In Tennessee, unlike other states, churches are exempt from the governors shutdown orders. Churches are considered essential services. While our state government realizes the importance of our churches, seems like an awful lot of our church leaders don't feel the same way. It would be hard to imagine a more essential service.

Grocery stores are open, hardware and building supplies and even liquor stores are open for business but not churches? Something's way wrong with this story.  

We've come a long way in the past few weeks in understanding how to prevent the spread of the virus by social distancing, personal protective devices and personal cleanliness. It's time to reopen our churches to those who wish to attend. And for those who don't, they can take advantage of all the social media platforms available. It's very frightening how easy it was to shut down so much of our society, but the idea that our churches are closed should scare all of us.

In the old times, many, many of the early Christians were killed just for their beliefs. Today, there are places across the world where Christians gather under threat of prosecution and the penalty of death if caught, yet they meet.  There was a time, not too long ago, that our churches were community leaders, now it seems we've just become community followers.

What will the church do when true persecution comes? What will our church leaders do when the state or federal government shuts down churches because they won't support and promote homosexuality, abortion or any other edict that would go against Christian teachings? If the current example is any indication, I fear our churches are doomed.

Looks like we'll be the first generation in American history to take the path of Peter and deny Christ in mass.

Open the churches for those who would come