A Crisis in our Practice of Faith!

The Rise of Caricature and the Demise of Character

Someone always asked why we air our dirty laundry in public for all to see? Shouldn't we address our divergent views in a more secluded forum? These questions presuppose that there is a forum where all African Americans discuss and dialogue about the issues that are important to us.

There was a time when that place was in part supplied by the church, but even the church has lost much of its moral authority with its contemporaries.  The church has become a place that is as much a caricature as it is a place of Holy Character.  All that we need do is examine the treatment of the church and its clergy by the fiction rising out of our culture. 

In truth there has never been a single place which exercised moral authority for every African American.  Yet the character of the church, the "bastion" of hope and help in the heart of our communities has lapsed into relative moral impotence.  Many attribute this decline of the church to the encroachment of Post-Modernity and the dawning of what is been hailed as the Post-Christian Era (PCE). 

There is no question that the church has exited its era of prominence and has entered an era relativity.  Relativity is a state of dependence in which the significance of one entity is solely dependent on that of another.

The Koheleth Crisis

The truth is more likely attributable to the proliferation of clergy.   There is a surplus of "preachers" lusting for celebrity and a deficiency of discipled servants willing to shun the pulpit for the smelly halls of nursing homes, the anonymity of bedside ministry to suffering saints, and the dusty playgrounds of children and youth ministry. 

There are far too many claiming the gift of preaching and clamoring for the elevated pulpit and far to few willing to dirty their hands in the depressed pits of service.  What can we say, either God has failed miserably at allocating His resources in the fields of harvest or we have failed to understand the truth of ministry. 

Could God have gotten the administration of His Church so wrong as to assign so many cooks to one kitchen and so few people to:

• waite the tables,
• serve the food,
• park cars,
• recruit diners,
• wash dishes,
• maintain the building,
• greet the guests
• follow up with past guests

Koheleth,  is the English transliteration of the Hebrew word, קֹהֶלֶת translated Ecclesiastes which is traditionally interpreted to mean "speaker or preacher". 

We are in a state of crisis with too many cooks in the kitchen, reminiscent of the proverbial amateur volleyball game wherein everyone including, the server, races to the front line to try and spike the ball.  The challenge is that in their haste to score the winning point and shine as the savior of the team, they have left their assigned post undefended making the team vulnerable. 

We have become caricatures, distortions ripe for ridicule and lampooning, fodder for the comic and the butt of every unspoken critic's analysis. 

Next Week: The Crises of Leadership!