search for faith

This is my concept of what Church --- the body of Christ will look like in a few years. I reckon God wants it this way also, but that’s just my idea, yet to be proven. We need to change our concept of what we call Church. She will change whether we like it or not, God has said, “I will build My Church…” The best thing we can do now is look to see what He is doing in the world and desire to be a part of it. And God willing, we will be a part of His Great work.

The church will become an undefined entity. Groups getting together to worship and encourage each other, merging, dividing like a protoplasm that is always on the move, constantly changing size and shape. Never actually being something anyone can even put a name or label to. Maybe a number of people will get together and form a legal entity to merge their financial resources to achieve a specific purpose but they will disband as soon as the stated objective is reached. It will be chaos, unorganized, inefficient. But a glorious, wonderful, free, life-giving kind of chaos.

We are already seeing an attitude of freedom among younger people. What members of other generations might see as a lack of loyalty and commitment, I see as an exercise of freedom. Sometimes they are at our meetings, sometimes they are somewhere else. But they do have relationship with people and thus accountability. The people of Jesus' day didn’t go to His meetings. They went to see Jesus, not His program or church service. Jesus, when He left [transcended] did not leave an organization, He did not build an institute, club or business. He did build people.

We are not here in Queenstown, New Zealand,  to plant a church. We are here to “Equip and empower Gods people to be Ambassadors for Christ”. We believe God has asked us to plant a church here in Queenstown to achieve this task. If doing church doesn’t accomplish it then we will do whatever is needed, whether it looks like church or not. It is not about church, but it is about doing His will, advancing the Kingdom of Heaven. Doing church stuff then becomes a means to the end, a tool to complete a needed mission, rather than an end in itself.

But this means we will not necessarily see anything that looks like church nor is it easy to evaluate success or failure. It seems God only measures things by growth of the fruit of the Spirit. Even then, often we will only see the fruit in a person's life through having a relationship with them, spending time, energy, love on them. Church programs don’t cut the cake. [Not that cake anyway] The church or Body of Christ looks a whole lot different from that perspective.

You may remember the computer program that came out about 10 years ago that was supposed to emulate the life cycle of bacteria. Where there was three dots on the screen another was formed next to the others, if there was a dot surrounded by other dots then it died, and so on and so on. Eventually dots would spread across the entire screen but it would be continually changing as areas died and other areas grow. [On the Apple II it took hours] I am sure there are programs that model the life cycle much more accurately now. However, for the purpose of my example, that is how I see the church living, growing in areas and changing in other areas where the task is completed. Continually changing shape, size, and even what and how things are done.

My focus in church life must change. No longer do I see my ministry as building the church [As if I could anyway] but life is the ministry. Within the sphere of the church, my task becomes a facilitator, enabling believers to get together and encourage, teach, inspire and most importantly connect with God and each other. That is the purpose of church. Being truly “purpose-driven” encourages me to rethink what I do, [not that we have it all together yet]. If my purpose is to be a facilitator then what I do or should be doing will be whatever is necessary to realize the purpose, whether it is a café, skate park, gym… These things end up not looking like church, as we know it but what does it matter. If people are connecting with God and each other then we are fruitful.

One day life won’t be so easy for us Christians here in the western “civilised” world, [what an ethnocentristic attitude] the church will survive however, remember, “I will build my Church”. But what will she look like? I feel a decentralized polymorphic entity is the best means to equip the saints. We cannot and perhaps should not expect the political, legal, financial and social toleration we presently enjoy to continue indefinitely. It would be bad parenting/pastoring if we did not prepare our children and ourselves for the future.

When the communists kicked the missionaries out of China it was a great shock for the Chinese Christians to discover what persecution was all about, they had never been taught a theology of pain or persecution. I am not proposing a martyr mentality or persecution complex but it does pay to “make hay while the sun shines” or as Jesus said, “work while it is day for the night is coming.” To me, it says to be prepared for the tough times. I believe the intangible organism I want to see called the Church is the best way to handle the stress of persecution and still reproduce.

I know the concept of the church being persecuted may seem far-fetched especially to North Americans where 54% of the population attends church on any given Sunday, but I believe God is not as interested in a nation for Christ as He is for a nation of individuals for Christ. He is not scared of persecution either for Himself or His people. He is quite prepared to see a little us in a little pain, especially when we consider the cost that has already been paid by Him as a loving heavenly Father.

Perhaps instead of a group going and planting a church, individuals should set out to attract to themselves whoever comes. And instead of doing worship just wait and see what arises out of the people. Jesus said, “It’s who you are and the way you live that count before God. Your worship must engage your spirit in the pursuit of truth. That’s the kind of people God is looking out for: those who are simply and honestly themselves before him in their worship. God is sheer being itself - Spirit. Those who worship him must do it out of their very being, their spirits, their true selves, in adoration”. The Message

As leaders and pastors it is our task to empower people to worship God in whatever way that engages their spirit, body and soul in a manner that is true to themselves. Whether that equals church or not is irrelevant. We are called to pastor people not organizations, the question is whether we and those around us are worshiping God in Spirit and in Truth. Who knows what “church” will look like then?