Do you know of any companies that said “sorry” to the public… when they weren’t getting sued for something? For instance, like Microsoft apologizing to the public with a statement “we are sorry for the troubles we’ve caused you,” and then gave you something to prove it… like Windows 7 for free? Not that that’s actually happening- in fact they’re selling Windows 7 for a little cheaper for a limited time, but it wasn’t an apology, it was a sales tactic. How about the government? What would we do if Congress publicly apologized to citizens for misrepresenting them? I wouldn’t know what to do with myself. I probably wouldn’t do anything since it’s still so disconnected with my everyday life, but has it happened? I know they’ve “served us,” but have they ever apologized to us for something they did wrong?
This is part 2 of our little series about why we want to plant a different kind of church.
What about the church? I remember reading this book called Blue Like Jazz, by Donald Miller where he tells a story about setting up a confession booth on the campus of a very liberal college. The confession booth was not so that students could come and confess their sins of the weekend, but so that the Christians on campus could have a face to face confession to Christ-resistant students of the wrongs of the church over history (like the Crusades)–an apology. Too bad this is only talked about in a book and was done maybe this once. Some Christians may think there is not much for the church to apologize about–after all, we are the good guys right? I think this is a naive way to look at the church today. We are painfully misrepresenting the Gospel and Christ–who is the very nature and radiance of God. There are some very good things about the church. It is not all bad, but we as a culture–our media, our own memories–tend to latch onto those mistakes that make the whole body (not to mention God himself) smell rotten. For us to deny that there is a problem, however–a disconnect between the character of Christ and the Body of Christ– would be an avoidance of the truth. What if we, as the body of Christ, could offer the public a “peace offering,” an apology for the bad track record of the church in general? What could that look like? How would the public respond?
the signs were edited. original @ http://bit.ly/Zebub
In part 1 of this series we talked a little about architectural theology, that basically when you walk into a church and observe how its built and what’s in it, you can figure out what they believe. For instance the Greek Orthodox churches believe in a grand and transcendent God who is far off and majestic, you can tell by how much effort and money they spend on decorating their church buildings. For some churches I’ve been to, I couldn’t tell what that particular church really believed; it wasn’t really defined. Sure, God, obedience, Jesus dying for our sins were part of their messages, but their actions were quite different. It almost seemed that they believed in paying the bills.
I read an article today on msnbc about some bus ads in Iowa that said “Don’t believe in God? You’re not alone.” There was some tension over the ads and a tug-o-war of it getting pulled and put back on, but the lady in charge of the ads for the buses had said “the issue was with the word God. They’ve never used it before to maintain some autonomy. We’ve had churches advertise, but it’s been for their church, not their belief” (emphasis mine). I knew it was true once I read that, because every commercial I’ve seen about God has rather been about a denomination or a church. That itself, speaks what our theology really is. We care more about our church or denominational ties more than we do about restoring people’s faith in God and knowing Jesus. Again, we would rather replace the carpet in our church than fund a ministry to feed the local homeless for a year. But hey, if that carpet gets you to believe in God, it must be worth it, right?
This is one of the reasons why we don’t want to plant a church with a building program–that is, a building program that results a church building. Aside the building cost, with all the money that goes into maintaining a church building, which is nearly 70 cents to the dollar donated or tithed, we have to wonder if there’s a more efficient way to serve in worship. Not just because a church building costs so much, in fact, I’d rather build something more expensive, but I guess I’m looking for something with a little more balanced faith:works ratio.
Humility is a major trait of Jesus that is lacking in the church– sure, we’ve tried to act that way as individuals, and that’s really important, but somewhere in the translation to being humble as an organized body of Christ, that humility was quenched a bit. That is where we want to respond.
Comment! What does your church’s building say to you? What do you wish your church would publicly apologize for?
Not familiar with what we’re talking about?
Try starting here at Part 1 – Architectural Theology.
Tags: apology, church, representation, Vision-Series