How to choose a church

First we traded in our California license plates for Illinois plates.

Then we closed out our California Wells-Fargo bank accounts.

Then we had to pay for some new local resident photo ID cards so we could use the local park district swimming pool.

(Which, by the way, was the best $10 I have ever spent. When it is 100 degrees and 70% humidity, the ONLY places to be are in a refrigerator or in a swimming pool. )

Pretty soon we’ll have to trade in our CA cell-phones for Illinois phones, and before you know it we'll be talking about "da Bears"

Lots of changes.

But so far, these have all been pretty easy. You need a cell-phone? Go to the cell-phone store. Need a new driver’s license? Go to the DMV. But what do you do about churches? New license plates don't really impact your life in any way, but I can't think of anything more influential in our lives over the last 7 years than the churches we attended. Finding a new church is a really big deal.

According to Yahoo, there are 10 churches of various denominations just within a 2 mile circle of where we are staying right now. Expand that out to the entire Chicago area and you’re talking thousands of churches.

Now, of course you can pare that list down fairly quickly. We’re not Catholic, so that cuts the list down. We are also looking for an English-speaking church, and not a Greek Orthodox or other ethnic variety church. Not because there’s anything wrong with Catholic, Spanish, Polish or Greek churches, but that’s not we’re looking for right now.

Then it’s a matter of choosing your flavor of Christianity. That cuts the list down even more. For us, we ruled out Episcopal, Methodist, Baptist, Lutheran, Mormon and Seventh-Day Adventist. Then you have to consider Presbyterian or not? And if so, which brand? Do you want PCUSA or PCA? Apparently I am told there are Big Differences there so we have to be careful not to mess it up.

But now what? Just go visit a new church every weekend? There’s only 52 weeks a year, assuming we are never sick or out of town on vacation, so in reality we’re talking like 45 Sundays a year.

That severely limits the number of places we can visit. Because, after all, one visit is rarely enough to know for sure if a church is a good fit, right? I mean, what if the main pastor is out of town, or they have a guest speaker? And besides, don’t all churches have good weeks and bad weeks?

And what do we judge the churches on anyways? Music quality? Seat comfort? Whether or not they offer free donuts?

OK, so I think I have a good “feel” for what I am looking for, but shouldn’t I be able to verbalize those criteria a bit better than just “I like the feel of this place” or, “I didn’t like the worship”? Aren’t those lame excuses? Or are they legitimate? Does God really like the idea of me comparison shopping for churches? OK that’s a rhetorical question, and given the country and culture I am living in, our dilemma is nothing out of the ordinary, and it’s not really sinful. But it does seem like we are wasting time…

We visited one church recently that is a fairly conservative Presbyterian church, with a pretty formal service style. I was really having a hard time focusing because it was so rigid and stiff. For the sermon they always use a quote from the OT as well as a quote from the NT. This sermon included an excerpt from the story of Gideon and the fleece. And just above that was a tiny 1 and half inch square black and white picture of something that looked like a bunch of Spanish conquistadores standing around in their suits of armor.



Then I looked at the little inscription and it said it was a woodcut made in 1570.

1570

At that moment I knew this church was not going to be a good fit for me. Woodcuts are for museums, not Sunday morning church services. I mean, I don’t want to offend any art historians out there, but I can’t think of anything more astonishingly boring than going to church and looking at a 450 year old woodcut drawing in the program. What exactly were they thinking? Is it supposed to liven up the otherwise graphic-and-color-free program? Is it supposed to help me visualize what was going on when Gideon put the fleece on the ground? (apparently Gideon wore a lot of fancy armor and sported a finely groomed mustache and a long ostrich feather in his helmet).

Maybe it was supposed to remind me that they have been preaching sermons about Gideon for almost 500 years? Or to put me in a serious mood of contemplation so I pay attention to the serious sermon? I have no idea. But the point is that I can’t see myself attending this church on a regular basis because my sinful, arrogant, cynical, snooty, post-modern self would just get too frustrated about this kind of thing.

BUT

As incredibly boring and sleep-inducing as the services at this church are, they have an amazing sense of community. It’s a very small congregation, but it’s clear that the people really do care and pray for each other. And have done so for years. One man gave a powerful testimony at the end of the service about the powerful impact the church has had on his life over the last 25 years, supporting him in missions work, in parenthood, in marriage, and in his walk with Jesus. It was awesome. Exactly what you would wish for in a church.

So, that leaves me perplexed when it comes to finding a new church. I still don’t think this particular church is the right place for us. But what is?