Is Church Safe?
Many of us will gather in churches to worship across the land today. I will too, though it will not be in a traditional format. Currently, I am between churches, so to speak.. As I have thought about this over the last few weeks, a question has come to mind that I want to ask those of you who read my blog.
Is Your Church Safe?
Let me explain what I mean. Few, if any of you, will face persecution today. We don’t really have to fear that here in the United States. Most of us will gather in a nice building that keeps us safe from the weather, so we will be safe from the elements. No, I mean something completely different.
Is Your Church Safe Enough To Ask Tough Questions?
Can you ask tough questions in your church? Can you do this without fear? Are you able to really open up and ask something that has troubled you for a long time? Do you fear what will happen if you ask a question that may be outside the box?
Is Your Church Safe Enough To Be Different?
What happens if you think differently than the pastor and the deacons? Or your Sunday school teacher or small group leader? Do you fear being ostracized? What happens if you don’t vote the party line? What happens if you aren’t a yes man?
Is Your Church Safe Enough To Challenge The Status Quo?
What happens when you challenge the “We’ve always done it that way” mentality? Do you feel comfortable sharing your ideas about what would make your church better? What happens if you ask tough questions? Do you fear you will be shoved aside if you do?
I believe that church is the place where we should be able to ask tough questions, where we should be able to be different and challenge the status quo. Why? Because the church is made up of many members just like your body. The finger is different from the pancreas. The eye is different from the ear. They are different, but they make up the body. I suppose none of us would want to be an appendix, which doesn’t seem to do anything but rupture and make the body sick. But each member of your body feels safe being there. So should we in our churches.
Have you ever been in a situation where you did not feel safe to do these things in your church?
Great questions! Some of this has been in my mind, but I did not have a framework of thought to put it into words.
I am in a leadership class at my church. The other week we were talking about personal strengths (using Strenghsfinder 2.0), and something bothered me. One of the leaders almost made fun of spiritual gifts surveys. That led me to notice that no where in the discussion of personal strengths was the Holy Spirit and spiritual gift brought up except in the comment about the spiritual gifts survey…and this is a church leadership class! So I posed the question whether or not some of these personal strengths may have come from the Spirit or enhanced by the Spirit. It was almost like no one knew how to answer. It got really ackward in the room. I was never really answered more than a maybe.
This bothered me and I feel really uncomfortable about bringing this up again. I don’t know who to talk to in the church about it or how to ask. In a way, I don’t feel safe. I don’t feel safe to challenge the status quo.
The other side of this, God does put us in these situations to grow us and grow others. I still don’t know what I am going to do with this, but it is leading me to study it out personally. When I feel led I will go and find someone to talk to. I will try to push the status quo. Maybe God wants to us me to grow the church’s understanding of these things.
This is the first time I have felt this way at my church. I have very much pushed the church to question itself. Especially in my single days. They did not have a good handle on how to deal and minister to singles (it is full of young families). I questioned the elders and pushed them to try to figure out how to minister better to us every chance I got. They are just now getting better at it…but I like to think that they have been working on it since a group of us pushed them a long time ago.
I think that somehow we grow comfortable with our answers. The problem is that our answers may have n othing to do with the questions people are asking. This brings about discomfort, and no one likes that.
Very true. We gain confidence in what we know the Spirit has taught us about things. We just have to trust that the Spirit is doing the same for others. When the uncomfortableness happens, we just need to pray for the other people…and pray and study for ourselves to make sure that we are not in the wrong in our confidence of something.
Joe, I agree. I wonder sometimes why He had me somewhere and what benefit it is to me. And I realize that the benefit may be that He is using me to reach someone else or bring them along.
to you in your leadership class do they even believe in the holy spirit i have deep study on this it concerns me i would even go as far to ask for permisson to come in and teach what i know
My husband was called to the ministry years ago and finally stepped out to obey it. He began preaching in churches and we began encountering a troubling problem. Many, many people have created a “Christian” culture where music is more important than the Bible. He began to teach on how to study your Bible. Over and over again people told him that the Bible was too hard for them to understand. The level of ignorance of the Word among the various church leaders was staggering. An elder openly stated “I know what’s IN the Bible but I can’t tell you exactly what it says.” Unfortunately, many of our churches can’t handle hard questions because they have built a culture of Christianity without knowing the Word. Our family chose to leave “church” as we knew it. We now worship with a small group of believers and we have found that not only do they KNOW the Word, the desire is to know it deeper and NO question is off limits. We’ve discussed “taboo” topics and questioned long held popular beliefs. There’s a freedom that we’ve never experienced. So much so that we won’t be going back to “church” but will instead continue to meet in Bible Study groups. My husband was called to the ministry, but not how we traditionally relate it. He was called to minister in these “small groups” where those that desire more can question, discuss and grow.
Rhonda, what you describe is what I think church is like in many places around the world. It sounds wonderful.