Unlearning

I wen to a talk / intro thing the other day by a guy names Sean Tucker, it was at 7am so my faculties may still have been at home in bed while I was out in the rain, but besides having a cool video with words popping out of his head (which made me a little jealous because the video's I'm in don't have those), he has some interesting things to say.

Like:

the church is flawed, but it's the best idea we've got. Got any thoughts on that one? I wonder if it is the best idea. Maybe the church is a terrible idea. An automatic 'you're either in or out' scenario. What if we had no formal buildings, no authoritarian leadership, no claim to have the answers on the gospel... but rather groups of people who's sole desire is to live more like Jesus every day, to meet together every so often to make sure they're on the right track and to generally have a good time together?

What if?

Then again, maybe he's right and the church is the best idea we've got, but it's just not functioning to it's full potential. But that begs the question, what is the full potential? Is there even one or is the potential limitless?

If you're like me, you see the potential good in a lot of things (and the potential pitfalls), and I see some of it in the Church, and when I say Church I mean you and me.

Not those people who meet in that building on a Sunday.

Not even 'us' who follow Jesus teachings.

But you (maybe I should say me).

The individual. The gospel of Jesus, the "Church" is a person, is this person, is me.

Maybe that's the potential, realising that I have the capacity to change my life (does that mean the world?)

Am I the Church? Really?


He also spoke at the interview of things that we can do better with our 'resources' as churches (as in the groups of people who meet as a congregation at such and such a place) - things like using our facilities for more than just directly church related stuff, even this morning I was speaking to a minister in Jozi who's church opens their doors every afternoon as a place for school kids to come and do homework etc (...there is the spin off that they then invite them to church events), but the question remains: Are we using our facilities - halls, equipment, etc. to their fullest potential, or are they standing unused for six out of seven days a week? Sean mentioned a group of people who broke away from an existing church - about 30 or so people - who met together after the breakaway and asked, "How do we follow Jesus better, and how do we make the world a better place?" and he told us some stories of putting kids through school, fixing people's cars so they could get to work and support their families, and other stories I forget... Simple stuff. Only 30 people. But can you see Jesus in it?

I can.

Contrast that with annoyed looks as people sit in church on Sunday if the wrong hymn is sung.

Or God forbid a homeless person wanders into 'our' service.

A lady was at our offices yesterday, a Zimbabwean refugee, no food, no place to stay, nothing. The only thing we could do for her is give her a pack of uncooked mielie meel and direct her to Central Methodist.

I was left asking the question: "Is that it? Seriously? Is that the best we can do?"

Sadly, that was the best we could do.

Is that our full potential?

I'm scoobied.


And I suppose I've got what some might call 'emotional fatigue' - I see so much injustice and rubbish every day that I can't even bring myself to feel bad about it anymore, let alone do something about it... maybe most of us have it.

But is that an excuse?

What about the people who the rubbish is happening to on a daily basis? Are they 'fatigued'?

So, what can we do about it?