How Deep is Your Love?

And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.

Many years ago (late ’80s-early ‘90s), there was a large billboard just off a highway in south-central Oklahoma, advertising a denominational Church of Christ located within the city limits of the town nearest the sign, inviting non-member passersby to attend Saturday night and Sunday worship services there. The sign itself was hand-painted and beautifully done, and part and parcel of the expertly-lettered information upon it was the following short, sweet, and to the point message:

Worship is our gift to God!

I put that statement in italics and ended it with an exclamation mark, by the way, because that is the way it appeared on the sign in question, as though it were being announced to readers by the body of the church’s congregation.

Now, don’t get me to lying about the Churches of Christ as a distinct denomination amongst Protestant denominations because I’m certainly no expert when it comes to its theological idiosyncrasies. I know a couple things, though, like, e.g., that its members sing from their hymnals without the aid of musical instruments and that sort of thing. Otherwise, my knowledge of that denomination and its peculiarities is about as deep as a puddle. There is the additional matter of the above-mentioned statement prominently inscribed on the church’s billboard, however.

I well remember the first time I noticed the new sign and read the message in question. Even though I couldn’t have possibly been more than twenty-two or twenty-three years-old, and therefore was not a particularly devout or well-grounded Christian at the time, that statement nevertheless struck me the wrong way right from the get go. I remember thinking to myself upon reading it, “if y’all think worship is your ‘gift to God,’ and not the other way around, you can be assured that me and mine will never darken the door of your church, or any other Church of Christ, for that matter.”

My assumption has always been that the intention behind the message was to attract non-member passersby to the church, not to drive them away from it. If I’ve assumed correctly all these intervening years, the author(s) thereof certainly failed in their style of “outreach” with the likes of yours truly. I reckon that most people who actually bothered to read the message as they drove by were likely indifferent to it and the intentions of its author(s) in any case, its off-putting effect on the likes of T. Morris notwithstanding. The vast majority who were not explicitly anti-Christian probably saw nothing wrong with or in it. Or, so I suspect. Whereas, those few haters-of-all-things-remotely-Christian who read it likely took offense to its holier-than-thou hypocrisy and fake display of piety and whatnot. But that element is such an insignificant minority around the area I’m talking about that no one pays them nor their opinions any mind in any case. Sucks to be them in Christ-friendly rural Oklahoma, if you know what I mean. But I digress.

I should probably shift into a lower gear at this point in the article long enough to say that if you, dear reader, are a member of the denomination in question, please be assured that nothing written above is in any way intended to insult you, nor it. Other than having previously attended the church in question two or three times with a former girlfriend and her member-parents some five or six years before the billboard in question went up, the statement itself was all I had in my “hip pocket” to go on as it relates to that particular church’s membership and their ideas of what it means for Christians to worship God, and why His people engage in the practice. I’ll freely admit and own as well that there is a (possibly) unfair “guilt by association” element in my approach to the question as it pertains to the broader denomination. Although I’ve often wondered since whether it was just an idiosyncrasy possessed of the membership of that specific church and church body, and not a belief held or commonly embraced by the broader Churches of Christ per se.

That question and its answer is less important to me in any case than the more fundamental question of what it is that invites such thoughts, or the seeds of such thoughts, more precisely, to be implanted into the heads of professing Christians, and then to sprout roots and mature enough that they produce the “fruit” of openly announcing it on their billboards, on their church marquees and in church bulletins and suchlike. When they’re not otherwise preaching it from the pulpit and enthusiastically AMEN!-ing its pronouncement from the pews, I mean:

“All that matters, flock, is what we do for God! Can I get an Amen?!”

That, to me, is the more interesting question, and the one that needs to be answered beyond the obvious, yet too vague, “sinful nature” answer generally given when people can’t narrow error down to a more specific cause. But it needs a more specific answer, so’s we can properly address the problem at its source and where it lives, and begin applying the proper remedy(s).

I trust it is not lost on this intelligent readership that I am implying a connection of this problem as we observe it in modern churches and many of their parishioners, back to that particular part of Christ’s answer to the scribe’s “loaded” question contained in the epigraph heading this article. Neither do I reckon it lost on y’all that there is too much emphasis in today’s churches (and, yes, Southern churches as well) placed upon the latter part of the answer given I purposely omitted from inclusion in the epigraph, and not nearly enough emphasis on the former. The First and Greatest Commandment is, afterall, supreme love to God, NOT the “Golden Rule.” At least that’s what Jesus tells us through the witness of His disciples in the gospels recording the episode. But one would never know that judging by the amount of emphasis commonly placed on each of the two respectively in far too many of today’s churches and amongst their congregants.

I’ve discussed this and similar issues before with fellow Christians who more or less share my persuasion on the matter, but what I generally get from them by way of their more charitable (than mine) dispositions is some form or other of “well, their hearts are in the right place.” But, see, I’m not sure I would agree that the hearts of such persons are in the right place if I felt qualified to make that determination. Which I don’t. I’m sure of this: God knows where their hearts are; I don’t much concern myself with that. What I’m chiefly concerned with is whether or not their heads are in the right place. Because, as was iterated above, loving God with all your mind is an exercise of the head, not of the heart. And I for one have come to believe that neglect of this aspect of the First and Greatest Commandment is likely the primary avenue by way of which such error under discussion creeps into the mind and eventually produces fruit after its kind, whose seed is in itself, if not effectively dealt with and corrected.

To be perfectly honest, I have no idea what the phrase expressing what we “do for God,” in any of its various iterations even means. Don’t get me wrong, I think I know what the persons who say such things think it means, I just don’t know what it means, and certainly do not believe its meaning generally reflects what they intend by it in any case, nor that such sayings necessarily proceed from hearts that are “in the right place,” for that matter.

Well, that’s enough “solid meat” to chew on for now. I’ll pick up on this topic again in future articles. Thanks for reading, and God bless the Southland!