An apologia for Gospel realism

A while back, Bill Kinnon started a meme entitled, People formerly know as the Congregation.  It's a conversation well worth partaking.  So,  it was with interest that I read the posting that Bill points to today by Michael Spencer at I-Monk about returning to his SBC church. 

Most of what is offered in Bill's meme is not my experience of the church, but it is the experience of a lot of people.  It is not my experience because I've never had very high expectations for the church. I am pretty realistic about it. I take it as it comes.  The church is the way it is because people are the way they are.  We are sinners, whose sin gets exposed in our boredom, our distractedness, our childlike desire for the church to be our mommy.  We are also God's children, God's creation, created for good works.  We live with the complications of sin and God's goodness wrapped up in the same package.

My realism doesn't mean that I've lowered my standards. It just means that when people fail, I don't see it as the end of the world. I am not a pessimist. I don't believe that failure is inevitable.  I simply recognize that no one's perfect, and that possibly by my own love and encouragement, my own belief in them, that they may rise above their own sense of inadequacy to greatness in their service to Christ.

So, I live with impossibly high standards, and pretty low expectations for people and their institutions. I'd rather be surprised by the nobility and goodness of a person than be disappointed when they fail to live up to their beliefs or commitments.  How many times while I was serving college students did I hear their complaint that the church is filled with hypocrites. My response was always, "Well, what do you expect? They are human beings."

What this means is that we need to stop thinking of the church as different from other institutions. I hear this from pastors and theologians all the time. It sets up the conditions for disappointment.  There is some perverse need for us to make the church so different that it can't be truly judged. As a result, it can never reach its true potential.

Theoretically, churches and other organizations are different at the point of purpose. The purpose of the church is different than that of a dairy or a school or a law practice. But the functioning is no different. Each are dependent upon people who are mixtures of sin and goodness working together to achieve their organizational goals.

Every organization functions with people organized to achieve something.  Every organization has a mission and a structural design for that mission.  Every organization has a collection of people who one way or another have decided to associate with this mission and organization.  The relationships are bound by a certain set of values that give meaning, purpose and define how this group of people will relate to one another. 

When a church or an organization is healthy, the mission is clear, and the values are also. As a result, the people working within that organizational structure can envision what the impact of their life needs to be.  Regardless, every church needs to have a clear sense of mission, a clear understanding of what unites these people in mission and what their intended impact of their life together needs to be.

Is this a high standard for a church? Sure. 

Is it impossible to achieve? No.

Can it be achieved by wishing, hoping with good intentions? No. 

Does this means we should never leave a church? No.

Does it mean that we should accept unrighteous treatment? No.

It doesn't excuse the pain or suffering that people have experienced in churches.  It simply points to the reality that healing is a choice we make that cannot be dependent upon someone else's apology or repentance.  It means that we have a choice that even as we are victimized by the sin of others, that we choose not to be victims. 

Is it pessimistic or realistic to not be surprised when people treat us like dung?  Realistic.

Gospel realism ultimately leads to the recognition that we are responsible for the course of the church. We each stand before God asking for the grace to be better than our sin and circumstances would dictate.  In this sense, Gospel realism is freedom.  The freedom to lay aside our fear and pain and receive the grace, goodness and love of God that comes as we seek for greater things.

Gospel realism leads us to understand how God works in and through our lives. It's a concrete, tangible, realistic understanding of all that the Scripture tells us about human nature and the reality of what the church as a human institution filled with God's Spirit means. 

This is not a view rising out of a reductionistic systematic theology. It is simply my observations from working with churches, listening to people, and trying to understand what is really going on in people's lives.  The more I've embraced a Gospel realism, the happier, the more fulfill, the less fearful, the more "humble" (as I say in all humility) and more able to see God acting in and through my relationships in the church. I wish the same for those who seek to find a place to be in the church.

Comments

[Pastor M]

I always enjoy your comments and find much with that stimulates my thinking.