Pure Religion

"Pure Religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world."

It is weird when I look at this verse and then look at what most of the American Church has done to itself over the last 100 years: I wonder, how did two simple biblical concepts unseperated in a single verse in the Bible become completely seperated churches? I mean, completely, fundemantly opposed 'churches'...

Yes, I am speaking about what most people would call the more often than not liberal churches and the fundemental, bible-believing churches. I do not quite understand how we have to seperate social justice with personal holiness, or simple belief in the bible from being the hands and feet of Christ to the needy. I think it is simply one of those stunning, complex, yet ludicrous, politically and ideoligically driven twists you see throughout human history somehow invading the Church that is supposed to be driven only by the knowledge of God and His will.

Two quick broadsides to the divided church and their respective often politically divided camps... First, How can Christ be in you and you not have a desperate heart for the poor and needy? How can the pictures of the poor and broken souls we see all the time not drive the Heart of Christ in you to groan? Second, How does the love of Christ dwell in a body that is given over to the world? How can the love of Christ for the poor and broken souls be attached and indwelling in the body of a man that still loves the very things that cause that terrible brokeness in our world according to God? Do you see the ridiculous paradox's of these notions?

I will say, if you are not going to be firmly rooted in the Word of God, you are going to fail as a man who is supposed to be full of the Holy Spirit and God's divine love and will, but if you are going to call yourself a Bible-believing Christian, live like it and stop ignoring the texts about being rich and what kind of responsibility that puts on you if you really are indwelt by the Spirit of Christ.

Lastly, I just read a brief summary of Walter Rauschenbusch life and work and wanted to throw a quote out there by this father of the Social Gospel... And while I can not say I agree with everything the man believes, I do believe he was a sincere follower of Christ:

"If the new interest in social questions crowds out the old interest in evangelistic work, it is a reaction from an old one-sidedness into a new one-sidedness...Nothing can supersede that great experience when the soul of man conciously turns to God"

Now, the only way you are going to have regeneration and the life of Christ in a man is to preach the Gospel as it is told and presented in all its power from the Bible. So, I desperately ask, anyone who wishes to really advance the Kingdom of God on this earth, preach the Gospel in all its power and give and do all you can for those in need.