The Simulated Church

Last week, I took residents from our local nursing home to the city for a doctor's appointment. For two days in a row, I spent several hours sitting in a waiting room, watching television, visiting with other patients, and reading magazines. I looked at the magazine ads and found it interesting that if one has the money, they can simulate anything. We can have enamel veneers over our teeth to make them look straighter and whiter. We can get that sun-kissed glow, not by sitting out or working out in the sun, but by paying money to have a special tint sprayed on us. We can purchase plumper lips by allowing a physician to inject botox (from the same root word as botulism) and this same injection can be injected in our frown lines to make us look younger. We can go under the knife and have liposuction and augmentations to give us the figure we never had but always wanted. We have hair plugs implanted so that baldness is no longer an issue, and if we have hair, we can have it colored, frosted, tinted or even have other hair woven in with it, giving us the kind of hair we want. We can buy colored contacts and have acrylic nails put on at a salon. The "fully simulated package" would show a couple with neon white teeth, an orange tan, hair colored to resemble a burbur carpet, plastic looking faces, and Barbie and Ken bodies---and instead of looking real, they would look like cartoons, out of place in the real world.
I began to think about how we, as Christians, seem to be becoming a simulated church. We have big beautiful buildings with stained glass windows and perfectly manicured yards. The upkeep on such a facility often necessitates a reduction in our missions and evangelism budget. We call it community reputation. In an effort to appeal to the world, we begin offering coffee and then donuts then breakfast. We call it Sunday school class. In order to keep our worship from being "boring", we inject much worldliness into our services. We call it praise worship. We offer social activities that include church league volleyball, church golf tournaments, etc. We call it fellowship. Most of our conversations with others is done via internet, email, facebook, blog, my space, etc. We call it evangelism. We come together with the saints, all dressed up, smiles on our faces, appearing to have it all together. We call ourselves the church.
I am afraid we are becoming less and less real. The real church is a group of people, sinners who were lost and are now redeemed by the Blood. The real church has struggles, they don't live perfect lives. The real church gives no thought to whether worship bores them, they realize it is suppose to be pleasing to God. The real church longs to be together, needing each other, making time to spend with each other, and for them, three times a week is not enough. The real church doesn't need food to entice them to Bible class. They are up early and have already eaten breakfast, they are anxious to come to be fed spiritually. The real church looks for real live human beings to talk to about God. They are concerned about the lost, they are encouraged by the saved and inspired by the Word.
I believe we are sincere in our efforts to be pleasing to God. But, sometimes we go so far that we become a simulated church. We become cartoonish in character. The world does not recognize us as the bride of Christ. All of the trappings that have become important to us have masked the radiance, purity and glow of the Bride. Perhaps we could even go so far that even our Groom would not recognize us. We need to refocus our spiritual lives on that which is important. We need to strive to be real, ridding ourselves of all that is fake or phony. We need to shine with the realness that comes from belonging to Christ. Let's be the real church rather than the simulated one. After all it was a real church He died for and it is the real bride He is coming back to get, taking her home with Him for all eternity.

Peace
Neva