Consumer Church vs. Community Church
There are two competing models of church in our world. One is biblical, the other American. I first realized this truth when I was 19 years old. I was in college, attending a vibrant and messy church that had only been planted a few years before. It was a deeply theological church, but also deeply relational and honest. It loved Jesus and the gospel and broken people. The first Sunday I visited, I watched the way people embraced and laughed and cried together and I knew it was the place I would call home. It has shaped my vision for ministry to this day. My realization came one Sunday when I found myself sitting next to a fellow college student whose parents were in town to check up on her. I knew from a few brief conversations that they were devout believers, albiet the sort of devout believers who had somehow raised a daughter who hadn't heard the good news of God's gracious salvation until she went away to college. I also knew they went to a big, famous church in a big city
