A Letter to My Church
The following letter is something that I wrote after much discussion, prayer and honest reflection regarding the current health of our fellowship, the Every Nation 6pm, in London. The night I read this out loud at our Sunday service, there were many more words spoken. For those of you who weren’t there that night, my prayer is that not any of what I’ve written is misconstrued as condemnation or even disappointment. I love our church family and have GREAT expectations and hope for our future. (Because when we are weak, He is strong!) My heart in what I’ve written is purely one of honesty and repentance. My motivation in sharing this is to hopefully provoke my brothers and sisters in Christ to also test their own hearts and join me as we continue to follow Jesus together into even greater things to come.
To my church,
Over the past several weeks and months I have felt the subtle, yet growing conviction from the Holy Spirit to honestly assess the health of our spiritual family; our church community that we so affectionately refer to as the “6pm.” The apostle Paul instructed the church in Corinth to “test” themselves. (2 Cor. 13:5) As I, along with others of you, have prayerfully and painstakingly held up this church, our church, to the loving and honest scrutiny of God’s Word, I have found myself deeply unsettled. Have we failed the test?! Have we laboured in vain? By God’s grace, we have not. We have not failed, nor do I believe we will, because our God will not fail – He is faithful even when we are not. Still… I cannot deny our many weaknesses as we have striven to be the church that He has called us to truly become.
God has given us everything we need to be His church, His sign, evidence that His Kingdom is being established at Imperial College, and in our great city, London. He’s given us a venue, a budget, a band, gear, food, leaders, teams, a pastor, HIS SPIRIT! But to what end have we laboured??? What have we done with it all? God has blessed us with some fruit, some amazing fruit. But I fear that our church, Jesus’ church, has in many ways become little more than a meeting that happens to take place at 6pm on Sunday nights. I love our church! I love us! I love doing Sunday services with you. But unless I’m greatly mistaken (and I wish I was), THIS is not going to change anything! Simply sitting in a tiny hall, “doing” church isn’t going to provoke anyone, inside or outside of this room, to even consider the truth about Jesus Christ! As it stands now, the thing that provokes me is the fact that there’s hardly anything provoking about what we’re doing here at all!
The love, compassion, generosity, humility, devotion that Jesus’ followers should have towards one another, the radical devotion that Jesus himself demonstrated for us in giving himself wholly on the cross, I believe, for us, to a great extent, is little more than a good idea – an idea that sounds wonderful, one that we all nod in agreement with, yet is still just an idea. Look at our fruit… practically, we are just as, if not much more, devoted to our coursework, our careers, our social lives, our love lives, our sport, our sitcoms, our whatever than we are to one another… than we are to the fellowship… to this family of God. The world is watching… we’re all watching… waiting, hoping to see a “truth” that really matters. Words no longer mean anything… they’re ALL relative! People need to see the truth lived out… in loving, devoted, I’ll-lay-my-life-down-for-you relationships. Only then will then will the commentary make sense. Only then will our friends and our family be provoked to even listen.
I’m not innocent. I know I’m preaching, but I stand here as guilty as the next. Everyday I feel the pull to build my own personal empire. My family, my money, my ministry, my calling, my stuff… I’m devoted to the people who I like or at least to those who can maybe help me along on my way. But my devotion to the fellowship? God’s family? This family? I struggle.
Lord, I’m sorry. Help me. Help us to be your people – those who might live radically for the sake of one another. Regardless of how much it might cost me personally, provoke us to live devoted to your cause, as brothers and sisters in Christ, that our lives together might provoke others to look up and ask themselves: what or who is responsible for such extraordinary love?
Devoted,
