I don’t go to church anymore because someone offended me five years ago. I can’t sit there and pretend nothing happened while she’s right across the aisle. There’s no way I’d ever go back there.
Sound familiar? Have you ever heard an argument like that? Maybe you’ve even said something like that yourself. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard people give that excuse for why they don’t attend church anymore. Oftentimes, it boils down to something rather petty, too—a fight over carpet color, a comment taken the wrong way, someone who was offended for not getting a thank you note… Look, none of these are insurmountable. Sure, they might cause hard feelings at the time, but they cannot be used to justify leaving the church entirely. And I find a strange thing at work here—very often, the people who have been hurt the most, those who have the greatest cause to leave, are the ones who stick with it through their pain. They know something important—it’s not Christ who is failing you—it’s His people.
TruthNotes 