Irrelevant Preaching

Some years ago, when a farmhouse caught fire in the middle of the night, the family barely escaped, but the tidy housewife paused in the burning living room just long enough to straighten a crooked picture before running outside. The entire home soon burned to the ground, but at least the picture was straight when it perished. That story comes to mind when I hear certain preachers today: the flames of cultural destruction are rising, the walls of discipline and moral order are collapsing, yet they spend their time “straightening pictures” denouncing mild words like “gosh” and “darn,” or preaching whole sermons about hemlines. Christ did not commission His church to fix trifles, but to proclaim that all authority in heaven and on earth belongs to Him, to disciple and baptize the nations, and to teach them to obey all His commandments. His promise “Lo, I am with you always” belongs to those who march under this Great Commission, not to those who waste their calling on irrelevancies. A derailed train is useless; so is a derailed church.