Josh sent me this via e-mail over the weekend. I’m assuming it was written or spoken by Rob Bell – but I can’t guarantee it was since I no longer subscribe to the magazine. Either way – love this… love it!
“We understand the Gospel to be how you are going to break yourself open and pour yourself out for the healing of the world.â€
Rob Bell, quoted in an interview with Relevant Magazine, Jan.-Feb., 2008.
I think the problem is that when people say “church,†many mean religious goods and services where you come and there’s a nice inspiring talk, good coffee in the back, snappy music and everything ends up fine. Jesus speaks of His people who are willing to suffer and die so that the world can be healed – that’s an entirely different proposition. For us [at Mars Hill], if you can resolve the sermon in the course of the church service, then the sermon has failed. If you can resolve what’s being talked about just by listening to it, then something’s seriously wrong. The only way to resolve the church service you just experienced, and specifically the sermon, is that you’re going to have to go and wrestle with it and then live it out. Our interest is not in providing goods and services that will leave you with a well-packaged religious experience. We understand the Gospel to be how you are going to break yourself open and pour yourself out for the healing of the world.
A couple of years ago somebody I love very much, somebody very close to me, was addicted to cocaine. He was wrestling with suicidal thoughts, addiction, and was in a downward spiral. He was not going to make it. A group of us who love him begged him to come to my house. He came over, and we all sat in a circle in my living room and begged him to get help. We literally pleaded for his life. One of the guys in the circle said, “I’m here. I’m going to be with you every day through this.†Another person in the circle said, “You know what? You can come live with me. I struggled with addiction, and I know what you’re going through trying to get clean. You can have the downstairs bedroom in my house, and I’ll make sure you get up every day. I’ll make sure you get to recovery meetings.†Eventually, he was able to get clean, and since then has totally turned around.
To me that is church. Church is when you are sitting in your living room with people who would give their lives for each other. So I don’t have any time or tolerance for nice services where we feel good about ourselves and give a little bit of our money to some people over here or there. To me, church is the people whom you are journeying with, and I think we are already seeing all sorts of new understanding of what that looks like. It has nothing to do with the building you’re meeting in; it has nothing to do with the name. It has nothing to do with how great your website is – it’s about the new humanity. It’s about people connecting with each other at the deepest, deepest levels of our being.
You have to challenge everything, and people should challenge Mars Hill. We have these giant services with thousands of people, and I think that public gatherings beyond 10 or 20 should be questioned.
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