I have been thinking a lot lately about what the church is and what the church is called to be. You may not realize it, but there are many opinions on the subject. Over the past few weeks I have been asking people to share with me what they believe about the church. OK, when I refer to church I am talking about the Church of Jesus Christ, the universal church, the body of Christ in the world. I understand also that when we think of church we also speak out of the context of the local church and for better or worse, the geographical location of a building where the congregation meets.
The answers have ranged from bewildered looks to radical ideas that look very different from what we currently experience on Sunday mornings… or Wednesday nights… or whenever we gather together. When discussing what the church should look like I am hearing everything from room furnishings to street ministry. What this tells me is that when we talk about the church or the Church we see the world through different lenses.
I, too, have been trying to look at the church through different lenses. As our building committee and consistory talk with an architect about creating a new facility I get excited about the possibilities of establishing a community center where the stuff of faith and societal issues come together. I think how amazing it could be to truly welcome people as they are and create an environment for new seekers and longtime disciples can worship, study, play, pray, eat and work together. I imagine a place where people point to each other when showing where the church is.
But I am also excited about another vision of the church. What if? Brace yourselves…. What if we decided that the true nature of the church is really where people point to each other and say that is the church? What if we pooled our resources and began to worship and pray and play in each other’s homes and we went out into the community to provide the presence of Christ through our ministry? The church would take on the feeling of parish where we focused on all the people around us and not just ourselves. Such a radical idea may seem foreign. And yet that is how the church began. If you don’t believe me read Acts 2.
So which is the better vision for the church? Perhaps we should look at a combination of the two. Of course there is another possibility. We could just keep on as we have been doing. We could just stay put. But that hardly seems an option for the Church or as we were once called… People of the Way.
