I wonder what comes to mind when you hear the word Judgment? If your like most people, not pleasant things. Judgment is one of those words that carries a heavy yoke of connotation. It implies imperiousness and piety in its practitioner and shame in the object of this practice. While we would like for the implications of Judgment to be Justice, it doesn't work that way in practice, in how we actually think about the term. Judgment, which should be a term of objectivity - as in an impartial judge rendering a verdict - instead has become a term of partiality and subjectiveness whereby the executor of judgment seems to mete it out at will, often unfairly.
In the scriptures though, Judgment is a key characteristic of God's nature. He is just, therefore he judges righteously, therefore his Judgment is good. the Bible supports this over and over again. The Judgment of God is a good thing in scripture, even a desirable thing because His Judgment is the execution of His just nature. Psalm 1:5 even promises evil people that they will not receive the Judgment of God. Imagine that, a lack of judgment as a threat!
Judgment is a tool of righteousness for God, but here's the catch. God is perfect, and he has perfect judgment, so the Judgment that He delivers is perfect. Since this is the case, His judgment is not something to be feared but rather something to be embraced. This concept of Judgment holds the world together; it makes social life possible, makes law and order in human communities possible, makes relationships fair, and so on. All of this is possible from a perfect source.
Something happens, though, when Judgment falls into our hands. We quickly learn to be proud of ourselves. As we recognize the justice of our actions - that is, as we align our activity with the precepts of God - we have a tendency to feel pretty good about what we're doing. In the process we give ourselves liberty to mete out the Judgment of God on everyone else, and a cycle can take hold whereby we seek perfection in our actions in order to leverage Judgment over everyone else. This is the very foundation of Religion in the most negative sense of that word. A sense of self-righteousness born out of the perversion of something good which we set up as the framework for judging everyone around us - that is the definition of religion.
Once you have self-centered religion, any Judgment you practice is tainted. It's tainted by pettiness and arrogance and a lack of mercy. It's tainted by rules and guidelines that become the arbiters of righteousness rather than God. And as people sense that they're being judged unfairly, that Religion is afoot and mercy and grace have retreated, the very word Judgment becomes tainted by an unrighteous practice of its application.
I've been talking about the word Judgment, but there are any number of other words that Religion has stolen and debased. Let's start with that word, Religion. This word is tainted mostly owing to its connection to Judgment. Etymologically religion comes from practices of study and devotion to gods, very concrete concepts that one would expect. But modern Religion implies Puritanical elements of unattainable piety and exclusivity.
Fellowship is a word I've grown to hate. It seems code for religious socializing, often forced or otherwise decidedly not fun. Then there's Church, a word which in the New Testament almost never refers to a building, but which in our time almost never does not. The writers of the New Testament constantly refer to the church as belonging to God; in Acts we're told that God purchased the church "with his own blood." Surely he didn't want to buy an assortment of ugly buildings in Amarillo, TX? Surely if we received a letter from a missionary to "The Church of God in Amarillo" we wouldn't post a picture of it online and claim it was meant only for our little congregation?
If any word is ready for redemption it is surely the word Church. The 2,000 plus years that have passed since Jesus was on the earth have been plagued with abuses by the church. In the name of "the church" people have been maimed, killed, and enslaved; forced to leave homes, families, and entire cultures; taught to hate other religions and ethnicities and nations; forced to support unjust governments and modes of life; and generally made to believe that someone besides Jesus himself is head of this thing called the Church which, by all accounts in scripture, should include anyone who has the slightest interest in a good, just, and holy God who does everything possible to bring grace and mercy and love to all humanity.
The very voice of God needs redemption. We live in the most literate time in human history, which by most Christian standards should mean that the Bible is being read in almost every possible corner of the globe. By the standards of most of the Christians I know, this should translate to a global revival. Imagine several billion people with access to God's words! And yet something unsettling is happening instead. It seems that instead of more freedom and healing and joy spreading around the world along with the written word, there's a strangling of the language of God. The more we put Bibles into peoples hands, the more we want to include our own interpretations (and connotations) of the language in those bibles. It's not enough for many of us that the Word of God is out there for the reading if someone who "knows what they're doing" is not also there to explain Judgment, Church, Fellowship, Grace, and even Salvation to the ignorant masses.
The voice of God needs to be redeemed because many of us Christians decided years ago that He doesn't (or can't) really speak anymore anyway. We ignored the fact that the Bible says "the Word became Flesh" and instead spread the lie that the Flesh became Word - that Jesus is summed up in the Holy Bible, so reading is all that's required. Our fixation on the printed scriptures ignores the fact that in order to encounter Jesus, you have to, you know, encounter Jesus! The word became flesh because not only can some people not read, but some people who can never will. God didn't write Moses a letter, he spoke to the man from a burning bush.
Redeeming God's voice is about redeeming the language of God. It's about giving life and power to words like Just and Good, Judgment and Love. Jesus came to earth to show us the character of God through the medium of our own skin, our own condition. Jesus embodied Judgment when he laid bare the hypocrisy of the religious leaders and repeatedly said, "I demand mercy and not sacrifice." Jesus showed us that Church is a community of the God-fearing rather than a temple of exclusion. And Jesus taught us that Religion is about self-sacrifice and care for the weakest among us - for the widows and orphans, the powerless and marginalized. Redeeming God's voice is an act of redeeming His character in our world. We need the language of God to represent His character and connote His love and grace, or else the only answers we'll have for the questions of the world will be empty promises.
Wednesday, January 25, 2017
Monday, January 2, 2017
What is Church?
The first time I heard the term "The Dones" was probably around the time that Joshua Packard published this short column on Christianity Today. I heard it (of course) on social media, and my initial reaction was one of disgust, but not with the concept. I hated that the institution - media, researchers, leaders, the church itself - felt the need to come up with a label for a group of people just so it could try to explain who they were.
Nevertheless, here I sit about 18 months later reading about how faithful Christians are leaving churches all across the country and all I can think is how it's about time. I myself have attended church the vast majority of my life, with two large periods of non-attendance. The first was during college, right around the ages of 20 to 23. At that time I was outside of my parents' control and I just didn't want to go to a Baptist church. The second period was during the early years of my marriage when my wife and I were moving every few months (it seemed) and couldn't - or didn't really want to - find a stable place to attend.
What is church anyway? The ready answer to that is exactly what comes to mind for me. For about 32 of my 36 years on this earth I have spent Sunday mornings and Wednesday evenings (and many, many more days and nights) in a building set aside for the practices of Christian worship. My early years were spent in Southern Baptist churches in Amarillo, TX. My latter years in various non-denominational churches. I spent almost eight years at Messiah's House in Amarillo until, for a variety of reasons, I didn't see the point in going anymore.
But surely church is not simply what we've come to expect it to be here in America? A social gathering mid-morning on Sundays - or if your particularly hip, Saturday night - where about 20 minutes is spent in song and another 40 listening to a single person (probably a man) preach a prepared sermon with lots of Bible references. On Wednesday night there is probably a small group or a Bible study, activities for the children, and a lot of friendly Hellos and How-are-yous as you rush about gathering up your kids so you can hustle home and get them in bed.
If that is what church is then it's no wonder people are done with it. When I read the Acts of the Apostles and the exciting work of the First Church, I'm dumbfounded at how what I've been doing most of my life comes anywhere close to the activity of Paul and Peter and all those new converts. When I hear a pastor brag about how a gathering of Believers in a living room swelled to the auditorium he's preaching in now, I can't help but wonder what exactly has been achieved. Why was the living room such a lowly location for the fervent pursuit of God? What makes an auditorium, replete with fog machines and jumbo screens, a holier location for the preaching of the Good News?
The irony is that what a new generation of Believers is searching for is exactly what so many pastors gave up to get into a building down the street. The authenticity of Jesus' love and redemption is far more at home in someone's house than in an American Suburban Temple. The stories of Jesus's miracles, of his healing and deliverance and grace, make such greater impact when we share them in the intimacy of small groups and real relationships. For some reason the church continues to pursue the caprice of newer buildings, better sound, and full-time salaried staff as if the formula of Church-Done-Right will be a better guarantee of salvation for the World. The reality is that Jesus Christ is personal. If we want to do his work on the earth, we're going to have to get personal, too.
Maybe that's what Church is - the Gospel of Jesus Christ delivered in a personal way. At one time I thought my most recent church experience was personal. Ours was a small church (about 200 people), and we saw the most impactful ministry occur in small groups on Wednesday nights. For a while it was a heady spiritual experience. There was freedom in ways I hadn't known there could be at church. And there was power - real spriritual power that was revealed in prophecies and healing and breakthrough for heartbroken people. But for some reason the specter of Church-Done-Right began to creep in. Before I knew it all of the most spiritually minded elders were gone, replaced by administrators with more disposable income. The mood shifted and so did the focus - from deliverance and relationships to programs and "involvement." The mantra became "getting plugged in" as if each of us was a spiritual appliance looking for juice from the ever-charged church. After a while it was too much. Without intimacy and the pure pursuit of God and the Spirit, it seemed like we were wasting our time. The worst part was that no one seemed to really care when we stopped showing up.
I don't know exactly what church is supposed to look like, and thank God and Jesus I don't have to. I'm not called to be the head of the Church; no man is. If I know my Bible right, the head of the Church is Jesus Christ himself, so I can't figure out why so many men (and sometimes women) are trying so damn hard to take control of this thing we call church. I would rather give over the larger vision to the Creator of the World and the Perfecter of my Faith and instead spend my time making friendships and bringing bits of heaven into this world. There are better ways to accomplish that then sitting in a pew on Sunday. Surely there are. Please God, please tell me there are.
Nevertheless, here I sit about 18 months later reading about how faithful Christians are leaving churches all across the country and all I can think is how it's about time. I myself have attended church the vast majority of my life, with two large periods of non-attendance. The first was during college, right around the ages of 20 to 23. At that time I was outside of my parents' control and I just didn't want to go to a Baptist church. The second period was during the early years of my marriage when my wife and I were moving every few months (it seemed) and couldn't - or didn't really want to - find a stable place to attend.
What is church anyway? The ready answer to that is exactly what comes to mind for me. For about 32 of my 36 years on this earth I have spent Sunday mornings and Wednesday evenings (and many, many more days and nights) in a building set aside for the practices of Christian worship. My early years were spent in Southern Baptist churches in Amarillo, TX. My latter years in various non-denominational churches. I spent almost eight years at Messiah's House in Amarillo until, for a variety of reasons, I didn't see the point in going anymore.
But surely church is not simply what we've come to expect it to be here in America? A social gathering mid-morning on Sundays - or if your particularly hip, Saturday night - where about 20 minutes is spent in song and another 40 listening to a single person (probably a man) preach a prepared sermon with lots of Bible references. On Wednesday night there is probably a small group or a Bible study, activities for the children, and a lot of friendly Hellos and How-are-yous as you rush about gathering up your kids so you can hustle home and get them in bed.
If that is what church is then it's no wonder people are done with it. When I read the Acts of the Apostles and the exciting work of the First Church, I'm dumbfounded at how what I've been doing most of my life comes anywhere close to the activity of Paul and Peter and all those new converts. When I hear a pastor brag about how a gathering of Believers in a living room swelled to the auditorium he's preaching in now, I can't help but wonder what exactly has been achieved. Why was the living room such a lowly location for the fervent pursuit of God? What makes an auditorium, replete with fog machines and jumbo screens, a holier location for the preaching of the Good News?
The irony is that what a new generation of Believers is searching for is exactly what so many pastors gave up to get into a building down the street. The authenticity of Jesus' love and redemption is far more at home in someone's house than in an American Suburban Temple. The stories of Jesus's miracles, of his healing and deliverance and grace, make such greater impact when we share them in the intimacy of small groups and real relationships. For some reason the church continues to pursue the caprice of newer buildings, better sound, and full-time salaried staff as if the formula of Church-Done-Right will be a better guarantee of salvation for the World. The reality is that Jesus Christ is personal. If we want to do his work on the earth, we're going to have to get personal, too.
Maybe that's what Church is - the Gospel of Jesus Christ delivered in a personal way. At one time I thought my most recent church experience was personal. Ours was a small church (about 200 people), and we saw the most impactful ministry occur in small groups on Wednesday nights. For a while it was a heady spiritual experience. There was freedom in ways I hadn't known there could be at church. And there was power - real spriritual power that was revealed in prophecies and healing and breakthrough for heartbroken people. But for some reason the specter of Church-Done-Right began to creep in. Before I knew it all of the most spiritually minded elders were gone, replaced by administrators with more disposable income. The mood shifted and so did the focus - from deliverance and relationships to programs and "involvement." The mantra became "getting plugged in" as if each of us was a spiritual appliance looking for juice from the ever-charged church. After a while it was too much. Without intimacy and the pure pursuit of God and the Spirit, it seemed like we were wasting our time. The worst part was that no one seemed to really care when we stopped showing up.
I don't know exactly what church is supposed to look like, and thank God and Jesus I don't have to. I'm not called to be the head of the Church; no man is. If I know my Bible right, the head of the Church is Jesus Christ himself, so I can't figure out why so many men (and sometimes women) are trying so damn hard to take control of this thing we call church. I would rather give over the larger vision to the Creator of the World and the Perfecter of my Faith and instead spend my time making friendships and bringing bits of heaven into this world. There are better ways to accomplish that then sitting in a pew on Sunday. Surely there are. Please God, please tell me there are.
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