Call me simplistic, but I think that when we talk about church culture, we seem to have gotten off track somehow.
For me it boils down to two choices. Either we have a church culture centered on the gospel or we have something else that looks like the church but is not.
The gospel tells us that we are saved by the grace of God and by His grace alone. In response to that salvation, we are called to fulfill two great commands. We are called to love God with everything we have and we are called to love our neighbor as good or better than we love ourselves.
I say that the commands are in response to the gospel because the Apostle John tells us that we love because God first loved us.
We don’t need a “woke” culture. We don’t need a social justice culture. We don’t need to gin up friendliness to visitors. We don’t need spectacular worship performers. The list of things we don’t need is endless.
What we do need is leaders and people who recognize their need of a savior and grateful that Jesus came to be that savior.
Certainly how we live out the gospel is many-faceted. Also, in each location living out the gospel will likely look a bit different because the people to whom we are called to minister are different and have different needs.
But, if we lose sight of our central purpose (individually and corporately) we will get sidetracked into all sorts of nonsense.
Focus on the gospel. Get that right and I have a feeling that everything else will fall into place as we seek God for how to proceed.
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