The ordinary means of grace
‘Today’s Christians are dissatisfied with the blessings God has given His church through the ordinary means of the preaching of His Holy Word and the Sacraments. The cause of the historic practice of Reformed piety is not helped by today’s societal dependence on immediate delivery of visceral satisfactions, whether they be gastronomic, visual or sensual. Everyone wants to “feel” their faith, and to worship with immediate feedback and physical enjoyment. People don’t want to sit for 45 minutes and listen to a man plainly exposit the Scriptures. If it doesn’t come at them with the “wowza” bam, bam, bam rapidity of Holywood big-budget action dramas, or ESPN’s Sports Center, people leave bored and unimpressed. If it doesn’t have the postmodern gloss, it isn’t seen as useful for their lives. The ordinary means of grace are not seen by so many today as THE means of standing firm in the faith! Yet God has ordained these for just that purpose! Where are people who reject these blessings left when the enemy attacks? What defense against the wiles of the devil (Eph. 6:10) have they? They are as Jerusalem was in Nehemiah’s day prior to the rebuilding of the wall: open for conquest, defenseless. And we wonder why the American church is in such a shambles.’
—Todd Pedlar from his blog article on William Gurnall’s The Christian in Complete Armour