It's bigger & better than I imagined

An interesting thing about deconstruction and rebuilding is, as expected, to some degree, you figure some things out that exist that you didn't know existed or possibly could be "a thing".

One of those for me has been the ability to see more clearly how the good news of God through Jesus has opened humanity to a new way of being IF they can hear and grasp what he's done for us/them.

One of the reasons that "church" is often a mixed bag of things for both insiders and outsiders is that in a lot of different ways, because of "how church is done", it recreates the wall God was tearing down.

Instead of drawing people to the good news, churches often have made themselves the "go between" for God and those who aren't part of the church and, over time, made "church" into the good news, per se.

Instead of telling people about the good news of what God did in Jesus, many "insiders" usually just tell the bad news of the "lostness" of humanity and leave the message that God is STILL angry with them.

__________

Some insiders rightfully feel weird about that and feel like there's something off - and that's a good thing! They don't know how to say the good news in a way that doesn't counter "the official church position".

What often results is a collection or two of people inside of churches who openly go along with things, but privately tell each other and some outsiders a different, much-closer-to-the-gospel kind of message.

They often do their church a double-edged sword kind of favor in that they offer hope to the world by saying, "it's really better than church says it is" and simultaneously let the air out of the tires of the church.

Over time, this has the effect of shedding off more people who "get it" and leaving the official leadership or influencers "at church" at a loss of how to bridge the gaps, share good news, and keep people happy.

The church becomes more homogeneous and less able to connect with the outsider who doesn't "know God" like the insiders do.  This leaves most churches two or three generations (10-20 yrs) from extinction.

__________

Weird dream the other night.  I dreamed that we discovered some long lost Sanskrit text that explained how people/religious leaders/figures of the Ancient East travelled around by what appeared to be flight.

Instead of "flying" on carpets or other items that provided flight, the person "flying" was sitting on a surface or item that an invisible god or being would pick up and carry, providing the appearance of flight.

Instead of searching out a connection with the god or invisible spiritual being, people spent all their time trying to get carpets to fly or other objects to levitate and carry them, completely missing the point.

There are times I believe that churches operate like this - like it all depends on them to get things done, to share the good news, etc - depending on a form of godliness, but denying its power, as it were.

It's interesting - when the apostles were facing a trial, their accusers noted they had a confidence/ability that didn't make sense - and they noted that they'd been with Jesus.  Apparently he makes a difference.

__________

So "out there" I have found that there ARE people who know and trust and depend on God and they share him openly with "outsiders", treating them as if they are people who haven't heard the good news YET.

"Going to church" often is not a part of their message of the good news of God in Jesus and yet, those who are hearing the good news want to get together with other believers to hear more and to grow in it.

I believe there'll always be "churches" in some form as we see them in pop culture and on street corners, but there is also this collection of people "out there" who know God and follow his Spirit anywhere.

I hope and pray for insight for into how to bridge that gap.  Maybe it's not important and God will work in both dynamics.  I don't know.  I do know from a human POV, churches could do better, per se.

Either way, I hope that all people everywhere come to know the good news that their Creator actually did make them, knows and loves them, and wants them to walk together.