The Church Is a Whore, and She Is My Mother

Augustine said it.

Every generation is prone to certain superlative assumptions about itself. We are always...

the most enlightened, most advanced, most creative, most civilized...

AND/OR

the most wicked, most degenerate, dumbest, laziest, voted-most-likely-to-usher-in-the-end-of-the-world generation in history.

So naturally it surprises us when we look back and see the same attitude in history. Is it possible that a 5th-century Bishop, prior even to the Dark Ages, could be as jaded against the church as our own breed of postmodern critics?

But yes, Augustine said it. "The Church is a whore, and she is my mother."

Last night at the Front Porch, I slipped into one of those conversations. Somebody mentioned the alleged $50,000 that a particular church happened to have spent on speakers for the youth center. Not a speaker system... not human speakers, just speaker cabinets. And one of our more idealogical Wednesday night regulars became, shall we say, livid.

"How... hm... HOW MANY LIVES DO YOU THINK COULD BE SAVED BY $50,000!?!"

Whether the statistic was correct or not was beside the point. The fact is that we Christians are famous for finding ways to collect large amounts of money, and spend it on something that many others deem utterly irrelevant.

I wonder what the underground Christians in China or Indonesia or the Sudan might think. These churches seem to be growing spiritually and numerically, under far-less-than-ideal conditions. Of course, it would not be original of me to point out the way Christianity tends to thrive under oppression.

Last night my wife and I were wondering out loud if American Christianity was headed in that direction. "Sometimes, in a very weird way," I said, "I actually long for that."

"You do???" She exclaimed.

"Well... sort of. I mean, it's a hard thing to say. But it's as if someone is out to destroy us either way. If we're being oppressed, others are destroying us physically. If we're being validated by society at large, we inevitably start destroying ourselves spiritually. Only, in the first instance we are drawing closer to God in our adversity, and in the latter, we're wandering away from him."

"I never thought of it that way," She said. "I think that's true."

In my other conversation, with the Front Porch idealogue, I seconded many of his concerns about the way we Christians use and abuse the gifts of God. But I also tried to convince him to give even the most suspect church the benefit of the doubt. The fact is, we don't always (and actually we hardly ever) fully understand the underlying motives, and the heart behind the decisions that are being made in other churches.

"I actually know people in that church who really have an earnest heart after God," I said.

"But do you know someone in leadership?" the idealogue demanded.

"As a matter of fact, I do." He gasped. You might think he was being over-dramatic. I might think you'd be right.

"Or was, anyway," I continued. "He was in leadership. If you're right about this church, and that it needs change so badly, I believe he would have been one of the people there longing to bring it about. But he's not there anymore. Maybe he gave up. I haven't talked to him about it."

"Well... yes... maybe," he stammered.

There is so much to hate about what they've become. What we've become. Reminiscent of Rahab, or Gomer, or Israel at large, we have been unfaithful. We've forgotten our first love, and chased after everything else that moves, looking for what we've already found, but lost. The Church has become, by definition, a whore. With a long and proud tradition of corruption and, well... pride.

But she is ours. She is us. She is the true body of Christ that stands by his power and grace despite so many stumblings.

She is our mother.

Ticketshyster

At the risk of gloating, I would like to make all of you aware that I am going to the Radiohead concert in St. Louis on May 14.

Tickets went on sale on a Saturday morning in the middle of February, and my wife and I were sitting at the computer, poised to obtain tickets for us and six of our friends so we could all go as a group. I'll spare you the details, but since Ticketmaster's website made it clear that there was a four-ticket-per-person limit, we decided that I would by four, and my wife would buy four.

To be honest, I'm not the only one who was disappointed in the idea of buying Radiohead tickets through Ticketmaster. Radiohead's immense popularity did not come as a result of heavy radio airplay (despite their name) or aggressive marketing. With the exception of providing some music for Baz Luhrmann's immensely popular film rendition of Romeo & Juliet in the mid-90's, Radiohead's rise to prominence has been overwhelmingly grassroots. So it seems antithetical that they would rely on a corporation that so completely exemplifies "the man" to distribute their concert tickets.

Nevertheless, I didn't make a big deal about it, because I figured it was probably a requirement of the venue (a corporately named, and corporately minded, humongous amphitheater) rather than a decision made by Radiohead themselves. Of course, the ideal concert in the minds of most RH fans would be in some dingy gothic theatre, or underground rave. But let's be realistic... a venue that cool would most certainly exclude me (and probably you) from going, if only for its smallness.

So I didn't complain about having to go through Ticketmaster. Until now. Remember I told you about that four-ticket-per-person limit? Well, like I said, I bought four tickets, and then my wife bought four tickets. So we had our two, and although we knew it would take a few weeks for them all to arrive in the mail, we started promising the other six to our friends.

Until we opened our credit card bill today. Because lo and behold, there was a charge for four tickets, another charge for four tickets, and then, three days further down the statement, a credit for the price of four tickets.

It turns out that their policy is not four-per-person, it is four-per-household. Whether it was a typo on their website, or an oversight on our part, they still let the transaction go through, making us think we had eight tickets, and forcing me to call several people today to tell them that we didn't have tickets for them after all. (Try spilling those beans to a h-a-r-d-c-o-r-e Radiohead fan living in the Midwest.)

I argued with customer service about it, to no avail. The usual shpiel... "A website can't be perfect, it let the transactions go through, and then when we discover later that two transactions have the same billing address, we canceled one of them." B.S.

A website can most certainly tell when two transactions come from the same household, when they share a billing address, and especially when they share a credit card number, and a last name.

What bothers me most is not what happened. It's that we had to find out by opening our credit card statement. Imagine going to a store and buying 8 shirts, and taking them home to give to your friends as Christmas presents, then having the clerk from the store sneak into your house that night, take 4 of them back, and credit your card for that amount.

Nonsense, right? Exactly.

Epilogue: After this debacle, I quickly called a friend who had tickets to the show, but only bought two, to see if he could get two more. Contrary to my assumption, the lawn tickets hadn't sold out at all, and he was able to get two more, which was the exact overage of friends to whom we had promised tickets. Whew! God does care about Radiohead concerts. ;-)

Communion

If I'm going to write a post about Communion (or the Lord's Supper) I have to start with a confession, and repentance. It has been my responsibility, as a pastor, to make sure that the people who worship with The Core have the regular experience of Communion... the bread and the cup. In The Core's two-year history, however, we have done it only once. At the very absolute minimum, it should be done once per year, at Passover, but I haven't even managed that much. For that I am very sorry, and I now have plans to fix this problem.

Starting on Sunday, September 23, Re:Group will begin taking Communion together, on the Fourth Sunday of each month (the first Sunday after Merge.) We will use grape juice instead of alcoholic wine because minors are likely to be involved from time-to-time, quite often without their parents (think college underclassmen) and because there may be those present struggling with alcoholism currently, or in their past. We will use unleavened matzah bread instead of anything else because leaven, or yeast, is a powerful symbol of sin in the Bible, and therefore the unleavened bread is a powerful symbol of the body of our sinless Savior.

Now I'm going to talk about one of the reasons I was reluctant to start serving Communion on a regular basis. It's not an excuse, just a reason. And that is the open/closed communion controversy. After some discussion, we have made a decision how to handle it.

Since it is not unlikely that there will be unbelievers present when we serve Communion, we have to be very careful that we do not include them in a way that is disrespectful to the commandment to "eat this bread and drink this cup"... "in a worthy manner". Let me make a few points before I share our conclusion.

1) In a small group setting, a non-believer would likely feel very awkward being told not to participate in something that every other person is doing. Feeling excluded and embarrassed, such a person is not likely to come back.

2) There is nothing magical (or even miraculous) about the juice, the bread, or the act of consuming it in a certain setting. We do not agree with the Catholic doctrine of trans-substantiation, which says that the juice (or wine) literally becomes the blood of Christ, and the bread literally becomes his body. Therefore, a person does not sin by taking Communion in ignorance, or in an unsaved state. It is rather the spiritual leader of the group who sins if he or she does not communicate clearly about it. If it is communicated clearly, then the leader cannot assume responsibility for whether or not each person understand, or complies.

3) The "unworthy manner" that Paul talks about in I Corinthians 11 refers to those who eat and drink without a) showing kindness and consideration to one another in that gathering, b) proclaiming the Lord's death, c) examining one's heart, and d) recognizing the body of the Lord. Letters (b) and (d) can only be done by believers, but (a) and (c) can be done by anyone.

4) Sin can only occur in the context of Communion in two situations: a) if the spiritual leader misleads non-believers into thinking that they are fully included in the Body of Christ by partaking, or that there is real spiritual benefit to the act itself, apart from belief and self-examination. Or, b) if a believer in Christ takes Communion in a way that is rude, selfish, thoughtless and dishonoring to God.

5) Jews practice the drinking of wine and the eating of unleavened bread every year at Passover. When a Jew learns the true significance of this act, and comes to believe in Jesus, her lifelong experience of the bread and the cup serve to enrich her understanding of Communion once she is a believer. Likewise, if an unbeliever eats and drinks with believers at Communion, all the while understanding that this is a time to examine one's heart, but the true meaning of the tradition comes when one's heart is surrendered to Christ, his inclusion can serve as a very positive experience in his journey toward salvation. What better moment to think about Christ, and examine one's attitude toward him than in a setting of loving acceptance and mutual introspection with sincere believers?

What we've concluded then is that the drinking of the cup and the eating of the bread can only be considered "Communion" when accomplished by someone who is a believer. If unbelievers were to join in the eating and drinking, it would simply be eating and drinking, and no harm is done, as long as they are not being led to believe something false by those who are serving.

So when the cup and bread are served, it will be made clear that this experience is designed specifically for believers for reasons stated above. If you are not a believer, you are free to pass on it. However, you are also free to take it, while knowing that it cannot really be understood or experienced as Communion without a heart that is surrendered to Christ. In the meantime, if you take it, please use this moment to examine your heart, and your attitude toward Christ, and see if you sense that he is calling you to himself. Ask him if you have been reluctant to accept something that you know in your heart is right. We hope that, either today or soon, you can find yourself transformed in the presence of Christ. But nevertheless, be aware that you will always be welcome among us, no matter what you believe.

I Am a Hypocrite

The whole world looks like wood to me.

Oh, I hear the snickers… the put-downs, the wisecracks. And you know what? I don’t care. They can laugh all they want. What good are their opinions anyway? Splinters in their eyes… every one of them. What chance do they have of seeing me clearly anyway? They’re nuts. They’ve got splinters everywhere.

“Hm… Coreman?”

“Yes.”

“Can I show you something?”

“Yeah, fine.”

“You see this mirror, here?”

“What are you talking about… that two-by-four?”

“You mean… this… two by four?”

“Where do you get that? And where did that mirror come from?”

“This board was IN your eye. See, it’s got a few of your eyelashes on it.”

“Well, what happened to all the stuff that was in your eye?”

“There wasn’t any… you were looking at this board.”

“oh.”

And everything falls apart. All my life I’ve been complaining with the best of them: “The Church is full of hypocrites!” Some of us complainers simply got fed up and left. Others were like me, and decided that the Church didn’t have to be full of hypocrites... those aren't the real Christians anyway. So if we start a new church with real Christians, bingo. Hypocrite-free.

But now I’m holding this two-by-four in my hands. And I realize that, when I left the old crowd to start fresh, I inadvertently brought one hypocrite with me. And standing in front of the mirror now, it’s all too obvious.

Donald Miller is famous for saying, in his book Blue Like Jazz, that “I am the problem.” After spending numerous months gaining a reputation as a socially conscious activist and political protester, he realized that he should rather be protesting himself, holding up a cardboard sign emblazoned with those four self-incriminating words.

Roger Moran, the man indirectly responsible for sending hundreds of new readers to my blog last week, is guilty of blind antogonism and divisiveness within the Body of Christ. He pulled out his rhetorical claws, and went for the jugular.

He attacked with error. I, in turn, retaliated with accuracy. But it was not Truth. The Truth of Christ cannot be couched in retaliation, defensiveness and pride.

I was talking with my dad (a fellow pastor and fellow church-planter) last weekend about what it means to be a pastor. It dawned on me that, although God calls certain individuals to be pastors, he does not promise us extra righteousness, and he certainly does not expect us to find it on our own. And honestly, even a pastor who is paid full-time to do nothing but study, preach, pray, and shepherd his people has no real hope for a superior holiness. Yet that is what we have come to expect from our spiritual leaders. To be a cut above… a little lower than the angels, and a little higher than the bourgeoisie.

But not only is such a notion silly, it is reckless. Isn’t it obvious that pastors feel this pressure building up, this performance anxiety to be a poster-child of godliness?

In the end, I decided that all we have is humility. All we have is repentance, accountability, brokenness. We cannot be superior, nor should we strive to. There will always be lay people more surrendered than us, more prayerful than us, more obedient than us. And there will always be grievous mistakes in our lives, straining to be confessed. It is not until we give up our pride of position and let them out that we can welcome authenticity into our lives. Perfection awaits us in the by-and-by. Let's embrace vulnerability and authenticity in the here-and-now.

Every church should have a perfect leader. We just have to let the Perfect Leader lead.

The Truth In Love

It is becoming clear that God is calling my wife and me to be the lead pastors of The Core Fellowship. Matt & Melissa Stephens, the couple whom we had all felt was going to fill that position, have felt the call of God to move away to attend seminary. We at The Core were very sad to hear this, but God accompanies his real calling with real peace, and that is what we have felt.

As I have expressed to a few friends recently, I am moving into this calling eagerly, but with fear and trembling. But there is a problem... I am the kind of sinner that can go for long periods without recognizing his own sinfulness.

A camel may travel for hundreds of miles without drinking, and come to believe that he doesn't need water at all. The reality is that the camel is drinking constantly, drawing upon the vast reserves carried within his body. And when that water is eventually depleted, it must be renewed.

I do not claim to have any vast reserves of righteousness. But the struggles of some are worn outwardly, and the struggles of others are less apparent. I belong to the latter group, and thus I can fool myself into thinking I'm a pretty good Christian most of the time.

But this week I was shaken out of that attitude, and reminded why I must approach a pastoral calling with fear and trembling.

Apparently it is the modus operandi of James River Assembly to never respond in kind when they feel attacked. Rather, they pray for the antagonist and all those who read or hear their words. I believe this is the reason why there were no commenters on my blog willing to stick up for James River. Instead of commenting, they were praying. I am severely humbled by this.

There is no doubt in my mind that God has given me a message. I look at the Church At Large and see the clergy burnt-out, the laity unengaged, and the observant public jaded against the whole institution. Some things have got to change. But I will not accuse James River of being the representative of this problem. They are simply an easy target, and I am ashamed of having taken advantage of that. I want to shake up and challenge anyone who leads the church astray, but I also want to apologize to those who were offended by my unfair singling out of James River Assembly.

I hope this experience stands as a milestone at the beginning of my life as a pastor. I hope I can always look back at this and remember that specific grievances should be brought with grace directly to the offending party, not published for the world, and general grievances should remain just that: general.

Father help us all to remember to speak the truth in love.

Smoke and Mirrors (or, How to Fulfill The Great Omission)

*Note - Please do not read this post unless a) you plan to read the whole thing, and b) you promise to read the next post, entitled "The Truth In Love." Thank you.

My wife and I have decided to become the connossieurs of small-town fireworks shows. I believe that our city is unusual for its size (160,000 or so) in that it boasts a Fourth of July fireworks extravaganza that runs upwards of 100,000 attendees and produces more second-hand smoke in one night than the cigarette smokers of Poland and Belarus combined. For a year.

Of course the local smoke I’m referring to is from the fireworks. This is because our nation, unlike those of the Eastern Bloc, is becoming increasingly tobaccophobic. But also because this Patriotic Extravaganza is run by the largest church in the region, a church I will refer to as “James River Assembly,” because that is its name.

Maybe if I had a secret informer among the many secretaries of this 5,000-odd member church, I would know the primary reason why they would choose to spend untold wads of Benjamins to be the producer of the only game in town. But based on what I have gathered from attending the production several times, allow me to hazard a guess.

Every church has a block party. Or a fall festival. Or a Vacation Bible School. Or something that helps them to either a) bring as many people into one place as possible and trick them into hearing the gospel, or b) make sure everybody knows what a cool church they are. I will not accuse James River of letter B, because it would be non-disprovable. But letter A is pretty sure-fire, since the planners of their event make certain to take prime moments within the program to sneak the gospel in, and have an altar call. And sure enough, people come.

But then what? You get saved by a program, and then a few hours later, the program quite literally goes up in smoke. The guy that preached the message is already packed up in his black SUV, and the guy who prayed for you is nowhere to be seen. You’re holding a Bible and a little pamphlet that outlines the next few steps. Although James River tries ever so hard not to seem pushy about you becoming a member of their church, naturally they would be quite happy to see you show up on Sunday. Learn some Christian songs, greet the people who happen to be seated nearby, listen to an upbeat diatribe, then “plug-in” to a group of other single, college-educated, broken-family, upwardly-mobile, green-eyed ladies between the ages of 26 and 32 ½. And this is the name of the class.

Are you going to connect with these people? I guess there’s always a chance.

Is anyone else feeling more and more like it’s not the Church’s job to get people saved? That God didn’t supernaturally weld us together for the purpose of producing a mind-blowing Jesus show? I think that maybe… just maybe the Church is supposed to be for Christians, and then Christians are supposed to be for everyone else. Sure, you could argue that their church members are the ones putting on the “God Loves America” celebration, but how much of that work do you suppose was done by hired hands? I, personally was twice among the 40% or so of the orchestra that was paid $250 for two rehearsals and a performance. And by gum, I was glad to get it.

But can’t we see what this amounts to? That $250 was tithe-money. Somebody out there worked for a month to pay me their tithe to play the saxophone so that a lot of people would come and hopefully hear the gospel if they’re not busy counting their change from the cotton-candy vendor, while the tither himself is sitting in a special tent provided especially for his own Sunday School class. Could you imagine if the thousands of James River Assembly members actually interspersed with this colossal crowd, to build relationships and make connections and show people that they’re not trying to fool them into hearing a few Bible verses, but they actually like them? Could you imagine if the Church spent its resources and energy on fostering a real, intimate, accoutable, loving community, and equipping and encouraging Christians to find as many points of contact with society as possible, to love people just like they are?

And to be fair… I’ll bet there were a decent number of people who did do that last night. My parents went to a similar event in Kansas City, where they were quickly invited to share some tarp-space and snacks with a family from the host church. So perhaps I’ve been a bit hard on James River. Perhaps I’ve made some unfair assumptions. But I know what I’ve observed of our churches over the years. I know the mentalities and the methodologies. I’ve seen the frantic committees scurrying to make each event “bigger and better” than the year before, because somebody’s going to, and if it’s not them, they’re sunk. I feel sorry for them.

But maybe there’s no truer way to be an American than to make sure that what you’re doing this year is bigger and better than last year. That is exactly what my wife and I were trying to rebel against last night. We looked on the web for the smallest town in our immediate vicinity that did a little fireworks show. Someplace that would be satisfied to do it pretty much the same every year. So we made our pick and showed up in Marionville, Missouri around 8:00 pm. We threw the frisbee, ate some munchies, then settled in at dusk for the “really big shoe.”

So the announcer comes on over the loudspeaker: “Hello… thank you everyone for coming out tonight. We really appreciate the support… we think you’re really going to enjoy the show. The City Council has worked hard to keep making our Fourth of July celebration bigger and better each year…”

Pack your bags, honey, we’re moving to Poland.