When the Church becomes a social club (1)

The Church was never conceived as a social institution established merely to satisfy humanity’s desire for association, entertainment, or public recognition. According to the New Testament, the Church is the ekklesia-the assembly of those called out of darkness into God’s marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9). It exists as a sacred community where the human spirit encounters the Divine, where character is transformed through grace, and where moral consciousness is awakened by the power of the Holy Spirit. The German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer warned in The Cost of Discipleship (1937) that whenever Christianity abandons costly discipleship for cultural convenience, it produces what he famously described as “cheap grace”—a religion that comforts people without transforming them. Sadly, this warning has become increasingly relevant in many contemporary churches where the pursuit of popularity has begun to replace the pursuit of holiness. The post When the Church becomes a social club (1) appeared first on The Sun Nigeria .

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