THE DOWNFALL OF THE CHURCH

Part Three. My Church Story + How churches could SAVE California from destruction

This is a subject that comes easily to me. I’m going to be open, honest, and frank. I might make some people angry - probably people I know pretty well. I’m okay with that, because I believe that hard things have to be said. The time for walking on eggshells and worrying about bruised egos has passed. Our country – and our state – has reached a tipping point. We are at a crossroads, and there is little to no time left to take action to save what vestiges of freedom we have left.

The truth hurts, especially when we’re talking about ourselves. I also want to begin this final installment in my “Let’s Save California” series by saying that today, when I am talking about the church, I’m also talking about the lies and tepidity that I grew up thinking were normal. The lies that I unknowingly perpetuated. The lies that, eventually, I broke free from and am now seeking a path forward on how to not only restore my relationship with the church in general – and looking specifically at what I can do to help the church as our state plods forward toward what appears to be imminent doom.  

I am just as guilty of being a dead branch on the tree of the church as many others are. However, once I woke up to the fact that I was a do-nothing Christian, I became acutely aware of how it happened – and the reality is not pretty.  

Today, I’m going to talk a little about my personal experience in the American church, my disillusionment with what I like to call the “church establishment,” and how California churches have the power to save our state from destruction, if they choose to wake up.

My Church Story

Here’s the thing: there is no such thing as a perfect church, just as there is no such thing as a perfect person. While we’re on Earth, our experiences will be marred and scarred by sin. However, that does not change the fact that some churches are just plain rotten, poisoned either by bad theology or, even worse, good theology and zero real-world application.  

I’ve been to a number of churches over the years. Some of them were fine. Some of them were bad. Some of them were just there – neither hot nor cold. Simply walking a threadbare line of meager existence, barely more than a shadowed memory in my mind. My personal story with the church began years ago. When I was a teenager, I would get really frustrated at the lack of real-world application Bible principals in church.

Preachers and Sunday school teachers and ministers would give wonderful, well-meaning sermons about Christ and the Gospel, (theologically, there was nothing wrong with what they were saying) but as far as what was going on during Sunday morning and Bible studies, there was no meat or teeth to anything. What I mean by this is that while we were repeatedly given a why of the Gospel, we were rarely – if ever – given a how. That is, how could we apply it to our lives in a doable, practical way?

 I noticed a pattern in every church I attended, too, when I would attend Bible study: Sit down, read a Bible verse, talk about how hard our lives are, examine the same verse seven times, start over, say some prayers, and then scurry on to our homes so we could return to whatever “crazy” and “chaotic” life schedule we had going. Moms’ Bible study groups were really good at this, too. Every week, meeting to talk about how difficult motherhood is (which it is) and how we need to give each other some grace (which can be true) – but repeating the same talking points over and over again. For years, and years…and years.

That’s not to say that there’s not a time and place to seek encouragement from other believers, but seriously: I got to a point in my Christian faith where I felt restless. We never talked about anything new. We never addressed current world topics. Every once in a while, there might be the cursory mention of a foreign war, or the dreaded-and-often-avoided topic of abortion (and how bad it was! Tsk!), or how crazy politics had gotten (people on stage are always very careful not to mention the names of politicians!).

Internally, a storm was brewing. I had questions. Serious questions. What did God think about what was going on in society? Why were our church and Bible discussions so incredibly limited to superficial topics? How come literally nobody else that I spent time with cared about what was going on in politics? I couldn’t understand this. Politics shaped policy, and policy shaped our culture’s standards of morality. Wouldn’t it seem common sense and logical, I reasoned, for the church to want to be strongly involved in the civic process? Why would the church shy away from controversy? Jesus certainly didn’t. Neither did Paul or Peter or countless prophets of the Old Testament who went toe-to-toe with tyrannical rulers and regimes.  

Pastors eagerly encouraged us as congregants to go out and spread the Gospel with absolutely no real indication of how to do so. Invite people to church, we’re told! Volunteer in youth group! Show up at the canned food drive on Saturday! All of those were good things – fine and dandy. But there had to be more. I volunteered for a long time in youth ministry and felt like I lived at church for years, attending every Bible study, helping with events, leading teams in Vacation Bible School, babysitting children so that busy moms could attend fellowship meetings (before I was mom myself!), volunteering in the nursery, and faithfully attending church every Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night without fail.

I was devoted. I was serious about church.

I was running the race because everyone else was.

I was empty inside.

Duplicity and Hollowness in the American Church

Why was I empty? Because I was confused. There was a duplicity in the church, and it was beginning to dog me. Like an unscratched itch or a thorn in my foot – I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but it was causing strife within me. Things in our society, from a Biblical perspective, are very bad. And yet, I would hear little about it on Sunday. In fact, Sunday was an escape from reality – a reprieve from the brutality of the moral battlefront in culture, a place to forget about all the things going wrong outside. And that was the problem. Church was a like a social club – a place to hang out and swap jokes and exchange statistics on family planning (“I have three kids already – you’d better hurry up and start having more!”). Fellowship is important, of course! But should it come at the expense of refusing to face reality? I argue that it should not.

Even more disturbingly, I began to realize as I roused from my stupor that people really didn’t seem to be very concerned about the stuff that was going on. We came to church to be encouraged and to have fellowship, but the buck stopped there.

I went through a period of time were the dichotomy between what the church said it was and what it actually was almost sent me to Hell. I was so angry at the hypocrisy of self-righteous parishioners, slanted and obvious favoritism, offensively exclusive social groups, and outright rejection by people whom I thought were “Christians,” that I equated the poor and embarrassing behavior of church members with Christianity itself. I almost rejected the Gospel entirely, but through God’s grace, I was saved and, after years of confusion and disillusionment, I was able to finally understand that Christ is perfect, and He is not responsible for the obscene failings of weak churches. My relationship with Him was not contingent upon what the church was doing – but it did not exclude me from my responsibility of being a participant and trying to work toward the mission of the church: to preach the Gospel and to make disciples!

But what a sad reality that it was the church that drove me away from Christ rather than drew me closer to him. And, unfortunately, I can think of many people in my life who have permanently fled church and sworn off Christ entirely because of their bad experiences in a church. As someone who has experienced that kind of pain myself, I sympathize, but my heart breaks for the loss of their souls. What has the church become? A bludgeon with which to impose a Christian social caste system? A place to judge others whilst not examining our own hearts? Where is the heart of Christ in the American church?

This experience - which occurred over the course of entire decade - was my “great awakening,” if you will. I was so flabbergasted and shocked that my own church had to debate whether or not opening our doors was a good idea in 2020 (because of Covid lockdown orders) that I nearly threw in the towel completely. I was floored that people were too scared to open the doors of our church in defiance of unconstitutional lockdown mandates. Why are we so afraid of being persecuted? It’s a reality that Christians will face it. After all, Jesus said, “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you” (Matthew 5:10-12).

Persecution is a part of the deal. People will hate us. We’ll be called politically incorrect. We’ll be called hateful or bigoted or insensitive - redefined trigger words meant to demonize us in the Western media. Again - who cares? We’re supposed to do the right thing anyway. It’s not easy. It hurts. It’s uncomfortable. You’ll probably lose relationships with friends and family members…but that’s the price of following Christ. The real, authentic price. Following Him is about more than attending Bible study and singing songs on Sunday. It’s about practical, real-world application. Day-to-day living. That’s when the real stuff happens, anyway. We seem to have forgotten that Peter was crucified upside down. Paul was martyred. People have preached the Gospel around the world, and their stories are written in blood and across tombstones.

How can we reconcile this? Is the church to be a place of worship and the body of Christ, or is to be treated as a secular platform, making decisions designed to help it survive, but not to thrive?

The American church has forgotten their purpose. It is not a social club. It is not a watering-hole for moms who want to earn a badge of honor for motherhood martyrdom. It is not a place to hide from the world – it is a place to stand up to it. It is not a place to be afraid to talk about politics, politicians, and legislation.

The Rulers Have Become Our Enemies (Someone has to say it)

Understand that legislation and politics are being pushed by people who often hate the church and hate Christ. They are our enemies, literally and figuratively. We have a moral and Biblical obligation to speak truth against vile, repulsive human rights violations, whether it comes in the form of abortion or forced vaccinations. If you think this is too harsh, I really would encourage you to look around you. Our world is in flames. The one place that can offer hope and order amidst the chaos of this fallen society is the church. Our government is a republic, which means that we have literally been tasked as a populace with keeping our government in check. Why don’t we do that? Why do we shrug our shoulders and erroneously say, “Well, Jesus said to give to Caesar that which is Caesar’s, so good Christians will peacefully comply so we can set a good example for everyone on how to be SUPER LOVING and KIND.” The absolute theological nonsense of this statement boggles my mind. Do we live in ancient Rome? No. We live in a constitutional republic which requires us to be involved in the civic process. And we, as a church body, have completely shirked that duty.

The church must be wisely informed about the events of the world. So much of what is happening in our society and around the globe is a complete hoax. The Bible tells us to be as wise as serpents but innocent as doves in the midst of wolves (Matthew 6:10). We need to be educated and informed. We are walking in enemy territory.

If the church would rouse from its slumber – would shake itself from its bed of complacency, selfishness, and fear of persecution – they could fight for not only California, but for the entire country. Churches are gathering-places for large groups of people – people who are seeking God and who have the potential to be mobilized to fight for God’s truth.

And yet we send them out the door with a placid smile, an invitation to yet another pointless, self-gratifying Bible study that talks about nothing, and refuse to get involved in politics because we’re all so afraid of losing our non-profit statuses or being called politically incorrect.

The reality is, church was never meant to be a business. It was meant to be a church, designed perfectly by God. We have allowed ourselves to become constrained to the government. We have allowed ourselves to believe that churches in America exist in a statist environment – that is, most parishioners believe that we obtain our right to exist from the state (non-profit status ties us to the government in a way that muzzles us).

Our country was designed with the intention that churches and moral entities would and should be involved in the civic process. Patriotic pastor and preacher, Cary Gordon, rightly stated in recent interview that government cannot be involved in the church, but church must be involved in civic process. Church is meant to check the moral temperature of our government – not the other way around.

You have been lied to for quite some time. Now, the moment has come to awaken.

Most of the preachers coming into our churches today are being trained in seminaries that have been deeply infiltrated with Marxist ideology, and that is part of the reason why our churches are so complacent. I have heard Marxist-laced preaching in my own church over the years, and it astonishes me to no end that many people don’t recognize it. In fact, Trevor Loudon, who produced the wonderful documentary, Enemies within the Church, correctly assessed that pastors today usually preach 90 percent gospel and 10 percent Marxism.

The point I am making here is that if churches would unite and stand up against the totalitarian regime of California - which is really just pushing an anti-God agenda everywhere, from our schools to our hospitals – we could stop this. The churches are the single largest coalition of American people who could band together and say, “NO MORE.”

But they won’t. At least not yet.

Until then, I encourage you to pray about what you can do to help save our state from destruction. For me, right now, my contribution is information. Communication. Getting the word out to as many people as I can. As far as church as a whole goes, I’m still figuring that out!

What do you do when you know the church is dead inside? When the tree stands but bears no leaves or fruit? Where do you go from there? You cannot change the minds of everyone, and it begs the question: if churches will not wake up, perhaps new churches need to be planted. Churches that are ready, willing, and able to do the work. To get their hands in the dirt and fight for what’s right. Churches with pastors who can be trusted – and the number of those pastors are dwindling.

What do you think, reader? Is the American church at a point where it can be saved?

Or is it already too late?

Personally, I think there’s time…just not much. There’s no room for waiting for this crisis to blow over. The crisis is here, and the battle is happening. Now. I have no time for vapidity. I want action. I want progress. I want to see the church rise up and take on the challenge, unashamed and fearless. If we saw a revival in the fire and zeal of the American church, we could change the course of our country…just like many abolitionists did in the 19th century in their work to abolish slavery.

The church doesn’t just have some power. It has all the power, if the church would just bend their knee to God’s will and find the courage to take action.

I’ll leave you with this:

“But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.

James 1:23-25

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I encourage you to check out Enemies within the Church, a documentary documenting the chilling reality that most American churches have been infiltrated by Marxist ideology. Trevor Loudon recently stated in an interview with Tina Griffin that “Communism is the scientific application of Satanism.” Think about that for a moment. If our seminaries, and therefore, our preachers, are coming into our churches and preaching the scientific application of Satanism, then we have been taken over from the inside by the Devil himself. We should all have an extreme sense of urgency to address that problem.

Share this with anyone who is willing to take a long, hard look at their own church. It’s not easy, it’s not pretty, and it’s not fun: but the truth will set you free.