I Believe in the Church

As Yogi Berra was alleged to have said, “Who would’ve thunk it?  My friend Dr. Joe Grana, Dean of Pacific Christian College at Hope International University, believed it; but I don’t think he really believed it.  The rallying cry for years was “You gotta believe!”  Then it was always, “Wait until next year.”  Next year finally came.

If you’ve read my blog before or know much about me, you know that I am an avid baseball fan, particularly an avid Dodger fan.  When the last day of the World Series is over, I don’t turn my interest to football or basketball, I start thinking about how long it is until pitchers and catchers report to spring training.  For twenty-eight years I have believed that next year is the year for my Dodgers, but Cubs fans had been pining away for that day for 108 years -- longer than any of them have been alive!  But they believed.  Yes, they believed that one day it would happen.  It did.

As baseball season winds down each year, I find myself in another season--church season.  It’s not that I haven’t been in church my whole life. It’s just that the fall schedule opens up an opportunity to tell the CDF story in a lot of different places.  This past fall I found myself at ten different churches in a span of thirteen Sundays.  It’s unusual to get to see a slice of the church that I have been privileged to see.  And while each church has its own personality, style, and character, they all have one thing in common. They believe.

The churches I visited were large and small.  From neighborhood churches to megachurches.  Music that quietly soothed the soul to music that pulsated from the walls and lifted the spirit. Older people and younger people, they were all there. But while these churches had their differences, they all had their commonalities.  Music. Prayer. Sermon. Communion. Offering. Announcements.  I think I could say, without exception, that’s what you’d see in just about every Christian Church, every Sunday, in the U.S.

But that’s not all they do because the church is not about what happens inside four walls on a Sunday morning.  And that’s why I believe in the church.  For sixty-four years CDF has been providing financing for churches to buy property, build church buildings, and enhance their properties.  But if that were all we did, we would be helping the church to build a fortress from which to protect itself from the world.

What I have witnessed is exactly the opposite.  The churches I have visited use their properties, not as a fortress, but as a position of offense, looking for ways to move beyond their physical location to attack the evil schemes of the devil, whose mission is to destroy people’s lives.  I have observed people in these churches making great sacrifices for the poor.  I have seen how their small groups have banded together to reinforce one another during difficult times. I have watched their community support programs help the deeply troubled.

I have witnessed their global view of the saving power of the gospel, sending servants around the world to bring light into dark places.

The churches I have visited understand that the church is truly not the building.  I don’t believe in church buildings.  I believe in the church.

The difference between church season and baseball season is at church we don’t have to wait for pitchers and catchers to report.  There is no other competing interest that allows us to take a few months off and have some time to rest up.  Oh sure, there are times when people seem to pay more attention to church attendance--Easter, Christmas season, and Mother’s Day.  But those are merely times when we count the number of seats that are filled on a Sunday morning.  The dedication of the church to the mission of Christ doesn’t take a day off.  That mission is carried out by the church.  I believe in the church.

The church is in the business of life transformation.  One of my favorite recent stories is that of Natalia Hamm, who shared her compelling testimony in this Facebook video.  It was because a local church was there, The Crossing in Las Vegas, that Natalia’s life was transformed.  Her story is compelling because of the complete life change.  My testimony is pretty boring in comparison.  But it was a church that poured itself into my young life, Knott Avenue Christian Church in Anaheim.  They put me on the “straight and narrow.”  I didn’t know it at the time, but while I lived that “boring testimony,” it was the men and women of that church who were transforming my life just as miraculously as The Crossing transformed Natalia’s.  I believe in the church.

I have dedicated nearly three decades of my life to helping churches get buildings.  Bricks and mortar?  Yes.  Lives transformed?  Absolutely.  And I don’t have to wait ‘til next year.  It’s happening every day.  I believe in the church.