The Church Search- pt. 5 – Doctrinal Dudes

I seem to run into Doctrinal Dudes, or as I sometimes affectionately call them, “Piper-heads”, everywhere I go. These are the young guys, and they are always young guys, who have man-crushes on John Piper, talk lots about “God’s glory” and predestination, are ferociously complementarian (and not in a way that makes women feel safe and loved) and get their spiritual undies in bundle over the most minute and divisive issues. (Often, they say things like, “If you don’t believe ‘this’ about ‘that’, or if you have a Rob Bell book in your library, you are not as doctrinally correct and therefore not as spiritually mature as me.”)

They love doctrine but people? Yeah, not so much. Their intellectual knowledge of the gospel far outweighs their application of it. Often, they have all the potential in the world to grow into truly influential disciples of Christ if they can just get their hearts to grow half as big as their heads. It is just that right now, in their youth, their heads are sooooo big and their hearts are sooooo small.

Don’t get me wrong,

I do love me some doctrine!!!

I love doctrine! I’m a doctrine nerd and God often relates to me with my intellect. I own copies of Grudem’s Systematic Theology, Driscoll’s Doctrine and most things Piper and Tozer. I read often on the subject from a variety of sources. I’m not a softy in this area and I’m not anti-doctrine or study.

But I’ve also been around long enough to know that doctrine lands on people. Ideas about God do not automatically translate into intimacy with God. There’s a saying, “Ministry would be great if it weren’t for all the people.” Doctrinal dudes seem to forget that people are part of the equation. Those who can combine really good theology with a really compassionate lifestyle have acquired wisdom.

Jesus said people would know his disciples by how they loved one another. Not by the authors we choose to read or the theological camp we fall in. (Not that those things aren’t important.) But when we get to heaven, scripture tells us He won’t say, “Well thought, my good and faithful servant.” He’ll say, “Well done…”  The application of His truth into our lives, how we live and actually practice our faith and not just what we talk about over coffee with our like-minded friends, is incredibly important.

I say all this because at one of the last churches I visited, a doctrinal dude was preaching. He was about 24 years old and went for over an hour and 15 minutes on a topic that would make John Calvin or Jonathan Edwards proud. It’s not that the sermon was bad, but I felt banged up after it was all over and not in a “Holy Spirit is convicting me” sort of way. More like a,”This guy doesn’t really like the people he is preaching to very much” sort of way.

So, part of our church search means figuring out what to do with churches and people who mean really well, that have great goals and dreams and are passionate about good things, but aren’t very loving… that don’t really seem to know what to actually do with the Gospel they are preaching.

The Church Hunt – pt. 3 – My Attitude

One of the things I’ve worked really hard to avoid with my blog is it degenerating into a “whine-fest”. You know what I’m talking about. There are blogs out there that are all about complaining. The authors verbally vomit everything that bothers them about…well…everything. They are so busy deconstructing that they never get around to actually constructing. I NEVER want my blog to be about that. I want to be a builder not a destroyer. Especially with my blog and definitely with our search for a church home.

So I want to be very careful in how I document the next few months. I’m not here to be critical from a distance and say, “Bad church!” I don’t want to point such a big finger at the other believers out there that I miss the three pointing right back at me. Because I know the church can assume many many different forms and still be very obedient to what God has asked that group of believers to do, I never want to be guilty of judging another man’s servant. (Rom. 14:4 Who are you to judge the servant of another ? To his own master he stands or falls ; and he will stand, for the Lord is able to make him stand.) And if they are in the game, trying to do something for our Lord, then more power to them!

I realize that in this search, my attitude is key. A church home is about my place of service, not where I will be served. It is about the place where I connect with God and my church family, where He changes me and speaks to me. It is about where I join with other believers to share the good news of the Gospel with a broken and hurting world and we become the hands and feet of Jesus as we work together to redeem that which sin has damaged and destroyed. I must choose to have this attitude wherever God leads us to join.

So I’m not looking to complain but to find where Jeff and I fit, where we can contribute and where God wants us to plug into and help build His kingdom.  I hope that attitude comes shining through my chronicling of our church hunt.

The big problem for us is that we aren’t a traditional fit. This part of it is what just might make the search sort of interesting.

The Church Search- pt 1

This past Sunday we began a process that, while I deeply loathe could prove to be very educational and rather humorous. For the first time since 2004 we’ve got to look for a new church home. For the record, I’m not a church hopper. I believe that you stay where God plants you and only in those deep, non-negotiable, long term relationships can you let God stretch and grow you. Leaving too soon only robs you of one of the ways God shapes and molds us into His image, and of the chance to develop really good friendships. Of course, there are many legitimate reasons for changing churches though, (I should probably blog on some of them…hmmm…good idea;) and moving to a new city clearly falls into one of those categories.

Stay tuned for my thoughts on the state of the church in the Northwest suburbs of Atlanta.