Last night Svar asked me to comment on if the Church will survive. I think this was driven by a comment at Alte’s place that listed a whole pile of abuses within the Church that I’ve seen over my life. It was a list of things that have made me either walk out or not go back to that congregation.

But the church sill survive. For in the end, the church is not ours, it is Gods.

Luke 9:1-17

1Then Jesus called the twelve together and gave them power and authority over all demons and to cure diseases, 2and he sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal. 3He said to them, “Take nothing for your journey, no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money — not even an extra tunic. 4Whatever house you enter, stay there, and leave from there. 5Wherever they do not welcome you, as you are leaving that town shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.” 6They departed and went through the villages, bringing the good news and curing diseases everywhere.

10On their return the apostles told Jesus all they had done. He took them with him and withdrew privately to a city called Bethsaida. 11When the crowds found out about it, they followed him; and he welcomed them, and spoke to them about the kingdom of God, and healed those who needed to be cured.

via Daily Lectionary Readings — Devotions and Readings — Mission and Ministry — GAMC.

What we are seeing here is the apostolic authority — the disciples were to be as Jesus, and like him, to heal the sick, drive out the devil (and the works of he devil), and to preach the good news.

What we are also seeing is apostolic service. Those who have great power and blessing are dependent for their very food on others. On the laity — on the provision of the faithful. There are no trust accounts. There are no contracts with the state.

The core function of the church is this apostolic role. If we lose the balance within this — of preaching the gospel and healing the hurts of people — we are preaching an incomplete gospel.

If we move to not healing and caring, we deny Jesus — who spent his day doing these things. If we don’t accept that we will be poor if we lead… and look for the security of the state, we lose our ability to preach the whole gospel, for we are now part of the secular system. In New Zealand, the latter has led to a dilution, secularisation and professionalism of both religious education and religions social work and the diminishment (almost death) of the gospel being proclaimed within that group.

And if we don’t do these things, that branch of the church will fossilize. It will not be alive. This is happening to the structures of mainline churches — and indeed many mainline congregations. However, there is a remnant. For as the compromised branches die out (as their generation gets older) then the newer branches take over.

Young and bright people want to make something, do something. I think at present they are being neo-traditionalists — either in the Catholic sense like Alte and Deagus, or in the radical punk monk sense like the 24 hour prayer movement and the Hillsong United or Parachute worship teams.

Alte describes this well (yes, I’m taking her comment well off-topic)

I’ve long assumed that feminism would run out of steam once it became entrenched, because then the high IQ types would abandon it for something more risqué and cutting-edge (which is now patriarchy/traditionalism). I think we can all agree that the intellectual and innovative thrust is no longer with feminism, except for a redoubt of true equality-feminists who struggle to deal with their dumber feminist cousins

Classical Modernism, its post modern (identity politics) and Liberal Religion are now dried out husks. They are going to die. The cutting edge remains with those who believe and who are acting on this.