Pastor’s Perspective
Church Membership and Dilettantes
In the old days, when a person was part of a parish, church membership was based on denominational history with that church and the location of one’s home.
Parishes were regions in which a pastor and congregation were given authority over the ministry of the region. In the halcyon days of high Church management, denominational congregations would plant churches within the confines of neighborhoods so that everyone had access to worship and community.
Competition between Churches, while it did exist, was community based, with each denominational congregation reaching out to their own congregants and working together, when possible, to serve the needs of the community.
The rise of individual automotive transportation and non-denominational congregations (often due to Church splits within the community itself) created both mobility and competition within the Churches that transcended the family traditions of Presbyterians or Roman Catholics.
As legacy churches began to decline, local storefronts congregations began popping up wherever a licensed minister (and several unlicensed ones) could hang a shingle or create an interest.
Those interests have created new motivations for allegiance to a Church. No longer are people connecting to Churches based on location or community but are more likely to associate with a congregation based on the giftedness of the minster or the connection to the politics of the congregation.
And as our politics get more fractured, so do people’s allegiances with their congregations. As pod cast Christianity ascends, people seek to attend a church (often times virtually) that fits their narrative on ICE or on Israel and Palestine.
This has transformed the Church into nothing less than another media wing of the various political interest groups. When we emphasize real world political action to the detriment of spiritual discernment and prayerful political positions, we find that we attract and create political activists and not people willing to be transformed by the Holy Spirit into followers of Jesus Christ our King.
These activists are also likely to leave the Church (or potentially split it) when the pastor of leadership fails to agree with their opinions concerning the next existential crisis.
The solution to this is not to cloister ourselves from the controversies of the real world, but to deal with them considering the gospel of Jesus Christ. A gospel that instructs us to love enemies and remain faithful to God by showing fidelity and love to God’s people.
Pastors and Church leaders must seek to avoid preaching to the interests of partisans and make sure that our gospel doesn’t look too much like our own political perspectives.
God is not beholden to our opinions or political preferences. God is our Creator and redeemer. He sent Jesus to rescue us from our sinful preferences and opinions about who is good enough for God’s love.
God’s Holy Spirit calls us to serve in unity with each other in the name of Jesus and show the world that the Kingdom of God is the only eternal Kingdom, regardless of what kings and leaders declare.
God is calling us to be One in the name of Jesus. To glorify the name of Jesus only. To live in love with each other and extend that love to those who disagree with us in the name of the one who died for sinners like us.
Following Jesus is hard work. It demands love for neighbors. It is sacrificial and it demands that we allow for God’s will to be done in our lives, even when we would prefer our own way.
Pastor Dan
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