WHAT IS THE CHURCH SUPPOSED TO DO?

The "church" of this age no more resembles the church of the New Testament than a stallion resembles a salamander. The church today is man centered. The church of the New Testament was Christ centered. Churches today exist for the pleasures of men. The New Testament church existed for the glory of God.

The average church in twentieth-century America is nothing more than a poor man's country club. It is an entertainment center, an educational facility, a rallying place for political causes (liberal and conservative), a place for burying the dead and marrying the young. Sometimes, a congregation may even feed some poor people, and that is good. But the church of this age has no sense of purpose, no understanding of its responsibility before God. The reason churches have so many fights and splits is obvious to anyone who will watch and listen - There is nothing to unite them. Everyone sees the church as an organization to serve his or her own interests. Few understand that the church of God is a body, a family in which redeemed sinners serve one another's needs for the glory of God!

Though it is certainly the responsibility of each local church to care for the poor and feed the hungry, the only way any church can truly serve the souls of men and the glory of Christ is by doing the one thing very few churches do - the one thing the church is supposed to do, and that one thing is preach the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace in Christ (Matt. 28:18-20). The Church of the living God is first and foremost a preaching center.

Donald S. Fortner, Pastor

GRACE BAPTIST CHURCH OF DANVILLE

2734 Old Stanford Road

Danville, Kentucky 40422

236-8235