By Ben Graydon

A friend asked me recently why it is, after all that church is (and is not, but claims to be) and has done to us, I would ever go back to one. My answer: Because it’s about the people, not the church.

A church has rules, and that’s partly of necessity. That’s the business part of it. (Church is, first of all, a business.) Turn the lights out when you leave, don’t leave the doors standing open in the winter, don’t jump on the pews, don’t carve on the piano, don’t (if it’s Baptist) give to Methodist causes, etc.

To the business rules, most add “moral” rules: don’t run naked in the church (or just don’t run in the church, period), use only the version of the Bible that we approve, don’t speak in tongues (or DO speak in tongues, depending), don’t sing CCM (or DO sing CCM, depending), etc. There are also the “rules” of science and geography: building location, thickness of the walls, size of the parking lot, number of windows and doors, etc. But, see, the PEOPLE have none of these rules – or, I should say, the ECCLESIA has none of these rules.

To join a church, you have to pass certain tests, do certain things, believe or say certain things. And in none of those cases is actual belonging to the ecclesia, the body of Christ, genuinely a qualifier. It cannot be, for who can actually know the mind of another? We may ask someone if he has accepted Christ as his savior, and he may say yes, but who is to know? As the Baptist minister I heard a few weeks ago said, there will be people (church members even) show up at the church building the Sunday after the Rapture, expecting to hear a sermon (and some of them won’t be disappointed!). Because, again: the church is not the ecclesia. It may house some of the ecclesia at some times (and we’re not just talking about the building but the whole institution, the whole organized structure that calls itself “church”), but it exists separate and apart from the actual body of Christ.

So back to the question at the top: why would anyone want to be a part of something so dead, so based on things separate and apart from the love and presence of God? Because at least some of His people may be there, and through those people, those actual “members” of the body of Christ, flows the love of God. Those are the people who give and care and pray. And God’s people will be very real in giving and caring and praying, no matter what limitations may otherwise be imposed by the rules and limitations of the church.

Why go to church, then, in spite of all of its faults and all of the ways that it is NOT the ecclesia, the body of Christ? Because, just maybe, some of the ecclesia are there. And if they are wise enough to practice their giftings in spite of the limitations of the box that is church, you just might get (and be) a real blessing!

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