Not finding them there, they dragged out Jason and some of the other believers instead and took them before the city council. “Paul and Silas have caused trouble all over the world,” they shouted, “and now they are here disturbing our city, too.” Acts 17:6 G. Campbell Morgan said, “Organized Christianity which fails to make a disturbance is dead.” It seems like wherever Paul went, there was either a conversion or a riot. There was never a dull moment with the apostle. Their critics in Thessalonica said that Paul and Silas had “caused trouble all over the world.” Then they added, “And now they are here disturbing our city, too” (Acts 17:6). That is what we need today: a holy disturbance. We need to get back to the way the early church did things. The church was not perfect two thousand years ago, just as it isn’t perfect today. We can see as we read the book of Acts that the early church had all the challenges the church faces today. They had hypocrisy. They had division. But at the same time, it was the church that turned their world upside down. I was watching a talk show host interview a pastor recently, and he said, “You know, the Bible is so outdated. Don’t you think it is time that we drug it kicking and screaming into the 21st century?” In other words, Let’s sort of edit the Bible to fit the culture of today. But it is the very opposite of that. We don’t need to conform the Bible to culture; we need to conform the culture to what the Bible says. Are you paying attention? It is because we have strayed from this that we are facing many of the problems in our culture today. It is not just the socialist agenda of Barack Obama, the RINO Republicans or the dishonesty of the statist Democrats in power. As we look at our country today, we see a culture that is turned upside down. We are living in a time when right is wrong and wrong is right, as Isaiah wrote of when he said, “What sorrow for those who say that evil is good and good is evil, that dark is light and light is dark, that bitter is sweet and sweet is bitter” (Isaiah 5:20). The very foundations of our country are crumbling beneath our feet because we have lost our way. It is time that the church stood up and made a Holy Disturbance. We don’t need to “re-envision” the church today. We don’t need to “rethink” the church. Instead, we need to rediscover the church. It is the only organization Christ himself ever set up, and I think he did a pretty good job. It is the salt and light of this corrupt and dark world. I am not saying the church is perfect. The church is not perfect today, and the church was not perfect 2,000 years ago, either. In fact, in looking at of the book of Acts, we see they had all of the challenges and problems that the church faces right now. But at the same time, this is the church that turned their world upside down. That’s why I love the above passage out of Acts 17. It tells the whole story in a nutshell: “These who have turned the world upside down have come here too”. Yep, all the things we read about in Acts actually happened—but they didn’t happen every day. They happened over a period of time. The book of Acts is a record of a thirty-year period, from AD 33 to AD 63. There were interventions of the Holy Spirit, but we also see people living out their faith in a practical way. Acts is a record of the Spirit of God working through the Word of God in the hearts of the people of God. So that’s why I said that we don’t need to “re-envision” the church or “rethink” the church. Instead, we need to rediscover the church. Jesus our Lord planned it, started it and is building it. It has his fingerprints all over it. In a way, the book of Acts is still being written today. I am not suggesting that we add new pages to the Scriptures, but I am saying that we can add new chapters to church history. And we are writing our own right now. Agree or Disagree? Let me know. Please Share these thoughts if you will.
Posted on: Fri, 22 Nov 2013 22:40:43 +0000
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