Insight for Living

Pastor Chuck Swindoll: The church's greatest threat today isn't external opposition. The biggest threat comes from an internal irrelevance, born from biblical illiteracy and cultural compromise.

Today on Insight for Living, Chuck Swindoll sounds an urgent alarm. We're witnessing a dangerous erosion of theological knowledge and world engagement among believers. But there's hope.

And in today's study, Chuck delivers a clarion call to action, challenging Christians to stop merely surviving and start thriving through deeper scripture study, authentic community, and spirit empowered witness. Teaching from Romans chapter 15, Chuck titled today's message: Encouraging Words of Affirmation.

Pastor Chuck Swindoll: Back in 1993, Dr. David Wells released a book that shook up the evangelical world. He called it, "No Place for Truth," with the subtitle, "Or Whatever Happened to Evangelical Theology."

In the book he describes the erosion that has been occurring. The theological drift. Churches losing their influence, turning more toward entertainment. This is in '93.

The embarrassing ignorance of biblical and theological knowledge. James Montgomery Boice, in his fine work on Romans, fourth volume, writes this regarding the same subject:

"A while ago, I asked the faculty at" (and he names an evangelical seminary, I'll not name it). "I asked the faculty at an evangelical seminary what changes they had noticed in seminary students in recent years."

As I read this, by the way, I thought about my Alma Mater, Dallas Seminary. And I thought, "Could this be said of us?" Probably so.

Boice continues, "David Wells was present at this gathering and he replied that he had noticed four things. First, that each entering class was more biblically illiterate than the last."

"Second, each class seemed to be filled with more individuals who were swamped with their own personal problems, and thus were thinking mostly about themselves, rather than about their studies or how they might help others."

"Third, they had a greater sense of their own personal rights or entitlements. They expected everything to be done for them. And fourth, they were sold out to and mostly uncritical of the surrounding culture."

Boice adds, "I find that frightening. Now, and with a glance to the future, can it be said of us that we are complete in knowledge? The church in Rome was. What's going to happen to us if we are not?"

Listen to me. Our hope for survival is our knowledge of the truth. Our hope for sustaining an impact and remaining a unique local assembly, is our commitment to biblical exposition.

The feeding of the flock of God, whether the children are ages 4 to 12 or the teenagers are coming along to be taught the things of God, every adult fellowship, every pulpit message is to be dripping with the information, the knowledge of God.

It is the knowledge of God and theology, biblical truth that is essential for our survival. It is the key to remaining people of discernment in a time in which people have lost their way. It is the antidote for resisting superstition, opinions, political statements, and politically correct thinking.

It is the best shield against cultural assaults, the best way to prepare our young for the future. Moms and dads, the church can do just so much, including this one.

We're like a relay team. The baton is yours through the week. Run with it. Do your job. Teach your kids. Get engaged in the study of the scriptures on your own, men and women.

Don't just live on my messages. I deliver them only once a week here. And when you get them, they're predigested, which kind of puts a new slant to it, doesn't it, when you think about it?

This is your book. This is God's word written in your language that you can understand. It's your move to read it and to claim it, to take it to work with you and its principles, to apply it in your neighborhoods, to use it in your homes, to let it rebuke you and correct you and lead you into righteousness.

Being full of knowledge won't happen by osmosis, because you sit next to somebody else who's in Bible study fellowship. It'll come because you personally are disciplined in the growing up of your life in the scriptures.

Thank God we have this book. From it we are guided into a path that will never lead us astray. He is impressed and he tells them that you are fully informed and aware. You see, when you gain knowledge of the truth, you see your times in a whole different way.

You realize how far off the politicians are. You realize how far off the media has gone. You're able to discern truth from error and even the subtleties. You're able to see the double messages.

And those things that they think are subliminal become loud messages that you grasp because you're gaining in knowledge. Please, get into the word of God on your own.

There's more. The end of verse 14, "You are also able to admonish one another." So let's use these words. They were genuinely competent to instruct and admonish. Genuinely competent to instruct and admonish.

Such a rich construction of words here. Even the little word 'able,' little four-letter word laying there on the page, little piece of black print, you'd pass over it. But it's the word *dunamis* from which we get our word dynamic, which is transferred to our term power. Let's use the word empowered.

You, Romans, you people of this church, you are empowered with your knowledge to admonish one another. See the word admonish? Two words. Get this. One word is *nous*, n-o-u-s, the mind. The other is *tithemi*. It's a term that means to place or to put.

When you put them together, to put something in the mind. You are empowered to put something in the mind of someone else that will help them. Sometimes it's a confrontation. Sometimes it's a word of encouragement. Sometimes it's just simply counsel.

Eugene Peterson in "The Message" renders this, "You're quite capable of guiding and advising one another." Williams New Testament, "You're competent to counsel one another." The New International Version renders this, "You are competent to instruct one another."

How helpful this can be in the lives of each other. If you like marking your Bibles, I wish you would write in the margin, right there by verse 14, this verse: Proverbs 27:6. Proverbs 27:6 says, "Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful."

The Hebrew reads, in so many words, "Trustworthy are the bruises caused by the wounding of one who loves you." Isn't that good? Ever been bruised? Why were you bruised? You received a blow. You ran into something. Something hurt.

"Trustworthy are the bruises brought about by the wounding of one who loves you." It doesn't mean we walk around criticizing everybody we're with. It's limited to those we love. So let's go there.

Some of the best counsel I've gotten have been from those mentors who loved me enough to tell me the truth, the hard truth. Things that I may not have wanted to hear, but they've shaped my life.

That's why we're grateful for parents who told us the hard thing and maybe still do. We still do it. Isn't that interesting? I mentioned our 40-year-old daughter the other day, earlier. The other day she was leaving the house, it was real cold and I said, "Don't forget to put your coat on." She goes, "Dad, I'm 40. I know to put the coat on." I know, I know. Just, you know, old habits.

Aren't you grateful somebody told you to put your coat on spiritually? Aren't you grateful somebody pulled you aside and said, "You need to know something. This is offensive. What you do is arrogant." Or your words come across very insincere.

Now you're alone and they love you, and they have the right to wound you and it's trustworthy. It says you're competent to do that. You know how you've earned the right? Your knowledge and your love. And your good.

When I know someone has my good at heart, that that person loves me and has a knowledge of the truth, please, I'm all ears. Now, be careful how you apply this. Before we know it, we'll have 25 people confronting one another before we leave the place today. It doesn't work like that. When you do it right, no one else knows about it.

I love this next one. "But I've written very boldly to you on some points so as to remind you again because of the grace that was given me from God to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the nations." It's *ethnos*, translated here Gentiles. We could render it nations. "Ministering as a priest the gospel of God."

Isn't that great writing? Paul sees himself as a priest and what he's saying is, "I'm passionately committed to the world outside my own." Passionately committed to the world at large.

One of the secrets of our survival will be our commitment to world mission. Our commitment to those who have never heard. Our commitment to those across the street, across the states, and across the seas. Our commitment to people where you work. And you are the witness. Our commitment to reaching out to them.

He says it in this way, "I'm a minister of Christ Jesus to the nations, ministering as a priest to the gospel of God." What's a priest's duty? Check the Old Testament. A priest stood between the people and their God, and the priest offered up offerings that connected the people to their God.

For Paul, that meant that he stood between the nations and their God, and though he was Jewish in birth and in training, he saw beyond his own race and realized that God had called him to reach out and to offer the sacrifice of the Gentiles to God as he gave them the gospel, the good news of Christ.

He's working in sacred things that's sort of woven into the text, and the sacred thing for him is the sharing of the good message. You know what we have here? We have another statement regarding the damnable impact of isolation.

One of the things I've loved about the ministry of women of faith, when you talk with the ladies, as they describe what God's doing, they're all excited, they're all thrilled. Not one of them lately has, I don't think ever, has told me how many are there at their meetings. And they're in the thousands.

But, boy, when they get a chance they'll say, "2,437 came to Christ as a result of that weekend." Yeah. That's what gets them up early and sends them to bed late. That's what puts them on the road so many weeks out of the year.

But that's them. How about us? If you're isolated, you don't even know how to bridge the statement to serve as a priest. Philips and Bardo, when he was at Stanford University, released an article on isolationism that stung when I read it.

He wrote, "I know of no more potent killer than isolation. There is no more destructive influence on physical and mental health than the isolation of you from me and us from them. It has been shown to be a central agent in the etiology of depression, paranoia, schizophrenia, rape, suicide, mass murder, and a wide variety of disease states."

Let those words hit you and remember back to the last mass murder you read about. And when you check out the one who was the predator, the murderer, almost without exception they're isolationists. They live alone. Their lives are haunted and hunted by twisted thinking, enraged thoughts.

Those are the words of Professor Philip Zimbardo, respected authority on psychology, a man who faces the blunt blows of reality in daily doses. His words are not only true, they are downright frightening.

No longer are we a share and share-alike people. We are independent cogs and silos, in complex corporate structures. We wear headsets when we jog or do the lawn, go to class or eat in the cafeteria. Our watchword is privacy. Our commitment is short-term.

Our world is fast adopting the unwritten regulations so often observed in elevators, quote, "Absolutely no eye contact, talking, smiling, or relating to one another without written permission from the management." The Lone Ranger, once a fantasy hero, is now our model, mask and all. Don't go there.

It's a dangerous way to live. You'll change. You'll change. We're back to the camel in the zoo. You're made for the wild. You're made for the world. I warn all of us as important as church is to every one of us and no one believes in it more than I do.

It can become like the zoo to an animal. It is a launching pad, not a place to hibernate. Mission is not a department in the church. It's the vision of our future. This neighborhood. I can do it 360 degrees. They're all around us.

Most of whom could not fill out a 3x5 card on who is Jesus. You may remember the interviews we did at the mall. Not one person we interviewed, and they were all intelligent individuals, could in simple, clear, confident words answer the question, "Who is Jesus?"

You hear more truth in one day than the average individual will hear in a lifetime. Do something with it. Take it with you. We can't leave out this last one. "That we may become acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit." Let's call this deeply dependent on the Holy Spirit. Deeply dependent on the Holy Spirit.

How easy to leave this all-important trait out of the picture. We're deeply dependent on you, oh, Lord. Think of it this way, any activity, if it isn't energized by the Spirit, is energized by the flesh.

If it's energized by the flesh, then you can pull it off. And you have a reason to brag about it. If it's energized by the Spirit, you often find yourself amazed at how God used you in a remarkable manner, in a way that you never thought could happen.

A testimony shared energized by the Spirit is effective. An act of kindness, even a random act of kindness, that's energized by the Spirit, leaves whoever receives that kind act taken back. A visit to the sick, a sermon preached, a warning given, a class taught, a child loved, a discouraged soul lifted up, done in the power of the Spirit. Oh, the rewards await you.

He says that it all may become acceptable and set apart by the Holy Spirit. So it's time for a little heart surgery. In this case, there's no one that will do it but you. You're the only one who knows the answers. First yourself, and then let's go to your realms of ministry.

Quickly now. Think first of your life. Answer these. Are you becoming full of goodness? When folks think of you, do they think, "What a good person that is?" What a good friend. Are you growing in your knowledge? Are you diligent to grow and learn and read widely and wisely?

Are you reading outside the fields of theology and Bible? Are you aware of the world around you? E. Stanley Jones was asked once how he would describe the church. He gave one-word answer that was suddenly a grabber. The one word I would use is irrelevant.

Irrelevant. Your knowledge will keep you relevant, in touch, aware. In the right sense, confident. You will no longer see yourself as a victim, but you'll see yourself as one of the fingers in the hand of God, at work, on the move.

Third, are you faithful to admonish? Just the circle of those you love. Do you tell them the truth? The truth. That alone is an admonishment.

Now let's think next of your ministry. Are you passionate about reaching out beyond your own world? Please cultivate it. Please go there. Otherwise, irrelevance will mark your life.

Finally, do you consciously and daily lean on the Lord? "Lord, today before I even get up, I want you to know that this is your day. I'm going to face some things today that I dread. I'm going to be in touch with some individuals that are hard to be with. I'm going to have some challenges that I don't even know about. I can't do it in my own self.

"If I do, I'll become retaliatory. I'll get angry. I'll react. And I'll ruin your reputation. So, Lord, I lean on you today. I place myself at your disposal. And just as soon as my feet hit the floor until I'm back in this bed, Lord, I'm yours. See through my eyes. Use my vocal cords and speak your words.

"Use these ears to hear what you would hear. Give me discernment. Give me gentleness. Give me a willing spirit to learn and to keep growing. Soften my stubborn nature. Help me to listen to people who love me. Without you, I can do nothing."

Let's bow our heads. There's a song that says, "Speak, Lord, in the stillness as I wait on thee." My prayer is that he will do that in the stillness of these moments.

No reason to be overbearing and read you the questions again, you've heard them, but maybe you've not yet answered them. It may take you a while to answer them in true honesty. Take your time.

Truth be told, you may have to say when you answer them, "I don't even know Jesus. I'm finding out who he is, and I'm realizing he died on my behalf. And I've kind of let that lay around in my mind, and today I want to do something about that. So Jesus Christ, I release it to you. I'm lost and I need you to bring me to a purposeful reason to live. And I can't do it without you."