Bob Hoeller [USA]
I want more!
[12.07]

Remember the scene from Oliver Twist where Oliver discovers after a tepid meal of porridge that he is still hungry?

I can still see him walking with that empty bowl to the headmaster of the orphanage, all the boys looking at him and waiting to see what will happen as he goes forward, empty bowl in hand. When he stands next to the headmaster he looks so small. He holds the bowl up and says: "Please sir, can I have some more?" The man cannot even comprehend that this little boy (Urchin as he is called) would even ask for more, says "What?" Oliver repeats: "Please sir, can I have some more?" All of a sudden it hits the man, MORE?  YOU WANT MORE?"

This scene is played out every week in our mainline churches in America. Young people are coming up to their parents, grandparents, elders, and pastors in the church and saying "I want more!" Sometimes the older generation doesn't hear them when they say it. Sometimes they cannot comprehend that they would want something other than the comfortable church they built for themselves. Sometimes they do hear them and like that headmaster in the orphanage, quickly remind them of all the sacrifices our ancestors made so that they could have this wonderful church (just the way it is). The answers might be different, but the outcome is the same. All of a sudden they look around and their children are no longer sitting in the pews. This is when they come to me, a younger pastor and ask me to help them get their kids back in church. What I have to say, they do not want to hear. They must change in order to reach them.

The Church is an organism that lives and breathes, too often we think of it as bricks and mortar. This living and breathing organism is moving forward constantly. Too many believers stop beside the road, where they are comfortable, to relish in what they have become, or to rest, or whatever.. and they find that the Church has passed them by. Many of them have beautiful campuses, beautiful houses of worship and sanctuaries and they are empty, simply because they allowed the Church to go on without them.

We need to get back to the simple concept of community. We need to get back to the basics of fellowship and engaging each other in a personal way. We need to stop building houses of worship that have us all sitting looking forward at the back of each others heads and begin to look each other in the eye and have conversation. We need to stop going to church, and start being the Church.

Every day I walk into church, I am like Oliver… I want more!