"We don't GO to church . . ."

Can this public booth be my private confessional?

Last night I was asked--again--"So . . . where do you go to church?" And I felt awkward and I flubbed my answer--again.

It is a normal question. The question will NEVER not be "Where do you go to church?" in my lifetime, so I need to get used to it.

When someone asks "Hey, where do you go to church at?" this is not an invitation to converse about the negatives of church-building-based Christianity. We can get coffee and discuss the downsides of owning a church building sometime, but that's not the point when someone innocently asks which building you center your Christian experience at.

The flub of an answer that I gave last night was "We don't go to church, we ARE the church." Oh yes, it's theologically more correct, but I flinch at the arrogance. And talking with God about it afterward, I think I now have a better response. I've practiced it so it's ready, and I'm hoping that when the next person asks me "Where do you go to church?" I'll be ready: "We are Shepherd's Gate Fellowship."

Is that so hard? It's true that I can't honestly use the same verb they used--I don't "go to" Shepherd's Gate Fellowship--but I don't need to belabor the point. I am SGF--you are SGF--and that answer can answer the awkwardness of the "where" question for the rest of my experience in dispersed church.

Lord, forgive me for being theologically correct in my arrogance. Thanks for letting me be SGF rather than attending a building-based experience. It is good.