A few years ago I would have given the party-line answer of most evangelicals; “at church.” The operative assumption of this response is that I am most at ease, most at home, most ministered to, and can’t imagine being anyplace other than in the building on Sunday morning with everyone else. Now that I have not participated in that means of community for some time, I have a little different take.
I think, like much of my spiritual development, that my idea of fellowship was shaped out of fear rather than abundance, that faith and vitality would surely wither away if I did not find myself in church on each and every Sunday, singing songs and listening to a man speak from the stage while staring at the back of the head of the person in front of me. I’m only glad that texting is a recent construct, lest my wife be embarrassed even more so at my boredom with the whole thing.
I can’t say how long it’s been since I’ve been a part of the Sunday morning ritual. Even when I was going to church I wasn’t really going. In my final years, I spent as much time between the hours of 10am and noon at the café at the neighborhood grocery store near the church than in the church building itself. I was a case, for sure, and it was best for me to sit by silently, to eventually drift away from The Church As We Know It.
I have to be brutally honest with you; I don’t miss it a bit. I have no regrets.
I think the reason is this; I still find myself in community with people of faith; my wife, my bros of the WAH, Beer Church with The Future, and the Lunch Bunch. These people encourage me, and make me feel not so alone.
When it comes to the “accountability keeps me safe” response, I think that’s still a bit over rated. You can lie to someone close to you and hide your secrets if you really want to. The husband of a dear female friend of ours decided to leave after 23 years of marriage because of a high school friend he reconnected with on Facebook. The douchebag went to church more than me and I don’t want to leave my wife. What’s the difference?
The difference is this; I know that I will have no one else to blame but me. We are each accountable for our own actions, regardless of how many people are around us. If I have to stand before a judge, he’s not going to ask me why I didn’t go to church. He’s going to want to know why I did the crime
But before you think I am encouraging a life of isolation, consider your own life and what motivates you. Are you motivated to stay away from porn because you will have to tell your accountability group on Monday evening or because you are sick of that addiction and realize you don’t want to have anything to do with that any longer? Are you motivated by getting caught or being free?
Community is still important to me, but it is not a panacea. Fellowship without some kind of understanding that you and I are still personally responsible for our choices with only lead to entitlement or co-dependency. The healthiest groups of people I know are made up of folks who know they need others, but at the same time are neither independent nor dependent.
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