Chat on Why the Nones don't Fit in Today's Church

Gang,

A useful email conversation developed in response to my Comment on Another Blog post.

Here's a question I was asked followed by my reply.

---------------

Do you have a grasp on what the deepest longings are of these folks?   When they show up or consider a congregation, how would they express their longings?   Maybe you could answer the question for yourself anyway.  


Well, we're talking about a very diverse group and we're defining it by a negative characteristic, i.e., not being edified by today's institutional church.

Nevertheless, two groups of people are coming to mind as I reflect on the issue.

First, from a CGGC perspective, consider, if you can, the number of APEs who have come and gone over my years, since the 1970s. We've had our share. Those people tend to be impatient with institution and intense about...well, whatever their gifting pushes them to be and do.

And, the CGGC body has effectively gotten rid of them through one strategy or another. Who can deny that? The common element in all of those stories is the institutional, shepherd dominated, CGGC culture.

Over the course of my nearly 50 years, the fact that He gives apostles, prophets, evangelists and shepherds and teachers and that we have no APE presence says to me that our body needs to examine itself. WE need to repent and turn from fallen ways. We need to produce different fruit. 

Second, I think it's useful to have compassion on, and to treat with respect, people who hop from one church to another. Certainly, many of those people are dysfunctional but I'm convinced that not all of them are...far from it.

Before my APEST days...(I wish you could have known me then, as someone trying to swallow my prophetic gifting to fit in in the CGGC institution)...

We had a couple become involved at Faith. She was extremely gifted, became involved with the youth, quickly was recognized for her passion and giftedness, rose to the position of youth leader and the ministry absolutely flourished. Then, what I now recognize as prophetic tendencies surfaced in her and she began to apply her truth-based 40,000 foot insights to the whole ministry at Faith. 

As you can imagine, what was considered to be negativism offended people in the church. Everyone became frustrated. And, she, and her husband, left the ministry. 

I still see her from time to time at the store. She's cordial enough with me because I know others in her family. But, as far as I know, her husband and she have no church involvement, and no testimony...probably no faith. 

You have no idea how often I've wished I could redo that one, and I wonder what APEST bill would do. 

---------------

Later on:

Can you think of an example of something the woman you are talking about said back in the day that was received poorly by others and led to her increased frustration?

What might a characteristic comment have been?

Or maybe closer to home, if you walked into a typical congregation today and the elders there said, we want to take you and your perspective seriously, what are one or some of the things that could happen to make you feel that the congregation was moving in a direction that would meet your needs spiritually?

It was a while ago and I only have impressions in my memory...and now, armed with APEST, a different way of understanding those events. 

She, as I recall, came across much like I suppose I come across to many in the CGGC  as someone who can only focus on what's wrong. And, as I recall, it wasn't so much that people disagreed with her. Most simply wanted her to lighten up.

OTOH, me walking into a typical congregation?

The one thing, above all, that would make me feel the congregation was moving in the right direction is the open and obvious trashing of the parish priest focused, producer/consumer model of ministry and the aggressive empowering of the so-called priesthood of all believers built on Ephesians 4:12.

---------------

I really appreciate the question about what a typical congregation could do to make me feel that it was moving in a direction that would meet my needs spiritually. I had to think it through before I responded. 

Reflecting on my recent visits to "typical" churches, the pastor (or staff) as provider of religious products and services to be consumed by the laity, way of being church infuriates me and, at the same time, breaks my heart.

There's nothing of that in the New Testament. 

For all the trendy and faddish concepts in the first-ever CGGC Strategic Plan, I don't see the Ephesians 4:12 notion that the people who hold positions of authority and influence in the church are to "prepare the saints for works of service."

In fact, the Strategic Plan goes in the old and unblessed direction, conceiving of the holders of institutional authority in the CGGC as leaders among leaders, not in the New Testament mold of APESTs as servants preparing disciples to serve. 

In fact, the very existence of a Strategic Plan puts the holders of institutional authority in the CGGC in the position of providing yet another religious product to be consumed by the people of the body. It extends the ministry provider/consumer way of being church. 

We need Ephesians 4:12. We need Romans 12:1 and its admonition that "true and proper worship" in the New Covenant has nothing to do with what happens in a gathering, but that it is a way of life. And, we need 1 Peter 2:9 and its reminder that every disciple is a member of the royal priesthood. 

But, mostly, for now, we need the people at the top of the CGGC pyramid, to see themselves, not as institutional leaders of leaders, but as down in the trenches equppers of ministry. We need Ephesians 4:12.