Not Your Grandpa’s Church

Start a church? Really? Had I ever thought about it? Well, not out loud, but certainly I had dreamed. Maybe a better word is fantasized. However, over the years I had developed quite a stack of concerns about the modern church. Those concerns were magnified in the years I spent teaching ministerial candidates in the study center sponsored by the church. Then layer on top of that all the questions spawned by the tornado and then the subversive stuff Earl had given to me to read.
I knew one thing for sure: Tulsa didn’t need another church. There’s already one on almost every street corner, and another one pops up about every other week or so. They are as numerous and prolific as roaches.
That, despite the fact that the church in Oklahoma and across America hasn’t been growing for dozens of years. We’ve just been passing around the same people among us. Why would I want to build a church out of somebody else’s rejects? People who are disgruntled in one place will still be disgruntled when they show up at your place.
While we’re talking about shuffling people, Tulsa is the biggest of culprits. One preacher has a new revelation and builds up a big following. But then he can’t keep it in his pants, so another “man of the hour” comes along until he gets a wandering eye or an old skeleton knocks on his office door.
And church in Tulsa is big business—big names, big buildings, and big money. The smorgasbord of programs, groups, and activities makes the local churches without a doubt the largest providers of consumer services in the state. Church has become a pay-as-you-go, consumer-driven enterprise where money changes hands in exchange for “services rendered.” And those consumers (called members) have expectations.
And those expectations begin with: church is supposed to be the place where the God-stuff gets done. Where our children and youth are supposed to get discipled so we, their parents, don’t have to do it. Us too, for that matter. Disciple me so I don’t have to do that myself either.
Oh and, we need a place to discover and exercise our “gifts.” Especially the ones that the “world” can’t seem to appreciate. We need a place where we can be suckled and be healed and find meaning and purpose. And if we don’t feel we’re getting our money’s worth, we can move on claiming we weren’t being fed.
After I pondered all of this—all things I had experienced or witnessed—I concluded that if I was nuts enough to go through with it, there would have to be a major paradigm shift. Not just in the thinking but in our whole approach to “doing church.” If we decided to do it, it would not be; it could not be my grandpa’s church.