different than I thought...

I've read many books and listened to many tapes/cds on the "emerging church" -- the up-and-coming, young adult, postmodern thing that will characterize the culture in the near future. I get excited about the implications for the church. In many ways, the changing culture will force the church to return to it's roots in the first century.

A quick example...for the past couple hundred years, our country and the culture has underwritten the christian church. The clearest examples of that is that churches are tax exempt. Our culture is shifting to the point that it will no longer assume good will for the church. What would happen if the church had to start paying taxes? I'm sitting in an office on a campus worth about 25 million...annually, we'd pay a truckload of taxed...people might give less because they wouldn't get tax credit...many churches would have to see their land and buildings. But...don't forget that the church isn't a building or property. It would force us to consider that the church has more to do with the community of Christ-followers than with what has become often little more than a social club that tips its hat to Jesus.

Anyway...I love thinking through implications of cultural relevance and how worship gatherings might change shape in the emerging culture. And as I've gotten ivolved in Catalyst (a worshipping community of young adults in Hamburg, NY), I've learned something huge...

...this community looks much different than I thought it would. I was looking for cool and edgy and bold. What I'm getting is socially awkward people who aren't very cool or edgy or bold. They've been kicked by life, laughed at by peers, and even turned away by church people. They walk through the door and force me to consider what's more important -- my image of the emerging church or the reality of community that I'm looking at.

I don't know why things are turning out like this. But I do know that these folks present me with an opportunity to be more like Jesus. The conversations can be strange and disconnected; I can't always follow the logic. They may get excited about things that I couldn't care less about. But they are all people that Jesus loves. That makes them my people. That makes them my brothers and sisters.

And so God is shaping and re-shaping this image of community...

Peace,

M@