The Main Thing

About twelve years ago I worked briefly with a pastor who was fond of saying that we need to keep the main thing the main thing. It's kind of a cute phrase and it certainly sounds good. I mean, who wouldn't want the main thing to be the main thing? The church we joined this weekend actually uses this catch phrase quite prominently. The difference between now and twelve years ago is that the pastor at our new church actually defines what he means when he says the "main thing".

He identified...correctly in my opinion...that for some churches the main thing is right doctrine. For others the main thing is speaking in tongues. And for still others it's adherence to denominational standards. Our pastor makes it clear that the main thing he's talking about is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The Word of God and exposing that word is central and drives everything the church does. At least that's what is being said. I'm sure they don't do it perfectly because there's no such thing as perfect in this existence.

Here's the thing about the main thing, being rooted and grounded in the Word is crucial to the healthy life of any church. This does not mean that the pastor is rooted and grounded in the word. It means that there is a passionate concern on the part of every single member of the church to learn, study and grow in their knowledge of scripture. It means that studying God's word isn't an optional activity and it's not a weekly activity. It's a daily pursuit of truth, knowledge and understanding. It's a seeking after the Holy Spirit to reveal, motivate and encourage through study of the word and lively interaction with others who follow Christ.

The sad truth is that right here in the United States our churches are filled with Biblical illiterates. If this sounds harsh, it's meant to be. I would hazard a guess that a majority of the people filling the seats on Sunday morning have only a passing familiarity with the Bible and probably not even that. The confirmation of this isn't the low attendance at Bible studies (although attendance is dramatically lower than for church service). It isn't an exhaustive survey I've done on what people know. No, the indication that people aren't passionately involved in studying God's word is that the church in America is declining. It's that there aren't people out helping the widowed, homeless, naked, imprisoned and orphaned in record numbers.

If church leaders were insisting and people were responding by getting deep into the Word of God there would be an explosion of faith like this country has never seen. Instead we're happy to read three sentences of scripture and hear 20 to 30 minutes of talk about those sentences each week. Here's a simple truth...the Word works if you work the Word. It works in your heart, in your life, in your family and in your community. It works because it is the living breathing power of God for the changing of hearts and minds. If more churches and church leaders stopped promoting the latest flavor of the month inspirational book/video/movie/etc. and started relentlessly promoting the Bible and the study of the Bible at all costs there would be and explosion of love, service and faith that would blow us all away. That's not my opinion. That's the truth.