Welcome

At at the beginning of August we had to leave the country for our first visa run.  So we did a little sight-seeing, got our visas stamped, taught English for two weeks to a pretty amazing group of people, and experienced a little more of the SE Asia culture.  While we were away we also found a church to attend, because that’s what we do on Sundays.  Anyway, I wanted to share something that the church we attended for two weeks does that is really different from any church we’ve ever been to.  In fact, it’s so different that it had us raising our eyebrows at each other during the service and all thinking, “This would NEVER happen in the States.”

Now that I have your attention and your curiosity is properly piqued, here goes…

They welcomed unbelievers in the service.

“That’s it?”  you say. “We all welcome unbelievers, we want them in our churches!  That’s the point of ‘invite a friend to church Sunday’!  What’s so shocking about that?”  Let me go back to my original statement:  They welcomed unbelievers in the service.   By in the service, I mean as a part of the worship service, out loud, from the platform.

I’m sure many of you who are reading this have been to a church (usually a smaller one) where they ask visitors to stand, sometimes introduce themselves or ask a regular attender to introduce visiting friends and family.  Well, this church, which is not small by the way, does that.  First they ask if there are any foreign visitors (they actually have seating just for foreigners so they can help with translation and such) asking them to stand and then they ask other visitors to stand and be recognized.  No big deal, right?  But they go on to ask, “Are there any non-Christians visiting us today?”  At this point any non-Christians stand up and are welcomed.  Crazy right?

OR maybe not…

I’m told that they also make a point of connecting with these particular visitors after the service to answer questions they may have and to share the gospel with them if they are open to it.   The practice of pointing out non-Christians struck us as odd because we would never in a million years want to put someone on the spot, or point them out as being different from the majority of people there.  We would never want to make visitors uncomfortable.

And yet….

I think we’ve done it anyway.  By ignoring the fact that there are hundreds of thousands of people who either have no idea what we believe in, don’t know much about Christianity (other than what they see in the media), or completely disagree with what they think we stand for, we have made them very uncomfortable in our gatherings.  By pretending that all the people sitting in the pews or chairs think and believe the same things and live by basically the same values, by failing to acknowledge very different life experiences, different opinions and different beliefs, we have made our “visitors” (when we have them) feel unwelcome and out of place.

In a Buddhist majority country, it really does make sense to acknowledge that there will be people who walk through the door, people who are curious about Christianity, most of the people who are invited to come are not Christians because most of the people in the country are not Christians.   It makes sense to let them know that we are glad they have come and that they are welcome.

In an increasingly secular society full of people who either don’t understand Christianity, have heard vastly conflicing messages concerning Christians and what they do and believe or people who just aren’t sure there really is a God, doesn’t it make sense to acknowledge them?  To validate their reasons for attending? To make room for doubters, scoffers, skeptics, and the curious? Shouldn’t most of the people invited to come to church with us be non-believers (or as I heard one pastor say “pre-believers”)?

And if so, it makes sense to say, “We are glad you are here.  You are in the right place.  Come on in and take a look around, check us out.  Let us tell you what this Jesus life is all about.  We see you and you are welcome.”

I was glad when they said unto me, “Let us go into the house of the LORD.”   –Psalm 122:1