Cheers and Jeers for "Quitting Church"

Last week’s column by Chad Hall drew lots of response from our readers. Some cheered, some jeered. Some scratched their heads and wondered why a pastor who quit going to church for a while would encourage others to do the same. In part, he had grown weary of the church thing. But Chad also reasoned that to understand non-Christians, he needed to hang out with them. To think like a fish, you must swim with the fishies, he said. (To read Chad’s full column, click here.)

We received many, many replies. Some readers took the whole column literally. They had quit church, and Chad’s “six ways” simply provided reasons for their exodus. One couple traded church for brunch, and reported they found there a real sense of purpose in sharing the joy of their faith with the non-Christians they were meeting over eggs benedict. Two said they had started house churches. One correspondent wrote: “OK, he quit and attended Bedside Baptist and the Bagel Church. When did he unquit and why?” It was signed, “Larry the Quitter.” (Larry, we forwarded your question to Chad.)

Many admonished Chad for ignoring Hebrews 10:25 (“Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is. … ). One thoughtful reader said that Jesus’ use of fishing analogies is always about groups. Fish don’t swim alone. And, another wrote, Christians are not called “fish,” but “fishermen.” Good points to ponder.

“Your advice moves quickly beyond ‘thinking like a fish’ into ‘becoming like a fish,'” one warned. And another said if Hall hung around pot-reeking concerts and mosh pits in order to understand spiritually hungry people, his life would begin to “smell like a fish.”

• Mike Robinson carried the analogy further: You are a pastor and it is a good thing to understand your flock; what they are experiencing, the challenges do they face, what are the struggles they deal with. [But] must you become a liar to counsel a liar? Perhaps you have adulterers in your congregation. Should you become an adulterer? What about murders? You get my point?

• Bob Brueggen: If Chad is in the water rather than on the boat (where fish are supposed to be taken from the water) how is he becoming more like the master caster himself, Jesus Christ? Like Chad, I believe the church is irrelevant for the most part to the majority of our society. Churches have to get out of a maintenance and into a ministry mode if we are to impact our world for the kingdom. However, when the boat isn’t doing what it’s supposed to be doing (i.e., catching fish) we don’t abandon ship and slip overboard into the churning sea. That’s not the way to catch fish. Once you get out of the boat and into the water, your fishing is over.

You may not agree with his methodology, but the issue Chad raises must be considered: isolation of Christians from the people and world we are to reach. One woman said, “We need to get out of these prison walls we call the church.” And many readers shared similar experiences.

• Christopher Ward said church people don’t know what it’s like in the ocean: You may get some grief from your fresh and free approach to a touchy subject but, I agree with you that many church/ministry people have no idea on how the world thinks or what they are like. I too had become ingrained in the church; ministry full-time, Christian radio, Christian friends, and Christian entertainment. Then after 9/11 our ministry shut down. I went to work in a secular business to take care of the family and wow, what a shock! Twenty-five years of ministry had not prepared me for reality of where the rest of the world was living. Some of the Christians in this market(place) don’t even smell like salt!

• Debbie Sandifer: How can we be good fishers of people if we don’t know what bait they’re biting these days?

• Brett Patterson, a pastor from South Africa, asked: Was there no other way of learning to love lost fish without giving up on friendship with your family of “found” fish? Whilst suspecting that your injunction to quit the church may be somewhat tongue in cheek, I think there is responsibility here to promote both wise and radical action at a time when many—leaders and people—are finding the traditional systems of Church-ianity (to be) a lifeless and meaningless experience. Was there not some wiser way of understanding the lost without giving up on being part of authentic community of friends of Jesus?

Several pastors rejected the notion that they could become detached from the “real world” their church members live in.

• Michael Williams: How can anyone, let alone a pastor, be that isolated or insulated from the “real” world? We don’t live in monasteries but in communities of one kind or another. Many pastors are bi-vocational. We are bombarded by the media constantly. So this idea of living in some kind of ecclesiastical cocoon is largely a myth.

• Brian Hawes: There are many ways to get out of the church-as-it’s-always-been mindset. Chad touched on some good ones, but he forgot that there is no need to leave the church in order to establish relationships with unchurched folks. Join your local school’s site committee or school board, serve on the planning commission, go people watch at Wal-Mart and strike up conversations, get involved with a local festival, join the Lion’s Club. There are lots of ways to do it. They don’t require skipping church.

• Pastor Patrinell Wright of Seattle fishes to a rock beat: I organized a three-piece band called “The Goodfoot Band.” We perform in local festivals and some clubs. People are shocked to see me in this role. I love it! Our repertoire consists of gospel, blues, and jazz and many wonderful fish out there follow me back to the church on Sunday mornings because I dared to bring the good news of Jesus Christ to these types of venues.

• And Bob Kaumeyer of Dallas Theological Seminary advises students to jump back in the tank, at least part time: After I graduated from seminary I worked for 6 years as a juvenile probation officer and then went into church ministry full time. [I tell] each graduating student that asks for advice: (1) Ride along in a police squad car at least once every three months so that your sermons will be fresh and based in reality.

(2) Get a life outside of the church, have a hobby that is totally immersed with lost people and their life styles. Motorcycles, flying, dirt bikes, local softball team, ice hockey, woodworking club, anything that is legal and moral, just get into their lives. Don’t just visit and then run a retreat to the church and hide, but really learn about life.

(3) Serve as a volunteer chaplain in the county hospital and work the emergency room on Friday and Saturday nights. This will make or break you when the reality of how people live and die meets your church-encrusted theology.

We have invited Chad to respond to several points you all raised. We’ll hear from him again soon. Thank you for your correspondence. If you would like to read more replies from our readers, including unabridged versions of these e-mails, click here.

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