Another
week and Covid-19 has kept most churches across America closed. We look forward to Easter Sunday with the
anticipation that Christians will not gather in mass to celebrate the
Resurrection of our Lord. To say the
least, this is going to be very weird.
There are so many questions that are being asked in and about the church
in the midst of this outbreak.
Like
many of you, I have had time to read extensively about the impact of Covid-19
on the church. Many questions are
raised, in and out of the church, and most are as yet unanswerable. Some are asking if churches are really
essential to the life of the community or do they fall into the same categories
as other entertainment life such as basketball or baseball. Others have asked how will churches survive
the lost revenue associated with not having regular collections. Here are some other questions that have come
up:
- Will attendance come back once social distancing restrictions are lifted?
- How do we start virtual, online, worship services?
- Will the shift to virtual worship increase that portion of weekly participation after this is all past?
- How many churches will die because of the losses experienced from Covid-19? (Offerings, members, excitement)
- Will Covid-19 enhance the ministry of home churches?
- Is it possible that this is just going to blow over and in a few months we will be back to the status quo?
- How do we care for our sick members in such a time as this?
- How can the church do pastoral care, or any other ministry for that matter, at a social distance?
But
there is one question that I have not heard.
Its absence is perhaps an indictment on the church like no other. Almost every question I have come across has
to do with how do we take care of our own, our stuff and our interests. Almost
all of them have been what we might call “collectively selfish”. They are profoundly selfish, but are
disguised as altruistic because we’re asking about the well being of the group,
not ourselves personally.
Before
we get to that question let’s take a different tack for just a moment. The rule of thumb is that 40% of America is
churched. I don’t know of anyone who
will say that 40% of Americans are actually disciples of Jesus, but we will use
that number for the sake of this argument.
We have also been told that we can expect between 100,000 and 250,000
deaths in the US from Covid-19. That
means that we can expect that in the next few months between 60,000 and 150,000
of our neighbors and countrymen will go off into a godless and damned
eternity. If we take the Word of God
seriously, it appears that when a person dies out of grace they face a doom so
horrific that it is beyond the capacity of language to fully describe.
No
one is asking the question, “How does the Covid-19 experience restore and renew
the evangelistic and disciple-making emphasis to the place of prominence in the
church?”
Maybe
this whole event can serve as a wake up call to the church. Maybe some churches will realize that
reaching the lost and making them disciples is what we are or should be
about. Maybe if we talk about people
dying and going to hell we will return to our church services more focused on “equipping
the saints for works of service”, and not on providing feel-good
religiotainment. Perhaps some churches
will see this close call as a wake up call and return to the ministry we see in
Acts. Some churches will return to the
status quo and will die, AND GOOD RIDDANCE.
I
don’t know of anyone who doesn’t think that Christianity in America is in
trouble and in decline. Maybe, just
maybe, we can take this moment of crisis as a warning. If we ignore it we will do so at our own
peril and risk. Maybe we will realize
all the nonsense we have focused on in the past wasn’t really that important
and we can revitalize the evangelistic and disciple making core of the church’s
life.
So,
here is the question to ask, “With thousands of people going to hell every day,
what should our church be about?”
No comments:
Post a Comment