The Church was never meant to be just a building. It was meant to be a family. "And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works: Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together..." — Hebrews 10:24-25 There is a question that has been weighing heavily on my heart: Have we become so busy being the Church that we have forgotten how to love the Church? We live in a world where everyone is overwhelmed. Everyone carries something. Everyone has battles that most people will never see. Yet many people walk through life carrying their burdens alone. Not because there is no one around them... But because no one stopped long enough to notice. The Church Is Not Steeples and Walls Somewhere along the way, we have forgotten what the Church truly is. The Church was never meant to be defined by buildings, stained glass, programs, or a beautiful sanctuary. A building can hold people. But only love can hold a broken heart. "Now ye are the body of ...
"For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." — Ephesians 2:10 From the moment we enter this world, people begin trying to define us. They measure us. They compare us. They assign expectations to us. Without realizing it, they build invisible boxes and tell us where we belong, how we should think, how we should act, and what "normal" should look like. But what happens when God creates someone who doesn't fit inside that box? What happens when a person thinks differently, learns differently, or sees the world through a perspective others don't understand? Too often, what is unfamiliar is mistaken for what is wrong. Yet throughout Scripture, God repeatedly chose people who did not fit the world's expectations. Shepherds became kings. Fishermen became apostles. A persecutor became a preacher. God's work has never depended on human definitions of normal. When the World...