The method is the message/Going to church to learn about God heresy

On Sunday we visited an institutional/traditional church for the first time in some time. I've been led by God to think in terms of making an impact, so trying a little "this Lord" asking in prayer and action, and seeing how God responds to see where.

My son decided to go off to Sunday School, bored with the main service (funny how it's called a "service" when no service happens). And he got even more bored.

I'm sure the teacher was well-intentioned, but she had the chairs lined up like a classroom, all facing forward to her. Since it was this church's first service in a new location, with them moving from two services to one in the larger facility, she introduced them all to each other and welcomed visitors (Sit down, shut up, I'll do the talking). And there was only 7 kids! Seven kids and the class is lined up in rows. She proceeded with a lesson, and my understanding is all the kids were obviously bored out of their gourds. The method was teaching these kids that church is a boring place of learning. My son said later that the whole experience was more boring than the most boring time he's had at school!

Somewhere along the line, this attitude that "church is where we go to learn about God" crept in. A totally unbiblical concept. For one, church is a community, not a location or event. We do not go to it, we are it. Second, church is not for learning about God -- the Great Commission was issued to disciples, and it is disciples who teach others. Church is for community, for encouraging one another to love and good deeds. Church is not a place to distribute knowledge. Early church history shows us that sermons weren't "popular" until the late 3rd century, and barely known beyond an out of town apostle visiting or a need to address a special issue until the late second century. For centuries, people were taught about God then joined into the community, not the other way around.

I'm convinced that the reason so many people are flooding out the back door of churches, that there is so much church hopping, that as Reggie McNeal says "[people] are not leaving the church because they have lost their faith. They are leaving to preserve their faith" is in fact this heresy that the church is a place you go to learn about God. The teaching always ends up at the same level at a given church - to the new believer, or an intermediate one. Once someone has heard what one church teaches or emphasizes, after some time you've got to move on to grow. Thus the church hopping. The believer who has been caught up in the knowledge myth then eventually finds no place to go, unless they rise to a place of power and finds a way to fire a preacher in order to hire a new one. It's been there, learned there, bought the T-shirt.