Hospitalized Church

I usually blog about whatever is on my mind or heart at the time but occasionally I get a nudge from the Holy Spirit to tackle a given topic on here. At first I thought to myself.. great, just what the world needs, another blog about what is wrong with the church...  but the more I humbled myself and considered the task, I realized that no one else in the earth can bring the exact insights that I can because no one else has gone thru what I have gone thru. In short, I had to reassure God that He was correct yet again.. lol

Am I the only one who does that?  I'm pretty sure many of you can relate to that.  :)

Church is supposed to be a hospital for broken souls. This is because only the sick need a doctor. Thus, you are going to be in one of two places if you are going to be in a local church for any length of time successfully. You will either be there getting some healing or you will be in there being a spiritual doctor helping others get the healing they need. 

When you break down these two things you find there are a lot of variations. For example, you may need a healing in your emotions, you may need a healing from a rare disease, you may need a healing in your mind from a demon (aka deliverance)  but in any case, you would be there to receive healing.  

On the other side, you may be there to help others heal. You may be a hospital receptionist (church secretary), a surgeon (one on one minister) a group therapy leader (Teacher), a nurse with several patients (home group leader) or you may be on the board of directors of the hospital (Elder or Deacon).  You may even be a skilled surgeon that travels and is on call for various different hospitals (usually a Prophet) or you may be one to go in, get permits and break ground to build new hospitals where they are needed (Apostle). 

Point is, when its all said and done the hospital is supposed to be a place to serve the community and ultimately help people heal.  This is exactly what the church is supposed to be doing and in some ways is successful and in other ways is failing. 

Something related; everything in the Kingdom of God works thru the divine nature of Jesus. If you do not see that Father/Son loving relationship in your dealings, you are not seeing the real Kingdom of God. 

Here is where we get into a bit of trouble as believers. We tend to allow ourselves to get into this no man's land of belief that suggests we are there to do both heal others and get healed ourselves at the same time. Now think about that logically for a moment. Can you imagine going on for a surgical procedure and the nurse telling you the doctor was just being wheeled out of the same surgery and as soon as he recovers he'll be right in to do yours? Yet that is exactly what happens repeatedly in most churches across the USA and around the world. We need to figure out WHY we are walking in the door on Sunday mornings. This means we need goals and clarity on who is supposed to be doing what.  

Another example; can you imagine a janitor stepping into your room, putting his broom down and picking up a syringe to draw blood? You stop him and he says "Oh, its ok, Ive seen it done many times now"...  the same thing happens with technical areas of the church all the time.  This is what it looks like when someone is doing sound that has no ear to mix or someone is ushering who has not bathed in three days.  

Without a doubt, most hurt feelings in the church come as a result of people trying to operate in a function they are not trained well enough to operate in. What complicates matters is that many times these folks believe they have been trained or already know what they are doing when they do not. 

So who is really trained and who isn't? I'll get into that next week as my blog series on the Hospital Church continues... In the meantime, feel free to comment below...

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