I told someone recently, “…to just pick a church — any church — and attend service regularly for six consecutive months.” Part of the reason is in our conversations it’s easy to spin in circles on where the church is often inadequate, or our personal struggles in relation to belonging and discipline, so after a while even the conversation topics become tiring. Perhaps, because deep down we desire steps to take us forward rather than being stuck in one place along our Christian journey. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a place for rest and sitting still because we need to listen or re-center ourselves. But, whether it’s as one who’s in church leadership or not, perhaps we’ll need to focus more on our energies not on “finding” a church or even “doing church” but first by “being church” and then see what happens- part of that being process is “being there” 🙂
Jason Clark says it well here in You’ll never find the church you’re looking for.
“I remember George Barna several years ago surveying non christians, unchurched people, asking them what would church have to do and be for you to ever consider being involved with one. They gave him a long list of things. He then followed it up by going back to people saying, ‘good news!’ their are some churches that have lots of those things you wanted, are you interested. And guess what they almost all said no thanks.
The reality was that people can easily list the things they say a church should be and do, but even if their is a community near them that is all those things, they still won’t by and large get involved. It’s easier to be a critic than to participate.
And in our desire to re-examine church, to adapt and change in the face of our changing world, under a vital missional mandate to do so, I keep reminding myself that relevance is greatly overrated. We can (and I think we should) strive to be kingdom based, break down sacred and secular divides, be communal with our experiences and learning, listen and be open to outsides, serve our communities without hidden agendas, foster a habit of participation and creativity, value ancient, modern and future, be networks rather than hierachy.
And still people will say no thank you, handing my life over to Jesus and serving the Mission of God with others in my community, doesn’t fit my consumer lifestyle and requirements. And maybe whilst we strive for those changes, we’ll stop beating ourselves up over not acheiving them all.
wise & realistic words above.
we often thought we have good reasons, but at the end we are just there with (hopefully still) good excuses to allow us to dwell in comfort zone, instead of moving on.
perhaps that’s human?
Thanks wahlau for dropping by. I think an important “move” for us is a theological (thinking) move where we see Christianity (cf. Christ-following) as personal and yet not private. IMHO, a lot of our Christian upbringing emphasizing “personal relationship” with Jesus, “private devotions”, “experience God personally”, etc. have perhaps drawn us to some unintended consequences where a more communal aspect is neglected and thus we struggle with many internal “paralysis of analysis” and miss the gift of allowing the community to hold us – even though we’re such a mess .. and allow for some aggresive patience when it comes to our spiritual growth, I’m conscious here about not being “anti-personal” (how else can we relate to anyone, especially God). But the “we” dimension needs a little more airpplay, and the “I” must decrease without being self-destructive (cf. an abusive way), it’s more of allowing our story with it;s ups and downs to flow with the wider river of God’s story.
what you say can be true. But i do observed people’s reactions and reasons/excuses nowadays when it comes to church going – more and more are there not for the real reasons anymore. To some (hopefully not most) it is more like ritual/obligation instead of pleasure. These are the ones who ultimately stop, or church hop, or thought they don’t need church.
hmm, perhaps we should start blogging on a series on the same topic 🙂
I like this post. It is true for me too that I must just ‘do’. Time to get off our bums and do stuff and stop complaining. I get so much more blessing from just doing than talking about doing… We have not yet embraced the notion that perserverance is good. We must stop wanting instantly. We must be prepared to wade through the mud. It is not about personal spiritual growth; it is about how passionate we are about our Christian faith. Lets stop sleep-walking!
Thanks SB, I need to find the “bumprint” poem .. a kind of twist of the “footprint” version which captures your challenge here. For me overdwelling on complaining is unhealthy in the long run, but keeping the conversations open is what gets many of us started in the first place (and that’s a little different from complaining with no steps forward and just being stuck). Conversations open up our imaginations to what is possible. So, some talk is still necessary but definately not ONLY talk. So, beyond sleep-walking to eye-opened dancing!? 🙂