10. Believe in your heart that church is a morning service in a building, instead of a community of Christ followers living real lives all week long.
9. Whenever your church hires a new pastor, assume that this means there is less work for you to do, instead of wondering what new initiatives this will enable your church to explore.
8. When you don’t understand what church leadership is up to, choose to believe that there is a conspiracy afoot to keep the congregation in the dark because the leader’s hearts aren’t in the right place.
7. Insist that the church ought to be pouring its considerable resources into meeting your needs, instead of insisting that you are all the church and that the church is God’s gift to the world.
6. Assume that your disappointment with something in the church is universal and be sure to speak about it that way. IE, “People don’t like the worship here,” vs. “I don’t like the worship here.”
5. Listen to sermons with the attitude, “Tell me something I don’t know from a novel angle I’ve never heard before,” instead of realizing that until you’re living it out, you probably need to hear it again.
4. Make sure you agree with Satan’s accusations about people’s faults and weaknesses and join him in his gossip and slander… instead of getting in touch with your own sinfulness and extending grace to others.
3. Use your tithe as leverage; withhold it when you disagree with something the church is doing.
2. Refuse to find a small group to be part of and then complain that the church is impersonal and that you’re not connecting well.
1. If something is wrong, leave and find a better church — instead of becoming part of the solution.
0. Insist that every focus and sermon and song and ministry should be exactly as you want it to be and nitpick with like-minded people or until people become like minded with you and molehills become mountains and you have created a divisive spirit that quenches God’s Spirit and causes the church to rot from the inside like a cancer, instead of saying, “Hey, close enough. Count me in!”
(Yes, this is technically eleven things… c’mon, stop nitpicking and just say “close enough…”)