It is easy to pile invective upon the Church or casually dismiss her importance and value.
"I like Christianity, just not the people."
"I would follow Christ, but for the Christians."
"I am spiritual, but not religious."
"The Church is a mess..."
"All the Church needs is (fill the blank)."
It is easy to parrot these lines. In fact, we all do it. Few of us, in our frustration with a broken world, are willing to strike out against God, so the blow falls upon His servant Abel. The Church is an easy target for one's frustrations with God and the world.
This is what turns everyone in the pew into a armchair critic, often with resentment and gossip. This what turns every seminarian into an idolatrous idealist--intent upon rectifying all that is ill. It is what hardens the aged pastor, who looks out upon a broken people and sees a mirror upon his own brokenness as an undershepherd. Of course, these are all pessmistic caricatures. Satan stirs up the hearts of us all to judge God's work by the brokenness of His people rather than the bounty and beauty of His powerful work in their hearts.
As a young pastor, I am beginning to truly comprehend the wonderful, horrendous calling upon the pastor. My idolatrous idealism is progressively and graciously being dashed against the rocks of the real world. Otherwise, like so many others, I would become another casualty of the pulpit (as so many are). Broken marriages, gossip, stagnation, obstinacy, self-righteousness, complacency--all of these things weigh upon my heart. Every perceived failure, setback, or inability to move forward is felt within my bones.
And in all these things, a mirror is placed before my own heart and I am found desperately wanting. In this overwhelming conviction, I find the God-ordained pathway toward greater Spirit-wrought maturation. My insecurities erode in waves of sanctification; my insufficiences in cries of helpless dependence.
These are three lessons that I am learning with regard to my own growth and that of the church, by God's grace:
1) Prayer. It is not a simple act, but a means of grace and a lifestyle. I must not simply approach the throne of grace, but live there, even in my broken estate. It is through prayer that I realize I am always at the end of myself and the beginning of life in Christ. It is through prayer, alongside of the other means of grace, that God transforms my heart to love His people in their brokenness, my mind to savor the Truth I proclaim, and my eyes to see His sovereign hand at work. This subsequently leads to the next lesson.
2) Providence. As mentioned earlier, it is incredibly easy to judge God's work by man's skewed standards. I do this all of the time! God does not operate on my timetable, which is of profound comfort, as I do not share in His omnipotence, wisdom, and compassion. One soldier here recently told me that the Church is in bad shape because we are not doing the miracles that God has called us to do. Aside from the faulty theology, this view betrays a profound lack of trust in God's providence. God continually strengthens His people in their sin and will use them for His sake.
3) Productivity. I must labor to equip the saints to lose themselves, even as God has equipped me to lose myself. God's providence, with His power and goodness in Christ, frees His people from their sinful impulses to do great work for His sake. It also leaves us with no excuse not to act. Our sin and our failings do not render our cause hopeless. Hope abounds. And in prayer, outreach, and service, we demonstrate our trust in His providence. These things all require us to lose ourselves for His sake. Without them, we confess Christ and bid Him make use of others who are "so inclined." We celebrate at the feast of His eventual victory, but fail to taste the fruits that make life meaningful.
Jesus Christ loved His ugly bride so much that He poured out His own blood to wash her clean and wash her white as snow. May I not assail she who has been purchased by His own blood. And may I seek daily to add to her number. In the schoolhouse of prayer, I learn anew to pour myself out for the Gospel, clinging to His gracious providence, and am thus made fit for His service by His Spirit's power and for Christ's sake.
