Daily Devotional for Sunday September 22, 2013
The Church of Anything Goes
(Revelation 1:11-3:22)
***ASK BILL: Pastor Bill, your devotion today says you pray we are part of that remnant God will use to bring in this last great harvest. How do we know there will be a great harvest of souls saved before the rapture?
ANSWER: Jesus said, "the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few." There are literally hundreds of millions in this nation alone, billions around the planet who at this moment are lost and without Jesus. Most truly are looking for real hope and real answers. We have the hope and answers they are seeking. If the rebellious people Nineveh repented bringing the masses to saving faith in the God of Israel, so can the people of our world today repent and come to faith in Jesus!
I had an epiphany a while back. I am tired of having to pray every day for the finances of this ministry. I am tired of people sending me nasty and hateful emails. I am tired of warning people of God's coming judgment. So I decided to start a new church. It will be THE best church man has ever known. You will be able to come every Sunday and never have to worry about feeling convicted because of the choices you are making. You will never have to hear about things like sin, service, or sacrifice. No, you just come each Sunday knowing that nobody will ever judge you or tell you how to live because you will be at . . . THE CHURCH OF ANYTHING GOES!
I'm going to start this new church in Tampa, Florida near where I live. I was thinking about a good place to meet and realized The Church of Anything Goes is going to be so popular we won't be able to hold services in a normal building. So I'm going to call the Glazers who own the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and rent Raymond James Stadium on Sunday mornings. RJ holds about 70,000 people and that may not even be large enough, since I have no doubt people will be running to attend services at The Church of Anything Goes. Within a year we will have branches of this new church in every city, town, and village in the U.S., and within two years, all over the world.
In planning some outreaches for The Church of Anything Goes, I came up with three right away. The first is an Adultery Pride Parade. I am so tired of seeing people who are only being themselves and have to have sex outside of their marriage being told they are wrong. After all, everyone knows 99% of the people who are married commit adultery. Everyone knows that people are born to have sex with multiple partners. I can't understand why people are so intolerant, so judgmental of others who aren't bothering them. Didn't God say, "be fruitful and multiply?" God created people to have sex so why are people so upset with people who are married having sex with people who aren't their spouse?
Those who have sex outside of their marriage have been made to feel shame long enough. It is time for them to "come out" and be proud of who they are. Why should anyone be ashamed of being an adulterer? A parade is the perfect answer. Marching up and down the streets of America, proudly proclaiming that, "I'm an adulterer!" Floats, balloons, marching bands, a real time to celebrate the joy of committing adultery. I can see this parade being broadcast on TV just like the Rose Parade on New Years or the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City.
The second outreach for the new Church of Anything Goes is going to be political. I don't know about you, but I think it is a shame that in this great country of such diversity, people who enjoy having sex with animals are treated like second class citizens, denied their basic human rights, discriminated against. If you happen to love a pig and people at your job find out about it, you are most likely going to be terminated. If you try to buy a new home for you and your chicken that are in a committed relationship, chances are good that you will be denied. If your significant other happens to be a goat, they aren't going to be eligible for the same benefits married couples receive. A man and his sheep should be able to adopt children! How dare states limit marriage to a man and a woman, when a woman and her horse have every right to enjoy the happiness and fulfillment and full legal benefits of marriage.
No doubt one of the first outreaches of The Church of Anything Goes will be to help insure the legal rights of those men and women, who by no fault of their own, were born to have sex with animals. In addition, we will start public awareness campaigns to help society be more tolerant. A good place to start will be in the schools, educating children through clubs and curriculum that there is nothing wrong with people who choose to have sex with animals. That is simply who they are, and just because you have a mother and father, some children have a dad and a goat.
The third big outreach we will have each year is Swap Days at Disney. The Church of Anything Goes will be a very popular church among those who like to trade wives and husbands. Swingers from all over the country can come to Disney one weekend a year and literally take over the facilities. They will book all the hotels and, of course, no need to close any room doors during Swap Days. They can go to the Magic Kingdom with their wife one day, visit the Animal Kingdom with their friend's wife the next, go to Epcot the next day with someone else's wife, the possibilities are endless. After all, even though Disney promotes itself as a "family friendly" theme park, we all know that as long as a group can bring them millions of dollars they welcome them with open arms.
Okay, I better stop before too many of you start heading to St. Petersburg to have me committed. Because I have been doing this for so long and know some of you may have taken me seriously, let me state for the record that I was being facetious. Let me now be very serious. As much as I wish The Church of Anything Goes was a fictional church, I am sad to say that it really does exist. Of course they don't have the guts to use that name, but in essence that is exactly how they operate. You will never hear about sin, how God expects us to live according to His Word, or about surrendering our lives to Him. You will only hear about how "God is love," and all you have to do is try, and that we all sin so don't worry about it, and most of all, do whatever makes you happy.
These are the churches that treat God's Word like a "nice book with some good thoughts," but not something you should take seriously. These are the churches where you will find gross sins like homosexuality, murdering babies, fornication, people living together without being married, and many others accepted and tolerated because they don't want to "offend" anyone. In these churches, Truth is not found in the Bible but is whatever you want it to be. These churches tell people there really is no place called Hell and there are many roads leading to God. Such churches are an abomination to God and a stench in His nostrils!!!
I love you and care about you so much. Sadly, too many churches have turned into The Church of Anything Goes. Once we compromise the Absolute Truth of God's Word, once that Book stops being our final authority in all matters, it literally does become a church that anything goes because you are now left solely to the imaginations of men to decide what is right and wrong. There is only ONE TRUTH my friend, and that is found in the Bible. There is only ONE WAY to God, and that is through faith in His Son Jesus Christ.
You may have found the first 7 paragraphs somewhat humorous, but if you go back and read them again they are actually very chilling. All I really did was take the prevailing mindset of this world and how it actually operates. People who have chosen to live in gross sin DO have parades to express their "pride" in the sin they have chosen. People who sin DO make excuses for their sin to try and justify how they choose to live, even using God's Word out of context despite the fact they live in rebellion to that very Word. There really ARE tremendous political efforts underway and programs that exist to indoctrinate children in an effort to force society to accept as normal the sinful choices certain men and women make.
May we pray that in these last days the CHURCH, the Bride of Christ and God's number one instrument of change in our world will not be like those 7 churches in the Book of Revelation, but remain true to His Word and the work of equipping the saints and reaching the lost. Now more than ever the church must rise up to be all God calls it to be as we share the Truth of His Word and the hope and love of Christ with this lost and hurting world.
In His love and service, Your friend and brother in Christ,
Bill Keller