Unlearn Apathy Toward the Church, Part 3

You Can Rest in Heaven: Pouring Ourselves Out in Service to the Church

This is part three of our chapter on unlearning apathy for the church. We recommend you read part 1 HERE and part 2 HERE first before reading this one. And please, share your comments with us: constructive or positive, we’re open to all.

Serving More than Suffering

In my marriage seminars I have to be careful because I’ll use stories of heroic love in the face of a spouse’s death, but most of us think if our spouse is facing something terminal, we’ll step up. Most often, however, marriage calls us to daily service more than heroic suffering, and the same is true of the church.

Daily, “mundane” service for the church includes:

·      The challenges of living with stumbling believers.

It can be frustrating and embarrassing to be associated with anti-intellectual people, hypocrites, or narcissistic people who co-opt Bible studies and small groups with silly questions and comments. I don’t love the church because it’s lovable; many times, it’s not. I love the church because I worship Jesus, and the church is his bride. While many church members inspire me with their devotion, inform me with their intellect, and humble me with their love, many others feel more like the “embarrassing uncle” at the family gathering who has a right to be there, but likely wouldn’t be invited otherwise.

·      Time and talents

The church needs Bible study teachers, student teachers, deacons, elders, facilities help, etc. Who has time for that? Suffering servants make time. The question isn’t, do I have the time? The question is, Am I called?

·      Giving money

If we don’t wince a little bit at the end of the year when we do our taxes and see what we’ve given, we’re probably not giving passionately and we’re certainly not giving sacrificially. We’re like the spouse who gives their husband or wife nothing more than a grocery store card and grocery store carnations on our 25th wedding anniversary: “I know I have to give you something, so here you go.”

·      Fighting against false doctrine

Being a suffering servant for the church can mean confronting false doctrine, as Paul does throughout his epistles. Calvin’s Institutes for the Christian Religion is one long running argument against his opponents, living and dead. To be honest I have little stomach for this, as I like to “chew the meat and spit out the bones.” But I know there’s a place for it. Fortunately, God raises others up with a better disposition and superior intellect for these tasks. We are called to serve the church, not be the entire church!

Every age has its heretics; those who faithfully cling to truth will be attacked. This will require patience and faithfulness:  “He is the one we proclaim, admonishing [challenging the false] and teaching [presenting the alternative] everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ” (Col. 1:28).

Paul models doing this to the Colossians: “See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ” (2:8).

Sometimes it’s almost humorous. If I do a blogpost about anger, it is certain to make a lot of people…angry. And there are certain “hot button” issues that some will even say, “Don’t go there.” And I wonder why I do, knowing it will stir up a storm. However, to be a servant of the church, sometimes, we must go there.

·       Showing Up on Sunday

It’s not easy to get to church, especially if you have young children (or, in the case of Texans, a ranch house getaway in the Hill country, or for Coloradans, a ski chalet in the mountains). At the end of a long work week and the cusp of starting another one, it makes total sense to me if families say, “we’re just too tired.” But by point of reference, the early church existed in a world where Sunday was the first day of the working week. Why is that significant? To honor the resurrection, they had to get up very early to celebrate before starting their workday. Church didn’t meet on the “weekend.” The equivalent today would be churches meeting on Monday morning, from 6 to 7. They didn’t traditionally get the “day off” to go to worship for several centuries. That’s the commitment on which the church was built, and that’s the commitment it will take for it to continue to grow.

As one who has worked on the staff of several churches, I believe church staff has a responsibility to make the members’ time worthwhile with engaging sermons and inviting worship, fostering fellowship and creating opportunities for everyone to serve rather than just listen. But church attendance isn’t primarily a statement regarding your opinion about your local church staff’s competence; it’s a statement about worshipping the resurrected and ascended Jesus.

You can take this the wrong way, but in a sense, a full parking lot preaches a sermon to all who pass by, especially those who would never venture inside a church. It’s a visual picture that if many are taking time on Saturday evening or Sunday morning to worship Jesus—maybe they should consider him, too.

Continue reading this blog over on Substack HERE.

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