My pastor once told a story about a member of the church pulling him aside one Sunday to talk with him. (Note: If it's possible, don't pull your pastor aside on Sunday. His/Her mind is in a million different places and it'll be better for BOTH of you to just call him during the week.) The long time church member proceeded to explain to Pastor Brad that another church member was struggling financially and that she had been assisting her for several weeks now. The well meaning church member went on to say, "I think the church should do something about it." Pastor Brad responded by asking her, "You've been helping her lately?" and the woman reiterated that she had been. "Then the church IS doing something about it," he said. And the conversation ended.
I love this story because it's a real life, flesh and blood example of what "church" actually is. Often times we get confused because of our modern, western understanding of the word "church." So lets explore the origin of the actual word. The word we translate as "church" comes from the Greek work "ekklesia." To understand the significance of this it's important to understand what the word "ekklesia" meant to a First Century person living in the Roman Empire. When a city within the Empire pledged it's loyalty to Cesar and Cesar alone, Rome would formally adopt that city and it's inhabitants would become citizens of Rome. Being a Roman citizen was extremely valuable at the time and came with rights that other were not given. (i.e. Paul's right to appeal his case to Cesar in the book of Acts.) Because of this, many cities were more than happy to give their loyalty to Cesar. They would adopt the currency, styles, rituals and holidays of Rome. They would learn to say things like, "Cesar is Lord." or "There is no name under heaven by which man can be saved than that of Cesar." (Sound familiar?) And for their loyalty, Cesar would declare their city an "ekklesia." You see, First Century Christians hijacked the word church from the Roman Empire.
They did that a lot actually. Hijacking Roman terms and mantras that we still use today. For instance we still say "Jesus is Lord." rather than "Cesar is Lord." And we still call gatherings, "churches" or "ekklesias." Why is this important? Because we should always remember that the very name we use to identify ourselves was meant to fly in the face of human power structures. The term "church" as it was used by First Century Christians was never meant to describe a hierarchical organization with a "top-down" leadership structure. Sure it had, and has, leaders but not in the same sense as we know it. The leadership came along side of it's people, it's didn't rise above them. But over the centuries the church has become domesticated. We began a wild lion and have become a common house-cat. We institutionalized ourselves, segmented ourselves, we fight amongst each other. Sadly, the Kingdom of God has grown more and more like any other kingdom in appearance and function over the last 2 Milena. Somewhere along the line we lost our desire to fly in the face of human power structures and replaced it with a desire to conform to them. We stopped being an insurgent, counter-culture revolution of people who love God and love others. Tragic.
That brings me back to the story my pastor tells. What was he saying to this very well meaning and kind-hearted lady? He was reminding her that "the church" is not a location. It's not a building, it's not staff, it's not service on Sunday. He was reminding her that "the church" is all of us. All of that claim to follow Jesus are the church. The church is alive. Rick Warren recently tweeted "The Church is a Body, not a business; an organism, not an organization." I love this quote because it's a reminder. It's a reminder that church is something we ARE not something we DO. Something we should BE not somewhere we should go. Church is found in people not in places. Today, when we gather as a "church' we call it "going to church." But in doing so, we lose the beauty and honor and wonderful responsibility of BEING the church. Please, don't just GO to church, BE the church. For God, for each other and for the world that needs us to fly in the face of human power structures.
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