Written by Dawn Rutan
I remember hearing Brennan Manning speak when I was in college, and one of the things he shared was advice that he received from a woman: “Be who you is, ‘cause if you ain’t who you is, then you is who you ain’t.” That’s good advice, but it’s harder to put into practice than we often admit. It’s not just teens who cave in to peer pressure. Nor is it just the world that is trying to fit us into its mold. The church can be just as tough some times.
Last year I started reading Hugh Halter’s book Sacrilege, but I couldn’t finish it. I still remember one illustration he used of a couple that started coming to his church. He said in essence, “They were sitting alone in the sanctuary waiting for ‘church’ to start, not realizing that church was what was happening in the hallway and fellowship hall.” While I agree that fellowship is important, so are worship, prayer, and teaching. However, I also have to point out that fellowship happens in different ways for different people. Not everyone enjoys crowded, noisy rooms. In fact, I’d say that true fellowship is minimal when you have to struggle just to hear one another. Smaller groups are more congenial in many ways.
There is a tendency within the church to pursue a one-size-fits-all approach to programming. Although it varies from church to church, many leaders think, “If this program works for 33% of the people, then all we need is to repeat this three more times.” So when we think about how to get more of the church members actively involved, the discussion goes one of two ways: either do more of the same, or slightly tweak what we’ve got to make it more appealing to a larger number of people.
There is often a lack of understanding of the huge diversity of people in the Body of Christ. I think some part of this is due to the negative attitude that many Christians have toward psychology, and thus they decline to accept the observations that psychologists and sociologists have accumulated about individuals and social interactions. Being an introvert and highly sensitive person, I’ve experienced firsthand how often events are planned for the most social people in the gathering. I’ve been made to feel not only like a minority, but like a “defective” person because I don’t enjoy the same things that others do.
When people come to Christ, they aren’t shoved into a cookie cutter to make them all look, sound, and act alike. Timothy had to be reminded not to let people look down on him because of his youth (1 Timothy 4:10). And when Saul was confronted by Christ and became Paul, he didn’t lose any of the fire or zeal that he’d had when persecuting Christians. When he said in 1 Corinthians 9:22 (ESV) “I have become all things to all people,” he didn’t mean that he abandoned his personality or his unique giftedness, but that he didn’t want anything to stand in the way of the Gospel. It seems like many churches take the opposite approach: if you’re like us you’re welcome, but if not, find somewhere else to go. (I think this is the point Halter was trying to make in his book, but he seemed to go about it by bashing all that the traditional church holds dear.)
There are certainly times when we all have to go out of our comfort zones, try new things, and perhaps find a new interest. (I wonder though whether the majority would be as anxious to try silence and solitude as they are to convince the introverts to be more social.) It’s easy to make excuses not to do things, but God sees through every excuse to the heart beneath.
I would suggest a few things that might help us all:
1) To the social butterflies and extraverts who make up the majority of our church membership and leadership, seek the opinions of the minorities among you. If a particular segment of the body is not involved in the planned activities, ask them why that is. Doing more of the same old thing is not going to suddenly change their minds.
2) To the quieter, less social people among us, remember that no one is going to read your mind and know what you’d like. Make your opinions known when you can. Just be aware that as a minority, sometimes you have to go along with the majority opinion even when you’d rather not.
3) To all of us, make the effort to establish and develop close relationships with individuals. Evangelism and discipleship generally happen one-on-one or in small groups, not in large groups or church socials.
We need the unique contributions of each member.
“God arranged the members in the Body, each one of them, as He chose. If all were a single member, where would the Body be?” (1 Corinthians 12:18-19).
© 2015 Dawn Rutan. The views stated may or may not reflect the beliefs of the pastor or leadership of Dulin’s Grove Church.
