Ok…here’s the deal.

my frustration level with the institution that is called the church is at an all-time high!
i just can’t believe that Jesus came to earth and died for what we call “church.” I think Jesus would be very sad at the condition of the church, especially the westernized, individualized version we have in america.

when i look around the “church world” or the “christian” landscape, all i see is hypocritical, judgmental, self-promoting people. we live in a church culture that may have started out with the best of intent, but we have slowly and consistently fallen into an organization that only creates the worst of outcomes.

instead of being about relationship and care and love…most “churches” have become institutions of fear and guilt! we guilt people into acting a certain way. in fact, most “churches” actually reward people for “proper” behavior and will beat the crap out of those who display “bad” behavior.

we have become an institution that rails against sinners. we are doing our best to keep the sinners out! we are extremely vocal about what is acceptable. we are constantly at war with our culture. we are constantly reminding everyone around us how they don’t measure up, how they don’t fit in, how they are less than perfect!

what the hell are we doing!!!!!!??????!!!!!!

how can we read the gospels and blow right past the fact that we are acting JUST like the religious leaders of Jesus day!? How can we be so blind to the massive log in our own eyes, but instead focus with such laser-like hatred on everyone else’s splinters!?

instead of BEING the Church, we have traded that in to build man-made institutions called church. this is where we live by the religious rules and duties put on us by our modern day “teachers of the law.”

but it feels so good doesn’t it? it feels good to judge. why? because it feeds our souls! it’s much easier to point out all the crap that is in someone else’s life than it is to deal with mine!!! after all, if i deal with my own soul, i might have to die to MYself and take up MY cross and actually FOLLOW Christ. and that’s just not as fun and keeping all the sinners out! i mean, i’d much rather drag an adulteress out into the middle of the town square and stone her to death, wouldn’t you?!

i’m just really tired of the institution of church. i’m really tired of all the hate, the back biting, the judging, the gossip, the fake friendships, the sin pointing.

i want to BE the church! i want to be around people who will LIVE in the LOVE of God, and allow that love to kill our flesh every day. I want to be in real relationships where i don’t judge you and you don’t judge me with some arbitrary, man-made, religious law. i want to know that i would die for you and you would die for me….and that we would both die to follow Christ!!!!!!

it’s getting harder, and harder to say that i am a christian and even harder to say that i am a pastor of a church. where is the real church?! not the man-made institution! the real thing!