My post of yesterday regarding the decline of once healthy congregations has been rolling around in my mind. I did sound like a bit of a downer, but this is a topic I care about greatly. Christ came into the world to change it forever, one person at a time, and this still happens today. Last November I had the opportunity to serve as a counselor in the Billy Graham Crusade in Pasadena at the Rose Bowl. I stood with people from all walks of life, eager to recommitt or give their lives to Christ for the first time. Lives changed, faith renewed, hope restored, all by the Living Christ.
I used to attend a church where the pastor would announce nearly every Sunday morning at the beginning of the service....."The Living Christ is here!" And He is, indeed. I see evidence of it every day. But, around us, the organized church may be struggling for its future. Suffice it to say that the denomination I belong to, the Presbyterian church, has experienced massive membership loss over the past 25 years or so.
Why is this so? In my mind, one word - irrelevance. In short, the modern church has become irrelevant to the modern man and woman. Secondly, our affluence in American has blinded us to the lack of real meaning in our own lives. And yet, a carpenter from Nazareth still changes lives. How do we reconcile the two? Here is a starting point.
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