Every week I receive emails from people who are leaving behind traditional churches and launching out into simple forms of church gatherings and a desire to live kingdom-lives 24/7. Something is drawing us out of our traditional church backgrounds into unchartered waters. Something is compelling us to leave the familiar for the unknown.
Skeptics might suggest that people are leaving traditional structures because of hurts that have not been resolved. While I do see many people hurt by hierarchical church systems, and while this may be a good reason to seek something different, I don’t sense that most people I speak to are nursing old wounds and refusing to receive God’s healing.
So, what’s motivating this uprising?
The more “spiritual” answer is that it’s the Spirit of God Who is moving people out of old wineskins into the new. While I’m sure this is true, the Spirit works through our human hearts and emotions to move us. He causes us to become dissatisfied, to see new possibilities, to be no longer content with where we have been. So, in a sense, when I ask the question “What’s motivating us?” I’m asking to understand more thoroughly just what the Holy Spirit is doing in the hearts of so many.
“What is motivating us?”
I’m interested in responses to this.
Initially, I became grossly frustrated with a system of church that devastated me personally as I experienced a significant, personal burnout and as I became painfully disappointed with the lack of transformation in the lives of people. I saw the dysfunction of the CEO-type pastor, the control and personal agendas that are inherent in a power-centered structure, and the pain caused by an organization that valued some above others. I saw the lack of real relationship and therefore honest love within a group of people who truly wanted both but were too busy keeping the system going to experience either. I wondered how any of this church-activity-stuff fit into what Scripture described as “church.” But this frustration was only the initiation. It produced the longing that got me moving.
I suspect that these types of frustrations and/or painful realizations are the starting point for many people searching for something more. But I’m also wondering if we need to transcend these initial negative motivations into something more constructive?
I am hoping that I have other motivations that are now stirring me to keep moving toward organic Christian living. I want to live in spiritual reality 24/7. I want to be the church– the living, breathing, organic movement of God’s people who are living in the leading and power of the Spirit. I want raw reality-of-God living, not a mediated experience in which I follow rote activities in order to feel good about having done some spiritual “duty-thing.”
I want to hang out with a community of people who are charged up about this type of kingdom living and who also know me, stand with me, support me… and for whom I feel challenged to lay down my life in order to do the same for them. I want to see the Body of Christ, wherever it gathers, loving one another, healing one another, pouring into one another until “the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.”
I want to see God’s people unleashed. Is that too big of a dream or what? As idealistic as it may sound, this motivates me. I want to see His glory cover the earth through His people who are lovers of God, lovers of each other, and living compassionate, power-enhanced lives. These are people who go through the same problems and strains as anyone else, but they do it openly, vulnerably, and their dependence on God and His grace poured out in their lives shines through them. They are weak, but Oh he is strong! They engage their spiritual gifts and their compassion in everyday life. Through thick and thin, they live for Him, give for Him, and ultimately truly, really desire only the One Thing–more of Him.
I am motivated by the desire to see “the church” get out of the way so that the church can become what it really is: the living, breathing presence of Christ in a world that so desperately needs Him. I want to see a little more of Jesus expressed through His collective Body so that we reflect, in a greater way, His glory, His wonder, His love, His grace, His purity, and His transcendent beauty. I long to see just a bit more of Him shining through!
What’s motivating you?
Comments
7 responses to “What’s Motivating Us?”
I am motivated to see and participate in true Christian living, to experience the fullness of the Holy Spirit leading us where we never imagined we might go (or transforming us into something we never imagined we might be).Yes, I’ve been frustrated and angry at what I’ve seen and experienced. It’s not the “real stuff” or the right stuff. I’ve experienced God and great times, but I want to be part of a real community of God, a real, living body that functions. I’m fully motivated to deal with our dysfunction, the trouble is christians don’t want to go there.
I’m motivated by the need for more transparency, more transcendency — in my heart (and others’ too!) I just started a blog where I want to explore these notions with other Christians. It’s called “Worship Naked” and can be found at the above address. I just found your blog today. I expect I’ll be back! Thanks for your thoughts.
Tracey
Great post! I also appreciated your last post. I’m going to direct people who visit my blog site to this post. I’m motivated by a desire to see a church that is really family to one another, and who engages the world through relationship into the loving and saving presence of Jesus Christ.
My motivation for seeking a way to connect with God outside of the traditional box is based in the desire to express the hurt, pain and frustration I have in my life. I love being in a community of people who know me (and whats going on in my life) well enough to not expect me to put on a “happy” face. They can just allow me to be. In traditional church I was always hiding behind the expected smile. This ability to be REAL has also opened me up to TRUE expressions joy and love.
Clearly the Holy Spirit is moving. With so many Christians from different backgrounds all hungering after the same thing. Even in the large churches, small groups have become a core part. The answer is that people are discovering God’s power in the midst of community.
For myself I am seeking an honest, authentic Christianity, one that isn’t present in the traditional Church. To be vulnerable and open, to not know where you are going can be a scary thing. But it is this, that draws us closer to Jesus. Also in impacting the world around us traditional church is no longer effective. We need to be the Church and not go to Church. The two are radically different.
These are great comments! Don’t we really want to be real? I mean, I’ve done so much searching and also once I found God, I’ve had fantastic moments and even evenings with hundreds of other Holy Spirit filled believers and also alone, by myself. i’ve also had dry times … as well as disturbing times. But I want to be so close and so “one” with God and His children… I’m longing for that brotherhood, the life in the Kingdom has its heart in community. Why are we all looking elsewhere when our brothers and sisters are here, near us and wanting the same thing (presumably?). OK so were not all at the same place but that’s the point – we accept others where they’re at. I want to “be” … and I want all my “doing” to emanate from that… no more time to waste.
You have to come out of Egypt and pass through the wilderness in order to get to the promise land. “And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace.” He has provided us with everything we need for the journey. The more we have fellowship with Him and “those who love His appearing” the more His truth will become evident. “Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth”