So I've been thinking a lot about church recently and what that looks like.
I'm not a raving radical or a mad traditionalist, but I think the church is made for more than this. I had was leading a bible study last night and thinking through the Luke 10 passage on loving the Lord your God, and loving your neighbour as yourself. This feels radical, as we chatted it through I realised that I haven't really put good thought into what these verses mean, what they call us to be.
I think as churches we are very good at loving ourselves, making ourselves comfortable, and having things within church that suit us, and make us feel good about having a great church where it meets our needs. But is that church? Well actually in some ways, probably yes it is!! We need that fellowship and the that sense of belonging, and being in it together. But has that taken over from being radical, from being an integral life changing part of a community that does not know God, yes, it probably has.
In Luke 10, the Pharisee asks, 'who is my neighbour?' and Jesus tells the story of the good Samaritan, the man who stopped not only to help a beaten stranger, but help a beaten Jewish stranger, when the priest and the Levite had passed by, not wanting to get their hands dirty, or for that matter even see if their is anything wrong. Perhaps the church is too much like the priest and the levite, perhaps it happily walks by thinking about how good it is without much thought for the people who are in desperation, the people that it encounters that it actually could do something for! The church in some ways has become desensitized to the issues around it. It has become a spaceship on an alien planet but the people within it have forgotten to go out and explore.
In the story of the good Samaritan, the Samaritan sees the need and deals with it. He becomes practically involved in the life of the beaten man, and he expects nothing back! This was a man with heart, who knew what love is and knew that it was best given away. Lets, with God be people who do the same!
The church is made up of people, and as people we have become consumer church goers, happy to keep church as it is, not wishing to rock the boat. At the minute the church can feel a bit like a toothless dog gumming on the community it is part off, not making any real headway. As a church, as people, we must look to our God, call for his guidance and look to become, not a toothless dog, but radical, community engaged, loving community, that is integral in the area it inhabits. A church thats sees the need and goes for it, one that is no longer selfish and self satisfied but one that desires to show God in all his glory and love to the community around it in whatever form that may take and however painful that may be. The church is suffering because it is no longer relevant, because people do not believe that Jesus is relevant any more, this is a call to me, to the visionaries, to the hands on people, to cups of tea ladies, to the church, to look at how radical this Jesus we claim to follow is, and move into our communities with a sense of purpose and a deep desire to introduce them to a God who loves them, in whatever form that may take, and however uncomfortable that may make us feel!
I'm just spewing out thoughts as they come, so feel free to comment...
