My parents just got back from a trip to Holland and Belgium.  They toured on a riverboat that cruised the extensive canal system crisscrossing both countries.  And, of course, after getting back to the States, they had plenty to talk about – the canals, the tulips, the people, and the churches.  Well, just the church buildings – there weren’t any worshippers.  My parents told me that nobody – absolutely nobody attends church in Holland.  The churches that have not been preserved as historical landmarks are all being used for purposes other than a place of worship: coffeehouses, shops, malls, apartments, condos, or just completely abandoned.  My father heard a rumor that there was a Lutheran church in one of the towns they visited.  He asked shopkeepers and the like if they knew where it was.  But no one knew.  No one cared.

Christianity is always one generation from becoming extinct.  If an entire generation doesn’t tell the story of Jesus to at least one person in the next generation, the Gospel fades away.  It has happened in Holland.  It could happen elsewhere.God has entrusted the spread of the Gospel to fragile human beings.  He has entrusted the spread of the Gospel to the oral proclamation and to words on a page.  The Church has survived only by the grace of God and by the power of the Holy Spirit bringing people to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ through Word and Sacrament.  The Church will survive – even thrive because God uses fragile humans like us to share the Gospel generation after generation until Christ comes again.Lord, keep us steadfast in your Word!