Where is the Church?

When Paul and Barnabas went to Pisidian Antioch (Acts 13) They were initially welcomed and invited to preach in the Synagogue on the Sabbath. It was clearly a mixed synagogue with “men of Israel and you who fear God” present. Paul recounted the history of Israel and showed that Jesus was the promised Messiah The challenge at the end of the sermon brought a mixed response. He challenged the scoffers as well as calling all to follow Jesus.

The response was very positive overall. The people begged Paul to elaborate on the following Sabbath. Some even couldn’t wait that long and followed Paul and Barnabas to hear more during the week. 

The stage had been set. On the following Sabbath “almost the whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord”. This was clearly the largest crowd the synagogue had seen at one of their meetings for a long time as it stirred up the jealousy of the regulars. It must have been quite a meeting.

When the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy. They began to contradict what Paul was saying and heaped abuse on him.

(Act 13:45 NIV)

What caused this I wonder? Could it be a matter of power and control? The leaders of the synagogue had a nice polite gathering each Sabbath. Now this out of town preacher comes along, gets a large following and starts to challenge their conventional wisdom. Even though Paul was preaching as a Jew to Jews, using the Jewish Scriptures, they must have been  confronted by the fact that Paul’s preaching had such a dramatic effect.

Paul’s response probably inflamed the situation even more since he declared they were unworthy to receive this message of salvation and turned to the Gentiles instead. Here is an outsider, even though he would have come with a prominent reputation, daring to challenge the established leadership of the Synagogue. He was telling them what they should have known and been practising. After all the Jews  were called by God to be the instruments of spreading His message to all nations, and Paul reminded them of this. They had failed in this and now Paul was to go directly to the Gentiles. What a slap in the face for the established “church”, which is what the synagogue represented.

The leaders then stirred up the prominent membership of the synagogue, “devout women and prominent men”, and proceeded to drive Paul and Barnabas out of the city.

However the word of God had been sown and would take root after they left.

Paul and Barnabas continued on their journey “filled with joy and the Holy Spirit”.

What does this have to say to us?  

A great deal if we have ears to hear.

The true gospel of Jesus will always challenge us in ways that we will find hard to accept if we are not attuned to the Holy Spirit alive in us.  Jesus calls us to a life so different from our existing lives that we automatically reinterpret what He is saying. Our lives, especially our church lives, are usually well ordered and comfortable. After all if we are challenged too much there is always an option to leave that church and find another where our likes can be indulged.

Church growth, so called, in much of the developed world is as much about transfer from another church as it is growth by new birth of unbelievers. 

Thom Rainer in a recent blog post (http://thomrainer.com/2014/08/eleven-observations-church-transfer-growth/), made the following 11 observations:

1. “In the recent past (15 to 20 years), transfer growth was rewarded. Churches and church leaders were recognized for the total number of new members who joined their churches. Thus, at least implicitly, transfer growth was seen as important as conversion growth (where a non-Christian becomes a believer and joins the church).
2. The pendulum has swung, and transfer growth is viewed more negatively today. The Millennials specifically seem to have an aversion to this type of church growth.
3. Much of transfer growth has been the result of the consumer mentality creeping into churches. Many Christians have become church hoppers and shoppers to find the right church that meets their needs and preferences. They view a local congregation as a country club with perks for the members.
4. It has not been uncommon for pastors to become competitive and antagonistic about members transferring from one church to another. This attitude is less common today than it was over a decade ago.
5. Transfer growth can mask sickness in a church. Churches can be lauded for their fast growth, even if the growth includes very few new Christians. So it is possible for a church to be held in high regard even though its members are disobedient to the Great Commission.
6. Transfer growth has been easy in many churches because of low membership standards. If churches truly communicate and expect members to be fully functioning in the congregation, fewer would transfer with a consumer mindset.
7. The decline of cultural Christianity has slowed the flow of church transfer growth. Many persons, including some non-Christians, used to transfer into the “popular” church in town because church membership was a cultural expectation. That is no longer true in most areas of our country.
8. More pastors and other church leaders are actually contacting the church from which a person desires to transfer. They are attempting to confirm that the person has been a member in good standing, and that he or she is not transferring unresolved problems with their membership.
9. Despite obvious issues concerning transfer growth, we should not assume all transfer growth is bad. It’s a bad metaphor, but don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.
10. Some church members seek to transfer because of major doctrinal aberrations in their churches. I recently spoke to someone who left her church because the leadership denied the exclusivity of salvation through Christ.
11. The fastest growing category of transfer growth today takes place when a person moves out of his or her community. We should be thankful for Christians who seek a church home when they move to a new community. This category of transfer growth is becoming the most common because of the mobile nature of our culture.”

Some of these observations are positive, or neutral. But the general thrust of the observations illustrates the problem faced by the church in developed nations. 

When the challenge of being like Jesus (after all that is what being a disciple of Jesus means) is put before people, the most common response (other than apathy) is something like, “We are fine here, don’t disturb us.” In fact if the very structure of the church is challenged, as I believe it must be if we are to be obedient to Jesus, then an even  more strident response is garnered.

It amazes me how protective of the structure of the established church people are, when its “gatekeepers” are challenged to examine what the New Testament  actually says about the nature and function of the church. Defensiveness is the mildest response I have experienced so far. The response is usually much stronger.

This puts me in a real dilemma. I love the church. I also love the Anglican church into which I was born again, nurtured, trained and equipped for ministry. I love the fact that this expression of the church truly is the “mid path” between the Catholic and Protestant wings of the church. It is like the image that Jesus painted of a tree with wide branches embracing different expressions of the Faith. Of course I am not blind to her deficiencies, the compromises which are tearing the worldwide Anglican Communion apart, the nominalism which attends so much of her membership and so on. I could list my grievances easily. But that does not take away my love for and commitment to  the Anglican Church as she was meant to be. The 39 Articles of Religion, the Lambeth Quadrilateral, and the other instruments of unity have much to teach the rest of the world, despite the fact that these instruments are largely in tatters today.  The Book of Common Prayer properly understood is also a unique resource for public gatherings, opening up these gatherings to all the believers and not just a priestly caste.

 The history of the English Church from the 2^nd Century until now is also a story of the work of the Holy Spirit preserving the faith of disciples through good and bad times. The way we have got rid of human domination only to take it up again, is a commentary on the Book of Judges. 

This early Celtic Church has much to teach us and I will write a separate blog about that.

But none of this allows me to remain silent when I see the parlous nature of much of the established church today, of all denominations, Conservative, Pentecostal, Catholic, Non-conformist, etc.

It is even more saddening to recognise that many of the issues faced today are not new, but have been there from the beginning. In the New Testament we see example after example, especially in Paul’s letters, of problems in the church. Problems are common. However it is the way we face these issues and deal with them that matters.

Many today cannot even see the problems. Let me just sketch a few of the major ones that exercise me.

•  The hierarchical structure of the church where all power and control is exercised from above. Jesus’ pattern of servant leadership is all but ignored today.

• Concentration on buildings rather than people, with the attendant redirection of finance to buildings and maintenance.

• Lack of equipping for all kinds of ministries of every disciple. Equipping for ministry is the one key role of the church gathered, so that we can be scattered into the world.

•  The whole question of discipleship, or the lack thereof.

•  The way money and resources are used. Most of the resources of church members go into self serving areas of comfort and security. Whereas I believe that the bulk of our resources should be invested in mission, properly understood as making Jesus known where He has not been known before with the consequent planting of new churches.

•  The Kingdom of God should be our major focus and then to allow Jesus to build His Church

• Comfort and security as against servanthood and sacrifice.

• Forgetting that God the Father is the focus of all things. The First and Great Commandment has become diluted with the Second. That is, we have become more focussed on ourselves and others than on God and His Kingdom.  Some of this is a reaction to a neglect of social responsibility in the past, but the pendulum has swung in the opposite direction now.

• The Church  has become in many areas little more than a social grouping or amateur social work agency. Even in its good expressions, it is doing the work that God gave to the famiy and not to the church.  Parents have given their children over to the church for their “religious education.” This is seen so clearly in our emphasis on children’s and youth work almost to the exclusion of equipping parents to do all this work as God intended. We have divided what God has made one.

• The last point can be expanded to the whole compartmentalising of church activities: children, youth, women, men, singles, married, etc. God’s pattern is of the husband and wife together growing strong so that THEY can pass their faith on to their children. Single people can be nurtured within the church as they exercise their unique role of ministry in a range of areas.

•   We have changed the thrust of the Great Commission to “COME” instead of “GO”. There is so much we can learn from the first 600-1200 years of the English Church. From its beginning in the early second century to its zenith in the seventh century right through to its demise by the twelfth, the Celtic Church was a powerful instrument in the evangelisation of the British Isles and much of Europe, until it was emasculated by the overwhelming authority of the Pope in Rome. It was a wonderful equipping and sending church, little seen since, until some parts of the last century.

What do I want to see?

I long to see the church rise in power and authority as she will when we catch a glimpse of the glory of the Cross and the power in sacrifice. Real power will then be seen in the way it was seen in Jesus, and not in the way of ecclesiastical authority, seen throughout the ages.

This can only happen as we see Jesus as all in all, sacrifice our lives in His service and love the Father so much through Jesus and the Holy Spirit that we will hold back nothing from Him. We will then be like the overcomers of Revelation 12:

They triumphed over him (the dragon, devil) by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.

(Rev 12:11 NIV)

Revelation 12:11 (MSG)
¹¹  They defeated him through the blood of the Lamb and the bold word of their witness. They weren't in love with themselves; they were willing to die for Christ.

Is this too much to hope and work for? Surely not! 

This can be seen in many places around the world, including the developed world. God has His faithful people all throughout the world.

All that is needed is for those of us with such a mind and will to stand up and declare the truth of the unchanging Gospel of the Kingdom of God.

This will inevitably bring a confrontation with the established powers and authorities in the church. How we negotiate that confrontation will determine the effectiveness of the Church in growing the powerful Kingdom of God.