Many of my friends will understand Aja and my reasons for leaving traditional church settings, but I’m all too aware that to some we seem flighty or even just plain off. In light of this I want to write a little something to explain where we are coming from, if not to persuade others to join us, then at least to make them understand.
At the heart of our decision is a plain straight forward reading of the Bible. For those who don’t know me very well one of the main things that I can’t stand is compromise. I’m not talking about weakness because I certainly understand that. I’m talking about knowing something to be true and saying I don’t care I’m going to do something else. This is an issue with most of traditional Protestant church life. Take the church meeting itself for example. The New Testament gives us basic guidelines on what to do when gathered and why we should do it in the first place. In short, the reason we go to “church” (the statement itself showing you how far off we’ve gone) is to use our gifts to encourage one another. The only real rules are that the results of our participation have to be edifying and that everyone should be allowed to participate. God, on purpose, made up the church so that we would need everyone’s participation when we come together. Are these simple guidelines followed? No. Why not? I can’t answer that, but I would presume the answer is that that is not the way things have been done. And because we don’t understand the goal of the church in the first place (coming to the fullness of Christ, which requires the use of the gifts of the Spirit, which requires Biblical gatherings)
On another point, take the role of the pastor. Do we ever see a pastor participating in a church gathering led alone running the meeting in the Bible? No. Should they participate? Of course, but as part of the body. Why are 99% of churches run the way they are? Again I can’t answer that, but it isn’t ok. It hurts the leaders and it hurts the church. How did we go from shepherds caring for people to shepherds becoming administrators and charismatic public speakers?
Lets move to the teaching itself. When Jesus sent his disciples out he said “go and preach the gospel saying, ‘the kingdom of God has come near.’” Paul was accused of treason because of his gospel preaching. The gospel as preached in the churches I’ve been in has been something akin to “ask Jesus to come into your heart and you will be saved.” Do you see the difference there? We have gone from saying Jesus is the king of the world who is going to make everything right to offering Jesus as fire insurance.
The things I like most about leaving traditional church setting is that I get the Bible back and I get the believing community back. I can read the Bible for what it says and not for what it supposed to say. I get the whole story, not a list of random verses to support whatever teaching is popular in the blog/book circuit. And I am in relationship with people, not because we happen to sit in the same room for an hour and a half once a week, but because we are family in Christ. The point is no longer to grow an organization, but to worship God together and grow into the fullness of Christ.
