Church Hunting

Well, I don’t know if this is the something interesting I have been trying to urge my brain to spew forth, but it is what my brain is spending a lot of time grappling with these days.

Church Hunting. Seeking to find the community of believers with which to associate. It sure seems like it would be a whole lot simpler to just have “The Church”, to just have one common gathering of believers. But in the two thousand plus years since Jesus walked this planet in the flesh, people have decided for various reasons, perhaps some more justified than others, that they must separate themselves or define themselves beyond whether or not they are believers Jesus Christ, the son of God, the way of salvation. We disagree on worship styles, when and how to be baptized, the sufficiency of scripture, the role of women in the church, which sins are “big” enough to keep someone from being a teacher or preacher, the activity and manifestation of the Holy Spirit in our lives, what the words “infallible” or “inerrant” really mean, how and when to take communion, and on and on and on! It all becomes very confusing after a while.

So, here we are, looking for a church home – church hunting. We are finding that we have to focus on the “essentials” (I have always cherished the saying – “in essentials - unity, in non-essentials – liberty, in all things – charity”). So for me, for my family, what are the essentials? What we hope to find is a community of believers (we assume believers to mean believers in Christ, the fully human, fully divine Son of God – who died and rose again, who conquered death, and who is the only acceptable sacrifice, the only acceptable atonement for our sin, the only way to the Father) who look to the Word of God as given to us in the Holy Scriptures as the only true and infallible authority in our lives and seek to apply it day by day and moment by moment – challenging each other to be in the world but not of the world, and who gather together to worship our Holy God in Spirit and in Truth and to encourage each other in walking each day as followers of Christ and servants of His church. In the end will it really matter if that group of people happen to be part of a denominational church or not, if they happen to worship in traditional or contemporary style or some mixture of the two, if they raise their hands and jump and shout or if they quietly but completely immerse themselves in worship, if they recite the Lord’s prayer and apostle’s creed or not, if I hear or see people around me speaking in tongues or being slain in the spirit or not, if, if, if……

All we can really do is ask God to lead us wherever He will lead us, to do whatever He will have us to do, and to always, always glorify His Name. After all, His church is about Him, not about us. I hope you will keep us in your prayers as we seek after the congregation God would have us be a part of.