Dear America: Chapter 3 (vs. 19-21a)

I would hope you are catching the theme here. All of America's wisdom is stupidity compared to God's wisdom. The book of Job says, "He catches the wise in their own craftiness." In other words, people plan and scheme all their lives, and to God it's no more effective than an ant scheming. In the end, The Lord could simply put His foot in front of us, and we would have to change our plans.

As one Pslamist said, "The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are futile." The plans of the wise are meaningless - useless.

I know many of you do not think of yourselves as wise, and many of you are too lazy to even try and find wisdom. So, you have completely put your faith in the wisdom of others. Some of you have put your faith in politicians or teachers or psycologists. As I have already said, this is foolish, since compared with God they know nothing.

However, some of you rationalize that putting your faith in your pastors is better. They are still human! On their own they are no wiser than a man who hates God. Do not put your faith in either.

You trust your pastors' wisdom so much that you do not search the Scriptures for yourselves. You do not even bring your Bibles to worship when the church meets together on Saturday or Sunday or whatever day you meet.

You fall into a rut of listening to no one but them. You view them as the head of the church body. You would never admit to it, but you even worship them above God himself. Think about it. How much do you read, listen to and talk about your pastor compared to reading Scripture, praying and talking about Christ your Savior?

You give up your soul to the local pastor and let him take it wherever he wants, to the point that if you pastor were taken down by Satan, the whole church body would go down with him.

And lastly, your infatuation with your pastors has even set church against church, as though the gospel were some kind of competition.

Pastors should despise such behavior in their followers. I am quite sure that Piper and Keller and I have no desire to be set against each other, but to simply be used for your own spiritual development.

God, not your pastor, is the One you should seek first.