Fishing in an Aquarium

(Inspiration for this post comes from a recent post at Monday Morning Insight)

Recently a nearby church plant closed it's doors. Instead of having the remaining people go without a ministry, I was invited to meet the departing Pastor and a state leader for lunch. At this meeting I was asked if I would help the remaining people in this closing church transition into our church body. There was some honest hesitation on my part but ultimately I agreed and we began working to transition about 20 people from this closing church into our own.

Three to four weeks into the transition things were going pretty well and we began getting these families into small groups for the first time to help with assimilation. During the 4th week something creepy happened. A nearby church began recruiting these families HARD CORE. They took them dinner every night, sent different members to say hello, had others make phone calls,etc. This church pulled out all of the stops to attract these few families whom I had been reluctant to try to persuade in the first place.

Then it hit me. Frustration.
As I tried to figure out why I had felt this way I realized that it was because this church had put all of this attention and energy into going after 'churched' people. Fishing in an Aquarium.

SIDEBAR:
I'm not that type of Pastor. I don't try to press people to attend our church. People (I pray) attend our church b/c of the vision of our church and not because of any pressure we place on them. I've learned that most of the people that have been pressured into the church by guilt or gifts usually don't stay and almost NEVER become active in the body. They usually take up a seat and complain. It's like that quote: "Whatever it took to get your spouse is what it's going to take to keep them!"

Anyway, back to the experience. I honestly don't care about their attending our church or any other as long as they are somewhere...

The part that bothers me is I wonder...
I wonder if this church goes after lost people with that same passion? I wonder if they take food to the homeless instead of the established? I wonder if they call the down and disheartened in their community. I wonder if they show the divorced or rebellious person the same sort of 'love'. I just wonder.

I certainly hope so. My heartbeat is to Encourage and Equip people to know God through His Son Jesus Christ.

In our church plant we've probably "lost" 30-40 "churched people" aside from these couple of families because I've completely determined that we will not be a church of spiritual babies in the I-chair. Our attendance at present is a little lower than if I had pacified the 'churched' and tried to be all things to all churched-people but I believe we're developing a culture in our community that values the lost and doesn't tolerate whiners. I also believe that the very things church whiners complain about are some of the things my newly saved friends consider relevant to their spiritual growth. Constructive criticism gets attention if it is aimed at reaching the lost. Comments from the peanut gallery don't have weight with us b/c we know where we're fishing.

Too many churches ask the fresh water fish what the salt water fish would want to eat.
Are you fishers of men in a sea of those who don't know Christ? Or is your ministry going to PetSmart to fish in an Aquarium?