I am troubled by a trend in the church. We tend to measure churches by the "style" of worship rather than the content of worship. People talk about the great music or the cool events. The focus seems to be on what you can do that will surprise people.
I am not against creativity. I think we should present the gospel in creative ways. I'm not against music . . . I love music. I think music touches the soul in a special way. However, music and creativity does not equal worship. These are not the main things!
Essential truth is the core teaching of the Gospel: the character of God, the nature of sin, the person of Christ, the place of the cross, the reality of the resurrection, and the nature of faith and discipleship. On these we must focus and on these we must agree.
Frankly, I don't get very concerned about how we worship. I don't worry about the amount of water someone uses in baptism, the frequency with which they take communion, the style of music they sing, the way they dress for worship, the form of government by which they function. In my mind theses are all "little things".
On the other hands beliefs that diminish the character and nature of God; truths that diminish the work or nature of Christ, or beliefs that undermine the authority of God's Word . . . these are significant. These things are eternal in their significance.
Unfortunately,we have turned these things around. We have emphasized the minor truths and glossed over the major truths. This is why, for the most part, churches are full but they are having little impact on our society. People are talking about how cool their church is instead of pointing to how wonderful Jesus is. [B]
