Change from within

The Nones. The Non Church. SBNRs (spiritual but not religious). Whatever they call themselves, these are a growing population in American culture and throughout the world of people who are saying I believe in God, faith, and spirituality, but not in the church or organized religion. When I say growing, I don't mean by one or two a day. I mean by leaps and bounds!
In the 1960's I remember a phrase that called Christians to task. Attributed to German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, headlines screamed at us that "God is Dead." In 1966 Time magazine ran a cover story asking the question, "Is God Dead?"
(Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,835309,00.html#ixzz1pDAlu9tX)
Then the Beatles came out and proclaimed they were more popular that God! It seemed that everyone was proclaiming the demise of God in the 60's and 70's. Not so now. Now people are holding fast to God, but claiming that it's the church that's irrelevant in their lives. They may be right. Yet, their approach may be a bit of an overreaction. As the proverb goes, I fear they may be throwing out the baby with the bath water.
In 1985, I began ministry as a woman in a predominately man's field. As I trained in seminary, there were many times I wanted to quit. There were warnings from female professors of the obstacles facing a woman in ministry. There were horror stories of women out in the parish and the ungodly things done to them by churches to run them off. There were my own field education experiences with horrific encounters of my own. Yet, a mild mannered, soft spoken, gentle spirited, favorite professor of mine told me something I will never forget. She shared with me that she, too, had often thought of giving up the fight to serve out her calling in the church. "But," she said, "the best way to effect change is from the inside." I never forgot that, and I have found it to be true. People on the outside throwing stones almost never change things. Martin Luther was a priest, not someone on the sidelines. Jesus was a faithful Jew, not a casual observer. They confronted the things within their organized religions that they felt were unjust or out of whack and they worked to change things. The founder of my own denomination, John Wesley, didn't set out to start a new religion. He just wanted to reach the poor and disenfranchised. It was the Revolutionary War that forced his hand and made him relent to demands to separate from the Church of England because the American colonies wouldn't go there to receive the sacraments.
Needless to say, I stayed in the church and worked to change things. I can proudly say that things for the young women in the church today are much easier because of trailblazers before me, pathmakers like me, and all of us that chose to stay and fight the difficult battles instead of go off and start our own woman-friendly church. Today women in ministry are common in almost all Protestant denominations. Our seminary graduating classes are right at 50% female!
What if all the Nones, the Non Churchers, the SBNRs and such were to help us reform the church? What if they stayed around and became the prophetic voices calling us to faithfulness? What if they turned over some tables and called out some hypocrites and challenged the status quo? Don't we need that in the church to stay balanced? At least engage the church in friendly debate!
²³ “What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are careful to tithe even the tiniest income from your herb gardens, but you ignore the more important aspects of the law—justice, mercy, and faith. You should tithe, yes, but do not neglect the more important things. ²⁴ Blind guides! You strain your water so you won’t accidentally swallow a gnat, but you swallow a camel!  (Matthew 23:23-24)
Jesus didn't hesitate to call out the good church people of his time! Maybe he was the first SBNR.....