Stop Going To Church – Be The Church

Ephesians 5:25, Matthew 16:18, Mark 7:6-13

That’s right – a Pastor is encouraging you to stop going to church; I really mean it! STOP! We’ve all become accustomed to simply going to church – as if church is a place. It’s not! Many of us have special uniforms (church clothes) that we don only on Sunday (church day), so we can go and attend worship (church service), giving God our tithes (church money).

It’s as if we have a neatly organized series of Rubbermaid Totes: one with tools for work, one with books for school, one with money for bills, one with your hobbies for you, and one with time for family. We keep God compartmentalized with his own day, his own money, his own clothes, his own house. When, in reality, we should empty the contents of our ‘God-tote’ out into all the other totes. God doesn’t want a piece of me or my week or my wallet. He doesn’t work that way. He wants it all – after all, it’s all His anyway, right? If I’m His child, then I am all His; so why do I have such a hard time letting go? That’s why I’m asking you to stop going to church… to get you thinking about being the church.

If the only encounter I have with God is on a Sunday Morning, for one hour a week, then can I really say that I know Him? Can I really say that I have a relationship with Him or do I simply have a religious experience that keeps God at a distance from my everyday life.  

God wants more than that. He did not die on a cross to just get that from us, So that we can play church. He did that for you and me so that we could be the church. To live lives that makes a difference, a impact on the world around us, to change a community for the kingdom of God.

Being the church is about showing love and kindness to our neighbors, helping the poor and needy, ministering to the brokenhearted, etc. Being the church is about walking into a worship experiences and expressing our love for our savior.

Park View Church let us continue to Be the Church, A church that is touching its community in positive ways for Christ our Lord.

Pastor Tim Campbell