No customers in church.

4As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, 5you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 1 Peter 2:4-5

When Peter considered the church under pressure he knew there were no customers in church. The followers of Jesus might experience the rejection of people, but they could also expect in the fellowship of the church to experience the delight and value of God. Peter sees God as a master builder, fitting the fellowship of Jesus’ followers into a healing community, “a holy priesthood.” In this kind of community lives are shaped by the Gospel and enlivened by the Holy Spirit to live sacrificially and responsively in all their occupations in the pleasure of Jesus Christ.

Churches come in all kinds of shapes, sizes, and cultures. Churches create their own weather patterns. But here’s the deal, wherever you are as a follower of Jesus it is the Lord’s will that you would be fitted and built into the lives of other followers of Jesus for the mutual benefit of this “house” and its community.

The customer mindset makes church about me. That’s really anti-church. Church is not about what I can take from the “church.” But its easy to settle for spiritual consumption and suck the life out of church as Jesus envisioned us.

Continually we must ask the Lord to renew our vision of what we can be as His church together.