Worldliness in the Church

Charles Spurgeon, 150 years ago, puts his finger on one of the church's besetting problems - the lack of clarity between the Church and the world:

I believe that one reason why the church of God at this present moment has so little influence over the world is because the world has so much influence over the church.

Frustrated by what he witnessed as "worldliness ... growing over the church; she is mossed with it", he had often argued from history that the church was at her strongest when she stood out distinctively from her culture:

Put your finger on any prosperous page in the Church's history, and I will find a little marginal note reading thus: 'In this age men could readily see where the Church began and where the world ended.' Never were there good times when the Church and the world were joined in marriage with one another. The more the Church is distinct from the world in her acts and in her maxims, the more true is her testimony for Christ, and the more potent is her witness against sin.

Charles Spurgeon, sermons from the Metropolitan Tabernacle, cited in CJ Mahaney, Worldlines: Resisting the Seduction of a Fallen World, p.23

How evangelicals can cut and paste the Bible

CJ Mahaney is his helpful book, Worldliness: resisting the Seduction of a Fallen World, suggests that, to the extent that "we ignore any portion of God's Word," we evangelicals can be prone to doing as much of a cut-and-paste job on the Bible as liberals

In particular, he asks whether worldliness and verses like 1 John 2:15 "Do not love the world or anything in the world" are uncomfortable for many modern evangelicals. We seek to evade any discomfort by arguing that such matters are personal or that most teaching on the subject is overly legalistic, sounding "like something out of an Amish handbook." But perhaps, our biggest concern is that the issue of worldliness is too close for comfort.

You're afraid if you get too close, these ten little words might come between you and the things in the world you enjoy. You're reluctant to discuss 'worldliness' because then you might have to change.

Of course, ignoring tricky verses is easier if we assume they don't apply to us or we caveat them to death.

Or perhaps you think 1 John 2:15 ... doesn't apply to you. Maybe because of your age, or your position in the church, or your reputation for godliness, you think you're immune to worldliness. From all outward appearances you're anything but worldly - a solid member of your local church, an exemplary Christian who worships on Sunday and faithfully attends a small group. You've never committed a scandalous sin...

If we don't ignore 1 John 2:15 outright, we load it up with qualifications. We file down its edges with explanations. We dismiss it as applying only to those more 'worldly' than us. We empty it of its authority, its meaning for our day-to-day lives.

Mahaney urges us not to do this because such difficult passages are nonetheless God's Word.

It comes straight from a loving heavenly Father to you and me. And it demands our urgent attention.

The Doctor's diagnosis: The danger of taking notes!

Martin Lloyd-Jones was cautious about people taking notes of his sermons. It suggested that what was going on was an information download and at some later point, the lives of his listeners would be changed. Lloyd-Jones wanted lives to change on the spot as people sensed God's holiness while the sermon was being preached. Have we lost that sense of expecting God's Spirit to be at work as we preach?

The first and primary object of preaching is not only to give information. It is, as Edwards says, to produce an impression. It is the impression at the time that matters, even more than what you can remember subsequently….It is not primarily to impart information; and while you are writing your notes you may be missing something of the impact of the Spirit. As preachers we must not forget this. We are not merely imparters of information. (Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Jonathan Edwards and the Crucial Importance of Revival)

The life of Christ is in us! It is not theory, it is a life-giving teaching, it is a life-imparting teaching. If I am preaching in the Spirit, as I pray God I am, I am not only uttering words to you, I am imparting life to you, I am being used of God, as the channel of the Spirit and my words bring life and not merely knowledge. Do you accept that distinction? I am almost afraid sometimes for those of you who take notes, that you may just be getting the words and not the Spirit. I am not saying that you should not take notes, but I do warn you to be careful. Much more important than the words is the Spirit, the life; in Christ we are being taught, and built up in Him. So that in a sense, though you may forget the words, you will have received the life, and you go out aware of the life of God, as it were, pulsating within you. (Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Christian Unity: Studies in Ephesians 4:1-16, (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1972) 114)

Preach so that we can taste the truth!

When Tim Keller urges pastors to preach to the hearts of their hearers so that God's Word can do its work amongst God's people, he often quotes Jonathan Edwards to underline that the purpose of a sermon is not just to make the truth clear but to make the truth real. In Edwards' sermon, A Divine and Supernatural Light, Edwards uses honey as an illustration to make his point:

Thus there is a difference between having an opinion, that God is holy and gracious, and having a sense of the loveliness and beauty of that holiness and grace. There is a difference between having a rational judgment that honey is sweet, and having a sense of its sweetness. A man may have the former, that knows not how honey tastes; but a man cannot have the latter unless he has an idea of the taste of honey in his mind. So there is a difference between believing that a person is beautiful, and having a sense of his beauty. The former may be obtained by hearsay, but the latter only by seeing the countenance. There is a wide difference between mere speculative rational judging any thing to be excellent, and having a sense of its sweetness and beauty. The former rests only in the head, speculation only is concerned in it; but the heart is concerned in the latter. When the heart is sensible of the beauty and amiableness of a thing, it necessarily feels pleasure in the apprehension. It is implied in a person's being heartily sensible of the loveliness of a thing, that the idea of it is sweet and pleasant to his soul; which is a far different thing from having a rational opinion that it is excellent.

Sermons are bad!

In a letter to his son, Christopher, dated 25 April 1944, JRR Tolkein, author of the LOTR trilogy and friend of CS Lewis, wrote: "But as for sermons! They are bad, aren't they?" However, trying to resist the Eyeore temptation to say it has always been thus, it is instructing to read how his letter continued.

The answer to the mystery is probably not simple; but part of it is that 'rhetoric' (of which preaching is a department) is an art, which requires (a) some native talent and (b) learning and practice. The instrument is very much more complex than a piano, yet most performers are in the position of a man who sits down to a piano and expects to move his audience without any knowledge of his notes at all. The art can be learned (granted some modicum of aptitude) and can then be effective, in a way, when wholly unconnected with sincerity, sanctity, etc. But preaching is complicated by the fact that we expect in it not only a performance, but truth and sincerity, and also at least no word, tone, or note that suggests the possession of vices (such as hypocrisy, vanity) or defects (such as folly, ignorance) in the preacher.

Good sermons require some art, some virtue, some knowledge. Real sermons require some special grace which does not transcend art but arrives at it by instinct or 'inspiration'; indeed the Holy Spirit seems sometimes to speak through a human mouth providing art, virtue, and insight he does not himself possess: but the occasions are rare.