Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Wait A Minute - I Thought...
Jesus tore up the temple for profiteering on worship practice. This links to a story from MMI about a church-owned shopping mall in Florida, the proceeds of which go to mission work.
But this bit I find very bothersome:
The gospel is transformative, and it does so by going deep, not wide. Repainting the room is nice, but it is still the same room. God wants to build a whole new building. Dressing up the stuff of our daily existence in God-clothes may create the illusion that the gospel is at work, but the foundation is still rotten and crumbling.
We divert ourselves from the real work of the gospel with this kind of skim-the-surface, paint over the imperfections, man-centered stuff. I almost physically ache when I read stuff like this, our God is so much better than this.
Please, I beg of you, the next time you are tempted by this kind of stuff, take a minute and think. Withdraw from the busyness just long enough to see what is really happening. Devote that time you would spend buying that happy little gee-gaw to prayer, and watch your life change in real, deep, and meaningful ways.
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Kingdom Plaza at the Normandy Mall is part shopping mecca and part Christian mission. The freshly refurbished mall is owned by the Potter’s House Christian Fellowship, a non-denominational mega church on the Westside. The for-profit mall is geared toward religious fundraising: any profits left over after paying mall expenses will be rolled over into the church’s missionary projects.A unique fund-raising exercise, to be sure. On the surface I cannot argue that it is de facto a bad thing. The devil is, of course, in the details - How much is the staff making? Who are the partners? How was the capital raised? Who holds the notes? What are the collection practices? Of course, we know none of that from the story.
But this bit I find very bothersome:
The mall’s stores are a mix of local and national tenants, but the place has an overwhelmingly Christian vibe, including a Rite 2 Life nutrition shop (slated to open in October) and the Kingdom Kuts barber shop.I am sorry but that just cheapens the gospel. Am I more holy if I get my hair cut at "Kingdom Kuts"? And if they claim I am, how precisely is that different than the sellers and moneychangers in the Temple courtyard?
The gospel is transformative, and it does so by going deep, not wide. Repainting the room is nice, but it is still the same room. God wants to build a whole new building. Dressing up the stuff of our daily existence in God-clothes may create the illusion that the gospel is at work, but the foundation is still rotten and crumbling.
We divert ourselves from the real work of the gospel with this kind of skim-the-surface, paint over the imperfections, man-centered stuff. I almost physically ache when I read stuff like this, our God is so much better than this.
Please, I beg of you, the next time you are tempted by this kind of stuff, take a minute and think. Withdraw from the busyness just long enough to see what is really happening. Devote that time you would spend buying that happy little gee-gaw to prayer, and watch your life change in real, deep, and meaningful ways.
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