I love the Church

“I love the church.” It came to me as if it was some new revelation. Perhaps it was less of a new revelation, but instead more of a new development. I had been praying for years at this point that Christ would work in my heart a deep, authentic, and internalized love for Himself and His Church. It seemingly came out of nowhere, revealing a subconscious working of Christ’s Spirit in my heart. It was spoken in response to a question asked regarding my reasoning for wanting to step onto the mission field in the future. There are many ways in which I could have answered that question, yet my response in that moment revealed to me a narrowing in a way or possibly even a sanctifying of my reasoning regarding what I perceive to be Christ’s call on my life to step into ministry.

I have begun to identify that my desire to step into fulltime ministry/mission work has become rooted in a deep love for the church. This love for the church has been built and developed over the last two years through Christ’s unyielding work of grace in my heart. I believe the Lord began to develop a love for the church within me by first teaching me to identify myself with it. Let me explain a bit.

Throughout much of my life, my role as a member of the body of Christ has had little influence regarding my relationship with Christ or the way in which I would identify myself. What happened to the church, whether local or global, was of little concern to me as I had become content to focus solely on my individual relationship with Jesus. Whether the church was suffering, experiencing persecution, or losing influence was of little concern to me because I had completely removed myself from it by not choosing to be identified with it. Little attention or focus was placed on anything outside of what the Lord was speaking, doing, or working directly in me.

I can remember the very moment where the Lord began to pour His grace upon this self-focused and egotistical area of my heart. It was over two years ago, and I was sitting in church listening to a sermon on the seven churches displayed in the book of revelation. It was honestly a sermon that I had heard probably five separate times before this point, yet this time as the pastor spoke through the attributes, mainly vices, of the seven different churches discussed in revelation, I was not able to quell the tears rolling down my face.

Previously, I had always approached this passage of scripture with a very individualistic way of thinking. “I can see how so and so would fit into that church.” “Thank God I’m not as messed up as that church was.” “I don’t feel like I really relate to what that church struggled with.” Yet for some reason, Christ in His mercy decided to come and touch my heart in that moment. For the first time my heart felt sorrow and grief for a church, of which I was a part, that had fallen short of God’s standard and was in desperate need of a Savior’s grace. As much as I wanted to, I could not separate myself from the body of Christ. Prayers of repentance began to pour from my lips for the way WE the church had fallen short, for the way WE hadn’t measured up, for the way WE did not deserve His grace. This was the beginning of Christ teaching me what it meant to love the church as He did. It required tears. An increased love for the church in my heart also meant an increased sorrow  for the ways the church had and was falling short. An increased love for the church also meant increased grief for the brothers and sisters who chose to walk away, saying the cost was too great. An increased love for the church required an increased pain felt over the persecution it experiences around the world. An increased love for the church demanded increased tears.

The Lord, through His grace, revealed sinful areas of my heart which had believed that my identity in Christ could be divorced from my relationship and involvement in the church body. In failing to understand that Christ’s primary relationship was with the church and not myself, my pride had hindered me from being able to receive the love that Christ has for His church and thereby be able to witness that same love for the church modeled within my own heart. Only when I began to identify myself with the global church was I able to understand Christ’s love for myself as an extension of it. This revelation brought with it a manifestation of Christ’s love for the church within my own heart.  

We live in a very individualistic culture. My dreams. My goals. My future. My career. Me. Me. Me. It has become so egotistical that we have completely normalized the practice of every single person having a page and platform dedicated solely to the promotion and self-aggrandizement of themself. This self-focused mentality is not reserved to the secular world. It has also seeped its way in the fabric of the West’s own Christian spirituality. Within the Christian sphere, we see this attitude portrayed in ideas such as a personal relationship with Christ. What is Christ is speaking to ME. What is He doing for ME. What are MY issues. What are MY giftings. No thought is given to the local church body, let alone the global church body. Little mention is made of the fact that Christ’s work within each of our individual hearts is simply a small piece of a much greater work that He is performing within His church. While I in no way am negating or diminishing the critical spiritual truth that Christ earnestly desires personal relationship with every individual and that Christ does speak uniquely and personally to each of us, I do want to introduce a possible idea for reflection. I would propose that before Christ is mindful of me, though He is, He is first mindful of His church. After all, I am simply an individual member, a small part of a much larger body. What if my value or significance in Christ’s eyes was found not in my own individual splendor or majesty, but instead in my connection and union with the global church.

The last few years have held many prayers that Christ would build in me a deep and authentic love for His church. As the end of this year draws closer, I can look back over the last year and identify many moments where the Lord was responding to those earlier prayers. Through a variety of situations, his grace began to slowly mold my heart towards the church in a way that better reflected that of His own. As I have found to be a common form of delivery of Christ’s grace, this gift of understanding regarding Christ’s heart towards His church came predominantly in the form of tears.

I remember a specific moment where I learned of another church leader, a national figure, whose disqualifying moral failing had recently been brought to light. It wasn’t a new story. It didn’t come as a shock. Yet it broke my heart in a way that similar stories had not in the past. What once would have reaped hatred or disgust in my heart for my brother and his actions was replaced with sorrow for how WE, the church I loved, had once again fallen short. It sent me running to Jesus to ask that He would instill and protect leaders in His church whose hearts are completely His.

I remember watching a documentary which highlighted a handful of people pulled from Generation Z. Many grew up in the church, all of them had left, and none up until this point had returned. I remember their stories hitting my heart in a fresh way. Stories of pain, abuse, and hardship, much of which was brought into their lives directly by the church. It brought to my mind story after story of individual friends and family members who had walked away, deconstructed, or completely renounced their faith publicly. A heart that once would have harshly judged those brothers and sisters who walked away or who refused to hold the Bible as authoritative broke over the way that WE, the church I loved, had fallen short in the way we discipled, treated, and loved a young generation of believers. I began to pray that the Lord would send out a powerful move of the Holy Spirit through the generation of believers, grabbing hold of their souls and dwelling richly in their hearts.

I remember again hearing the testimony of John Chau’s life. How he willingly gave his very life in order to bring the good news to an unreached people group off the coast of India. I remember crying uncontrollably, struggling to understand why the story of a person I didn’t personally know could hit me in such a uniquely personal way. It was in that moment that I realized that I had, in a very real sense, lost a brother. He was my brother in Christ. He was a part of the same body. We, the church I loved, had lost a brother. How could that not feel personal? I prayed that Christ would comfort both John’s earthly family and all the brothers and sisters in Christ who were grieving the loss of his life. I prayed that the Sentinelese would be brought into that very family, that I would one day be able to great them as a brother and sister in Christ.

So why do I want to step into fulltime ministry/mission related work? Because I am grieved by the moral failings of my brother. Because I am sorrowful over the hurt inflicted on my younger brothers and sisters. Because I am torn apart over the loss of a brother. Because I love church. Because I can think of no greater honor than to be able to devote my life completely to the encouragement of my brothers and sisters, the service of Christ and his church, and the promotion of the Kingdom of God here on earth.