So....you think that it is a good idea to move Bible study and the fellowship of believers from the local church into homes and away from the church for whom Jesus says in Eph. 5:25 He gave His life for.....   I know that a building is not a biblical church...but it is place were the members of the church can come and meet and the building is the center place of that meeting.    And you think that less services are better.....and that is the action of an enlightened modern Christian church to do away with their evening and Wednesday night services. Yes, I understand you fullu, because I know that is the natural course of worldly thinking.  

   Why.....it gives families much more time to watch the TV.     I see what you mean too....it is too much to think that believers who Jesus Christ suffered and died for should assemble together in their local church to pray and worship the Lord on Sunday night.  It is much better for ourselves and children to watch the sports  on TV and the exciting action movies....  

I was raised as a SB  and I will be eternally grateful for the sound Bible teaching and example that I receive as a boy and a young Christian.     Yes, I think I know a great deal about the SBC and its past....    I had a godly pastor and wonderful SBC church who had SS, a morning service, and YES...Training Union in the hour before the evening service.

By the way I know you never heard of Training Union.    Let me explain that it is not working out in the church gym or praying basket ball on Sunday evenings in the "Family Center."   Ask some of the really old people in your church...they will remember it and explain to you what it was.    We Baptist believers would actually assembly at the church and for one whole hour before the evening service and study God's word and train believers in how to study and present the word of God to others.    I suppose we were a little fanatical to actually give that much time to the Lord and the study of the Bible. We did not need a gym at church to get us to attend. We loved our church.....do you love your gym?  

You seem to be blaming the apathy found in so many churches on the order of the church and its meetings.   I wonder if you have really thought that through.    Do you hold that it is better and less boring to do away with our services?

The question is this....Why is a lot of Bible teaching received or condemned as being boring and not relevant....   You with your modern enlightened way of thinking blame it on the church.....  You know...we were doing okay to you modern folks began to change everything. I know it is really far fetched,  but you suppose it might be because of worldly minded church members who are bored with God's word and as Paul said ". . .after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth."   Do you think that doing away with services is the way to solve that supposed problem.  I know....the modern church member has a different and more posh palette than their predecessors have in centuries past.    They need power point presentations and stylish media in their services and little non offensive sermonettes that are always positive and never address sin.       

 Yes,  and when I was a boy we  also had a Wednesday night prayer meeting where these wonderful godly ole timey boring believers got together to pray for their church, its pastors and the lost in their community.     We never dreamed that it was really boring or that being traditional was out of vogue.    We thought it but a way to follow God's instructions in Hebrews 10:25  which says the local congregation is not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together.      I really glad you modern folks were not around then.....you would have spoiled it for us, by telling us what a waste of time it was.....and boring too.   I suppose our ignorance was bliss.... Surely, we wouldn't have wanted to be bored....of all things!    Wow,  you could have helped us to become spiritual like you are by doing away with our boring services.        

Yet, you "modern" SB folks ( to be distinguished for the old timey SB folks who loved and served the Lord) ...please excuse my bluntness. . . are more enlighten today than we old traditional Southern Baptists were.    You know so much better than us.    Yet, I look at what your generation is producing and look at mine and I think I see some interesting differences.  

We encouraged people to come to church for worship, pray and Bible study and did think it much to give the Lord one day of our lives out of seven.    I think I even remember being taught that was in the Ten Commandments about keeping the Sabbath day holy.  But you dear folks are  more "in tuned" people and are so superior to us, because you purport that less church is better. . . You don't need all those boring services. Yep, that is a big difference.

  You folks have brought modern music and entertainment into the pulpit and services....so folks can have a good time and surely you do.    I have seen your services.   You can pat your foot, swing your arms around in the air and really have a good time.       I guess the word of God was too boring....so you jived it up with some fast contemporary music with a fast exciting beat....      That is surely something new.    But you know, we old fogies were more concerned about worship.....true worship of God and honoring Him and would never have thought of bringing the world's music and "beat" into our services and offering that unto our Holy and Righteous God.       It never occurred to us to make the pulpit a stage for entertainment,.   We sort of thought it was a place where a godly pastor, lead of the Lord would preach God's word.    We did not go to church to be entertained, but to worship the Lord and study and fellowship with God's people. We were surely naive to think that this was what God wanted and that we were uplifted by it.      And we thought we were getting our  "counseling"  in our services and meetings.

     We did not even know it was boring.....   Oh, yes we had the old fashioned hymns too. . . I'm sure that tells you how misguided we were.   We really sang hymns that were based on the Word of God, the scriptures.....imagine that.    We actually sang scripture in service.     Can you believe that they uplifted us and we thought we were honoring the Lord by singing songs based on His word.   We were so dumb...we did not know we could have done more for the Lord by having a real band, with drums and large amplifiers in our services. We did not know that the preaching of God's word was God's way of winning the lost to Himself. I'm sure you folks have taught the Lord a real lesson about that....   

We never dreamed it was better to sing one or two lined rote choruses . . . fashioned after popular secular music.   We enjoyed singing with only a piano and sometimes an organ. And we had people to sing solos and small groups....and did not have a microphone and a mixer system to "enhance" the singers voice. Our hearts were lifted up to the Lord... imagine that!

 In our time they actually played hymns on the radio.    You know I   turned on a station on the radio the other day and thought it was a rock and roll group.... But before I could turn to another station  I heard the "DJ?" saying this was the latest Christian group.....and you could buy their album for thirty bucks!     They said they were worshiping the Lord?!  I am glad the DJ told me it was Christian music. I guess I really am out dated because what I thought I heard was just rock and roll....with some "Christian" phrases. I think that is really strange....to think that rock and roll is Christian music.  

   We kinda thought we were obeying God by "not being conformed to to the world....but rather being transformed by the renewing of our minds"...in SS, Training Union, Prayer meeting, and two worship services on the Lord's day.          

Oh, yes we had what we called cottage prayer meetings....I know that is a surprise to you......!   We met in homes no less, but we never let them replace our assembling in our local church.    

But, you modern folks are better  and so much more informed that we were and condemning us as being legalistic..... You know I never heard that word...until you modern more spiritual Christians than we,  began to use it.    I'm still not sure what you mean by it......What  I think you call legalistic we simply called obeying God.  

And oh yes, what is your generation of enlighten, believers produced.....?    A divorce rate in SBC churches that is the same as the secular world.   Preachers in hundreds of SBC churches preaching devotionals instead of God's uncompromised word.     Promoting every new supposed translation of the Bible as being better than our old KJV?  We did not know all those verses we read were not a part of God's word....even if they are in the majority of the Greek texts.     We were so backwards that we though we understood what "thee" and "thou" meant.    We even got saved and born again....reading and hearing that old outdated KJB. Maybe we were not as educated as you are today.   

And what about your modern SBC preachers. " I am referring to the modern products of your seminaries and not to the godly few pastors that still stand for God's word and will die and go to the Lord with a clear conscience of never having misled their congregations or compromised His word.    Who strongly and with conviction preach "thus saith the Lord" and condemned sin just like Jesus did.     How come hundreds of SBC pastors each year are bringing scandal and reproach upon the name of Christ by their sexual affairs with women in their churches.       

And not just to blame them....why would any Christian woman and wife allow herself to be seduced by her PASTOR!..... Wow, maybe there was something for having the family in church all those boring times...even on Sunday night at Training Union and the preaching service...    And yes, what a great thing you have done in  emancipating the women folk and appointing them as women deacons and preachers....    That has really strengthen the families of your churches.    You even know more than God does about how He instituted the local church and the order in a family by having women in authority over men and confusing the roles of the husband and wife in the family.    

You are right....you don't need a Sunday night service anymore.   What's the point in having two entertaining shows with the same theme on the same day and letting blind leaders lead the blind? People might really get bored with two such services (shows) a day.

I am astonished that you a "leader" in several SBC churches would write me and criticize me because I believe that God's people ought to get together as often as they can....yes even Sunday evening when all the ball games are on TV..... Where, Sir....is your biblical discernment. You know why you wrote me and rebuked me? You know deep down in your heart you are dead wrong.....and are seeking to justify your worldliness. Well, I want let you get away with that...and I do not apologize for getting personal.....you need to get on your knees before God and repent for your sake and the sake of those people you "minister" too.

  By the way let me be so bold as to says.....I absolutely reject and rebuke your modern worldliness and will till the Lord returns or takes me home. You knew that when you wrote and that is why you said you would not change my mind...... You knew by my stand for the Lord that I love Him, His word and His congregation and will never mislead them away with all this modern "junk" that is simply worldliness.    And do not write me any more criticizing me for doing what is right and biblical.....     And maybe  word to the "wise". . . . I use the term losely.....there will come a day when you will stand before the Lord and explain your modern enlighten leadership.....    I will be there too....I wonder on whom He will smile.....     

I think the Lord had you folks in mind when He inspired Paul to write:  "Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables. But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry" (2 Timothy 4:2-5).      

Cooper P Abrams III
Calvary Baptist Church
Tremonton, Utah.

  "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.  And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God"  (Roman 12:1-2).