Going to Church to Avoid Being the Church
Church. Interesting word.
To some it is a place to go. To some it is a place to avoid. To others it is an identity; a people to be. To Paul and Jesus, it seemed to be the latter. Paul wrote to the church in such-and-such city (hardly one building) and Jesus called his church a bride (last time I checked my wife was a person). But to most in our society, church is a thing. We go to church. We plant churches. We build churches. We choose which church to go to (often based on the quality of the preaching, singing, or children’s ministry). This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it can be. It becomes so when we go to church to avoid being the church. (By the way, a friend of mine, Jonathan, helped identify categories of those associated with church.)
There is a large percentage of people who do just that. They feel that if they faithfully attend the right church (as defined by them or their culture) then they have met the requirements of being a good Christian. Typically, their definition of church is an established building with an established name within an established denomination (or association). There must be preaching and singing and tithes collected and paid pastors to pray and children’s church and youth ministry and, and, and… (in fact, this definition is so ingrained in them that they feel there must be something wrong, or cultish, with a Christian who does not attend such a church). In addition to attending such a church, they feel in order to be a great Christian they must serve the church in some internal capacity and join a small group.
The Christian equation is this: Attend + Serve + Tithe + Small Group = Good Christian.
But here is the subtle deception. They feel that since they have met the requirements, they are free from being the church. They are free from true engagement with Jesus. They are free from true engagement with other people. They are free from pursing their identity as priests and saints. They are free from real life-changing discipleship. They are free from seeking God’s healing justice (not judgment) in this world and society. They are free from radically living and serving and loving and following the at times insane leading of Jesus in their daily lives as they interact with the world around them. They are free from taking up their cross daily. They are free from the demands and persecution that Jesus promised to hi followers. They are free from BEING the church, the bride, and the dynamic-life-changing-people God wants to restore in order that he can restore others through them. They are free from all of this because they park in a certain parking lot to go into a certain building at a certain time to sing certain songs and to listen to a certain man (in most churches) talk about certain topics using a certain book, and to give a certain amount (the faithful give 10% of their pre-tax income), and repeat this process week after week, month after month, year after year until they die and have entirely succeeded in avoiding being the church simply because they went to church.
There are some that are saying “enough!” They feel like there has to be more. They sense that this church-thing system is stifling them from truly being the church. They desire to be his bride without all the trappings of the church-thing. They are tired of attending church sit-n-watch. They want the radical restorative community life they read about in the New Testament. They don’t want to be counted among those who ATTEND in order to AVOID. They want to a community that helps them embrace their identity as Jesus’ bride. All the things the others want to avoid, they want—and they want it so bad they are willing to go to great lengths to get it. Often, they abandon their family’s traditional church-thing, self-ostracizing themselves from friends and family who don’t understand. Most of the time, there are no other alternatives and so they are left with an unfair choice: continue living in the church-thing tension or stop going, both of which are internally painful—and often lonely—decisions.
The there are some who are trying to build an alternative to the church-thing. A few blogs ago I compared this process to my son and I building our tree house. We are trying to dream of a third way. The options of going or not going are not good enough. We need community. We need others. But we need a different—some would argue better—approach to being the church. What will it look like? We don’t know. But it will not be for those who want to ATTEND to AVOID. It will be for those who want to ENCOUNTER in order to EMBRACE.
What of those who want to avoid being the church? I would point them to the yellow pages and they can choose a church they want to attend. A search-tip for those wanting to avoid: the bigger, the better.
About The Author
Can I say, AMEN! But now that I have, let me share what I am finding along this journey. It is not only as you said, those who feel they have met the requirements that now are exempt from being the church, but deeper still, they believe they have. The problem is deception. We as church leaders and believers are responsible for at least part of the problem. The way we have done and taught about church, has created this illusion that the way we are doing it is being the church. We don’t feel exempt while acknowledging we aren’t being; we actually think we are being the church way we are doing it. I hope that wasn’t confusing.
When we become dependent on the intitution of Church it keeps us from being dependent on Jesus. This is why it becomes frustrating for pastors as well as us as individuals, when we are not seeing the transformation of life that we know should be happening or we have a personal crisis, because we are counting on the institution to carry us when it is a substitute for Jesus Himself. And when this happens, people get mad at the church (as they know it), it’s programs and leaders; then they get hurt or offended and leave.
So, be the Church, follow Jesus, live deeply in Him, equip and encourage other along the way to live deeply in Him so He can lead them.
May we be indeed.
You make a great point that we are not simply avoiding being the church, but think we are being it by simply going to church and doing church things.
I saw that you are a lead pastor. Do you teach/lead along these lines? If so, how is the coongregation responding?
I grew up in the UMC and hav been in the non-denominational church since the mid 80’s. I say this to give a sort of background to where I am now. I’ve been in ministry for 20 years and have been pastoring in my current location since 1999 (my 1st church plant). We have gone through some changes over the past 2-3 years. I have experienced the frustration and longing you described in your post, which has led me on a personal journey with Jesus which has led to changes in ministry.
The answer to your question is “I am beginning to lead along those lines.” The answer to the second half is “not so well and we will see.”
It is hard to wean people off a dependency on program and leadership as we have modeled it. Based on what we have come to believe the church to be, it can make it difficult for people to make the shift. Dependency on a system and its leaders only will lead people to frustration when it fails to be the way they want. It will wear leaders out trying to maintain an institution to satisfy people and increase in numbers. We ride the worldy success train.
The shift is not easy but it is simple. The church is His people on a journey together and along the way we help eachother which feflects Him to the world. We make it difficult by over organizing and controling it instead of living it.
We lost many people over the last year to churches that will provide a place for people to sit and soak. However, we have a great group of people left that just want to know Jesus deeply, follow Him, share life as it comes together and share it with others. For leadership this hs been a shift of focus off building programs tobe successful to equipping every person in our life to know the Father’s love, follow His Son, live in friendship and let HIM lead them.
When all else fails, and it will, Jesus is always enough!
I too have witnessed churches who decide to move in this direction lose people to other churches that offer great programs. It has really good for me to have a group of friends who really want to live simply and deeply as we try to follow Jesus together. It gets messy at times, but in the end it is really real.
“The church is His people on a journey together and along the way we help each other which reflects Him to the world.” Very true.
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