Carelessly drifting, the church drifts along,

For pleasure and folly, a gay, giddy throng;
Led on by the glitter, the pride, and the show,
So careless and thoughtless as years come and go;
Unheeding the voice of the watchman on high,
“O turn ye, O turn ye, for why will ye die?”
Carelessly drifting away from their God ,
Away from his people, away from His Word;
Bewitched and enchanted with sin’s siren song,
They plunge in the whirlpool of folly and wrong;
Forgetting the holy, the pure, and the true,
Still onward the byways of sin they pursue.
Carelessly drifting, the wise and the great,
The rich and the poor alike drift to their fate;
For gold and for silver, for honor and fame,
So blind and deluded their glory’s their shame,
Forsaking true wisdom and knowledge for dross;
They seek for mere bubbles—in hell they’ll be lost.
Carelessly drifting from Jesus and right,
Still farther and farther into the dark night;
The prayers and the tears of loved ones they crush,
Like filth in the streets as onward they rush,
Hard’ning their heart as an adamant stone,
Rejecting the blood for their sins to atone.
Carelessly drifting from heaven and home,
From bright fields Elysian forever to roam;
Far, far, from God’s mercy, His smiles, and His love,
To suffer forever ‘neath his wrath from above;
The blackness of darkness they choose for their fate,
They awake to their doom when alas ‘tis too late!
(Note that this poem originally started with the words, “Carelessly drifting the world rushes on,” but it fits the church so well, I changed it. The author is unknown.)

As an introduction to this blog, I am pasting the following, taken from an e-mail sent to me:

Ask the average “plain person” what he is patterning his life after, and 9.5 out of 10 will tell you the Bible is his pattern. This answer is great, in as far as it goes.

But we must go beyond mere Biblicism and pattern our lives after Christ. The one does not exclude the other, but following Christ is brutally spiritual in nature; while being Biblical may be nothing more than a theological exercise. And yet, those who follow Christ and focus on Him are the best Biblicists (whether they know it or not) that you can find.

Think of the Ephesian church. (Rev. 2)

I’m sick and tired of cheap spirituality, where people become merely “liberated, enthused and spiritual,” when real spirituality has the cross/death/discipleship (and Jesus) at its core.

And I’m weary of the opposite rationale that hinges everything on the fear of apostasy, legislates a form of Biblicism to keep the church faithful, and has a 50-point plan to keep the church “safe”.

Discipleship is neither of these—it’s personally (and then collectively) following Christ with commitment enough that all of life is ordered by that devotion. (And my wife and children will be the first to recognize it).

Revival can happen just as easily in settings that aren’t perfect positionally. In fact, our sense of already having everything right can be a real hindrance to revival. Being 100% “right” on baptism, dress, etc. is not the issue; following Christ with absolute commitment to doing his will is.

Being in the Truth is not having the right positions/doctrines on everything; being in the Truth is knowing Him that is the Truth.