The Church Trance

It's amazing how many church goers turn there spirit and mind off during the sermon and become excepting of what they are given. I once was part of a very large charge, one of the fastest growing Baptist church at the time, when I went through my big awakening. I would find myself in shock by how absurd the pastor's statements were almost every Sunday. He would give a message that had a good conclusion and include a verse or two. The problem was often how the conclusion was reached was wrong, often it was obvious to any Sunday school teach who's mind was not asleep. My favorite example of this was one time when he needed an example of how a martyr for Christ can make a dramatic impact on the lives of others, so he used the story of the stoning of Christians in Acts and how it turn Paul around. The problem is Paul clearly wanted to hunt down more Christian after that and it was while he was traveling to Damascus that God changed his life. I looked at my friend setting next to me who had been going to church more years them I and they thought he was making a good point. I showed them the chapter that covers this and they were shocked. I got mixed reaction from those I showed this to most stop setting next to me and a few left the Church, as maybe I should have done. Sometimes he stepped into areas that are spiritually harmful, like the time he tried to help a deacon who read his prayer from notes. What he ended up concluding is that God is busy and we should organize our thoughts on paper as not to waist His time. The biggest problem with prayer is most peoples don't take the time to quite there mind down and hear God. The pastor was a grate motivational speaker but had no spiritual depth.
Most Churches that are growing and are thought of as successful are that way because they are a good social organization. They are not growing because of there spiritual depth. We do not get to know each other spiritually but only the social side that we wish to see. Oh we swap our wisdom on scriptures at times in Sunday school, but not spiritual interpretations. Sunday school is a mindly study of the bible that does not lend itself to spiritual depth. We need church to be an environment were we can guide each other to spiritually deeper relationship and not swap our knowledge of history. We may try to apply it to today, but even this is often stretched way out of context. We need to be teaching each other how to fellowship with God.
Now I know most pastors are not like the example. My point is the state of our Christian culture. Our culture is based on actions and knowledge of the Bible. The culture is based on the more knowledge of the Bible you have the closer you are to Him. The culture works against a deeper Christian life. You can find a few trying to fight the culture but it is very difficult and the numbers are few. It is Gods desire for the number to be few as a popular Christian movement takes the focus off of His purpose.