Friday, 11 July 2008

• Are There Enough Prostitutes At Your Church?

  by mr. maple

  "I told a story in my book The Jesus I Never Knew, a true story that long afterward continued to haunt me.  I heard it from a friend who works with the down-and-out in Chicago:

  'A prostitute came to me in wretched straits, homeless, sick, unable to buy food for her two-year-old daughter.  Through sobs and tears, she told me she had been renting out her daughter - two years old! - to men interested in kinky sex.  She made more renting out her daughter for an hour than she could earn on her own in a night.  She had to do it, she said, to support her own drug habit.  I could hardly bear hearing her sordid story.  For one thing, it made me legally liable - I'm required to report cases of child abuse.  I had no idea what to say to this woman.
  At last I asked if she had ever thought of going to a church for help.  I will never forget the look of pure, naive shock that crossed her face.  "Church!" she cried.  "Why would I ever go there?  I was already feeling terrible about myself.  They'd just make me feel worse."'

  What struck me about my friend's story is that women much like this prostitute fled toward Jesus, not away from him.  The worse a person felt about herself, the more likely she saw Jesus as a refuge.  Has the church lost that gift?  Evidently the down-and-out, who flocked to Jesus when he lived on earth, no longer feel welcome among his followers.  What has happened?" -What's So Amazing About Grace? by Phillip Yancey.

  While the title of this post is intentionally explicit and shocking, so are many of the characters and people Jesus encountered during his time on earth.  Our first reaction to this question of "who belongs in church?" is to quickly assert that we shouldn't encourage people to do things that are wrong.  This is obvious.  However, the next question then becomes, who is it we encourage to come to church in the first place?

  Encouraging someone to come to church or an invitation to follow Christ is not just about the words we say.  It is in the way we listen to or condescend a person, the places we go to simply be ourselves or with the explicit intention of evangelism, the type of friends we choose to make or avoid.

  I am not saying that we deliberately dilute the gospel to pander to people's sense of entertainment or religiosity (though much of modern evangelism works this way!)  I am only saying that the true gospel is something that holds promise, rebuke, and hope to people of all backgrounds even if it offends them.  But perhaps something is wrong when a particular ethnic or socioeconomic group emerges as the dominant culture in a church.  Perhaps something is wrong when the church is no longer the first thing people consider when they are in desperate need of mercy and grace.  Perhaps something is wrong when we allow the insidiousness of our desire for power, beauty, and popularity to pervert the way in which we express and encourage community.

  If you know a person by the company she keeps, what does your company say about your self image?  If your contacts with non-Christian friends are limited to painful exchanges at the office, what does that say about your sense of self-righteousness?  If all your friends are of a particular ethnic group, what does that say about your belief in the unity and uniqueness of cultures?  If all your acquaintances are wealthy (or at least middle class), what does that say about your opinion of the poor and your insecurity over personal belongings and life?  What is the condition of your soul?  What is the atmosphere of your church?  What can be done (or has been done through the gospel) to change these things?

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