Why People Leave the Church: I don’t think it’s hard to understand

Rachel Held Evans talked about”15 reasons i left the church” over on her blog today. Needless to say, with all the drama regarding the latest in Mars Hill Church and spiritual abuse, elections coming up, and new laws being presented for different people demographics (ie: gay marriage, immigration reform), it’s no wonder that more and more people are leaving the church.

It seems that the reasons that people are leaving the church all boil down to this: a lack of Grace and Love in the Church. The church seems to be continually divided right down the middle with the Right and the Left. I have talked many different times about the need for a seperation of Church and State. I still fully support it, because I feel that it takes out the idea of grace and love from our Christianity and instead leads to what would benefit our needs and beliefs rather than the need of others. The Jesus I have met and continue to follow would never look down on somebody for their religion or faith. The God I worship would not wish death on people even if they did the most horrible thing imaginable. Instead, I am led by the Holy Spirit to Love.

But this is difficult for us to understand. This is idea of “a lot of room in God’s Kingdom” may sound like awful theology to us, because we live in America. This is the land of Justice – a land where people get what they deserve – it’s an Eye for an Eye. Here in America, if a person slaps you in the face, you don’t turn the other cheek. Instead, you sue them. If someone asks for your clothes, you tell them to get a job and don’t take advantage of the welfare system that is set up for them. Strange theology indeed. It’s strange justice in my opinion.

This idea of strange justice was seen at the end of Jesus’ Parable of the Prodigal Son. The older son looks in the window and sees his younger brother at a party thrown for him; a younger brother who had just returned from a life of debauchery and silliness only to be met by the love and grace of his Father. The younger son deserved to be with the pigs, but instead they threw a huge rager for him. How peculiar indeed.

This lack of Grace and Love, this is why people are leaving the church. We hear and read words spoken from the mouth of Jesus, but we hardly see them lived out. Let’s revisit the overall theme of Jesus’ thesis: Love God, Love neighbor. There is nothing there about judging. There is nothing about American justice. There is nothing about politics and who and what to vote for. There is only love – acceptance of people. The acceptance of sinners. Not sin, of course, but sinners. Not the act, but the person.

Now comes the arguement of what about if people keep returning to sin. I say forgive them 77 times. well, not me, but Jesus told us this, and I believe that the number would have kept getting higher and higher if people gave a rebuttal.

And finally, let’s get real: this idea of Grace and Love isn’t easy. There are a lot of people that I really have a hard time with (I sling coffee in the PNW, for crying out loud). But if we are to call ourselves Christ Followers, it is essential. Though our church has become very Pauline in nature (preaching from the epistles more than the words of Jesus), I have a feeling that even Paul may have sided on this side of the arguement.

So, yeah, I see it. I see people leaving the church. I’ve heard the arguments of “isn’t this church that we are having here in my living room with ‘two or more gathered?’” I’ve seen people leave because they felt forgotten, lost, abused, judged, or “insert feeling here”. These people have lost their faith in the Church and it’s leadership and people, but all we can do is hope that they haven’t lost their faith in the Grace and Love of Jesus. The grace and love that he so freely gave all of us when he died on a cross, only to resurrect for the sins of the most dispicable among us: the human race.

Sunday Set List

Today, as we continued through the season of Lent, we looked at the idea of the filters that we see Christiansity through. I found myself sitting through the service thinking about the idea of the filters and what we see in the church today. This idea of filters really exposes the ideas that are stemming throughout the church today (i.e. missional, mega, whatever the trend is at the time). At RCC, our ethos is shown through our actions and our mission. We didn’t do this because we go with the flow of the latest chruch movement, or we read a book and really like what it had to say. We did this, because our filter of the gospel showed us that our mission is to Love God and Love Neighbor. So that being said, here is the Sunday Set List for this week (all the links are YouTube clips of vids of the song some are serious, some are to help you see what the song sounds like, and some are goofy or funny):

Yahweh – This is a U2 song off of their “How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb”. My favorite lyric is “take these lips, so quick to criticize. take these lips give them a kiss”.

Blessed Be Your Name - Everytime I pull this song I feel like it could be put to rest for a little bit. But then we play it and it feels like it speaks deeper and deeper to the congregation and they don’t really mind that we are singing this song again. Sometimes I sing the bridge (You give and take away) with the melody of U2′s “with or without you” (You give yourself away) so that it says: You give and take away/ and you give and take away/ and you give/ and you give/ and you give and take away. Usually leading into the hook of  “I can’t live/ with or without you” back into the Chorus of Blessed be…

Jesus, You’re the Light -  A new song that I introduced to the congregation. It’s a reflection tune that is a prayer for Jesus to shine light on us to reveal sin, not just to lead us to Him but instead to be closer to him.

Because of Your Love - One of my favorite Paul Baloche tunes. We took out the “Yeah, Yeah, Yeah” part and put a bit of a Dave Matthews groove to it. This is a great song that helps to remind us what God has done for us and how we got here in our faith.

Trust and Obey – Love this hymn. A call for the church to be the church and trust God and obey the Holy Spirits leading.

The Value of the Homeless

Here’s a question: What is the value of the homeless in our church today. If we are to do to the least of these, then what value do we place on the dirtiest of these? I once worked at a church where a pastor said, “maybe we could bus the homeless over to the video venue…they might be more comfortable there, don’t you think?” No joke, I was not happy about it. To give this story context, we were talking about the homeless program at the church bringing people in and how they disrupt the service or make people uncomfortable.

So, I ask again: What value does  the church place on a dirty, no money having, probably still drunk, disrupting the service bum?

Bursting Your Christian Bubble

A friend of mine here on the blogosphere and in Tweetsville (twitter) made me think today. His name is Tyler. He is the “Man of Depravity” and he lives in Portland (my third favorite city on the west coast). He posed the idea of the Christian bubble. The Christian bubble is the seperation of the sacred and the secular in our lives. We see it all the time when christians go to christian stores to buy christian albums or christian books of christian artists written specifically for christians. This is the bubble that we live in. We live in it and when we do, we lose touch of the world outside of it.

When I was going to Trinity Western University, I saw this bubble first hand. I would drive on campus and see all of these students who knew each other, took classes together, had bible studies together, went to games together, and went to chapel and church together. The students were all stuck in the trinity bubble together, but had no need or even want to get out.

So Tyler had two questions:

1. Does this apply to you?
2. How can Christians avoid this happening (practical ways)?

I saw this happening in my life. It’s hard not to when you work in a church. I wanted to get away from the bubble. I wanted to have “normal” conversations. I say normal because christianity is such a sub culture that we speak a whole different language. I wanted to converse with my friends who spoke with a native tongue that I once spoke before I met Jesus.

I got a part time job outside of the church. I did this for two reasons. 1) we needed money and 2) if I taught guitar lessons part time instead, my only clients were going to be references from churches. and so I donned the green apron and began pushing caramel machiatos to the masses. This is the idea of the bi vocational pastor. Though I do not hold the title pastor, I do work inside of a church and am therefore thrusted into the bubble.

I think the bubble is a sad place to be at times. Non Christians (NC) are uncomfortable being there and Christians try to be hospitable but their language and culture is so foreign that the NC’s feel even more awkward. Another thing is I feel that the Christians sometimes feel that their job is to make sure that the NC’s must leave having made some sort of progress toward becoming a Christ follower. This is just wrong. Now they are a project not a friend.

But if the Christian has lived in the bubble for so long, they may have nothing to talk about. They have seperated themselves from the culture. They couldn’t talk about things that may matter to modern day culture. again, awkward conversation. The bubble must be popped.

Now I am not saying to join the culture and abandon all that matters to you. What I am saying is that if we are to pop the bubble, we must no what matters outside of the bubble. Have an opinion but don’t think that it is the only one that matters because God is on your side (this drives me bonkers when Xtians pull this one out).

thoughts on the bubble?

The Grinch Who Stole Christmas Carols

Am I the Grinch who stole Christmas carols? I had some people ask me to do Christmas carols during our worship at Roosevelt Community Church. As a staff member of a church that practices and obeserves the Advent season, this brought up a few Questions for me:

What is the true job of the ministers of the church?

Is the true reason to appease the congregation? Should we say “give them what they want”, or should we liken our job as ministers to teach what, how and why we believe as Christ followers? As a staff member of a church which follows the church calendar, only to find themselves in the middle of Advent, then I believe this is a great teaching moment. What if we taught the idea of patience in the midst of the season of antcipation. otherwise, to put it semi-crudely, we experience the climax without the foreplay. It’s just straight to the money shot and we don’t realize what had happened in between it all.

As an artist, what am I to do?

Do I simply go with the congregation, or do I challenge them to think? Is that not the purpose of the worship leader – to help people think, see, and experience Jesus in different ways? Maybe we need to push people outside of their comfort zones. Instead of singing the familiar tunes of  “Angels We Have Heard on High”, we challenge people in experiencing the anticipation through the ideas of  “Come Thou Long Expected Jesus”.

What tears me apart as an artist is I want to challenge people, but on the other hand I have to think about the feelings of the congregation. So what can I do? Do I feel like a sell out, or keep the integrity of the season? I opt for the later, myself. Which draws another question:

Why couldn’t there be more accesible ways of explaining the Advent season?

Really, in teh singing world, you are stuck with a handful of songs that describe teh Advent season…about three I believe – the two more recognizable being “Oh Come, Oh Come Emmanuel” and “Come Thou Long Expected Jesus”. After those two you need to be creative. I’ve written an Advent specific song that we share as a congregation, and have allowed artists to share in teh past through visual arts of painting. I wonder if, you who are reading this, you have any ideas? If so, please let me know.

I would say that I am the farthest from being grinchy. I start my Corporate Christmas ways on November 1st. I listen to music and tour around Target looking at the lights and decorations that have been made by children and prisoners from foreign countries (that’s a topic for a whole other post). I just want to teach my congregation just a little bit of restraint. I want to have one place where they can reflect and not be sucked into what they are hearing outside of the walls of our little church. Somewhere where they can learn a little more about their faith. Call me crazy, but that just might be what the church service was designed to be.

It’s Too Early For Christmas in the Church

As a worship leader, we are to direct people into God’s presence. This is pretty simple thinking. The thing that we have to take into consideration is what we are teaching our congregation as we lead them. Case in point: I’ve had a few people ask me when we start playing Christmas tunes at RCC. To this I reply, “at Christmas”.

Don’t get me wrong. I love the corporate season as much as the next guy, and don’t think for a second that there won’t be posts about it! My favorite CD is the Charlie Brown Christmas. My favorite Christmas movies are Die Hard and Gremlins. But when we truly begin to remember the real season of Christmas, we must remember what is happening in the Church calender. Before we can rejoice, we must reflect. Before we can celebrate, we must anticipate. Before we can recieve, we must wait in expectation.

We know how the christmas story goes. We know that Jesus comes and is born in Bethlehem, and that there are shepherds and angels and three wise men, a star, a manger, etc, etc. But we must reflect going into the season. We must look at why this savior is coming. We must reflect what this savior is doing in our lives and those around us. We must anticipate the coming of renewal.

So, as a worship leader, this is why I don’t play any “CHristmas” tunes until Christmas eve (i.e. Joy to the world, Hark the Herald Angels Sing, What Child is this, etc). I even extend it into the epiphany season, but by that time corporate Christmas has shoved it all down our throats and we are sick of it. Oh well. The Church goes on, but we must be continually teaching people the proper way to worship – why we worship and how we worship – in order for it to make sense.

My After Election Hangover

I feel hungover. I can’t believe what happened last night – I keep wondering if it really did happen. A lot of people on my facebook status updates are angry – more are angry than happy. But overall, I am glad for what happened last night. I am excited for the future of America. I feel that for once my vote counted. But I still feel hungover.

I voted for Obama because I am a democrat at heart. I always tell this story about when my mom taught me about voting when I was a kid: “Remember when you vote”, she told me, “to mark everyone with a ‘D’ next to their name”. Now obviously I don’t vote this way, and all kidding aside, the reason I feel hungover is because I feel as if I did something awful last night. I feel as if people look down on me because of my choice. As if I am less of a Christian because of my vote and my political stance as a democrat?

A lot of my friends are angry and sad, and then they threaten to leave the country, and then they say that they are putting it in God’s hands. I wonder why we as Christians say things like, “we have to put it in God’s hands” when the situation is bad in our opinion, but if it turned out the way we planned, then it suddenly “God is good”. This is where the seperation of Church and State was a good thing.

Maybe then, we shouldn’t vote as christians, but instead as Americans. When religion creeps in then all hell breaks loose. Maybe the mistakes we make are when we mistake our faith with our morals. Hmmm. this is complicated to explain. Maybe what we think are Christian values that we vote on are really things that we do simply because we have believed that all along. Maybe they are things that we believe because we were told they are good or bad.

Either way, we witnessed history. I feel more proud of America than I ever have been in teh past. I am one of the millions who have witnessed what has happened, and truely believes more than ever that anything is possible.

Blessed are the Sex Offenders

I was at Jack in the Box yesterday, when a lady who comes off and on from my church saw me and asked me to send out a prayer request to people in my church (if you are comfortable with it, please join me in praying). She asked me to pray for one of her sons who was going to reveal to his fiancee that he is a sex offender. This started me thinking…

I began to pray for him, but the prayer felt so recycled. It was the normal, “give him strength and wisdom/ soften her heart/ let them see eye to eye”. Then I began asking God for some understanding. How do we pray for somebody who has done something that society deems so atrocious? Can we honestly look into the mirror and say that we are okay with this because God can redeem it? I wondered these questions to myself as I walked out.

I know a few sex offenders, in fact, I am directly related to one. When I look at a sex offender, I try not to see an ugly person. I try not to see the broken past that they left behind for me or my family. One thing that I do see when I look at them is somebody that society has forgotten and the only way that they are remembered is when they have to check in with probation officers. Are these one of the least and lost that Jesus spoke of? Are even the sex offenders included in the Beatitudes? If so, then how do we love the Sex Offender? How do we show them compassion and grace without seeing the ugliness of their sin? These, to me, are the questions leading toward true Christianity…sometimes I find myself far from it.

Rabbit Trails of Worship

While I was working at the ‘bucks today, I read a t-shirt of one of my customers. It read: “How can I think outside of the box when they won’t even let me out?”.  This t shirt brought me back to my struggle when I was working at another church as a worship director. When I worked there, I had a few ideas that I felt could help us to teach others and encourage them in leading worship, but usually my ideas got shot down. I felt very stifled and unheard. In fact, I felt like a wierdo in my own church at times – a wierdo with crap ideas of what worship could look like.

Let me tell you, I love my church that I work in now. I feel encouraged to think outside of the box. In fact, sometimes I feel like I live outside of it. I’ve spoken many times about how the church is unoriginal and such, but I really think that it is this idea that we are stuck inside of the box. We cannot think outside of the box, because we refuse to acknowledge the idea that there even is a box in the first place!

All I can do is pray for imagination and encouragement as worship continues to develop into new and innovative ideas for praising God, Jesus, and Holy Spirit at Roosevelt Community Church and beyond. I wonder if we the church, then, should be innovative and one step ahead of what culture tells us is art? Cutting edge is not sounding like the latest trend of music with a painter on stage anymore…but what is it then? What is cutting edge? Why do we even need to be cutting edge?

Maybe it’s not the idea of being cutting edge, but leading our congregation in new ways of worship. Maybe we help them see the Greatness of God, the goodness of Jesus, and the beauty of the holy spirit through ways that they never thought were worship in the first place. Maybe our goal is not to lead our congregation to the cusp of cool, but instead take them to the feet of Christ.

thoughts?

Starting a Church? Involved in Church? Going to Church? This is a Must Read!

My friend Sam’s, also in my links, friend Wade Hodges wrote this:

“A friend of mine celebrated one year of sobriety today. We got to talking about Alcoholics Anonymous and how helpful it has been to him. He said that from a marketing standpoint AA is hopelessly antiquated. The material was written in 40’s. It uses sexist language, outdated illustrations, and awkward syntax. Yet countless people from all walks of life come to AA and are given the tools they need to make a change in their life. Nobody gripes about the way AA does things. As far as my friend knows, there is no feminist agenda within AA to update the masculine pronouns of the Big Book. There are no young people campaigning to make AA more relevant to their generation. At AA those things are not issues. AA is made up of a bunch of alcoholics who have hit rock bottom and have no other place to go. This reality allows them to see past the irrelevance and grab onto what really matters: a plan that works and a group of people who understand and are there for you no matter what. I guess when you’ve got those things, relevance isn’t that big of a deal.

I wonder how much of our effort in churches to stay relevant, to be hip, and act cool is actually a sign of how little we really understand the gospel. If our churches were full of people who have been grabbed by the gospel—what it means to be lost, what it means to be saved from sin, what it means to die someday and give account to our creator for the mess we’ve made of our lives, what it means to join God someday around his banquet table in the new creation—then would they really care how relevant we are? If they could come to our churches and have their lives changed, really changed, would they gripe about the length of our services? If they found in our assemblies people who really cared and welcomed them into the family and loved them into a relationship with Jesus, would they hop from church to church looking for better music? I don’t think so.

Rock bottom alcoholics aren’t looking for a cool program. They’re looking for one that works. Sinners in search of salvation aren’t looking for a cool church. They’re looking for one that can show them the way to salvation.

Until we understand this, everything else is irrelevant.”