[Biblemat] A> The Church’s Role in a Post-Christian World

[Jeff S. Smith]

The Church’s Role in a Post-Christian World
by Jeff S. Smith

The phrase “post-Christian world” is at once offensive and  
demoralizing, but perhaps sadly accurate as well.

The popularity and influence of the Christian faith has been waning  
ever since it reached its apex two centuries ago. Devout participation  
in church is becoming rare throughout Europe and secular humanism in  
our schools, courts and cultural fonts has emasculated a once solid  
religious foundation in the United States. Even as the Middle Eastern  
world enforces strict Muslim piety, the west is selling its collective  
soul to a deified environment or an idolatry of materialism. We are  
quickly becoming vulnerable to the devil or to a subtle Islamic  
invasion or to amoral atheism.

To its discredit, our society has wearied of the Bible and decided to  
forge ahead with a new morality that devalues traditional ethics and  
validates iniquity (Isaiah 5:20). Churches, challenged to survive in  
such conditions, fought valiantly for a while, but many have  
surrendered to the marketplace and adopted a much softer stance, both  
for Jesus and against sin.

It is not uncommon to see church advertisements that are completely  
lacking any reference to the Lord, instead promoting gymnasiums,  
daycare, banquets, dances and scout troops. Bible classes are replaced  
with arcade hours and unless the snacks are free, the numbers decline.

To a society that finds devout Christianity offensive and threatening,  
it is imperative that Church, Inc. carve out a new niche that studies  
the market and gives it what it wants. The church’s role in a post- 
Christian world is perceived to be almost anything except the Lord’s  
original intent. Sadly, the itching ears have prevailed and the  
denominational church has become little more than a carnal fellowship  
of spectators and fun-seekers (2 Tim. 4:1-5).

Churches of Christ are naturally tempted to follow suit – many already  
have and a few are actually leading the way. Faithful brethren,  
however, will insist upon soundness of doctrine and practice,  
regardless of their lack of appeal to a community in search of thrills  
and meals (1 Tim. 6:3). Sound preaching is not spiritless, but neither  
is it afraid to exhort and convict, labeling sin for what it is and  
calling its practitioners to reform (2 Tim. 3:16-17). Worship will  
continue to be both in spirit and in truth, without devolving into an  
exercise in musical or comedic entertainment (John 4:23-24). A sound  
church will function as an outpost of stability and truth in a world  
bent on self-service and convenient error (1 Tim. 3:15).

The role of the churches of Christ in a disinterested world is to  
continue proclaiming the gospel and seeking the few with honest hearts  
who will see through the flimsiness of perverted messages and obey the  
truth (Rom. 2:8, Galatians 1:6-8). If the church changes just to  
survive, it won’t be the church anymore, but another in a long line of  
highly flawed denominational experiments (1 Cor. 1:10-13). A real  
failure (Revelation 3:1-6).

Jeff S. Smith