Reformation and Demolition - David H. Lauten

As the son of parents who grew up in Detroit, I watched with interest the demolition of the J.L. Hudson Company’s downtown store on October 24, 1998. The building, built in 1911 on Woodward Avenue, was the tallest department store in the world, with 29 stories. When it came down, the Hudson became the largest single building ever imploded. Its great plunge went exactly as planned. 

Some demolitions go awry, but the goal is a controlled and contained collapse. Usually the takedown allows room for an improved space and newer building.

The history of the renewal of Christ’s church is a mix of reformation and demolition.  The Reformation of the 16^th century brought with it a rediscovery of the gospel, the centrality of God’s Word, God’s grace in salvation, and a Scripture-shaped corrective to worship. It also brought some demolition—a sudden and dramatic change of direction to some of the Medieval church’s structures and practices. 

While certain habits must go when God brings revival, the ideal formula involves as much needed reform as possible with as little destruction as feasible.

The Genevan reformer John Calvin, in a 1543 letter since titled “The Necessity of Reforming the Church,” writes to Roman Emperor Charles V sketching the decline of worship and the common understanding of justification, the sacraments, and church government. Calvin not only exposes church troubles, he also suggests the “means and methods by which religion might be purged from all these defilements, the doctrine of godliness restored to its integrity, and the church raised out of its calamitous into somewhat of a tolerable condition.” And he describes some of the difficulties of rousing the church out of a state of calamity to tolerable-ness. 

Among these challenges is the risk of demolition.

While we earnestly desire and pray that God will renew and bring spiritual vigor to our lives and the lives of his people, genuine revival brings about changes that may be difficult to handle. But here, too, Calvin reminds us that some risks are worth taking: “it is the greatest and most excellent of all causes, [and] we must fight our way through many difficulties.”

Reform and renewal may bring challenges, but we may join Calvin as he reflects upon the efforts of his fellow reformers. They faced overwhelming obstacles and the threat of collapse in order to bring reform to Europe.  They devoted themselves to the cause of the gospel—“the same course,” Calvin says, “we are still pursuing in the present day.”

For over 20 years since Hudson’s fall, the 1200 Block of Woodard Ave Detroit has remained undeveloped. However, in recent days, Bedrock Detroit, a commercial real estate firm specializing in the strategic development of urban cores, is undertaking the rebuilding of the site. 

With the increasing influence of a secularized culture, many of our churches today find themselves underdeveloped and need to be reminded of God’s plan, his only plan – the expansion of his kingdom through the biblically directed work of the church.

While God is the one who graciously and sovereignly brings revitalization to his church, we do have a responsibility for the development of its spiritual welfare. He uses means, even faulty fallen human agency and just as he did in Calvin’s day He will, through the powerful work of the Holy Spirit, bring renewal through a fresh discovery of the gospel, the centrality of God’s inerrant word, His grace alone in salvation, and out and out theocentric worship. Will we continue to tolerate the evil one’s attempts to thwart the development of the church, or, through the means that God provides, will we boldly and obediently commit ourselves to stabilizing and building up the church of God?