December 24, 2014
All Inclusive
Many of today’s churches are
on the all-inclusive bandwagon and I believe their intent is, “regardless of
your religious persuasion, everyone is welcome to worship with us.” It’s almost
as though all-inclusive has become a marketing tool for the church. It strikes
me as arrogant that these churches would think God, gods, or any number of
religious belief systems would even want
to be included in a co-op worship service. “You shall not bow down to them or
worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the
children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those
who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of
those who love me and keep my commandments” (Exodus 20:5-6 NIV).
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1 comment:
Gail;
-----I hadn’t thought of it from the angle that “they” have their own ways and places to worship. One of the major themes of Old Testament history is Israel reflecting the cultural and religious attributes of the peoples around them, and the ruin it caused. Before God ever threw Assyria upon the Northern Kingdom, many, many decades, even centuries of innocent, precious children’s horrific screams were muffled by excited drumbeat as God’s people roasted their own offspring over open fires in the arms of Moloch. It wasn’t these dregs of Moloch coming into the Temple and early synagogues that rotted God’s fruit on the vine. It was His people going into the hills and woods and worshipping in “their” places and ways, then themselves dragging all of those deceitful idiocies into God’s special places. Kind of what we see today.
-----Atheists, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindu’s, etc. have their own places of worship. The very concept of worship is to wrap yourself around an idea for dissolving yourself into it. That does not happen very well where your ideas are condemned as lies and deceit. As kissy, kissy and candy coated as we try to see the Bible, it continues to expose foolish and treacherous, phony religion, denouncing it as evil, and assuring its rightful destruction. This is not a good atmosphere for sticking butts in the air while pressing stupid foreheads against prayer mats towards Mecca. So, nobody comes to worship those. Yet, the Laodicean church makes its worship places look even more like those without caring about the hostility this is to the Lord.
-----God made man’s nature a reflective one. We are not good at creating ideas out of nothing; they almost always come in the light of something else, however related it is. The Koran is an excellent example. Muhammad’s Allah seemed very short on originality, for the overwhelming majority of the Koran is imagery, expressions, and history copy-catted from a few Old Testament stories and some of Jesus’ and Paul’s expressions, then twisted into a new shape. People are efficient sponges for the ideas around them.
-----And so the Bible warns against keeping bad company. “Bad company ruins good morals.”
(I Cor 15:33b) “He who walks with wise men becomes wise, but the companion of fools will suffer harm.” (Pro 13:20) “Make no friendship with a man given to anger, nor go with a wrathful man, lest you learn his ways and entangle yourself in a snare.” (Pro 22:24-25) “…I wrote to you not to associate with any one who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or robber—not even to eat with such a one.” (I Cor 5:11) “If any one thinks that he is a prophet, or spiritual, he should acknowledge that what I am writing to you is a command of the Lord. If any one does not recognize this, he is not recognized.” (I Cor 14:37-38) “If any one refuses to obey what we say in this letter, note that man, and have nothing to do with him, that he may be ashamed.” (II Thes 3:14) “Any one who goes ahead and does not abide in the doctrine of Christ does not have God; he who abides in the doctrine has both the Father and the Son. If any one comes to you and does not bring this doctrine, do not receive him into the house or give him any greeting; for he who greets him shares his wicked work.” (II John 9-11) “The friendship of the LORD is for those who fear him,
and he makes known to them his covenant.” (Ps 25:14)
-----The Bible is not a book of mindless lovey-dovey. It is instruction for sincere people seeking to know God truly and desiring His righteousness. In this world of smoke and mirrors and traps and snares, it’s words must be followed, not edited.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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