Faith.In.Life
Evangelicalism is not an Elite And Exclusive Club
But, we have made it out to be. In the boomer generation’s heyday I imagine that you would not have seen much difference between the elite golf resort’s attire and the clothes you would see on Sunday in church. This weekend many will watch the Master’s Tournament. When a golfer wins the Master’s Tournament they will receive a unique golden casual dress coat as a mark of their achievement. Still to this day, people from the same generation will show up with their colored shirt and casual dress coat throughout the US. By the very dress code, Evangelical Churches feel a lot like some type of exclusive club.
I once heard about a pastor who was to be ordained at their newest call. On the day of their ordination, a homeless person showed up to this particular church. They had torn clothing that smelled like they had slept in the sewer. As they entered the church, people did not say hello to the person, and in fact, they went out of their way to give the homeless person a wide berth to avoid him entirely. The homeless person made his way to the front of the church at the regular attenders’ dismay and sat down for the service. The time then came for the congregation to be introduced to their new pastor. His name was announced, and everyone looked around to see who this new pastor was. Slowly, the homeless person stood up and headed to the stage to introduce himself as the new pastor. In his introduction he read from Matthew 25:34-36;
34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry, and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. 36 I was naked, and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison, and you visited me.’
37 “Then these righteous ones will reply, ‘Lord, when did we ever see you hungry and feed you? Or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 Or a stranger and show you hospitality? Or naked and give you clothing? 39 When did we ever see you sick or in prison and visit you?’
40 “And the King will say, ‘I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!’
41 “Then the King will turn to those on the left and say, ‘Away with you, you cursed ones, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his demons. 42 For I was hungry, and you didn’t feed me. I was thirsty, and you didn’t give me a drink. 43 I was a stranger, and you didn’t invite me into your home. I was naked, and you didn’t give me clothing. I was sick and in prison, and you didn’t visit me.’
44 “Then they will reply, ‘Lord, when did we ever see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and not help you?’
45 “And he will answer, ‘I tell you the truth, when you refused to help the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were refusing to help me.’
46 “And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous will go into eternal life.”
Then he simply said: “We have a lot of work to do.”
When I first heard this story I wondered to myself if I would have the resolve to start out at a church in that way could really offend a congregation before you even begin as their pastor. I realize I probably would wimp out. At the same time, it is fascinating to walk into a church as a guest even though I am a pastor. I recently attended a large church while I was on vacation and the only person who greeted me was the formal greeter. No one naturally approached my family and I to ask who we were, if we had recently moved to the area, or anything like that. In fact, we had to approach someone who we hoped could give us some directions to even figure out if there was any children’s church programming that day. While I won’t go so far as to tell you the name of this church, they are a part of the Evangelical Free Denomination. If their very name includes a notion of telling the gospel, well you would hope they would be excited to have the opportunity to tell anyone who would walk through their doors about Jesus. Instead, in the announcements they did welcome people that were new to the church, but then proceeded to put the first step of introduction on the guest telling us to seek out a pastor or leader in the church to say “hello,” and learn more about the church. I found it offly bold of them to put the first step of introduction on the guest, rather than on themselves as the host.
My stories thus far do not even engage with a much broader problem within Evangelical churches. That is, we have largely become an institution that is more concerned about our own people then any of the people who “have gone astray.” When making decisions about our institution you will be surprised at how many times the reasoning for why something needs to happen is based around “because a lot of our people want it.” Our very language is exclusive, while the Gospel itself is the most inclusive invitation to “the ends of the earth.” The Gospel itself proclaims that people from every nation and tongue will bow and confess that Jesus is Lord, yet many of our churches don’t look anything like the racial demographic of the area they do ministry in. Truly, Evangelicals, including myself, have a lot of work to do. Thank God that the harvest is plentiful. For however few of the workers are, let us be the beautiful feet that bring the good news to the entire world so that more and more might hear the very Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Yet, within this nature of inclusion comes another challenge where Jesus says “pick up your cross and follow me.” We, much like the very crowds that Jesus spoke to, will come with excuses to not follow the narrow way of Jesus. While our excuses might be a little different on the surface level, they reflect the same excuses given in Jesus’ time that sounds a little like this:
We will say, “What do I have to give up?”
Jesus says, “Everything. But that doesn’t mean you will have nothing.
We will say, “But what will people think?”
Jesus says, “Who cares. The only thing that matters is what I think.”
We will say, “Will it be hard? I don’t want to do it if it will be hard.”
Jesus says, “Yes, but it will absolutely be worth it.”
We will say, “But what if people persecute me? What people look down on me if I follow you?”
Jesus says, “Blessed are the persecuted, for while you give up an earthly kingdom, you gain the very Kingdom of Heaven.”
And maybe the hardest challenge for our current culture:
We will say, “Do I have to give up my individualism? Do I have to give up my name?”
Jesus says, “Get rid of your name, get rid of your individualism. And take upon my name, the Name above all names.
To which, there will be some who will say no to Jesus’ call and never walk in His foot steps. There are others who may start to walk in Jesus’ footsteps, and then fall away. In this way, Jesus’ call will be exclusive. As C.S. Lewis says in Mere Christianity:
“There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, "Thy will be done," and those to whom God says, in the end, "Thy will be done." All that are in Hell, choose it. Without that self-choice there could be no Hell. No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy will ever miss it. Those who seek, find. Those who knock, it is opened.”
To those who are calloused to God and in the end hear God say to them “Thy will be done,” the Kingdom of God is incredibly exclusive and they will call Christianity foolish and judgmental. They may very well be knowledgable of their sin, but rather than being lead to God’s kindness, they turned away from God ever blaming Him for even things they personally have done.
To those who are warmed to say to God “Thy will be done,” Jesus will include you in the blood that He spilled, for you are His, and He tends to His sheep. To you the kingdom is the most inclusive place you will ever encounter. To you, the Kingdom of God is full of wisdom, grace, and kindness. As one person said: “When I finally read the Bible I found a love letter written to me. I couldn’t believe that God would love me, that God would chose me, despite the things I had done.”
The problem Evangelicals make is if we somehow assume that we know who is “in” and who is “out,” so to speak. That was never our call to make, and we need to repent if we have tried to make that claim. We then are called to act out our mission as if Heaven is empty with the knowledge of the promise that the harvest is plentiful so that Heaven will be quite a diverse and full place.