October 19, 2022

Thirst and Water and Poisoning in The Church

What does a water system crisis have to do with where we are today in the church?

What if you knew that some sort of toxin was contaminating the water supply in your town?

In Flint, MI the crisis was exposed when it was found that old, metal pipes made with lead and lead in the joint systems were infecting the water supply with toxic levels of lead. Christian relief groups organized and shipped hundreds of thousands of bottles of drinking water to Flint neighborhoods in an humanitarian outreach effort. An immediate outcry began and the crisis caused a National media focus on what appeared to be selfish decision making on a few politicians part resulting in thousands of people being subjected to unsafe levels of lead in their water. ​

But what started it?  Well, the city of Flint, MI had been struggling financially for quite some time.  Cycles of unemployment as auto manufacturing adjusted to being more efficient and versatile had taken its toll on many Michigan cities.  The seemingly great jobs with unionized United Auto Workers had been shifted increasingly to states with new plants and non-union workers.  Why?  Because the cost differential was so big, that competition for keeping the price of a new car down made it impossible to pay an extra 4-5,000 per car for labor in the more expensive, older manufacturing cities.  With jobs drying up, other businesses closed too.  Initially, politicians made up short term deficits in their tax base by raising taxes on those that stayed, but that only made matters worse, and it drove more businesses out.  Cities in industrial Michigan that once were the jewels of the upper Midwest became shells of themselves.  It also didn't help that during the heydays, everyone had budgeted based on the best of times, and had made increasingly large pension promises to public workers.  Many thousands of people worked their minimum and got great retirement promises from cities and states that didn't expect that their economies would ever be poor.  Revenues were down, expenses were rising, especially the cost of water - which was being purchased from the expensive and unpredictable Detroit Municipal Water Supply, city officials had to figure out a way to save money.  With a $25 million dollar a year deficit in its budget, the city of Flint essentially went into receivership and was taken over by the state in 2011.

But the water problems had actually started way back in the early 60's.  Flint had always had its' own water supply as it peaked as the heart of auto manufacturing through the mid to late 20th century.  In fact, Flint's water system was the envy of many similar sized cities.  Surrounding towns purchased their water from the Flint waterworks.  But in the early 60's, a planned new pipeline from Lake Huron directly to Flint fell victim to a public/private profiteering scandal.  Backroom deals and bribes and self-interests killed the new pipeline project.  Instead, in 1964, the Flint water district signed a 30 -year deal to purchase water from Detroit and then resell it to Flint residents and to other towns in their county.  The Flint area became dependent on Detroit for water.  Flint area residents then began to experience the unintended consequences of the earlier corruption and mismanagement.

Maybe well-intentioned, but bad decisions begin to cause even worse outcomes...

As Detroit struggled from all of the same intrinsic economic and political factors that Flint did, one way they dealt with it was to raise costs of water supply to their customers - including Flint and all the towns purchasing from Flint.  The Flint area, because of self-interests in stealing public money in the pipeline project of the early 60's was now dependent on another struggling city that had suffered decades of self-dealing and public fund mismanagement.  The area entities that were buying water from Flint, who was buying water from Detroit, began to rebel and say they were going to take their water purchase business elsewhere, further squeezing the Flint water people on both sides.  Something had to be done, but not much money was available anywhere to invest in a big capital improvement. 

So, once again, 40 years later, the city and the towns around begin to plan to build a new pipeline from Lake Huron and bypass purchasing water from the unpredictable and increasingly expensive Detroit supply.  But what was a practical idea in the 60's had both financial, union, AND environmental challenges in the 2000's. Cost overruns, delays, and political challenges forced a now bankrupt area into emergency measures.  The City of Flint decided to cancel their contract with Detroit to save what money they could, and, until the new Lake Huron pipeline was installed, tap into an easy water source - the Flint river.  There had been an existing pipeline from the Flint river for decades, and it was close by.  It was only a temporary measure, but it would hold them until the new pipeline could be put into place.  Water treatment was needed because the Flint river was dirtier.  So - the treatment plant increased the use of chlorine to kill bacteria and overcome issues with smell.  Again, the unintended consequences of adjustments and decisions would soon be felt.

The water treatment engineers didn't plan on that the needed increase in chlorine was going to cause an unforeseen, bigger issue.  Higher amounts of chlorine and treatment of the dirtier river water caused the corrosive levels in the Flint river water supply began to break down the old lead pipes that were over 50% of Flint's water system.  Hooked up in 2014, by January of 2015, the GM plant stopped using Flint water because the water was corroding new auto parts.  Then, testing the water began to show lead levels that were way beyond safe levels.  In addition, since the shift to the Flint river, customers had complained about brown water, smelly water, and other problems.  Legionnaires disease caused several deaths and many more illnesses in the 2014-2015 time frame. 

A full-blown emergency was declared and water was brought in from outside sources, with people in Flint drinking bottled water and boiling theirs, and then emergency provisions were made to re-connect other water supplies.  But it was too late.  The corrosive effects of the flow of highly chlorinated water had started to break down the lead in the pipes and the fittings.  Over the next several years, all of the pipelines that had lead in them had to be dug up and replaced at a huge cost.  What was a well-intentioned solution in the early 60's had been corrupted, then ignored, then turned into another set of well-intentioned solutions that led to unintended consequences.  Once people realized the crisis was real - it was too late.  The cost of the litigation alone to settle with families whose children were affected by the lead is over $640 million.  The total cost of this crisis is in the billions, not to mention the delayed development of children's brains, and damage done to the health of the area's citizens.

What was once the model for a water system in the early 1900's to 1960 had become a dangerous and deadly purveyor of poison. How could it be?  How could it have gone from great to dangerous?

The unfair characterization of the crisis only looked at the last few years of it, blaming the politicians of the 2010's to 2016 as the evil money-grubbing, heartless penny-pinching, killers and poisoners of Flint's children.  In fact, it was two to three generations before that began this crisis, and continued it.  Many of the politicians who were in power have been charged with crimes and some brought to trial.  However, It was the grandparents of Flint's children who didn't complain when times were good and public spending was wasteful and corrupt.  It was the parents of Flint's children who continued to vote for politicians who promised everything and kicked fiscal responsibility on down the road a bit to avoid the discomfort of the truth.  Does this sound familiar?  How about a little medicine today, not too much, because you may not like it.  We can't expect you to be completely fiscally responsible - after all, we all need to enjoy something now, don't we???

Is The Church in a similar situation? What if? What if WE in the church are in the same situation? What if a toxic mixture of things are lurking in your water supply? We would all jump to action and get to the bottom of it and demand that those responsible figure out what to do and fix the situation. Hopefully, eventually, we'd also figure out how we got to the situation and how we can prevent the beginning of the crisis.

What does a 2014 water crisis have to do with the church and what you normally write on these blogs at Trinity Gathering? The church today is in precisely such a place. And if we don't sound the alarm that the toxins are poisoning all who drink the water, we could be complicit in the largest single catastrophe in church history. The bottled water campaign won't be enough to stem the toxic effects of what has been going on for the past several hundred years.

What???? Norm, you have got to be kidding me? Sounding the alarm? Calling for crisis management? Why would it be a crisis? What is so toxic that it is killing us? What is your problem, man? Don't be so judgmental and instead bring some positivity to the conversation. I would say that something seems to be wrong, and it is evident in the society and culture and the church as well. Please read on if you can.

Hope ahead, even in the midst of crisis:
Let me first say, I am extremely positive and hopeful about the future, AND the future of the Church. Grace from our Father above is always about what lies ahead of us, and the promise of relationship and redemption and regeneration. If we turn from the side and toward the direction of the Lord, and His leadership, we have a bright future ahead of us. For every one of us, the hope of grace is all we ever have. But - the beauty is - its all we ever need. - More about that at the end. If you only grasp one thing about this lengthy analogy and discussion, let it be that God's Grace is in front of you and I. God's Grace is available for the entire church, and will be freely extended to anyone who recognizes the greatness of His love for us, and accepts that He has a way to lead us from where we've fallen, back to healthy, connected, life-giving relationship.

POISON?

The poisonous environment is the lead and toxic substances leaking from the pipes that have been installed throughout our systems of church that were intended to bring living water from God to all of us. The piping was supposed to make more efficient the delivery of living water. The treatment plants and large-scale processing (read: churches) of people were supposed to get them cleaned up and acceptable to God and one another. But, because we believed that we could build it better, and we could process people more efficiently, and in some cases, we could manipulate people easier, we built a system that has literally contributed to the demise of most of the church in America. As well, we fell victim to kingdom builders who were no longer connected to God Himself, but instead had the knowledge of God, and the patterns of behavior from their forefathers, and believed that these heritage points would be enough to sustain them.

What once was a shining example of simple people, wholly and completely submitted to the Lordship of Jesus, inviting and connecting people to the Father through Jesus, and enjoying the power and fruit of the Holy Spirit that makes life new; instead has become systems of behavior and belief management that rivals the height of the pre-reformation church.

Harvard, Yale, and Princeton Universities were all founded with a hope that they would be institutions, centered on God, understanding that all knowledge and truth comes from Him. Calling young men and women to dedicate their lives to the pursuit of God's truth, and leading a nation in that pursuit. Handbooks and written notes from those early days of Harvard, Yale, and Princeton indicate that they believed that all who came there should have at their very center, a relationship with God Almighty, through Jesus Christ, that impacted their entire educational experience. You would be hard-pressed to find a significant group of professors or students at any Ivy League school - or elsewhere for that matter, who would agree that God is the source of life, knowledge, wisdom, and is alive. What happened? - What group of contractors, or professors, attempted to profiteer off of the life-giving blessing of the beginning of these esteemed institutions and set in motion a series of unintended consequences? Has the same thing happened in the church as well?

By the middle of the 1700's, in the US, there were significant calls for challenging the doctrine of the Trinity, and many politicians and several key church leaders had retreated to a position of "Deism" which acknowledged a kind of God that possibly created the world initially, but left the running of the world and management of life to humans. What was initially a group of single-minded believers in Scripture and allowing God to rule in every aspect of a Christian's life, and by extension, any civil society made up of largely Christians, got a negative label - PURITANS. The term PURITAN was in the beginning a pejorative one - intended to insult and marginalize anyone who would be foolish enough to believe that God was actively over everything and worth complete submission to. The challenges to the Trinity were nothing new. As early as the late third and throughout most of the fourth century, there were influential church leaders who denied the deity of Christ and the role of the Holy Spirit. Instead, created alternate systems of belief that drew entire regions into errors and disbelief.

In America, even though there were significant numbers of faithful believers, the potential for political power, influence, and controlling the direction of a new nation was all too tempting to certain leaders that would use forms of Christianity, combined with other types of beliefs that would eventually create divisions between the faithful and the politically connected.

So the water system problems were already beginning. The paths taken to correct the issues only made things worse for us today in the American church. It is impossible to get a consistent set of beliefs from churches in a city, let alone even churches of the same denomination. Independent churches and independent church associations have even more diversity. Today we have a jumble of syncretism (blending of many religions into one) as our primary belief structure where old heresies, non-Christian belief systems, law and license advocates, as well as some orthodox beliefs are all merged into a type of marketing package and group identity programming that takes shape as the church of today for over ninety percent of people identifying as "Christian". An increasing number of others are identifying with the claim that they have no belief system - blaming the church for causing this unbelief. What would the "Puritans" or the "Methodists (another pejorative)" think today if they were to step into 2022?

Jesus said "…out of his heart, will flow rivers of living water…" in John 7:38. The life giving supply of nourishment and sustenance was to come from the Spirit, into a believer, and out to the others (The World and One Another) Life, literally was supposed to be in a believer, and then shared with those that were drawn to the believer. This is exactly the way the Eklessia (What Jesus said He was building) worked, in that citizens of a region were called out to make decisions and take responsibility for their city or region. The challenge is that the connection to the living water supply is each Christian, connected to God, living a life in The Spirit, and bringing living water to those around them. Instead, just like all of the human beings before, we didn't trust that plan, and thought we could do it our own way. The early church did this, the middle age churches did this, the reformation had ideas about doing it differently, but continued, and we continue it today.

In thinking that we are called to build living water systems and attempting in our own strength to make disciples by simply telling them how to behave, we have actually disconnected the very thing that brings life. We instead hook them up to a water supply that may have one day had life in it, but now makes its own, dirtier, more toxic, and dangerous water. This water can lead a person to think that pleasing God is the way to happiness, and that grace may be for an initial saving situation, but performance is the way to blessing and everything else after you agree to the grace proposal. The churches of today are literally disconnecting a person whom God draws and attempting to get them to grow by drinking water that does not produce life. What they get are people, who are convinced that they are growing and healthy, but are being stunted in their growth and maturity, much like lead and toxins in water do, silently stealing health away and taking life instead of giving life. Watch almost any popular teacher today on YouTube and you'll hear scripture being used, to create in the hearer an understanding of where they need to improve, then offered steps to improve with. These steps can be five ways to unlock some blessing in your life, or three easy steps to achieve God's peace. They could be three ways that we need to be more accountable, or give more, or have more self-control. Listen to these messages with a lead poison test in your hand and see if they are promising to re-introduce you to God Himself, and to His grace for you that sets you free, or if they are promising blessing and improvement based upon your effort, or your faith, or your behavior. If it is based on you, it is poison as it will lead you down a path of self-effort that does not lead to life.

What can Galatians and Martin Luther tell us?

Martin Luther's commentary on the book of Galatians is so appropriate again today. If you have a chance to review it, I'd recommend it. He speaks of Paul - the Apostle of Grace, standing alone and firm against the religious leaders of the day, who wanted to take Grace out of the Church. The supposed religious leaders poisoning Galatia were convincing the churches in the region that they were the ones who knew the true path to the gospel. They were the ones who understood the keys to salvation. They were the ones who had the secrets. Luther's assessment is that they were exactly like the Roman Catholics of his time, or the Anabaptists as well - All who were emphasizing works as the way to get God to give salvation. Luther knew all too well that the normal human being would be captivated by a system that allowed for a person to try and achieve their own holiness and in turn, have the expectation of grace and salvation be granted to them by their own faithfulness and performance. It is a compelling, and effective way of getting people to behave as you want them to - convincing them that God is simply waiting for them to perform well enough, believe or have enough faith, get holy enough, or do things just right. "If you fulfill your side, God is obligated to fulfill HIS side they preach…." Galatia dealt with it. Martin Luther dealt with it. AND WE TODAY ARE TOTALLY INFECTED BY IT. MOST OF OUR LIVING WATER SYSTEMS ARE TOXIC! The toxic substance is SELF. YOU can live your best life. YOU must be good enough. YOU can fulfill God's dream for you. You can unlock the secrets to God's blessing if YOU simply understand and have enough faith. YOU can be powerful if YOU learn how to call upon the Kingdom to come here. YOU can be fulfilled if you just……. SELF and SELF-WORSHIP and SELF-EFFORT and SELF-JUSTIFICATION is the toxin that has poisoned the entire water supply system.

Here's the real issue: Well meaning and good people are caught in a system that is teaching them a form of godliness with really no transforming power, and they have decided that this kind of fake, tainted, toxic life-draining water is what the Christian life is about. They are caught, thinking that just going to church once a week and doing their service, duty, and maybe doing a little bible study or being a part of some other meeting is what defines Christian Life, along with avoiding too much obvious sin, and keeping quiet about the other sin. What the rest of the community doesn't know won't affect one's standing, and we are told that everyone deals with something, so just hide it and act like things are fine, just fine. Grace then becomes a sprinkle of weed killer, or a blanket that covers up the weeds as they grown underneath. Grace doesn't transform, it kind of washes occasionally. Paul and Martin Luther would say that kind of grace isn't even grace. Both of them would stand strong and call out such a set of lies and say they are toxic.

The subtle nuance of this is that holy living is a result for anyone who is IN CHRIST, and are in the Father's family, through accepting the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross on their behalf, and have been granted new life by the Holy Spirit. But the power for that holy living comes from transformation within, and not from mere effort. Any teaching that encourages the effort, without first connecting a person to the transforming power that comes with new life is toxic and should be avoided like lead-poisoned water coming out of a faucet in Flint, Michigan. You must be born again, by the Holy Spirit. (John 3) You must be connected to the Vine (Jesus, John 14-17) You can not accomplish anything disconnected from Him (John 14) Socializing behavior by encouraging you to try harder and buck up and start living right merely takes you down a path where you will end up apart from God, unknown to the very Savior that you thought you were serving. (Matthew 7)

Return from Whence You Came (Or go where you've never been)....

If you do not have the fruit of the Spirit that naturally comes out from the inside of your being, you must come back to God the Father, give up on trying to perform (repent), believe in the truth of Jesus Christ, and receive the grace for your life that comes only from Him. Then, let that connection to God be connected to the power and fruit of the Holy Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, and Self-Control. When the Spirit brings those out in you, it is not by your performance or your effort, it is by your connection to the Life of God. I am convinced that we have so poisoned the church's role of making disciples that we truly have very few followers of Jesus that truly have the fruit. There are many who can occasionally demonstrate overcoming certain sins, and may have moments of "victory" in Jesus, but the wholesale transformation of people isn't happening. Not because God isn't doing it, but because we are instead poisoning the understanding of grace and the resulting transformed holiness that comes from being connected to God Himself as a child. If we as the church continue to teach performance and behavior (even in so-called "Spirit-Filled" churches) we will continue to be characterized as powerless and striving and religious instead of transformed and unique and attractively different.

Do you have love? Or do you simply try to love and occasionally demonstrate loving behavior?
Do you have real joy? Or do you cycle between satisfaction and frustration with your situations based on how well things are going?
Do you have real peace? Or do you only have peace when you accomplish something and feel relief at having accomplished it?
Are you really patient? Or is your patience situational and temporary?
Many people can manufacture kindness - It is a popular goal in today's culture to be "Kind" But is it the kindness that happens when you react to a situation or person or the kindness that you can plan out and do as an act?
Jesus says no one is truly good. So - real goodness has to come from an outside source and is not an act.
Are you faithful? Or does your faithfulness depend on the reward you get from it?

Some may conflate gentleness with weakness and therefore write this fruit off in an attempt to be right or be powerful or be a leader. However, true Fruit-of-the-Spirit Gentleness comes from an absolute assurance that God is sovereign and in control, thereby allowing a follower of Jesus to trust Him and carefully love another as He loves them.

Self-Control is elusive. If you think you have self-control based on your own will power or your own training and discipline, you have already lost, because pride is the sibling of self-powered self-control. It will turn you into a comparison machine and a demanding entitled one who requires payment for being so disciplined. This is a big draw to the life coaches and motivational speaker types of preachers today. They know they can't make you love, or force you to have peace - but they can preach self-control and cause you to perform all day long.

So - what to do? Where do we stop this toxic water from flowing and instead hook back up to the living water that comes from relationship with Jesus?

Simple - Grace, Grace, and more Grace. Surrender, Surrender, and continued Surrender. Receiving the life in the Spirit in humility and repentance. God the Father is standing on the front porch, scanning the horizon for the ones who have squandered their inheritance and are destitute and poor and have turned back home. The greatest truth you can know is that before you, in Christ is sufficient grace to overwhelm all of your failures and all of your failings, and undo all of your addictions and distractions. You don't have to perform any more. You don't have to run on your own any more. He is ready right now to receive you, to put a ring on your finger and a new robe on your back. He will bring you into His household and give you a new place to live. Then, you will find that He will also give you new power to live and new fruit as described above will begin to grow out from within you.

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