Wake Up, God!

Wake Up, God!
Psalm 44

In connection with Psalm 20 I’ve mentioned that our church has just had to accept that we could no longer afford to pay the salary of a pastor. I mentioned this to one of my sons in England, who expressed surprise that such a thing could happen, surmising that it could hardly happen in the Church of England. The system of financing and paying salaries there is more centralized. In England, however, financial factors can mean that a minister who leaves may not be replaced; the church may have to share a minister with the next parish. In the United States and in Britain, there are churches that grow and new churches that start up; all is not doom and gloom. But the position of many local churches is discouraging. Our instinct is then to blame ourselves or to blame sociological factors...