How Long, O Lord?

How long, O Lord will I have to watch the farce that has become your church? And when I speak of the farce of the Lord's "church," I do not mean that God is the farce because he is the only constant in our lives. He is truly the one being in this great and immensely large universe in which we can trust. No, the farce of the Lord's church is in the farce that God's people make of the church. Is it any wonder that people die and go to hell lost in their sins when God's people seem so caught up in their own little world while the world literally falls apart around them?

As I watch with newly opened eyes, I wonder how God stands to look upon what he sees among his people? Does he feel intense hot anger like I do? Does he weep openly like I do? Does our creator, who loved us so much that he sent His only begotten Son to die the cruelest of deaths that we might gain salvation, shake his mighty head in disgust and sadness? As our preacher says, I am engaging my heavenly imagination to wonder about my creator and my Savior. I believe he does all of what I have described and so much more.

I believe that our Savior weeps. He weeps for the lost; and, he weeps for his people. There is no doubt that in spite of our failings, he still loves us unconditionally. He still pleads with us to listen to his voice and his tender guidance. He comes back to us time andtime again even though we don't deserve it because he wants us to be a part of his work. He wants to use us as his representatives, his ambassadors, to a lost and corrupted world.

But, how can he use us? Do we enjoy simply playing church? Is this all just a game to so many of us? Do we even care the damage we are doing to God's work at such a critical time in world history? I often find myself profoundly saddened by the state of what has been termed by some, the "modern" church and by others, the "post-modern" church. The modern church is every bit the Laodicean church of the book of Revelation where Christ writes to say "I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot" (3:15). The modern church is truly lukewarm and it surprises me that God has not already spewed us out of His mouth in disgust. There is nothing worse than lukewarm water, lukewarm food, and especially lukewarm belief. Lukewarm food and water are sickening to the taste, upset the stomach, and generally just make you sick. If lukewarm food and water do that to humans, how must we have sickened our Savior? The fact that he hasn't cast us aside is evidence of his long-suffering patience.

Are we willing to step outside our comfort zones? Will we sacrifice in the service of our Lord? Or have we become a comfortable people incapable of understanding the voice of God? Do we hear the call of our Savior to go and tell? Or are we content with our own church family and unconcerned with those who have not heard and will not hear save through us? I fear that these rhetorical questions do not have positive answers for the modern church. I truly fear that most of us are not capable of stepping outside our comfort zones. We are so comfortable, so "rich yet poor" that we often do not even hear the voice of God. Or worse yet, we consciously choose to ignore him because hearing him requires action and action requires obedience and obedience moves us well outside our comfort zone. I also fear that the modern church has lost its concern for those outside its four walls.

These thoughts bring me full circle to the title of this blog. In Habakkuk 1, the scripture says "O Lord, how long shall I cry, and thou wilt not hear! even cry out unto thee of violence, and thou wilt not save!" And, I ask truly from my heart, "How Long O Lord will you tolerate our lukewarm faith, our lukewarm attitudes, our cold hearts, our richness while we are yet poor? How long?"