“Lord, make me worthy to serve Your Church when she is down.” I read this quote in a book called Heart Fire by Johannes Hartl. It both inspired and challenged me. My heart jumped up to meet it and say “Yes! Yes, Lord, me too!” At the same time it frightened me a little.

This above quote, along with a number of other things, has had me reflecting as of late on my often inwardly tumultuous relationship with ‘the Church’. And these reflections brought me to the question “Where did this begin?”

I think it began with her. I think my history with the Church is wrapped up a bit with her history.

My mother.

To be fair to her, my mother’s life was tough from her very beginning. Born to a mother who, having attempted a self-given abortion, died giving birth to her while her daddy was sleeping off the effects of the night’s “social drinking” on a park bench.
That’s the story she told me.
Her daddy remarried a woman who enjoyed social drinking as much as he did so it was left to her grandmother to take her to Sunday School. But then Grandma died.
Fast-forward a good few years. Divorced from a crazy man after enduring years of every kind of abuse, she now had 5 hungry children looking to a single mother without even a high school diploma to feed them, clothe them, put a roof over their heads, and send them to school. Waitress by day, bar maid by night, the little bit of money she was making was going to childcare and her family turned a deaf ear to her requests for help.
Having vague memories of kind people from the days of Grandma taking her to Sunday School, she turned hopefully to the local church. The help they offered in response? To adopt her children out amongst the congregation members. This was almost acceptable to this desperate mother who was envisioning her children enduring a childhood of rejection and bullying due to the holes in their shoes. But hospitality would only be extended to her twin girls if they went into separate homes. Anyone who has been a twin or raised twins understands the cruelty of this.

Unable to take from her twins the one comfort they still had in one another’s company, she sadly turned her back on the Church and their hospitality that fell so far short from the hospitality of Jesus.

Not knowing how else to ensure that her children would receive three solid meals a day, decent clothing and an education, she adopted them out amongst her ex-husband’s family then ran as far as she could from the guilt and grief.

Fast forward a good few years again, my dad and I are now in the equation and between the faithful persistence of a local Christian couple and the timeliness of a Christian television host, she had finally met Jesus. So had my dad and we were part of a small country church. But there was still a lot of baggage present. Baggage that did not help our home to be a peaceful one. There was much that I didn’t fully understand as a child. But like all children, I was defensive of those I loved in spite of faults and flaws. So when members of our church felt it somehow appropriate to tell a child their opinions as to whose fault our family tensions were, it made me very angry. And though I loved Jesus and attended everything there was to attend at our church, was involved in children’s church and later the youth group, served in various ways such as in creche and on the worship team, there was an underlying anger, bitterness, distrust and cynicism towards the church as a whole.

At age 17, God in His great grace and tender mercy did a supernatural work of healing in my heart and took away all the anger and bitterness. My mother’s relationship with the Church continued to be one of tension, of hurt, of distrust, even fear. But I fought to guard my heart from being contaminated once again.

Fast forward again. I had been in YWAM a good number of years, much of that time travelling around the USA as part of a mobile ministry team. We had worked with just about every kind of church and denomination out there – from small country churches to massive city churches, rural churches unaware of a world dying around them to inner city churches nearly killing themselves on behalf of the poor, wealthy white churches who gave us their floor to sleep on to tiny Hispanic churches who lavished hospitality on us in every way. We saw some of the best and worst sides of ‘the Church’ in America. And eventually I discovered within my heart a fresh cynicism and harsh criticism of the very Body I was meant to be serving. Even worse, there was an attitude of judgement and superiority within me. I was uncomfortably aware of this but thought maybe I just needed a rest. Then I read The Fire of God’s Love by Bob Sorge and God once again removed the toxins from my heart and replaced it with His heart for His Bride. And it broke me. I felt a bit of His broken heart for His Church and I understood the call on my life to be like John the Baptist, like the best man to the groom and to go after the wandering, distracted Bride and remind her of her First Love, to call her back to Him.

That was a life-transforming, life-defining time, a burning bush moment if you will. And God has continued over the years to deepen, develop and build on this revelation. It has not always been easy. There is still often inner tumult in my relationship with the Church and I have to surrender old attitudes to Jesus again and again. I have been tempted a number of times to throw in the towel.

But His heart that He downloaded into me all those years ago keeps me coming back. Because when it’s all said and done, I love the Church. I believe in her. I have great hopes, a dream for her. Because Jesus loves her. Jesus believes in her, Jesus has great hopes and a dream for her. And He has privileged me to share in that love and dream. I think He has privileged us all to share in that love and dream if we dare.

So, yes, Jesus, this is my prayer, my heart cry as well. She is not perfect, she is often infuriating, she is broken, she is often so far from her potential, yet she is beautiful, there is none other like her and she is deeply, passionately, fiercely loved by You. So with Barbara I pray, “Lord, make me worthy to serve Your Church when she is down.”