theology-ecclesiology

Shifting Focus from Celebrities to Christ

/ Richard Bargas / Leave a comment

I came across the following quote from Gregory the Great (Bishop of Rome from 590-604 AD):

“That man is an enemy of his Redeemer who on the strength of the good works he performs, desires to be loved by the Church, rather than by Him [Christ]. Indeed, a servant is guilty of adulterous thought, if he craves to please the eyes of the bride when the bridegroom sends gifts to her by him.”1

A lot of Christians have noted that the “celebrity Christian” thing is weird and should be done away with. Yet, after one falls, another begins to rise to the top and quickly takes the last one’s place. There are a lot of issues related to the celebrity culture, but my aim in this post is to point out that the celebrity Christian thing is not only wrong, it’s adulterous.

When we put men or women on a pedestal, we divert the eyes of the world and other Christians away from Christ and onto a man. And when we seek to be the one on that pedestal, we desire to be the one who draws the eyes.

Tradition in the United States is that no other woman should wear white to a wedding other than the bride-to-be. Why? It is because the eyes of the guests, and especially of the groom, should be on the bride. So what happens when there are competitors? And not just wearing white, but seeking to catch the attention of the groom? Gregory is correct in stating that this is adulterous and marks such a person as an enemy of the groom, Jesus Christ.

Some who crave the spotlight would say that my comments and those of others who decry celebrity culture are simply a result of jealousy over their success, and that they are seeking a way to point others to Jesus. Yet, I don’t see these tactics used in the Bible. Instead, Jesus said, “And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself” (John 12:32, LSB).

May we see more Christians with the attitude of George Whitefield:

“Let the name of Whitefield perish, but Christ be glorified. Let my name die everywhere, let even my friends forget me, if by that means the cause of the blessed Jesus may be promoted. . . . I am content to wait till the judgment day for the clearing up of my reputation; and after I am dead, I desire no other epitaph than this, “Here lies G. W. What sort of man he was the great day will discover.”2

  1. Gregory the Great, Pastoral Care, trans. Henry David, Ancient Christian Writers 11 (New York: Newman Press, 1950), 75. Quoted in Harold L. Senkbeil, The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor’s Heart (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2019), 117. ↩︎
  2. Arnold A. Dallimore, George Whitefield: The Life and Times of the Great Evangelist of the Eighteenth-Century Revival (2 vols.) (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth Trust, 1980),2:257-258. ↩︎

Pastors or Shopkeepers?

/ Richard Bargas / 2 Comments

“The pastors of America have metamorphosed into a company of shopkeepers and the shops they keep are churches. They are preoccupied with shopkeeper’s concerns-how to keep the customers happy, how to lure customers away from competitors down the street, how to package the goods so that the customers will lay out more money. The marketing strategies of the fast-food franchise occupy the waking minds of these entrepreneurs; while asleep they dream of the kind of success that will get the attention of journalists.” —Eugene Peterson

Peterson’s statement strikes at the root of the modern evangelical church today. Don’t speak on controversial issues. Make sure your social media strategy keeps up with the latest trends. Watch where the “market” is driving the tastes of the most “customers” and shift your marketing strategy in that direction. God help us.

What might look like “market dominance” and “success” in this false narrative for so many of these types of ministries will turn out to be more like cotton candy. Appealing to the eyes and the flesh, and yet truly amounting to just a little bit of colored sugar spun into a frenzy that appeals to children and those who hunger for flash over substance.

Give me a church where men stand before their congregation and open up their Bibles and thunder, “Thus says the Lord.” They aren’t harvesting social media followers or their brand. They aren’t gathering up lieutenants who are loyal to them more than to Jesus. No, these men and the churches they lead are content to be faithful and be forgotten.

These types of men aren’t tending to their shops, strategizing how they can better market to the masses under the guise that they are doing evangelism. These men are more on their knees than on TikTok, more in the Word than on Instagram. Instead of selfies they are selfless. Instead of harvesting followers, they are walking with the Savior in humble obedience.

It’s not flashy. It’s doesn’t draw a crowd. But the world doesn’t need a phenom, or a CEO. We need pastors who will gently lead us to Jesus.

Why Do the Wicked Succeed?

/ Richard Bargas / Leave a comment

“Righteous are You, O Yahweh, when I would plead my case with You; Indeed I would speak matters of justice with You: Why has the way of the wicked succeeded? Why are all those who deal in treachery complacent?” (Jeremiah 12:1, LSB)

As a pastor, it can be quite frustrating and even depressing when you are trying to be faithful in your ministry and yet it seems as if the work you are doing isn’t having the effect that you hope it would have in the lives of the people to whom you are ministering. This frustration is exacerbated when your church is located near an unbiblical church or a cult that seems to be swelling in numbers and influence.

Several years ago I remember having a conversation with a member of our church over a similar situation. He came from a megachurch that had a large and influential ministry in the area. Although the teaching was evangelical in nature, the heart of the church was very sick and the church leaders were very abusive and manipulative, as was attested to by several former members. On the day of our conversation, this brother in Christ expressed his concern as to why his former church was so large and wealthy, and yet they failed to practice biblical church discipline, were unkind, even cruel to staff, and were almost cult-like in the way they had formed their leadership structure. On the other hand, he had grown to love our small church, seeing that what we attempted to model was from the New Testament, and that we had a warm and welcoming body that exemplified what he always felt was how a Christian church should act–even if imperfectly.

In his worldview, the larger church had been blessed by God, and that was why it was large. Our church, which was much smaller, struggled in all the ways smaller churches often struggle–with limited resources and staffing. We weren’t always able to do what we felt God called us to do on the scale we wanted to in order to reach others for Christ. If our heart was right and we were trying to be conformed to the New Testament model of a Christian church, why was it that God wasn’t blessing us with more people, financial resources, and other visible “blessings?” What the Bible says and how it played out in real life was puzzling to this sincere brother.

Since we live in a world where our eyes can deceive us, it is easy to default into a popular view that the Jewish people often held in the Bible. It was the idea that in this life, God blesses us when we are good, and God punishes us when we are bad. Although this idea is simple and clean (and is often true, but not always), it doesn’t always work out that way in real life experience and it can become very disorienting when the righteous are seemingly not blessed and the wicked seem to succeed.

Asaph wrote a psalm voicing his struggle with this very issue (Psalm 72). He began to feel as if all his striving to walk in obedience to the Lord was a wasted effort, ““Surely in vain I have kept my heart pure And washed my hands in innocence;” (Psalm 73:13, LSB). Essentially, Asaph wondered aloud, why bother if in the end, the righteous end off worse than the wicked? There are a lot of problems with this sort of thinking, and that is another subject for another time, but here is the reality that sobered up Asaph:

“When I gave thought to know this, It was trouble in my sight until I came into the sanctuary of God; Then I understood their end. Surely You set them in slippery places; You cause them to fall to destruction. How they become desolate in a moment! They are completely swept away by terrors!” (Psalm 73:16–19, LSB)

The moment Asaph walked into the presence of God he was immediately reminded of the eternal realities his eyes could not see in the moment of his confusion about his present realities. This world is not all there is. Jeremiah needed this reminder as well. The fall of Israel and Judah were not the end. The wicked that the Lord used as His instruments of judgment would not be eternally exonerated. And the church that throws off how the Lord desires to be worshipped in exchange for a spirit of entrepreneurial showmanship will eventually reap what they have sown. The cultists, false teachers, and those that treat the church as a money-making or power-grabbing enterprise will reap what they have sown eventually.

You see, some seeds take longer to bring their harvest. Sometimes we see the fruit of our efforts in this life–good or bad. But other seeds, and these are often the most important ones, we will not reap the harvest until we stand before our Creator God. We need to be focused upon faithfully sowing the right seeds, and worry much less on what the other guy is doing. By keeping our hands to the plow and working the vineyard the Lord has given to us, we will find that we are more content and filled with joy when we see the harvest, big or small, that the Lord brings through His powerful gospel.

Popularity Doesn’t Equate with Truth

/ Richard Bargas / Leave a comment

“Moreover, Jehoshaphat said to the king of Israel, “Please inquire first for the word of Yahweh.” Then the king of Israel gathered the prophets together, about four hundred men, and said to them, “Shall I go against Ramoth-gilead to battle or shall I refrain?” And they said, “Go up, for the Lord will give it into the hand of the king.” But Jehoshaphat said, “Is there not yet a prophet of Yahweh here that we may inquire of him?”” (1 Kings 22:5–7 LSB)

As I was reading the passage above, I noticed something I hadn’t seen before in my previous readings in 1 Kings.

King Jehoshaphat requested that King Ahab first inquire about the will of God before agreeing to go to war with him. Ahab obliged by calling 400 so-called prophets who told him that the Lord approved of the war.

But Jehoshaphat was not fooled. Something didn’t sit right with the message these prophets gave. The text doesn’t tell us why, but Jehoshaphat didn’t accept these 400 prophets as speaking from the Lord. As a matter of fact, this is what caught my eye.

Again, it says in verse 7, “But Jehoshaphat said, “Is there not yet a prophet of Yahweh here that we may inquire of him?”” It is almost as if the king told Ahab, “Yes, yes, I have heard the popular opinion of all these men, but…don’t you have any actual prophets of Yahweh, or only these fakers? I’d actually like to hear what Yahweh has to say.”

Ahab doesn’t seem to be confused because he knows that his sleight of hand trick hasn’t worked. He knows that he has been keeping the good stuff in the back and hasn’t brought out the real prophet of Yahweh. Ahab wasn’t looking for truth, only for a confirmation of his preconceived plans.

You know, some people claim to want the truth, but they want their truth, as the current foolishness of our day would say. But the truth is a stubborn thing. Something is either true or it is not. And the number of people you get to back a lie doesn’t increase its truthfulness. A lie is always a lie no matter how many false prophets can lip-sync in unison the siren song of the culture or popular opinion.

We need to ask ourselves this as well. Do I really want to know the truth, or am I wanting to fit in, to follow with the cool crowd (whoever the “cool kids” might currently be)?

Appeals to “science” or straw man arguments, or the number of books written or Instagram followers may sway those who want to affirm their own preconceived notions, but popularity and doctrine don’t equal truth. Whether it is the cultural doctrines of gender politics, abortion, or feminism, or the theological doctrines of eschatology, pneumatology, or ecclesiology. Memes don’t prove the truth. Mic drop blog posts and Facebook rants bring more heat than light.

What we need is to hear a true prophet of Yahweh speak. God has spoken, and He has done so perfectly in His Word. So, instead of gathering polemics and talking points from Fox News, CNN, Twitter, or YouTube, for those of us called out by Christ, let’s open our Bibles and listen to God speak.

Pastor, Why Do They Come to Your Church?

/ Richard Bargas / Leave a comment

“As they went away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds concerning John: “What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind? What then did you go out to see? A man dressed in soft clothing? Behold, those who wear soft clothing are in kings’ houses. What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet.” (Matthew 11:7–9, ESV)

Christmas and Easter are the two holidays that cause a jump in attendance at churches all across the United States as people attend who don’t normally darken the door of the church. Many come to “feel close to God” during these precious Christian holy days.

But for those “churches” and “pastors” that are enamored with nickels and noses when people come into their buildings, Christmas and Easter are opportunities to “wow” their audiences with a spectacular show that will hopefully get them to stay and “experience” all that this type of church has to offer.

I don’t mean to disparage those churches that see the infrequent visitors as a mission field to whom they can minister to and share the wonder of the incarnation and resurrection with. We would be remiss as Christians not to take advantage of this opportunity. But there is a definite philosophy that loses the baby Jesus with the bathwater when productions, lighting, and stage histrionics take the place of the power of God vested in the gospel.

I point to Jesus’ words above from Matthew 11:7-9 as sobering truths for all of us. We need to ask ourselves, “Why do people come to our church?” In doing so, we reflect this time when Jesus asked the disciples why the crowds went out to see John the Baptist. Did they go out to see a reed shaken in the wind, or as we might say it today, a man taken by the latest fads and opinions of men? No, the people didn’t go out to see that.

As a matter of fact, Jesus asks if they went out into the wilderness to see a man dressed in soft clothing. But John was famously known to wear a rough-cut animal skin with a strip of leather for a belt around his waist. He ate what he could scavenge out there in the wilderness–locusts and wild honey. John wasn’t a skinny-jeans wearing, cappuccino-sipping, bearded hipster having “dialogues” with the people. He must have looked like a wild-eyed madman compared to the refined religious leaders of the times. Instead John looked like an Old Testament prophet of God, most notably, like the prophet Elijah. His sandals weren’t Birkinstocks, and his beard wasn’t oiled with shea butter and lavender. They knew if they wanted to see a man in soft clothes that they wouldn’t go out to the wilderness.

So why did they go out to see John? Because they wanted to hear from God. And to do that, they needed a prophet. Not a fancy boy who spends his days taking selfies in a mirror to gain more followers. Not a politically correct parrot who takes the temperature of the world to adjust his message to fit the popular opinions of men. They needed a faithful messenger who would speak the truth–unvarnished and true.

So, the next time you are considering what you can do to polish up your look, your sermon, or your church’s “stage,” remember John. People came out to hear a word from God. And if they want to hear something else, there are plenty of false churches and false teachers that will accommodate them.

“I 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: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.” (2 Timothy 4:1–5, ESV)