Criticism and Consumerism: The Churches Fatal Flaws

Critical comments drive me insane. Like, I cannot stand it when people follow some shallow compliment with a “….but,” and then go on a rant of displeasure that far exceeds the compliment that they just half-heartedly gave. We live in a world of critics and people pointing fingers and casting blame. I have been there with the best of them, but I know that recently, my heart has been more attune to notice criticism in my own life and try to find the positive in situations that are far from pleasant. I have not been perfect at it and the battles are many. However, I feel like the issue needs to be addressed.

I’ve noticed a trend at Liberty. We spend so much time entrenched in doctrine and teaching that is good for us, but as C.S. Lewis puts it, “One of the things Christians are disagreed about is the importance of their disagreements”. A majority of the students here will be in agreement over how a person is saved or the inerrancy, infallibility, and inspiration of Scripture. We will talk until the sun comes up about grace and mercy and how wonderful and scandalous the love of Jesus is, but we will talk more about predestination or free will. We will talk and argue about a literal or spiritual rapture and things that are OK to debate, but not OK to stake our beliefs on. Things that do not and will not change the message of the Gospel and things that do not and will not change the fact that we are ONE body UNIFIED in Christ.

I’ve noticed a lot of people, myself included, discrediting people because we don’t agree with these “outlier” issues. We are telling other members of the Body of Christ that they are not good enough for “our body”, but that they should try out the “body down the street” because they are more likeminded. It is unbiblical to behave this way. It causes separation where God meant unity. Church is not a club. Grace is not exclusive. All we need is the Gospel. We forget sometimes that that is where we started. I do it. We need not be so quick to forget that we were not a neat and clean package full of deep theology when grace found us. We were, and still are, a mess, a mess that is covered by grace and seen as beautiful through Christ and His sacrifice, but a mess nonetheless.

I believe that this issue of criticism is rooted in our consumerist behavior. Church has become a place where we go to benefit us. If a preacher teaches or speaks in a way that we don’t “learn best from” we walk away saying that we didn’t “get anything” from the service neglecting the fact we just experienced one of God’s greatest blessings, the Body of Christ. If the worship pastor didn’t play our “favorite” song that morning, we walk away feeling dissatisfied with the entire service. I know that is my biggest struggle. I love music and I love worship so if I feel something is missing, my entire attitude about the service shifts.

When did church become a self-serving activity and not an act of worship? When did it become about what was good or bad for us and not about what the Lord had for us? And how do we get it back to its purpose?

Something that has been taught to me here and something that I think I overlooked a lot of the time is that we simply need to preach the Gospel to ourselves everyday. We need to remind ourselves where we came from and what God saved us from. Not to shame us into some skewed guilt-ridden humility, but to bring us back down to the foot of the cross. I’m not saying that this will fix all of the issues that I mentioned and I’m not saying that it’s the answer to everything, but I do think that it will bring humility to look at people with a more open mind. Not to compromise our beliefs, but to see them as Christ sees them and to love them as Christ loved them. Preaching the Gospel will remind us of the grace that we encountered and the mess that we were carried out of. It will remind us that we are dependent on Christ. It will bring humility that is not driven by shame and guilt, but humility that is driven by the appreciation of receiving a gift that we did not deserve.