a Christ-less Church of the Common Era

JESUS Christ was the SON worthy of Christians who once worshiped like this:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and unfading, having been kept in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

First Letter of the Apostle Peter 1:3-5 Legacy Standard Bible

• HOW OFTEN DO YOU HEAR ‘our Lord Jesus Christ’ preached from the pulpit of your Common Era church?
• IS SCRIPTURE INSCRIBED on the doorposts and gates of YOUR COMMON ERA CHURCH?

שְׁמַע יִשְׂרָאֵל יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ יְהוָה אֶחָֽד׃ דְּבָרִים

(Deuteronomy) 6 :4

“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart..

Deuteronomy 6:5-6 ESV

And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates.

From the LAW of Moses – Deuteronomy 6:9 King James Version

a HOLY Gospel or a Common Era Jesus?

SOMETHING CHANGED, but I’m not certain when.

In the year of our Lord 1959, I joined our local Christian church and the Pastor presented me with a Revised Standard Version of the HOLY BIBLE, which our membership class had studied beginning with the first five books of the Law in addition to discussing key verses from the New Testament.

So the A.D. 1950's apparently were not yet a time when Christians walked away from God's HOLY BIBLE.

As children of Christian parents we were expected to become part of our local church and community. Some did so begrudgingly and others of us out of duty to family. What else could we do? And everyone I knew seemed to ‘go to church’ one place or another.

We referred to God and Jesus as ‘Lord,’ addressed adults as ‘Mister‘ or ‘Missus‘ [so and so] or if we didn’t know them sir or ma’am.

Our pastor and preacher was to be addressed as, Reverend, just like most of our parents addressed him. (Even children understood what reverend meant as to respect due to this man and his piety associated with God’s leadership of our church.)

Before the Common Era

SOMETHING CHANGED during the 1960’s, continued to change into the 70’s and yet more beyond the close of the 20th century.

Many churches still EXPECTED Christians to stand in acknowledgment of GOD’s HOLY Word as WE bowed in silence to hear proclaimed:

“THE GOSPEL OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST ACCORDING TO .. [Matthew, Mark, Luke or John],”

and then the Holy Scripture was read.

christianity-lite churches of 2023 of the Common Era can hardly imagine it!

Some imagined it to have been liturgical routine rather than intended due reverence for the HOLINESS of God's Very Word.

The dichotomy of holiness as separation of GOD ABOVE ALL and JESUS CHRIST as LORD of ALL seemed to blur into a common division from contemporary culture.

Christians loved their Christ of Christmas and Easter, while ALL the world (mostly US) awaited a dismissal of JESUS as just another sweet lord of some days of a future passed.

A.D. 1960 – Do you remember when?

Source for most: Year 1960 Fun Facts, Trivia, and History

• JFK was elected the first Roman Catholic President of the U.S.
• The average family income was $5,600
• and a new house cost $16,500.
• The starting salary for a teacher was $5,135. It was $4,400 for a police officer and $9,400 for an engineer.
• A slice of pizza cost 15 cents, a McDonald’s hamburger was also 15 cents, and candy bars were five cents apiece.
• The minimum wage was $1.00, (family members no min. I made .50/hr. in the 60’s)
• Farmers made up 8.3% of the U.S. labor force.. about 3,711,000 American farms.. about 303 acres apiece.
• Over 90% of American households had at least one TV,
  • and about 65% of Americans were churchgoers.
• The FDA approved the world’s first commercially produced birth control pill.
  • The Roman Catholic Church opposed its use (even by married couples)
  • Protestant churches and other religions still expected NO SEX before marriage and discouraged any divorce.

Why did christians erase the LINES of Scripture?

Churches had to re-imagine JESUS for a post-Christian world of members who no longer wanted to GO TO CHURCH.

Christians of OUR future world will embrace a Jesus Christ SUPERSTAR along side our flawed antagonist apostle Judas who seemed to be just as I am. WE are the world, too.

Among our [*] secular friends WE continued to claim that WE are ‘believers,’ BUT we no longer liked to be identified as MEMBERS of the [*] BODY of CHRIST.

a few definitions erased and eroded

*SACRED [now archaic in the Common Era] once meant separated from the common sin and evil of the world in order to remain HOLY [on GOD's side of good and evil] and used in 700+ verses in the HOLY BIBLE.

*SECULAR [also archaic to Common Era culturaly inclusive speech] pointed outward to a world separated from the SACRED by clear BIBLICAL LINES of DOCTRINE. 

The Body of Christ and the Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ point to HOLINESS only attainable through Christ as symbolized in HOLY COMMUNION.

So clearly defined Biblical church lines of religion blurred

AND antiquated doctrine retired and relegated into the annals of church history.

The Church of our Lord OR christians of the Common Era?

• HOW OFTEN DO YOU HEAR ‘our Lord Jesus Christ’ preached from the pulpit of your Common Era church?
  • Rarely, since in a post-Christian world HE is now a familiar pronoun for a more familiar jesus who embraces believers of every culture into gatherings for the anonomous ME.
• IS SCRIPTURE INSCRIBED on the doorposts and gates of YOUR COMMON ERA CHURCH?
  • god forbid! For holy means separated and WE are together.
  • Therefore the BIBLE bows down to OUR corporate vision to which WE must preach to include ALL the world for the love of our culturally correct Jesus.
    1. Just call Him KING; NEVER Prophet or Priest, which would separate HIM from the multitudes of the world WE seek to gather. AND remember,
    2. MOST books of the BIBLE are OFFENSIVE to seekers of other beliefs; consequently NO Scripture on the walls (or church building or worship screen up front).
    3. THE BIBLE HOLY? – Prophets, Priests and gods forbid!

christianity-lite

a graceful LIFE

RE-imagining jesus

for a culturally-correct

church of the Common Era

In the context of Western culture and because of growing biblical illiteracy in our churches, the content has often been highly eroded. It has been made light and insubstantial, replaced by a set of self-focused interests.

David F Wells – GOD IN THE WHIRLWIND, p.188

The challenge of Teaching GOD’s Truth

SOMETHING CHANGED between the years of our Lord in centuries past and these last days of the Common Era.

God is not man, that he should lie,
or a son of man, that he should change his mind.
Has he said, and will he not do it?
Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?

Numbers 23:19 ESV

It wasn’t God.

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.

Hebrews 13:8 ESV

And it was not Jesus Christ (re-branding HimSELF for a Common Era church).

“Do not be led away by diverse and strange teachings..” the letter to the Hebrews continues in 13:9a.

All Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be equipped, having been thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Second Letter of the Apostle Paul to the pastor Timothy 3:16-17 LSB

It wasn’t God’s HOLY BIBLE that changed..

(although some have intentionally smudged scripture by their own rewording).

COULD IT BE THE COMMON ERA CHURCH (members, not the building so much) THAT HAS CHANGED?

..it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing.

For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food.

Lord OR just another king of culture?

Let the church of these last days of a Common Era hear the prophesy of John the Baptist:

“And the axe is already laid at the root of the trees; therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. As for me, I baptize you with water for repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, and I am not fit to remove His sandals;

Gospel of Matthew 3:10-11b LSB

• DO YOU WORSHIP JESUS IN TRUTH AND WITH THE HUMILITY OF JOHN?

“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, in Your name did we not prophesy, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name do many miracles?’

“And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.’

The GOSPEL of Matthew 7:21-23 Legacy Standard Bible

DOCTRINES of the COMMON ERA CHURCH – To Be Continued… God-willing