Today I opened some mail that had been piled up for a few days and found a newsletter from the Assemblies of God national office. In briefly glancing through it, I found an interesting article by Dary Northrop, pastor of Timberline Church.
Churches that welcome prodigals was his subject, and he made the introductory point that if the elder brother in the "Prodigal Son" parable had been the one to answer the door on the day that the prodigal came home, the entire story would be different. No doubt the older brother would have rejected his younger brother, even remarking how much he stank of pigs. He would have been annoyed at the unkempt appearance, the worldly influence still evident in his habits; there is no way he would have killed a fatted calf and ran weeping to embrace him the way the Father did!
Too often, the church finds itself in the place of the older brother (the more "religious") who expect people to be cleaned up before the enter church doors. Dary Northrop called for churches to accept all types of people into the worship environment and allow the Holy Spirit to guide and convict the sinner into a relationship of repentance. Whoa! This is revolutionary stuff; apparently we don't have to do the work of the Holy Spirit for Him by pointing out all the sinful shortcomings of other people. If we create an environment of authentic worship--worship for all--then we can respect that we may be at different places in our walk with the Lord, but God is at work in each one of us.
We have to be careful not to add cultural rules or personal preferences to the Canon of Scripture. But that precaution is easier said than done. Just yesterday in the car on the way to Annapolis with my visiting cousins, we got into a discussion about things that offend us, but don't offend others. Where is the line of right and wrong? To give just one example of personal preference issues: I know Christian people who say, "This sucks!" or "This is crap!" Are words like that acceptable, sinful, or just in bad taste? For prodigals or those who are unsaved, words like that are so mild in comparison to the vulgar language of the world, they would be surprised to find out others are offended. Another example of a cultural issue: a man recently told me that when he was growing up in Southern Virginia, teenage boys and girls in his youth group were not allowed to have pool parties together; it was considered too sexual, and he was told it was "a sin." When he moved to Maine later in life as a pastor, he was shocked to find that the entire church had parties on the beach, where all the men and women--young and old, married and single--wore their swimsuits all day. It wasn't sinful at all to them; it was Maine, where the beautiful coastline invited social activities and the church made use of it.
When I was on my last furlough, I used to tell a story about a persnickety relative who hung a sign on their door, "Stocking Feet Welcome Here" as a pointed hint to remove your shoes. I commented that taking my shoes off in other people's homes makes me uncomfortable (especially if its unexpected). I may have stinky feet, or holey socks, and so I feel awkward. I feel that by having a sign like that, however cutesy it seems, requires people to change to your standards before you welcome them. But that has no place in the Church! We cannot alienate those who need Christ before they get all the way in the door.
This whole subject ties well with a sermon I heard recently from Rob Rhoden about having an incarnational ministry: Jesus became like one of us in order to reach the lost--he didn't expect us to become like Him first.
I have been to Grandfather Mountain many times in my life, but I have never seen as beautiful a day as this one. After days of rain, this morning's skies were a perfect blue. We decided to skip our plans to go to a children's theme park in favor of going to nature. We simply had to be outside in the gorgeous weather.
