No pretty pictures this time.  Sometime my mind wanderings get into deep theology.  Here is part of a discussion I am involved in ... from a farm forum no less.  On one forum I frequent a question was raised about church.  Here are portions of the original post:

"Our kids started church here when they were very young and it seems like them and some of the other long time members kids are kind of being accused of being territorial and not very welcoming to new possible members. Our kids have been taught to hold themselves to a high standard. If you think that someone might be trouble then steer clear, they are overall well-behaved and willing to help with about anything you ask, work hard and you really would be hard pressed to find a better bunch of kids. Ministers and youth leaders I think are led to try to bring in any and everyone who needs help as they should, but the rub is that my kids know these kids from school and the community and have a hard time believing that they are sincere after seeing them in real life in other places.  After I have told my kids all of their lives to be selective about who you are around should I just say nevermind? The real mission of our church is to bring the Word of GOD to as many people as we can but I'm pretty sure that the more needy folks you bring in the less that the long time members will want to participate."

We could have a long discussion on just that last sentence.   But let's blend that in with a couple things my online friend Kay said:


"some people are very territorial and closed-minded and -hearted when it comes to accepting people into their church.  ... Being "selective"' in your personal life - who you associate with in school and who you bring into your home - is not necessarily the same as who you want to welcome into your church. Isn't church supposed to be where people go to remake their lives, to be forgiven, to be welcomed into loving arms?  Jesus was not too selective, was he?   It is two-faced to teach one thing, and practice another.  It is the classic example of hypocrisy. "

So many thoughts rattling around in my head.  I'm probably not going to do a good job expressing any of them. I remember reading someplace that nobody is perfect.  I think the implications are some are even farther away than others.    I don't have a good answer about how to handle others with a less than desireable history.  I guess it depends on how sincere you feel they are.  If the kids think they are sincere how they ought to relate to them is a lot different than if they think they are just cming to church meet the opposite sex or if they are just coming for the free cookies and milk.

What is the real mission of the church?  Is it to reach out and bring others in? Is it to do good? I have a viewpoint that many will have trouble with.  The real mission of the church is to worship God.  Nothing more, nothing less. But here is where it gets interesting.  When we look through the New Testament  we see Jesus say "Feed my sheep".  We see phrases like fruits of the Spirit. We see talk about faith and works.  We read in James that if we have faith but it doesn't show up in how we act our faith is worthless.

If the church is fulfilling it's real mission (worshipping God) it is going to show up as actions. Not necessarily by the church as an organized body but the church as the people involved in it.  At the end of James chapter 2 we read:

For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, even so faith apart from works is dead.

That is a very, very theologically deep sentence. Where I'm going with all this is if the church is really fulfilling its mission to worship God it cannot help but do the things we see as reaching out to the ... I hesitate to say "lost" but it most quickly gets the point across ... and helping develop them as followers of the faith.

In the Book of Revelation we see various churches mentioned.  It is commonly accepted these were real churches but also they were examples for us to study and take note of.  One of the things they tell us is a church can mess up.  The church is made up of imperfect people, people who do things wrong and mess up.

I was at a conference a few years ago with a speaker from a large fundamentalist denomnation. He said the average church lasts 100 years.  His denomination, rather than try and fix a dying church, would just start up a new one nearby.   I understand from a human standpoint that is the quickest and easiest solution, but I'm a farmer who was raised to never throw away anything that had potential of good in it.  I think the same of people and churches.

The difficulty comes when we try and reform the folk who have become so set in their ways they don't realize their attempts at doing right are becoming a hindrance to others.  I see that happening in my church.  The new preacher is advocating some actions, some changes in how the church does things.  The problem I'm not sure he realizes yet is some long time, raised in this church members see it as saying Dad and Uncle and Friend were wrong because the didn't "do church" that way.  I think that is why the denomination I mentioned just starts over.  It avoids the hinderance of history.

I'm wondering away from where we started.  Let's look at one more thing.   "Being "selective"' in your personal life - who you associate with in school and who you bring into your home - is not necessarily the same as who you want to welcome into your church. Isn't church supposed to be where people go to remake their lives, to be forgiven, to be welcomed into loving arms?"  How do you (and your kids)  do both? We are warned in 1st Corinthians 15:33 not to be tricked by false words,  that evil company does damage to good behaviour.  As I said earlier, I don't have a good answer.  If they are sincere then we have an obligation to help them grow and mature.

I've taken a lot of space and still haven't gotten to some of the issues or answers.   I'm not sure there are good answers.