{"id":3942,"date":"2011-04-16T13:19:04","date_gmt":"2011-04-16T17:19:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/?p=3942"},"modified":"2011-04-16T09:20:24","modified_gmt":"2011-04-16T13:20:24","slug":"church-of-buildings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/church-of-buildings\/","title":{"rendered":"The Church of Buildings"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Jesus<\/a>Every time I enter a building where a church meets, I am reminded of something one of my seminary professors said: \u201cFirst we make our buildings; then our buildings make us.\u201d It seems that far too often, a church is formed and influenced more by its buildings than by Scripture or even Jesus Christ. We defend our buildings and what we do in them more than we defend the fatherless, the widows, the poor, the hungry, and the destitute.<\/p>\n

A church that might begin in simplicity, with fellowship and service being the focus of their community, radically changes once it constructs a building. It now becomes focused on filling the pews, upgrading the sound system, paving the parking lot, and paying the mortgage. Whereas before the church used to go the community and get involved in their events, now the church invites the community to the church building to attend the church events.<\/p>\n

All of this leads me to believe that we are no longer the church of Jesus; we are the church of buildings. We strive for buildings and work for buildings. We live and die for our buildings. We protect them at all cost. We defend them to the death. We are jealous of the buildings of bigger churches and newer churches. We fight for our right to own buildings, keep buildings, and meet in buildings.<\/p>\n

Returning to the mission and message of Jesus might require us to give up our buildings. Why? Because we have become the church of buildings, rather than the church of Jesus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Returning to the mission and message of Jesus might require us to give up our buildings. Why? We are the church of buildings, not the church of Jesus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3770,"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":[15,32],"class_list":{"0":"post-3942","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"tag-close-your-church-for-good","8":"tag-theology-church","9":"entry"},"yoast_head":"\nThe Church of Buildings<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Returning to the mission and message of Jesus might require us to give up our buildings. Why? We are the church of buildings, not the church of Jesus.\" \/>\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\/church-of-buildings\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Church of Buildings\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Returning to the mission and message of Jesus might require us to give up our buildings. Why? 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