How Safe Should the Church Be?
We long for a church community where we can be transparent, don’t we? Where we don’t have to remember to paint on the smile and pretend everything is going fine. Where we don’t have to pretend we’re remaining ever so thankful in the midst of trials and that we’re really not in trapped in addiction.
Do we also long for a church that will teach us to turn away from sin and bondage and to walk in freedom? Do we also long for a church that will point out the darkness in our souls with one hand and draw us closer to her hearth with the other?
Is the church a place where you can come as you are, but don’t leave as you were?
[tags]church, christianity[/tags]
seth says:
September 25th, 2006 at 8:34 pm
The place we meet in is called the sanctuary, this leads us to believe that it should be a SAFE place. Certaintly not safe from honesty and transparency, or even the occassional fire and brimstone.
Have you ever wondered why so many christians are concerned about being accepted in churchs? If they struggle with showing who they are at church because they are wretches at home, shouldn’t they be more pissed about being a wretch. How come being honest always means describing how much of a sinner I am. WHy can’t honesty mean telling people how I have had victory over certain sins? why is a Christians masquerade always described with a smile, is it possible that despite trials or tribulations we can still have joy and express it with out feeling guilty of pretending? If there is sin then shouldn’t we get transparent with ourselves first before we bring our sacrifices of praise to the Lord? and wouldn’t that create quite the sanctified sanctuary Maybe their are to many unbelievers in the church?
Romanós says:
September 25th, 2006 at 10:26 pm
Church should be at least as safe as a hospital… and anyone coming there for help should be accepted “as is.” The “medical premium” has been paid in advance, and by the Physician Himself, and so, all that is required is cooperation between patient and staff. If everyone listens to the Doctor’s orders, they’ll all turn out just fine.
The metaphor comes from the Eastern Orthodox concept of “church” as a “xenodocheion” (inn) where the wounded are brought by Christ “the Good Samaritan” who leaves them along with partial payment, promising to return and pay whatever He still owes to the staff.
kenny says:
September 26th, 2006 at 8:47 am
I do particularly long for a church that will teach us to not be in “bondage” but instead to walk in “freedom.” I always hear this concept being tossed around…but I’m not sure I’ve ever seen it effectually taught or lived.
Whether you’re talking about the church being a safe haven for sinners or a burning pillar of fire to guide people toward righteousness - both models represent a call to love. The lack of either or both is a lack of love. Love would forgive and embrace the sinner; love would not let the sinner go without helping her out of her sin.
Joyously, I think the way to increase love (and therefore both grace and righteousness in the church) is to realize how much God has loved us. We love because he first loved us; our love is a response to His love. So perhaps we need to take some time to understand how much we are loved by God.
Romanós says:
September 26th, 2006 at 2:42 pm
Kenny, yours is an excellent, well thought out response. Amen, I agree with you 100%.
jose says:
September 26th, 2006 at 3:03 pm
Seth, I’ve seen that guy who has plenty of reasons to sulk and cry and yet rejoices in the Lord. I don’t think that guy’s pretending. Really, it’s not the smiling that bothers me, it’s the smile that gets put on for show.
It seems true that victory doesn’t come for a Christian struggling all by herself. Who can help her if no one knows her struggle? Who can know unless she tells them? Why would she tell unless she felt safe enough to expose her faults?
And I agree with you. I would love to hear more testimonies of victory.
jose says:
September 26th, 2006 at 3:07 pm
Romanós, I was thinking about that metaphor as I was writing this. I clung to the picture of the church as a fortress/outpost or as a university because I had nothing better to compare it too.
But yes, a hospital! It carries with it the idea of healing and being made whole again. It also carries with it the idea snapping bones back into place and amputating a gangrenous leg.
jose says:
September 26th, 2006 at 3:11 pm
While I agree that an understanding of God’s love would increase grace and righteousness, I ask myself if we don’t already talk a lot about God’s love for me. If I were the only one who needed saving, Jesus would still have gone to the cross. He chose me to be saved. And like the song says, he “thought of me above all.”
Would it make any difference if we proclaimed the love of God was for us as group, instead of me as an individual?
kenny says:
September 26th, 2006 at 6:29 pm
We don’t need to say ‘God loves us’ more often; we need to believe it.
So in that we’re talking about sanctification and discipline. We’re talking about actually sitting down and meditating on the fact of God’s love for as long as it takes for it to sink in.
It’s praying for an hour instead of a minute; it’s studying the Word more than we entertain ourselves; it’s fasting.
I think the answer is ‘God’s love,’ but the mechanism is spiritual discipline.
Drew says:
October 13th, 2006 at 11:57 am
I think Kenny mentioned something that is altogether something that seems to be greatly overlooked when prayer is mentioned.
Fasting is more powerful than we realize. Jehosaphat was on the brink of war and told all of Judah to fast, David fasted and prayed for people who were trying to kill him, and a few times it’s mentioned that only God needs to know about your fasting. I think it should be more encouraged in today’s churches. Only in the last year have I heard this brought up even in my church.
To tie it in with the subject of this blog; I think there’s a very thin line between “safe” and “comfortable”. I’m very weary lately of my own comfort, and I don’t think it’s the church’s job for people to feel safe. I think it’s the church’s job to allow for people to connect with God and it’s then, when we feel the arms of God around us, that we feel safe.
Church should be convicting, stirring our spirit about what’s not going right in our lives. Church is also the community of believers that build each other up in the Lord and love on each other.
jos' says:
October 18th, 2006 at 11:11 am
No need to be weary of your own comfort. It seems God is moving you out being comfortable and into a dangerous faith.
It reminds me. God is quite wild and dangerous isn’t he?