You Can't Love Jesus and Hate His Wife

I thought this was worth sharing. It comes from some of the materials from a conference I recently attended.

You can't love Jesus and hat his wife. by Ed Stetzer
Get this. I'm standing in a reception line with my wife following a speaking engagement when this guy comes up to me and starts telling me how he's read all my books, has heard me speak on several occasions and told me how influential I've been to his ministry. (Please go on!)

He talks about how he's introduced a number of his pastor friends to all things Stetzer and how they actually traveled across country to be at this event. Wow!

But then, he starts verbally ripping on my wife like she's not even standing there. She's right there! He thinks my wife, who has been the love of my life and a partner in ministry for 25 years, is a drain on my ability to influence others. He says she's obsolete and that the "old girl is a little faded."

I'm in shock. Suddenly, the cheezy Christian motto of the 1990s flashes through my mind: What would Jesus do? Turn the other cheek? Pray for his enemy? Hand this guy His cloak?

I'm about to jo Jack Bauer on him.

I think Jesus would have been ticked - like any normal husband would be. You see, the church is the Bride of Christ. And, you don't mess with a man's wife.

The story about my wife is made up. The reality of what professing believers of Christ do to and what they say about His bride - the church - is not. Ant it is exponentially more serious than saying my wife is, "a little faded." (And I would take that pretty seriously!)

You cannot say you love Jesus and abuse His wife.

Unfortunately, there is a prevailing wind currently blowing across Western Evangelicalism that has caused an ecclesialogical (church) drift into dangerous waters. Research stalwart George Barna documented the tread in a longitudinal study released in 2005. One alarming element of the study showed that 70% of respondents found their primary means of spiritual expression through the local church in 200, but by 2025 he predicts those numbers to decrease by at least half. Did you get that? Now I have some quibbles about the numbers and more about the theology. But, if Barna is right, in less than 20 years, only 30-35 people out of 100 will believe that the church holds primary significance in their relationship with Christ. That's stunning for someone who loves the church (like I do.)

We were surprised that in our recent research on young adult dropouts, the more common reasons young adults dropped out of the church were lifestyle reasons. They got too busy, moved too far away, or experienced some other life change. And the church did not make the new list of priorities. Nice.

My question is how can anyone give even a cursory read to the New Testament and miss the supreme importance give to the church by the One who is most Supreme? Paul says that we were once "alienated and hostile in mind because of [our] evil actions. but now He has reconciled [us] by His physical body through His death, to present [us] holy, faultless and blameless before Him." Paul goes on to say that he rejoices in his suffering because his suffering is "completing in [his] flesh what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for His body, that is the church" (Colossians 1:21-24)

Paul was willing to take a beating for the church because Jesus submitted to a brutal murder "to make her [the church] holy, cleansing her in the washing of water by the word. He did this to present the church to Himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but holy and blameless." (Ephesians 5:26-27)

Seems like fewer and fewer people are wiling to take the church seriously, let alone take a beating for her.

In the wake of books like UnChristian and They Like Jesus but not the Church, I wonder if people have been tempted to throw the baby out with the bath water. I, for one, still believe that not only is the church still relevant, it is indispensable, as we look toward the future.

This conference got me thinking about another point, the idea that contemporary Christians have wondered away from the idea that ours is a shared, communal faith - something we do together. In the grand scheme of things it is only fairly recently that people could even read the Bible on their own, much less develop any sort of "Jesus and me" spirituality. But that is a discussion for another time.