Church Hermitology

Several years ago I had a friend named Donnie who had a sense of humor that rated in the top 5 of people I’d ever met. Donnie was a superb church musician who wound up becoming the main worship guy at the mid-sized church we attended at the time. After his appointment, his parents suddenly started showing up on Sunday mornings. Since I had rarely seen them before their appearances, I asked Donnie where they had been. He simply replied, “Oh, they’re church hermits. They go wherever they want whenever they feel the urge.” Cracked me up. 

“Church hopping” can become a disturbing pattern in the life of Christians, but how can it be defined? At what point does one morph into a “hermit” versus, say, a thoughtful, Spirit-led parishioner? When one changes churches every month? Every year? Every 4 years? Every decade? Moving out of a church should not be taken lightly, but vast numbers of evangelical churches are so loose on structure and discipline that most can come and go like they’re attending the local cineplex. Are there legitimate concerns from a scriptural basis that might compel a brother or sister to leave? To that question, most Bible-believing Christians would state unwaveringly, “Yes.” So, when it comes to when and how to leave, two books offer outstanding guidance: The Peacemaker by Ken Sande (www.hispeace.org) and Vintage Church by Mark Driscoll (relit.org/vintagechurch). This has become a very personal issue to me since my family and I are on a church hunt now -- which means we're leaving our current church. We've made our decision after exhausting all biblical avenues and after much prayer and counsel from trusted sources.

So now we come to where God would have us next. I just know there is a perfect church gathering out there somewhere! Having just stated the absurd, how does a believer decide which ministry is best to link up with when in search mode? I would like to offer some personal thoughts and guidelines in answer to that question.

I created a grid with several potential local church bodies as “candidates” for my family and me. (To help me in crystallizing my rationale for leaving our current ministry, I decided to judge it by the same criteria as though it were one of the new candidates.) I created the grid with each of the potential churches (and the most recent one) running down the left column. Then I supplied, in the form of headings, categories which are important to me (clearly, a personal set of criteria that are, in my bias, biblical). Some categories are more important than others, but the ideal church candidate would  fit most criteria. Under each category I would supply a question mark, a check mark, or an “X” corresponding with the church ministry on the far left column. Here are my category headings in no particular order:

• Prayer Soaked
• Holy Spirit Sensitive (Desirous of the Spirit’s filling and empowerment and at least “open” to the so-called “miraculous” gifts)
• Biblical (Word-based and strong on the expositional teaching of Scripture)
• Reformed (“5 Solas” and “Doctrines of Grace” Centered)
• Gospel focused (the Cross!) -- not marketing and methodology focused.
• Socially aware and involved (care for the poor with a Gospel intentionality and not $$$/facilities focussed)
• Missions minded (both local “missional” and international mindset)
• Confessor baptizers
• Accountability (not entirely independent, but not necessarily a heavily structured denominational network [PCA, e.g.])

Upon completion of my chart, I could clearly see the Spirit’s involvement in taking us out of our current church and, consequently, I felt much peace. It should be quite a trip as we now try to accurately fill in the blocks for the other candidates! Naturally it will mean many visits and casual discussions with leadership and members of the prospective ministries. Meanwhile, we are determined to leave where we are currently in a biblical way and in the love of Christ.

So, why would I author this post as my inaugural foray into the blogosphere? What relation does it have to the title of my blog? Well, initially, I intend to expand on the above “hermitology” criteria as a springboard. Trust me. . . it will, in time, make sense where I'm going with all this. I have quite a story to tell along with the insights and I hope all of it will be of help to my readers. God bless you on your own iter crucis!