Monday I was meeting with a friend who is a pastor of a very large church. This church has an entire ministry through their website, in which they broadcast their live services (start to finish), and they have over 5,000 people who are part of their online community. It’s a really cool ministry that meets people where they are…and they have had people accept Christ via the internet.
As we talked we hit the topic of why people would watch the church online versus coming to the physical service on Sunday mornings. It hit me that there are three different groups of people who would watch; those who can’t, those who don’t and those who won’t join us on a Sunday morning. My friend told me that he thinks I have hit on something and we continued. As I went through the week this conversation and the three groups of people continued to rattle around in my head. I learned that people who watch online each Sunday morning represent our entire society that can’t, don’t or won’t darken the doors of our churches. Here’s what I came up with.
CAN’TS – PHYSICALLY UNABLE – There is a large group of people who are part of the online community who are shut-ins or are too far away from a service to attend. One woman lives in another country and there isn’t a church within 40 miles. There are several that are elderly and can’t drive and don’t have family or a support system to get them to church. They want to be part of the service but CAN’T.
DON’TS – APATHETIC – This may be the largest group. These are the ones who are uninterested…they don’t see the value in walking into a church service. I meet people every day who really don’t care about the church and have never thought about the spiritual side of life. They are just tooling around doing their own thing not concerned or aware of the eternal…or maybe they figure they will go to church when they get a little older. Whatever their reason…they could be a part of service but they DON’T.
WON’TS – HATRED AND DISTRUST – This is the group that bothers me the most. They have had experiences with the church and didn’t find the loving God that Christians claim to serve. Some of them found a group of judgmental hypocrites that are happy to cast the first stone while others have been severely damaged by a leader or prominent member. In the last nine years we have heard horrible stories of abuse (physically, emotionally, mentally and sexually) and have had pastors show up to our classes in jail after a conviction of drugs or sexual abuse…these men did not practice what they preach and the world is watching. The personal experiences of the won’ts, with the church (and by extension God), has driven a wedge between them and the church and they just WON’T.
The point is that Christians have been called to go to those outside the church and love others in the name of Jesus. The problem is we are so focused on our Bible studies, life-groups, kids programs and our comfort that we separate ourselves from the very people we are called to serve. Jesus said “Go…” and has many times as I have read Matthew 28, I have yet to see “when you have time” “when it’s convenient” or “if you are gifted at evangelism”. No excuses…He just said go.
I have overheard or been a part conversations that make my point (no…I wasn’t eaves dropping…it is the curse of having really good hearing and being able to differentiate multiple conversations at the same time and understand them all). The first was a group of women eating lunch at the next table in Brentwood. “I was talking to these people that aren’t Christians…I couldn’t believe it…I guess I just live in a bubble because I just don’t know people like that”. Another conversation was in Franklin between some friends who were catching up, one of which was apparently from out of town “the churches in our town won’t go help in the community because they don’t have time…but they sell out the men’s retreat every year”. The last conversation was with a volunteer in a children’s tutoring program “We won’t be coming back…I don’t want my kids around THOSE people”.
As my thoughts continued about the can’ts, don’ts and won’ts I realized…there are only three types of Christians who fail to love and serve those outside the church. CAN’TS – they are PHYSICALLY UNABLE to go and serve. DON’TS – they are APATHETIC about serving Christ. WON’TS – they HATE AND DISTRST those outside the church. If you claim the name of Christ and are not actively serving…which one are you?