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by Heidi Schlumpf on Jan. 05, 2010
A simple email message from Rick Warren, pastor of the evangelical Saddleback mega-church in Southern California, garnered $2.4 million in donations in 48 hours, reports the Los Angeles Times. Warren had said the church needed $900,000 to continue with its ministries in the new year.
Granted, the church has some 22,000 congregants who attend weekly services at its five locations. But in these economic times, this kind of fund-raising is, well, almost miraculous.
Warren is the author of the best-selling "The Purpose-Driven Life," in which he counsels people to discover and follow God's master plan for their lives. He also was criticized--from both the religious right and secular left--when President Obama asked him to give the invocation at his inauguration.
You got to give him this: He trusts God--and his church members--to come through.
Clergy like Rick Warren or
Clergy like Rick Warren or Joel Olsteen might be criticized by the religious right. But they have many valuable lessons to teach more conservative churches, if these churches only have the humility to learn.
The fact that these evangelical non-denominational churches are making such in-roads into traditional Protestant churches and also the Catholic church---is telling us much.
When the Gospel, was first preached by the earliest Christians, it was received with joy. Why? Because what Jesus did and taught offered hope to people who didn't have much hope. Jesus and His message offered peace (of mind and heart) to people who didn't have much peace. Tidings of great joy were to people whose lives were often devoid of much joy. That is what the Gospel is about---God's news---Good news!
Human beings may live in different centuries, cultures---but the desire for hope, peace and joy are still there. If Rick Warren, Joel Olsteen and others are able to bring this message to their congregations and make it a reality for them---traditional Protestants and Catholics should take notes. How and when did we dilute the Gospel to be anything else but "tidings of great joy"?
How and when did we become so bland, so unexcited, so uninspired?
Hmm---maybe somewhere some Church leaders are paying attention, and planning to excite the people to get involved, to give of time, talent, and treasure---to believe sincerely that Christ can change lives for the better. Yes, maybe somewhere...if only it were so easy....
God has a Master Plan for
God has a Master Plan for people's lives? If we figure it out and follow it, then what? Is that the exercise of free will or a belief in predestination? Purpose driveness feels good if you have the means to afford it, but is it really the point?
In the old days, when people weren't so self-actualized -- maybe because they didn't have so much money -- religion showed them the way that God would be with them through the ordeal of living. Suffering led to experiencing God's intervention and religion led to the recognizing of that intervention.
God probably is with the happy, purpose-driven people also, but that should not imply that there is something wrong with the religions that aren't all about feeling good and whose followers cannot shower their churches with whatever funds are supposedly needed.
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