why i'm not attractive - redux

Here is a repost of what was already a partial repost. My small group just discussed the covenant of community and this post seemed timely ...

Jonathan Brink asks the question, "what draws you to church?" This was triggered by some thinking he was doing regarding the "attractional church" and a flyer he got in which a church was describing its virtues.

Raquel gave a good response, i.e., "God". I like that. Perhaps something more precise like, "God in us"?

I think the real issue is "what is church". If it is our building, meetings, programs, etc., then we have to work on being attractional. And there are of course good and bad ways to do that. And we can discuss forever the rightness and wrongness of this. But the fundamental problem is that have a wrong base ... this is not Church and the whole attractional point is moot.

If church is the body of Christ, a community of believers working out their faith together in love, etc., then we don't think about being attractional. In fact, the concept would be contrary to our focus. We will love God. We will live together in love with each other against all worldly logic. We will serve each other and serve those that are bound by darkness. We will demonstrate and proclaim the Gospel of the Kingdom. We will be making disciples among the ones we live with. Etc.

This will attract those that have been made alive by His Spirit to come be within the family of God. It will also attract those that want to earn something from God. It will also drive some away to cry out blasphemy or whatever. And it will cause some to want to kill us.

Attractional? Not in the sense of the attractional church. But, it will certainly command a response - and it won't be due to a flyer in the mail. I'm not pro or con flyers - it's simply that it's not about that.

I'll repost something I did two years ago ... I still like it and find it relevant.

In The Pursuit of God in the Company of Friends, Richard Lamb explains, "...Jesus is the tangible incarnation of God, and his manner of inviting people into deep relationship with himself is the manner we have available to us today. Jesus gathered a group of people together, some good friends and brothers, some complete strangers and natural enemies, and eventually he told them that by their love for one another people would know that they had been touched and changed by God incarnate. In fact, this kind of friendship, inexplicable apart from God, was the apologetic by which he demonstrated his power to the world (Jn 13.35; 17.20-21). He told his disciples that their friendships would either make or break the mission of the church, his mission in the world."

“What would it be like to pursue – and find – God in the company of friends? What would those friendships look like? The process we call discipleship, and the context we call community.”

Lamb later provides some definitions for friendship by citing Aristotle in Nicomachean Ethics 8; "... qualities enjoyed by friends that continue to be apt and helpful today: friends (1) enjoy one another, (2) are useful to one another, and (3) share a common commitment to "the good".

I no longer feel awkward about having relationships for purpose. My passion for pursuing God now leads me to connect with those that are useful and share the same passion. My compassion for the lost now leads me to connect with those that I perceive God is working in. While I care for the "crowd", I am selective about time spent building relationship without one of these purposes.

The Word became flesh and blood,
and moved into the neighborhood. (The Message)

Technorati Tags: community