Emerging, Emergent - Whatever.

Okay, so I've had a bad taste in my mouth for this whole movement of emerging or emergent churches. I can't remember if I've blogged about it before or not, so sorry if I have. Apparently I should not interchange the names emerging and emergent, because emerging simply describes a style or philosophy that a church can take on while emergent is actually a church that has joined some association called the Emergent Church. Whatever! This is a Carol Dockrey definition, but here's what it boils down to, in my opinion: an emerging/emergent church is a church or a group of christians doing all that they can to be "relevant" to the world around them so that they are attracted to Jesus Christ (i can feel the hate mail from those associated with this style or philosophy, explaining to me how wrong I am, but oh well). It's like they sort of go to the extreme to prove that they are not simply traditional religious folk, but that they have a relationship with Jesus Christ and can basically, live like the rest of the world, and then they hope that this type of life looks appealing to those who don't yet know Christ. That's my opinion of what it's all about anyway.
So, what happened to simply preaching the Word of God and allowing people to be attracted to that? What happened to simply living like Christ (loving unconditionally) and allowing Him to draw people unto Himself? IJS!
Here's the thing - I've recently seen an overall lack of "awe" (for lack of a better word) for God's Word among His children. What am I doing to cause this? How is my life not exuding the importance of knowing God more intimately through His Word? It grieves my soul! So, what am I gonna do about it?! I care absolutely nothing about being "relevant" if it means that God's Word takes a back seat. I don't think that God's Word calls us to live like the rest of the World. We've got to trust that He is powerful enough to draw people unto Himself when we are obedient to surrender to the leadership and guidance of the Holy Spirit, NOT the leadership and guidance of this world and this evil culture!!!

----stepping off soap box now.