|
–
Escape From Churchianity –
by Chip Brogden
It is
important that we make a clear distinction between the True Church (the
Ecclesia) and the Institutional Church, Organized Religion, or religion
in general. The easiest way to begin is to discuss one critical thing
that Organized Religion cannot do.
Organized Religion cannot impart Life.
"This
is our testimony, that God has given us Eternal Life, and this Life is
in His Son: He that has the Son has Life, and He that has not the Son of
God has not Life (I John 5:11, 12)."
Contrary to popular belief, the Lord Jesus Christ does not live within
the matrix of Organized Religion. The Ecclesia, like our Lord, is Wholly
Other. I can prove it to you beyond the shadow of a doubt. Can you join
a "church"? Yes, if you meet their requirements for membership. Can you
join the Ecclesia? No. You have to be born into it. Or, to be more
correct, you have to be born-again into it. It is not a question of
joining or not joining, but a question of having Life versus not having
Life. "He that has the Son has Life; He that has not the Son has not
Life."
Some
erroneously believe Jesus founded a movement, or formed a new religion.
No, the world already had movements and religions, and would continue to
have them. He had no intention of starting a new one. What did He bring
us? What did He contribute to the world? He committed Himself to us as
our Life.
Muhammad, Buddha, Confucius, or Socrates can bring us good teaching,
moral excellence, and religious philosophy. For this they may be
commended as rendering help and aid to humanity. But Jesus Christ is
different: He brings us Himself as our Life. It is not that He merely
transmits some teachings to us, depositing some virtue into the human
race, before being taken up into heaven. It is well beyond Him simply
being an example for us to follow, the standard by which our morals are
measured as we frantically whisper, "What would Jesus do?". No, He
Himself came to be our Life. He is Savior, and Salvation. He is
Redeemer, and Redemption. He is Healer, and Healing. He is the Giver of
Life, and He is Life.
In Him
is Life because He is Life. All who are in Him possess Life, and Life
possesses them. The Life is in the Son. The Son is in me, and I am in
Him. We share in a common Life. "He that is joined to the Lord is one
spirit with Him (I Corinthians 6:7)."
Everyone together who possess Life are called the Ecclesia, the Church,
the Body of Christ. The individual members of the Ecclesia are called
Christians. They are the in-Christed ones. They abide in Him, and He
abides in them.
You
ask is not a Christian one who believes thus and so, or behaves thus and
so. We answer that they may very well believe or behave thus and so, but
the belief or the behavior, while it may assist us in identifying them,
is not what makes them a Christian. It is the Life. Certainly,
Christians have a core system of beliefs and practices. But the
characteristic of a Christian is Life. It is not even "the Lord of my
life", implying something apart from Him that I still have control over;
it is "the Lord AS my Life."
An
intellectual Christianity is what Organized Religion brings. It cannot
impart Life. What do I mean by an intellectual Christianity? It is the
ABC Gospel. Perhaps you have heard it. Salvation is obtained in three
easy steps: "A" stands for "admit you are a sinner"; "B" stands for
"believe on the Lord Jesus to save you"; and "C" stands for "confess
Jesus as your personal Savior." What is wrong with that? Simply this:
there is no Life there. "ABC" will not save us. With "ABC" there is no
encounter with Jesus, Who alone is Life. There is only an intellectual
acceptance and affirmation of what is presented as "Three Easy Steps". I
believe this, I say that, and that makes me a Christian, right? No, it
just makes you religious. There are many people who "get religion", but
they don't get Jesus.
Organized Religion has caused Christianity to morph into Churchianity, a
gospel which is easy to believe in but progressively more difficult to
live up to.
Organized Religion can bring doctrine, teaching, and belief. Some of it
may be morally excellent and good. Some of it may even sound Biblical,
like "Three Easy Steps". Nevertheless, Organized Religion cannot impart
Life. Why? Because it has no Life to give. Jesus Christ is the Life. And
Jesus does not live within the matrix of Organized Religion. He gives
HIMSELF. How can any man, organization, or movement claim to give away
another man, much less impart the very Life of Jesus Christ? Only Jesus
can give Himself as our Life.
You
see, then, that the most anyone can do is point people to Jesus as the
sole Source of Life. They may contact Life through us, but we cannot
give them Life. To those bound by Organized Religion, Jesus cries "You
search the Scriptures, because you think in them you have Life. You are
content to read about Me, but you will not come to Me that you may have
Life (John 5:39,40, paraphrased)." Come to Me! Not, "Memorize these
Three Easy Steps and attend the Church of your choice this Sunday." Come
to Me! He is Life.
The
Church, the Lord's Ecclesia, is the synthesis of individuals who have
the Revelation of Jesus and have come to Him to receive Him as their
Life. Here is where the confusion begins. We glibly use the term
"church" to describe things which are not The Lord's Ecclesia. A
building devoted to religious meetings is called "the church". Attending
a religious meeting is called "going to church." Hearing a good message
or good music during the religious meeting is called "having church" (a
popular tune says "crank up the music, let's have church!"). Becoming a
member of the non-profit organization which owns the building devoted to
religious meetings is called "joining the church". Taking responsibility
as the founder or being voted in as the director of the non-profit
organization which owns the building devoted to religious meetings is
called "pastoring the church". Making additions to the building devoted
to religious meetings or to the membership list of the non-profit
organization which owns the building is called "church growth".
Why
are we being so facetious and wordy? Why do we choose our phraseology
carefully? For the sake of convenience, or just plain laziness, people
have grown accustomed to saying "church" instead of "a non-profit
organization that owns a building devoted to religious meetings."
Whatever nomenclature you decide upon, we are drawing the line and
making a distinction between "The Church" and "church". We hope to
impress upon you the difference between what people customarily call
"church" and what the Lord considers to be "The Church". As demonstrated
above, much of what we call "church" is simply Organized Religion. It is
not the Lord's Ecclesia.
We
simply see things the way we have been trained to see them; we do not
see things as God sees them. It is very easy to quantify and describe
things in terms of Organized Religion because it is earthy, worldly,
natural. Ask someone on the street. What is church? Why, it is that
building there with a steeple on top. What is a pastor? The fellow who
does the preaching. What is a Christian? The folks who read their Bible
a lot and pray a lot and go to church a lot - you know, doing good
works. You see how easy it is to define. It is tangible, concrete. We
can get our hands on that.
But
the reality is that everything which makes up the Ecclesia is spiritual,
and thus, it is invisible to the naked eye. It is non-corporeal. It
cannot be measured by dollars and statistics. Now ask the same questions
of someone who knows better. What is church? The Church, the Ecclesia,
is the synthesis of individuals who have the Revelation of Jesus and
have come to Him to receive Him as their Life. Pray tell, where do I
find that? What do I look for? You can't do it, it's like trying to find
the wind at 101 North Main Street. It is beyond geographical
description; it is everywhere and nowhere. What is a pastor? Someone
called to feed the Lord's sheep as an under shepherd of the Chief
Shepherd. Huh? You mean preaching? No, not necessarily. You mean a
doctor of theology? No, not really. Oh never mind: what is a Christian?
Oh that's easy, someone who is in Christ. What do you mean "in Christ"?
Don't you mean "believes in Christ?" No, I mean IS in Christ, in union,
one with Him. So what does THAT look like? How many chapters of the
Bible do they read per day? How long do they pray? How often do they
attend church? It defies explanation because the truth is it has nothing
to do with the external, only the internal. Like the wind: you can see
the effects of it but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it
goes; so are they which are born of the Spirit (John 3). This invisible
Life is the characteristic of the Ecclesia. When you can capture the
wind in a bag then you can stuff Christians into a building and call it
"church". "Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold,
the kingdom of God is within you (Luke 17:21)."
So,
from our vantage point here on earth, Organized Religion can be easily
seen, felt, touched, experienced, quantified, denominated,
characterized, categorized, analyzed, and explained. We can chart its
progress and hang the data up on the wall, point to it and say yep,
we've got this many million converts here, and this many million members
there. Church growth is up (or down), we collected this many billions of
dollars last year, and in relation to the rest of the world's religions
we rank number whatever. We've got this many thousands of churches in
this part of the world, we have this many thousands of pastors and
Christian workers, and we've translated the Bible into this many
different languages.
Meanwhile, what drives the Real Church, the Ecclesia, is invisible,
spiritual, ethereal, in the world but not of the world, hidden, veiled,
hard to describe in terms we can understand. We can't generate the data
and hang it up on the wall. Even those who know what the Ecclesia is
sometimes have difficulty expressing themselves. Ask them where to find
the Church of which they so longingly speak, and they are apt to reply,
"I'm not sure if I know where the Church is, brother, but I sure know
where it ain't!"
Now
imagine that the Lord wakes you up one night and says, "Come up hither,
and I will show you the Church." You expect Him to carry you down the
street to the Family Worship Center or across the country to where the
crowds say they are experiencing revival; but instead you find yourself
rising high into the air, leaving the earth behind, and in the blink of
an eye you travel beyond the edges of the temporal universe and into the
spirit realm, seated with Christ in heavenly places, there in the throne
of God.
Seated
with the Lord and looking back down upon the world, we find from this
perspective that the cathedrals, the church buildings, the worship
centers, the sanctuaries, the denominational offices, the seminaries,
the tithes and offerings, the membership drives, the movements, all
vanish from sight. Everything melts away. He does not see the Assemblies
of God, the Southern Baptists, the United Methodists, the Lutherans, the
Presbyterians, or the Roman Catholics. He does not see Charismatics or
Fundamentalists or Bible Belts or Christian Conservatives or Religious
Rights. He does not see the building devoted to religious meetings as
anything more special or significant than the grocery store or barber
shop. He sees pastors, yes, but strangely; He does not see every
director of a non-profit organization who owns a building devoted to
religious meetings as a pastor. And it is not just the pastors that are
different, from our heavenly observation point. Everything seems odd.
Backwards. Apostles are not where you expect them to be, and they are
not doing what you expect them to be doing; neither are prophets,
evangelists, or teachers. Yet, they are right where He wants them to be,
doing exactly what He wants them to do. Interestingly enough, He is not
concerned with a rise or a decline in church attendance because He does
not see the Church as something which can be attended. Hmmmm.
Standing next to Him we see as He sees. We realize when we look upon
Christendom that all God sees there is His Church, the Ecclesia. He
deems those who abide in Him, those who possess the Son, as those who
have Life. His Church is not declining, it is growing because His Life
cannot be contained or restricted. His Ecclesia is outside the matrix.
His Church is spiritual, and as such, it is eternal, transcending time
and space. Just as He is, and does.
You
look upon His Face and see the curve of His smile, so you follow His
gaze - and there it is, the living stones and precious gems which make
up His Church. You couldn't see them before, because you were right in
the middle of it while still on earth. But now, far removed from it all
and looking down upon it from the Lord's perspective, you see that the
living stones are being assembled together into a brilliant, gleaming,
dazzling building which covers the entire earth! An angel stands apart
from it, shouting, "100% pure: never touched by human hands!" You zoom
in closer and discover that the stones and gems are not literal stones
and gems, but people! Wonderful, beautiful, joy-filled people, joined
together into a striking mosaic of vibrant colors, a tapestry of
interwoven beauty, a medley of lives in perfect twelve-part harmony, all
pulsing with His heartbeat, His Life, His Essence. You begin to weep at
the unadulterated purity of it and oneness of it. There is no spot,
wrinkle, or blemish to be found.
Only
God could make something this gorgeous. Only God. Only God. And there in
the midst of this wonderful place, you see what makes it so splendid...
There
HE is, walking around in the midst of this Temple, adding living stone
upon living stone, precious gem upon precious gem, and what do you hear?
Singing? Yes. The Living Stones are crying out in praise. And He is
smiling, and - whistling! - while He works.
Jesus
is building His Church.
Then,
as quickly as it began, it is over.
You
open your eyes and find yourself back on earth, having returned to your
three-dimensional world. It's a sunny day, the birds are singing, the
church bells are ringing, and you see men, women, and children walking
down the street, carrying their Bibles. You rush out into the road and
grab an elderly gentleman.
"Where
are you going? What's going on? Why are you so dressed up?"
"Get
your hands off me, you crazy idiot! It's Sunday morning, and I'm going
to church!"
"You've seen the Church??"
"Seen
it? Of course I've seen it. My great-great grandfather helped build that
church!"
"No, I
mean have you SEEN the CHURCH," you repeat emphatically. "The Church
that JESUS is building!"
"I
don't know what the devil you're talking about, young man. Now let me
alone, or I'll be late!"
You
let him go and before you know it you are swept along by the crowd and
find yourself sitting within the four walls of a building that calls
itself "First Hypocritical Church, International."
The
service is just beginning. The pastor approaches the lectern and
announces, "Let's all stand and sing!"
Not
sure what to do, you join in the chorus:
Know
ye not, know ye not ye are the Temple?
Know
ye not, know ye not ye are the Temple?
Know
ye not, know ye not ye are the Temple?
Ye are
the Temple of the Holy Ghost!
At the
end of the song the pastor appears at the lectern again and
matter-of-factly shouts, "Isn't it good to be in the house of God
today!" It's more of a statement than a question. And all the people
say, "AMEN!"
Hope
rises! The House of God! Maybe he's seen it too! Forgetting where you
are, you stand up and excitedly shout "Have YOU seen the House of God,
brother?"
"Amen!" He replies. "It's good to be in church this morning!"
"Amen!" the people agree.
"No,
wait a minute," you interrupt, mouthing the words ever so slowly and
deliberately, as if you were talking to a deaf lip reader. "Have you
SEEN the CHURCH, brother? The Church that JESUS is building?"
All
heads are turned now, facing you. The old man, one of the deacons,
whispers, "That's the weirdo I met on the way to church this morning!"
The
pastor is growing impatient. "This IS the church, brother. Hallelujah!"
"But
sir," you press, "KNOW YE NOT YE ARE THE TEMPLE???"
The
silence is deafening.
"You
are the Temple. WE are the Temple! Jesus is building His Church! I've
seen it! It's a wonderful House of Living Stones, filled with His Life!
We are the Church that He is building! We are the Living Stones, the
Precious Gems! I saw Jesus, and He was smiling and placing the stones
together, and..."
Some
teenagers on the back row are giggling.
"I've
seen it! It's true! The stones... the jewels... it's gorgeous!"
The
people are looking at the pastor to see what he will do.
Slowly
it dawns on you. You realize that to them you are an alien from another
planet trying to communicate something that is so real to you but is
totally foreign to the rest of the world.
Desperately you grab the man standing next to you by the shoulders,
thinking to shake it into him. "You don't believe me... But it's true!
You sing about it... but you don't believe it! YOU ARE THE TEMPLE! You
have to believe me! I've seen it! Jesus is building His Church!"
The
ushers are making their way over to your place in the pew.
Sweating and shaking, you look around the sanctuary, wild-eyed. "No,
something's wrong here. Everything is different... this isn't the
Church! I mean, you're calling it church, but this isn't what I've seen
at all. No, the Church is... is... One Flock with One Shepherd, not
divided up into denominations and sects! It's a mosaic of people! It's a
tapestry of rich colors! It's a medley..." You begin to sob. "Listen to
me! Know ye not ye are the Temple?!?"
The
congregation is uncomfortable and agitated. The old deacon is
ashen-faced, glaring at the pastor to put an end to this.
"Friend," the pastor finally manages, "if you'll go with the ushers I'm
sure we can better minister to you in private. With every head bowed and
every eye closed, why don't we go to the Lord in prayer right now."
While
every head is bowed and every eye is closed, except the pastor's head
and eyes, the ushers quickly hustle you out the back door and throw you
down the steps.
The
pastor smiles. "and the church said... AMEN. Amen. You may be seated.
Well, praise the Lord. Today my message is entitled, 'What It Means To
Be A Christian'. Turn in your Bibles to...".
* * *
If God
would grant you a moment by His side and allow you a fleeting glance at
His Church you would at once understand what a pitiful substitute we
have in Organized Religion. There is no vanity so deep as religious
vanity, nothing more sickening and diametrically opposed to the heart
and ultimate purpose of God.
And we
who are in Christ Jesus ARE seated with Him in heavenly places
(Ephesians 2:6).
If God
is pleased to grant you this vision of His Church then you will come to
appreciate it as a blessing and a curse. A blessing, because to see
things as He sees them is true Wisdom and Oneness with Him and His
people. A curse, because to see things as He sees them will ruin you for
life, for you will never again be able to accept the surrogate, the
counterfeit, even the good, at the expense of the Holy. His Church, His
Treasure, how holy and pure and wonderful and unspeakable it is! Before
you would casually call this thing and that thing "church" just like
everyone else does and find it socially acceptable, but now your skin
will crawl and your stomach will twist in knots when you hear others
call some building the "house of God", knowing full well that His House
is not this dead thing made with human hands!
It
will not be enough for you to then say: "Lord, the Church belongs to
You, not to me, not to anyone. Now I see my mistake. I take my hands off
of it, for it is not mine to control or run. I repent of trying to build
what you wish to destroy, and destroying what you wish to build. What am
I, Lord, but a little stone, a little sheep, a little member of a
wonderful Body of Believers? You are building Your Church, and now I
will let you do it. At last I see. Only let me find a quiet place to
serve You and serve Your people in secret, for I want nothing else for
me, but all of it for You."
No,
once you see this, once you take your hands off of His Bride, once you
stop beating your brothers and sisters in the Name of God, then you will
be jealous over His Church with His jealously, and will be so sensitive
and so aware of false pastors and false teachers and false evangelists
and false prophets and false apostles - yes, all that would abuse and
confuse and rape and pillage His People! It is a question of seeing! And
see, you will! You will see as He sees, hear as He hears, feel as He
feels. "He was angered at their hardness of heart." Without effort,
without trying, you will see right through the false, the quasi-faith,
the pseudo-spirituality, the whitewashed tombs full of dead men's bones.
Once you have had a taste of Real Life, you smell Death a thousand miles
away, and your spirit rebels against it, your emotions scream in
protest, and you are sick to your stomach with grief, anger, and
compassion all at once. "No! This is not the Ecclesia. This is not the
Lord's Church. This is a sham. This is bogus. This is nothing but
Organized Religion!"
May
God have mercy on us, and give us such a revelation of Himself, and His
Church, that we may escape from Churchianity and find Life.
We are
not suggesting that you challenge the system this Sunday by provoking a
public confrontation with some unsuspecting pastor. All the argument in
the world will not convince people, nor should we attempt to make people
see. Simply allow them to see. Look upon the face of Him who sees things
as they are, that others may look into your eyes and see Him as He is.
One minute of seeing is worth a lifetime of argument. God will grant us
a discerning heart and eyes to see if we will ask for them, and if we
are willing to accept both the joy and the burden that accompanies such
a revelation.
Copyright ©1997-2004 Watchman.Net.
Permission is granted for non-commercial (free) distribution provided
this notice appears.
Email: info@watchman.net
|
