The Highlander

 This was originally posted in Patrol Magazine.  I found it quite insightful and I am afraid, spot on.

Grace and Peace,

The Highlander

 The Flabby Body of Christ  Why is church so dull? A psychotherapist diagnoses the Sunday ritual.

  By Stephen W. Simpson    Nov 12, 2009    SHARE

 CHURCH IS boring. I don’t ever recall hopping out of bed on Sunday morning jazzed about the sermon, even when the preacher was good. I’ve never driven to church in anticipation of hearing the choir or the worship band, even when they included remarkable musicians. When I went, it was to see my friends. I wanted to talk. Sunday school and Bible study were okay, but breezeway and parking lot conversations were the most invigorating.  My utmost communion with the Body of Christ didn’t even happen on the church premises. That happened in some loud restaurant that offered free refills of Diet Coke that helped me power on past noon and large portions that would render me unconscious fifteen minutes after I got home.

 Now that I have kids, I don’t really get to have church anymore. Our four year-old quadruplets (all natural, so step-off, octo-haters!) keep us scurrying during the breaks. I go to church for them now. Statistics on church attendance, especially for men my age, suggest that I’m not alone. Maybe the problem isn’t me, after all. Maybe something is wrong with church.

 As much as postmodern evangelicals bandy about the word “community,” our gatherings have changed very little. Stylistic alterations might add some hipster flair, but the focal point of the liturgical week remains theater. A dozen or so people perform for a few hundred that sit, stand, kneel, pray, and sing on command. We squeeze real community into the gaps, between events with a hierarchical structure. Not only is this a long way from Biblical models of the early Christian church, it’s a breeding ground for messy group dynamics. And, again, it’s boring.

 Church today, whether a cathedral, a mega-aluminum warehouse, or a little wooden building in the country, has little in common with the New Testament church. In the first century there was still teaching, prayer, and worship, but the early church was about community. Paul’s letters paint a picture of people living together and collectively figuring out what it meant to follow Christ. The authority of the leaders and teachers wasn’t a forgone conclusion. They were in dialogue with their congregations. Paul himself often had to defend his position of authority and many of his letters are part of an ongoing doctrinal debate. You get the sense, however, that even theological issues were somewhat secondary. The focus was a meal, not a class or a worship service. Some early Christians enjoyed the community meal so much that Paul had to tell them to tone it down because they were partying a little too hard.

 Nowadays, it’s hard to imagine most Christians getting too carried away having a good time together. Church is an adjunct to professional and familial communities. We get up on Sunday, drive, park, sit, listen, sing, pray, chat, and go home. Even if we’re involved in a small group, the relationships are usually secondary. The early Christians learned and grew through relationship. It’s plastered all over the New Testament. Yet, we still structure our religion around one guy, and it’s not Jesus.

 Churches often grow for the wrong reason. If you don’t find church boring, it’s probably because of a talented preacher. He’s smart, but moreover, entertaining. Big, active churches are cults of personality, not communities. Try to imagine Mars Hill in Seattle without Mark Driscoll. Try to imagine the other one without Rob Bell (though at least he had the wisdom to abdicate his throne). Try to imagine Lakewood Church without Joel Osteen. You can’t. When the focus turns to Christ, it’s because a showman gets our attention first. We don’t find God in each other. The Body of Christ has an enormous head atop a weak, flabby body.

 Though pastors give “servant leadership” lip-service at leadership conferences, few enter the ministry out of a desire to submit and suffer for others. How could they? How can we expect our leaders to be authentic when theater is the center of our religious week? How can someone consent to shepherd the flock as a Man of God without being narcissistic? Any leader in the modern church needs at least a little bit of narcissism to survive. No one is drawn to such a job unless they enjoy power and attention.

 A little narcissism isn’t really the problem. We need to like ourselves and have a healthy sense of entitlement. But when these traits reach a clinical level in the form of Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD), it’s poison to the body of Christ. In my fifteen years as a psychotherapist, I have encountered few human systems so consistently dysfunctional as church staffs. I’ve heard of pastors doing things that would make the most ambitious CEO’s blush. Though most of us only hear about this when a high-profile church leader’s grandiosity leads to recklessness, most of the time acrimony and dysfunction continue behind the scenes for years. When we rely on the talents and titillating vision of one man instead of the slow, silent life of community, it’s easy for people to get hurt.

 After spending a thousand words twitting the Sunday service, I should probably come up with an alternative. But I don’t think that’s a good idea. I’m too narcissistic as it is, and I don’t want to be the one to tell you how it’s supposed to be. We need to decide. We need to figure out, once again, what it means to follow Christ together. This is a plea, not a prescription. I want church to be fun again. By fun, I don’t mean entertaining or topical or cool. I can get that at concerts and movies, and they do a much better job than the church ever will. No, I want to talk. I want to listen, but to a friend instead of a sermon. I want to be taught, but only if I can ask questions and participate in dialogue. Mostly, I just want to eat, drink, laugh, and enjoy other people. That’s where I find God.

 I was recently scanning some blogs about different “Pastors Conferences” that were going on around the country, and as I was reading, I just had this sick feeling come over me.  I started looking at the “headliners” who were speaking at these places, and of course, they were the guys who have supposedly “made it”.  They have big churches, lots of nickles and noses, and have seemingly found the key to growing a big church.  They’ve written books, got You Tube status, and are “reaching the world for Christ”.  Now, they can go and stand in front of a group of salivating folks who want to know how they too can do the same thing, and get paid very nicely to tell them “how”.  In most peoples eyes, they have “arrived”.

It’s sickingly funny how this has not changed through the years in any denomination or movement.  It seems that the only way you have a right to share or speak at these major events, is if you have proven that you are a success, however that group or movement deems that.  Here in the United States, that success is determined by the capitalist principles of buildings, budgets, bodies, and popularity.  If you have done well with these, you can write a book and headline all the major “Christian” gatherings across the land.

There may be exceptions to this, but they are rare…very rare.  What about the little guy who sits unnoticed in the back of the room who is doing good to gather 25 people together on a weekly basis, BUT, who knows God in ways and depths far beyond the “keynote speaker”?  What about the man who struggles weekly just to get by, but whose character and conduct reflect Jesus in ways that leave an impression on people for a lifetime?  Don’t you think these guys might have something of far more value to share with us concerning a RELATIONSHIP with the living God, and not about how to have a “successful ministry”?

We are a nation that flocks to the “successful” ones in any field.  We are attracted to the glitz, glamour, and gold of those who have arrived in our eyes.  Sadly, it is no different among the Christian community, and especially among the “professionals” in that community.

Funny how Paul had no spiritual “heroes”.  He cared less about what others were in the eyes of men.  It was no big deal with him that he got to hang out with Peter and James for a while.  Heck, what were they to him, but brothers in the family?  He was not smitten by their very presence, what they had done, or even the fact that they were part of the “original” group of disciples who physically walked with Jesus!  Don’t believe me?  Just read Galatians 2:1-14.

This same Paul also talked about the more insignificant parts of the Body deserving greater honor than the ones everybody else could see.  But, where do WE focus and glory in, and flock to hear?  The one’s everybody can see!  We seem to be mere hearers of the Word and not doers of it.

We have whole cult followings now in every circle, movement, and denomination, along with devoted followers to their particular “heroes” who will defend them and their message/theology to the death.  It is idolatry plain and simple.  Has “I am of Paul, I am of Cephas, I am of…”, now become the “in” thing?

If I remember correctly, Jesus did say something about the fact that HE would build His church, and I don’t remember Him saying that He needed our help in doing it.  What He has invited us into though is a RELATIONSHIP with Him and each other, where we learn to love Him and others as we journey through this life.  He Himself said that others would know that we were His by the way we loved each other and Him.  He did not say it would be by how “successful” our ministries were, or how “big” our churches grew.  No, it all goes back to LOVE.

I guess I am at a point in my life where all that stuff just does not matter any more. I really could care less whether any man or group deems me a success.  It used to be important to me (sadly and sickingly so), but not any more.  I have a library full of thousands of books that when I look at them, I feel sort of like somebody who is full of steak walking into a steakhouse to have to eat again!  There is just no appeal.  I rarely go into a “Christian” bookstore any more, because of that same feeling, and because the shelves are lined with “how to’s” and “steps to” success in whatever area you want.

I have not been to a Conference in years, and have no plans to be at any in the near future.  Don’t get me wrong.  I am sure that there are many folks there who truly love God and want to serve Him, and believe that they really are.  It is just the “system” itself that makes me sick.  The Kingdom and its values just is vastly different than those of the world.

I am interested in a relationship with a God Who is better than my best thought of Him, and Whose grace is richer and bigger than I can imagine!  I want to walk with a Father Who loves me more than I’ll ever know, and Who deems success in terms of Him shaping me more and more into the likeness of His Son each and every day.  He promised to finish the work HE started, so I think I will just sit back, learn to love Him and others, and enjoy the ride.

The Highlander