Have you seen those funky Febreze commercials? You know, where blindfolded people are asked to sit in a room full of stinking refuse and then asked, “What do you smell?” They volunteer answers that suggest they think they’re sitting in the Garden of Eden! Once the blindfold is removed, the befuddled test subject is shocked by the nasty, gross, and decaying trash that surrounds them. The point of the commercial is: Febreze makes things smell better.
But did you know that when Febreze was first introduced it didn’t sell well? It turns out that the product designed to neutralize bad odors floundered because people didn’t think they needed it. In case after case, Procter and Gamble (the parent company) discovered that over time people get used to bad smells in their lives. In their desensitized state consumers saw no need for odor elimination. It was not until P&G changed their marketing strategy that sales of Febreze took off.
In learning about the Febreze back story I couldn’t help but think of the church at Laodicea. In Revelation 3 Jesus tells the church, “Because you say; ‘I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing,’ and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked” (Revelation 3:17).
The church at Laodicea had become desensitized to their true condition. They thought everything smelled great at their church. They had some signs of blessing we often covet in our churches, yet something was in the air and it was not the smell of roses. They thought they smelled sweet but Jesus instead smelled their spiritual poverty, the filth that was right under the surface of their lives, and their wretchedness.
The congregation did not have a clue because they were used to the smell. They thought they “had need of nothing.” They came to church dressed in the finest fashion of their day, but in His eyes, they didn’t have a stitch on. Like the Emperor in the fable of “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, they were deluded as to their actual shameful state.
Are we also living cluelessly in such a smelly mess? Is your church exhibiting the characteristics of what Jesus meant the church to be? How do we go about discerning the true state of our church? How do we shake off our desensitized state?
One way is to identify the patterns that run through our church’s history. Does our church have a history of unresolved conflict between pastors, staff, lay leaders and/or congregation? Does it reek of the misuse of spiritual authority? Has a lack of church discipline left us with rotten things in some of the church closets or under our church carpets?
May God bring a fresh breeze of blessing to your church, not by covering up the bad odors with spiritual Febreze but by addressing the issues that generate repulsive fumes in the first place.
How about it? What needs freshening up in your church?
Mark Barnard serves as President of Blessing Point Ministries and is the author of The Path of Revival – Restoring Our Nation One Church at a Time and co-author of the Healing the Heart of Your Church Facilitator Guide. Like us on Facebook.
