Christian Impact News

When I first started going to church, I wanted everyone else to go too. I wanted them to go and get what I received and be free. I wanted them to know that there is a family in GOD who loves them. I wanted them to find a place where they have value that is not based on race, religion, gender or wealth. I felt they would find a place where they could find freedom from their sins. So I evangelized and ministered. I invited “crack heads” and prostitutes. I picked up drug dealers and homosexuals. I invited the so called “dregs” of society into my home and to a church. They came, they saw and they left what ever church I brought them to. I blamed them and was very upset that they could not get out of bed to go to church on Sunday morning. I gave them my “knowing” smile and accused them of not putting aside time for the One who Loves them so much. In my heart, I felt they were just children and could not understand. After doing this for several years – at different churches – I finally woke up and saw it was not them but I who was missing the truth.

The lost do not come to church because most churches are not for them. Before you attack this statement, let's take a look at the church from a different perspective. Churches are filled with Hallelujahs and praises. It is filled with people who still sin but admit it not for fear of being an outcast. It is written that all sin and fall short of the Glory of GOD. Why then do people who know, admit and are in their sin so uncomfortable in church? Many would say they are being convicted in their spirit for what they are doing and can't take it. That is false. Every drug addict, prostitute, dealer, thief and common criminal have expressed that conviction long before I took them to church. That conviction doesn't come from the church, that conviction comes from GOD. We are lying to each other and to ourselves.

Shepherds are made for the sheep, the sheep are not made for the shepherds. Churches are run like businesses and many are led by the very best businessmen (and women) alive. I do not object to good stewardship, I object to man be treated like a commodity. Did you know that many pastors will not evangelize in certain areas because it is not financially beneficial? In other words, who would you want as a tither, someone who stays in the ghetto or someone who stays in a rich neighborhood? If you really pay attention to what some of the larger, more expansive churches are doing, you will find new church plants to be in areas “that can support the financial needs of the vision.” No, I will not expose the pastor who told me this but he will also read this and see the sin* in this behavior-can you? I am not saying that wealthy people don't need GOD. I am saying that their spiritual needs are being addressed because they can pay. That sickens me to write, even more so because the inverse is also true- the spiritual needs of the poor are not being addressed because they cannot pay.

I had a pastor tell me two days ago, “we don't do charity outside of our church.” He firmly believes on promotion from within and taking care of his congregation. Those are good things, if they are not so firmly indoctrinated as to cause no impact on the community surrounding them. Lord Jesus moved amongst the people. At one point Our Lord Jesus The Christ, told a lady, “It is not good to cast the children's food before swine.” The lady's reply was, “Yes, but even a dog can eat the crumbs that falls from his master's table.” Our churches are designed to let no crumbs fall, every morsel is accounted for and used to forward the mission and vision-which sounds reasonable, and would be if the vision and mission were pure.

The visions and missions are not pure, they are contaminated by the vessels they are in. This contamination does not come from common sin, this comes from conscious sin and hardened hearts. Is it really logical to have a racist pastor? (I guess it depends on where you want to go). Is it important to you how wealthy your pastor is? Or how affluent or intelligent? GOD can send His Word through stone, He does not require you to submit a resume, application or have a certain GPA. GOD doesn't check your credit and surely He cares nothing for cars, jewelry or clothes. GOD does not check your references. In Him, you receive Grace. Lord, I pray that one day this grace is echoed throughout the church.

The Untouchables

If I am a lost sheep, whose responsibility is it to find me? Who will leave the ninety-nine to find me? Who will leave behind those things that are pleasing to man to rescue a nobody? Surely not the untouchables. I have heard many horror stories where a faithful member places a frantic call to the pastor because a family member is in peril. This person is routed to “the appropriate department.” Not to be rude or anything, but I did not call for the “appropriate department”, I called for the pastor. My pastor is not in- he is playing golf, or networking, in prayer, studying for next week's sermon, planting another church, or planning next year's agenda. Frankly, the pastor is too busy for you. I understand, with a thousand or more sheep, all the pastor really has time to do is fleece them. How many can he know by name? How many can he really touch? I am not just presenting these questions to you – I have asked many pastors the same thing. Some got angry, many were frustrated by them and others looked upon them with derision. Most looked at me as if I could not understand and talked to me as if I were a child. I understand. I understand that it is much more profitable to handle business that way. I understand that that is the best way to enlarge your congregation. I also understand that that is the worst thing that could happen to a lost sheep – be brought in with other lost sheep, told you are now saved and be preached to once a week. That is it. Of course many sheep find that very pleasing-do you? I do not. That left me still looking for a church to call home.

I need a church that will work with other churches, indiscriminately, to fulfill The Grand Commission. Are churches built on the same Foundation? If this is true, then surely they would work together to achieve common goals. Surely, denominational trivialities would fade when compared to The Grand Commission that has been placed on us. Sadly enough, some pastors want very little to do with the community around them and even less with “churches outside of their governing body.”. Even worse, churches have territories (I didn't know it either-I learned this from pastors). It is considered very bad to evangelize in another's area-again, this I have learned from pastors (definitely more than one, I had to confirm this a few times before I would believe it.) So now what? How do I achieve this love for all while shunning those who confess to be my brothers and sisters? How can I love GOD, who I cannot see with my physical eyes, and hate my brother who I could touch if I were inclined to? I find that impossible so I found myself angry, frustrated and still looking for this church.

I find these practices despicable but who am I to judge? I do not hold a theology degree. I have not been indoctrinated in (the mob call it being “made”) by some great man of GOD. So, last week, I cried out to GOD. It was after that that I began to remember all the conversations with pastors and the ones with the various “criminals” I have come to know and love. That is right, I love them truly and cannot even think about them, who I consider my brothers and sisters without tears and anger (pastors and criminals alike). I am not angry with them, I am angry with the enemy for such a clever construct, such clever twists to the Truth. I have realized the folly of my ways-I have been looking for something to compare to what is inside of me. I have been called, not to find the “perfect church” or denounce the existing ones but to bring a new thing into being. A new church with a new mindset. A church where we (all of us, man/woman, children and the elderly, of all colors, nationalities and demographics) follow and He Leads. A church that is defined by its love for others and itself. A church where all are free and equal under GOD. A church without the man made doctorates, one that is alive and not limited to the vision or mission of one man or organization. I have new wine that must be placed in new wineskin, lest the old ones burst trying to contain it.

*Sin is a term used in archery that literally means to miss the mark.