The Church and the Ways of the World

[The Church's] ministry to the world is not realised in compromise activities, by identifying with [the world's] practices. One of the most distressing spectacles is that of the visible Church been seen attempting to mimic the world and adopting its questionable gimmicks. It is a sad reflection on the spiritual state of the Church. A Church that is but an organisation, probably well organised, but lacking spiritual life will not effectively appeal to the world or meet the need of deeply impoverished souls.

The Church is a living organism called to dispense life to a dead world and should not be swooning over its corpses or worshipping its idols.  For the Church to copy the world is tantamount to putting a shroud on a living person.

Melvin J. Seaborne, Aspects of Biblical Ecclesiology (Penygroes: A.C.T.S., 1991), 19