The Greatest Threat to Christianity - A Low View of God

How did we end up this shallow? What has the church done, or not done, that has brought us to this point.

Tim Challies, in his book The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment lists a low view of God, a low view of scripture, and a low view of theology as some reasons for our lack of discernment. These are all interwoven but I would add a low view of the church to this list.

A low view of God – God is truth. Any minimization of the importance of the whole truth is a slight to the character of God.

This low view of God is manifested in the false gospel of the “health and wealth” preachers. Publishers Weekly noted this in a review of Your Best Life Now by Joel Osteen;

“…it’s a treatise on how to get God to serve the demands of self-centered individuals. … Theologically, its materialism and superficial portrayal of God as the granter of earthly wishes will alienate many Christian readers who can imagine a much bigger God.”

When the secular world notices a low view of God then you know the problem is real. The “prosperity gospel” is an easy target. We all lower the majesty of God, however, when we promote an alternative “gospel” of personal comfort and self-improvement. God is not a means to our selfish ends.

As A.W. Tozer wrote in The Knowledge of the Holy;

“The message of this book … is called forth by a condition which has existed in the Church for some years and is steadily growing worse. I refer to the loss of the concept of majesty from the popular religious mind. The Church has surrendered her once lofty concept of God and has substituted for it one so low, so ignoble, as to be utterly unworthy of thinking, worshiping men.”

“Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness.” Psalm 48:1

Next week: A low view of Scripture

Previous posts: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4