Church can be boring.
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It’s truly amazing to me that I am a pastor at a church, considering my journey getting here. I grew up being dragged to church by my single mom whether I wanted to go or not. It was the old saying that every parents barked, “As long as you live under my roof, you will follow my rules!” And one of those rules was church every Sunday. I absolutely hated it and dreaded every single boring minute of it. It seemed to have no point and I could tell that most everybody there felt the same way I did! I honestly don’t remember a single new person ever joining our church. I invited someone to church once, and it didn’t go so well.
As you might imagine, when I got to college, I never went again. Never!
I have to keep this post short so let me just say that even though my life seemed to be fulfilling…college football scholarship, success on the field, a hit with the women (I know, hard to believe!), I was totally and completely empty. Nothing seemed to truly fulfill my inner longing for happiness. We all have that longing, by the way.
It’s a long story, but I discovered that Jesus was the answer to the true joy I was longing for. I just didn’t see it before. Once I surrendered my life to Him, I quickly wanted to discover how he wanted me to leave a mark for Him on this world. And in order to do that, I found out that much of what Jesus is doing on this earth is through the church. The church has a profound and incredible mission. As a kid, I just never saw or heard what that epic mission was.
William Temple said, “The church is the only organization that exists solely for its non-members.” The mission of the church is to reach those that are far from God. To share the love of Jesus with those people who do not believe that He could love someone like them.
Now that’s a mission I can get excited about. So I got on my knees and said, “Jesus I’m all in. I will go and do whatever you want to do.” Little did I know that that prayer would put me in Detroit to launch a church with Steve Andrews and Mark Nelson. A church with an epic mission to reach those outside the church walls.
It’s been the most incredible and exhilarating ride of my life. Seeing people find Jesus week after week for the last 27 years has been the most fulfilling, yet scariest thing I’ve ever been a part of. We never know where God is going to lead us next, but we do know that it will have something to do with following Him as He leads us to the [one] far from Him.
And that’s not boring at all!
-Dave Wilson | Lead Pastor, Kensington Orion
