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I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom:
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preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction.
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For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires,
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and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths.
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But you, be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.- 1 Timothy 4:1-5
Our sermon yesterday morning was titled The Itching Ear Church and we read from 1 Timothy 4. In our world today, we're seeing more and more churches pop up that focus so heavily on tickling ears and making people comfortable in their sin instead of convicting them and saving them from Hell. These are churches full of people that have stopped looking for truth and started looking for pleasure. They want to be comfortable. They want to water down the gospel to fit their sinful minds and they want God to compromise, but God does not compromise in order to make us happier here on earth.
In these churches, we see -
Grace Without Guilt -
The people in these churches want Heaven without Hell, salvation without repentance. They want God's grace without the conviction, they don't want to let go of their sin in order to receive rewards from God and enter into Heaven. They want to live like the world in the presence of Christ. As Christian's, we are not called to make people happy. We are not called to be people pleasers. We are called to reprove and rebuke, to preach without apology despite the fact that it may run some of these people off. We are to challenge them, show them the truth of the gospel - all of it.Doxology Without Doctrine -
The people in an Itching Ear Church just want to feel good and hear their own, made-up doctrine. It's not about truth or praising God in the way He intended, it's about making us happy individually without His true doctrine involved. They want everything to be about them - even praise.They also tend to pat themselves on the back when they praise, as if their praise and worship music is what puts them in the presence of God, when in reality, the only thing that makes us capable of being in His presence is the blood of Christ. They've taken the blood out of the picture though, because that makes people uncomfortable. Their worship has turned into nothing but pagan styled worship, with repetitive music to make them happy, instead of focusing on making God happy. They want to rely on themselves, not God's doctrine. They use what they want. Their music has no meaning, their prayers become empty. They are so focused on themselves that they forget about God.
Amen to this! No more watered down gospel-sharing or teachings.
ReplyDeleteI am blessed to go to a church that is not an itching ear church. In fact, our new (well, he's been here for a few months now) pastor gave a very strong, blunt sermon yesterday...and he didn't need his mic! ;) It's good to know there are still churches like yours and mine, though they may be a minority now.