CONFESSIONS OF A CHURCHAHOLIC

Amy Spencer

My name is Amy, and I’m a churchaholic.

There. I said it.

It’s Church Hour on Sunday morning, and instead of sitting in the pew, I’m at my computer, writing this confession in hopes that somewhere out there someone like me will read it and be encouraged. Maybe you’re reading this in your easy chair at home or on a park bench. Or maybe it’s Sunday morning—during the sermon?!—and you’re wishing you were in your easy chair or at the park.

Don’t get me wrong. I love the church. Community and fellowship are the bedrocks of my faith and discipleship, and Anabaptists are keen on this; hence, my faith has been deeply enriched by things Mennonite. The Anabaptists started out as a radical community, meeting wherever they could, in woods and caves—not unlike Jesus and his Twelve, who frequented hillsides and byways. They thrived in those hills and caves, those "churches," where they found strength in each other and in God. I’m reminded of Paul’s admonition, "Let us not give up meeting together" (Heb. 10:25). It’s so important, do it in caves or on hillsides or in garbage dumps if you have to.

"So," you might ask, "why aren’t you in church?"

Like I said, I’m a churchaholic. I need not to be there. After years of wrestling, I’ve realized that my reasons for going to church don’t have much to do with discipleship or relationships or even with God; they have more to do with addictions and bad habits. Again, don’t get me wrong. Lots of wonderful things happen at church. It’s a great place—for most people.

Let me give you some background. I went to church every Sunday for the first 18 years of my life—and I was utterly bored. Never would I have set foot in a church after high school but for two reasons: first, "church on Sunday" was ingrained, something I was supposed to do; second—and most important—at 17 I had a deep experience with God in which I committed myself to follow Jesus. And how else does one follow Jesus but by going to church every Sunday . . . right?

After traveling through the Christian scene for twenty-some years, starting in a mainline denomination and making stops in campus fundamentalism and charismatic gatherings and missionary gangs, I finally parked in the Mennonite church. And here I stay. Sort of.

You might label me the ultimate postmodern: always seeking something more. Well, I happen to be seeking Jesus, and there is always more of him to be found. And I’ve found him in every one of those places: the Church of Tedium, the College Club for Control Freaks, the Congregation of the Waving Hands, the Choir Without Accompaniment.

But something in me always shuts down during an ordinary—and even a not-so-ordinary—churchish Sunday morning. I can worship at moments, or at least pretend to. I can chat away in Sunday school, even somewhat astutely. But I am an alien, a stranger to every form of Sunday-go-to-meetin’ I’ve been committed to. Call me church-impaired. It’s a weakness; I just don’t "get" church.

It’s important that you know another thing, because maybe you can relate: I am always hoping for new people to be drawn into Jesus. Looking out for the outsider—that’s a passion of mine, an obsession. How could it not be? Jesus is so . . . essential; he is the Key for every single person and for the whole world.

This evangelical spirit makes church hard for me, oddly enough. There I sit, in the same pew every Sunday, listening to the undeniably good sermon; joining in the four-part hymn resonating heavenward; praying for sick friends-who-have-become-sorta-family; grinning as my son does special music. . . .

For heaven’s sake! Why am I not there today?

Because I can’t take it anymore, the way the church (and I, when I’m being a good "church person") hoards the gospel. It’s like packing away bags and bags of food in our church cabinets while a hungry child stares in at us through a rain-spotted window. After a while, all that yummy apple butter and fresh-baked bread tastes rotten.

As I sit in my pew, I think about the church building (it may be simple, but it’s opulently unfriendly) and wonder why I’m tithing for it. I think of those who have been so damaged by churchly abuses that they have rejected God. And those who have never darkened a church door because they think God is totally irrelevant. And those like me who are in the church, but not of it.

Lord knows I’ve tried hard not to be critical and to fit in. "Just live with it" has been my motto. (And have I ever! Thought control is an incredible thing.) "Learn to love it like they do" was a good one too, and it even worked at times. But I finally had to realize who I am; I had to come to grips with my very self. "Just live with it" was clearly no longer a healthy enough response.

I realized I didn’t have to live with it anymore. Belonging to a big herd has its good and godly points, no doubt, but too often I have taken shelter in the herd to the point of compromising God’s call. I hear someone else’s reasons for not following on the hard way, and I take that as a good excuse for me not to also. God may be pushing me to take a risk that is uniquely tailored for me, but I don’t, because . . . well . . . no one else is doing it. (Duh!)

Christoph Friedrich Blumhardt, a Christian thinker of the nineteenth century who influenced many theologians of the twentieth, echoes my cry: "We must come to the point where we can experience God . . . and have fellowship with him. I am not talking about any sort of theology [or form of church], but something much more real than words! There must be deeds. Deeds are true."

I came to a point (and I return to it often) where I had to recognize that I was taking comfort, and even pride, in my theologies and my deed-doing. But so often my deeds were mere habits—even addictions to meet some need—rather than Spirit-led, Spirit-infused acts. So often I acted out my false "church" self instead of living freely as my God-made self.

I have had to come to grips with this addiction and realize there is no life in deeds for the sake of deeds, for the sake of tradition, for the sake of theological rightness, for the sake of churchliness. There is life in deeds (including going to church) only when those acts are for the sake of our Lord of love. "Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God" (1 Cor. 10:31).

So, to break a habit of lifeless doing, to break my need to follow in the same way other people follow, I decided to leave church as I knew it and join that hungry, cold child outside. More than a year ago, my husband and I put on our coats and galoshes to go sloshing around in search of a new hillside or cave, a form of fellowship that enriches more than it frustrates, a way that includes people like us, a way to a spiritual feast that nourishes but doesn’t make us fat and sedated.

There are other Jesus followers out here searching. We haven’t given up meeting together, but we are meeting outside the traditional church. Maybe we’ll find ourselves on the way to Emmaus or on Damascus Road, learning from Jesus something that will meet the needs of a new (though very old) world. Maybe we’ll wander outside until we die, never finding a way. Or maybe we’ll come back to church next Sunday.

All I know is, for the sake of my relationship with myself and my God—and, just maybe, for the sake of coming generations of believers—I’m off walking, in search of a hillside.

—Amy Spencer, Kalona, Iowa, is a freelance book editor who enjoys her husband and two teens almost to the point of idolatry. A sometimes-seminarian, she also likes preaching, poetry, presenting devotions at the local retirement home, and exploring all things Celtic.