My experience with a horrible church

Have you ever been in a church service that made you cringe? Have you ever been involved with a church that continually tried your patience, zapped you of your inspiration, and generally left you with a feeling of discontent? Have you ever struggled loving people in your church who seemed insufferable, annoying, or altogether evil? If so, you and the Apostle Paul have a lot in common.

I’m currently teaching through the book of I Corinthians, and after weeks of learning about Paul’s least favorite church, I am left astonished at Paul’s persistent love and patience with his non-spiritual misfits. Truthfully, I doubt anyone would willingly choose to be a part of the church in Corinth. The list of wrong behaviors and dangerous theologies that prevailed within the church are enough to make any Christian cringe. And yet, despite their numerous sins, perhaps the most self-destructing sin was their sin of spiritual pride. Pride in their own spirituality, and spiritual gifts, was essentially a serious threat to their own spiritual survival and the gospel itself.

Paul remedies this great spiritual sickness with words of compassion and instruction. Instead of hurtful and humiliating criticisms, Paul writes to the dysfunctional church with words laced with love. Through Paul’s writings to this church, we are all reminded that humiliating a brother or sister because of their sins, weaknesses, or shortcomings is never a healthy way to treat someone. Rather, when we are a part of an underachieving church or are confronted with a troublesome brother or sister, we should follow Paul’s example. Let your words, even to the worst of sinners and in the worst of churches, always be words laced with love and godly encouragement.

Paul sought to provoke the Corinthians to a greater level of humility and sincerity not by showing them what they were not, but reminding them of what they were in Christ:

For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. (I Cor 1:18)