Leonard Ravenhill once said, "the tragedy of today is that the Church is pursing happiness not holiness." We are seeing a pandemic of unholiness in the Church, as more sexual scandals break out and leadership covering it up. We keep asking why? Why are innocents being preyed upon. All the usual tropes are brought up, "wolves in sheeps clothing," (Matthew 7:15) and that Jesus said, "everything that is hidden will be exposed." (Luke 8:17). Those are true, but we are reaching a point in the Church were all credibility is getting lost and it maybe beyond saving. The Gospel and Jesus Christ our Lord will not pass away, but the church may and one of the cornerstone problems with the church in the West is an obsession with Happiness. In the Age of Reason, an ungodly fusion was made between Christianity and Humanism, an idea that one could satisfy both the Kingdom of Heaven and yourself, even though Jesus said, "deny yourself and pick up your cross." (Matthew 16:24). You hear people saying, "I need to find myself," this is a rewording of "Self Realization" the hallmark of Humanism, and its more watered down form is, "I just want to be happy." If we just find what will make us happy, we will achieve self realization, achieve our potential. The problem is this is antithetical to Christianity which has you focused on Christ, "fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the
joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat
down at the right hand of the throne of God," (Hebrews 12:2), and on others, "Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers." (Galatians 6:10). Humanism was already an enemy of Christianity in that it denied the supernatural and deities, but it remains strongest as opponent in Self Realization, in trying to achieve your potential independent of God, to pursue happiness which is wired even into the United States Constitution, "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness." Many of the Founding Fathers were Christian Humanists.
As Christians were are not suppose to pursue happiness, rather holiness, "But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, Since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy," (1 Peter 1:15-16), "Let the evildoer still do evil, and the filthy still be filthy, and the righteous still do right, and the holy still be holy,"(Revelation 22:11), "Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies," (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). What is holiness? The word holy means in Hebrew and Greek to be "set apart," more properly it means to live a life separate from this world, to die to this world, "As for me, may I never boast about anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of that cross, my interest in this world has been crucified, and the world’s interest in me has also died," (Galatians 6:14) and its lusts, "For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world" (1 John 2:16); it means to hold to a standard of living that is in tune with God's Will. Humanism in contrast says you can achieve potential and fulfillment, self realization apart from God, sounds like the Five I Wills of Satan to me (Isaiah 14:11-14). The Church has adopted this tenet of Humanism and reformed into into "be happy," or "prosperity doctrine", the idea that God wants us to be happy. C.S. Lewis once said, "I’m not sure God wants us to be happy. I think he wants us to love, and be loved. But we are like children, thinking our toys will make us happy and the whole world is our nursery. Something must drive us out of that nursery and into the lives of others, and that something is suffering." Lewis touches on something, "deny yourself, pick up your cross daily and follow me." (Luke 9:23). Jesus' statement was about suffering, every Jew He spoke that to knew that because crosses were Roman torture execution device. Now is God a sadist and wants to torture us? No. Does he want to make us perpetually unhappy and never have joy in this life, no, "The Joy of the Lord is my Strength." (Nehemiah 8:10). The problem is happiness cannot be achieved outside of Him, hence Lewis' other words, "God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing" (Mere Christianity). Humanism has infected The Church with the idea that we can achieve happiness, our potential, independent of God, it is Lucifer all over again, urging us to rebel and find solace in our own source, rather than turning to God as the Source
The antithesis of the Happiness Cult is to pick up your Cross and to live a holy life. It is to decide to live the words in the Letter to the Romans, "Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will." (Romans 12:2). I am not saying this means live a somber and monastic life of feeling as if you are throwing yourself on rose bushes (St. Benedict was nuts!) but it means to reorient your life, to make The Holy Trinity, not your own happiness the focus. The only way to achieve Self Realization is in Christ, "I am the Vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in Me and I in him bears much fruit, for [otherwise] apart from Me [that is, cut off from vital union with Me] you can do nothing." (John 15:5). We can achieve no fruit bearing, no potential apart from The Son of God! The problem is the Church is using the Humanist model while still serving Christ, they are in effect trying to achieve both, but one cannot carry a cross and pursue happiness apart from Christ! The church is like two oxen with one wooden yoke fastening them together, but the two oxen are going in different directions, which leads nowhere.
Bringing up this subject is hard because people when you discuss holiness and suffering tend to swing into the Roman Catholic camp and become obsessed with mortifying their flesh, becoming miserable beings. That is not what I am advocating, holiness is not this somber path with whips and grumpy monk faces. In the Lord Almighty is great joy, hope, love, and fruit, we are not to be deprived of happiness altogether, we are to find it in Christ and those we love, "love the Lord God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, this is greatest commandment," (Matthew 23:37) and "love one another as I have loved you. They will know you are my disciples by your love for one another" (John 13:34-35). The problem is we have allowed Humanism to leave a stone in the Church, that is Luciferian, it is making us like the two oxen walking against each other. We have to purge this teaching of Humanism, of Self Realization because it is predicated on doing it independent of God, which is how Satan came to be. We do not want to become little satans, we are called to be "little christs" (C.S. Lewis). Amen.
Comments
Post a Comment