The Actual Mission

Many years ago I was in a church that jumped on the band wagon of having a “mission statement”. It was the latest rage coming from the corporate world so churches were following suit. I guess we had forgotten why we existed and a cleverly assembled mission statement was the perfect solution.

      After countless weeks and months of development we put together a pithy two sentence statement that was then put on posters and brochures and promptly forgotten by most. The average person in our large church couldn’t have recited it or identified it from numerous other sayings. I noticed that we put the bulk of our emphasis, time, money and staff hiring on the last three words . . . “beginning with seekers.” That meant outreach events, evangelism strategies, and counting conversions were the dominant forces behind everything we did, That’s where the money got spent, the staff got hired and all purposes ended. That wasn’t morally wrong, it was just lopsided and out of balance with the Bible.

      Years later, after serving in several other churches and sitting through thousands of hours of board meetings, strategy sessions, team planning meetings, conferences, and training seminars, I came to the conclusion that the real, unspoken, and underlying mission statement of most of the churches I experienced was .  . . .  “We exist to get more people to come here, so that we could exist”.

     I once wondered out loud “If our church ceased to exist, who outside of our church would care?” In other words, it seemed we were totally self-serving. We existed only for those to whom we could gain a benefit if they stayed among us. But, If we disbanded, almost all of these people would simply be absorbed into one of the numerous other churches doing pretty much the same thing and no one would even notice the absence after a year or so. Only those who came and joined had any benefit from our existence. It felt rather - Well,- selfish.

     Last week when Gonzaga Campus Kitchen held it’s weekly meal for the poor in our gym, their leader, Emily came to me with tears in her eyes because she saw the For Sale signs on the building. Another woman who has worked for Spokane Neighborhood Action Program (SNAP) for many years, confided in me that a bunch of the agency people had taken bets a long time ago about how long I’d last. “You’ve made it more than twice as long as anyone thought” she told me. They’ve watched a lot of Christians come and go in this work. She used to be a Lutheran pastor’s wife for many years and thought the church would toss me out or I’d give up long before we got this far.

     Numerous homeless people have quietly come up to me almost in a state of panic and fear to ask “how long before this all goes away?” When the homeless saw the for sale signs, their sorrow ran deep, but they are so used to disappointment that they’re first reaction was to use their words and spend their time trying to console me. Which I thought was really touching. This is their place of hope and safety and they’re afraid it will disappear—even though only a small percentage have ever come to a church service, this is their home. “Like sanctuary” are the words most often used. They get dignity, respect and safety here.

     A lady from another non-profit told me at our last city-wide homeless coalition meeting,  she wanted to look up my number to call me but couldn’t remember the name of the church.  Sticking her head out of her office at the shelter she works in, she called out “What’s the name of that church where  . . . . “, “FIRST COVENANT” came the chorus of replies from the poor gathered there. They know us.

     Two weeks ago on a Sunday afternoon as I was talking with a homeless drunk, I couldn’t figure out why he was mad at me. Finally through his slurred words he blurted out, “Because everybody likes you! No mater where I go from one end of town to the other, everyone here on the streets talks about you and how great you guys are and how much they like coming here.” Why would this anger him? In the end it came out that he didn’t think any of those people deserved it. I found that ironic. None of us do, but love shines through anyway. That’s the Mission  of the church — GRACE!

     God knows what will come next. He loves the poor so we keep going. He has answers for our future, as a collective and as individuals. We   plan on holding on in faith until he leads us to what is next. But now I know what it feels like to be in a church were there are way more people outside of our doors who care about our existence than there are inside. It feels good.