David Binder explores what it’s like being an outsider in your local church
You’ve been attending your church week in, week out for a while.
You arrive 15 minutes early ready to chat with your brothers and sisters, but for some reason it just doesn’t happen. Everyone is either deep in conversation already or doesn’t seem willing to talk.
No matter, you sit down and experience an edifying service. Eager to engage afterwards, you find again that everyone is in their groups chatting away in their ‘circles of trust’. You exchange a few brief pleasantries with a few, have a half-decent two-minute chat with one and then retreat back to the bookstall hoping that someone will notice you’re doing the ‘bookstall’ thing (‘I’m new, lonely, or both – please come and talk to me!’) and beaver up to you. You wait 20 minutes and still nothing. Finally, you give up and sullenly trudge off home.
This pattern seems to repeat itself for longer than you care to remember. It feels like you know everyone and yet no one. You’re an outsider.
Building the church
It is a sad thing indeed that outsiders exist in our churches today. If it is true that we together are the body of Christ – that is, the church (Romans 12.5) who have all been given gifts to build one another up (1 Thessalonians 5.11, 1 Corinthians 12.25, Galatians 6.1-6) – then this must surely be true for everyone, outsiders, insiders, or those in between. In short, everyone in Christ’s church is needed.
Because of this fact, our churches cannot be social clubs where we merely come to hang out. This isn’t to say that there isn’t immense benefit in cultivating strong friendships with people we naturally click with and I’m certainly not calling for these to be abandoned. Such relationships are absolutely crucial if we are to keep going and growing as Christians
We would do well however to remember that Jesus didn’t die for us because we’re affable, warm, cool, or because we wear Converse trainers. No, he loved us and gave up his life for us despite us (Romans 3). We’re wretched sinners who deserve nothing less than judgment and yet Jesus gave himself up for us in the most costly way imaginable, enduring God’s wrath for our sake.
Why does this matter in relation to this article? Because, if we are to love others as Christ loved us (John 15.12, Ephesians 5.2), then this should surely include reaching out to outsiders, and also those we might find it naturally difficult to get on with. We should dispense with any prideful notion that the insiders are somehow more worthy than the outsiders (and vice versa for that matter).
Loving others as Jesus loved us
Further, I wonder whether we’re often guilty of approaching those who are new to our church, or who struggle to fit in, in a ‘community service’ type of way. That is, we can talk to someone once, think we’ve done ‘our bit’ and then never talk to them again; or if we do talk to them repeatedly over time, we can treat them as our own personal ‘projects’ (that is, as impersonal, detached assignments, whereby we try and ‘improve’) and not as fellow brother and sisters who we dearly need as much as they need us.
As such, when I try (and all too often fail) to love others selflessly like Christ did, this encourages and builds me up. Any attempt to demonstrate Christlikeness towards others also has the potential benefit of forming a new friendship.
Don’t wait to be served, but serve
If what I’ve said so far mainly applies to ‘insiders’ relating to ‘outsiders’, allow me to spend the rest of the article discussing the inverse.
First off, if you feel like an outsider, be encouraged! If you’re trusting in the Lord for your salvation, Jesus died for you and loves you whether you have many friends or none. Believers have been richly blessed in Christ and in him alone we have all we need for contentment, now and for eternity (Ephesians 1.3, Philippians 4.11-13).
Jesus knows what it’s like to be an outsider more than anyone (Isaiah 53.3-5). He was rejected by men and women and endured total separation from God the Father (Matthew 27.46). Amazingly, not only does Jesus know what it’s like to be rejected and alone, we can also be sure that he isn’t a distant deity, but someone who is intimately involved in every aspect of our lives (John 15.1-11) and who loves to hear our prayers (Proverbs 15.8), having been tempted in all the ways we are (Hebrews 4.15). Therefore, if you’re feeling lonely, why not talk about it with God?
A ‘consumer church’ attitude
Second, as alienating and difficult as it is to be an outsider, I wonder those of us predisposed to feeling like this can sometimes be too demanding and have an unhelpful ‘consumer church’ attitude when we feel that things aren’t going our way.
I believe we can sometimes get drawn into an unhelpful mindset of only wanting to do things which ‘feel good’, rather than what’s needed or what might be helpful in building up the church. Did Christ love us because it felt good? No. He redeemed us at enormous personal cost. As such, let’s not be making personal gain or enjoyment a primary motivation in getting involved in our churches. Rather, let’s be driven by a desire to build Christ’s church and love his people.
Thirdly, could it be that sometimes in our dissatisfaction we’re looking for something that can’t be found this side of the new creation? No church, earthly relationship, ministry or whatever is going to totally satisfy us. There’ll always be a longing for something better, and this longing is a good thing. It tells us that we’re made to be in a better, perfect relationship with our saviour King Jesus.
Fourthly, perhaps we’re also guilty of waiting for others to come to us, rather than being focussed on making the first step ourselves. Making this first move might not be easy, but isn’t that the way of Christian life so much of the time, reflecting the way God in sending his Son initiates, drives and achieves a relationship with us?
Sacrificing to build
I've had conversations before with people who desire deeper friendships and greater levels of church involvement but who, when I suggest potentially viable options or invite them to things, shy away, essentially saying that particular activity isn’t for them. In which case we need to ask whether we’re willing to put ourselves out, sacrificing for the sake of building one another up? It’s a big challenge to the consumerist mindset that has saturated our culture and infiltrated many of our churches, but one I think we all need to heed.
Summing up: Christ is sufficient
If you’re feeling like an outsider, do pray about it, talk to a friend, small group leader or pastor and do remember that God loves you enough to send his Son to die for you despite you not deserving it. Remember also that God in his loving providence has given us everything that we need today to keep going and growing as Christians (2 Peter 1.3).
If you’re not feeling like an outsider then do please look out for those who look like they might be, not out of begrudging duty, but out of love for your brother or sister.
In addition, no relationship can or will fulfil us while we wait for Christ to come again. Therefore, as we wait, let’s be building one another up in Christlikeness, not heaping unrealistic expectations on each other and not seeking our own pleasure and enjoyment.
Finally, everyone in Christ’s church has a key role to play in building it up. Let’s not forget that.
