Restoring Kingdom Builders

I felt very uncomfortable in church last Sunday.

My wife and I are living in a new area and we’ve been looking for a church home.  Last Sunday, we visited a church several miles away that meets in a small converted warehouse.  Our daughter was with us because it was Mother’s Day.

There was much about the church that I liked.

They sang some praise songs I knew.

They acknowledged the mothers in their midst and gave each of them a gift.

They showed a cute video about Mother’s Day.

The pastor’s message was biblical and heartfelt.

But something bothered me … something personal.

When I brought it up to my wife and daughter in the car afterwards, they felt differently.

But I still felt uncomfortable … even anxious.

If I made that church my home, I’d remain anxious about this issue.  I don’t want to feel the way I do, but I do.

And this is how thousands of Christians feel every Sunday … at their home church.

They feel uncomfortable about:

*pews that are too hard

*theatre seats instead of pews

*the way the pastor dresses

*songs they don’t know

*songs they do know but have sang way too many times

*the style of the music

*the worship leader

*music volume

*the greeting time (“I don’t want to shake hands with people I don’t know!”)

*the pastor’s speaking voice (his accent, pitch, rhythm, clarity, volume)

*the pastor’s stories (too many, too few, too irrelevant)

*the pastor’s points (biblical?  relevant?  realistic?  meaningful?)

*the pastor’s body language (does he smile?  stand up straight?  wave his arms?)

When I leave a worship service these days, there are many criteria I can use to determine whether I’ll visit again:

*How much like me are the pastor and congregation?

*How well was the service done?

*How meaningful was the music?

*How wisely was Scripture used?

*Did God meet me there?

But increasingly, I find myself measuring a service by how the worship experience made me feel.

And one dominant question rattles around inside my spirit:

How comfortable did I feel in that service?

The more comfortable I feel, the more likely I am to return for a second visit … and eventually stay.

The more uncomfortable, the more likely I am to cross that church off my list and visit another one the following weekend.

Here’s how all this is relevant:

When most people attend a worship service, they want to feel comfortable there.

While they may be open to being challenged intellectually and spiritually, they wish to feel safe emotionally and socially.

If they visit a church once, and it feels comfortable, they may visit again … and again … and again … until they can predict that they’ll feel safe every time they attend.

And if the rest of their family has a similar experience, they will finally make that church their spiritual home.

But there are two wild cards that can mess things up and lead to conflict.

The first wild card is sudden or drastic change that makes them feel even more uncomfortable.

The second wild card is their own personal anxiety that they bring with them to church.

I will discuss both of these wild cards in my next article.

And I hope you feel comfortable until then!