Sunday, March 27, 2022

Surface Christianity!


Surface Christianity!

“O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how  unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!” Rom. 11:33

Today we have too much superficial Christianity. Many Christian have a very shallow relationship with Christ and a rudimentary understanding of his word. We are not quite at the point of a falling away yet, but many could easily head in that direction.

Jesus gave the Parable of the Sower and four soils. The seed was the same, which is the Word of God, but the different soils hindered the seed to flourish. Only one soil was good ground and the others did not allow growth. Though the rocky ground, thorny ground and the wayside were all different, they all had one thing in common. There was no depth. The wayside seed could not even penetrate the soil so was eaten by the birds. The rocky soil had little moisture and allowed a little growth but soon withered away because the rocks prevented the seed from taking root. The thorny ground likewise choked up the roots and prevented them from digging deep into the soil and thus became “unfruitful”.

A plant without deep roots will not flourish and can easily be uprooted. I remember living in Miami when Hurricane Andrew hit. We were fortunate with little damage to our house and it seemed like every third house in the neighborhood suffered great damage. After a horrid night with family staying at our house because it was further inland, some of us went and drove around the neighborhood. The soil in Miami is very sandy and many of the trees had shallow roots and were upended. One man the night of the hurricane, thought it would be safe to chain his trash cans to a large tree outside his house but the tree was completely uprooted and turned upside down. Now his trash cans were hanging in the tree 20 feet up in the air. Another neighbor had a huge tree uprooted and it fell on his house and a large branch penetrated his roof and it now looked like a tree growing out of his living room!

Depth is essential for a tree, plant or even a building to survive in a storm! Most architects will agree that the taller the building the more necessity for a deeper foundation. This is also true for Christianity. The bible talks about being Christians “rooted and grounded (Eph. 3:17).”

Another interesting aspect of the importance of depth is the fact that though the plant, flower or tree is visible, the roots are invisible. That is, they are often hidden.  Its like an iceberg. What you see on the surface is not indicative of what lies beneath! On the surface many Christians can appear to be flourishing. They can go to church every Sunday and be involved in many church activities and yet the rest of the week on the job, home and in all the other areas you don’t see, there might be a different story.

The parable of the sower is not just about a sower, but is also about what is being sowed, where its being sowed and how its being sowed. First Jesus explained the seed is the word of God and this is the starting place. Surface Christianity unfortunately is a product of a superficial gospel rather than the Gospel of Christ and the word of God. Preachers often preach life inspiring stories, self-help sermons, motivational messages or comedic dialog without good Biblical teaching! Entertainment has often replaced edification and rocky worship instead of inspirational devotion. Encounter groups have replaced Bible studies and social issues have replaced the scripture. The Bible says to pray for the laborers for the harvest. Many have plowed the ground but they no longer have the pure seed of God’s Word but instead, a seed that is GMO (Gospel of Mans Origin).

So now we have a threefold problem. A shallow gospel that portrays a superficial Christianity that produces only surface Christians. To produce depth in Christ we must dive deeply int the Word of God. We must instill deep relationships with Christ and we must get his people out of the shallow end of the pool and teach them to navigate the deep waters of the real power of the Holy Spirit!

 “But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.” 1 Cor. 2:10

Jesus confronted the superficial religious system of his day and sought to bring the people out of the temple and into the kingdom. The prophet Ezekiel records the Angel of the Lord measuring the waters that flowed out of the temple (Ezek. 47:1-12). First it was to his ankles, then to his knees, then to his loins and finally so deep he could not cross it. I pray we don’t lose a generation to being a surface Christian but that we would restore the Church and its people back to the depth of God.


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