By Hunter Greene
I’ve often wondered why there are so many churches in our area, yet so many lost people. I am perplexed at the number of churches that I have been to, including my own, that have so many empty seats every service. I don’t understand how the modern church has more resources and technology than ever before, yet we struggle to lead more people to Christ. Jesus never struggled attracting the masses and neither did His disciples in the book of Acts. I’m not saying that we all should be mega-churches by any means. However, I find it odd that we aren’t reaching people like Jesus reached people.
I think for years we have become so focused on our churches and our people being more entertaining, more right, more traditional, and more exciting than the world in hopes that we might convince people to Jesus. But Jesus never convinced people to come and follow Him. He simply asked and kept moving forward. Jesus isn’t something to sell. He is someone to love, cherish, and follow.
I think our problem lies in the fact that we don’t look, sound, or live like Jesus anymore. Mahatma Gandhi, a Hindu lawyer who advocated for the poor and oppressed in India, once said, “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” I think Gandhi is spot on. People like our God and our Jesus, but they do not like us or our churches. Francis Chan, in his book Crazy Love, writes, “We need to stop giving people excuses not to believe in God. You’ve probably heard the expression ‘I believe in God, just not organized religion.’ I don’t think people would say that if the church truly lived like we are called to live.” We have found that it is much easier and more convenient to try and sell people to Christ with dinners, VBS, fundraisers, parties, flashy services, and extravagant churches.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think any of these things are inherently wrong or sinful. I just think the Church needs to fall back in love with the true, genuine, raw Jesus. We need to fall in love with the Jesus who left Heaven for a dirty manger. We need the Jesus that was so passionate about God, He left Mary and Joseph to teach in the temple at age 12. We need the Jesus that wasn’t afraid of the possessed, the lepers, the adulterers, the homeless, or the violent Roman soldier. We need the Jesus that hated greed and exploitation so much that He walked into a temple and flipped tables. We need the Jesus that told Peter to lay down his weapon and handed himself over to be killed for the sin of the world. We need the Jesus that forgave the very people that mocked Him, beat Him, and crucified Him. This, friends, is the real Jesus.
We must learn to conform to who Jesus is rather than trying to make Jesus fit who we are. It makes us uncomfortable to think about Jesus asking us to sacrifice, give, and even die. Many of us are guilty of trading in our crosses for comfort, and the world has taken notice. The world has noticed the drug epidemic in our country yet we keep running from the addicted. The world has heard the cries of poor single mothers and struggling families yet our churches continue to sit on hefty bank accounts. The world has seen how the homeless are without food and clothing yet we keep driving past them day by day. The world has felt their emptiness and brokenness yet we fail to give them the wholeness and satisfaction of Christ. We may wonder why people don’t want Jesus anymore, but it may be because we aren’t really giving Him to them.
1 John 2:6 says, “He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.” We are the representatives of Christ and His kingdom. How the world perceives us is often times how they will perceive our God. If they see us as fake, bitter, and unloving, then they will see God in the same way. As we live in a world that desperately needs the love and redemption of God, let us follow Jesus wherever He takes us and to whomever He sends us.
(The Solution Column is provided by Pastor Brandon Young of Harmony Free Will Baptist Church, Hampton, and his associate, Hunter Greene.)