The beginning of yesterday’s Gospel lesson got me thinking about a congregation going through a tough, divisive time. Their old traditional church building was declared structurally unsafe. Some members want to build a new church; others want to do whatever it takes to repair the old building. As I hear, the members are sorely divided against one another.
“As Jesus came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, ‘Look, Teacher, what wonderful stones and what wonderful buildings!’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Do you see these great buildings? There will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down’” (Mark 13:1-2). Sure enough, except for the small western wall, nothing remains today.
Our big church buildings make no economic sense. Unused for most of the week, utility bills still need to be paid, custodial care is needed, and code upgrades are necessary as the building ages. Congregations pay insurance on a building that is a target for storms and vandals. If I were starting a mission church, something I wanted to do but life didn’t turn out that way, I would urge the congregation to keep using rented space rather than obsess about building a church. I suspect I’d lose because the notion is a mission congregation hasn’t really arrived until it’s self-sustaining and has its own building, but it’s not the building that makes the church. Jesus does. He told the disciples, my inadequate paraphrase, “You will go through very, very tough times because You follow Me. When that happens, don’t be sidetracked by the troubles or by other saviors. Stay true to Me, and when this temple goes down, this earthly institution ends, you will be saved.”
Like the old temple, a church building is a powerful symbol. This architecturally different place focuses our faith and devotion in a heavenly minded way. When your dear church building will be destroyed, and it will be, God will usher in a new heaven and a new earth with “no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb” (Revelation 21:22). These buildings are symbols for us, but I wonder what they symbolize to our community in these times when people think they don’t need the church? My prayer is we never be so focused upon property and buildings that we give non-churchgoers valid reasons to criticize the Church of our Lord Jesus.