Commenting on the Comments

What a wonderful conversation has been going on in the comments lately! My thanks to all who have contributed, and who will contribute (Nancy, I'm still looking forward to your always valuable insights).

Much of the discussion has of course been about when to leave a church, the proper grounds to leave a church, etc., and in addition there has been some give and take concerning th nature of leadership in the church.

On leadership: I think I agree with Clay that not everyone is a church-leader. I really do not consider myself one. I am not in on the councils of church governance. No one has asked me to be an elder or take charge of a ministry. I don't contribute to the overall self-definition of my church by influencing the teaching-focus in any way. I do "facilitate" a home group, and I do volunteer in various ways (for example, each week my wife and I staff the church bookstore). Believe me, I am not simply trying to make a display of humility here. I simply cannot define what I do as leadership. For example, I haven't notice anyone following me, which is surely a necessary condition for wearing the badge of leadership.

Now, this doesn't mean I'm sitting on the sidelines. At times I am an encourager, a comforter, and in some small way a guide and teacher in some of my personal relationships within the church (and on the other hand sometimes I am the one being encouraged, comforted, guided). If anyone wants to call that sort of thing leadership, they can be my guest, but my ideal has to do with following, not leading.

Here's the thing: I don't think that I am in any way neglecting some unfulfilled duty or service that I owe the church (except in the sense that I am not always as patient or loving as I should be, of course). But most of our obligations as Christians relate more to work, family, and neighborhood, in my view, than church-related "ministries."

So that's my take on leadership. As for the matter of leaving the church (that is, of leaving a particular local branch of that great invisible body we call the church), I do not exactly know what I think. I do not want to leave out of mere crankiness, or because the worship music doesn't suit me, etc. On the other hand, the preaching in my church, while in no way "heretical" (in my view), tends to be surprisingly unconnected to Jesus Christ "and him crucified." It is about many things, and sometimes Jesus does receive a mention (and sometimes, more rarely, his cross), but we are seldom given to understand how the many things have to do with the one. For example, how worship, or service, or a sense of community, or love, or fellowship, hinge upon our understanding of the cross and its relevance to our lives.

An illustration: there used to be a large wooden cross in our church. It was kind of shoved into a corner, but it was there. Some years ago, though, it was removed, and now it sits in a storage shed in back of the church. When a friend of mine asked the pastor about bringing it back, he said, "That's just not the kind of church we are." He didn't mean, we're not the kind of church that believes in that cross stuff. Not at all. It's right there in a our "what we believe" statement. But what he meant was, we're not the kind of church that emphasizes that sort of thing. And so we have ever since been a church without the prime visual symbol, historically speaking, for Christianity.

That may or may not be important. But the fact is, the preaching in my church reflects that kind of mindset that would shove the cross in a storage closet and forget about it, moving on, it would seem, to matters of more importance (for example, we do have a picture of a woman in an ecstatic hands-raised posture of worship).

The question is, should I try swimming upstream in such a situation? And what if there is a body of believers in my neighborhood which does in fact reflect my own understanding of the centrality of the cross, preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ with a relentless focus? Is that not a group of believers I ought to support and throw in my lot with? And, might it not be that when I chose to cast my lot instead with my current church, I simply made a mistake?

Well, those are my thoughts for now. I'm really encouraged by everyone's input in the comments so far. To Dan I would simply say, I am not making this decision in haste. I believe it will be months before I make up my mind. In the meantime, I'll continue to value your insight and those of the other commenters.