I've been preaching a series on Christian Spirituality, and as part of the research on spiritual deception, I read Billy Graham's Storm Warning, recently released as an update of the original 1992 edition. Going through chapter 10, "The Cult of Spiritual Deception," I found some things that the venerable Dr. Graham had to say about the state of the church in North America in 2010.  Given the title of the chapter from which these quotes were taken, you can deduce where the world's foremost evangelist sees the church going:

• Church is not for pretenders and performers, Church is a place for pastors to preach principles of the faith in order to prepare believers to face the storms of life on the stage of an unbelieving world.
• Church is not the place to promote programs, but to profess faith.
• The Church should not reflect pop culture but portray godly attributes.
• The Church should not promote anything--but preach Christ only.
• The Church platform is not a playground but the place of proclamation.
• The Church is not to reflect the world, but to be a portrait of Jesus Christ.

I suppose that many pastors would point out that Billy Graham is an evangelist, not a pastor, and that he should stick to what he does best and not try to tell pastors how to conduct church.  That may be a valid point, but it's not just Dr. Graham who is troubled by the direction of the church and its obsession with pop cuture.  In his July 10, 2010 daily devotion, Pastor Greg Laurie asked, "Are we trading Reverence for Relevance?"  He writes, "Look, I am all for relevance.  We need to make sense to the people we are reaching.  But let's not lower our standard in order to extend our reach.  Let's not trade reverence for relevance."

I pray that we find the balance--that we remain reverent while being relevant.