Delight in Truth has been a critic of Mars Hill pastor Mark Driscoll on select topics, but not today. Today I commend the Seattle pastor for standing up to overwhelming pressure to cancel his church’s afternoon and evening services in favor of the Superbowl.
He decided to go ahead and hold AND preach the 4 pm (Pacific Time) service, smack in the middle of the Superbowl. What makes this even more noteworthy is the fact that Seattle’s favorite team, the Seahawks were playing.
Said Driscoll:
“I fully expect it will feel like we missed the rapture, as many saints will not be in the room.”
This is the sad reality. Many saints were not at church Sunday because many churches across the US have cancelled afternoon worship to make room for assisting at another kind of worship. The sanctuary for this type of worship is the football stadium, while the gods are the game, the athletes and the depraved performers of the halftime show. The worshipers are non other than the crazed fans in the stadium and living rooms across this country.
Proponents of service cancellation have their arguments. There are no Bible verses telling us that we have to attend every church service. There are no verses telling us what time we should worship. There is no Scripture telling us we will lose our reward for missing a church service.
True.
But there is a commandment saying “You shall have no other gods before me… You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God” (Ex 20: 3,5)
Cancelling worship service in order to watch how others delight in the vices of this world says a lot about where the lukewarm Christian’s heart is. It says that we love the things of this world and possibly love the world itself. If you love a thing of the world to the point that you are addicted to it, you love the world. It is a painful truth which may be difficult to accept.
But there is good news also.
We had youth night at church on Superbowl evening. And to my delight and surely, to the Lord’s delight the youth showed up to worship God. The true God.
And it was an opportunity to remember this Scripture:
“Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” 1 John 2:15
Delight in Truth 
Hi Delight.
I’m not a big fan of Mr. Driscoll myself, but he made the right call on this one. I know my church was planning on its Sunday evening service but the roads here in Arkansas were icy and I got a call from my Sunday School teacher, James, that church had been cancelled because of the weather. I was supposed to teach school today and we have ice on the roads again and all of the local schools are closed.
I recently put up a post about how overly important sports are in our culture. Cancelling church for no reason (the Superbowl) is no surprise. Sadly, it “says a lot about where the lukewarm Christian’s heart is.”
The verses you have quoted here are very appropriate.
It’s great that you were able to have youth night at church on Superbowl evening.
We are losing churches like yours and mine left and right. I guess it’s a sign of our times.
God’s blessings my friend…
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Sadly, this is an idolatrous and adulterous generation. I suppose I should be grateful that the Cowboys weren’t playing (smile).