Thursday, September 16, 2010

So You Don't Want To Go To Church Anymore (Part 2)


We continue with the review of So You Don't Want To Go To Church Anymore?

To be truthful, it’s precisely this kind of view (the one held by the character John in the book) that weakens the overall body of Christ. I found this view to be extremely selfish and built around the individual. There’s no commitment to your fellow brothers and sisters with this view. It’s all about you. You want to go to the 10am worship service, fine. You don’t, fine. Sure, it’s ok if they go to church and do church stuff, but they have no place telling you that you need to be there too. You have freedom in Christ!

This re-defining of what church is wouldn’t fly with the real New Testament authors (John being one of them). Their letters are written to local churches (which have structure and leaders) to strengthen their commitment to Jesus and each other. Paul even says in Romans 5:5 that believers belong to each other. Don’t tell me he’s just referring to the too-big-to-see Body of Christ and not the local church. He's writing to a local church. A statement like that implies obligation to your brothers and sisters in Christ because of your relationship with Christ. One couldn’t just drift off for a few weeks and not be held accountable for such an action. The early church depended on its members showing up.

By the way, there’s an extra section in the back of the book that is an article about why the author doesn’t go to church anymore. If you read it you’ll notice it sounds just like his character John.

Angela asked some great questions on last week's post that I wanted to re-post here and answer next week. They are:

Angela asked,

- What does Jesus teach us about this topic?

- Did he have any roots?

- Did he tell us that we should be connected locally somewhere?

- With the same people every week?


We'll answer and talk about those next week.

3 comments:

Nelsman said...

related questions from another side of the subject: Why do people who don't want to go to church want to get married in a church by a pastor? Why do people who don't want to go to church want to have a pastor at a funeral? ...

Tim Sheets said...

That is kind of funny isn't it?

Unknown said...

enjoyed the review buddy...i think people really need to stop writing books like this about things in the faith that need "redefined" and just plainly state "scrap the bible and do whatever you want." i know, i know...im just too "intolerant" :)