Regular Network Norwich and Norfolk columnist James Knight looks at the church as a place of encouragement and growth in the second part of his column on how to find the right church.

 

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The importance of Christians gathering together in love and mutual support in pressing on with our journey cannot be overstated, after all, we find exhortations in scripture which encourage us to ensure that we do not get in the habit of falling away – for we all know that many who fall away from church life often are susceptible to falling away from Christ:

 

 

One analogy I like, which I didn’t invent, is one told to me by an elder of my first church. I remember shortly after becoming a Christian feeling dissatisfied with church life, and I queried with this gentleman whether it was wholly necessary to attend church. He said that although this church might not be the one for me, I would be wise to find a place I could call home. He likened the situation to that of a red hot coal fire (the church) and each piece being one valuable member of the congregation. If you take a lump of red hot coal out of the fire and put it on the hearth it would retain its heat for a while, but soon it would fade from red to black and lose all of its heat.  His point was that just like the lump of coal, away from the Church family I would have less efficient means of receiving the fire that one needs to glow in the faith, and as my journey progressed I came to see that this was a very good piece of wisdom.

 

A friend once said to me, ‘I don’t really need to go to church, I have enough friends as it is’.  Now of course if friendships were all that one required from a church then she is quite right. But step into a good church and you will see something remarkably different; you will see individuals who are able to reflect the Divine light like no other earthly congregation - just as you would expect from a place that calls itself the House of God. 

 

Friendship is never a bad place to start, but we should be quite wrong if we thought that friendships were all that we would find. Many people in this world do not bother to approach Christ for a friendship because they try hard to be perfectly happy with everyday men and women whom they have chosen as friends. But it is not always noticed that some of these friendships are only good if one’s state of mind is sound from the beginning. If you are a bad man to begin with, some friendships can help you become good, but many others will simply make you worse. The same applies to romantic love - in fact, to everything that is perceived as special in this world. Special things almost always have behind them something which absentmindedness has no trouble overlooking.  As humans we may have proficient abilities to sharpen each other just as iron sharpens iron, but even the best men will burr their edges from time to time. In short, we are going to need more than mere human abilities if we are to have any hope of wisdom and success in life – we are going to need help from Christ, the founder of the church, and the Creator of all who belong to it. 

 

When Christ works through people something very peculiar happens. He is able to draw together individuals who, without Him, would often have little in common with each other or, in some cases, absolutely no interest in each other. Some of my more traditional Christian friends and I have virtually nothing in common except our love for Christ, but strangely that is more than enough. The most natural feeling of all, the one which truly embodies a man’s love for his church is, in a diluted sense, the same kind of love that a man has for God (although this is only usually realised when one has it).

 

When I was looking for a suitable church at the beginning of my Christian journey, I used to suspect that any tendency to a fervid liking for one type of church might be regarded simply as a temptation to a fervid disliking for all the others. But I was led into thinking this by the profusion of (what I considered to be) bad or unsuitable churches that I visited throughout my search for the right one. Very often an aversion to a particular type of church is, in the positive sense, a particular likeness for a particular type of congregation or style of service. I do not think, however, that this is how we should go about finding the right church for ourselves; for I think we should look to God for the answer - that is, look to Him to help us find and settle in the church that He chooses for us. 

 

The more we absorb the love between Christ and our friends in the house of God the less we can attach any great importance to the things which some of us will invariably see as disagreeable traits. In other words, the love both of God and for God can easily look through these things while at the same time willing the eradication of such traits. If grace is able to bring about improvements in nature and in creatures who are loved into nature, it must expand into every part the individual - into the full richness of the diversity which God intended when He created us the way we are.

 

Most church polls conducted on the streets show a heavy leaning towards church disfavour; that is, a large majority of people think that church is boring, antiquated and irrelevant. And this, of course, shows the necessity to bring the church up to date with the times. I do not of course mean alter doctrine, nor eradicate tradition - but it seems that the fervours of antiquity that once seemed so irremovable may be in fact the things that are stopping many churches from connecting with the people of today. It might be worth asking - were these fervours meant to last anyway? Certainly not at the expense of progression. And perhaps the worst thing of all is that these treasured fervours in the past which are so tormenting if we try to inculcate them in the minds of 21^st century folk were only wholesome, alimentary and beneficial when church members were happy to accept them for their real qualities - for their sacredness. In other words, they were never the things that attracted people to the church; they were part of its precious internal enchantment. Thus we should aim to keep these things, yet at the same time aim towards moving with the times so that we can connect with young and old people of today. This would be a truly wise position to take regarding the church of today; we must not mistake great memories for the real nutritive things, for if we try to exhume them - if we try to conjure them back, they will send up through the soil things which we scarcely recognise. If we leave the bulbs undisturbed, we shall see new flowers will come up. But pull them up with gloves on and sift through them hoping to get the glorious flowers of yesteryear and you will get nothing.

 

 

It is naturally important to have great churches. Without great churches, the belief that Christianity is both wonderful and necessary will soon dwindle into a mere sentiment. No church is perfect - as the old adage goes – ‘If you find a perfect church do not attend for you are bound to spoil its perfection’. We should not, of course, expect a perfect church (although sometimes I suspect we do). A great church will be found, not in expectation, but in obedience. For if the magic of creating a good church was going to remain tangible in every square inch for the rest of our days, then surely the magic would have to be, in one sense, factitious. Magic is in the truest sense in the making as well as in the completion - for this is the type of magic that is not produced synthetically - it is the magic which is most true to everyday life - thus it is the magic that is most likely to bring magic into everyday life as well. But mix the powder of construction and the powder of completion and there will be an explosion, for all the magical things in a church are instances or consequences of bigger (and often unknown or only partially known) Divine truths.   That is why all good sermons should encompass the reality of the eternal truth; that is - that membership and unity in Christ will be around forever - each living soul who stands in front of Him will see eternity as theirs. Thus the preacher desires not to excel with timeful things - he desires to excel with eternal things - while at the same time excelling in the present. 

 

Songs have always been very important to me, but here I must embarrassingly admit that I am no great lover of traditional church hymns; embarrassing because, in stating here that my great love is for the Pentecostal movement, the admission might be taken as a boast - which it is certainly not; for in fact, I often wish that I liked them more. It is something that I very much regret but I can do nothing about my dislike for them, just as I can do nothing about my dislike for onions, parsley or anchovies. Many of the hymns are, to me, bad poetry accompanied by insipid organ music - and as much as I have tried to like them, I have never been able to do so (save for half a dozen of them). 

 

Some of the very best hymns are able to evoke in me numinous thoughts, but I cannot at all be certain that it is the hymn itself that has caused this feeling. In fact, I do not see why it should. I find correlative explanation, when stripped of its own coincidences and endowed with the coincidences of some other correlative explanation, a mode of which it is surely impossible to distinguish from other modes. In other words, why should a good hymn, played and sung beautifully, elicit in me numinous feelings which one would expect to be present at all times throughout the service? If the whole act of singing hymns is simply memorial, it would seem to follow that the value of singing must be purely psychological, and dependent on the recipient’s sensibility at the moment of reception. And I cannot see why this particular reminder should resonate more than other reminders - for I am reminded of Christ’s glory in so many other things as well.

 

I hope I am not misunderstood, I do not wish for you to think that I dislike them in churches; in fact, the times when I thought I could locate the true beauty of simultaneously worshipping through singing the hymns and absorbing all that is meant to be absorbed from them, were times that it was easy to see how others who were more attuned to their real qualities could be blessed through them.

 

A moment ago I hinted that I particularly like the style of songs sung in Pentecostal churches. Perhaps it is because the music is very much like the music of some of my favourite bands and artists - but I think there is something more. The songs are, in my view, extremely well written, and able to evoke in me much of the numinous fervour that I find lacking in other types of Christian music. Perhaps that also explains why Christian music has never achieved critical acclaim amongst the cognoscenti of popular music - why the works of, say, Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, Bob Dylan, Pink Floyd, David Bowie, and Neil Young, will always be of a higher critical standard than, say, Hillsong or Delirious or Sonic Flood. Perhaps the latter can only be fully appreciated by those who are able to appreciate the Divine spirit from whence the influence for the songs came. But I do not know for sure, you will have ask those whose musical prowess or musical appreciation is better than my own. 

 

To the outsider, church must often seem to involve a desperate claim for having found the answers. But to take up your crosses and follow Christ - in fact, to be in a room full of people who have done the same, involves, at some level, a shocking level of amazement for those who stand side by side with them. And those who wish to be sceptical about church have the ideal medicine to swallow. Those for whom trepidation comes freely can claim that going to church will hold them back from true individualism; they will claim that becoming part of a new group will purge them of their perceived individualistic qualities. But to become a member of the church to which God calls you to belong involves not becoming undressed but becoming reclothed. Often this is only known when we come to realise that our present attire is not a basis (or datum) from which we can know Him. The parts of our character and personality which we most want to hold onto for fear of losing their personification are only really shadows of the real self. And it remains as true today as it did when the early Christians founded the first Christian churches that we will take our place as a small cog in a big machine - we will be parts of an eternal engine. And naturally if it is true that a man can only find his true self by a union with Christ it is going to be imperative that he finds the right church for himself - a church that will best help him to grow in Christ. A church that best allows a man to submit himself to the collectivism is already helping him to create a real personality - one that is part of the union of Christ. 

 

Each and every one of us who has found salvation will have different needs in their church life and different preferences. No one church is suitable for everyone, that is why we should celebrate diversity and equality while at the same time trying to make sure that our church is delivering in the areas in which all churches should deliver. 

 

All the things I have described in both last week’s message and this one - they will not necessarily be at the forefront of everyone’s mind as they look for a place of worship. And that, I think, is the real beauty of the house of God. The differences between individuals when becoming part of a family - far from becoming homogenous - become more diverse, exhibiting the multifarious wonders of Godly collectivism for all to see. 

 

To those on the outside I would like to dispel two myths; firstly, the myth that church members should strive to lionise human individuals because of their being ‘in the know’ - and secondly, that church life still belongs in the nineteenth century. I do not doubt that there are some very funereal church services which are ideally suited to those which a penchant for antiquity. But attempts to resign church life to antiquated stereotypes - attempts to decree it as ‘passe’ - will be expelled in the mind of the critic with one visit to one of the many vibrant and rapidly proliferating churches in our region; for it is the most lively, convivial, contemporary, energetic, accessible and fun churches that are likely to have the biggest impact in this region.

 

If anyone has been indoctrinated with bad information about how church is ‘not supposed to be fun’ then I am afraid it has crept in from the puritans, for there are, in my experiences, bad enough preachers who deliver sermons with enough acerbity and ungrace to put people off Christianity for life. I should imagine that Christ was a man that everyone (who saw who He really is) wanted to know and be with - not just because of what He did, or because of His personality, but because they saw God in Him. And that, I think, is the biggest challenge for every one of His disciples - to be as lively, contemporary, urbane, congenial, passionate, friendly, accessible and as fun as the modern world needs Christianity to be if it is to have any appeal in recognition of the world’s own needs. Churches that can best relate to the needs of the men and women of today will also be best able to help the individual submit to Christ with the hope of Him bringing out their true personality - both as an individual and as part of a collective unit. 

 

In closing, I have wanted to show in these messages that real Christianity is not all that interested in heritage, in bricks and mortar, in money, or any material things outside of their intrinsic value. The church as God intended it is only interested in people - in the salvation and growth in Christ that will bring the soul into the Lord’s eternal presence. That is why a church that is predominated by thoughts of appearance, or of money, or of bricks and mortar and other material things, stands out a mile as being a bad church, particularly to the diffident souls who wish to slip in unnoticed at the back and seek a steady relationship with Christ. If the individual needs are not put first it will be quite discordant in the world of spiritual needs, for we are not here to have a temporal impact - we are here to help make new creations (2 Corinthians 5:17) - we are collaborators; we have been given by God that which Pascal referred to as ‘The dignity of causality’. 

 

If ever there is disunity between Christians of different churches - one can still see clearly the mutual uplifting which we must attribute to the work of the Spirit within each man and woman who in guiding them through their errors inhibits the bad parts of their human self so as to not spoil the wonders of Divine knowing. When it comes to finding the right church - Christianity offers each individual the opportunity to ‘feel’ themselves into a church; and this feeling - the almost indescribable feeling - cannot be found with reason alone. And here we have an example - the rarest of examples - when reason by itself is of no use in this situation; that is, we cannot reason ourselves into this feeling. The colloquialism is often stated as ‘a sense of belonging’ but it is so much more - it is like being brought back into something that you once were, it is as though the Heavenly party has started a little early. 

 

And that is why reason itself cannot deduce anything of that nature because reason, or rationality, belongs there - the eternal Word, the reason and rationality of Christ which begets such wonder, or allows us to beget such wonder, is transcendent of the thing which we would be trying to rationalise. The ‘sense of belonging’ is more rational; looking to belong involves reason and rationality, belonging does not. There is nothing to be worried by exercising things outside of our own rationality, for in cases such as this, the real irrationality is with those who cannot find a way to belong. The detective who would try to solve a murder case by staying at his desk and reasoning would be an irrational man; though at the same time reasoning is in itself a more rational endeavour than the endeavours demanded by this enquiry. 

 

Thus there are times when reason by itself imposes limitations on the thing to which it is connected. And I think, though it might surprise us sometimes, particularly when we are looking for the right church, we might have to admit that putting these things in God’s hands involves a little bit of this process - for we can never put things in His hands while at the same time trying to take total control of the job ourselves. And here I think we have found the key, not just to good devotional life, but to a good and successful Christian life. It is not and never has been what we can do, it is what God can do in us; thus we should look to God first for everything. In doing this, we shall find everything we need to make us the best disciples possible, including the church that God wants us to call ‘home’.