In your household, you probably have a few pretty large expenses every month. Rent or mortgage, utilities, maybe a car payment. Like most of us, those bills take up a lot of our income. Churches aren't much different. At one church, we called those the "fixed costs" and they had to be paid before we could use the funds for anything else. The payment for the building, the utility bill, vehicles, maintenance, the list is pretty standard. My challenge today is, should we be putting most of our money into overhead? Should the church have so many bills?
Let's back up to the New Testament. First off, I want to put this out there now. The tithe existed for the Jewish people to pay for the temple and the priests. The tithe is not a New Testament requirement on the non-Jewish people. Are we commanded to give? Yes. How much? Paul said whatever we can give, above and beyond our ability in some cases. Having the tithe, or the 10% is easy, cause it's a set number and people can just cut a check. Provides accountability, but it pays for stuff in the Old Testament that we don't have today, or at least aren't suppose to have. The tithe is an Old Testament law to support the Old Testament structure. What is the New Testament structure?
Let's be honest, the early church didn't have a dedicated church building. They couldn't, they were being persecuted. The Jews had the Temple and the synagogues. The pagans had the pagan temples, the Christians, they met in homes, in caves, in other places. They just met wherever they met because they had no "church service". They didn't decide they were going to meet every week at 11:00 am to have a service. They did worship together on Sunday, but it was more like Sunday dinner than a worship service. They all came over on Sunday, fellowshipped, worshipped, talked, and ate. It was pretty simple. The guy who leads the group was the "elder" or "pastor" and all these little groups cooperated together. It was understood that "the church" was all the Christians in that town that met in various places. Not too different than today.
When it came to time to give, the early church gave with the understanding of where the money went. First, to support those who were poor, in danger, or in need. They gave early on to support the church in Jerusalem, which was experiencing persecution. Makes it hard to work when you are running for your life. They gave money to support others. Second, they gave to support the Apostles, Elders, and Pastors. That's it. They gave their money to support, help, and care for others. All of their money went to this end. All of the money the church gave went to people who needed help, to spread the Gospel, to plant new churches and to give aid to the sick and poor.
I'm not going to say that buildings are bad, they are a tool. I have worked in several church buildings, and they are nice. It's nice to have an office, it's nice to have a kitchen and classrooms and a dedicated space for worship. It's nice to have those things, it makes it easier. Setting up chairs is awful, being transient is awful. It's nice to have a building. At one point in the history of the American church, it also made sense to have a building. Does it still make sense to pour most of the giving into stuff in the day and age we live in? Does having a dedicated church building do the most good for the ministry?
Here is reality. That church building, those chairs and the AC. You can say it's for the community, but it's not. It's for you, the church members. It's to have a nice place to sit, a place to listen to your Christian Concert and drink your coffee. We like having a nice building that is heated and air-conditioned. Sure, visitors can come in, and new people, but if another new person never visited your church, would you tear it down? Nope, not as long as you were still attending. Still don't believe me? Ask yourself why there are so many fights about the way the church looks. Why do we fight over carpet color, paint color, and decorations? If the building doesn't matter, why do people get so upset when things change? You think the lost people or the new people are concerned with the picture your grandmother donated 50 years ago? All those things are for us, the church members.
Here is my suggestion. Sell all that stuff and meet at a High School gym. Here is an even better idea, work together with a Christian business that is closed on Sunday morning and has a church there. Know what my dream is? Multiple services every week in Chick-Fil-As all over this country. At one point I had discussed with a friend starting a pizza restaurant that had a large dining area that on Sunday would donate the space to a church that we would plant there. The restaurant would be self-sustaining, it would pay for itself and the church would have very little overhead. Can you imagine churches in car dealerships, restaurants, office conference rooms, schools, theaters, and all kinds of places that cost just a fraction of what a church building does?
What would the church do with all that extra money? Maybe we could help all the people, instead of waiting on Congress. Maybe the church could send people to the border with supplies to help those in centers, instead of complaining on social media. Maybe we could help the homeless Vets, we could support those babies who were not aborted. We could spend the money being the salt and light of Jesus and make a huge difference. We wouldn't need to wait on government social policy, we could do it. We can make a huge difference if we can decide not to spend the money on air-conditioned buildings with comfortable chairs, good coffee, and a state of the art sound system so we can enjoy ourselves. We would become the church instead of Christian consumers, and I think we may even see some revival.
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