So who exactly do you think I am?
- Gill Lee
- Nov 7, 2022
- 6 min read
“If you want to do the work of God, pay attention to people. Notice them. Especially the people nobody else notices.”
No one took more interest, was more invested in people - all people - than Jesus. He was utterly inclusive, he engaged with, and listened to everyone; one-to-one with prostitutes, tax swindlers, women on the margins of society, young, old, sick, homeless, he paid attention to everyone, listening to them in ways that revealed his empathy, compassion, unconditional love. He changed hearts and lives because he communicated total acceptance, respect, love, for every individual, in particular those whom society had marginalised.
What has happened to his church?
When I was a new Christian, in my twenties and thirties, I learned very quickly that I was now part of a world that, while it preached grace, very often had difficulty living it. I learned very soon that I was now part of a family that had, for two thousand years accepted misogyny and sexism as part of its DNA - in fact, for many evangelicals it was a theological imperative, influenced by Greek philosophical thought rather than Scripture, to consider women, if not inferior, then, at a stretch equal but very different, and certainly not gifted in the ways in which the male of the species was. Women were excluded from any form of leadership or teaching within Jesus’ ‘wholly inclusive’ community. I came to learn over a number of years and a lot of study that this was largely due to a toxic mix of historical patriarchy, power-play and lazy biblical exegesis whose starting point was self-serving male bias.
Things have improved, in many churches, over the past thirty plus years. I trust there are now not too many churches or Bible colleges where women have my experience, both as a trainee and as a minister, of being bullied, controlled (they tried!), insulted and marginalised simply because of my gender. It saddens me though that in the county where I live there are still many churches who do not allow women to preach or teach or to hold leadership positions. I believe it saddens God even more.
The early church proclaimed the equality of all people, a new humanity where peoples’ identity is defined not by race, social or financial status, gender - or age - but by Jesus Christ.
Many years ago, as a student, I learned about the Church Growth movement and its guiding star, the Homogeneous Unit Principle - snappy title - which taught that churches grow faster when people remain within their social, ethnic, cultural and class distinctions - that people are happier learning with folk with whom they are comfortable, people ‘like them’. I cannot think of anything that more profoundly offends the inclusive gospel of Jesus, and yet it has had a great influence on the church of the past fifty years.
Apart from anything else, it ignores the biblical evidence of the early church, and its growth, which was that the church grew exponentially amongst totally diverse community groups, who lived, loved, learned and grew together as Christ followers in the midst of state sponsored persecution.
All the evidence is that the gospel broke down and cut across all social, ethnic, economic and cultural barriers in ways that were and remain unique in history.
So why? Why are we still insisting on church models that not only marginalise and disempower a significant part of our society and our congregations, but are an impenetrable barrier to a world that needs to know that God loves them?
As a seventy-something, very flawed disciple of Jesus I have now come face to face with the uncomfortable truth that there are churches - I was going to call them fellowships, but there is little or no fellowship with people who marginalise a large proportion of their number - whose culture is ageist, and who neither listen to nor respect either the needs nor the contribution that their more senior members can play in church life.
Before you think it is just me finding another ‘ism to get hot under the collar about - Steve Robinson, CEO of Pramafoundation, an organisation promoting initiatives that give dignity to people in later life, writes this “When we are unintentionally ageist it makes people within our congregations feel less valued. It makes them feel unhappy and it alienates them from what else is going on within the community”. He then goes on to quote an example of a lady who is just seen as a “little old lady” within her church, when in earlier life she was a doctor and a missionary in Africa. He writes “Now having had all that wealth of experience, all that Christian strength and stamina . . the commitment and the calling, all that is put aside because she’s seen as being a little old lady . . it’s just so awful for the church to do. It’s disrespectful to older people; we need to get rid of those silos that we put people in and have communities of all generations”. He goes on to say that the church needs to acknowledge the value and wisdom that older church members have to offer. “As a church we tend to put a retirement age on being a Christian, up until a certain age you’re an active Christian, you’ve got a calling, a ministry, you’ve got something God wants you to do. And then, when you hit the age of 65/70 . . now you’re not valuable . . God never puts a retirement age on Christianity”.
And yet . . . in this country, there are churches, whole denominations and church franchises, that dismiss those over the age of fifty, that ask the question ‘would he/she relate to young people?’ when calling leaders, even if their fellowship consists of many older, faithful, faith filled followers of Jesus, that pushes anyone over the age of fifty out of leadership and encourages them to ‘sit back and be ministered to’. How patronising, how contrary to the inclusivity of a true Jesus community - and how damaging to the Kingdom of God. We pray for the youth work, the worship band, the pub ministry, the toddler club . . . I have never in recent years heard people pray for the many over fifties seated in the congregation - does anyone even ask them if they have needs, if they are lonely, how are they coping with losing a loved one, with failing health, with financial worries - do they have anything from their years of experience of God’s faithfulness they would like to share with the community?
How easily in our ageist blinkers do we forget the biblical precedents! Abraham was 99 when God called him, James, Paul and Peter were preaching and teaching well into their sixties, John was in his late eighties when he had his amazing visions on Patmos.
If we continue to ‘filter’ those whom we deem acceptable or unacceptable, valuable or expendable to our church community, we cease to be the church that Jesus has in mind. When we lose our inclusivity, we lose our identity as Christ followers. There should not be any people groups in society who feel excluded, unseen, judged and marginalised by the church. God have mercy on us.
To end on a positive note - Lewis B. Smedes, Christian pastor, author, ethicist and theologian, whose powerful ministry continued until his last breath, finished his personal, powerful memoir just days before he died, at the age of 81, writing this . .
“This is where I find myself now on the journey that God and I have been on, at the station called hope, the one that comes right after gratitude and somewhere not far from journey's end. It has been "God and I" the whole way. Not so much because he has always been pleasant company. Not because I could always feel his presence when I got up in the morning or when I was afraid to sleep at night. It was because he did not trust me to travel alone. Personally I liked the last miles of the journey better than the first. But, since I could not have the ending without first having the beginning, I thank God for getting me going and bringing me home. And sticking with me all the way.”
― Lewis B. Smedes, My God and I: A Spiritual Memoir
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