Affiliated. Attending. Listening. Leaving. All these words describe someone we all know. You know the guy that we see every single Sunday morning. We shake his hand when the worship leader tells everyone to fellowship and welcome each other but we really don't know him.
You know the guy that I am talking about. "The Pew Sitter." He sits in a spot that isn't too far from an exit but as far away from the pastor as he can get. Pew Sitter takes in the surroundings but only gets the message from the screen rather than from the passion the pastor has about what he is bringing to the church. He is in attendance but he isn't really present. He can leave during the service and most of the folks around him will never know he left. He can fall asleep, doodle, google, text, Facebook, or tweet with out fear from where he sits. This guy goes to church to keep the peace at home with his wife and so his kids get something "positive" from the youth pastor. He goes to church not because of any spiritual need but because it appears like the right thing to do. When he looks around he sees nothing masculine about the place he is. It all appears to be generic and quite possibly feminine to him.
This guy is an affiliated attender but he is both emotionally and relationally distant in the vision for his church. The church he attends has his presence but it has none of his untapped power or potential. He gives his best ideas to the company he works for and his energy is spent throughout the week at work, on the ball field with his kids, and any other activity that he "cares" about. He cheers harder for Alabama or Auburn on Saturday during football season than he worships God on Sunday or any other day of the week. He is present in the local community and culture but not in church. He probably has some serious game in the workplace but no one has ever told him that he could use those skills for God. From his perspective, there has never been any real intentional effort to meet or recruit this man for anything in the church. Imagine a school playground in the fourth grade when they were picking for dodge-ball: this guy was chosen last... a lot.
There are men like this in every single church in America. They are like an iceberg. We see only part of them on Sunday mornings. Below the surface of their life, a whole series of issues simmer around the surface of his life. He has issues, insecurities, and emotions that make up the substance of who he is and help create the distance that he has created between himself and the church and God. These below the surface issues are exerting a great emotional toll on his life and putting pressure on every other relationship he has. He is losing sleep, losing his cool, his moral compass, and ultimately he is losing his confidence. He feels like he has no place to process any of these feelings in his life especially ones that will make him feel weaker than he already is. Basically, this guy is stuck in the mud. He is a starving man that doesn't know how to get fed.
The guy I am talking about is like a nuclear warhead that, if ever armed and equipped, would change the face of the church and his community. If we, the men of God, can find a way to reach the man out there like him the world will change. It doesn't matter what you call this guy it just matters that he is called. If we want to see the church reach everyone that it can. we have to activate every single man that sits in our churches, idle, every single week. They believe that they can show up for an hour and fifteen minutes every Sunday morning and that is the end of their "contribution."
I can't forget what Jesus said in Matthew 6:21-23 (ESV), “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. "The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” What I took from this passage is the investments we make and how that brings out our energies and passions. When I look at the word "healthy" in the original Greek, I find that the word here means "generous." When I look at the word "unhealthy" in the Greek, I found that the word actually meant "stingy." My prayer is that I am not found stingy with what God has given to me.
We have to see "treasure" in the men that are sitting in our churches week in and week out. We have to come alongside them and invest in them. It shows a generous and healthy outlook towards the man we are trying to reach. Our generosity towards helping men grow in the faith and truly become involved in God's work. But the opposite is also true. If we don't reach out to these men or the other men in our communities, then we will be looked upon as being stingy and unhealthy in the eyes of the lost. They will see us as just another example of hypocritical Christianity, where religiousness overrules righteousness and the people suffer and the church dies. Ultimately the enemy wins. It is bad for the man. It is bad for the church. It is bad for the world. The only one it is good for is the devil.
Men, these guy's are waiting on us to walk down that aisle (had to throw in my Ric Flair reference), pick up the phone, send the email, and connect with them. It is through the eyes of God that we have to see these men. We have to minister to them the way God would direct us. The real question we have to ask ourselves is: Will we see him the way God does? Will we see the value he has to offer? Will we "walk down the aisle" and connect to him?
You know the guy that I am talking about. "The Pew Sitter." He sits in a spot that isn't too far from an exit but as far away from the pastor as he can get. Pew Sitter takes in the surroundings but only gets the message from the screen rather than from the passion the pastor has about what he is bringing to the church. He is in attendance but he isn't really present. He can leave during the service and most of the folks around him will never know he left. He can fall asleep, doodle, google, text, Facebook, or tweet with out fear from where he sits. This guy goes to church to keep the peace at home with his wife and so his kids get something "positive" from the youth pastor. He goes to church not because of any spiritual need but because it appears like the right thing to do. When he looks around he sees nothing masculine about the place he is. It all appears to be generic and quite possibly feminine to him.
This guy is an affiliated attender but he is both emotionally and relationally distant in the vision for his church. The church he attends has his presence but it has none of his untapped power or potential. He gives his best ideas to the company he works for and his energy is spent throughout the week at work, on the ball field with his kids, and any other activity that he "cares" about. He cheers harder for Alabama or Auburn on Saturday during football season than he worships God on Sunday or any other day of the week. He is present in the local community and culture but not in church. He probably has some serious game in the workplace but no one has ever told him that he could use those skills for God. From his perspective, there has never been any real intentional effort to meet or recruit this man for anything in the church. Imagine a school playground in the fourth grade when they were picking for dodge-ball: this guy was chosen last... a lot.
There are men like this in every single church in America. They are like an iceberg. We see only part of them on Sunday mornings. Below the surface of their life, a whole series of issues simmer around the surface of his life. He has issues, insecurities, and emotions that make up the substance of who he is and help create the distance that he has created between himself and the church and God. These below the surface issues are exerting a great emotional toll on his life and putting pressure on every other relationship he has. He is losing sleep, losing his cool, his moral compass, and ultimately he is losing his confidence. He feels like he has no place to process any of these feelings in his life especially ones that will make him feel weaker than he already is. Basically, this guy is stuck in the mud. He is a starving man that doesn't know how to get fed.
The guy I am talking about is like a nuclear warhead that, if ever armed and equipped, would change the face of the church and his community. If we, the men of God, can find a way to reach the man out there like him the world will change. It doesn't matter what you call this guy it just matters that he is called. If we want to see the church reach everyone that it can. we have to activate every single man that sits in our churches, idle, every single week. They believe that they can show up for an hour and fifteen minutes every Sunday morning and that is the end of their "contribution."
I can't forget what Jesus said in Matthew 6:21-23 (ESV), “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. "The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” What I took from this passage is the investments we make and how that brings out our energies and passions. When I look at the word "healthy" in the original Greek, I find that the word here means "generous." When I look at the word "unhealthy" in the Greek, I found that the word actually meant "stingy." My prayer is that I am not found stingy with what God has given to me.
We have to see "treasure" in the men that are sitting in our churches week in and week out. We have to come alongside them and invest in them. It shows a generous and healthy outlook towards the man we are trying to reach. Our generosity towards helping men grow in the faith and truly become involved in God's work. But the opposite is also true. If we don't reach out to these men or the other men in our communities, then we will be looked upon as being stingy and unhealthy in the eyes of the lost. They will see us as just another example of hypocritical Christianity, where religiousness overrules righteousness and the people suffer and the church dies. Ultimately the enemy wins. It is bad for the man. It is bad for the church. It is bad for the world. The only one it is good for is the devil.
Men, these guy's are waiting on us to walk down that aisle (had to throw in my Ric Flair reference), pick up the phone, send the email, and connect with them. It is through the eyes of God that we have to see these men. We have to minister to them the way God would direct us. The real question we have to ask ourselves is: Will we see him the way God does? Will we see the value he has to offer? Will we "walk down the aisle" and connect to him?
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