Bjcorbin's Blog

I should preface this essay with the disclaimer that I have spent the majority of my life attending a church building on a weekly basis.  In fact, my wife and I currently attend church services when we’re able, and would happily claim the folks there as part of our extended family.  For some, that might be considered an indictment against our judgement, for others it may lend some credence to what I want to share. 

In the last few decades I’ve had a spectrum of church experiences.  After beginning in the Liturgical world (i.e. Catholic, Episcopal), I traveled in Evangelical circles (i.e. Baptist), and eventually landed in the Pentecostal realm (e.g. Assemblies of God, various Non-Denominational…).  I can honestly say that I have grown within all of those spheres, though I would attribute that more to God’s faithfulness than as an advocation of any of those particular systems.

As a child, I had a sense that most God-fearing folks went to some sort of church, and I just assumed that the blueprint for these church systems must come from the bible.  But as the years passed, I’ve come to realize that isn’t the case.  Though the various elements can be tied to something within the scripture, the recipe for what we’ve cooked up isn’t really there.

Along the way, I’ve discovered three very distinct camps of “Believers”.  There are those who staunchly hold to, and defend the traditional church model as “the model”; those who largely believe in the traditional church dogma, but who also believe that the old model needs to be updated (e.g. Five-Fold Ministry, House Church…); and finally, there are those who see the institutional church as oppressive, abusive, corrupt… advocating a complete abandonment of that mode.  For the purposes of this writing, I will refer to these clans as. “Traditionalists”, “New Wineskin Advocates”, and the “De-churched”.

More disclaimers.  I will speak of these groups generally, and as with all generalities, that means there are most certainly exceptions, which by definition are exceptional.  I would also like to preface my criticisms of these particular paradigms with the understanding that they are not intended to be an attack on the people within these systems.  For the most part, this is simply how we’ve been taught to do ministry.

I also understand that when you’ve experienced, or even just witnessed the damage that has been done through these various religious patterns it is tempting to villainize anyone associated with those programs, but that would be equally unfair and hurtful. 

I believe that the stereotype of the greedy, power hungry, glory seeking minister is extremely overstated and overused.  I sense that most folks get into ministry with pure motivations, and that the vast majority serve in a sincere effort to fulfill God’s calling on their lives. 

This field is only lucrative to a select few, while the vast majority toil in obscurity, often overworked and unappreciated.  The burden placed on a typical pastor is unreasonable at best, and is frequently damaging to them and their families.  My issues are not with these folks, but with the blueprint that we’ve used to do “church”.

Traditionist’s tend to revere the institution of the church as being sacred, seeing it as an integral and essential element of their faith walk.  While they might acknowledge that the church isn’t a building, their connection to God is most tangibly experienced there.  Of course, these ideas aren’t organically arrived at, they are consistently reinforced by the institution itself.  On a purely practical level, this messaging is crucial to the entity’s survival. 

Even churches which openly acknowledge the indwelling the Holy Spirit tend to promote the concept of the church building being the “House of God”, which infers that this is where you need to go if you hope to interact with Him.  In such settings, the corporate worship experience is generally valued above personal interactions with the Lord.

Old testament images, such as temple worship, and the High Priest entering the Holy of Holies on behalf of the people encourage congregations to view their clergy as a sort of broker between themselves and God.  While the gap between “clergy”, and “laity” creates the sense of exclusive membership in some sort of elite branch of the body, much like Special Forces units compare to the regular infantry. 

The Apostle Paul spoke of a body where every member provides something essential for the greater whole, but the traditional church model reduces the vast majority of congregants into students (who never graduate), servants (who are simply gears within the larger machine), or perhaps worst of all, into spectators (who are expected to crowd-fund the vision of their leadership).

Jesus came to give us a better covenant (Heb.7:22, 8:6, 12:24).  When He died on the cross, the veil was torn (Matt.27:52, Mark 15:38), signifying that followers could now boldly come before the throne of grace (Heb.4:16).  No more need for bloody sacrifices.  No more need for a High Priest to do their bidding.  Christ was the perfect sacrifice, and through Him we became a part of the royal priesthood (1 Pet.2:9).

Jesus explained, that it would be better that He go to the Father, so that the Spirit would come (John 16:7), and He assured them that His sheep would know His voice, so they could follow Him (John 10:27).  All of this was meant to revolutionize the way we worshipped (John 4:23), but over time followers simply reverted back to the familiar temple-based system, where a staff of intermediaries could once again represent and lead them.  When the temple was destroyed, the system morphed into the Synagogue – Rabbi model, which maintained a similar emphasis on buildings and teachers.

Over time, numerous liturgies, rituals, and sacraments were developed with the idea that they might be representative of our relationship with the Lord, but in many cases, they have become a substitute for a genuine, personal, connection with the Living God.  This is the anti-thesis of what we should be aiming for, but the unfortunate truth is that this twisted dynamic is actually good for the “church” system.

None of this would matter much if people were sincerely connecting with the Lord, manifesting His light and life to those around them, and actually being transformed into His image, but for the most part, this industry we call church is what we’re spending our time and resources on instead. 

The greatest indictment against this traditional church model is that it has utterly failed to produce any of the hallmarks described in scripture.  “Christians” are not known by their great love for one another (John 13;35), instead they are famously divided (e.g. more than 25,000 denominations).  They are not known for their “Christlike” character (Rom.8:29), nor are these institutions consistently producing devoted disciples (Matt.28:19).  Even with thousands of years of church history, His pure and spotless Bride has never emerged from this system (Eph.5:27). 

D.L. Moody offered, “Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at something that doesn’t really matter”.  I would suggest that the institutional church has gotten very good at a lot of things that may not matter much to the Lord.

Though some fine work has been, and is being done in Jesus name (e.g. food banks, clothing banks, Christmas gifts for underprivileged kids, drug rehabilitation…), the transforming love of God is only trickling through.  It is like a charitable organization that spends 90% of its resources on sustaining the corporate structure, while only pennies on the dollar actually reach the intended beneficiaries (e.g. the lost).  The impact of these institutions is not only declining within our culture, it is declining within our homes, as our children are abandoning this system in droves.

Those who have come to recognize these shortcomings within the traditional church model frequently split into one of the other two groups I previously mentioned.  The New Wineskin Advocates tend to believe that changes in leadership structure (e.g. Five-Fold Ministry), and/or format (e.g. House Church, Small Group…) would be sufficient to move the institutional church in a new, and more fruitful direction, while the De-churched largely view the institutionalization of the church as the root problem.  For them, this system is too broke and/or corrupt to fix.

My motivation in writing this piece is not to promote any one of these groups over the other, but to lay out the challenge that each of them face. There are valid points to be made for and against each perspective, but regardless of what camp one ascribes to, there is much work to be done.

There is no doubt that God has used, and continues to use the traditional church model.  Flawed vessels are all that He has to work with, and to the degree it is about Him, He works through it.  In many ways this system works fairly well for young believers, as it provides a substantial amount of structure, and basic teaching.  But on the other end of the spectrum, it struggles to allow disciples to come to full maturity. 

A comparable paradigm would be adult children, who still live in their parent’s basement.  By appearance, they are fully functional adults, but in truth they will never actually stand on their own two feet (i.e. put a roof over their head, put food on their own table, pay their own utility bills, raise their own children…) until they absolutely have to.  Even if they’re paying rent to their parents, they are still very much dependents, who won’t find out what they’re capable of until they build a life of their own.  It was never God’s design that children should remain wards of their parents (Gen.2:24).

Likewise, the Hebrew writer explains that the Levitical priesthood was never going to be sufficient to bring the church to its fullness (Heb.7:11-12), which created the need for One who was both King and Priest.  Again, this was intended to be a radical shift in the way that the body of Christ functioned, and he ultimately chastens these particular followers for their lack of growth in the walk of faith (Heb.5:12-13).  Yet, as constructed, the traditional church system re-creates this same Levitical pattern.  As long as there is a professional staff to do the work of ministry, it is unlikely that the royal priesthood will ever truly emerge (Heb.7).

Finally, the church as an institution is a troublesome notion.  A body is formed by the Creator, and it is a living thing.  Institutions are constructed by man, and the only life within them comes from those who inhabit them.  No matter how diligent the construction, such entities are highly susceptible to corruption, and the long sad history of institutional religion is infested with tragic examples of this.  There is also a built-in conflict of interest, as helping folks to go directly to the Lord becomes a threat to the solvency of the structure.

Perhaps the greatest danger is that folks mistake their affiliation with the institution for genuine communion with the One who came to set them free.  In the midst of such deception, there are bold declarations of liberation, but genuine freedom is never truly experienced.

Ultimately, the evidence that a branch is connected to the vine is the fruit that naturally springs forth from it.  If the traditional church model isn’t producing followers who think, look and act like Jesus Christ (2 Corth.3:18), one needs to question what vine it has grafted itself to (John 15:5).

New Wineskin Advocates recognize the need for a change, and have varying ideas about what this new form or format might look like.  Many believe that getting away from buildings, and corporate structures would create a closer knit, more intimate community.  Others believe that Apostolic leadership, and Prophetic insight are what’s missing from the current church recipe. 

To be sure, there is some amount of scriptural basis for these (and other) potential approaches, but it is questionable whether any of these changes will actually transform “the church”.  Without a genuine change of heart, we risk carrying the damage and dysfunction of our current system into the new format. 

Many of those who’ve already ventured into the House Church movement have found themselves having the same sorts of issues (albeit on a smaller, more intimate scale) they were having in church buildings, and in ministries attempting to implement the Five-Fold Ministry approach, the clergy / laity divide is actually growing.

Watching these first small steps toward a “new wineskin” might lend credence to the De-churched belief that this system is broken beyond repair.  But if that is true, where does the Body of Christ go from here.  Our mission is not to simply diagnose what’s wrong with the church.  It is to be the active, visible, breathing representation of Jesus Christ on the earth.  If one concludes that the established system is a counterfeit, it becomes incumbent upon them to go on and manifest something legitimate in its place.

In far too many instances, the De-churched gather around their damaging church experiences, congratulating each other for escaping “the system”, and disparaging anyone who remains within it.  None of that gets us any closer to our destiny, and staying there for any amount of time cultivates a root of bitterness.

After spending a couple thousand words in breaking all this down, I would like to suggest that it doesn’t really matter which of these camps you might find yourself in.  Ultimately, the challenge is the same.  God does not view us as we view each other, He is looking directly into our hearts (1Sam.16:7).  I would further submit that if our hearts were in the right condition, the format of our worship wouldn’t inhibit us from manifesting a legitimate representation of Christ (Rom.8:28).

The gospels (Mathew & Luke) record an intriguing scene from the ministry of John the Baptist.  “When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: ‘You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.  And do not think you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham.  The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire (Matt.3:7-10)’.”

It’s interesting, and maybe a bit concerning that no one ever seems to see themselves in the Pharisees, and Sadducees.  Could it be a similar kind of religious pride that blinds us to the deception in our own hearts?  After all, these men had devoted their lives to ministerial pursuits, and they were confident in their knowledge, lineage, giftings, and callings.  They had credentials, and position, and a booming religious system behind them.  And how is that any different than the religious leaders of today.

Then, along comes a wild-eyed street preacher, questioning their legitimacy, and demanding that they produce the fruit of their alleged repentance.  Who was he to make such an accusation, or to deliver such a mandate?    Of course, had there been heathy fruit to present, it would have been a simple matter to discredit this outsider, but despite the thriving temple industry, the cupboard was woefully bare.

We too, can point to our beautiful facilities, our state-of-the-art sound systems, our arena sized worship events, and our well attended conferences, as evidence of “success” in ministry.  But those things are a better representation of the culture than of Christ.  Once again, I hear the Spirit of Lord demanding that we present the fruit of our supposed repentance.  That is the challenge laying before all who would call themselves by His name.  Indeed, the ax is already at the root, and without genuine fruit, our labor will continue to be in vain.

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