Now that the Olympics have come and gone, I am left with many questions:
§ What is up with the Speedos?
§ Is fast walking really a sport?
§ Can somebody please hold onto the baton?
But, the most pressing question of all in my mind is “What is up with synchronized swimming?”
My problem is not so much with the event. It seems nice enough: teamwork, splashing, and even some neat headdresses. My problem is I can’t figure out whether it’s good or not. On a really boring night during the Olympics, I actually watched these queens of the pool wow the audience with their clever frolicking. But I didn’t get it. They played sweet music, wore funny outfits, and did a routine. Then the judges supposedly decide if the routine was “good” or not and give them an appropriate score. I was shocked. How do you score that? What makes it good? If I put on a funny headdress, got a few buddies, and kicked my legs around in a pool, would that make for a good synchronized swimming routine (don’t picture that – you will burn your corneas!)
My point is this – for any group, be it synchronized swimming, football, or the church, in order to have an effective scorecard for success you must know what defines the group. What makes a synchronized swimming team a synchronized swimming team? What makes a football team, a football team? And for our purposes, what makes a church a church?
Now I know that this seems like an obvious question: A church is a group of people who love Jesus and want other people to do the same. While most would accept that simplistic definition, it seems that we have great diversity on how this should be carried out. It seems that within the church world and without we struggle to define just what a church is and what it isn’t. And I believe that this struggle to define the church leads to a struggle to properly assess whether or not the church is doing its job.
If we collected the current models of church and church planting practiced in the South and build the church in pyramid form, I believe it would look something like this:
Here’s how the argument goes:
1. The system of the church is messed up and failing so therefore we need to deconstruct everything. Go back to the basics. Start over. And where do we start? Well the answer is simple: Just reach people. The premise of this philosophy of the church is that reaching people for Jesus is the foundation on which the church should be built. At this point, we give little thought to just what we are reaching people with and what we will do with them after we have “got ‘em”.
2. So how do we reach people? Well, here again the answer seems obvious. Create a system of church that will best help us reach people. For some, this looks like constructing the most impressive edifice around and blowing other churches out of the water with your style and charisma. If we simply do church well enough they will come (or so the argument goes). For others this means getting rid of the church thing altogether. The best way to reach people is to deconstruct the whole church thing. No corporate gatherings. No church leaders. Birkenstocks and lattes is all we need. Since they won’t come to the church we will go get them. Regardless of which system a particular church chooses, most build their system around what they perceive to be the foundation.
3. Once we have the mission, now it’s on to the ascetics. Let’s build hip buildings, led by cool pastors, with edgy rock bands. Let’s do it bigger, better, and badder than the next guy. Maybe our pastor can even curse a couple of times just to increase the appeal. Through clever tactics and emotional manipulation we can get people to leave their dry drab church down the corner and come and check out our cathedral. Or, let’s get an angry ex-church guy. We will send him out on the air-waves (through blogs and books). Let’s let him bash the whole church thing. Deconstruct everything. People will be so drawn to Jesus by his bashing of the church.
4. And then finally, once we have drained our energy, we will begin to talk about theology, doctrine, faith, and obedience to the living God. The central question is what is the most basic and minimal standard of doctrine one must profess in order to be a part of the church and how quickly can we “claim” them. We will baptize people, get them in a small group, and send them back out to the world telling them all the while “Just love Jesus”. However we often still fail to define who Jesus is and what obedience to him looks like.
While it seems that this is the model of the church being taught and practiced throughout our landscape, I have a growing problem: I can’t seem to find that in the Bible. In fact, the model presented in Scripture looks a lot more like this:
1. The foundation of the church presented in the New Testament is Jesus Christ and Him crucified. It is through reconciliation with this God, that believers are built together into a living temple (1 Peter 2). This building is done by God based on the revealed word of God, which serves as the basis for all that follows.
The foundation upon which the church is built is the redemptive plan of God.
For example, when I read Paul’s instructions to Timothy on the church I find:
“I hope to come to you soon, but I am writing these things to you so that, if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth. Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of godliness: He was manifested in the flesh, vindicated by the Spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory.”(1 Timothy 3:14-16).
It seems that Paul may have a different scorecard for the church. In his writing he describes the church as a “pillar”and “a buttress of truth”. It seems that Paul was incredibly concerned about the Truth and the role the church played in promoting it. So much so that in this passage he spells out a basic doctrine and theology of Jesus – just to remind the church of whom they were following. And this is not the only place. It seems that Paul was a nut about training the church (and its elders) to have as primary the role of teaching and proclaiming Truth and avoiding and condemning all false claims. So, if doctrine is primary, then the central questions for any church to be a church must be:
§ What is the gospel of Jesus Christ? Who is he? What was the purpose in His coming? What did his death and resurrection accomplish for mankind?
§ What is man’s problem? How is sin dealt with?
§ How is man brought into a right relationship with God?
§ What is man’s role in the redemption of humanity?
§ What are the non-negotiables of our faith?
§ How is the church to be led?
§ How do we promote holiness in the lives of our people? How do we measure true growth?
§ What has He called the church to be and do?
2. Once the correct doctrine of the church is in place, then one is equipped to ask how the church is to go about partnering with God in his redemptive plan. This allows the theology of the church to drive the mission of the church and not the mission to drive the theology. Using this concept, the pyramid changes. People properly grounded in faith in the living God as proclaimed in Word of God are the focus. As they grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus, people are then sent on mission to partner with God in His redemptive mission in our world.
3. The doctrine of the church and the mission of the church allow for a system of church to develop that promotes the mission and doctrine. Now, don’t be deceived. Many will argue that the problem is the system and if we just get rid of the system, then we will have a church. However, the system (in and of itself) is not the problem. Systems should, and in fact must, exist.
Systems aren’t the problem – Stupid systems are the problem.
With the proper theology and mission in place, we can then move the system from one in which people are trained that Sunday morning is the evangelistic expression of the local church, to one in which they are taught that they are the missional expression of the local church each and every day. Proper elder/pastor leadership at this point can allow the church develop a system that is a proper expression and complement to the redemptive mission of God.
4. With an accurate system in place for how best to accomplish the redemptive mission of God, we can then ask what a proper, cultural expression of the church would look like in our land. What aesthetics would promote, and not hinder, the church from being a reflection of its Savior? In what ways does the culture of one’s local church affect how one should express the church in that location? With the proper foundation in place, this final building block is given support and shape by the preceding blocks, and we do not find ourselves is a position where we allow cultural tastes to affect the gospel.
What is secondary in the minds of the leaders will become tertiary in the lives of the congregation. If doctrine is relegated to the supporting cast behind the mission, system, and aesthetics it will not be long before the people in our congregation will dismiss it altogether.
