Jul 20, 2010
Is the Church gathering a home or hotel to you?
Posted by Mitch Sliwa in | Comments (4)
When you go visit a hotel you expect everything to be clean, orderly and that everything is done for you. Its perfectly OK to put your feet up and have someone else serve you, because you paid for the service. For you moms out there, how would you feel if this was the attitude of those in your house? If you spent the majority of your time cleaning, cooking, serving the family to only have them sit around waiting to be served by you. In a house it should not be this way. As family members who love one another, we should all pitch in and serve each other. When you go to Church gatherings on a Sunday morning, do you approach it like you are a family member going into your home or a consumer visiting a hotel?
Here are some questions that might help you decide:
- Do you come with the mindset of "How can I be served this morning?" or "How can I serve others this morning"?
- Do you serve in some capacity, or do you simply consume what other people bring and offer as service?
- If you see trash on the ground, do you leave it for someone else or pick it up yourself?
- Do you feel it is your responsibility to contribute financially to make sure there is place to meet and to help pay for the minister?
- Do you join a church body based on what you can get, or what you can give?
- If something is lacking in the body are you more likely to complain about it or actually do something about it?
These are very forward questions that I have to ask myself. I write the blog article as someone who has not attained but as someone who is striving for this goal. I desire to not only help out in my own house and serve my wife in her work but also to make sure that my heart is right when I visit a church gathering. There have been times in my life where my primary concern is ME. "Do I like the sermon? Do I like the music? Was the sermon too long for my preference? Was the coffee the way I liked it? Were there deserts afterwards?" And in all of these areas, I spent my time complaining inwardly instead of getting off my butt to go do something.
If you desire to treat the church gathering as a home then here are some action items to help you:
- Find out areas of service that need to be filled
- Spend less time complaining about inadequacies and more time figuring out how to fix the areas that are lacking
- Pray about how God would have you give and serve in the body
At Sacred Journey one of the values we desire to practice is to remeber that church is not a place but a people. We are the family of God and our practices must reflect our beliefs about the church. I pray that we would be a people marked by being servants of others.
Posted by Mitch Sliwa in | Comments (4)
Mitch Sliwa
Yeah Jesus also said that if we wish to be the greatest, we had to become the servant of all.
“Mark 10:43Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, 44and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. 45For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
MANY…
Sheep…
Joe Paravisini
Great thoughts here. Definitely calls to question what my idea of “church” actually is. Most of my life it’s 100% been a hotel. The times I was involved in serving, it was just getting on staff at the hotel, but there was still such a disconnect in my attitude toward the people I worked side by side with and the people I served. It wasn’t often, how you had put it, a home/family.
Alexandra Sliwa
so true! i totally agree most people just like we have in past treated church as a hotel.
Michael Howarth
Great post. This is absolutely key. We are adopted into a kingdom who’s king became a servant. God so loved the world that he gave….and his people are to respond to the gift by perpetuating it; giving our time, our money and our lives. This is the culture of the kingdom.