“Church is not a building.”

–Christians who attend churches where a majority of the budget is spent on buildings.
@FailingPastor

 

The amount of money spent on church buildings is ridiculous. I do believe this is going to come up on Judgment Day.

There is nothing in the Bible about churches having buildings. At the same time, there are plenty of verses talking about not putting our treasure on earth, not seeking material wealth, not getting tied down to earthly things, and the classic passage where the disciples bragged to Jesus about the impressive temple buildings, only to be shot down by Christ.

I won’t say having a church building is a sin, nor that a church should not have a building, but I do hear an awful lot of pride expressed in buildings, the very same buildings that will, like the old temple, be toppled.

I did a wedding at a different church once where they just added a new addition. It was a separate building with a gym and classrooms. They proudly showed me every single room, even though they all looked the same.

When the Grand Tour was over, my tour guide asked me, “I probably shouldn’t have shown you all that! Now you are envious of our building!” This was said with zero hint that they were sorry. It was pride through and through. I said, “No, not really. I think I’ll be ok.”

“You still meeting in the same place?” is a question I get frequently. Without blowing my cover, we don’t have a building. What we do is pathetic in light of what all the cool churches are doing. It has cost us some people.

One family left because the new Vineyard church put in an arcade for the kids. “How come our church doesn’t do anything like that?”

“Because I think that’s stupid” was apparently not the answer they were looking for. They left. Hope their kids had a nice time at the arcade.

Continue reading “Some Thoughts About Having Church Buildings” →

I must admit I was a little shocked when I saw all the ABCDEFGHILMNOPQRSTUWXYZ’s in my KJV Only Study Bible.
@FailingPastor

 

 

The phone rang as I sat down for dinner with my family. An anonymous person warned me, “There are people in your church who will leave if you keep using the NIV. You have a small church; you can’t afford to lose more people. I’m telling you: go back to the King James immediately.”

One of the weirdest things I’ve run into while being a pastor are people’s rabid defenses of Bible translations. I like the King James. I use the King James. I also have some problems with it. But I like it, I’m familiar with it, and I use it.

The fact that I preach out of the KJV has led many to believe I am a KJV fanatic. They do the wink-wink, nod-nod KJV Club stuff with me, until the Sunday comes where I say, “The King James kind of botches this translation.” Redness overtakes their face.

I have had four people leave my church because I “used the NIV” on Sunday morning.

Here’s the thing: I have never once used the NIV on a Sunday morning.

Here’s the other thing: I constantly make fun of the NIV. Anyone who listens to me for any time knows I don’t care for the NIV (no, I do not want explanations about the NIV’s strong-points). I don’t care if other people use it, I just don’t like it.

The people were actually upset when I read something out of the New American Standard Version, which they took as the NIV, and left the church.

Nope, it didn’t matter when I told them it wasn’t the NIV. It didn’t matter when I said I never have, nor will, use the NIV with any level of seriousness. Nope, didn’t matter. They were gone. I used the NIV while reading the NASV and that was enough.

One lady actually yelled at me during the service to “use a real Bible” when I read from not the KJV.

Who knew that Bible translations could be so divisive? It’s God’s Word, originally written in not-English. Translations into English are just people’s best efforts to help us understand the Greek and Hebrew. I encourage people to use all kinds of translations (even the NIV can be occasionally helpful. Sometimes.). When the KJV uses a weird word, I pause in my sermon and define what the word means, and that definition is usually the way other translations translate it!

But the KJV Only crowd aint playin’. They take this stuff to an unreal level, claiming the KJV is inspired. They will fight you. They will lay you out.

Apparently salvation doesn’t come by the Gospel; it comes by what English translation you prefer. And if you bring your newfangled ESV up in here, they will condemn you to hell and that right quick.

Oh well. I continue to use my KJV. Although I’ve considered using the NAS or ESV simply to remove all visitors’ hopes or fears that I’m a KJV Only man.

But I don’t cave to stupidity. Plus over the years I’ve adapted a liking for poking people who take themselves too seriously. So I keep using my KJV and critiquing it when necessary. I’ll keep a running tab of how many people leave. It keeps me entertained.

 

 

Of these things put them in remembrance, charging them before the Lord that they strive not about words to no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers.
–2 Timothy 2:14

THEM: We’re doing the Lord’s work.

ME: You sure? Cuz it looks suspiciously like a bunch of people doing busy work to maintain an organization they created for their ego.
@FailingPastor

 

 

Churches like to keep people busy. If people are busy in church, then the church is doing something and the people are doing something. Doing something is the sign of things being done. And if things are being done in the church, then those things being done must be good.

The church convinced people that service to the Lord only takes place at church. Therefore people now want their every spiritual desire turned into a church sanctioned event or included in a church service with church approval.

But here’s the thing: you don’t need the pastor or the church’s approval to do ministry. Just go help people.

As a pastor, the guy in charge of what’s going on in the church, I began examining the results of our busy-ness. There were very few, if any, spiritual results. In fact, some of our stuff seemed to be having a negative spiritual effect.

I called out our church over concerns I had with our youth program, which was successful by external measures. Every year we begged people to volunteer because we had so many kids coming. We needed bodies to fill roles. Eventually our standards for leadership dipped so low, I had to pull the plug.

I told the church, “It is impossible for spiritual leadership to take place if there are no spiritual leaders.” I told the church that we were not doing our youth program until we get our act together as a church.

My hope was that people would rally and ask what they could do to help each other grow and defeat sin. Instead, half the church left.

Continue reading “Playing Church” →