Skip to main content

The church is the people, not the building.

This old adage has been repeated so often it hardly seems worth saying any more.  But, like all good clichés, it gets an outing on a pretty regular basis.  Someone said it at my church on Sunday.  And I realised it isn't true.

Or if it is, we no longer attend the same church that we stepped into almost two years ago.  We started going there in December 2009, when it met on Saturday nights and we were childless and free.  By the time Toby's baby shower came around in October 2010, almost all the people we'd initially got to know had left.  Half a year later, when the founding pastor moved back to Canada and a new minister took over, very few of those who had signed Toby's baby book for us were still around.  Not only the congregation but also the leadership had changed completely, twice.

Yet the building is still there, and still pretty much the same.  Whatever else has changed, there is still a sense of calling to that particular place.  What does this mean, and how does it affect how we do church as such a changeable congregation?

Most church plants start with a group of people.  They meet in a house, a coffee shop, a rented school.  Later, as the group grows, they may start to think about buying a property and calling it a church.  By then, the church-as-people is already well established.  They have been through a few struggles, lost some people, gained some people, and hammered out what they are there for.

Through a combination of circumstances, my church plant came at things backwards.  It was gifted with a building while the fledgling congregation was still small and finding its wings.  The people part of the church is still working out who it is and what it is there for.  But meanwhile, the building is there, designated as a house of prayer.  Go and open the heavy oak door to a small stone English country church.  As you step over the threshold, your footsteps will become quieter and your voice will hush, and your eyes will lift to the stained glass that depicts the glory of God.  The centuries of Morning and Evening Prayer whisper in your ear and a peacefulness comes into your heart.  All this without another person present.  The building itself holds the atmosphere of holiness, and although ours is so much newer, it too is acquiring that hint of peace.  Perhaps this is our first calling: to so worship and so pray in that building, that whoever enters it is moved to recognise the presence of God.

Downtown Fort Worth is not the gritty urban setting that might come to mind when you hear the words "city centre church".  The streets are clean and spacious, the bars and restaurants are generally free of drunken yobs, and the condos in the tower blocks sell for a million dollars.  If there is a ministry here, it is to sophisticated urbanites who quite probably regard churches as outdated, inflexible and irrelevant.

But they drink coffee.  Coffee shops are not outdated, inflexible and irrelevant.  They're where you go to deepen relationships, hear live music, and discuss the meaning of life over a quick meal.  So nothing like church, right?  Well, this building happens to be half coffee shop, half church.  And maybe the two halves have more in common than either the churchgoers or the non-churchgoers might think.  So perhaps this is our second calling: to throw open the doors between the two; to discuss God in the coffee shop and the latest news in the church.

So is the church the people, not the building?  What do you think?

'Mister,' Anna took his hand and pulled him to the wall, 'mister, is the Thames the water, or the hole it goes in?'
The policeman looked at her for a moment and then replied, 'The water, of course. You don't have a river without water.'
'Oh,' said Anna, 'that's funny, that is, 'cos when it rains it ain't the Thames but when it runs into the hole it is the Thames. Why is that, mister? Why?'
I grabbed Anna's hand and led her away. 'Nice work, Tich, nice work. A good bit of thinking, all that Thames stuff.'
'Oh,' murmured Anna, 'but when do you, Fynn? When do you start calling it the Thames and when do you stop calling it the Thames? Do you have a mark? Do you, Fynn?'
From Mister God This Is Anna, by Fynn

Comments

Charles Crookes said…
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

Popular posts from this blog

Models of Contextual Theology: Spiritual Formation Book 7

"A theology that neither issues forth in action nor takes account of the way one lives one's life can hardly be theology that is worth very much." Models of Contextual Theology looks like the most boring book in the world. Dry academic title, weird geometric cover design - you'd definitely only pick this up if you were required to write an essay on it, wouldn't you? Well, I wish the outside did it justice, because the contents are much more exciting than the cover. It asks some very interesting and important questions about how our faith relates to the world around us. Is culture mostly good or bad? Is there such a thing as the "naked gospel", free of context? Do you have to be a trained academic to theologize, or can anyone do it? How much does theology from one culture transfer to a different culture? Bevans describes six models of theology which offer different answers to these questions. All are valid, he says, but they all understand the gospel an

Unto us a son is given...

Did I mention something about life getting back to normal in October? Oh yes, I was just finishing work and looking forward to at least two weeks off to organise the house, stock up the freezer and buy baby stuff. Then little Toby threw a spanner in the works by turning up five weeks early! Which would put his birthday in... let's see... October. So much for normal! For those who would like the gory details, here goes. If you are a mother who had a long and protracted labour, I advise you to skip the next bit - or if you don't, please don't start sending me hate mail. You have been warned. You see, we'd been to all the childbirth classes (yes, just about managed to finish them) and learned all about the different stages of labour, and how many hours each lasted. We learned some relaxation techniques and various things Graham could do to help coach me through long periods of contractions. And then we turned out not to need any of them, because the entire thing

A birthday weekend in York

We were surprised to discover that York is only a 90 minute drive from our house. It's somewhere we'd been thinking of going for a few years, but I'd assumed it was much further away. So when we wanted to go away for the weekend to celebrate my birthday in January, York was the obvious choice. The city did not disappoint us. I'd been to York years ago, and my only clear memory was of a tower on top of a grassy mound. That was Clifford's Tower, owned by English Heritage, and recently updated with a rather snazzy series of platforms and staircases inside. We saw a 13th century toilet which had been inaccessible for 400 years (I think I was more excited about this than the boys) and got a great view of York from the rooftop viewing platform. View from the top of Clifford's Tower Most people's memories of York probably involve the Shambles - an ancient street of shops - and York Minster. Apparently there isn't a clear difference between a minster and a cathe