Life in the church by Pastor Ed Young

What happened?  I got out from under the authority of my father.  I did my own deal.  And some of you right now know what I’m talking about and you’re saying, “Ed, man, my boat is sinking, dude.  I got this hole and I’m taking on water and I’m trying to do this and I’m trying to do that. Yet, I’m by myself paddling back to shore and I’m always just bailing water and trying to stay afloat.”

The reason is authority.  The reason is because you’ve got authority issues.  God has it there for your protection.  Come underneath God’s authority.  See who you are before God.  The church is God’s authority.  We’re to be underneath the protection of the church.  God wants us to do life together.  The church is a colossal collection of moral foul-ups.  We’re all fallen, we’re all fallible.  We’ve been saved by the mercy and grace of Jesus Christ.  We’re to be under the protection of the church.  We’re to worship corporately together.  We’re to serve in the church.  We should revolve our social life, our relational life around the church.

I’ve seen this happen so often in my life.  A family will be a part of the church.  They’ll be doing life in the church.  They’ll be serving in the church, attending church consistently and then one day they make a little bling-age, a little bit of sweet mullah and then they step out from underneath the authority of the church. They buy the house in the mountains or at the shore or they buy the boat or whatever.  On the weekends, now, they’re always chasing fun fixes. They’re always doing this, they’re always doing that. And then, suddenly, they have some problems in their marriage. And then they don’t understand why their kids are rebelling. Yet, they’ve rebelled against the authority of God.  They’ve rebelled against the authority of this church. And you know the rest of the story.