has if you�re a Christian, and regenerated you, justified you, redeemed you, and the list goes on and on and on and on and on, summarized by Paul in Ephesians 1, 2, and 3 in Christ.

Then live out who you are, and if Jesus loves the church, if Jesus is going to build the church, if Jesus realizes there are less than perfect people in the church, less than perfect leaders, then you should love the church too.

Pete It�s really not, it�s not that hard to figure out if Jesus died for the church, then, you know, can�t you at least try to restrain your critique of the church?

I mean, it�s kind of, yes, he died for the individuals in the church, but he�s building the church.

He�s the one who designed the institution of the church.

Mark We interrupt this show for a broadcast important announcement. I�ve got the Joe Osteen special Your Best Life Now board game card deck in front of me, and on the top side it says, �Wonder

Words.� And so, you need a wonder word once in a while, you just flip it over in the middle of the game. And so, our wonder word today,

Steve, is � Steve Magical. Mark Magical. How does that work? I just want to, you know, magic.

Mark You know what I thought it was? I thought it was the magi, wonder words magi. And then

I thought, you know, we could redeem about anything. Steve One of the other wonder words cards is, �Bird

Stole the Ball.� Havlicek stole the ball,

I think. Steve Oh, bird stole the ball too. I think he stole an inbounds pass and - Mark Yeah, he did, he did.

I think maybe DJ stole it, one like that too. Do you think our listeners across the country would be more

Chick Hearn fans or more Johnny Most fans? Two basketball announcers, one for the

Lakers, one for the Celtics. Steve I don't know, but if they have any sense, it's Chick Hearn. Mark Do you know what I actually wish? I wish Johnny Most was alive and he was attending the church and then he could be in charge of some of these meetings and stuff and get these people online.

He would definitely whip them into shape. Steve You know what we should do? We should have him make announcements. Mark Yeah, well, if we find

Johnny Most, we'll take care of that. Okay, so, yeah, I think it's not only the fact that people need to edify, but I think, you know, if every

Christian, and this is true, we know that every Christian is gifted spiritually, then every

Christian ought to be involved, not hitchhikers. Church is not a spectator sport. It's just not.

That's the name of the chapter, I think. It's just not. It's something that you get involved in.

If you're going to a church, why wouldn't you be involved in it? Not just show up and go home, but actually serve in the local church.

Mark Steve, besides the obvious Christ -honoring aspect to this, in terms of being involved in a local church and pouring your heart out and your soul and your money and your work into the church that Christ is building there locally, pragmatically,

Steve, it's even better for the person. They're happier. They are more contented.

They get more fulfillment as they see the Lord work through people who aren't perfect to get his ends done and through the means of imperfect people.

Don't you find great joy in serving with people who are far from perfect? Steve Yeah, and I mean,

I think back on some of the best times that we've had here, and I mean, they've been like the Saturday cleanup days or whatever, you know, when everybody's just here and, you know, the kids are running around acting goofy and causing more mess for us to have to clean up, but it's, you know, it's just fun.

It's just fun to have everybody there and, you know, it's really not so structured and you're just kind of, everybody's just sort of putting their shoulder to the wheel and helping, and it's good.

Pete Steve, maybe this is a good illustrative analogy. You go to a church potluck at Pot Providence and you don't bring any food, and you pile up your plate full, and then while you're eating the food at the table, you complain about all the food.

It doesn't have enough salt, it's got too much MSG, all that kind of stuff. Steve Yeah, perfect. You know, who brought this gluten -free stuff, you know?

I mean, all that kind of thing. I was thinking about a sports analogy since it has some of that. Imagine, you know, the guy who kind of comes to every other practice or whatever, or he's sitting on the bench and all he wants to do is complain about everybody who's playing.

You know, look at that guy. Come on, hustle, man. Set that screen with a little verve, you know?

Come on. Pete I mean, aren't we just dumb sometimes? Aren't we just ignorant and foolish and stupid?

And then off we go, and we take our eyes off the Lord and who He is, and then they, you know, go down to focus on people, and then they always let us down.

And so then we are in a trap. Pete Well, I dare say that, you know, most people, if they went to work and acted the same way that they often do at church or around church, they might not be employed for very long.

If all you do when you go to work is complain about everything that's there, I don't think your boss is gonna like you.

Jay Well, what I like to see is when Paul will make a switch in his grammar from speaking about himself to we, and you'll see that with the other writers as well.

And when you think, you know, it's us against them, and you know, I'm an outsider, but it's when it's we, and then you can't go to leadership and say the church doesn't do such and such because then that person is part of the church.

I mean, we all need one another, and then how often do we say to our thumb, you know,

I just can't believe you're messing me around like that, you're dogging me, and I don't like what you're doing.

I mean, aren't we part of one body? And that's just my desire.

Pete Yeah, I think that's exactly right, right out of 1 Corinthians. All right, number two, consumer Christians. Ecclesiastical shoppers that attend one church for preaching send their children to a second church for its youth group and go to a third church's small group.

What's in it for me is the motto. There's not, that doesn't happen anymore.

That was during the seeker -sensitive, like, emergent stuff. Jay I think it does happen, you know, but it, and it's exactly what he says here, you know, some people are just like, a little bit of this, a little bit of that, you know, but I'm, I don't know, there are no words for that.

I couldn't, I personally couldn't do this. I want to be at a church 100%, you know, all in, whether I was in the ministry or not, that's just not how

I would live. Pete Well, when people say, when they first call the church, and tell me a little bit about the church, and we began to talk about what we think is the priority biblically,

Christ -centered preaching, expository preaching, you know, we start off with those things.

The second they say to me, well, how big's your youth group? What do you do for your youth group? Then I think, what would you say to, you know, the

Jerusalem Council? How big's your youth group? I don't know if I really want to go. Marduk's youth group's a lot bigger.

Pete Yeah. Yeah, although, you know, Molech's programs for the kids are not too good.

Marduk Yeah, that's one and done pretty much there. Pete Yeah. Marduk Of course, you want to have fun, but what do you do if it's a small little community, and we're not in some big urban area, and you've got four kids, and so then what do you do then?

Pete I just think that people just need to, you know, well, my church doesn't have a youth group. Okay, well, maybe you need to serve there.

You know, my church doesn't have this or that or the other thing. Okay, well, maybe it would be great if you started organizing that.

Marduk And is it a local church without a youth group? I mean, is it a God -ordained,

Christ -centered church if you don't have a rockin' youth group? Pete Hmm. Yes. Marduk See, I know.

How about this? What if we went to every local church in the United States and said, from now on, there's no music, no youth groups, no

Oprah book reading clubs, no any of this stuff, but there's just preaching and prayer on Sunday morning,

Sunday night, and Wednesday night. I wonder how many people would stop going to those churches. Pete I think there'd be a number,

I mean, I don't know how big the number would be, but there'd be a sizable number who'd just say, this doesn't work for me anymore.

It doesn't work for me. Marduk Uh -huh. See? All right. Well, time is fleeting, and number three says,

Spectator Christians. They feed on the delusion that virtue can come through viewing, much like football fan who imagines that he ingests strength and daring while watching his favorite pro team.

Steve, let's particularly talk about, and the article doesn't address it, but people do the home church and they're bugged or something with a local church.

It doesn't fit their standards, so they just watch church services at home on their computer, and then that's their worship service.

Short of being in China and you can't find a church, I mean. Pete Or, you know, you're sick or whatever, okay, fine.

But yeah, that's just not, again, this is kind of like, what's in it for me?

Because I'm being fed, I'm getting what I want, well, what about your obligation? What are you supposed to be doing?

How do you utilize your gifts? How do you bear one another's burdens? How do you find out what people need so you can pray for them?

You know, and all these kind of things. It's not, church is about more than simply going.

It's about being involved and about loving one another and about, you know, really creating a kind of a family.

Steve, I've had to learn the hard way, and I haven't always done it perfectly, obviously, and still have a long way to go.

But on the good days, I think when I'm in this building, it's a Sunday morning worship service.

I think to myself, you know, there's probably people that need encouragement today. I know they need the

Bible preach, so I want to do that. But they probably need a hug. They probably need a handshake.

They probably need me to ask them, you know, how's your son doing? How's your sick dad doing?

To give them, you know, some appropriate physical, you know, hugs for men.

You know, you can just grab them for ladies. It's a public place, but you still have to be careful. I think to myself, what do people need?

How could I encourage them? Those are the days that I think properly versus, you know, what are people going to do for me today?

Well, and there's way too much of the latter, you know, and so much what we forget sometimes is life is hard, you know, and when we get together, exactly what you're saying, you know, we just need to bear one another's burdens, just look at each other and realize that every person has their own little difficult patches that they're going through.

So I think we'll do these other three for the next time, but if you go to a worship service, and how about this?

Maybe we could institute, and I know people love law, but this is not law, it's just suggestion. When you get to the local building, you know, the local where the church meets,

I'm not saying the building, it's the church. When you get to the parking lot, why don't you dads just say, okay, let's just pray before we go in.

I like to do that. I'm on vacation in California. Let's pray for the service. Let's pray for the preacher.

I know what it's like. I would like to have people pray for me before I preach, and so what if we have people, they pull up in the parking lot, get there a few minutes early, and then pray.

Lord, may we serve today as a family. May you give us opportunities and wisdom so we can serve the people that your son died for.

Help the preacher. Help the students. Keep people safe. Wouldn't that be a wonderful thing is just go to the church parking lot, dads pray for a few minutes.

If you're a single mom, then you pray, maybe have a couple of the kids pray, and then walk into the church service.

Instead of, you know, okay, let's go have fun today. One, two, three, ready, break. And the thing is, in one sense, when you go serve, like you were talking about the church cleanup, the church building cleanup,

I did have fun. I mean, I got hot and sweaty and dirty, but I had fun when I was interacting with other people, and we were horsing around, and I'm not against fun.

I'm against, I want to be focused on myself, because isn't that the problem? My problem is me.

I need to be outward focused and not inward focused, and how many problems, whether it's mental quote -unquote illnesses or everything else, when you focus on yourself, the wheels fall off.

They're supposed to. Yep, the more you focus on yourself, the worse your problems get, and that's just the reality is.

And Steve, I mean, there are people out there that have a lot worse problems than we do.

There are a lot more difficult circumstances that they're dealing with, and then when you go serve them, you say, well,

I was glad to serve, and then you also say, you know, the Lord must really be great to withstand these folks because they're going through so much more than I am, and why am

I complaining? It's true. It is totally true, and I just,

I would encourage everybody who's listening to just kind of think, what can we do to improve our local church?

What can we, how can we serve? How can we be involved? How can we be even praying, you know, for that church?

What sort of things, you know, does our, I mean, if you just kind of look back and you think, well, what sort of things does our church need?

Everybody knows, you know, what the various strengths and weaknesses of a local church are, so if you see some of the weaknesses, why don't you think, well, what could

I do? It doesn't have to come from the pastor. It doesn't have to come from some committee. Sometimes the

Lord uses people in the pews, and that's fine. Just help. Pete And Steve, don't you think it's true, if there's an opportunity to minister,

I would much rather have somebody just go for it than be paralyzed and not do anything.

And even if they've overstepped their bounds, maybe with a budget or something like that, I might say, now let's be careful.

But inside, I'm super happy that they want to take the initiative and serve. Oh, it's so great to have somebody where you have to go, whoa, slow down a little bit there,

Junior. You know? Pete Whether some old slogan about how much easier it's to keep something going than kind of stop some kinetic energy or whatever it is.

It's a nice slogan, isn't it? Pete Yeah, it rolls off the tongue. Pete NoCompromisedRadio .com,

see you next time. With Pastor Mike Abendroth. This production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life -transforming power of God's Word through verse -by -verse exposition of the sacred text.

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