Growing up, the Christianity I saw wasn’t something that excited me. Once I became a Christian, I still thought there had to be more.
I don’t think I was wrong.
This month, I finished the book Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne. It talked about what being Christian and the church looks like. It woke me up, and it made me think. All the time, I talk to people from one denomination or another, and all the time, I hear people tear apart denominations that are too Conservative or too Liberal.
That’s not the church I know. And if it were, we’d have a problem because everything from Catholics and Pentecostals are on my squad. The church I know is a community of believers. They are people who live by the Gospel and are ready to grow. It is the five girls I live with every month, the locals I befriend, the house I lived in last year.
It’s not a building or denomination.
Whenever I start to process a new idea, I usually write abstractly as I collect my thoughts. This poem I began after my first church service in Zambia. As I was telling someone back home about my experience, they interjected saying “they must be part of a more charismatic organization.”*
It frustrated me, and so I started writing this poem to process. I’m not saying I’m write or wrong, I’m just sharing a thought that’s been in my head. And, I’m hoping it provokes a little bit of thought. 
ECCLESIA
A paradoxical orthodoxy of religion—
trip in a puddle; falling face first
in the mud, we laugh and point a finger…
Collectively we are a two who gather.
It can be more, but never less.
We are a body; Christ is the head.
I am the toe, my brother an eye, and you an arm.
I’m a person. You’re a person.
Together we are called to the assembly,
but somewhere along the lines of searching,
Google told me that you’re a building.
In the Spirit, we become new.
Slaves freed from bondage
not confined to the walls of a church.
Universally we’re related.
Locally we grow.
We encourage, and we teach
knowledge and grace.
We are the church.
A body of believers,
Relationship builders
Called to follow the Gospel—
not religion.
*The story I was telling was about the worship service. There was tons of dancing and singing, and at some point, the pastor took out a whistle and started blowing into it while he danced with joy and energy around with the rest of the congregation.
