{"id":2159,"date":"2011-02-28T09:52:51","date_gmt":"2011-02-28T14:52:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/?p=2159"},"modified":"2013-05-31T18:38:19","modified_gmt":"2013-06-01T02:38:19","slug":"the-one-thing-the-church-must-be","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/the-one-thing-the-church-must-be\/","title":{"rendered":"The One Thing the Church Must Be"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In case you didn&#8217;t read it, this was<a href=\"http:\/\/theooze.com\/church\/humanizing-church\/\"> posted over TheOoze.com<\/a> last week. Hardly anyone ever comments over there, so now that a 48-hour waiting period is up, I am reposting the article here.\u00a0It is similar in content to <a href=\"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/im-a-leper\/\">my post from yesterday<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">* * * * *<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"RedeemingGod image 2358\" href=\"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/the-one-thing-the-church-must-be\/mother-teresa\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-2358\" title=\"mother-teresa\" src=\"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/mother-teresa-200x141.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"200\" height=\"141\" srcset=\"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/mother-teresa-200x141.jpg 200w, https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/mother-teresa-300x212.jpg 300w, https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/mother-teresa.jpg 504w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px\" \/><\/a>As I have read and thought, written and talked about the church over the past few years, I have come to realize that the purpose of the church includes something the world gets nowhere else. The church must be a humanizer.<\/p>\n<p>If there is one thing the world, sin, and the devil does to people, it is dehumanize them. In this world, we become numbers, statistics, projects, targets, customers, consumers, and victims. We are told to sit down, shut up, and let the powers have their way. We are reminded that the majority rules and while individuals have a say, it is only money that talks.<\/p>\n<p>The church has the chance to step into all of this, look a person in the eye\u2014a person who has been beaten, battered, and trampled by the world\u2014and say to them, \u201cYou matter. I hear you. I love you.\u201d Remember how Jesus responded to the leper in Luke 5? By most accounts, this leper was no longer part of the human race. He was less than human, treated worse than a dog. He was dead, but simply didn\u2019t know it yet. When he shouted at others, they threw rocks at him, and told him to get away. But when he shouted at Jesus, Jesus not only heard him, but walked up to him, and embraced him. In that one little touch, which was not so little, Jesus humanized the leper.<\/p>\n<p>This is what the church must do. We are called to humanize. It doesn\u2019t take much. A touch here. A smile there. A word of encouragement where criticism is the norm. Treat people like the image of God that they are, even if that image is buried beneath months of unwashed grime and the smell of urine. It\u2019s not about preaching the gospel to crowds of thousands or inviting people to church. A gentle word or a generous tip are better than any gospel tract.<\/p>\n<p>Who can you humanize today?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In case you didn&#8217;t read it, this was posted over TheOoze.com last week. Hardly anyone ever comments over there, so now that a 48-hour waiting period is up, I am reposting the article here.\u00a0It is similar in content to my post from yesterday. * * * * * As I have read and thought, written [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2358,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[19,32],"class_list":{"0":"post-2159","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"tag-discipleship","8":"tag-theology-church","9":"entry"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Humanizing Church<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"So many factors in our world dehumanize people. The church must be the great humanizer, the one place that restores value and dignity to people.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/the-one-thing-the-church-must-be\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Humanizing Church\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"So many factors in our world dehumanize people. 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