Fooled by Buildings

Don't be fooled - being a regular attender at a church 'building' does not make you a Christian no matter how many times you go and how much 'work' you do for the church. Do you become a policeman because you visit a police station or a nurse because you visit a hospital? In itself the act of attending a building every week will never make someone a Christian.
Infact it will proably make you an unbeliever! Institutional church is a highly dangerous place for a true believer because the structure and culture call for adherence to unseen 'rules' which if not recognised and followed will get you left out in the cold. and most of these rules will pull you right away from the work of the kingdom.

Why did Jesus come - Luke 4:18 "The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed," If church isn't doing this and expending all it's time energy and resources to doing this how is it a church at all?

Jesus saved his strongest words for the religious leaders of his day......
And his kindest words for those society ignored and excluded.....

If Jesus came back today and visited one of our churches on a Sunday would he be included and would anyone listen to him?

He visits our churches every week in the form of the outcasts, the poor, the broken, the desperate, the addict and the socially unacceptable - and by and large the church does not welcome comfort or include him. Often he is rejected abandoned and made to feel even more worthless by those carrying the name of Christian.
And so he sits on the street with the homeless instead, he sleeps on the floor of the single parents bedsit, he gathers round the campfires with the outcasts and the poor singing their songs and sharing their pain. He dances on injustice in the dark places no one would ever imagine he would go. He's cries with the broken hearted and struggles for the light with the mentally ill. He pours oil on the heads of the disabled and desperate and holds the hand of the fatherless and abandoned. He's doing it now and will keep doing it outside the walls of institutional church as he's always done.

The church has definitely left the building - thanks be to God!

Checking Out

Checking out when you 'hint' that I don't come here often enough. Checking out when you tell me I need to come next week to hear this famous preacher that's travelled all the way from Holland. Checking out when you make me stand up to sing. Checking out from your empty words and empty heart. Checking out. I'll be here in body but not in soul. My soul is at home with God and flying so fast past your timetable you can't see me.
No problems no fear and no concerns about church like this anymore...........
Playing the game so well you could never tell now.

The Lost are Found

The lost are found
The blind will see
The lame will walk
The dead will live
And You Are God
Forever You will reign.....

Living Stones

Jesus came to seek and save that which was lost. To bind up the broken hearted and to bring healing to the sick and set the captives free.

He did not come so we could play 'happy church' on a Sunday morning and Wednesday evening then go home feeling satisfied that we went to church and played our part so well that we should be congratulated.

Christianity is NOT about having and getting, it's about losing and giving.

It's not about living the good life well.

It's about dying uncomfortably, rejected and misunderstood.

It's not about having a great friendship circle to laugh with, to live with and to share with,

It's about walking away from the above to reach out and move towards those who have no-one.

It's not about attaining the dizzy heights of church 'leadership and ministry'

It's about laying it all down for Christ and aligning with the poor.

Christianity is about Jesus.

He was poor and mistreated, misunderstood and rejected.

He was love and he loved and he chose to align himself with the 'least' and the lost, the sick and the unwanted.

It's about following Jesus where he what and doing what he did.

The church of the real Jesus exists in hiding. He is building his church on the margins of life in the dark and abandoned places where christians fear to tread.

The church of Jesus is alive and kicking. It's growing and it's beautiful, filled with the humble and the broken - those the world rejects and has no time for.

Jesus is placing the stones just where they should be. One by one honed and polished shining like diamonds in the blackness. He is keeping a remnant for himself.

Occasionally he places a diamond inside the institutional church - to show his workmanship, because Jesus does want to save christians.... but mostly the diamond is trodden on or ignored, because by standing alone and appearing so different it is gauged to be useless and too unconventional to have any worth........

John 1:5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.

Loss is Gain

Tonight I sat on the floor. And I realised something I've seen glimpses of in the distance. This time it came in full focus. You cannot teach someone compassion, only the Holy Spirit can do that.
I've spent decades trying to open the eyes of the hardened Christians around me to the needs and the desperation of their suffering and struggling neighbours. But it never worked. Not once. Not once in 20 years did I teach or show by example how to feel, live and walk with those on the edge of life, those who don't fit those who suffer and search and holler from the gutter for justice mercy and love. Not once. Not once.

I'm blessed.

He took my life.

He gave me life.

I spent 20 years in the gutter losing everything bit by bit until I had nothing left. No dignity, no love, no respect. He allowed me to make mistakes... to lose the husband I adored the family I loved the child I would die for the house I waited for the career I had planned, the respect of my friends, the belonging to a church which accepted me. Everything...... until I was crawling in the dirt dying alone and forsaken.

Over 20 years He allowed me to be beaten until in the end he could win.


What did he win?

Tonight I saw. I saw the person He has made me. The person who 100% aligns herself with the poor and forsaken and rejected. Who has compassion. I am so eternally grateful that He allowed me to lose every thing. Because in losing it all I have gained Christ in His fullness pressed down and overflowing in streams of living water , over and over and over my cup overflows.

Blessed be your name.

Matt 16:25 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it.

Real Church

I work with the homeless. I get paid to rescue the lost and the broken and those who have given up on life.

Took a while.

Took 45 years but God got me there in the end.

It's a blessing, poured out, over flowing, more than I can handle more then I could ever have hoped for, beyond my wildest dreams - I would never have dreamt this dream because for so long I was just the same as those I'm paid to rescue - and when you're like that you don't dream dreams of being rescued and fulfilled, you wait to die.

God has a heart for the poor. God's heart is so infused with love and grace towards the poor and broken that it literally bursts out of me across the room to those who need his touch his help and his healing.

I understand from the Bible that you have to be born again to 'see' the Kingdom of God. Lazarus entered heaven - there was no record of him being 'born again'. He entered because he was enlightened - although there is no record of him being 'born again' he was broken humble desperate and vulnerable. - a beggar, the lowest of the low. He had no means of supporting himself. He relied on others - and they did not care. So. Lazarus went to heaven and the rich man went to hell. Wow do I love Jesus! The rich man not only ignored Lazarus's plight but he was 'glad and made merry and rejoiced every day' while Lazarus suffered..........

I think and I watch. I see the happy well fed joyful Christians I know making merry with their endless get togethers, parties, social functions and prayer meetings and then I see Jason.

Jason metaphorically 'waits at the gate.' But guaranteed he will not be welcomed in and given sustenance, because he is an un-desirable.

Jason is the type of guy you cross the street to ignore.

So I'm sat with Jason while he pours out his sad tale of rejection, alcoholism and physical illness. At 45 he's alone with no home and no money. Everything he hoped for as a child, a teenager , a young adult has been snuffed out. He is dishevelled, unkempt and un-appealing. So I sit with him. He tells me his story. And he has no hope, and he's dying, he has a fatal illness. He's dying at 45 with no money, no partner, no family and no home. So sad. I know the Bible and I know?! Jason is not born-again so he's going to hell. Right then and there towards the end of my time with Jason. I cry out to God from my heart as I speak to him. I cry out God: 'if there's a heaven, which I know there is and people like Jason are not gonna be there because they have not openly professed faith in you and become 'born again' and attended church regularly then God I want no part of it. I will go to hell, because I want to spend eternity with the Jason's of this world and not the Christians of this world who are for the most part hard and cold and removed from the suffering and the pain, cocooned in their little worlds of happiness and joy and adept and pushing the Jasons out of their cocoon because they are dirty and sinful and tainted',........so anyway - long prayer....

Back to Jason. He tells me his wife threw him out and he hates her. So I asked him if he could 'let this go.' I'm not permitted in my job to ' talk religion' to him as its not considered politically correct' so I rephrase my questions accordingly.... Let this go? his eyes light up.

He looks directly at me and says ' you mean forgiver her'?

Woooo I was not expecting that. (I feel God nudge my spirit!)

Yes I said forgive her.

Again he stops - this weak and shattered man - before me suddenly looks alive and awake.....

Are you religious he says?

Uhm I say... I believe I'm a follower of Jesus but I don't go to church...

I get the feeling this is going somewhere....

So from zero/zilch I am now faced with this desperate and hopeless individual who seems to have an understanding of the basic principles of Christianity....by then I know he has in the past been touched by God.

Yes he tells me he used to go to church, yes he tells me he believes, no he says he wont go back as he was rejected and made to feel dirty, unacceptable and rubbish when he tried to go he felt no good and inferior.

So in the wildernerness Jason and I sit and we talk - about faith, about life and about hope. And he agrees that he needs to forgive and he shares that he wants to forgive - knows that he should. And we don't pray or lay hands or sing songs or look holy. We look like normal people off the street. But God is there and we both know it.

And Jason goes back to his sofa and I go back to my kids - and that was church for us.

REAL CHURCH.

Matt 18:20 Where two or three people meet together in my name, I am there with them.

Listen to Lazarus

As most of you know I have had a hard time in Institutional Church. The IC tends in the main to run as a business with a hierarchical model - much like the 'world' Also much like the world the poor, the outcast, the socially inept, the single parent, the uneducated, and the homeless get mistreated, ignored and deprived of having any real voice or influence. As a poor divorced single parent from the wrong side of town I have suffered untold and told abuse at the hands of those who supposedly are shepherds of the flock. It has been the same for every other person from my background that I've taken to church. So what's that all about?

I was praying this morning and asking God why he allowed myself and my children to be treated this way in 'His' church? Surely anyone with only a minimal knowledge of the Bible knows that much is said about protecting, nurturing and leading the widow and fatherless gently....
So why God why did you let us be so viciously treated at the hands of your very own ministers and leaders?

If your face and background fit you will never see or feel the abuse. That's the problem. IC can be a great place to be an 'acceptable christian' - if you find favour with the leadership because your lifestyle, family and background are considered 'acceptable' It's also a bonus if you have some hard cash to 'give' on a regular basis. This is the truth.

One day those who abused me, ignored and shunned me because I didn't have the 'right' credentials will have to give an account to God for their actions. The thing is I don't know anyone else personally who has spoken up about the way they have been treated by IC - I have watched so many from my background go to church and leave quite quickly - but they don't have the courage to speak out. The middle classes scare them. They baffle them with eloquent speech and long words. They have money and power and influence.The poor are aware of their shortcomings. The IC causes the poor the uneducated and those who don't 'fit' the required and acceptable mold of a believer to feel even more inadequate. The last thing they will want is a confrontation - on every human level they know they would lose - so they leave.

I hope and excuse me if this sounds a bit harsh.... I hope that on judgement day Jesus will bring every poor, rejected, lonely, outcast, homeless and desperate person I took to church into the great hall. Then he will bring the leaders of the church in who rejected, ignored and shunned them and then I hope he will ask them for an explanation and then I hope he will judge accordingly. Sounds to me a bit like a story Jesus told here about the rich man and Lazarus - but of course institutional church portrays this as a mere parable which 'doesn't have to be true in all its particulars...........'!!


We - all of us are without excuse if we mistreat the poor. The Bible is clear as to what awaits for those who behave this way...

What surprises me is the way so many Christians concentrate on showing and telling the world about their blessings of wonderful husbands/wives and families and Gods provision of their amazing church/house/car/holiday/promotion etc etc. Now this I agree is ok as long as it's used as a vehicle to reach out and tell those who don't have all the above that God can intervene in their lives and give the same things to them. All too often the church keeps the blessings to itself. The members keep the blessings within the confines of the church family and congratulate themselves for being so holy and worthy to receive these gifts. Bullshit.

Do these Christians ever stop and think what their boasting does to those in the gutter who have lost their spouse, their homes, their jobs, their self respect and are struggling to survive?
I don't recall Jesus ever going on like this. Hang on, I know, remember the time he walked right up to a disabled, homeless guy on the pavement and told him how God had blessed him with amazing legs so he could walk run and skip. Of course then Jesus went home and wrote all about it on his blog telling the world about how God had blessed him..... I think not. Jesus was too humble and thoughtful to do that!

If I ever do get 'blessed' with a spouse and my own home and the regular comforts all my christians brothers and sisters consider 'blessings' I will not speak about them as I would not want to cause even more pain and heartache for those who have not or worse still, had but lost.

These are the blessings Jesus spoke about so I have no problem with anyone boasting about these...

"Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn,
for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they will be filled.
Blessed are the merciful,
for they will be shown mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called sons of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are you when men shall hate you, and when they shall exclude and mock you, and throw out your name as evil, for the Son of Man's sake.
Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven, for their fathers did the same thing to the prophets.
"But woe to you who are rich!
For you have received your consolation.
Woe to you, you who are full now,
for you will be hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now,
for you will mourn and weep.
Woe, when men speak well of you,
for their fathers did the same thing to the false prophets.

Well I didn't plan for this post to go this way... but it has got me thinking about all those happy blessed, full and highly regarded christians out there...... who like to write endless blog posts showing just how much they have and how richly God has blessed them..... Taking into account the above verses the 'blessings' they so want to ram down our throats are not from God at all!!! I'm not saying christians shouldn't write about Gods provision or Gods healing power or Gods intervention in their lives - that's fine and good as testimony is always uplifting. But 'bragging' about a 'blessing' that God doesn't even call a blessing is wrong and very hurtful to those who are struggling and suffering and 'have not.'

I recently had some correspondence with a christian (no-one who reads my blog!) who constantly goes on about 'his' and 'his' families 'blessings' I challenged him about this and explained how it could be very hurtful to those who had nothing. He disagreed and was very self righteous with me so much so it had me quite tearful, I deleted his last message as I am not clever enough to respond using the kind of language he uses and also as a woman who has already been so abused and downtrodden by the IC I just don't have the strength to fight what he says. He has a huge following in the States and is well respected, maybe I'm wrong or misguided - i don't know, all I know is that Jesus measures our Christianess by how it impacts (for the good) on the 'least' among us. (Matthew 25:31-46)

This is an unfinished post which has sat in my drafts for 6 months. I'm posting it anyway today as it is as I continue to grapple with the issues mentioned here myself.