Monday, May 14, 2007

What is the church?

A thought struck me the other day: if the church is the incarnation of Jesus in the world, then we ought to spend more time out in the world than in the church building. Thus we would refrain expending lots of energy or resources on "programming" and facilities (to the extent that they don't facilitate the three items below) in order to really focus on three things:
  1. a weekly worship gathering,
  2. opportunities to help others intentionally grow in their relationship with God
  3. intentional ways for the church to share the love of God out in the community
If Christians are spending all our time at church with other Christians then how will people hear about the radical love of God? What do we imply about the church and Christians if we don't spend time developing authentic relationships with outside our community of faith? What are we saying about the good news of Jesus if we are afraid to share it with others?

I pose these questions to myself and my own church context as well as to the broader church. What do you think?

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