Of "Faith In Action" Sundays

A subtle poisonous New-Evangelical strategy has recently been devised which would divert Bible-believing churches from their Scripturally mandated Great Commission Mandate in favor of a pro-socialistic social service emphasis via a so-called "Faith in Action" Sunday observances in the fall month of October.

Many New-Evangelical leaders are promoting the pseudo concept that the gospel message contains two major components: a spiritual message aimed at individuals and a social message keyed to social service projects and ecological/environmental changes in society. According to these deceived leaders, in order to really preach the Gospel and "worship God," believers and churches must be actively engaged in community social service projects, in addition to their congregational gatherings that involve music and preaching/teaching endeavors.

THE PROMOTERS AND SPONSORS

Get on board the social service track and the "environmental train" seems to be the main pitch of such prominent New-Evangelicals today as Rick Warren, social activist Jim Wallis [Evangelicals for Social Action. [Ed: Wallis is really an apostate under a false cover!] and the Emergent Church leaders, who, using the banner of the NAE [National Association of Evangelicals] based Evangelical Climate Initiative [ECI], are calling for fervid involvement in "climate change" activities [the new code word for the socialistic "global warming" craze].

These men and related New-Evangelical organizations are themselves merely parrots and pawns who are sometimes naively promoting, in modified format, the agenda of left wing globalists such as Al Gore whose real goal is to reshape human society into a collective socialistic one-world mould.

Co-sponsored by three organizations: Outreach, World Vision and Zondervan Publishers these unscriptural forces have devised a new social-service program deceptively called "Faith in Action [FIA]. Concentrating on a single fall date, these organizations under the FIA title, are proposing that conservative churches "cancel their services" on what they deceptively call an "outreach" Sunday.

THE BASIC STRATEGY

In preparation for this "social service" centered campaign, a devotional guide has been prepared with 28 daily devotionals centered around this theme, based on "small group" study gatherings. Preachers are then encouraged to devote four sermons to this topic.

The "social service" emphasis is then capped with the cancellation of worship services one Sunday when members individually and collectively engage in community social service projects such as distributing firewood, spreading mulch on public grounds, painting city parking walls, etc., in place of their regular church worship attendance and ministries.

Zondervan’s "Director of Church Engagement" said that their "hope is that churches across the country will unite and show their community a true servant’s heart." By so doing, the churches will supposedly not focus on themselves, but "on Christ’s teaching and his divine example of compassion." FIA advocates claim their program will cause churches not only "to be worshipping in the pew," but "worshipping outside the church" as well.

WARNING!

The F. D. editor believes this program is an unscriptural "hoax" and should be strongly resisted by genuine N. T. churches! A major threat, however, is that Sunday night services in many historic Fundamental churches are dry, dead and gradually dying. In some professing Fundamental Baptist churches, the Sunday evening services have been entirely abandoned or changed to fit into a small conversational type setting. Such churches described above are prime prospects for this pseudo "Faith in Action" social service "outreach" activity.

This writer thinks that this FIA concept may be slow in gaining momentum, but that it could gradually gather steam and eventually become an evangelical fireball with all kinds of variant clever offsprings that could produce great pressure upon non-participating churches to become a part of these ventures.

SUGGESTION

This writer urges Fundamentalist pastors to place anew a special emphasis upon SUNDAY EVENING SERVICES that include variety, warm-hearted evangelistic music, congregational participation and strong preaching!

The fall "Faith in Action" Sunday would be a great day for an intensive evangelistic outreach drive to the local community, where you "pull out all the stops," with an afternoon house-to-house stop at every possible home, perhaps an outdoor barbecue dinner, etc., and a great evangelistic soul-winning rally later in the afternoon or evening.

For Fundamental Baptists, Sunday must always be the Lord’s Day, with saints active in worship and work in the local church—Acts 2:42 while still acting as good American citizens concerning legitimate community social projects and manifesting a social compassion concerning temporal needs,

N. T. churches must concentrate on the Great Commission mandate, an order that emphasizes soul-winning evangelism, not social service—Rom. 1;16, II Cor. 5:20!. God’s divine plan for believers today is to "daily" preach and teach Jesus Christ "in every house"—Acts 5:42.