Creative Autopsy???

This is best done under the Life Lessons series of posts! A friend sent me an email. It contained the following ‘report.’ I am always a fan of creative efforts. But I am not sure I would have had creative thoughts about a post-mortem report. This one may make you smile a time or two, but it may also make you wince a time or two. It’s short, and when you have seen it all you’ll know why I thought it was a good Life Lessons post! And I’ll tell you up front, I added a little creativity of my own.

Life Lessons: Who Killed the Church? 

What we might be see in the OBITUARY COLUMN??? 

A post-mortem report reveals many things. It is done to determine the cause of one’s death. For the Church, there are a number of factors indicated. The following has been observed:

• The baptistry had been very dry for a long time
• In recent years its mourners’ bench had been skillfully removed, and it seems the church never fully recovered from the loss of this vital organ.
• Breathing has been difficult for quite some time. This is because of accumulated dust in the prayer room.
• The church suffered from a lack of proper exercise. Specifically, it’s right arm of Christian fellowship showed signs of atrophy due to stiffening of the muscles of forgiveness. The left arm of benevolence was completely paralyzed by a severe stroke of selfishness.
• The church’s blood stream, demonstration and declaration of the Gospel, had ceased to flow because the arteries of consecration had become hardened.
• The church lacked the strength to lift both feet. The feet were inordinately heavy due to an excessive accumulation of worldly pleasures. Attempts to remove this muddy weight with multiple self-help classes proved unprofitable. It seems worldliness doesn’t disappear through endrosement.
• The above disorders were further complicated by the pneumonia of indifference. In addtition to pneumonia and its strangling grip, matters were made worse when the church developed the common cold of carelessness.
• Despite these ailments, it seems DEATH was directly attributable to a heart attack caused by an overdose of false doctrine. The heart cannot love the Master and money at the same time. 

There are no relatives to mourn the passing of this grand lady known as the Church. It seems she viewed her sister churches as competitors rather than companions in faith.  

Funeral arrangements are incomplete. The funeral home is searching for someone to conduct the service. All of her former pastors are dead. They were taken from her by over-exertion, exhaustion, false ideas about leadership, and constant efforts to revive her. She refused all prescriptions for repentance, revival, missionary engagement and practice of stewardship.

Soli Deo Gloria! 

PS – If I knew who provided the foundation of this piece I’d share it. But know I enjoyed the read and adding a few observations of my own to this Life Lessons post-mortem! 🙂

PSS – Just received an email update. According to the email note, the original document was written in the 1940’s by Pastor R. Von King.