I really want to quit.
I'm not writing that so a bunch of people beg me to keep going. That's not my style. I'm not going to quit because actually quitting at this point is just not an option in my world (for multiple, complex reasons). But I really want to.
Mostly, I'm getting bored. Doing anything every week for fifty-two weeks is draining. I have been a Christian for almost nine years, and I've never gone to church twenty-four weeks in a row. I would love to take a few weeks off, but the subtitle, "48 Churches in 52 Weeks," would seem silly.
To make matters worse, I spent this weekend at a friend's lake house, and I’ll be spending the next two weekends in the Outer Banks. It was super annoying leaving the lake house to find a church in Hillsboro, Ohio.
So, if this week's reflection is grumpy, you have some background information. With that said …
I desperately wanted to find a snake-handling church on this journey. I thought I might be able to track one down near Hillsboro, but it didn't happen.
The next best option was to locate the smallest, scariest looking church I could find and hope they at least handled nightcrawlers.
On my way to Northside Church of Christ in the heart of Hillsboro, I stumbled upon Hillsboro Church of Christ in Christian Union. That was the name. It looked scary. And the name seemed odd.
“In Christian Union?” What the heck does that mean? Whenever a church denomination adds one of those extra phrases to its official name, it worries me.
“Cincinnati Church of Jebus … that likes to eat human flesh.”
You had me at Church of Jebus, but then you had to add the flesh-eating part. Frankly, eating human flesh sounds like the exact opposite of how I want to spend a Sunday morning. It sounds bizarre. As does the phrase, “In Christian Union.”
But two things were true. One, I wanted to visit a Church of Christ. Two, I thought it might be entertaining.
So, I waited around, took a stroll through downtown Hillsboro (which took about thirty seconds), and at 10:25 am (the service began at 10:30), there were exactly three cars in the parking lot. I started to wonder if the time on their sign was wrong, or if the church had closed, or if the congregation had some secret backdoor entrance … which would have been pretty sweet.
I walked up to the front door, peeked inside, and saw … three people. I assumed one of them was the pastor. The other two were women and had a combined age of one thousand.
Three people.
I didn’t think I could handle it. I have done small churches before (New Spirit Metropolitan Community Church had about twenty), but three? I closed the door, jogged back to my car, and then drove to Northside Church of Christ about two minutes down the road.
In retrospect, I wish I would have gone inside and experienced how it felt to be 33 percent of the congregation. I would have basically been the choir. And the prayer team. I would have also lowered the average age from 134 to 100. Oh well … I can’t turn back time.
As I previously mentioned, I ended up at Northside Church of Christ.
From an outside perspective, many of the Christian denominations are starting to blur. Honestly, I have no idea what separates the Church of Christ from lots of the other places of worship I have visited.
Same hymns, same communion, same bible, same message, same prayers.
In fact, the only thing that differentiated the Church of Christ from any other experience was the lack of musical instruments. From what I understand, musical instruments are a no-no. Glad I left my penis flute at home.
The sanctuary sat about 250 people, and approximately 150 were in attendance. Every single person was white (which is probably more a reflection of Hillsboro than the church), and there was actually a pretty healthy mix of young and old, including a couple dozen incredibly loud children. Similar to the Mormon Church, parents seemed to let their children run wild. Which is fine, but it makes listening to the message nearly impossible.
Here is the riveting play-by-play of what happened during the seventy minute service: Hymn, communion, tithes & offerings, hymn, hymn, scripture reading (by the least enthusiastic person I have ever encountered), hymn, message, hymn, closing prayer, adios.
I met the pastor after the service, and he seemed like a nice guy, but seriously, does church have to be so boring? I wrote this in my notes:
Is this it? Is this my faith? Is this God? Bad music? Super lame? Boring? Is this what we have to offer the world?
I know not all churches are bland. I have been to a handful this year that are interesting and creative (especially the Vineyard and Crossroads), but the majority are not. I never had the experience of being forced to attend church as a child, and thank God I didn’t. I looked around at all those young kids at Northside Church of Christ and thought, “They will get older, make their own decisions, and never come back.” Why would they?
I’m not saying church has to be entertaining. It’s not the circus. I don’t expect pastors to juggle. But I do expect churches to represent the true nature of God, and if that true nature is bland, boring, and predictable, then we are reading two different Bibles. (Mine was written by Dan Brown … that’s the correct version, right?)
The Bible is a thrilling adventure. Church services should at least be tolerable.
And don’t just take my word for it. I looked around a lot while the pastor spoke, and at least half of the audience was engaged in some other activity. Many talked to the person sitting next to them. Kids were making all kinds of noise. Some were falling asleep. And I’m pretty sure one guy fell into a coma. It was rough.
The most interesting part was when the pastor said (when talking about who Jesus is), “Some people can’t get past the Babe in the manger. They see Jesus as nothing more than a little baby.” Helloooooo! Talk about the perfect setup for this:
Northside Church of Christ didn’t play the video, so I had to act it out in my head, which was still pretty amazing.
It’s not that the pastor said anything wrong or bad, but please, church leaders, don’t just read the Bible and give your congregation a lesson from Christianity 101. Tell us stories of how Jesus has transformed lives—especially your life as a church leader. Make the words come alive. Help us to see Jesus as the revolutionary rebel he was and still is, not as a Sunday school lesson. Use your platform to stir my heart and soul, not to repeat trite clichés.
Please.
After one more hymn and the weekly announcements (including a 94th birthday party at the Ponderosa, which was strangely alluring), the service ended, and I was cruising back to the lake house.
Experiencing Northside Church of Christ the week after the Vineyard was like chasing fillet mignon with a McRib sandwich. Hopefully, a week on the beach will get the taste of that rib sauce out of my mouth. I desperately want to find a church that has a beach service. How about worshipping God with my toes in the sand? Now that would be the ultimate dining experience. The Banana Nut Cheerios of church.
Thankfully, not all was lost this weekend. I did get to see Bradley Wise shirtless. Speaking of fillet mignon …
JOIN THE CONVERSATION
I'm not writing that so a bunch of people beg me to keep going. That's not my style. I'm not going to quit because actually quitting at this point is just not an option in my world (for multiple, complex reasons). But I really want to.
Mostly, I'm getting bored. Doing anything every week for fifty-two weeks is draining. I have been a Christian for almost nine years, and I've never gone to church twenty-four weeks in a row. I would love to take a few weeks off, but the subtitle, "48 Churches in 52 Weeks," would seem silly.
To make matters worse, I spent this weekend at a friend's lake house, and I’ll be spending the next two weekends in the Outer Banks. It was super annoying leaving the lake house to find a church in Hillsboro, Ohio.
So, if this week's reflection is grumpy, you have some background information. With that said …
I desperately wanted to find a snake-handling church on this journey. I thought I might be able to track one down near Hillsboro, but it didn't happen.
The next best option was to locate the smallest, scariest looking church I could find and hope they at least handled nightcrawlers.
On my way to Northside Church of Christ in the heart of Hillsboro, I stumbled upon Hillsboro Church of Christ in Christian Union. That was the name. It looked scary. And the name seemed odd.
“In Christian Union?” What the heck does that mean? Whenever a church denomination adds one of those extra phrases to its official name, it worries me.
“Cincinnati Church of Jebus … that likes to eat human flesh.”
You had me at Church of Jebus, but then you had to add the flesh-eating part. Frankly, eating human flesh sounds like the exact opposite of how I want to spend a Sunday morning. It sounds bizarre. As does the phrase, “In Christian Union.”
But two things were true. One, I wanted to visit a Church of Christ. Two, I thought it might be entertaining.
So, I waited around, took a stroll through downtown Hillsboro (which took about thirty seconds), and at 10:25 am (the service began at 10:30), there were exactly three cars in the parking lot. I started to wonder if the time on their sign was wrong, or if the church had closed, or if the congregation had some secret backdoor entrance … which would have been pretty sweet.
I walked up to the front door, peeked inside, and saw … three people. I assumed one of them was the pastor. The other two were women and had a combined age of one thousand.
Three people.
I didn’t think I could handle it. I have done small churches before (New Spirit Metropolitan Community Church had about twenty), but three? I closed the door, jogged back to my car, and then drove to Northside Church of Christ about two minutes down the road.
In retrospect, I wish I would have gone inside and experienced how it felt to be 33 percent of the congregation. I would have basically been the choir. And the prayer team. I would have also lowered the average age from 134 to 100. Oh well … I can’t turn back time.
As I previously mentioned, I ended up at Northside Church of Christ.
From an outside perspective, many of the Christian denominations are starting to blur. Honestly, I have no idea what separates the Church of Christ from lots of the other places of worship I have visited.
Same hymns, same communion, same bible, same message, same prayers.
In fact, the only thing that differentiated the Church of Christ from any other experience was the lack of musical instruments. From what I understand, musical instruments are a no-no. Glad I left my penis flute at home.
The sanctuary sat about 250 people, and approximately 150 were in attendance. Every single person was white (which is probably more a reflection of Hillsboro than the church), and there was actually a pretty healthy mix of young and old, including a couple dozen incredibly loud children. Similar to the Mormon Church, parents seemed to let their children run wild. Which is fine, but it makes listening to the message nearly impossible.
Here is the riveting play-by-play of what happened during the seventy minute service: Hymn, communion, tithes & offerings, hymn, hymn, scripture reading (by the least enthusiastic person I have ever encountered), hymn, message, hymn, closing prayer, adios.
I met the pastor after the service, and he seemed like a nice guy, but seriously, does church have to be so boring? I wrote this in my notes:
Is this it? Is this my faith? Is this God? Bad music? Super lame? Boring? Is this what we have to offer the world?
I know not all churches are bland. I have been to a handful this year that are interesting and creative (especially the Vineyard and Crossroads), but the majority are not. I never had the experience of being forced to attend church as a child, and thank God I didn’t. I looked around at all those young kids at Northside Church of Christ and thought, “They will get older, make their own decisions, and never come back.” Why would they?
I’m not saying church has to be entertaining. It’s not the circus. I don’t expect pastors to juggle. But I do expect churches to represent the true nature of God, and if that true nature is bland, boring, and predictable, then we are reading two different Bibles. (Mine was written by Dan Brown … that’s the correct version, right?)
The Bible is a thrilling adventure. Church services should at least be tolerable.
And don’t just take my word for it. I looked around a lot while the pastor spoke, and at least half of the audience was engaged in some other activity. Many talked to the person sitting next to them. Kids were making all kinds of noise. Some were falling asleep. And I’m pretty sure one guy fell into a coma. It was rough.
The most interesting part was when the pastor said (when talking about who Jesus is), “Some people can’t get past the Babe in the manger. They see Jesus as nothing more than a little baby.” Helloooooo! Talk about the perfect setup for this:
Northside Church of Christ didn’t play the video, so I had to act it out in my head, which was still pretty amazing.
It’s not that the pastor said anything wrong or bad, but please, church leaders, don’t just read the Bible and give your congregation a lesson from Christianity 101. Tell us stories of how Jesus has transformed lives—especially your life as a church leader. Make the words come alive. Help us to see Jesus as the revolutionary rebel he was and still is, not as a Sunday school lesson. Use your platform to stir my heart and soul, not to repeat trite clichés.
Please.
After one more hymn and the weekly announcements (including a 94th birthday party at the Ponderosa, which was strangely alluring), the service ended, and I was cruising back to the lake house.
Experiencing Northside Church of Christ the week after the Vineyard was like chasing fillet mignon with a McRib sandwich. Hopefully, a week on the beach will get the taste of that rib sauce out of my mouth. I desperately want to find a church that has a beach service. How about worshipping God with my toes in the sand? Now that would be the ultimate dining experience. The Banana Nut Cheerios of church.
Thankfully, not all was lost this weekend. I did get to see Bradley Wise shirtless. Speaking of fillet mignon …
JOIN THE CONVERSATION
