Light of the Church?

I have been away from home for a while now and have been finding myself in unfamiliar terrains. This, I do not have a problem with. What poses itself as a problem when I find myself in a situation like this is answering the question ‘what church will I attend this Sunday?’
In times past, when I found myself in situations like this, I would just forget about the whole church thing completely till I get back to my familiar terrain because choosing a church to attend has never been interesting to me. But lately, since I have mostly been away from my familiar terrain, I have always been faced with this daunting task because I do not want to be labelled ‘sinner’ by shallow minded people.
Well, today, I settled for a certain church. From the time I laid my feet in the church till when I stepped out, I had to restrain myself from expressing the speechlessness that I felt. Firstly, the church is smaller than my living room, four rows, six columns, like ten extra seats and the pastors’ and choirs’ seats. The choir in my home church is actually more than two times bigger than the whole congregation. Secondly, the church service lasted for over 3 hours but the sermon took about only 15 minutes. You will be asking yourself now that what were we doing the whole time, right? Well, I asked myself the same thing. By the time the service was over, I was hungry, tired and ready to bail but it seemed like 3 hours was not enough for them because after they service, they began FAF (fellowship after fellowship) and series of departmental meetings were still scheduled for the day.
Anyway, I am not writing to criticize this church, they are just doing their own thing and maybe that is the order the in which the Holy Spirit moves in their church. My point here is that with so many churches springing up left, right and centre in Nigeria, on every street, in every corner, even in our living rooms (just like the church I attended), it is such an irony that it remains one of the most corrupt countries. Majority of Nigerian citizens are Christians that go to church every Sunday and we are the same ones degrading this country, even our dirty ‘chop money’ politicians go to church every Sunday.
Further speaking, what is the role of the church or Christian in the world? Are we called to be the light of the church or the light of the world? There is at least one church or more on every minor street and at least 5 churches or more on the major ones. This is a good thing because it makes the gospel spread because no one will say he/she did not hear the good news when judgement calls.
On the other hand, why would almost everyone rush to their place of worship on Sunday morning and then we do not even wait till Monday before we resume our corrupt practices, we start immediately we leave the church. I think it will be better if we just sat at home and label ourselves atheists.
I personally think it is time for the church and Christians in general to rise up, stop shining the light on Sunday mornings only and forming unnecessary caucuses and cliques in the church. Let us start shining our light in the world and be the light we have been called to be. Some people and churches have already started, let us follow suit.

1 comment

  1. babe nice one!
    Frankly i av bn avin d same issues wt ds churchy thingy... d only i eve feel comfortable in is covenant nd ds bcos Pst Poju is a straight arrow..I'm just tired of all d serenren cant we just worship God, hear d word and bail? I think we as Nigerians r just too bloody reigious!
    Anyways like I told a certain friend of mine
    we g no points for being in church every sunday ltes genuinely affect society!
    Lets become the change we yearn to c!

    ReplyDelete

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