Your Church Might Be A Country Club If… (Part 2)

By amazon Thursday, February 6, 2020 Comment Edit

Viewing the church or behaving as if the church is a country club distorts both the identity and the mission of the church.

In my previous post, I began outlining four identifiers that your church might be more like a country club than a church. Once again, I’m not knocking country club memberships. If you are a member of one, I give you permission to sing along with Travis Tritt—loud and proud—“I’m a member of a country club….”

But I fear that many believers view the church as a country club. Or at the very least, they practically behave as if the church was indeed a country club. Regardless, viewing the church or behaving as if the church is a country club distorts both the identity and the mission of the church.

Knowing the characteristics of a country club can help protect the church from becoming or being viewed as such.

Here are the remaining four identifiers that your church might be more of a country club that members pay for rather than the church that Jesus died for.

Fifth, your church might be a country club if your members worry about public disruption.

One of the benefits of being a member of a country club is that you don’t typically have to worry about the public infringing upon your property. In other words, the members of the club can enjoy the exclusivity of the club’s amenities.

They don’t have to vie for tee times, tables in the dining room, the pool, or the tennis courts. In short, they can enjoy their club with minimal crowd or public disruption.

Many churches, and church members, don’t like crowds—they don’t like newer people coming in and disrupting the way things are. They want their same parking spot for both their car and their rear. In addition, church members may fear that more newer people means more newer things.

In other words, if the public ...