We went to church again this morning. You may recall that I mentioned our desire to begin attending a good, Bible teaching church, where the Pastor knew what he was supposed to be doing. It seems that so many churches these days are trying to appeal to the broader elements of society rather than remembering and performing in the manner described in the New Testament. For starters,

2Timothy 4:2 Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching.

And of course,

Ephesians 4:11 And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers,

12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ,

13 till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ;

14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting,

Well, anyway, we found such a place and you may also recall Jeanie and I pledged to support and pray for the staff and others in that family. You may also recall (see "Good News!, Sunday June 14, 2009, on this blog) that I wrote,

"I have come up with our solution. We will go to church late. We will leave the house when church begins and arrive in time for the one (hopefully) quiet contemplative hymn or the modern variation thereof which comes before the sermon. We will not be embarrassed and we will give, love and support this church and never speak of this again. Except in the car, afterwards, having arrived on time for some reason beyond my control."

I have to take back that last. I need to speak of it again.

After a marvelous, well thought out discussion and teaching on Romans 8:28-30, we were all contemplating the beauty of God's eternal plan for those of us in His family by our acceptance of the free gift of salvation through the work of Jesus, the messiah. Praying in our quiet time, arranging thoughts in a manner we hope will please God the Father. Meditating quietly on the depth of the lesson we had just heard. Allowing the joy of that understanding to flood our soul and comfort our very core. A great moment for me, one that doesn't come easily to a person such as I am. Then in this beautiful moment of serenity and closeness to God Himself,

BAM!

The drummer hit the bass drum pedal and the bass guitar player created a riff that would be comfortable at a Grateful Dead concert. I actually jumped and my heart reacted for an uncomfortable minute, pounding away as if I had been in combat (I know, I've been there!). What is up with this? Why do we have performance art in the church? How do the musicians get on the platform during the pastor's closing prayer, his intercession with God on behalf of us in the auditorium? Do they think their music is more important than what the pastor is saying to God on their behalf?

Moreover, if we stopped music like this in the church gatherings, would anyone be there? If we limited ourselves to singing Scripturally based choruses, would someone learn some Bible verses? Heaven forbid! Think of the money we'd save in electricity alone, not to mention the cost of an ambulance to take me to the emergency room.