Have You Lost Your Religion?

When you think of church, what’s the first word that comes to mind? Many of us have had positive experiences and think of words like home, community, discipleship, and love.

Others may think of sad words, like hurt, rejection, judgment, and loss.

The reality is that the church is comprised of communities of imperfect people seeking to know and be like Christ with a mission of bringing others along to do the same. These same imperfect people can cause us to think of all the sad words.

Our Churches

I do believe we need faith communities. First, we have the concept of the global or universal church. All of us serving Christ in communities across the globe is the global church. But let’s think about our individual church communities.

Does your church community encourage you to ask questions? Do the people encourage and counsel each other through doubt? Are they willing to walk with you through struggles of sin? I said it at the beginning, but let me emphasize it here: We, the church, are imperfect. We fail each other. We judge when we should love. You may have experienced some of these things when going through struggles or doubt. As you think of these questions, think about the hearts of those in leadership. Do they lead from a place of humility? Do they seek to love the body well but fail occasionally? Are they transparent and repentant when they fail?

My husband, James, and I are about three years into a church plant west of Denver. It’s a rare sermon where James doesn’t disclose his own doubt, struggle, or sin. I do the same in my conversations with our community. At one time we had a pretty significant issue in our marriage. James didn’t disclose the details—those were ours alone—but he did share that we were experiencing the issue. He confessed his sin to our church family, and he asked for prayers as we worked through it. While I was in a place of hurt and sadness, I was still grateful for his leadership through the situation. I believe our church family grew in their faith by coming alongside us in our struggle.

Our faith communities should be places of safety, love, and gentle correction. We should be exhibiting grace and transparency. We will fail, but the norm should be repentance and redemption versus unhealed wounds.

Ourselves

What does losing religion look like in your own heart and life? The topic of judgment is such a tricky one. We’re called to judge situations, to discern right from wrong. However, we’re far too quick to judge others and their actions. We’re often short on grace for others’ struggles, forgetting our own.

Before I was a parent, I’m ashamed to say, I was deeply judgmental of other parents. It would happen most often when I saw children behaving badly in stores. I believed I would be able to control them, and I judged the poor struggling mom or dad. I have repented of this behavior and pharisaical attitude. Now when I see parents struggling with children in stores, I feel compassion. I often offer an encouraging word or assistance, if reasonable. We don’t know the stories of others or what issues a family may be dealing with.

Social media is another area where we can intentionally lose our religion. I try to post at least one #keepingitreal post a month that doesn’t show the most funny or perfect parts of my life. I tell a story about how a kid disobeyed or how I messed up something. We can experience solidarity when we share not only our triumphs but our struggles.

Social media also provides a false sense of anonymity as we type our opinions from behind our screens. This is another way we can lose our religion. We must remember we’re talking to other image bearers of Christ in every interaction. Are the words we’re sending what we’d be willing to say to someone face to face? Would we say them to Jesus? May we show the mercy of Christ in every interaction on social media as well as in our communities.

As we are reminded in James 1:27, “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world” (NIV). I grew up in the church, so I used to think Christianity was my religion. As I’ve matured in my faith, I’ve learned my relationship with and devotion to Jesus and my treatment of the people he loves so dearly is what really matters. Going through this life humbly, with authenticity, working to love others well and repent when we fail–this is losing our religion. To that, I say good riddance!

Amy Wiebe is a Jesus follower, wife, mom of three, church planter, finance director, and lover of sarcasm and deep conversation with friends. She also loves camping, rafting, skiing, sewing, and having people over. Amy blogs with her husband at fringechurch.com.