Like the Highlander franchise, this series has gone on longer than originally planned. Part seven (!) with one to go. Here are parts one, two, three, four, five and six.

One of the best ways to get to know a church is to take a membership class if one is offered. One of my ‘finalist’ churches offers what is called an inquirers class that is a prerequisite for membership, but is open to anyone who desires to know more about church doctrine, polity, etc. (A church that offers a class like this is usually one that is serious about Discipline/Discipleship). If one is not offered, ask an elder or the pastor out for coffee or a meal to get acquainted and talk about the church.

Some readers may find it amusing to know that my two finalists were a Baptist Church and a Presbyterian (PCA) Church. A Brethren Church was a distant third place; in their case, the musical style, personal connection and size were factors against, but the preaching was fantastic. On essential Christian doctrine, all these churches qualified, though they differ greatly on secondary issues.

Here is an ironic twist: Remember some of the bad reasons I listed for leaving a church?  Some of these bad reasons might be good reasons to not choose a particular church as your new home. In other words, why go looking for problems? If you left a church because it has grown too large (not a good reason to leave), then you should probably eliminate large-ish churches from your list of possibilities. It’s a bad reason to leave a church because you don’t like the music half the time; but if you don’t like half the music at a prospective church, it might be a good reason to not join it.

Time to get serious

Hopefully, you’ll now be at a point to decide on a church and the right choice will be clear. Again, praise God if this is true for you. If you’re not yet at this point, it’s time to get serious and make a decision.

Assuming you have your list narrowed down to two churches, devote a month to one church, then devote the next month to the other. And I do mean DEVOTE. Give yourself to everything you think you might be interested in as a member (Acts 2:42). Most churches welcome visitors to join with all their worship, prayer, fellowship and service groups. Join the choir, attend Sunday school, bible study, a committee meeting, youth group, a fellowship dinner, a council meeting, small group, prayer meeting, a work day, a service project, personal evangelism, or anything else you think you might enjoy doing. Get to know the people and how they do things. Prayerfully reflect on each experience and ask God to make the decision clear to you.

At my ‘finalist’ church, I sang in the choir over Christmas, joined a Sunday school class and attended Men’s bible study. I also invited the Senior Pastor out for coffee one evening to talk about my search and ask questions about my situation and the church. These were means toward the end of getting a good ‘feeling’ for the church and her people, not just an analytical examination of the strengths and weaknesses of the programs and ministry. One of the things the pastor told me was that relationships matter greatly. I don’t think I had given them as much weight as they deserved prior to that meeting.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Pray, pray, pray and pray some more (Eph. 6:18, Phil. 4:6). This cannot be stressed enough if you are struggling with any decision. It is especially true when choosing a new church for you and your family. Spend time also reading God’s word. Read Acts to learn about things the early church was doing. Read the Timothy 1 & 2 and Titus to learn about what biblical leadership should look like.

Pray also with your spouse and your children. Spend time reading portions of Acts together. Talk to your Christian friends about your decision and ask them to pray for you and your future church. Seek the wise counsel of a trusted elder friend (Prov. 28:26, 13:20) who has gone through what you’re going through. Pray some more. Meditate on God’s word. Repeat. Often.

Pull the Trigger

Remember the shock of not going to your old church the first Sunday after you left? You were comfortable there; it was like second nature to drive there and find your seat on the same side every week. Eventually the shock wore off and you got used to being a ‘drifter.’ If you’re like me, you probably skipped a few Sunday gatherings altogether. But you got used to being uncomfortable.

Strange thing, this: You can get very comfortable being uncomfortable; so much so that it becomes uncomfortable to think about getting comfortable again. Don’t let it happen! Make a commitment! Drop the hammer on that nail and drive it home!

You’re never going to have all the information you need. You’ll never know all the people you should know well enough. There is going to be something that you missed. In the end, you need to trust that God has led you to the place where He wants you to be. (Prov. 3:5)

Don’t worry! (Matt. 6:34) God knows what He’s doing!

Make an informed, educated choice and stick with it. Throw in your lot with the people you feel drawn to intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually. Commit to them and let them commit to you. Enter a relationship with God’s people, do your best to love them and keep praying for the best. (John 13:34-5)

Next: Finishing Up and Starting Over

Now the work really begins, and not just because you can’t wear your pajamas anymore. (Actually, I’ve visited some churches where pajamas would be fine!) You’ve got to get yourself and your family all dressed and ready to do something really difficult and unpleasant: walk into a strange church where you (probably) don’t know a soul.

Attend the prospective church on a typical Sunday morning. Don’t go for the first time on Easter, Christmas, special events, etc. You want to see a ‘typical’ service if possible. If you happen to go to a church for the first time and there is a guest preacher, special event or other non-typical event, plan to go again the following week.  Do not judge any church on only a single Sunday’s attendance. A good rule of thumb is that you’re not qualified to evaluate a church until you’ve attended at least three times.

The exception to the ‘three visits’ rule is if you find something biblically amiss the first time;  like a woman pastor or a Joel Osteen video in a bible study class. There’s really no reason to go back unless it is to advise them to revise their website to reflect reality.

Playing Games

I don’t recommend that everyone do this, but there are some subtle tests you can perform to help evaluate certain aspects of the church during your visit. Perhaps ‘running a play’ would be a more accurate description than playing games.

All the lonely people; where do they all belong?

At two different evangelical megachurches, I stood along the wall of the narthex/commons area all by myself and just kind of looked around. I met people’s eyes whenever possible as they were walking by and nodded or smiled at them. I did this three to five minutes prior to or just after the service. Not a single person stopped to talk to me in either place. The preaching was very good at both churches; the music was acceptable but not great at one, and downright irritating at the other, but this was a deal breaker for me.

I was fishing for a greeting, trying to look as lost and vulnerable as I could, but didn’t succeed in catching anyone. People doing what I was doing should get noticed, and someone (anyone!) should stop and say hello at the very least. (Romans 12:13)

When I ran this play at Parkside Church in Bainbridge, Ohio, a man named Douglas came up to me almost immediately and started a conversation. It was mostly small talk, but it was enough to make me feel welcome and when we parted ways he said he hoped to see me again. Eight months later I still remember his name, so he obviously made an impression. I really, really like Parkside church; unfortunately, it is about a 45 minute drive from my home.

“Hi. My name is Dave Miller, this is my (first, second, third) time here. How long have you been attending?” That’s my standard opening line when visiting a church. Usually, rather than waiting to be approached, I find a man about my age, walk up, put out my hand and ask the question; then I shut up and listen.  There are also a few standard follow-up questions that I’ve used depending on the situation.

• Do you have family here too?
• Where did you go to church before?
• Would you say this is/was a pretty typical worship service?
• What do you like most about this church?
• Does the pastor have any tattoos or piercings?

I’ve never actually asked the last question of anyone, but include it just to make the point that there really isn’t anything that is too far out-of-bounds to ask when visiting a church. If there is anything you are concerned about or just want to know, ask!

Grading on the curve

When you get to your car after the service, write down the names of the people you met and a few short impressions of your experience. After you get home, go over your list of primary and secondary criteria and assign a letter or numerical grade to each if you can. Write down your general impression of the church in more detail and include the input of your family as well. After visiting three churches, each more than once, you can start ranking them.

Remember, there is no perfect church. Don’t be disappointed when you don’t find a church that receives a perfect 10 rating. Part of being a Christian is compromising with fellow believers on non-essential issues (Romans 14:5). As long as the essentials are present (Preaching the whole counsel of God, sacraments are rightly observed, discipleship is practiced and encouraged) the rest is just a subjective decision.

If you made a personal connection with someone, you really hit it off and made fast friends, don’t discount that as unimportant. Personal connections with fellow believers are a big part of being in Christ. This is especially true for your children. If your kids have a connection, that should carry quite a bit of weight when it gets to making a choice.

When I got to the point where I had my list narrowed down to three candidates, I kind of knew in the back of my mind which was the right church for me. As I mentioned in a previous post I’m searching by myself, so if you are searching with your family, (Praise God if you are!) be sure to take their opinions into account too.

Next up: Narrowing down.

The devotional told the story of a pastor who gave a group of children one Lego block each, and then asked them to add each of their blocks to his block and build a “Lego church.” His intention was to demonstrate that each of them was a part of the church. The pastor said that some tried to build something resembling a house, but many pieces were sticking out “on a limb.” Since there were so many different kids with different ideas, the construct looked like “nothing you have ever seen before.”

The pastor summed up this object lesson with the following:

The real church is like that. Each of us brings our piece to add to the whole and even if someone suggests we add it in a certain place, we have our own ideas and place it where we will. It seems like a mess! But then we are reminded that this is not our church [but] Christ’s church and he builds it as he wills it.

God does receive us in the shape we are in and fits us into his church, but the fact of the matter is that we just don’t fit very well; nor should we. We come to God’s church in a worldly form. He meets us where we are, like the woman caught in adultery and like Zacchaeus in the tree, but he doesn’t leave us in the shape we were in when we met Him. The woman caught in adultery was told to go and sin no more (John 8:10-11) and Zacchaeus repented and promised to repay his victims four times over (Luke 19:8).

Likewise, if we remain in the worldly shape that we were in when we come, the church we form will be worldly as well. That’s what the devotional writer got wrong. God’s church doesn’t have parts sticking out in random directions that serve no purpose and we aren’t the ones who form God’s church in the first place! No, Christ reshapes us into the kind of block that He needs for His good purposes. (Matthew 16:18) Look at the quote above again. In one sentence the writer says, “…we have our own ideas and place it where we will.” And two sentences later, he says that Christ “builds it as he wills it.”

Which is it, Mr. Devo Writer?

Are we building it or is Jesus?

In ancient times, the Tabernacle was constructed to very exacting specifications. It wasn’t a random conglomeration of whatever rocks and branches the carpenters found lying around. God spoke to Moses about the materials, the processes, the sizes, the adornment, and the order of all of the parts of the temple, including the priests themselves! (Exodus 26:1-27:21) He ordained who would do the work of the Lord within the temple; and how and when they would do it in order to please Him (Exodus 28:1-31:18). The devotional writer is saying the exact opposite – that we come as we are, we decide how we are going to be, what we are going to do and we make something pleasing to God all by ourselves.

Nothing could be less biblical.

Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of — throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself. – C. S. Lewis in Mere Christianity

I live in an area of Ohio where there are more than 100 churches within a 20 minute drive. I was able to narrow down my list of potential new church homes to about a dozen while sitting at my computer.

The first thing I did was eliminate every church that has “UNI” in its name (Thanks, Todd Friel). United Church of Christ, Unitarian Universalist (double-whammy!) and Unity Church are not worth wasting your time considering because they either tolerate/allow sinful teaching and behaviors or even celebrate them. This is also true to a lesser degree with Evangelical Lutheran, Episcopal and some Presbyterian (PCUSA) churches as well. Elimination of these falls under the heading of “Lack of Biblical Church Discipline.” (See 1 Cor 5:1ff for more information.)

Write down what you believe and why. Be sure to cite scriptural reasons for them if you can. This is not a “preferences” list; it is a list of biblical truths that cannot be compromised. Keep secondary issues out of it for now.

Here is my list (Note the words, is and must):

• One God, three persons, all are God, holy and set apart (Deut 6:4, Matthew 28:19 Isaiah 6:3)
• Man is sinful by nature and separated from God since Adam’s fall (Rom 3:23, 1 Cor 15:22)
• The person and work of Jesus is the focus of the church and the ONLY WAY to reconciliation with God for those he elects (1 Cor 1:2, John 14:6, Acts 4:12, Eph 1:4-5 )
• Jesus lived a sinless life, died an atoning death on the cross, rose from the dead and went to the Father. He’ll be back to collect His church someday (2 Cor 5:21, Acts 2:32-36, 1 Thes 4:17)
• The Bible is God’s word, infallible and inerrant (2 Tim 3:16, John 17:17)
• The church is to preach the whole counsel of God, observe His sacraments (both of them) and foster discipleship (Mat 28:20, Rom 10:17, Luke 22:19, Mat 28:19, 2 Tim 3:16-17, Mat 18:15-17, 1 Cor 5:1-13, Eph 4:11-32 Phil 2:1-18.)
• There must be gospel and monetary outreach to the lost, poor, sick, lonely, hungry, etc. (Mat 25:35-40, 28:19-20, Acts 4:34)

Your list might be a little different from mine, but the basics of Christianity are always the same. This list will be most helpful to eliminate churches from consideration. If they don’t meet these criteria, there’s no reason to even attend a Sunday meeting. A prospective church’s stance on these issues can usually be easily determined with a visit to their website, or with a phone call.

Usually, churches that are affiliated with a particular denomination will say so or provide a link to their parent church on their website. Some do not, though, and it takes some sleuthing to find out if a Presbyterian church is PCA or PCUSA. (Hint: There’s a BIG difference.) Most non-denominational churches spell out what they believe in detail on their websites.

• Preaching should be expositional, verse by verse teaching more often than topical
• Prayer should be a big part of worship, not just reciting the Lord’s Prayer
• Music should be God-honoring, not man-centered. Hymns sung from hymnals are preferred to projected lyrics so I can figure out the tune
• Pianos and organs = good. Drum sets and electric guitars = not so good *
• Bible reading should be a part of worship, (and not just one or two verses)
• Creeds (ie. Apostles, Nicene) should often be a part of worship
• There should be lots of young families and old people. A good mixture of all ages
• There should be plenty of opportunities for Christian growth for the whole family (ie. Bible study, Sunday school)
• There should be plenty of opportunities for fellowship for the whole family

This will help you narrow down your list of prospective churches prior to visiting. Depending on your relationship with your current pastor, you might share these lists with him and ask for a recommendation for a new church for you. This could also be presented to a trusted friend or mentor who knows and understands your reasons for leaving.

Do not pick a church just because it is the only one that offers the kind of music you like. Remember, music in a church service is an offering to God, not entertainment for your enjoyment.

Next up: Visiting is the hardest part.

By far, the most difficult part of changing churches is leaving your current church. My leaving experience earlier this year was far more emotionally taxing than I expected. I am not a particularly sensitive person (My favorite Star Trek character is Spock!), but the feelings of anger, loss, resentment and sadness caught me by surprise. In hindsight, I don’t think I did a very good job leaving my former church, but since I’d never done it before I suppose some errors were inevitable.

There are many reasons people give for leaving a fellowship of believers and the assumption in this article is that you’re leaving for a bona fide (good and faithful) reason. For example; if the whole word of God is not being preached, or if the Sacraments (both of them) are not being rightly observed, or if Christian Discipline is not being practiced, you are not in a true church anyway, so just leave already. (Belgic Confession #29 – You might need to click on Article 29)

Leaving a church, like changing the structure of government, should not be done for “light and transitory reasons.” That is, you don’t leave your church home because the new carpet isn’t the color you like, or the communion wine is too sweet, or even if you don’t get along with the pastor. I know a man who broke fellowship with his church because the preacher didn’t like the same football team as he did. This is selfish and short-sighted. There are times when it is right to leave a church over non-essentials, but not often; certainly much less often than is normally observed in the American Christian experience.

Tim Challies wrote an article on this subject about a year ago that helped me immensely.

John MacArthur has also addressed the issue.

The Nine Marks Blog has a list of 10 Questions you should ask yourself before you leave.

These are reliable resources; use them!

“Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.” – Ephesians 4:29

Though not everything you say to your pastor must be positive, be sure that it is truthful and spoken in love (Eph. 4:15) so that it will accurately inform him to the reasons why you are leaving. Remember, leaving your church is hurtful to a pastor; you are basically firing him from his position as shepherd of your soul. Try to show your pastor the same grace that God has shown to you. Be willing to keep some secondary concerns to yourself, especially if they involve interpersonal differences with other members of the fellowship.

If you do some scouting for new churches before you formally leave your current church, you should assume that word will get back to your pastor about it. This is especially true in a small town and is why you should meet with your pastor first. Don’t do your leaving in the middle of the night, like there is something shameful about it. Remember, you have good reasons, right? Be upfront with your pastor about your concerns and be certain they’re biblical.

You and your spouse should be in agreement about leaving. If not, you have some talking to do (Eph. 5:33). Lean on each other throughout the leaving and the searching process, bear one another’s burdens (Gal. 6:2). Be up-front with your children about leaving; don’t leave anybody in the dark. Explain your reasons to children in terms they can understand. This is a good learning opportunity for them, don’t waste it! (Eph. 6:4)

In my own situation, my family left my former church before I did. They are now at another church they are content with while I search for something better; hopefully for all of us eventually. A word of advice on my situation: Don’t split up. I wish we hadn’t. If you’re going to stay, stay as a family. If you’re going to leave, leave as a family. Dad and Mom going to different churches with or without the kids is a sad situation.

If possible, you should talk to a trusted friend who is also a member of your home church. Tell them the reasons you are leaving – just the same as you told your pastor. Don’t change your story or embellish it! Make sure what you say is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth (Eph. 4:25). Ask them for their prayers and for any insightful advice they might share. Promise to keep in touch and then keep that promise.

Next up:  Searching

When you joined your church, you made a promise to share in the joys and sorrows of the fellowship of believers. Now, perhaps, you think it is time to break that promise and leave your church family. You may be right, but you must be careful.

The purpose of this article is not to encourage you to break your promise and leave the fellowship, but rather to encourage you to consider seriously whether or not it is right, biblically, for you to leave. A few good reasons for you to break from your church are: if you are moving, if you desire better teaching for your children, or if your church has broken their promise to you.

Some hard questions you should ask yourself before you break fellowship with your local church:

Am I leaving because my needs aren’t being met by the people, programs or leadership?

If your answer is yes, you may not be leaving for a biblical reason. Contrary to the Saturday morning children’s song, you are not “The Most Important Person in the Whole Wide World.” Church is not about you and your needs; it is about God and His Glory (Eph. 3:21). He knits together dissimilar parts into a family of fellowship and calls us to bear all things for our brothers and sisters (Eph. 1:4-5, 1 Cor. 13:7). Are you bearing up under difficult circumstances or running and hiding because it’s easier?

Am I leaving because church just doesn’t feel the same as it used to (usually because of changes)?

Contrary to the teaching of Obi Wan Kenobi, you shouldn’t necessarily “trust your feelings.” Your decision needs to involve both your heart and your head, not just your heart. The heart is deceptive and the human mind is deceitful above all things (Jer. 17:9). Leaving shouldn’t be your first course of action; instead, do something to make a positive change to get back a little of that familiar feeling.

Am I leaving because another member is hard to get along with or is stubborn and contentious?

We are called to be forbearing with others and to not be a stumbling block to weaker brothers (Col. 3:13, Lev. 19:14). You have an opportunity to show difficult people in your church how a Christian reacts to conflict. Remember, your church consists of both wheat and tares, and we have to deal with both of them biblically and with love. If you leave, I can guarantee that there will be stubborn people in your next church as well.

Am I leaving because there are too many people who just don’t “get it” like I do?

Again, our churches are full of wheat and weeds. Some Christians are big on unity and couldn’t care less about the truth. Others are more concerned with being biblically correct all the time at the expense of loving their neighbor. There was probably a time not so long ago when you didn’t ‘get it’ either. Talk to your Christian brothers and sisters and help them ‘get it’– it might surprise you to find that they have something to teach you too. Don’t think too highly of yourself. (Rom. 12:3)

Am I leaving because I don’t believe the same as the church does (beliefs or practices have changed)?

Now we’re getting out of the area of bad reasons and into the realm of good reasons to leave a church. There are many issues upon which Christians must hold fast and not compromise. There are many more issues upon which Christians can and should be willing to compromise. Clapping during worship bothers some people and not others; it’s not worth separating over. Outside performers (who aren’t professing believers) singing secular songs during worship is crossing a significant line. Espousing heretical doctrine from the pulpit or allowing people who live in open rebellion to the word of God to lead worship services is another example of crossing a crucial line. Given enough of these line crossings, churches will begin to lose faithful members.

Other good reasons for leaving a church include:

• Leadership promoting tolerance of intolerable doctrines or practices.
• Leadership focusing on something other than the person and work of Christ. (ie. Politics, social activism, growth)
• Local congregation remaining in apostate denominations. (ie. UCC, ELCA, Episcopal, PCUSA)

Even if you have good reasons to leave, you might desire to stay and fight for the truth of the gospel. In my own experience, I stayed and tried to change things in the leadership of the church (I was Chairman of the Elders). After more than a year, having received little support on crucial issues from my fellow elders or the pastor, I left, rather than continue to compromise on what I considered to be Christian essentials.

Selective disregard for the authority of scripture among the leadership was the primary reason for me to leave my former church. It took the form of tolerance (and tacit approval) of the openly immoral behavior of a few professing believers. In other words, Christian Discipline was non-existent.

It seems like a pretty clear-cut reason to leave now that I see it written out so plainly, but things weren’t so clear to me at the time and I’ve done more than enough wrestling with doubt.

Hopefully, though, I’m not like this guy:

Next up: Leaving Well.

This has been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done in my life – and one of the most necessary, because I believe I’ve outgrown my home church.

I like to think of my home church as an incubator; a place where baby believers of all ages are loved and comforted and nurtured with milk until they become mature enough to eat meat. A young believer in an incubator isn’t ready for meat, and a growing believer who is ready for meat doesn’t need an incubator.

I love my incubator because it was there that I first heard the Gospel, where I fell in love with Jesus, where I first tasted and saw that God was good, and it was the place where my faith began to grow. I have in no way outgrown my need to hear the good news; I need to hear it every day, as every believer does.

There are people I am leaving behind who have been in the incubator for decades – their spiritual growth seemingly stagnant – they love their milk and their comfortable surroundings and seem to have no desire for real food. I leave behind people 40 years my senior, whom I love dearly, but who exhibit no signs of Christian growth.

There are others there whose faith seems strong and mature, like a tree growing beside a stream, yielding up fruit in its time. (Psalm 1:3) Some of them are much older than me, and a few of them are younger. These people puzzle me and cause me to question whether or not I should have left.

It broke my heart to leave because I still love my incubator and the believers being nurtured there. Ultimately, though, staying would have meant compromising on Christian essentials, so the decision simply became one of obedience.

But because my perceptions above may be mistaken, and I don’t want to think too highly of myself (Romans 12:3) I chose to leave rather than continue to fight against the rest of the leadership of the church. It is also possible that I should have stayed and kept fighting – I just don’t know. I won’t go into details; but it should suffice to state that the main problem was one of the same things that Paul wrote to the church at Corinth about in his first epistle.

Yet I cannot minimize how the Apostle started out his epistle to this church whose people engaged in immorality, idolatry, worldliness, jealousy, lack of discipline and tolerance of sinful behavior.

To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, saints by calling, with all who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours : Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. – 1 Cor. 1:2-3

I’ve prayed for wisdom in this matter and now think that sometimes you’re just not in a place to make a sound conclusion on an issue. Wisdom is knowing when to stop trying so hard and realize that understanding is further down the road. It will just take time to get there.

The journey continues…

In the meantime, I need to post an announcement to prepare for a continuing series that I probably should have started months ago.

I have left the church that has been my home since I was two years old. It was the only church I ever belonged to in 45 years of life.

This was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done – and one of the most necessary. I won’t go into the specific reasons for leaving right now, but the words of Bill Hill sum it up pretty well, “I will not go on in compromise. I am ashamed that I have gone along as long as I have. The time has come to obey God and not compromise.”

I am searching for a new church home in the Akron, Ohio area, and have been since the first of February. I hope to post short updates on the process from time to time. My intention is that these will prove helpful or edifying for others who are searching for a new church home.

I’m not going to ‘review’ the churches I visit, but I will offer observations and insights from some of them and keep the reader more or less up-to-date on my search.

It took me three years to decide to leave my former church; it was not a spur-of-the-moment decision. I am now actively searching for a new church home and I don’t know how long the search process will take. I tend to be very methodical and thorough, so it could take a while to find the right place.

Trusting in God,

-Dave

Forget about them. Jesus wants you.

Do you think you’re too bad for God to love? Do you think you need to clean up your act before you can get right with God?

Forget about that. Jesus wants you.

He wants you just as you are. He wants you to come to him in honesty and brokenness and tell him you know what you are, a sinner. You’re a mess; God already knows that, and He’s forgiven worse than you. The Bible says He will not break a bruised reed or quench a barely glowing wick. (Matthew 12:20 ESV) Come to him in humility and apologize for the mess you’ve made. Jesus did not condemn a woman caught in adultery; He forgave her and told her to go and sin no more. He promises to do the same for you when you repent and believe.

Christians may look down on you or ignore you, Christ doesn’t.

Churches might make you feel unwelcome, Jesus won’t.

I hope you won’t judge Christ by a church that happens to use His name, or by those who call themselves Christians. The church can’t save your soul and Christians can’t forgive your sins. Jesus can do all that and heal you of whatever sins and griefs you bear.

Jesus wants you. Please, give Him a chance.

It was a diorama about twelve inches square and nine inches high. It depicted a simply appointed living room with a chair, a carpet, a door, and a woman vacuuming. It was an ordinary scene with absolutely nothing remarkable about it. What made this piece of art so memorable to me was what was going on outside the room.

Outside was a fanciful array of men and monsters of all different colors, sizes and shapes. Their tentacles, arms, legs and eyes were all interwoven and they surrounded the room and the woman doing her chores. Inside was a scene of mundane toil; outside was total chaos.

UPDATE: Here is the work of art described above. Click for a larger version.

That piece of artwork depicted my life at the time. To the casual observer, I was an average guy working an average job living in an average house and driving an average car. My main worries were losing my job, losing my wife, losing my house, losing my car and my dwindling bank account.

Since saving faith was granted to me by God through Jesus, I really don’t worry much about my job or whether I will have enough food or clothing (Luke 12:29-31), nor even about having enough money. Strangely enough, I still identify with this piece of artwork and am still concerned with many things.

The monsters lurking outside my window today are my sins that I don’t want to do, but keep doing (Romans 7:15); my unsaved family (both those who claim to know Christ but produce no fruit and those who overtly deny Him); my friends at church who seem biblically illiterate and apathetic about the Gospel;  people I work with who are trapped in a legalistic religion; and what, if anything, I can do to help bring these people to Christ.

For now I think I will pray about it (1 Peter 5:7), be still, and know that God reigns. (Psalm 46:10)