Church: Travis Doesn't Feel God

I grew up in the church and my family always liked one thing, a good message and good music. But over the years, the church I love started to change. The music turned into concerts and the band members became celebrities. We would call it worship music, but what it had become was not. It became more about bigger and better, lasers, balloons, and confetti. It was almost too much. I thought I would be more connected to God, but in the midst of it all, I kind of just lost my way. I don't know. If that's where the church for me just, I don't know. I'm just over it. (gentle music) I have a secret. All my life I've had questions about my faith about God, about religion. But now I'm gonna tell you my questions, my struggles, my doubts. I hope you can handle the truth. (upbeat hiphop music) Okay, so in the Bible, Christianity is not just a personal thing, but it's about having a community and making disciples. That's what the Bible says the church is. But I feel like the church today has kind of, over the years, lost what it's supposed to be all about. When I was growing up, I loved going to church. It was where my community was at. If a friend came over Saturday night and spent the night, we were going to church, and they were coming with us. It honestly never felt like a chore. My faith was never a checklist. Until one day, some kid rolled up in our youth group and kept talking over me. And I tried explaining that to him, but it seemed like my perspective didn't really matter. That really hurt. I mean, just getting ignored like that? It made me not want to go back to church. (dramatic music) None of us gets to choose our families and they're all different. Some are fun and healthy and there are also some family members we know we never would've chosen. God compares the church to family a lot. The church can be full of health or sickness, members we love and members that get on our very last nerve. We definitely see this in the Bible. Moses was a man who literally killed a guy trying to save his people and lived on the run for decades. The Israelites, after seeing the amazing rescue God provided from Pharaoh, later accused God of bringing them out into the wilderness to murder them. David was full on in love with God, but he still made mistake after mistake after mistake. Peter rejected Jesus at his greatest moment of need. And later, Paul had to criticize him for his racist actions against non-Jewish people, which is all to say, church people are still just people, but we are called to be a family. And I'd rather go to church with messed up people who love God, than go to church with religious people who don't love messed up people. (upbeat hiphop music) For some people, going to church every weekend is fulfilling. And with all the craziness, it does give some people peace of mind and a safe space. Whereas for me, I don't hate church, but I don't feel it either. I don't feel connected with God and I don't know. It just it doesn't fill me up. (tranquil music) Like other cultures before us, we've been taught to chase certain feelings, whatever makes us feel authentic or feel worshipful or just plain feel good. Our world tells us this life is all about us and what we get out of it. And it seeps into how we feel about church. If the vibe isn't right for us, if we don't feel like we're getting the right things there or whatever, we feel a right or even an obligation to bail. But the primary purpose of church is not to get a warm, fuzzy feeling about Jesus. It's not to earn points with God. The church exists to display God's glory. And part of that happens when redeemed sinners gather together. Even Adam, before sin entered the world, when it was just him and God, untainted, was not complete. God said to Himself, "It is not good for Adam to be alone." He said this even though Adam had God Himself because that's how much we are designed to be with other humans. Because the church is a diverse group of sinners, its unity is a miracle. But it's not just a miracle, it's a witness. According to Jesus, the oneness of Christians has the power to display the oneness that exists between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The power to tell a true story about who God is. God's desire for us is to experience unity with each other in love and bonds of peace because of Christ's work. Any source of division that we let fester in the church is like a crack that creeps along the walls of a building. That structure may be tall and impressive, but if it does not have integrity, it will fall. Any sin in the church that goes unchecked is not only a threat to the wellbeing of sons and daughters who Jesus died to save, but a threat to the good story God wants to tell through the church. As we work toward making the church a place of true gospel unity where everyone feels welcome, we would display the glorious unity and diversity of God Himself. I think that the church when it's working right should be like music. When I play my keys, I play my own unique part. But if I'm playing with the band, there's this collective sound of individuals playing together. In music, your sound is your own. But if you're playing with a band and you start playing louder than everyone else, it's not gonna sound good because you need other people. You need to work in a balance. Church is messy, family's messy, life is messy. But we're not meant to move through life alone. We're meant to move through it with other people so we can grow, build, and experience faith together. That's one way the world can see Jesus through the love that true Christian show for each other. (dramatic music)