(A lament in verse, echoing timeless tensions in the faith: where cultural allure and quantifiable “success” eclipse the unadorned power of the Gospel’s promise—that Jesus saves the lost, not the trending. Inspired by reflections on church resilience amid relevance’s pull.

In the hallowed halls where echoes once rang true,
The Precious Church of Jesus Christ now hums
With algorithms of approval, screens aglow—
Metrics marching like a metronome of might,
Where “likes” ascend like incense to the cloud,
And relevance reigns, a scepter sharp and bright.
Culture’s chorus swells in viral verse and verse,
A symphony of scrolls that scroll the soul away,
While the Gospel whispers, faint as fading hearse:
“I am the way, the truth, the life,” He says,
Yet drowned in data streams and trending praise.

Oh, seeker of the saved, the Lamb who left the ninety-nine,
Who dined with debtors, healed the halt and blind—
Has your light grown dim in this electric shrine?
The numbers climb: attendance apps that tally throngs,
Engagement engines fueled by fleeting fire,
Hashtags of heaven, but hearts adrift in wrongs.
Culture courts the crowd with coffee bars and bands,
Relevance robes the ragged in designer grace,
While Jesus stands at the door, nail-scarred hands,
Knocking not for nods, but for a contrite face.
“For God so loved the world,” the ancient cry,
That whosoever believes might never die—
But now ’tis whosoever shares, reposts, complies.

Precious Church, your altars altared to the age,
Where faithfulness fades for followers’ fleeting gaze,
The Savior’s story sidelined on salvation’s stage.
Culture’s crown is heavy, relevance a rusted chain,
Binding bold belief to bland conformity’s bane.
Yet in the quiet quake of Calvary’s refrain,
The Gospel gleams: not in grandeur’s grand design,
But in the grace that grips the guilty, makes them thine.
Return, O bride, to the blood that bought the broken whole;
Let metrics melt like morning mist, and mercy take control.
For Jesus saves—not by the scroll of social score,
But by the cross that counts the cost, and opens heaven’s door.