Church for People Who Hate Church
Episode 3 transcript
JOHN YODER: [00:00:00] Hi everybody, welcome back. I'm John Yoder, together with Pastor Sam Chacko and Pastor Moses Saldivar, discussing the issue, Church for People Who Hate Church. Our subject for today is that healthy churches embrace cultural diversity and help people form tight knit spiritual communities.
I went to an all-white high school in a little town in Illinois. [00:00:26] And I go to a lot of churches that look just as white as that high school did. I've also worshipped in dozens of immigrant churches where everybody in the room was Vietnamese, or Sudanese, or Anuak, or something else. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with that, but those churches tend to not meet the needs of multicultural people.
[00:00:50] In most of our major metropolitan areas, our high schools have no majority group. Gen Z is the first generation of Americans [00:01:00] where nobody comprises 50 percent or more of the people in the room. And it's not just true of the classroom. It's true of the workplace, social media, the environment, television. They are more likely than previous generations to befriend somebody of another ethnicity to date them, to marry them, to live in their neighborhood.
[00:01:21] And even if they don't believe that a homogenous church or place is wrong, it just may not feel natural or normal to them. Here's what Pastor Moses has to say about why we need multicultural churches.
MOSES SALDIVAR: This is the most intercultural generation, most globalized generation that the world has ever seen. [00:01:45] This isn't just an American phenomenon. This is something that exists globally. And so you've got these kids that are growing up in these spaces, and then they go into a church environment. [00:02:00] And it's still the things that Martin Luther King was talking about in the sixties, where it's still the most segregated space that we see in the country. [00:02:12] It exists on a Sunday morning.
So for them, they're growing up in multicultural intercultural spaces, going to school in these spaces, working in these types of environments, yet they don't see that in their church. And for that, for them, that just reeks of hypocrisy as well. What they see at the end of Revelation, what they see at the beginning of Acts in this very diverse church. [00:02:33] They're not seeing that lived out in their experiences. And so for them, it makes them not want to be a part of that.
I'd say the other part is that they are growing up in multiple worlds at the same time. So not only from their heritage culture and getting influences from that, but also the majority dominant culture that they happen to be in.
[00:02:50] And those things are merging or intersecting to help shape their worldview. And that means that they don't fit neatly in [00:03:00] either one of those spaces, they're not going to fit neatly in a 1st generation church or heritage church, but they're also not going to fit neatly and a majority culture church as well.
[00:03:10] They may spend some time in either one of those, but what you'll find is that they generally will start disengaging. And so you may have some folks that that want to follow Jesus, that are very spiritual in nature, but just don't feel at home. They don't feel like they really belong in either space. And so those are the things that are really creating a lot of those tensions and those gaps that are keeping them, I think, away, predominantly from engaging in the church.
JOHN YODER: So, friends, if all of that is true, what does it take for the church to embrace that kind of diversity? For many of us, we've defined our primary identity as our ethnic group, The language we speak, our citizenship, our political party, our denomination, maybe even our [00:04:00] gender or something else. When we do that, we become exclusionary. [00:04:05] People are insiders or outsiders based on whether they speak Spanish, whether they're American citizens, whether they're part of my denomination, and that creates division.
Unity comes when we believe that the primary identity of every Christian is being a child of God and being a brother or a sister of every other child of God on earth. [00:04:34] Now friends, that is already our current reality. In 1 Corinthians 12:13, Paul says, “By one spirit, you have already been baptized into one body”. God has already made every Christian his child. He has made every Christian a brother or sister of all other Christians. And [00:05:00] our job is to understand that, to make it more important than our ethnicity, our language, our citizenship, our politics, our denominations. [00:05:11] Here's how Pastor Sam describes it.
SAM CHACKO: But together, we can reflect the beauty and diversity of God's kingdom and make a lasting impact on the world. Being part of the global body of Christ means that we are members of a new family that transcends biological and cultural backgrounds. While we may struggle to fit into our parents cultural expectations, while we may struggle to fit into the culture around us, the Bible reassures us that in Christ, We belong to a new, diverse, and global family.
[00:05:48] Paul writes these words in Corinthians. He says, "For we are all baptized by one spirit into one body, whether we are Jews or Greeks, slaves or free, we are all given one spirit to drink".
[00:06:00] And he expounds on this in Ephesians 2, from verses 14 to 22, and I don't have time to read this, but he says, You are no longer foreigners or strangers, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of God's household on the foundations of the apostles and prophets, with Jesus himself being the cornerstone. In him you are put together, growing into the holy temple of the Lord. In him you are also being put together for God's dwelling in the Spirit".
Our identity as children of God is the most important aspect of who we are, and it shapes how we interact with the world around us. [00:06:38] Here's the thing, being part of God's family calls us to a higher standard of unity and love. Paul reminds us in Corinthians that through the Holy Spirit, we are all part of one body. That means our differences, while they are significant, should not divide us. Instead, we should see our differences as ways that we enrich [00:07:00] the body of Christ, allowing us to serve and support one another in unique ways.
[00:07:05] Our diverse experiences, our backgrounds become strengths, not hindrances, and they contribute to the health and the vibrancy of the local church. And living as children of God and siblings in Christ involves actively building relationships within the body of Christ. It means reaching out to others, especially those who feel marginalized or different, welcoming them into the spiritual family.
[00:07:33] It involves showing empathy, offering support, and being willing to learn from one another. This shared identity encourages us to participate in the global mission of the church, the recognizing that we are part of a vast, diverse family working together for God's kingdom.
JOHN YODER: One of the biggest parts of diversity in the American church today is singleness. 46 percent of Americans 18 and older are not married today. Nearly half of us, at any given time, are single. And yet, many churches are designed to emphasize marriage and parenting. That turns a lot of people off, and we need to become the kind of place that embraces married and single together. Here's what Pastor Moses has to say about it.
MOSES SALDIVAR: I think the key is being able to find a place for those that are single to, to where they can serve, where they can contribute, where they can be empowered, where they can be a part of something. I would also say flip side to that is, and what I've also seen in churches that have to, that tend to be, have a lot of families, a lot of young families.
[00:08:48] Sometimes we idolize the family so much to where we also give one image and one picture of how the family can serve together. Or what it should look like.
And what I've also seen where that will manifest in a [00:09:00] negative way is that one of the spouses, generally the wife feels very pigeonholed into what she can and can't do and how she can serve the Lord. [00:09:08] And it isn't just going and having babies for her and for the young lady that shouldn't necessarily be your only aspiration as well.
That's whatever the Lord would have you do in the season that he's having you do it in. And we've got to create spaces that allow them all to be able to, to contribute in a manner that meaningfully uses their giftings.
But I do know our churches struggle with giving space for young people and how they can lead, but we have to create spaces for them. That's the future of our church. And even Paul was single and then so we've got to be mindful of that the Lord can use single Jesus was single So the Lord will do powerful things through single people.
JOHN YODER: We believe that the church must embrace cultural diversity And we also believe that the church must embrace single people as well as married Another [00:10:00] thing that's essential for a healthy church is to help people form close knit spiritual families.
[00:10:07] Now, we all have biological families, people that we are related to. Some of those families are positive, some are neutral, and some are negative. But spiritual families, people in the church, are ones we can choose, and we can always choose positive people who will build us up.
And that is exactly what happened in my life. [00:10:33] The family that I grew up in was not especially healthy. My parents divorced when I was one year old. My dad died when I was nine. I barely knew him. He was a stranger to me. My mom had some mental illness, some anxiety issues. She became a very judgmental person. And there was not a lot of nurture for me growing up.
[00:10:56] But at 13, I came to faith in Christ. I was [00:11:00] baptized. I joined the church. And the church became my spiritual family. Some of them were leaders in the youth group, others were members of that youth group who became my spiritual mentors, who became my spiritual peers. And throughout the years, the church has provided more personal nurture for me than my biological family ever did.
[00:11:24] That is what the church needs to become for everyone, a place where we can all plug in and find spiritual family. Today's young people are longing for relationships. Here's how Pastor Moses describes it.
MOSES SALDIVAR: Probably the generation that struggles the most with depression, anxiety, feelings of loneliness, but yet they're also the most, at least on paper, the most interconnected generation that we've ever observed.
[00:11:51] So they really desire connection. And we could say, okay, but we can provide that in the church. Yes, but what they really want to see is an authentic [00:12:00] form of community. They don't want a to be superficially welcomed.
They want to know that if things get messy, you're going to be there and you're not going to, to disappear on them and that you're willing to walk with them through that messiness.
[00:12:16] So you've got to have something that provides an authentic form of community. You got to have something that not only that doesn't point fingers at their heritage culture, nor at the majority culture, but that celebrates the beauty of both of those things coming together and what God is raising up and creating in the midst of that.
[00:12:38] So they want to be a part of a community that celebrates that diversity as something that is a gift from God. And if they don't see that, if they don't feel that, it's going to be very hard to get them to engage. Gen Z, Gen Alpha really desire community.
Authentic community struggles with anxiety and depression. And a lot [00:13:00] of that is resolved through having real authentic community. I think the reason why we're seeing that at unprecedented rates is because they don't have it. If you look at our churches today, what's probably the thing that we struggle with the most.
And I would say, and we, I think we really saw this happen during COVID the churches that thrived generally were the ones that continue to be actively the church. [00:13:22] That we're living out in true community and we're pursuing others. And that is what the next generation wants. And that is what we need.
So for those that are next gen, what I hope you hear is we need you. And we may not realize even in some cases that we need you. So help us. And we have a lot to learn from you.
[00:13:46] And likewise, our faith was built on the backs of generations, and there's a lot of wisdom there. That doesn't mean we disregard everything from the last 2000 years and previous since the beginning of [00:14:00] creation. So know, next gen, that there is a lot that you can learn from us as well. But in a spirit of doing this in a spirit of mutuality where we can learn from one another.
JOHN YODER: Some of you will say, “John that is spot on.That is exactly what I need. [00:14:17] I don't need another sermon I don't need another lecture. I don't need more guilt about the things that I'm not doing right. I just want to be in a place where we can dialogue and discuss about these issues”. And you might be asking, “Where are those churches? Where is there a place where I can actually sit down with others and tell my story and know and be known?”
[00:14:45] Next time, in our final episode, we're going to talk about how you can find a healthy church like this in your community, and if you can't find one, what you can do about it.
