Slice of Laodicea: "Would you like spirituality with that?"

Our church email account gets a great deal of spam. Unsavory characters troll the various Christian web sites harvesting email addresses, then bombarding church email accounts with wickedness and filth.

Today we received-- not wickedness or filth--but a slice of Laodicea. The email links to a web site promoting a church ladies' retreat featuring.......CHOCOLATE.

Yes. Chocolate.


Now, I enjoy chocolate as much as the next person, but to build a church ladies' retreat around it...?! erhmmmmm, NO. "Some things naturally go together," the web site coos. "Burgers and fries...salt and pepper...peanut butter and jelly....WOMEN AND CHOCOLATE." It continues on to say that the feelings and emotions we have toward chocolate are much like describing God's grace. ("We don't deserve it, but we long for it and need it.")

Excuse me?? CAN we cheapen our Creator, Redeemer God any further?

"Chocolate Boutique™:
Where women taste and see that the Lord is good."

Would you like some God with your chocolate this weekend?

This disgusts me to my very core.

As if our Lord needs gimmicks to be palatable (pun intended) to be relevant to today's society. This is church marketing at its cheesiest. Man-centered and experiential-- not Christ-centered.

I don't have time to rant fully. I have to teach in 1:15 minutes and must get the laundry away/living room up to snuff for those guests who sit in and listen to their kids' lessons.

tchah!