The Body of Christ is You.

Our church spent Easter weekend baptizing hundreds of people, and we’re set up to do it again in August. I serve on the Decision Counseling team – watching lost souls find Jesus and make a public proclamation of that belief is something that makes me emotional on a regular basis. So you can imagine my surprise, and concern, when I watched each person step into that water and I wasn’t overflowing with joy. I was wholly, deeply convicted…but I couldn’t pinpoint why. Many, many things went through my head, and as I submitted them to God I knew it wasn’t any of the reasons I could come up with.

You see, a couple years ago I prayed a prayer that only some ever pray – Lord, break my heart for the things that break yours. It wasn’t long after that I was suddenly deeply concerned not just for lost souls (that’s important, I still believe that), but for lost Christians. What do I mean when I say that? I mean the Christians that made the proclamation of faith, accepted Jesus as the Son of God and their personal Savior – and then went right back to their old life, old habits, old behaviors. The ones that sought God for answers, but got angry with him when they didn’t get the answer they thought they should get. The ones who wanted healing, but it didn’t come and so they abandoned their walk.

I began to see gaps in the typical church structure. The way we walk with them up to their decision, and then we just kind of turn them loose and expect them to know what to do next. We ask if we can pray for you on Sunday, but we don’t follow up with you in the weeks after to find out about your father’s heart condition, or your broken marriage, or how it’s going with the friend that betrayed you. We encourage you without really digging into the details of the story, and frankly – sometimes you’re reaping what you sowed and God isn’t going to fix that. And if your church is big enough, when you call to get help, you get shuffled around and pointed in other directions and no one ever thinks about you again after that. They simply don’t have the resources.

Please don’t get me wrong, this is a massive generalization to point out a deficiency, and nothing I say applies to every single church or member. I serve in many areas of my church, with many wonderful people (usually the same people, I should note.) And let me be clear, I’m not faulting the corporate church or pointing fingers – I know how hard the staff at my own church works, the long hours, the public events, the phone calls and resources and nonstop planning. I do, however, place one single blame on the corporate church that is at the core of this entire issue: you have allowed us to sit back and do nothing while you carry the burden of the body of Christ. More often than not, you simply do not have the bandwidth to do it alone. Somewhere along the way WE, the actual body, have stepped to the sidelines and left everything on the shoulders of the corporate structure while we show up on Sunday, smile and shake hands (maybe, if you’re lucky), judge every piece of what was said and what was sang, and then go home.

It took me days of submitting reasons to God before that one settled. I am not upset with the corporate church – I am upset with THE CHURCH. You. Me. WE are the church, and we’re doing nothing to live out our commission.

After Jesus rose from the grave, the eleven disciples went to the mountain in Galilee where Jesus told them to go. On that mountain, Jesus gave The Great Commission to the disciples.

Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

– Matthew 28:19-20

When we think about or repeat the commission, we typically stop at the baptizing them part…but Jesus didn’t stop there. He went on to say, teach them to obey what I have commanded. Teaching them requires more than one conversation about whether or not they believe Jesus died on the cross to save them from their sins, whether they feel “worthy” or not. Teaching them requires investment.

We send our kids to school for 13 years to teach them how to be productive citizens in society. Jesus spent 24 hours a day for 3 years teaching the disciples how to walk in his footsteps. If you’re LUCKY, your church has some kind of class that lays out what it means to be a Christian, but those are too far and too few between. We invest one hour on Sundays in the teaching (and I would argue that Sundays are much more often about reaching the lost than cultivating Christian walks that honor Jesus – but let’s just lay that aside for now), and we wonder why being a “Christian” looks so much like the world.

I know the argument that follows – many churches offer Bible studies, maybe you have small groups available…valid points, I suppose. Forgive me for not having full faith in those activities. I did Bible studies consistently for several years and while I learned some things and it felt good – not one of them actually taught me how to draw closer to God, or how to have a real, deep relationship with Christ. I have participated in and led small groups for 5-6 years – and we worked HARD to invest time and energy into deepening the provided lessons. I finally found this amazing $6 book that helped me learn different ways to actually study the Word – but do you know how I built a relationship with God? Someone invested in me. One on one, someone walked me through how to study, asked the hard questions, made me dig deeper. She didn’t settle for cupcake Christianity, she pushed me to know what God really said, what that really meant. She didn’t sugarcoat the Christian walk for me, she just held my hand through the messy and challenged me to know God better every step of the way. She gave up her time and her energy and her soul to make sure I knew what I was proclaiming to follow – and I am a better Christian for it today.

The corporate church can’t do that. Bible studies can’t do that. Small groups can’t do that. (Sometimes, some can – but you have to be really lucky and have a whole group of people at the same spiritual maturity and one person willing to invest their soul into them.) The body has to do that. WE have to be willing to find that someone and share our pain and progress with them; to hold their hand as they walk; to challenge what they believe and point them to what God’s Word really says about it. WE have to be willing to sacrifice some of our time and our energy and our being to bring along the babies in Christ – and THAT is how the “Christians” won’t look like the world.

From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. – Ephesians 4:16

You have a purpose in the body of Christ, and I can promise you it’s not just opening the doors or working the concession stand on Sunday. You have a purpose that is every day in the body of Christ.

Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. – Titus 2:3

Your example matters. You should be mentoring the generations coming up under you.

And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others. – 2 Timothy 2:2

You are supposed to be stepping up as reliable people – to take the message you heard on Sunday and dig deeper, to help others understand it. Preachers and ministers can’t do the work of ministry on their own, it’s up to us to step up and help carry the torch.

I thought I was disappointed in the church. I thought that they should do a better job at the “after-baptism” part of the Christian walk. Turns out, what they should be doing is holding us accountable. They should be equipping their body to do the day-to-day with new brothers and sisters in Christ. They should be fostering strong relationships within the body, finding and using the gifts of each member of their corporate church, and holding us accountable to carry out the second, and in my mind most critical, part of The Great Commission…teach them to obey what Jesus commanded.

I’m grateful that God opened my eyes – the conviction wasn’t for the corporate church, it was for me. I am committed to solving this problem within myself and finding a way to reach my local body with the accountability commanded by the Word of God.

I would encourage you to consider what contribution you’re making…and I would warn you to be careful where you place the blame of conviction. It is almost always about YOU, not them.