The Problem With the Church is That We’ve Made Church for Church People

Who is the church for? (Pardon the grammar). That is an ancient question with very modern ramifications. In our increasingly segmented society, the divide between the religious and non-religious, church people and non-church people is growing wider every day. I grew up as a church person. I went every time the doors were open. I know the songs, I know the stories, I know the language. I could decipher the shorthand for something as cryptic is, “The WMU meeting is going to be in the Fellowship Hall right next to where the RA’s meet once EE lets out.” I look the part, I dress the part, I am the part. I am a church person.

And then there are those that don’t look like us, talk like us, act like us. They don’t know the stories, they don’t know our songs, they don’t know our language. Sure, we want them to get saved, but we also want them to become church people like us. Everything is more comfortable that way. I would argue that the default mode for most churches today is to make the church for church people. It makes sense, because church people are the ones that show up, church people are the ones that give, church people are the ones that volunteer, and church people are usually the ones that complain if things don’t go their way.

But the problem with making the church exclusively for church people is that because of our increasingly insular religious culture, we’re circling the wagons and making it that much more difficult for non-Christians who are trying to turn to God. The unspoken rule in many churches is that it’s not enough to become a Christian, you also have to become a church person. So what does the Bible say about this?