Does your Pastor embrace the Gospel-fueled Great Commission?
Or does he not?
Is your Pastor all about the full life-, culture-, and civilization Gospel?
Or is his gospel something smaller.
Much smaller.
As in: man-sized with no room for anything else.
Sadly, it’s this little man-sized, eek-a-person-into-heaven counterfeit gospel that has become the norm in most self-described “conservative, Bible believing” (and even “Reformed”) churches in America…which tells us all we need to know about how and why the American culture has come to its current pathetic and getting-worse-by-the-minute state.
In it’s place, they’ve embraced a sort of neo-Gnostic, hyper-spiritualized, insanely pietistic alternative worldview that enables and encourages the preemptive surrender of any area of life, culture, and civilization deemed not to fit into the teeny, tiny, man-made counterfeit definition of “spiritual”.
In their open rejection and replacement of the everything-touching, everything-defining Gospel-fueled Great Commission of Jesus Christ, these often kind seeming, friendly Pastors and church leaders are, in reality, escorting the culture (and everyone in it) to hell.
Despite the warm smiles and bajillions of vague social media posts describing the loveliness of Christ or the sovereignty of God or some similarly lofty thing, the lofty stuff never seems to have any detailed application in real life where the rubber meets the road in art, education, law, government, politics, or anything else. Worse yet, a primary goal of many of these “Christian leaders” seems to be to keep the Lordship of Christ from being brought to bear in these areas.
While in recent months and years there have been many wonderful and inspiring examples of God graciously moving to open eyes and move people to embrace rather than reject His Gospel and Great Commission, the overall trend in America is still quite awful.
Most “conservative, Bible-believing” Christian leaders in America still promote the abandonment, rather than the embrace, of the Gospel-fueled Great Commission.
So it should be no surprise that American culture is continuing its rocket ride to hell.
Last July (2016), we examined the cultural impact of this swapping out of the true Gospel for a pathetic little counterfeit in a post entitled: What do American Christians believe most about the Great Commission? That it can’t be done. Therein we made the following observations:
“What do American Christians believe most about the Great Commission?
Before diving into any potential answers, let’s take a moment to consider the most concise, clear reference point in Scripture regarding the Great Commission:
And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
~ Matthew 28:18-20
So now, with that fresh in mind, back to the question: What do American Christians believe most about the Great Commission?
Do they believe that all authority in heaven has been given to Jesus?
Oh sure. No prob there.
That one’s easy, what with “heaven” off yonder somewhere far away and probably not even a part of the physical universe. Yeah, allowing Jesus the position of holding all authority in some distant, far off kingdom of immaterial whateverness sure feels nice and completely nonthreatening to anything we want to do in detail here and now in “the real world”.
But what about earth?
Does the typical American evangelical Christian believe that all authority on earth has been given – as in past tense, meaning it’s already a done deal – to Jesus?
Oh no.
Not even close.
Jesus can be Lord and have authority over the fluffy, vague, wispy “spiritual” stuff out there in heaven or whatever, but most definitely not over the real-world details of law, government, art, education, economics and business right here and now in ‘Merica.
No, no, no…He doesn’t have any of that authority.
So what about making disciples who learn and actually obey all that He has commanded?
Uh, once again, no.
Are you kidding?
That can’t actually be done here in the real world!
Especially not here in America, where we celebrate and proudly defend the “God-given right” to everything from porn and gay marriage to child sacrifice and the “freedom” to openly worship any false god we like.
Okay, so what is the one thing that most American Christians actually do believe about the Great Commission?
That it can’t be done.”
Let that soak in as we continue to backtrack through the most recent years of long running American decline.
Back in 2015, we touched on the cultural consequences of our Pastor-led sprint into the arms of a weak counterfeit gospel in an article entitled Little Gospel Syndrome and the Death of American Culture, which included the following bits of info that only seem to grow more relevant with each passing year:
“The disintegrating American culture is not primarily a product of liberalism, however much secular “conservatives” may say otherwise. It’s not primarily the product of ignorance, however much the “education”-minded may imagine otherwise. And it’s not primarily the result of hedonism or materialism, however much the “hyper-spiritual” among us may proclaim to the contrary. The dying American culture is first and foremost a product of the professing Christian church’s abandonment of the full, life- and world-defining Gospel of Jesus Christ.
In making the Gospel just about our personal salvation and letting the rest of creation go to hell without too much concern or opposing effort on our part, we have abandoned the Great Commission and denied the nature of the true, supernatural Gospel of Christ.
In considering ourselves “good to go” with a mere profession of faith accompanied by “good works” like regular church attendance, Bible readings, and other Christian-ish activities, we’ve traded in the comprehensive Christian life and worldview for a self-centered, comfortable, easy path of disengagement and pre-emptive surrender. We’ve traded in the life- and culture-transforming mission of the Gospel-fueled Great Commission for a life of minimal effort and minimal (if any) commitment to “take every thought captive” (see: 2 Corinthians 10:5) and become disciples who actively strive to obey all that Christ has commanded (see: Matthew 28:18-20).
Where the Gospel of Jesus touches literally everything, we have decided to keep our version of it neatly sequestered and safely “in it’s place”, relegating it to largely ornamental status. We like to admire and read Scripture about how awesome it is, and talk about how awesome it is, but when it comes to application…well…did I mention that it is a beautiful ornament?
It’s an ornament that we like to keep in a display case and show off “at the right times”, with “the right people” and in “the right places”, but when it comes to bringing its purposeful, everything-defining light into contact with everything, as Christ has clearly commanded His people to do and as the very nature of the true Gospel requires, well…we like to keep it simple…and vague…
We love to say, “Jesus died for sinners!”
But we hate to define sin.
We love to say, “Repent and be saved!”
But if we won’t define sin, what is it that people are supposed to repent of, exactly? (See: The Little gospel That Can’t.)
If failing to do what God has commanded and doing what God has forbidden is sin, then we obviously can’t have a coherent, vibrant, effective Gospel presentation if we are not about the business of identifying what those sins are in detail in light of His Word, can we?
Even the twelve-steppers understand that the first necessary step to solving a problem is acknowledging that it exists, right?
If someone asks, “Is homosexual intimacy a sin?”, most of us have little trouble saying that such activity is indeed sinful.
Yet if someone asks something along the lines of, “Is it okay for me to send my five year old off to the State for what we all know is an explicitly anti-Christian ‘education’?”, we often hem and haw. Or, even worse (and far more commonly), we say something like, “Sure. Go ahead. Just be sure to use the comparatively little time you have with them to try and at least begin to compensate for some of the satanic spin on the pursuit of knowledge that they are being modeled and molded to emulate and embrace all day long each weekday.”
And then we wonder why each successive generation of professing American Christians is less Christian, more liberal, and more Statist than the last. (See: Statism 101: State-run “education” makes a State-dependent population.)
Has God spoken any less clearly on the necessity of Christ as the explicit core of children’s education than He has on the subject of homosexuality?
Could our abandonment of His Word in the one area be the primary reason we are experiencing so much hellishness in the other? (See: Limp Wristed Gospels Make Limp Wristed Cultures.)
Has God not spoken clearly as to the nature, purpose, and application of law, economics, and civil government? (See: Presuppositional Law: Where we begin with law determines where we end.)
Has God not spoken clearly and sufficiently to us so that we might understand and profitably pursue every good work possible in His creation?
All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
~ 2 Timothy 3:16-17 (emphasis added)
The Gospel is not all about us.
It’s all about Him.
It’s all about Him restoring everything. (See: The Awesome Gospel.)
It’s all about Him restoring everything by His grace through His Spirit-filled people in accordance with His Gospel-fueled Great Commission. (See: Jesus Conquers Everything.)
The sooner we ditch and repent of having ever embraced the pathetic little self-centered “Gospel in a Bottle” that we’ve allowed to lead our culture to where it is now, the better.
Big Government, Big Materialism, Big Liberalism, and Big Hedonism are not what’s killing America. Not primarily, anyway.
Little Gospel Syndrome is what’s killing America.”
About a year earlier, in late 2014, we shared Why is the beast of Socialism eating our children? Ask your pastor., where we asked the following questions:
“Are you being led toward the clarity and life-bringing truth of Scripture…or away from it?
Are you being convicted and inspired through the clear preaching of the Word on this subject…or are you being “protected” from being made uncomfortable?”
After encouraging us to ask and consider these questions, the article returned to it’s focus on the subject of anti-Christian approaches to children’s education as openly encouraged and enabled by “Christian Pastors” across the steadily darkening land:
“It never hurts to ask a pastor a good, honest question – especially on such an important matter as the formation of our children’s minds. Any pastor striving to serve the true Christ of Scripture should never resist a request to dive deep into the Word for detailed answers to any question, much less one so important as this.
If your pastor has not been clear or precise on this subject (quite possibly out of ignorance or fear of offending those who worship and adore the modern American idol of State-controlled children’s “education”), then it would be a good idea to kindly, graciously ask him what the Word of God has to say on the subject.
Encourage Him to go to the Word.
Insist upon it, lovingly but firmly. (And remember: Grace, grace, grace…we’re all, at best, works in progress by the grace of God.)
His answer to such requests will tell much about his role in leading others to support or oppose the beast that is even at this moment consuming the minds of tens of millions of little children…children who come mostly from “conservative Christian” homes and are members of “Bible believing Christian” churches.
We can’t even begin to slay this dragon if we won’t face it head-on.
We can’t find the answers if we won’t ask the questions.
And we can’t credibly claim to be true disciples of Christ if we will not seriously strive to learn and obey all that He has commanded…including His many detailed pronouncements on the subject of children’s education.
It’s all on us.
The minds and souls of our children, grandchildren, and generations to come thereafter are hanging in the balance.
Now what are we going to do about it?”
So what are we doing about it?
Are we, by God’s grace, pursuing true, ongoing Reformation of all areas of life in accordance with His life-, culture-, and civilization-impacting Gospel-fueled Great Commission?
Or are we doing something else?
And escorting the culture to hell in the process.
Those are our only two options.
May we repent and reform accordingly…while there is yet time.
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You can also help support the Fire Breathing Christian mission by checking out these books:
Stupid Elephant Tricks – The Other Progressive Party’s War on Christianity takes a painful but much needed look at how Christ-less “conservatism” has captivated Christians and co-opted them into helping march the culture ever deeper into darkness:
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The Beginning of Knowledge: Christ as Truth in Apologetics is an approachable, easy to read introduction to Christ-centered apologetics:
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Apathetic Christianity: The Zombie Religion of American Churchianity explores the tragic true horror story of all-American dead religion masquerading as Christianity:
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On Education is a compilation of some of the most provocative and compelling Fire Breathing Christian articles on the subject of children’s education:
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There Is No “God-Given Right” To Worship False Gods is a compilation of some of the most provocative Fire Breathing Christian articles on the subject of America’s embrace of a satanic approach to religious liberty:
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Fire Breathing Christians – The Common Believer’s Call to Reformation, Revival, and Revolution is the book that first presented the FBC mission to apply the Gospel-fueled Great Commission in every realm of God’s creation:
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An alternate white cover version of Fire Breathing Christians is available:
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There is also an alternate black cover version of Fire Breathing Christians:
Finally, here are a few good intro/reminder links for those of you who are new to Fire Breathing Christian and curious about exactly what’s goin’ on ’round here:
What are you, some kind of [insert label here] or something?!
What’s with that shark-fishie graphic thing?
Intro to Fire: The Power and Purpose of the Common Believer
When the Bible gets hairy. (Or: Is it right for men to have long hair?)
And especially this one: Never forget that apart from God’s grace you and I are complete morons.
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