Warning Will Robinson

No one can argue that we live in the most automated of times. Almost every aspect of our lives is automated, mechanical, speed and ease is the name of the game. Cashiers have been replaced by “check your self out” registers. You can get money out of your bank without seeing a teller. Cooking time has been cut drastically by microwave ovens. Mechanics can tell what’s wrong with your car simply by hooking it up to a machine: they don’t even have to get dirty! Is that all that has become mechanical in our lives? Have we in some respects reduce our service to a series of mechanical actions?

In Luke 11:1, one of Christ’s disciples can and said, “teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.” The words that Jesus then spoke have become probably the most famous prayer ever. We call it the Lord’s Prayer. It is said more than any other prayer. It is memorized early in life by most Christians. But, the question is HOW is it said? Has it been said so much that it is just a habit? Is it a mechanical part of our lives that contains no feeling or thought? Does it allow us to go through the motions without putting forth any effort? Did Christ give us this prayer to be a mechanical prayer that could be said on the run from memory without putting forth and effort? Or, was the “Lord’s Prayer” a model of how we should pray? Was it an outline of the things we should pray for and not the exact prayer that should be committed to memory to allow us to be able to go through the motions of Christianity while all we are doing is participating in a “fast food” religion?

On the night He was betrayed, concerning the Lord’s Supper Jesus said, “this do in remembrance of me” (I Corinthians 11:24). Yet, today this has become a ritual that is done from habit. It can be the coldest minutes of the service. In some churches should someone come in who knew nothing about the Lord’s Supper, they’d leave with the same knowledge they came in with. We go through the Lord’s Supper with all the mechanical precision of a skilled surgeon. Many people partake and yet have no clue what they are taking. Doesn’t a supper of this type deserve just a hit more?

Today’s world has changed drastically from the world I was born in (which had changed from the world my parents were born in). Today we are busier than ever and most things we do are “on the run.” Isn’t it time we slowed down and worshipped the risen Lord instead of running about in our fast food lives and settling for a McJesus?


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Until next time May The Good Lord Bless and Keep You: All Y'all!

Bobby
Bobby Cohoon
North Carolina, USA
cohoon@embarqmail.com