Seeker Sensitive?

Maybe out of spiritual sensitivity someone seeks to visit a church meeting.  Such seeking happens though in far less frequency today.  A tension exists about the issue of seeking.

On the one hand, the Apostle Paul writes in Romans 3:11, “There is none that seeketh after God.”  That must be true.  God said it.

Yet, on the other hand, twenty-nine times scripture says “Seek (ye) the Lord.”  As if someone can seek the Lord when scripture says not.  A classic location for this is Isaiah 55:6.  It reads:  “Seek ye the LORD while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near.”

One might ask, “How could God command someone to seek Him, when none can seek Him?”  Although by nature dead to God, He enables men to seek Him through His revelation.  When man seeks God, God caused that.  He wants man to find Him.

The Grace of God and Seeking

With the grace of God that appears to all men, men can seek God.  Without that grace, they would not.  A good overall understanding of this truth, the Apostle John writes in 1 John 4:19, “We love him, because He first loved us.”

Seeking based on the grace of God begins not with a worldly temptation to attend a church service.  That seeking is not seeking God.  That person follows his lust to a meeting, because a church drew him with it.  The worldly or fleshly enticement is not God’s love.  God doesn’t allure or entice.

The attraction of God is either God Himself or the things of God.  Those surpass any worldly or fleshly allure.  Yet, unbelievers still seek worldly or fleshly allure.  Church leaders know this.  To increase attendance, they use other attractions besides God and the Word of God.  Those don’t seek God.

Unbeliever Visits a Church

1 Corinthians 14:24-25

If an unbeliever sought after God and went to a church as a part of his search, what would he find?  The Apostle Paul writes what he should find in 1 Corinthians 14:24-25:

24 But if all prophesy, and there come in one that believeth not, or one unlearned, he is convinced of all, he is judged of all: 25 And thus are the secrets of his heart made manifest; and so falling down on his face he will worship God, and report that God is in you of a truth.

Carl Trueman wrote about this in World magazine:

Second, the church is not called to mimic the world. Far from it. There is only one description in the New Testament of how an outsider should react when he blunders by accident into a church service. It is in 1 Corinthians 14:24–25. Paul tells us that such a person will be convicted and fall on his face, knowing that God is there.

Presumably, this is because he finds himself in the presence of a holy God and is overwhelmed by his own sense of unworthiness. Turning worship into a comedy skit seems unlikely to produce the same result. In fact, far from being sensitive to the needs of any seeker, it sends a clear signal that the gospel is unworthy of attention by any serious-minded person, believer or unbeliever.

The Apostle Paul describes the random visit of an unbeliever to a church.  Trueman calls it, blundering by accident into a church service.  Paul’s description of a church meeting provides authority for what should characterize one.  These verses open a window into the worship of the first generation church.

Psalm 40:3

1 Corinthians 14:24-25 remind me of what David wrote in Psalm 40:3, depicting the worship of God’s people:

And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the LORD.

In this one verse, unbelievers witness the distinctive or new song of believers.  They see their praise and what?  Fear and then trust in the LORD.  These unbelievers aren’t excited, entertained, enchanted, or mesmerized when they join a meeting of God’s people.  Instead, they are shaken by “seeing” this praise from the mouths of a believing congregation.

Experience of Visitors with True Worship

When unbelievers choose to join a church meeting, 1 Corinthians 14:25 says the experience includes secrets of the heart made manifest.  Gill writes that these visitors are shown “the naughtiness of” their hearts,

discovering the lusts that are in it, detecting the errors of the mind, and filling the conscience with a sense of guilt, and a consciousness of deserved punishment; so that the person looks upon himself as particularly spoken to.

He falls on his face, speaking of a visitor’s shame over sin.  It also humbles him.  The first experience of a true seeker is “worship.”  God seeks for true worshipers (John 4:23-24), which is why they can seek Him.  The first act of true worship means the offering of a soul to God. He converts or restores the soul of the one who offers it by faith.  Jesus called this, losing one’s life for His sake.

Contrast with Contemporary Evangelical Experience

Qualities of 1 Corinthians 14:24-25 and Psalm 40:3 do not depict what most evangelicals offer an unbelieving visitor.  These churches or “communities” long ago departed from the true nature of a New Testament church.  They know their so-called “seekers” aren’t seeking those biblical, holy qualities.  Instead they give them something else more to their liking or better, lusting.  Then when they get a crowd of “seekers,” they attribute that to God working, which is a lie.  It is nothing like the work of God.

Trivialization of Worship

Trueman continues his rebuke:

Such trivialization of worship rests ultimately upon a trivialization of God Himself. It is a function of the same culture where sports stars refer to the Lord as “the big man upstairs,” as if God was just one of their drinking buddies . . . . one more example of a world that does not take the holiness and transcendence of God seriously.

It raises the fundamental question of whether some pastors even understand what the nature of worship is and why the church exists. When worship is turned into a clown show with a religious patina, Christianity and Christians are infantilized and God is mocked.

Our God, our New Testament God, is a consuming fire and to be approached with awe and reverence, as the book of Hebrews teaches. And those incapable of acting in accordance with that have no place in the pastoral ministry.

Finding a Sweet Spot

Some churches are very good at the “clown show with a religious patina.”  Other aren’t, but they still use the same strategy, only a lesser version.  Sometimes, they modify the show to avoid the extreme.  They attempt to find a sweet spot between reverence and lust.  In either case, it’s a show.  Sometimes it’s a show led by a natural showman.  He just can’t help himself.  He offers a show in the name of God.  It’s still a show though.

In John 12:25, Jesus said:

He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.

If someone wants life eternal, he hates and loses this life.  A true seeker, who hates this life will stop seeking someplace to satisfy his lust.  A true church will stop providing a show to attract seekers by lustful allurements.