What are we doing here?

I just got back from a family vacation to Gulf Shores, Alabama. My family first started renting a beach house there when I was in High School. We haven't returned lately because my brothers and I had grown up and gotten busy with life. My brother John, my mother and I drove down and met my other brother and niece, who flew down, at our beach house. My family invents strange things to keep ourselves occupied on a long road trip. This particular trip we made up a story and named the characters after roadsigns for towns along the way in Alabama... the story was entitled Heroes Highway, maybe sometime I will post a chapter from this story as a preview, for I am sure that one day it will be published. Regardless, we also wrote down some of the names of churches that we found amusing. These included "The Church of Bible Deliverance" (do they deliver bibles? are the being delivered from the Bible?) and "Full Power Holiness Church." We also saw the greatest billboard... it read "Go to Church" in big red letters. In a smaller font it read "or the Devil will get you." Oh, and did I mention that it had a picture of what looked to be a man with a scythe... like somebody felt it necessary to remind us to go to church so that the scary man with a scythe doesn't come and kill us... sending us straight to hell. With all of this, paired with the religious conversation that is inevitable in my family, I started to think... I know... how unusual... but really my thought was, Why do we go to Church? What are we doing here?
For some of us, I think that the answer is quite simple. Sunday mornings our sleep would be rudely interrupted by our mother or father throwing back the curtains and flooding our bedroom with blinding sunlight. As they left the room, we'd hear the inevitable statements of "breakfast will be on the table in a half and hour" "make sure that you look presentable, don't wear those aweful jeans with the holes in the knees" "I don't want to be late and have to sneak in during the pastor's announcements, so get out of bed RIGHT NOW!!!" We'd creep out from under our comforters and loudly whine "Do I HAVE to?" Then as adults, after taking a hiatus during our college years, we return to the church as we have found that, like our parents, we want to raise our children in the church and pass on the faith, so now we are the ones throwing back the curtains and listening to the "Do we HAVE to's" from our own children... still somewhere in the back of our minds we are asking ourselves "Do I have to?" as well.
For others, it is not out of a sense of duty to our elders that we go to church, but rather a sense of duty to ourselves. We desire to go to church so that we can be "saved." We are looking for our personal savior to come and be the antidote for our unhappiness. We desire fullfilment, holiness, and righteousness. Now don't get me wrong, these are not bad things to desire, but if we are coming to church for ourselves... I ask again, what are we doing here?
The purpose of the church is no more a band aid to alleviate our unhappiness, then it is a babysitters club, watching over all of the babies who come because they HAVE to. And this is it... this is where my thoughts have led me. I am afraid that the church has become another club that we hold membership cards to. We pay our dues. We attend the meetings. We follow the rituals. We come to this club looking for fulfillment, or answers, or help, or hope... a sense of community... Again, these are not bad things to desire... only, they are not the purpose of the church... they are not the point of worship.
The church is the body of believers sent into the world to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ. Let me say that again... the church is the body of believers SENT INTO THE WORLD to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ. The religious institution of the church should be equipping that body with the tools they need to proclaim this message; biblical knowledge, fostering of spiritual gifts, understanding of the radical relational and justice oriented message of the gospel, prayer, and an attitude of worship. We go to church for so many reasons... but ultimately the ONLY reason we should be going to worship is to give thanks and praise to our Creator who loves us, regardless of our undeserving, so much that God would become human to save us and bring us into eternal life and relationship with all of creation and its Creator. If we ask anything of God at worship it would be to stir up the Holy Spirit in the hearts, hands, mouths, and feet of the Body of Christ that we may truly be a vessel to re-present Christ to the world.
The church is not a club that you can hold up your membership card and say... look, now I have salvation because I go to church. The church is a responsibility not to be taken lightly... if you are coming to worship at church for any other reason than thanks and praise and relationship with your Creator, then maybe you should spend some time thinking... "What am I doing here?" Furthermore, if you read this and think... great!!! Karen is giving me an excuse to not go to church, then maybe you should read it again... you have a GREAT responsibility to re-present Christ!!! So.... BE THE CHURCH... don't just DO CHURCH...