Is The Church Keeping You From God? Series

Now if you’re on the outside looking in, and that bothers you, please understand that the Church is definitely made up of imperfect people. Is there some other kind of people? And we’re not gathering here under the pretense that we’re a group of perfect people, and then when you become a perfect person, you can come here too.

But you’ve had your reasons over time to keep a distance from the Church. In fact, of all things, you feel like the Church has been one of the main reasons you are at a distance from God.

Let me suggest a few questions that may help:

How much do you put up with in other places?

For instance, you don’t like that there are hypocrites in the Church. Don’t you put up with them everywhere else? It doesn’t keep you from the mall, Wal Mart, or from voting does it?

Maybe the Church seems irrelevant. There are certainly ways the Church needs to grow to remain interesting and to be relevant to your life. But, let me ask you to think about how irrelevant the world is when it comes to matters that are eternal in nature.

“Good Morning America.” In case you never do, just watch it some morning. After a few minutes discussing the lighter stuff, like terrorism, world economic collapse, and the latest widespread natural disaster, GMA gets on to the weightier, more important issues of life – the royal wedding, the most popular YouTube videos, what someone was wearing as they walked down the red carpet, and which celebrity couple is adopting an orphan and naming him “Purple Thursday 12.”

When it gets to issues beyond your paycheck or your retirement fund, when it gets to crises in life that can’t be answered by the world’s sappy answers, when it comes to the things that will last forever, just how relevant is the world, really? How much help is the world to you, really, when it comes to things that actually matter?

While the church may miss the mark in some ways, but it’s at least pointed in the right general direction; it’s at least pointed at addressing the stuff of life that has substance.

Maybe you’ve been burned – you’ve had a bad experience some time in the past – a bad minister, a bad church member, maybe just a bad church, and it has really kept you away.

Let me ask, have you ever had a bad experience at Wal Mart? Have you ever run into a bad mechanic, an arrogant doctor, a grumpy waitress? I have.

You know what I did? When I could, I went to a different one! But I still needed groceries. I still needed medical care. I still needed to get my car repaired. I still wanted to be able to go out to eat. I didn’t just quit all those things because I got burned. I still need those things.

Whether your experience in trying to get there has been good or bad, you still need a relationship with God. The Scriptures make it clear that God loves His Church and is using His Church today, even with all of its imperfect people.

In fact, the way that God works through us in spite of our imperfections is a way He is showing off His wisdom today.