If they like us, they will come. . .

Before anything else I must admit that I grew up in a nice community in which niceness was cultivated.  It was a small town in which everyone was your neighbor, the polite thing to do was the right thing to do, the right thing to do was the polite thing, and we found a way to get along.  Now those theses were tested from time to time by folks who did not play nice in the sandbox and by the political and religious tenets around which we were gathered, but it was a nice place to grow up and is still a pretty decent small town.

The problem is that some have decided that niceness is the key to growing a church.  We just need to be nicer and folks will throng to our doors and fill our empty pews.  Aren't we nice already?  Apparently not.  We need to be nicer and niceness means not judging, being willing to surrender doctrine for success, and fitting in to the world around us.  We should not talk about the things that might divide us and concentrate on talking about the things that unite us.  If they like us, they will come.  Right?

We are in the midst of turmoil not simply because we do not cultivate niceness (and we don't) but because there are fewer and fewer things that unite us.  We were once on the same page with the bulk of our values even though we were still fairly diverse.  Now we cannot agree on what is right or wrong or even what a woman is or is not (or man) -- so how can we agree on other things if we cannot even find basic things in common?  That is the fallacy in the idea that the Church must become more like the world in order to succeed.  Which world?

We are more divided than ever before on the basic meaning of life and the important things that support this life.  We have become more thin skinned than ever before and take offense where none was meant simply because we can.  We actually enjoy being victims because it gives us cover to respond in kind.  If this is true within the social and political realms of our lives, it is also true within the religious spheres of our lives.  Besides this, we insist that no one can tell us we are wrong about anything and if they do that means they hate us.  Hmmmm.  How would Jesus fair in such a world?  Imagine telling a mind your own business kind of woman that she has had many husbands and the man she is now living with is not her husband?  What kind of Jesus would say tell a woman of a different ethnic group or religion she was a dog?  What kind of Jesus would tell a rich and successful lawyer to sell everything and then come back to talk about God?   Oops.  Jesus was not being very nice.

The Church does not grow because we are nice people and because we smile a lot and do not judge.  The Church grows because the Holy Spirit works through the Word of the Lord to call her into being, gather her from the ends of the earth, enlighten her to everlasting life, and sanctify her to become more like God.  It is the Spirit's work.  Nobody says that this justifies us being rude or unwelcoming or hard to get along with.  Nobody.  But the Church does not grow because people like us or we are nice to them.  The truth raises up the faithful, endures the days of trouble, and saves to everlasting life.

I think we should be nice.  I do not think our victim culture or our willingness to hit post or send before thinking about it are good things.  I do not think that the Church should be unfriendly.  But I also do not think that the Church lives or dies because her people are not nice.  Niceness is not a mark of the Church -- faithfulness is.  So if you are reading this, God does not countenance you being a jerk but neither did the Lord ever say that the Church will grow if you are nicer.  Be faithful and the niceness will come.  Listen to the Law.  It cannot save you but it does reveal to you the way life should be.  Don't make a program out of being nice as if it will substitute for the other things we should be doing to evangelize.  You cannot program niceness.  It is the fruit of the Spirit's work -- an overall term for the many fruits of the Spirit.  Part of being nice means being of the truth.  Part of being nice means speaking the truth in love.  Part of being nice means speaking the truth in love because God is truth.  But the Lord grows His Church not where we are nice or polite but where His Word is preached in its truth and fullness and the Sacraments of Christ administered in accordance with His command.  We should not need to be told to be nice but it won't hurt to remind us to be nice even if it will not buy us the kingdom or result in a bigger Church.  Nice sometimes means speaking forthrightly the hard truth that you wish you did not have to say.