I don't know what to title this, I just know it's important

Make sure we don't miss the point

To be honest with you, this week is the most creatively drained I’ve been in I don’t know how long. I am developing material regularly enough that writer’s block isn’t really an issue I deal with, but for some reason the writing, podcasting, and video production this week have felt impossible.

More than that, they’ve felt pointless. Every bit of content and teaching I’ve tried to do has felt like a waste of time, and I couldn’t figure out why.

Then it hit me: it’s Fyodor Dostoevsky’s fault.

It’s only been since I finished reading The Brothers Karamazov that I’ve felt so aimless, and I think that’s because the book hit me between the eyes with the author’s intended effect.

To summarize countless hours of impossibly deep character development as briefly as I can, the book focuses on three bothers: Dmitry, the impulsive one; Ivan, the intellectual; and Alyosha, the man of faith. A popular analysis says they were intended as embodiments of body, mind, and soul, respectively, or emotion, rationality, and spirituality.

Dmitry’s impulsiveness and poor decision making render him unserious and easy to see through. It’s the dynamic of Ivan and Alyosha that becomes most intriguing, as Ivan the skeptic questions and cross-examines Alyosha’s faith.

Without spoiling the book too much, it’s no surprise that Ivan’s reason leaves him cold and aimless. He’s able to critique everything that’s wrong but can’t define a positive good. Alyosha, on the other hand, despite not having a perfect intellectual grasp of everything he believes, continues living out his faith. The result is that he genuinely blesses all around him and is widely looked to as a leader and an encourager. In the end, nobody cares that Ivan may have won the arguments.

This is what has been so heavy on my mind since finishing the book—it must be our goal not to become the Christian Ivan Karamazov.

I know my writing reaches a lot of disgruntled Christians. I hear from church leaders who feel their congregations don’t want to do anything. I hear from members who are on fire but feel they can’t get their leaders to do anything. I hear from people who are without a viable church home, either literally or functionally.

The critique implied in the title “Church Reset” is a beacon of sorts to such people, an implicit message that something needs to change. I mean it when I say, I appreciate each one of you and enjoy hearing from you as we commiserate and try to solve these problems.

And, obviously, I fully believe there are things that desperately do need to change. Whether by nature or nurture or some combination thereof, troubleshooting and critical analysis are what my brain is wired to do. I am endlessly frustrated by those who plug their ears in the face of countless closing, declining, or drifting churches and insist everything is going “just great, better than ever, even!” Pretending the problems aren’t there won’t make them go away.

In today’s backsliding culture and church climate, there are plenty of problems to solve.

But it must not be done in the spirit of Ivan Karamazov.

If you and I virtually put our heads together and figure out how to distill the perfect ecclesiology but are out of touch with everyone around us in our neighborhoods and home congregations, what good have we done? Take it from Paul:

“But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith” (1 Timothy 1:5).

Both of Paul’s letters to Timothy are packed with critiques (don’t be timid, set an example, preach the Word, etc.) and troubleshooting (avoid, have nothing to do with, reprove rebuke and exhort, etc.). We can’t do good without fixing what’s bad.

Unfortunately, there are those who believe it’s inherently unloving to try to fix what’s bad and that an undefined, generic “love” solves all problems. These are the people and churches that may burn brightly and look so loving and happy, but usually flame out quickly or give in to doctrinal drift because there are no guardrails to define what love looks like. There must always be a place for specific, nitty-gritty details kind of preaching, teaching, and writing.

But on the other hand, if we are so deep in the weeds of fine-tuning that we aren’t sharing the love of Christ with the people directly in front of us, we need a course correction. It’s like attempting to build the perfect car while forgetting to ever put gas in the tank. As Paul said, the point of all the doctrine and structure and fine-tuning is love.

If this work of “Resetting the Church” is only building resentment, it’s missing the point entirely. To be clear, I’m not asking us to choose between reason and love—I’m saying reason, if it is going to be a positive tool, has to be used in service of love. As Ivan and Alyosha teach us, arguments aren’t won with words but by the fruits that result from those words.

So I share this as a reminder first of all to myself. Who knows, you may have needed to hear it, too. Always keep an eye for what we can do better, but keep it strictly under the aim of blessing the people around us because we love them.

“Little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth.”
- 1 John 3:18

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Notes

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