Brain Storming

So I am only three days into this blog and I am going to buck the trend already. I will continue to lay down my thoughts on the verses I am reading, but today I want to focus on the church that I am currently attending. For the majority of my adult years, I have been an anti-establishment man and that included church. It helped that I was also non-christian for most of that time, but even when I began my journey back into a relationship with Christ, I was wary of organized religion. So it wasn't until 3 years ago that I let my guard down and allowed myself to become a member of EVC a truly organized church with its bi-laws, and politics, and organization. And it has been an awesome experience. God has been faithful in demonstrating the spiritual needs that can be met by a church. He has also shown me that despite of of her faults (mainly being run by humans :) a church can play a powerful role in both the community as well as in an individual's heart.

Now it's 3 years later, I am getting ready to head off to Dallas, and I am watching all this human shit going down in my church home. And it hurts. Without going into details, human politics is rearing its head generating division and strife because folks are aligning behind one person's idea(s) or another. I can understand the passion a little bit, but I don't understand the amount it is pushing people. At least 2 of the topics are biblical in base: tithing and the expectation of our leaders, and missionary work and how to best support our missionaries. The third topic is more relevant to our times, but less biblical or spiritual in nature: should the church as a body align itself with a political/social stance or should it be neutral.

Folks are being hurt by this strife. People are leaving the church and some are even leaving Christ (or at least heading in that direction). And I bring this up here for two reasons. The first is posterity; I look forward to the future when the church has worked through these issues and this entry will be my only reminder of the strife within the church. I want to be able to look back and see what has come from this struggle. I hope and pray that God will use this time build the church up so that as a united body, she can truly be God's presence here in our community. Secondly, I add this entry as a written prayer. I know it is not of the poetic form we find in the Old Testament, but it is my petition to the creator: I don't know what is going on (as usual) but I don't like what I see, so God I ask that you will bring healing to your house, that the division and strife be removed instead of amplified.

Peace
Dustin