One of the challenges facing Christians in North America is that we have to go out of our way to suffer for our beliefs. Our neighbors are more likely to ignore us than persecute us because we follow Jesus. The closest most of us come to shared suffering is when we endure a boring sermon from a long-winded preacher while sitting on the same pew.
Throughout Christian history, and in parts of the world today, shared suffering has given Christ-followers the strength to persevere through physical, social, and financial persecution. One of the reasons many churches struggle to create a sense of community that’s deeper than the pan of brownies at a potluck is that we’re not reaping the benefits of suffering together. This reminds me of little booklet I once heard about called “What the Church Needs is a Good Persecution.” I don’t think it sold very well.
This is not a call to go out looking for trouble. It’ll come our way, in one form or another, in due time. Until then, we can train ourselves to be ready for anything by getting together with other followers of Jesus and voluntarily doing things that make us uncomfortable.
The stories many Christians tell about their best church experiences usually include some kind of adventure in which communitas resulted from attempting something difficult with others. It may have been starting a new church in the inner city, transporting medical supplies on the back of a burro into the jungles of Nicaragua, or smuggling Bibles behind the iron curtain. It wasn’t formed by sitting in a pew on Sunday mornings.
So what we need is a training exercise that will launch us into risky, uncomfortable, uncertain environments. Sounds like a perfect job for door-knocking.
That’s right. I just suggested the long practiced, much despised practice of going door to door and bothering people in the name of Jesus. Not because I think its a particularly good strategy for sharing our faith, but because it’s a great way to strengthen the faith of the one knocking on the door. It has been observed that this is the greatest benefit to Mormon young adults when they go on their year-long door-knocking missions.
As you can imagine, Mormon door-knockers experience a variety of responses while doing their thing. They’re rejected, insulted, ridiculed, and peppered with difficult questions. Repeated exposure to these challenges helps them own their faith and become true-believers. I’ve also noticed they never go alone. In addition to safety, I know at least one other reason why.
Many years ago I was working with a small church in the Pacific Northwest. Our building was in the middle of a neighborhood. We were struggling to reach out to our neighbors. I knew it was my responsibility to lead the effort, but as an introvert I struggled in this area of church leadership. At a time when I was desperate for ideas, I heard Tony Campolo give a talk where he described a new way to do door-knocking.
Instead of going door to door and inviting your neighbor to church or trying to give them some literature, he suggested we ask our neighbors how we can pray for them. That’s it. Ring the doorbell, introduce yourself and say, “I’m going through the neighborhood taking prayer requests and I was wondering if you have anything you’d like me to pray about.” I knew as soon as I heard him describe it that it was something I had to do.
Eventually.
I put it off for several months. There are few things I’d rather do less than knock on a strangers door and strike up a conversation. I blame Jesus for my reticence. He taught us that we should “Do to others as we’d like them to do to us.” Since I hate it when people come knocking on my door trying to sell me something or tell me about their church, I assume the best way to obey Jesus is to abstain from knocking on their door.
No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get Campolo’s idea out of my head. Nor could I shake the notion that this was something God wanted me to do. One Saturday I told myself that if I didn’t go through the neighborhood around our church building asking for prayer requests, I was going to have to resign my position as pastor of the church. If I couldn’t obey the prompting of God and lead the church in an effort to connect with our neighborhood, I didn’t deserve to keep my job.
So I spent a couple hours on a Saturday afternoon going from door to door introducing myself and asking for prayer requests. The response from the neighborhood was mixed. Some slammed the door in my face. Some told me they already had a church home (as if going to church precluded them from sharing a prayer request). A few were fascinated by my approach. I collected a handful of prayer requests. One lady even showed up at our church the next day to worship with us.
It was an amazing experience. I was intentionally putting myself far outside my comfort zone. I was going public with my faith. I was living out my convictions and setting an example for my church. It was probably one of the best spiritual exercises I’ve ever done as follower of Jesus.
And I hated every minute of it.
Even though the results were positive, it was an excruciating experience for my introverted self.
So I never did it again.
Some activities, no matter how beneficial, are too hard to do alone.
Telling Stories, Asking Questions, Learning Lessons