There’s a question a lot of us ask, usually without saying it out loud, when we’re evaluating a church: what am I getting out of this. Was the music good, was the message helpful, did I feel connected. Those aren’t bad questions on their own, but if they’re the primary lens, they turn church into a product you’re consuming rather than a body you belong to. And a consumer posture will eventually walk out the door the moment the product stops satisfying.
The Question We Default To
It’s not surprising that we default to a consumer posture. Almost every other institution in our lives trains us to ask what’s in it for me, and it’s a reasonable question for a gym membership or a streaming service. The trouble is when we import that same posture into a body we’re supposed to be a functioning part of. A hand doesn’t ask what it’s getting out of the arm. It just does what hands do, because it’s attached.
Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.
— Philippians 2:3–4
That’s not a call to ignore your own needs. It’s a call to hold them alongside everyone else’s, instead of treating your own experience as the only metric that counts.
A Different Kind of Membership
A church works differently when enough people show up asking what they can contribute instead of only what they can get. It’s the difference between a room full of consumers waiting to be served and a room full of members serving each other. The first version is fragile, because it depends entirely on the product staying good. The second version is durable, because it doesn’t depend on any one person or program carrying the whole weight.
So next time you catch yourself evaluating a Sunday by what you got out of it, try asking a second question right alongside it: what did I bring. Both questions matter. Only asking one of them is where the trouble starts.
Andrew Washkow 
Leave a comment