I had a friend message me today on Facebook, asking me if I could give her the link to a blog a like.  I had  shared a link to it earlier in the week, and I guess it stood out enough for my friend to remember it to ping me to ask me about it.

The problem was, she said, that some friends of hers who had been raised in the church, and who had been raised under good teaching and all, Gospel and truth, were at a place where what they often heard from the pulpit, though true it may, was agitating and discomforting.  Both her friend and her husband had grown up in broken, abusive homes, and the words they were now hearing, though crafted with the intent to love and guide, were cutting and bruising.  They still love Jesus.  Still, my friend told me, “she’s taking a break now and trying to reset her compass without leaving Jesus in the dust.”

The blog my friend was asking about is Addie Zierman’s “How to Talk Evangelical” blog.

I’ve been running into this struggle quite a bit lately.

Other people are usually the biggest problem about being a part of a church.  They get tangled up in the religious stuff and often forgo spirituality for superficiality, trying to play the part that they think they are supposed to play, now that they have “found God”- not realizing all the while that because they are playing a part, they can’t see God.

It’s a topic that current writers are hitting on mainstream pieces, asking about why people leave the church.  Just this weekend, rising blogstar Rachel Held Evans wrote an opinion piece for CNN titled “Why Millennials are Leaving the Church”, whose assertions are interesting even if some of them are questionable.

I understand the compulsion though. Some people in any organization will hurt us, even though we think in the church it’s the last place it should happen.

Heck, when I was in seminary, I remember one day out being on a walk with a few of my classmates between classes, and the question of who would “make it” as a minister came up.  As though we were trying out for a team.  And one of the guys, an older dude who was type A and had already been a charger in his life in the business world, was asked about me.  Not aware I was tagging along behind in the group, I essentially heard him give me the thumbs-down.  I was not bold enough.  Not mature enough.

And so we are left with this challenge as believers, old and new, of what to make of this institution that for some has become too showy and flashy to be taken seriously, to others, a harbor of hurt and heartache, where the “Good News” is hidden somewhere between the rock worship hour and the catchy, happy illustrations in the message, appearing somewhere around where Jesus’ name is mentioned.

Jesus entreats us to follow him through his Word.  This was his first invitation to his disciples- “Follow me.”  The church actually grew in the beginning because people were earnestly doing that, and realizing that while they were fully following him, there were others around them doing that as well.

All I can say is that I am grateful that God picks his team, and not men.  And that when this spiritual family that is supposed to help us hurts us instead, He is there to remind us that So-and-so is still learning to pitch, and the welt will go down.  He’s the healer, though.  The captain.  The coach.  And to play on his team I have one rule to follow, really.  “Learn to love.” That’s the rule in the Kingdom.

And then he points me at the church.  “There’s where you have to start.”

If place 1 doesn’t help your heart, then by all means- try place 2.  Or place 3.  Definitely take breaks if you need to, but then keep looking.

Church was designed by God to be the place where we learn to love, and to regularly practice what we learn.

Unfortunately, part of loving is forgiving, and the church gives us opportunities to learn and to practice forgiveness as well.

“But the only thing that matters”, as Paul stated in Galatians, “is faith expressing itself as love.”