Dear The Church

Dear The Church,

I love you so much. You are judged so harshly, in ways that don't even make sense sometimes, from places of bitterness and hurt. And sometimes you are judged because the people that make you up are misguided or mean or power hungry. 

At times, we forget that you are made up of broken, real, hurt, forgiven, healed, scarred, imperfect people. All of whom find wholeness in Christ. If you look closely, you may see ugly. If you dissect motives and look through the microscope named suspicion you'll definitely see hard things. Human reality. Human beings. Humans...being. 

(If you're reading this and dissecting and looking so closely at The Church...pull back. Ok even further. Further. THERE!  Now, what do you see?  A beautiful tapestry of people all woven together. Diversity. Hints of Heaven. Blood, sweat and tears mingle within the patchwork so much so that you can scarcely tell where one history ends and another begins. Family. You see broken arms made straight in order to be able to lock together. Scars touching scars.  HOW GORGEOUS IS THIS BROKEN BODY STANDING TALL?)

Ok, back to you, The Church. What the world deems as bad (history, scars, mistakes) God uses within you for our good and for the very glory of God! I hate it that some people within the church have used those things against the people who enter your doors. It's not ok. I'm so, so sorry they've been hurt. I know it hurts you too. I promise to be gentle with them, to not simply say, "get over it." I promise to love them. To lay down my life for them. 

Love,

A scarred (but not scared) member of the body. A woman enamored with you.  A woman who will work hard WITH you. 

Ephesians 2:19-22 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being  the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

1 Corinthians 12:12-14 For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body,  so it is with Christ.  For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body— Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. For the body does not consist of one member but of many.