church growth?

The other day I was asked, "What are you?" I was being asked what church I attend. I responded with an awkward, "I...I....well you see I grew up in the Methodist Church, but now I go to a Baptist Church.....but its not what you think!" As I was talking, I heard myself say "Baptist" Church and I choked and had a hard time breathing. Do I really go to a Baptist church?

The truth, I go to a post-Baptist, evangelical (notice the lower case "e", see A Generous Orthodoxy by Mclaren) gathering place. A place that encourages those that falls short. A place that challenges the Christian culture, and that come to the text with a new beginning and sense of wonder and mystery. However, its traditional as far as the music and preaching goes, yet it doesn't downplay tradition, yet downplays a lazy tradition full of nonsense and motions.

It has been my experience that a Bible church emphasizes the teaching and spoken word as seen through the Bible. In a southern Baptist church, you have the Bible and conservative reflection along with a righteous life; the mantra of my Baptist Brothers. In a Methodist church, you have a group that loves tradition, swims in Armenian theology while making sure to have an unbiblical hierarchy of church leadership. First, let me say, all things aren't necessary bad and most are needed. However, there seems to be a distraction of what we started our faith journey towards. In the beginning we have zeal and grace, fueled by a desire to see people who are "lost" come to know the Lord. Somewhere along the way, we get caught up in religion and theology and succumb to the committee’s procedure. We lose our sense of Grace and trade it for a "Gatekeeper" theology, where we say who is in and who is out. Please know that, the church today is doing well--people are loving and serving and reaching out--and God is working. However, there are still so much to be done---there is another group that has been lost thought the cracks, truly there is always the "other."

What are we to do? Are we just to forsake the Bible, or lose our tradition or live lives that don't reflect the Glory of God? By no means! (Hell No, Translation from Greek :) I believe we must lay down our security and seek the mystery. This may look different for you than it is for me. For the Bible church, maybe its approaches the Bible without the answers. For the Baptist, have a beer with a co-worker ;) and try to see things in Gray instead of Black and White. For the Methodist, change the communion time up, invite a Baptist over (and not drink)--look at the doctrine of predestination with an open mind as a body and struggle through the hard questions and not arrive at an answer. Once we approach the "other" and lay down the security we think we have in our policies and committees and theology's, we might learn something about ourselves, others, and God.

If we have do what we have always done, we will get what we have always gotten...