Will I Ever Enjoy Church Again?

Recently I have had more opportunities to talk with Christian leaders from different walks of life. Although they come from different perspectives it is interesting how certain themes stand out regardless. One of those themes is a growing dissatisfaction with church and, in particular, Sundays and services. One leader I talked with had just gone to a Good Friday service at a mainstream church. They shared how now that they have seen both sides of church (from the congregation and from the leadership side) they felt like they couldn’t go to a church without wondering what was really going on. Did the pastor have a bad week? Was the worship leader fighting with his wife? And permeating it all was this strange but persistent subculture of rituals that would not make sense outside of a religious context. They ended with the lament, “Will I ever enjoy church again?”

I must admit, that sentiment has crossed my mind at times. Throughout my life I’ve had a love/hate affair with Sunday morning church. I love the people and I love God but sometimes how we approach Him just doesn’t jive with my spirit. Recently I was at a well-known, popular conference. I felt like I was on Mars or in some news network’s expose of Christian weirdness. As the people jumped and swirled to Jewish tunes and high-octane praise songs I couldn’t help wondering what an unchurched person would feel coming into this scene. I’d like to think they’d find God but I wasn’t sure because I was really struggling to do that. I went because I was really hungry for more of God, but I felt stymied by all the hype. Is it possible to so long for revival and manifestations of power and exciting worship that we miss meeting with the Person of God? It’s an uncomfortable question for me – especially because I am aware that a part of the problem I had could be with my own judgments and wounds.

What I can’t deny is the growing concern I feel as I see many people giving up on the Church altogether and walking away from spiritual community. One thing I strongly believe is that God is not giving up on His church. He loves His Bride the Church dearly and will see her presented flawlessly to Him on that day. I love His Church too. I can’t walk away from those whom God loves so much.

Another leader I talked to recently acknowledged the difficulty of the current situation. They spoke of the transition that we are in at this time in history and how we are in the process of moving from old to new. They felt strongly that God has not yet released us fully into the new. The problem comes from the growing dissatisfaction with the old and the discomfort of the transition time. They had observed young leaders who had rushed into the new prematurely and had become hurt when it didn’t work out. Often these leaders would find that their “new” form would end up looking the same as what they had tried to leave behind. The call was to call to those who were struggling and tell them to not give up hope but to be patient to wait for God’s timing to release His Church into the new that He has for Her.

I agree. It is not always easy for me to get motivated to scrape myself out of bed on Sundays and get myself to church. Even when I am leading the service I find myself at times deeply dissatisfied with the outcomes. I long to see what’s next and to walk forward into new forms and new expressions, yet we only have limited release from God to do that in this season. To the extent that it is “good to the Holy Spirit and us” we will experiment and try new things. However, we are aware that there is much more newness that God has yet to release His Church into.

If you are feeling dissatisfied, discouraged or frustrated with the Church, I urge you not to give up hope. God loves His Church and those who want to be like Him will find His love in their heart to do the same. The transitions in life are uncomfortable and often are the times that people are tempted to give up. Many marriages fall apart when kids come, in mid-life crisis or menopause or when the kids leave and there’s “empty nest syndrome”. Yet those that persevere reap the fruit when the transitions pass and they find that loving through the hard times was worth it. So it is with His Church - those who make it across the Jordan will find themselves in land of Promise. That’s worth the wait.

Ben believes in creating bridges for people to connect to each other - one of them being the bridge from the old to new ways of being the Church during this transition time. Ben recently took up the hobby of tennis.