Jesus used metaphors for the Kingdom of God, here are my metaphors for the church.
The Church as an Atom
This is an example of how the church should not be. Right now many churches act like atoms. An atom has a nucleus at its center and in the nucleus are neutrons and protons. Many of us act like this is God and the pastor(s) all huddled together at the center. Flying around the nucleus are Electrons. The church people are electrons, and they move around the pastor, but never get very close to each other or the pastor. Sometimes they fall in on the pastor and there is a big explosion, and some times another church atom gets close and they break off and join that atom, but they never interact with the other electrons around them.
The Church as a strand of DNA
I started to use a cell but I didn’t want to get overly complicated. The church best fits a DNA strand because it is interconnected, it can fold and change without blowing up on each other, if there is a problem it can be repaired. Most importantly it is the building block for the body of Christ (see it does work). But as with anything, it can die if the problem is not caught early enough and corrected before it spreads.
While my metaphors are not perfect don’t miss what I am saying. As we try live in our church community and love one another in the body of Christ we are not going to be perfect at it, but we have to be attached to each other in order to function.
Atom model used courtesy of http://timerime.com/en/timeline/154564/History+of+the+Atomic+Model/
DNA images used courtesy of http://www.truthnet.org/Christianity/Apologetics/Godlogical3/
About Steve Crenshaw
I have to say that you have chosen very interesting and unique metaphors for the church. An Atom and a DNA strand.