Our secular world tells us to look inside ourselves so that we might find the good within, but at the Lord’s Table, we are asked to examine ourselves so that we might find our weakness and sin so that we might be taught to rely more and more upon Christ’s sacrifice, which becomes more endearing to us once we have determined through introspection that we are lost apart from his broken body and redeeming blood. As Gentiles were invited to humble themselves during the Day of Atonement, so we invite our guests to examine themselves and pray that they might find their need for Christ and become jealous for what we have found signed and sealed in those little tokens of Christ’s body and blood.

The mission and purpose of church outreach are best summarized by Christ in the commission that he gave his church: to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all of his commandments. These marching orders tell us that by reaching out to the world, we are to draw them into the covenant communion of the Church. Discipleship does not end at the water cooler at work or wherever the gospel is first believed. It follows the road that brings us into communion with the people of God.

Unfortunately, many churches and denominations have adopted a policy of outreach that involves conforming the church to the image of the world in some way, thus making the church more palatable. For instance, if the church is seeking to draw in more young people the worship becomes more youthful and energetic. On the other hand, if the church is targeting another niche group, such as “cowboys,” the service will take on a more western theme.

Now it might be good to offer a little conviction on this matter. This is something that churches can do without even realizing it. In 2016, I know of many members of Presbyterian churches who voted for Donald Trump that were made to feel as if they had done something immoral and hurtful by things said from the pulpit. I know of others whose experience was the reverse. They had not voted for President Trump and were anxious about what was to come from his presidency, only to find in their churches, rather than Christ centered worship that left political concerns in the parking lot, a political victory parade in the guise of Christian fellowship. We must ask the question and be serious in answering it, “Do our church services, how we decorate, or how we preach focus on attracting only certain kinds of people with specific political affiliations to our congregations?”

I bring this up to make a point. If our worship of Christ is made contemporary to our present time or culture, our worship becomes enslaved to current events and proclivities. By allowing the secular to invade the sacred, we have tragically, and perhaps inadvertently, made the sacred less appealing to those who have grown weary of the vanity of the secular. This is precisely what we see taking place in our world. More and more people are beginning to wake up to the fact that they have been sold a lie by those who seem influential in the world. Atheism has not offered them the hedonistic utopia that they were promised. Guilt and shame did not disappear with their belief in God, and now, rather than having a compassionate and merciful God to go to with their sin, they have nothing but a blind, pitiless, and indifferent universe of stuff. These people have judged the secular and have found it to be wanting.

How unfortunate it is that all some churches have to offer these people is more secular art, music, motivational speeches, and politics all rebranded with a Jesus FishTM slapped on it. We, as Presbyterians, must have something to offer the world that is not of this world. Something like the Kingdom of God! (John 18:36)

There is nothing more peculiar to the Church of Christ than the sacraments that He has given to us, through which he gives us the grace that sets us apart from the secular world. These sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper are things that are not given to the world but only to those in the household of faith. Baptism is given to those who have believed in Christ and their children, whereas the Lord’s Supper is given to those who are able to feed upon Christ as he is offered in the elements of bread and wine by faith alone.

The exclusivity of the sacraments, however, does not make them unserviceable in our outreach to the world. Christianity is not a gnostic religion, whereby we hide secret knowledge from outsiders. There is no “inner sanctum” of knowledge or revelation that the church has been commanded to keep out of the sight of the unenlightened.

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