Next-Wave Ezine > church & culture

Coming out of the cocoon
By M. Scott Rogers

In a world as diverse and dynamic as the one we live in, one can’t help but wonder if church should be the same way. Perhaps we, the “churched,” have come to learn that institutionalized religion is a safe and secure place. For the most part, churches are revered or at least considered semi-sacred.

A good friend of mine recently elaborated on his views of church and structured religion. He waxed and waned between the hazards and pitfalls of doctrinal Christianity and an urgent need for a personal understanding of one’s own purpose. The interesting point is that we as humans need structure, need routine. Still, when one delves into the history of “church” we find that not everything is the way it was/is meant to be. The first church was nothing more than a conglomerate of people meeting to discover the Truth that was reshaping their lives, that is, the Gospel message. And yet, how did we come to formula-ize such a simple message as the Gospel? We seemed impossibly competent in taking something as straightforward as “love God, love people, love yourself” and turning it into a set of regulations for living an untainted, pseudo-reclusive life.

The problem we face then is what do we do with an organic relationship between God and Man that has fallen under the tracks of railroad theology – a straight and narrow system of belief designed and engineered in much the same fashion as a government? If we rule our relationships with each other as we rule our religious selves - right is right – wrong is sin - then what recourse do we have when others refuse to retain relationship with us? Burn the proverbial bridges?

If we were to look at the organic design of the church in its original state, we might find ourselves ashamed at trying to force it into something so mechanical, so industrial. After all, the point of the Great Commission wasn’t to proselytize the world. The goal was to introduce others to a relationship with Jesus.

“Hi, I’m Joe and I have a friend I think you might like to meet. His name is Jesus and He’s the most understanding and supportive person I know.”

Like that. Instead we’ve turned it into “Get saved or die a horrible, gruesome eternal death.” Perhaps that’s why so many choose organized religion. Following a system of right and wrong is fairly easy though tiresome while fear is the Great Motivator. Developing a relationship, on the other hand, takes effort and a lot of it. Especially a relationship that is synonymous with marriage: a life-long contractual agreement to work with another person to create a rich and healthy environment for personal growth.

Back to what my friend was saying. The past dozen books that he’s read all revolve around the history and construction of the modern church. Everything from why it’s on Sunday to the reasons Constantine and the Roman Catholic regime developed the empire as they did, to how our education system mimics the dogma of early Protestantism. Take it for what it’s worth; the church has relatively remained the same for nearly 1500 years. I can’t help but wonder if this surprised God on some level. We hold in our hands a simple

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story that tells of all the things He’s done and willing to do to have us recognize that a relationship with Him is more than possible and still we get hung up on whether it’s just to have the Ten Commandments removed from our court houses.

I really don’t believe Jesus is surprised by the events and changes or lack thereof in the church through history. He’s big enough to know that in the end, we all look for the same simple thing – love. As big and enigmatic as love may be, it’s tied up in our purpose, who we are as people. To love and be loved.

Regardless of the rules, doctrine, dogma or design, our longing for purpose and belonging will always drive us past the façades of religiosity and into the heart of God. Judge those that sit outside the church walls and we condemn ourselves to a life of loneliness. Like the dwarves from C.S. Lewis’ “The Last Battle,” the only company we’ll keep will be our own, in a dark little room, when all creation is begging us to come outside and discover the depth of His reality.

Knowing then that God is not surprised by our endeavors to understand our purpose and worth by designing formulae and methods to extract that information from such a simple message, is it any wonder that the church on the brink of dissolution? Or perhaps it’s just ready to break out of the cocoon it’s been wrapped in for so many centuries. When those wings spread and finally begin to beat the air, we’ll be in for a wild, magical ride.

In the mean time, as individuals we can’t simply hibernate in the coziness of our Sabbath rituals and traditions. Like a husband who bores if his wife serves the same meatloaf at the same time every day, there comes a time to explore the relationship, go out for Cajun so to speak.

What makes it stagnate? What snuffs the spark of excitement?

I’d venture to say lack of intimacy. Most relationships don’t fail because of too much intimacy, but rather not enough. Mankind likes to swim on the surface of our emotions, never committing to the deep waters for fear of hurt and rejection. What we fail to recognize is the richness of the depths, the vast unexplored world that lies below the surface of the waves of life. We are too complex to allow ourselves to be defined by the good or bad we do; which is where the rubber meets the road in organized religion, or church. Sins and penance define sinner from saint. Thus designated we are assigned pearly gates or hellish flames. Isn’t relationship more than whether we take our shoes off at their house or whether we can eat cheese puffs in the living

room?

Organic Christianity then must grow beyond doctrinal limitations and formulized sanctity. Jesus was quite clear in His simplicity that the entirety of the law is summed up in “love God, love people, love yourself.”

Anything more complicated and we’ve lost the plot, the simplicity of the Gospel, and placed our hunger for regulation over the sacrificial relationship of Christ to the church, to the world.

Then what becomes of the modern church? At the moment, very little. Through intentional and purposed developments of relationships with one another and with Christ we can begin to crack the shell of human wrought ideologies and dogmas. The more realistic the possibility of relationship with Jesus becomes and the more it’s evidenced in our relationships with each other, the more likely the old structure of religiosity will begin to crumble and fall away revealing a new, relational oriented design that’s more God-inspired than man-achieved.