Ready to leave your church?

 

I read a blog titled “Why People Leave Your Church” that started like this: People leave churches, and they give all kinds of reasons for it. They will say stuff like “I’m not being fed.” or “We’re trying to help another ministry.” You may be tempted to blame it all on the shallow, self-centered, consumer mindset of American Christians—and, sure, there’s a lot of that. The writer went on to suggest that people do sometimes leave a congregation for all the wrong reasons – things like personality conflicts or unrealistic expectations about their own needs. Believe or not people get miffed about things like: The youth ministry doesn’t give my kids personal attention weekly. They fail to provide free nursery care during the weekly women’s Bible study. They wouldn’t help me pay my rent for the 4^th month in a row.

Others leave churches for reasons more reasonable.  They encounter a pastor who preys on people instead of praying for them. Or, they sense their church is drifting from the mooring of Scripture into humanism. Or, their church may begin to major on minors, trading the Gospel for politics, or substituting psychology for discipleship. Or, the writer I quoted earlier said they might even be spooked by too much change for which too little explanation is provided.

We must adopt a much higher view of ‘the fellowship’ to sustain the church. It is no accident that the Scripture uses the language of family to describe our churches.  We are to be ‘brothers and sisters.’  We have the same Father, the same Savior. Before we walk out the door, a consumer seeking a place that better suits our desires, we should spend great energies in prayer that focuses equally on allowing the Spirit to change our heart and shape our church in His will.  Severing relationship with our church family ought to feel as painful as a divorce!

To regard ‘church’ as an organization similar to other social groups is to miss the truth by a country mile.  We don’t ‘join’ the Church. We are called out of the world and into Christ. That is why we read this command. "I don’t want anyone strolling off, down some path that goes nowhere. And mark that you do this with humility and discipline—not in fits and starts, but steadily, pouring yourselves out for each other in acts of love, alert at noticing differences and quick at mending fences. You were all called to travel on the same road and in the same direction, so stay together, both outwardly and inwardly. You have one Master, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who rules over all, works through all, and is present in all. Everything you are and think and do is permeated with Oneness. But that doesn’t mean you should all look and speak and act the same. Out of the generosity of Christ, each of us is given his own gift." (Ephesians 4:1-7, The Message)

The church is not a mind-control cult, nor it is the property of the pastor, nor is it a corporation for public benefit. It is a living organism, the expression of Christ in this present world through which He does His work and makes Himself known. When it is healthy, it is a thing of beauty, powerful, and capable of changing cultures for good in remarkable ways. The end of slavery finally came about as result of the work of Christians who woke up to this terrible sin. Justice for the weak and dignity for the poor come where Christians walk humbly with their God! 

Are you ready to leave your church? I would urge you to think it over. Ask the Lord what His will for you might be. He may well use your prayers, your gentle, loving attitude to spark a spiritual renewal right where you are, instead of joining the one already in progress at some other local fellowship.

The Bible says that “Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.”  (Eph 5:25-27)  Do you love the Church, too? Are you helping to make her beautiful?