There’s a lot of talk nowadays about all the new trends in the church. Some people are happy with the changes, and some, like me, are downright appalled at how far afield from the Bible the church is moving. My greatest concern is that the gospel, by which we are all saved, is being left behind in the shuffle to attract unchurched people.One rarely hears a straight gospel message preached from the pulpit anymore. Instead we have weekly series on marriage, finances, child rearing and so on. Sometimes one would think we weren’t in church at all, but in the midst of a 12 step support group or listening to a religious version of Dr. Phil.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all in favor of being given Christian instructions on how to live. It’s necessary in a chaotic world which has no clear standards of behavior any more. What I object to is that in many cases it’s being done to the exclusion of the word of God.

I’ve even seen secular books on physcology, marriage and child rearing being used as teaching guides. In fact, some of the Christian books that are being used have very little to offer in the way of true Biblical instruction themselves, but simply rehash the same warmed over pop physco babble that’s been around for years. Very few churches I know of even use the Bible to study the Bible anymore. Some pastors don’t preach out of it either, but use denominational sermon guides.

Then there are the soft sell sermons, where Christ is only mentioned in passing, or in some cases not at all.

In his great little book “This Little Church Went To Market”, Gary Gilley describes the difference between the real gospel and what is being substituted for it nowadays.”Salvation is not simply, under the new gospel, the forgiveness of sin and the imputation of righteousness. It is not a deliverance from the wrath of God upon a deserving and rebellious people.”"The new gospel is a liberation from low self-esteem, a freedom from emptiness and loneliness, a means of fulfilment and excitement, a way to receive our heart’s desires, a means of meeting our needs.”

Sounds pretty good so far, right?But wait….”The old gospel is about God; the new gospel is about us. The old gospel is about sin, the new gospel is about needs. The old gospel is about our need for righteousness, the new gospel is about our need for fulfillment. The old gospel is foolishness to those who are perishing; the new gospel is attractive. Many are flocking to the new gospel, but it is altogether questionable how many are actually being saved.”

Friends, saving people is at the heart of the gospel message. Without that as the end result, we are merely speaking empty words and preaching another Jesus. We may leave feeling good after hearing a “new gospel” sermon, but it does nothing to develop the character and the discipline of Christ in us, which we all so desparately need. If you are hearing another kind of gospel, run, don’t walk, to the nearest exit and get into a real Bible based church that’s more interested in deepening you spiritually than in tickling your ears.

At the risk of sounding like a complete old fogie, (and I’m sad to confess that somehow I’ve finally gotten to that age), I find the post modern church severely lacking in a couple of things I was taught early on that were essential to Christian life.

Number one is reverencing God.

A great many of us in my generation, lovingly called the baby boomers, have enjoyed a lifestyle unprecedented by anyone before us. Yet, somehow in our “it’s all about me” mindset, we’ve lost our gratitude toward the God who prospered us, just as He cautioned the children of Israel in the Old Testament not to do.

In our personal quest to acquire all that is good in this life, somewhere along the line we also developed a serious apathy about the after life. Because we were so “busy” chasing the American dream, we chose to let televangelists and mega-churches take over our individual teaching of the gospel, and the personal modeling of Godly principles all believers are called to do. Because we got too busy to pray and to read our Bibles, we also relied upon pastors and others to seek God, and to have our personal relationship with Christ for us.

So much of the emphasis of our modern worship services is on the make-me-feel-good-about-myself gospel, that we’ve pretty much left God’s chosen agenda out of the equation. As we’ve aged, we have, along with our children, become more of a generation of religious consumers and purpose driven groupies rather than Presence centered activists. Even though we baby boomer Christians pride ourselves on our tolerance and compassion for others, our generation actually spends far less time in practical service to those in need than any other generation before us.

However, because so many of us do tend to put our own goals above our responsibility as blood bought members of Christ’s body, the spreading of His gospel has suffered more than anything else, from neglect on the part of His chosen people. In fact, to a generation so concerned with self image, sharing the gospel outside of church nowadays is considered downright embarassing. And this despite our being one of the largest and most influential generations in history, 80% of whom claim to believe in God.

I was also taught, early on, that personally modeling the integrity of Christ in all our ways was something every Christian should do to honor God.

However, that sort of Christian life lesson isn’t taught much nowadays, because our self-seeking culture no longer honors God first. Instead, it teaches us it’s all about how much we can get away with and not be held responsible. We are even told by some of our religious leaders that “sin management” is out of style in this new age of religious tolerance. We are led even further away from any real sense of Christian responsibility by an overly indulgent society that encourages us to think of ourselves as victims if we’re criticized or disagreed with nowadays. With all that going against us, we Christians think we have to go with the flow too, in order to fit in.

Because our generation is much more into appearances than our parents were, we often allow ourselves to be both inwardly and outwardly intimidated by what people might “think” if we actually determined to live a truly holy, morally upright life. Some of us sincerely believe if we really dared to stand up for the truth God, no matter what, we might not be accepted in our families or our social groups. That, in our approval seeking generation’s eyes, is the worst thing that could possibly happen to us – short of taking away our financial security, of course. Somehow, we must wake up and stop using our precious religious freedom to create more self-serving clones of ourselves, and begin to actively practice our Christian faith in more needful and mindful ways.

It’s not just about praying that our loved ones get saved, and thinking our job is done. It’s not about just going to church, and writing a generous check to missions on Sunday, thinking we can bribe God. It’s about being more committed to His chosen agenda every day, in our own practice of Christianity, for everyone’s sake. It’s about not watering down the gospel message, or changing God’s truth, in order to get it across. We shouldn’t have to do that anyway if we’re being living proof of Christ’s ability to transform lives and renew minds. It’s not about us Christians trying to gain the world’s approval by going with the flow. It’s about being concerned enough with someone else’s welfare to tell them why they need to come to Jesus and repent of their sins, so they can escape God’s judgement of the world.

We don’t know how much someone’s else’s decision of whether to spend eternity in heaven or hell is going to be influenced by how effectively we model Christ in our individual areas of influence. We may not realize, this side of heaven, how many anonymous souls are saved by our public professions of the truth about the priceless gift of salvation that Christ made possible on the cross – for all who would believe. The fact that all the people we know don’t believe is precisely why this generation of Christians needs to get our minds off filling up our pocketbooks, and get back to filling our lives, and everyone else’s, with the real treasures contained in God’s Book.

Reverencing God and having the integrity of Christ will never win us any brownie points in today’s largely secular society. Nor will it go over well in many radical fringe groups of the church itself, who are more interested in the emotional experience of religion, than the reason behind it. No matter what denominational beliefs we may have however, God’s basic message does not change from generation to generation. These are very serious times, and if we are to leave behind the same legacy of Christian truth that we were given in the beginning, we need to be as serious about conducting God’s business as we have been about conducting our own.