with Bob Bowen

One of my jobs at Off the Map is to respond to inquiries and requests associated with the Idealab. Recently, we received a request from Pam who lives in Oregon, that she be removed from our mailing list as a result of our promotion of the Generous Orthodoxy conferences we are doing this fall. I followed up with her recently to discuss her request. Pam was kind enough to let us include our dialog in this edition of the Idealab.

Background
Pam grew up in Las Vegas in an unchurched family. They did attend church for a brief period, just long enough for her to learn John 3:16. As a teenager she got caught up in drugs and reassured herself that it must be ok with God because she could recite John 3:16 when she was stoned. (no small accomplishment ). Pam came to Christ at age 18. She had a powerful encounter with Jesus that resulted in a fairly dramatic conversion. She abandoned her party lifestyle and pursued God with youthful passion. When she was 21 she joined YWAM and served in Hong Kong for nearly seven years. It was there that she met and married her husband. They returned to the US in 1992 and have been involved in ministry in their local church since then.

OTM: How did you find out about OTM?
Pam: I wrote an article for a regional Christian newspaper on the emerging church movement. One of the people I interviewed, Kelly Bean, told me about it.

OTM: When did you start reading the IdeaLab?
Pam: I signed up for the IdeaLab around March, after checking out OTM’s website. I liked what I read. What attracted me was the encouragement for people to share Christ in ordinary ways in the course of everyday life. Sharing Jesus doesn’t need to be this big, organized event; just sharing Who He is with the people we naturally come into contact with. I’m all about that and I appreciated Off The Map’s approach. I also liked the interviews with “the missing” as you call them, (I like that term, btw,). The idea of dialoguing with someone about their perception of church and Christianity without trying to preach at them is very appealing to me. It was also reassuring to read about other people who struggle with evangelism and the whole guilt trip thing, feeling like I had better get someone to say the sinners’ prayer or else I was a lame Christian. I felt encouraged by OTM to lighten up on myself and focus on being natural, authentic, in sharing my faith. This actually is how I am, anyway, in sharing Jesus, so I felt validated.

OTM: What happened to make you unsubscribe?
Pam: I had heard from Kelly Bean that there would be some sort of OTM event here in the Pacific Northwest in the fall. I was looking forward to when the dates and details would be announced, as I was very interested in attending. When the conference information arrived I checked the cost, and honestly, it was the pricing more than anything that turned me off to not only the conference but also to OTM.

I’ve become a bit disillusioned about the whole conference scene, the high ticket prices, the self-promoting that tends to go on, the pushing of books and tapes and all the marketing to get my money so I can hear yet another life-changing message. I expected more from OTM, but the pricing and packaging of the General Orthodoxy conference seemed like the same old formula to me.

Nothing new there. So I decided OTM wasn’t any different than a lot of other ministries out there who razzle and dazzle with their conference promotions. Perhaps I’m being judgmental, but that’s the way it seems to me.

OTM: Have you told anyone else about OTM or encouraged them to unsubscribe?
Pam: I did tell some of my friends about OTM when I first heard about it. I didn’t forward the link or anything in an email, just in random conversations. So no, I didn’t get anyone to sign up or unsubscribe. Though I did tell a few friends about the conference and pricing and, dude, they all had the same reaction I did. I really did not try to sway their opinion with my ultra-charismatic speaking skills. (smile)

OTM: How are you specifically disillusioned with church? How did you get here?
Pam: There’s not a specific point in time I can point to. It’s been gradual, like some sort of strange awakening. Maybe I took the red pill and didn’t even know it.

I’ve been a part of church for decades now and it seems we are more irrelevant than ever. I see myself and my friends roll into church Sunday after Sunday for another sermon and we’ve brought no one with us. We come alone where we gather with others like ourselves to talk about Jesus, sing about Jesus, and then we go home where we read books about Jesus and blog about Jesus and live out our lives in our Jesus bubble. I’ve become acutely aware of how insulated the church has become…and what is the church? It’s people, it’s me and it’s you. When I say I’m disillusioned with church, really, I’m disillusioned with myself.

How did I get to this place of living an insulated life with little meaningful contact with the unchurched, or the missing, as you call them?

For starters, I can tell you that at times I’ve been so busy with church related activities and ministries that I simply have not had time to get to know my neighbors or unchurched friends. This doesn’t sit right with me anymore.

I have to also say that the ministry machine has messed me up. I have felt at times like a worker in a store where each department manager wants to get their hands on me to get their work done.

I was talking to someone this past week about the need of ministry. We do need spiritual ministry. However, it seems to me that it’s meant to flow from a place of intimacy with Christ and one another rather than this “keep it going” mentality. A pastor friend of mine said to me that Sunday morning is literally like, “the show must go on”.

How did the bride of Christ, who is meant to be passionately in love with Jesus, morph into a system of religious entertainment? I wonder what God thinks of it all? What is His dream for the church? I know He is intensely devoted to the bride who is called the church. Because of this I do my best to guard myself against contempt or bitterness for the one He calls beloved…the church. His bride is the apple of His eye even in all her weakness and struggle. I cannot be given over to writing her off because God Himself does not write her off. And this gives me hope.

OTM: Do you have friends that are missing that you have talked about this with? What is their take?
Pam: I don’t talk about my church angst with my unchurched friends.

I did recently, though, have an engaging conversation with a woman in my neighborhood about faith and politics. She expressed to me how people of faith were manipulated in the last election to vote a certain way. She felt that the politicizing of Christianity was a detour from the teachings of Jesus, as she understood them. She then asked me if I had ever attended a “gay church”, quickly adding, “I mean a church where gay people are welcome.” Isn’t it interesting that this is even a sentence…a church where gay people are welcome?

I hope the day comes in my lifetime when churches are known for our radical acceptance of people. I don’t mean a free-for-all-do-whatever-you-want, but rather a place of grace and love. I adore how Jesus treated people who were outside of the circle.

OTM: Can you share any insights on what you’ve learned about what the kingdom of God looks like in the everyday lives of ordinary people?
Pam: That’s a good question! I’m looking for those answers myself.

I suspect that the kingdom of God is found in relationships. I heard someone say, “God doesn’t come to meetings, He comes to friendships.” I believe it’s the intimacy of friendships and relationships where the kingdom of God shines the brightest. I think it’s in how we treat one another that distinguishes what kingdom we are under the rule of.

Jesus said His greatest commandments were to love God and one another. I am convinced that His kingdom is foremost a kingdom of love…how does that look in everyday life, in politics, in the workplace, and especially on Sunday morning? How does the kingdom of God manifest itself in the collective body known as the church? Those are the questions that have captured my imagination. I daydream a lot about what that could like…imagine going to church and being told to give your tithe that day to someone in the congregation who needs help with their bills…imagine lonely, unimportant people finding true friendships in their local church where they are accepted for who they are rather than their gifting…I like to imagine the day when humility and obscurity are true values in making sure Christ is exalted and not our own names or church reputations, where the reality of who God is and what He is like is more important than my own interest, where the only true celebrity in the body of Christ is Jesus.

It is my prayer that the body of Christ would experience a revolution of intimacy that would lead to reformation…a revolution of intimacy with Jesus and with one another. It is my fervent hope and prayer that intimacy with Christ will be what heals the church of her dysfunction.

OTM: What Have you found helpful in building relationships? What do your friends think when you invite them to a church activity? What might have been done to change their perception/experience in a positive way?
Pam: It seems to me that being real, being who you are is the way to go. It is my experience that sharing Jesus in an authentic way through the natural course of the relationships I have has more impact than trying to get someone to a church service. It is no longer my goal to get people to church to find Jesus. It is my intention to help people find Jesus right where they are.

For a long, long time I felt immense pressure to have a perfect life to show my friends how much happier and more fulfilled I was than they were. I felt tremendous pressure to have it all together, to have a better marriage, to have awesome parenting skills, to basically be Miss Perfect-Who-Does-Everything-Right-So-You’ll-See-Christ-In-Me. That created a lot of inner turmoil as you can imagine. I either felt like a loser-of-a-Christian if my pagan friends had stronger marriages than I did, or else I would get smug about how together I had it and those poor souls didn’t know any better because they don’t have Jesus. This set me up to be judgmental towards others as well as harsh on myself.

In the last several years I’ve been more open and genuine with my friends, Christian or not, about my own life struggles . I’ve let my Gotta-Be-Perfect -Guard down with the hopes that my witness for Christ won’t be damaged. If anything, it has been strengthened. Sharing my own struggles and weaknesses and how my faith in Christ steers me through such things allows my friends to see that I’m not Miss Know- It-All. I don’t have all the answers. There is a freedom now for me to be more intimate with my friends, more honest and vulnerable, and let them view my inner struggle with this thing called life and the grace that God pours onto me. It certainly has deepened my relationships.

OTM: What role does “taking people to church” play for you?
Pam: I don’t try to get people to church anymore. Maybe my attitude sucks, but if they can’t relate to church my concern is maybe they’ll think that they can’t relate to God, who is the most amazing People Person I know. I encourage people, when we are having spiritual conversations, to seek the reality of who God is and if Jesus is His Son or not, to go to God themselves and ask Him to reveal who He is to them. I trust that if and when they have a God encounter, getting involved with a community of faith will come next.

I’ve had some disasters taking people to church. I once took a neighbor from a very chaotic home to an Easter service. Of course her preschooler son came along and naturally he wasn’t about to go into a Sunday school class with a bunch of strangers. I spent the whole service attempting to keep him entertained to no avail. I died for her when an usher came over and told them to keep it down. They were clearly misfits in our church of well-behaved people. I never talked to her about it, as it seemed an embarrassing situation for her. After that I determined to just tell her God loved her rather than making it a goal to get her inside of my church.

Another good friend of mine attended church with me several times. She said it reminded her of a concert. Looking at the Sunday morning production through her eyes I would have to agree. She was entertained, and though the preaching was biblical and skillful she did not have the encounter with God I so desperately prayed for. We had our most significant talks about Jesus a year later when she got breast cancer. Her encounters with God happened in her own home as she coped with the biggest crisis of her life. It reminds me that Jesus is who we need to have a revelation about, not an encounter with a place but rather with a Person.

I remember my sister’s reaction to church when she came one Sunday. She simply said,
“No offense, but that was boring. I have no idea what he was talking about.” This from a woman with two college degrees.

Most of the time when I have invited someone to church they politely decline. They are just not interested in spending their free time on their day off sitting through a church service. I rarely ask anyone to come to my church anymore.

Back Stage with Bob
OTM offered a couple of free tickets to Pam and a friend and they have agreed to attend the Seattle Generous Orthodoxy conference in November and do another interview with me afterwards.

Stay tuned...