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How to find the right church

Regular Network Norwich and Norfolk columnist James Knight looks at how finding a good church helps us use our talents and have the freedom to be ourselves.

As a writer who, due to a very wide circulation list, receives lots of emails and correspondence, I am often surprised how many people wish to talk about their church - usually, I’m sorry to say, about problems they are facing or some kind of dissatisfaction that pervades throughout their church life. I am, however, pleased to say that I think they are in the minority, and the impression I get is that most Christians have very healthy church lives. I think, in general, we should be proud of the broad and diverse ranges of churches, and of the fact that there are many different styles of worship to suit many different kinds of worshippers. There should be no church rivalry or competition; God intended us to be part of the same body - the body of Christ His Son - united in our common love for one another and in our desire to make a difference in the world.

Having said that, this two part message about how to find the right church is not just written for those who are dissatisfied with their church life, or indeed for those who are looking to begin church life and wonder what they should be looking for - it is for every church member, in the hope that people can identify strengths and weaknesses in their own church and act upon such identification. Moreover, given that there is likely to be a significant increase in church attendance in the next few years, it will be good for us to see if we have got our house in order.

If you were to ask many young people of today to close their eyes and picture a church, I should imagine many of them would picture an antiquated grey building with a predominantly elderly congregation. Now one of the pivotal roles of the modern day Christian is to help change this image, for when it comes to reaching out, church in the 21st century is about making connections with people who are on the outside. No Christian should accept, by itself, the epigram ‘Church is the place where we go to worship’; for in truth, when we speak of ‘The Church’ we are really speaking primarily about people, not buildings. The quality of the church is garnered by the quality of the congregation, and a successful church will have good and productive activities on days other than Sundays, such as midweek groups for connecting up, Bible study groups, prayer meetings, good social opportunities for people to get to know one another better, and strong induction programs for newcomers to make them feel welcome and to help them fit in well.

Each of us is called to find the church that best suits our needs, to serve and be served - the church in which God calls us to become a member. In one sense, we should really believe that our church is the best church in the province, as should all the members of the other churches, for if you do not believe that your church is the best, it probably isn’t the right one for you. That is the cardinal criterion by which we realise this standard; whether or not it is the church to which God has called each of us - that to me is a sine qua non - otherwise why wouldn’t you be in the church that you think is better?

Love in the church

The love that exists between church people is, presumably, a love that has a little bit of the ‘Heavenly’ about it, although, of course, we are much less developed and still only learning our trade. Of course no church is perfect, and in every church there will inevitably be strands of the bad things - but they should be solecisms and aberrations, not a predominant part of church life. The friendships that church provide ought to exhibit a wonderful togetherness by congruity, which is, of course, Heaven sent - while at the same time exhibiting genuine opportunities for growth and inclusion. The numerous people who are blessed in amazing ways are each on the right road to Godly fruition, and each special relationship has commonalties with every other relationship, but also a uniqueness with which God has blessed them individually.

In the second place the church, through their love for people, ought to remain at all times in touch with the genuine needs of the city in which they live - and be influential in changing the perceptions of people on the outside by bridging the gap between Christianity and secularity. Any church member should attend a place in which he or she feels proud to invite his or her friends to a Sunday meeting in full knowledge that the church is able to connect brilliantly with folk in the 21st century. If you are in a church where the congregation isn’t growing or you are not seeing very many people come to Christ - something is wrong!

Avoid heavy shepherding

A good church brings together a diverse range of people, where they can be one strong collective force and at the same time strong individual servants of the Lord. The real exaltation of knowing how best to serve the individual springs up in a good church, and shatters any contemporary illusions about the church being out of touch with the people and eager to shepherd them heavily. More importantly - one of the big challenges of the contemporary church is to shatter the illusion that collectivism is bound to either marginally dehumanise a man or woman, or ruthlessly dilute his or her personal abilities. Both illusions are shattered in the very best churches, and this is something to which every church leader must pay great attention.

The myth of equality

There are several Christian doctrines that assert a parity between all individuals; we are all fallen, we are all sinners, we are all reliant upon grace, we are all undeserving - there is no favouritism with God. But if the church takes this into bad and excessive areas - if this parity overlaps into the domain of fabricated equality (the insistence that everyone is seen as the same) then there will be problems in the congregation. This ‘fabricated equality’ will be a recurring topic as we proceed with this message. By fabricated equality, I mean this; if a minister claims that we are all the same, and he means that we all have equal rights, then he is, of course, right. But if he thinks ‘the same’ means ‘interchangeable’ (as some do) then he is quite wrong. Any kind of parity which implies that the individuals are interchangeable (like equal value coins) is in fact a nonsense. It might be useful in some areas of life where an undisturbed prejudice might lead to ill feeling or (much worse) violence, but it is never based on truth; thus we must expel it from the church, for all things in church should always pertain to what is true, and the belief that ‘we are all the same’ is one of the falsest views that anyone can possess.

The main function of true things (aside from separating them from false things) is to reveal to us in subtle ways the parts of the Divine that we can receive in our time on earth. We have nothing to gain from trying to arbitrarily shuffle creatures of God into an order which suits our church or our leaders - we cannot turn works of art painted by the Divine hand into mere paper etchings; we cannot make monochrome from full colour. A strong church that realises this will only remain strong whilst it is realising this. If this realisation is abandoned, diluted, or forgotten, the congregation can retain only what can be justified by civic practices and day to day congeniality.

It is on this point that I want to say the following; if you are in a church that you feel shepherds heavily, or tries to suppress or hinder individual talent, or tries to repress personal opinions, or tries to dissuade people from developing their own unique abilities, or treats everyone as though they are the same, or discourages people from having much involvement with the outside world, or deters people from academic learning and developing one’s own knowledge through the medium of books, then something ought to be done about it – and it is with that thought that I turn to the next section.

Helping people develop their talents and abilities by avoiding ‘fabricated equality’

It is true that many churches in the 21st century are alarmingly out of touch with 21st century people (although it is true that many 21st century people are out of touch with good traditional Christian values). As I have said, all the best churches are the ones which encourage the talented and the blessed to develop their abilities in serving God. Really bad churches shepherd heavily and end up taking people out of themselves, to the extent that if a young Aquinas, a young Joyce, a young Auden, or a young Descartes should enter the congregation, the priest, the curate and many of the elders would soon try their hardest to bring him into standardisation. He would in the end forget about the precociousness that God had given him - every engine of dismantlement would be levelled against him.

The antidote for the stifling of talent is that talent should be attended to, not that each situation should be treated as neuter. To attend closely to other people’s talents and help passionately to cultivate them the leaders must develop and retain a sincere and devoted enthusiasm for making the most out of every single person’s abilities – for then they will see a healthy, vibrant and successful church. To try our hardest to do justice to the awesome nature of God, we must do justice to the awesome nature of His creation by helping them discover and nurture their God-given abilities, for whenever we do we glorify His name. But that does not mean that whenever we try to glorify His name, we always do justice to those whom He has created. The act of bringing out the best in each individual is in itself a way of glorifying God - it is helping to bring out things that will glorify Him both to the subject and to all those who witness such glorification.

Having spoken of churches bringing out talent - this does not, of course, mean making the less-talented people feel inferior, or showing special favouritism to those whose talents are more outwardly evident. For the less-talented do not, in fact, desire talent or think of talent in the same way that one might presume they do. Very often those who think that talent lies only in the outwardly talented do not really understand talent at all. God has given gifts and abilities to all of us in a multitudinous variety of ways; thus if dedicated each man and woman can work towards his or her potential - a potential that will bring them the ‘full life’ that Christ promised to those who follow Him with all their hearts (John 10:10). True recognition of talent is a recognition of this; it involves those who ‘can’ encouraging those who ‘don’t think they can’ - encouraging them to explore fully the talents and abilities and strengths that God gave them and wants to develop more - thus, encouraging them to have a full life with Christ.

It ought to be noted that there is a danger that church members must avoid – a danger quite specific to those who are easily swayed by others or by their environments outside of church – they are those who cannot quite hold their Christian life and their secular association in both hands – they end up dropping some of the good Christian principles by keeping a tight grip on the outside influences with their other hand. With one hand they try to hold onto devotional things that help them maintain a good church life, but they will soon find that if the good Christian life isn’t grabbed firmly with both hands, the secular pull can be quite forceful (we must be ‘in’ the world but not ‘of’ the world). This is why one must be alert to the danger (perhaps the only danger) of bringing others to church; for some can go on to have negative influences. Bring them in, in fact, try your very hardest to bring them in – they need us - but keep a firm grip on your own Christian principles and do not dilute the true collectivity of Christianity in which you now belong. This is perhaps our biggest challenge in reaching the masses - we must, as Pascal said, ‘Touch both extremes and fill all that lies between’.

Collectivity and individuality

One of the primary resistances to Christianity (albeit a subtle resistance) is the contemporary feeling that Christian togetherness is an outrage upon 21st century living - after all, most other forms of collectivism have been successfully incorporated into each other to the point that most thought-groups (politically, sociologically, ideologically and methodologically) are, in the modern day fantasy of utopian progression, leading us down one common path. Really good churches are able to show newcomers that the path is much wider than they realised.

All good churches find ways to stop a particular tendency amongst young Christians; the tendency for part of an emotional exchange to impede the greater thing to which the exchange duly belongs - some examples of which are; a man’s need to spread the word hinders his need to practice the word; over emphasis on a claustrophobic discipline hampers some of his natural abilities; solitary reading and learning detaches him from the outside world; he gets so caught up in giving (for others) that he makes little or no time to receive (from God); and the hurried desire to become a fully grown Christian encroaches upon his ability to steadily developing a relationship with others. I think that a man can only safeguard against these things if he is in a good quality church where such possibilities are extremely minimal, but one must be mindful of these knotty entanglements.

If these possibilities become actualities or if the church is too heavy with its shepherding it won’t be long before our man has fallen foul to their injudicious ways. The church is a union in the Heavenly body, therefore one must be allowed to develop as an individual as well as a part of the collective body. Carpenters know that if they want to get a tight screw out of hard wood they must press down hard; the harder they press inwards the easier the screw will come outwards. But when it comes to helping a young man remove his bad habits and his sinful ways, the opposite approach is by far the best way; that is, the harder you push the tighter the screw will become. No, we must help a man out of his old self by being gentle and kind, just as Christ was gentle and kind to those who did not know very much about their wrongdoings or were too afraid or parochial to face up to them. It should be remembered that almost no one comes to church because they want to be cured of their inner wrongs (they usually learn the true extent of this later), they usually come to belong somewhere (as a result of being invited by someone who already belongs there), to investigate Christianity, or ideally, they come to do both.

The homogeny that is so often seen in members of other groups such as Communist and Socialist groups is very far from what we are called to be as groups of Christians in Christ. St Paul talked about the palpable difference in individuals within a church, but stressed the importance of collectivity amongst the diversity. A good church family will excel at collectivity amongst diversity, in the same way that a household family excels by being very different individuals.

Good collectivity is sometimes shown by reductionism; that is, take away one distinct individual and you see a weakened structure (if it were not, he or she would not be a beneficial part of the structure) but also you see a different type of unity is formed not in spite of his or her absence but because of the absence. That is why, for example, three friends who are great individuals provide a very different table atmosphere than if just two of the three were present; for when the third individual is back in the group his presence accentuates the diversity and restores the harmonious union - both as individuals and in collectivity. This rule moves in all areas of relationships - all the time celebrating the distinct nature of each person and the many varying facets to his or her personality in the many varying situations (A can bring out things in B that C cannot bring out, yet C can bring out things in B that A cannot, and so on). That is why it would be very peculiar for a boy to behave exactly the same in the company of his mother and his best friend, for his relationship with his mother is the one that best allows him to be himself more than any other relationship. That, incidentally, is the principal reason why schoolchildren become embarrassed when their friends and parents come together, for the mother knows the real nature of her child, she knows the parts which he wanted to save for his home life, the parts he didn’t want his friends to see.

And it is with this in mind that we stumble upon something else that is very important; church should be a place where none of this goes on; that is, we should never treat church as a place where we can go and be someone else for the evening - it should be the one place where we can all go to be ourselves - in the house of God, in the presence of our brothers and sisters in Christ. In some ways, a bad church can force a man to put on a mask that he does not wish to put on; thus he never gets out of church what he should be getting out. His growth is stifled because all of his church friends - well meaning and caring as they are - are oblivious to his true self and thus insensible when it comes to his real needs. They spend too much time shifting the lights of the collective into dark corners where nobody sits.

Good churches should consist of a significant difference between the minister and his congregation – rather like the difference between a father and his sons. The predicates (that is, the qualities) shared between the church leader(s) and the folk in the congregation should of course exist as a commonality of Christ-like things. Such shared predicates are what Christ uses to cement good relationships between pastors and church members - all the time making themselves very approachable and exhibiting a keen willingness to meet in private with anyone who so wishes. This type of relationship helps instil a blanket of comfort over the church body, while at the same time creating a great impression for newcomers in the church. Just as self-effacement is the pathway to true inter-personal comfort, and keenness for absorption the pathway to growth; the true pathway to become yourself in a congregation is found in a collective unity in which all members put Christ first, over and above their own wisdom.

Having established the qualities of collective unity, we must guard against a possible misconception - one which most good churches guard against very well and most bad churches do not. It is something that we touched on a moment ago. You will naturally find in all churches a substantial stratification, or at least substantial differences, in individual’s abilities. Churches should of course play to everyone’s strengths - utilising the gifts and talents of each member of the congregation while helping to create and install a belief in the unity of the collective - what some might call ‘All essential cogs in the machine’, or what St Paul would call, ‘Body parts working together’. And having admitted all this, good churches are then able to guard against the occurrences of genuine talent being stifled in the big machine; thus the big cog cannot do the work that a little cog should be doing any more than a foot can help your eyes focus in on small objects.

So, returning to the subject of equality, we have two types of equality; the first kind acknowledges that we are all created in the image of God, and that He has no favourites - His love for us is not measured by our gifts and talents. And the second kind is what one might call ‘equality in individuality’ - that is, being free and equal in honing talents and putting them to good use in areas where others may not be able to do so. As I have already mentioned, the stifling fault that all churches must guard against is ‘fabricated equality’ - it is a necessary part of political thinking and many other areas of life, but it does not belong in churches, nor in schools or universities. If a type of fabricated equality is created in a church or in a system of education, it soon shows itself to be cruelly exposing the real inequalities amongst the congregation. To lose this point is to be guilty of misunderstanding what equality really is – and as I have already mentioned, equality is perceived in two different ways, the first is an incorrect perception - the second a correct one. When equality is linked to deserts it is almost always based upon false premises. St Paul was quick to point out to the Romans that all of us have fallen short of the glory of God, thus all of us ostensibly fall short of the ability to self-govern - we must strive to be governed by our sovereign Lord.

And here we something vitally important - something that is misunderstood by so many Christians; there are no claims in the Bible that God created an egalitarian world. He gave us the freedom to excel so long as humility was the predominant factor in our excellence - but He also created us to be governed, by our parents, by the authorities, and by those who know better than us. We are governed by people because it is in our interests to be governed; thus the real nature of equality has to bear this in mind. Knowledge of the qualities of equality is knowledge of its real position. That is why theocracies are such abominable things, because priests, rabbis, imams and religious political figures are fallen men like us. Authorities rule (or should rule) by prudence not by sanctimony. That is why a church with a sanctimonious preacher will almost always be a bad church; there will be unrest and underachievement in the house of God. A good preacher lowers himself in stature and becomes exalted in humility and wisdom.

Do not misunderstand me. I am not in the least trivialising this fabricated equality, which is the main deterrent against our acting in accordance with our bad instincts. This equality is in many respects in the same mould as our aesthetic tastes; that is, we are compelled by the tacit laws of civility to say we like a lady’s new hairstyle or an old man’s recalcitrant grandchildren. And of course, no harm is done by such placatory actions. But if we attempted to recover the changes by which we arrived at these tacit laws in the hope of introducing a better method of realism we should probably find that the facade of fabricated equality is really one of our best opportunities for kindness and generosity, even at times when we do much feel like being kind or generous.

The fabricated equality must never be abolished and nor should any man wish that it were. It exists for our protection, it is not for our edification and certainly not for our pleasure (although there are very slight interrelations with both). By defying what we actually see and feel we avoid being hurtful and disrespectful, and this is, of course, as welcome in church as it is anywhere else. But if it is taken further and used to propagate notions of equality in the sense of being equal in gifts and talents then it all becomes terribly fraught, creating uncertainty in whichever church the invocation occurs.

St Paul points out that the value each of us has is a value which exists because of God, not outside of Him. Christ died because we are unworthy not because we are worthy. And if words like ‘worthy’ and ‘unworthy’ grate like fingernails running down a blackboard it is not because of any sense of feeling meritocratic inner-worth or self-achievement - it is because this dissonant feeling has crept in from outside influences - influences that promote fabricated equality in the same way that Colegate promotes their toothpaste.

No church has a happy congregation if the leaders make it their business to stifle talent. The real equality comes, not in our faults but in our efforts to become better. And if anyone ever wondered why a good church is so much more pleasurable to be in than any other organisation or social group, and why a bad church is so much more frustrating than, say, a bad golf club or a bad dance group, it is, I think, for this reason. Within the church it is not simply the individuals alone that matter - it is the individuals as a group - as a part of the Divine togetherness. When the whole place is united in worship and praise for Christ, we step outside that existence which decrees parity; we delight in servitude, and we rejoice in humility in ways that no other gathering can imagine.

Any moment that we offer unadulterated praise for a fellow church member is a delightful experience, one in which, on the outside world, envy and hubris will allow only adulterated praise. As the outside world tries to homogenise us with the insidious threat of fake-democracy, the church offers us the one place where we can be free, free to be who we are; free to grow in God’s presence. Already here we can sense that those whose churches discourage such things would probably feel a little ashamed at the constrictions they impose if they were to see sense for a moment. I do not mean that we should champion lawlessness, of course, for all the best churches have good moral discipline - but they are also spiritually disciplined, intending to help us become the kind of people that God wants us to be. The good church has the good body and it makes the individual, any individual who should walk through the door, a part of that body. He or she gradually becomes ‘A pillar in the temple of God’ (Revelation 3:12 ).

This message concludes next week