Jul 11 2008
Bombed out City:
This last week I was in Beirut training group of pastors around Tangible Kingdom concepts. The only thing I knew about Beirut prior to this trip was that they’ve been sandwiched in between two pretty mean big brothers on each side of the country and as the middle child has had to take licks from both sides. The people of Lebanon are a beautiful people and there are many vibrant believers, but they’re often overshadowed by the Islamic infighting between Muslim factions, Israel, and Islamic fundamentalists. Hezbollah is a sleeping giant that can mobilize terror and destruction at a moments notice.
While there I learned that thousands of Christian Lebanese have exited the country recently. Add the to that the fact that most Christian families have 1-2 children and most Muslim families have 6-8 children, the future looks bleak for the church in this critical part of our world.
This reality of a declining church is not just 4000 miles away. While in London the week prior, I learned that there are more Muslims in mosques every week than those in the Church of England! In England. The Anglican Church that held massive national and global presence now is folding up like a broken lawn chair. They even have an office called, “The office of redundant churches” that is solely focused on selling their churches to keep their denomination funded as long as they can. Many churches are now pubs (which isn’t a bad thing to a guy like me), restaurants, health clubs or community centers.
Now back to the Beirut pastors. Imagine if you expected that your Christian movement could actually be merely a remnant in a few short years. How would you respond? Would you fight? Would you get radical and do all you could to extend the mission forward? OR would you veer toward fear, control and maintenance? My guess is that you may vacillate between the two. They have. There are those who are working tirelessly to extend the vibrant mission of God and there are those who have taken a more skeptical stance and are just trying to stay out of harms way.
Normally I would judge anyone not willing to do anything to extend the way of the kingdom, but after seeing what the church in Lebanon is up against, I am humbled at anyone’s willingness to pastor at any level there. It is tough! Tougher than almost anyplace I’ve been to to date. In addition to simply being massively outnumbered, the state requires that everyone hold a card that indicates whether they’re Muslim, Catholic or Christians, and specifically who they are affiliated with. To be married, divorced or get functional civil representation, you have to choose a side and there must be a sanctioned church or religious heritage over everyone or you won’t have anyone to bury you when you die, or marry your children.
Now imagine that a guy like me just came in and suggested they send out a decentralized movement of incarnational communities to engage the world. Nice idea, but you may be able to see that it’s not that simple. Unless the existing church figures out a way to sanction, support and affiliate decentralized mission from a centralized structure, the church may not survive. Yet, they are going to try and we’re going to do what we can to help.
I bring this up more as motivation for us in the states. Nothing holds us back. No one is threatening our existence. If the evangelical movement dies out in the next 25 years, which it is on pace to do, it’s going to be no one’s fault but our own.
We must stretch beyond our present ways of church. We must stop belly-aching about the cost of new exploits or the potential for failure. “Oh, we might not get paid…Oh, we might not get the respect of our peers…Oh we may have to work a normal job…Oh our denominational leaders may belittle us”…YOU’VE GOT TO BE FREAKING KIDDING ME!!! We still get to make a good living, our children live in peace, we can find plenty of friends who are living the same tension, and we don’t have to worry about exiling our country or leaving everything we know. The worst thing that will happen if we leave the institutional church to engage the world is that we may not reach anyone. That’s it, and that’s not even that bad. It’s just a blow to our pride.
Church planters, it’s time to stop trying to plant churches that give us personal credibility and simply be faithful to love the lost regardless if a church is established. It’s time to stop pandering to consumer Christians who want a cool church service to attend. Denominational leaders, it’s time to stop protecting your job at the expense of standing up for and advocating for the courageous young leaders God is giving you. Time to take the heat for them, and if possible to serve with them in the culture. You may even find ways to give back your denominationally funded salary and get a bi-vocational job with them. Oh..and to “normal Christians”…stop being normal. Instead be “Christ-followers.” The world isn’t inspired by our limp-wristed ways and you don’t even enjoy living that way. Time to step into the waters of financial faith, personal sacrifice, and time with people.
It’s time for everyone to dig in our heels, grab the rope and start pulling. Don’t worry, the rope is anchored to the Spirit of God and is tethered in heaven. It was lowered to the earth through Christ, and now is handed to us by Him. “As the Father has sent me, I now send you.”
If we fail in a land of comfort with all the resources at our fingertips, I believe it will be very hard to look Jesus in the eyes someday.
Hugh
The Anglican Church in England has recently changed its’ ‘Redundant Churches Division’ to become the ‘Closed Churches Division’. They/we are not “solely focused on selling their churches to keep their denomination funded as long as they can” but simply putting churches where the regular congregation, if there is one, can no longer take care of their building to new uses which we hope will benefit the communities around them. these churches are nto sold to the highest bidder, as you would expect if it was about money, but are sold or leased to those who make best use of the building with creation of a new place of worship at the top of the list followed by community use.
While in some ways the name change may be seen as an issue of semantics, at its’ core it reflects the fact that these churches aren’t redundant, they are simply no longer used for regular public worship (emphasis on regular there because sometimes they continue to be used for occasional services).
The Church of England has been closing churches since World War II following a huge increase in the number of churches between the 19th and 20th Centuries and this can not directly tied to church attendance decline.
If you’re particularly interested in our statistics on this, send me an email.
Fi
Hugh,
Thanks for that last blog entry. I printed off a copy of the last paragraph starting with the line about “it’s time to stop trying to plant churches that give us personal credibility.” I now have it pinned up in my cube (right between the stats on implied growth rates and p/e ratios).
I know it’s been a while since we’ve been in contact, but I’m glad things are going so well with the new book. I look forward to getting a copy. Keep fighting the good fight and calling the Church to task.
Peace of Christ to you,
matt
P.S.: I’m glad to see denominatonal leaders are actually reading your blog even if it is to add a bit of clarification… Be wise, be humble, but stay the course.
Well said! Hugh I think you have touched on something so important.
I also want to get your perspective. As a self professed Pharisee in remission, I have had my share of humble pie served to me this year.
I serve in a church that has extended me a heaping helping of grace and love. That is awesome. However, it has allowed me to sit on the sidelines to re-kindle the fires of a righteous person.
When do we let our “fallen brothers and sisters” back into leadership and progressively build our community.
It seems that one of the flaws of the current church is that we don’t let those who have stumbled back into the front lines. As Ryan Taylor puts it, we have to many walking wounded. Many of which could heal faster and quicker by being given an opportunity to get back in the game.
There is an unobtainable standard, and when someone misses it, we count them as lost. Why get involved in a community that values that?
This post brings up an interesting question our leadership team raised when working through Alan Hirsch’s book The Forgotten Ways. In particular, he makes the case that latent “apostolic genius” is activated through persecution. How is it activated when the church isn’t persecuted? We live in a place where “Nothing holds us back. Nothing threatens our existence.” We are dying by indifference not persecution.
If only it was that easy Hugh, if only!
Lots of love!
Pops