Determined Weeding

I debated whether or not to share this today, as I felt it was clumsily expressed, and I didn’t want to risk being discouraging. But I tried to take the more difficult parts out, and immediately felt corrected to put them back in. I believe there is God in it, so it is important to share, even knowing that I don’t have the answers. Because many are struggling with similar concerns and questions, and if nothing else, it helps to know we are not alone in the searching…

So one of the things I have openly struggled with lately has been the ever present sense that Christians are being seduced back to religion. So many of us ‘woke up’ during the first lockdown, and realised that reformation was needed. “Church has left the building” was a much-repeated phrase, and many rejoiced at the ‘New’ that was being ushered in. But now, with a tentatively growing hope that lockdowns are in our collective rear-view-mirror, where does that leave us? Well, for many, it leaves Church back in the building. There are some changes: most notably that Church is also now well and truly online. Some people have stopped going to church buildings and are connecting online instead, for better or worse. Some are connecting online who have never set foot inside a church building, while others have left the building and are no longer connecting at all. The Church has undergone a significant shift. But has it done what God wanted? I’m sorry to say it, but I don’t believe so – not yet, at least.

As I have been praying and seeking God for His heart and his leading, I cannot shift the fiery look in Jesus’ eyes (see last week’s blog, Holding Jesus’ Fiery Gaze). It’s a look of passionate, all-consuming love for his Bride and determination to complete the transforming work He has started in us. That determination is both awesome and terrible to behold – very difficult to explain, but absolute and inescapable. If it weren’t coming from a position of overwhelming sacrificial love, none of us would survive. Praise God, we are under Jesus’ blood.

I saw that determination again today in conversation with God where He showed me a clear picture. Yesterday a group of us had been discussing the passages in Scripture where leaven/ yeast is mentioned, from the Passover command in Ex 12:15 – “For seven days you are to eat bread made without yeast. On the first day remove the yeast from your houses, for whoever eats anything with yeast in it from the first day through the seventh must be cut off from Israel” to Jesus warning to His disciples in Matt 16:6, to “Take care; be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees”. Nowadays we value yeast: it increases the volume of our bread and makes it nice, light and fluffy (think about that in the context of religion – ouch). But the point God was making was that yeast spreads and contaminates the whole batch of whatever is being prepared, thus destroying the purity of whatever is involved. The tiniest amount of yeast compromises with whatever ungodly thing is presented, and ruins the entire batch. No wonder Jesus was so determined to expose the Pharisees’ hypocrisy & dead religion when He walked on earth! He wants us pure and free from contamination.

It is not about whether or not we meet in buildings, have meetings with songs, sermons, offerings, etc Those things are not wrong in themselves… unless they have become idols. The problem is, I think in many cases that is exactly what they have become. We can’t conceive of a way to be Church (or to fulfil Heb 10:25) without any or all of them. We’re contaminated – compromised – addicted to our idols and we don’t even realise.
Fellowship, worship, meetings, tithes, governmental structure, ministry titles – all these things were supposed to be overflow, blessings that naturally followed our dynamic, living relationship with God. We’ve focused so much on those things and so little on spending quality time with Jesus – pouring our most extravagant, lavish worship on His feet in the secret place, paying the cost to press in and hear his heartbeat, and only THEN ministering to others out of overflowing obedience to what He says – that we’ve fallen into ‘doing’ Christianity (or rather, churchianity) outside of a living relationship with Him. And that makes it all idolatry. So Jesus is determined to uproot the contamination of that idolatry from his Bride.

I’m not angry here, not wanting to judge or condemn anyone – I’m just grieving, repenting, and praying for us to wake up and repent en masse: to accept the conviction of religious idolatry, and surrender to the work Jesus wants to do to remove it. When God led me to step back from structured church 15 months ago, I was sad but also glad. I knew He had something to show me, and I knew it involved the religion he wants to deliver us from. In no way did I assume (nor do I still) that He was asking everyone to abandon structured church – just that He had something important to reveal. But fifteen months later, I don’t feel any more free of religion than I did then. On the contrary, He has used that time to expose more and more religious idolatry in my own thinking and in the whole Church, as I have continued to seek His guidance. Is it possible for those regularly attending meetings to be delivered from churchianity while still involved in organised church? I don’t know. I just know I couldn’t. I was called out of it in order to see more clearly, but God can do anything: maybe He can deliver us from churchianity while we’re still serving our churches? It’s just that when I see people commenting “I attend such-&-such church”, or asking if new believers are being “churched”, squabbling about any element of their meetings, or preaching their own personal opinion, I feel such an overwhelming grief that we are still missing it: STILL looking at “church” instead of Jesus, theology instead of Jesus, opinions instead of Jesus.
Structured church is not wrong in itself – it’s just thoroughly contaminated with the leaven of religion. The longer I continue on this journey seeking God’s vision for HIS Church, the more I see how totally contaminated we are. It’s going to take more than a cursory wash or surface-level repentance. We still have many deeper levels to deal with.

And the picture I saw today (sorry it took so long to get here) was of Jesus in gardener’s clothes, that same look of unflinching determination on his face as he methodically uprooted every bit of Japanese knotweed (our most invasive weed in the UK) from His garden. Japanese Knotweed is particularly nasty because during the barrenness of winter it can look like it has died back. It’s only in Spring when things start growing again that it becomes evident it was lurking there all along, ready to take over yet again. I believe that is exactly what is happening to the Church now in the fight against religion. In the picture Jesus wasn’t angry – on the contrary, He was actually joyful as He worked towards his purpose – but still, there was a LOT to clear. We might want to start replanting (and really, who isn’t praying for revival?), but He is still weeding. He – and we – cannot afford for religion to remain rampant throughout the Church so that the coming harvest of newly born-again souls become equally contaminated. I do not want to be found guilty of Matt 23:15, but we have to be open to conviction (not condemnation) here too – “It is bad for you, teachers of the Law and proud religious law-keepers, you who pretend to be someone you are not! You go over land and sea to win one follower. When you have him, you make him twice as much a child of hell as you are.”
I don’t think many of us are consciously hypocritical. But I do think we have allowed ourselves to believe we are more on-fire/ devoted/ holy/ Spirit-led than we truly are (I’m looking at myself first here). Those of us who do make disciples are pursuing a noble commission, but if we then funnel them into our churches and train them in religion instead of discipling them in Jesus, is it really anything to rejoice over?

Personally I’d rather be pronouncing a nice fluffy word of encouragement and reassurance. But that won’t help His purpose. His desire is for a spotless Bride – one who has been purified and prepared like Queen Esther with her year of beauty treatment (including six months of myrrh, representing mourning). So at the risk of sounding like a stuck record, here I am again, sharing His call for us to rend our hearts before Him, open ourselves up to His fiery gaze and invite him to convict and purify us of ALL religious contamination. Let’s not take any of our church assumptions as granted, but let’s hold all of it before Him and ask Him to expose the idolatry of religion, so that we can step free as He leads.

There are many things being declared by God’s people right now. Some prophets are prophesying a year of warfare – and I think they’re right. Certainly the darkness is getting darker and the pressure is intense. Some prophets are prophesying ‘suddenlies’ and breakthrough, and I think they’re right too – I can feel the Spirit hovering, ready to show Himself strong on our behalf (though aware that His ‘now’ is not always the same as ours). But underneath all the noise and chatter of people seeking a new word from God, I can still feel Jesus’ heart beating for His Bride, and see His look of determination to transform her, deliver her out of her contaminated rags & into pure robes of righteousness.

And isn’t that what we all want? So let’s not be in a hurry to move on out of the place of conviction, repentance & deliverance from religion, because Jesus is still wanting to work there. Let’s co-labour with his agenda, shall we?