Bishop TD Jakes "The Church has become masterful at doing things that don't Matter" - Is The Bishop On Point??

According to All Christian News on March 7, Bishop T.D. Jakes gave his viewpoints on what is going on in the church today.

During the first keynote address of the 2014 InternationalPastors & LeadershipConference in Orlando, Florida, Bishop T.D. Jakes said he believes "the church has become masterful at doing things that don't matter."

Bishop Jakes explained that the church is too caught up in "tradition" and what it used to be. The church today, according to Jakes, is failing to fulfill its mission of reaching the world. Therefore, he used the title "The Instinct to Shirft" for his message as he challenged Christian pastors and leaders to have an outward focus in order to reach the world with the message of Christ.

To substantiate his views, Jakes used Ezekiel’s vision of the waters flowing out of Jerusalem in Ezekiel 47 as the theme of the conference — “branching out.” He said the conference was intended to get leaders to adopt an outward focus in order to reach their community, their city, and the world.

Black Christian News on March 6, outlined other powerful statements to pastors from Jakes' keynote address:

"I have never seen so many depressed preachers in my life…No fire, no zeal, no passion, no prayer, no looking to God. We have had more suicides among clergy in the past year than at any other time."

"Twenty million people in America believe in God, but they don’t believe in us — the church."

"A question for the church: ‘Do you want your traditions, or do you want to be effective? Are we more loyal to our traditions than we are to our God?"

"Our generation has done the worst job of winning our children’s generation [to Christ] in the history of the church since data has been collected. Instead of the church affecting the culture, we are allowing the culture to affect us."

"Do we care more about membership than discipleship?"

"If you build the people, the people will build the church… People are not going to help you build the building if the building isn’t there to build them."

"If you are not seeing change you are stuck! Anything living will change — bud, blossom, bring forth fruit!"

"Your church is the twelve; your world is the 5,000. The church is used to take the message to the world."

"If the church is not saving the city and the world, it’s not a city — it’s a cult. Are you a church or a cult?"

"Pentecost happens when the message is put in a language that the world can understand…Your city cannot hear you because you are so churchy to the world that you are speaking in tongues."

Jakes also criticized "hour-long offerings," unnecessarily long church services, and leaders who cling to titles that may confuse or turn off those in the world.

The pastor of The Potter's House in Dallas, Texas with over 17,000 members concluded his message by challenging pastors and leaders to do the following things.

• Rethink how you get your message out.
• Rethink who you can influence who will influence others.

Catch Bishop TD Jakes on my show each weekday at 9:45am on 92Q