Detoxing from Church: Resurfacing

Re-Surfacing

In January of 1999, about eighteen months into the detox journey, I remember having nachos and a pint of Alexander Keith’s India Pale Ale (a great brew from Canada’s east coast) with a good friend, and suddenly having an epiphany that – when all detoxing and debating and deconstruction is said and done – I and only I am the one who can choose what kind of person I am going to be.

And I decided that I was tired of feeling dead. Another friend referred to his struggle with being “bitter and twisted”, which became as common a phrase as Brother Maynard’s CLB (church-left-behind) would later become.

It was a simple but profound moment, one that I was probably incapable of in the early stages of the disillusionment of the detox, but now – suddenly – it became possible.

In the next few weeks, almost as confirmation from Someone Else, I was asked to lead worship at a youth home group, which eventually translated into leading the group. Andrew Smith invited me to play bass on a cross-Canada worship tour (meaning a five week vacation from The Meaning of Fish), which was an incredible time of soaking in a worship band environment, complete with digital loops, acoustic vibes, and good old-fashioned Delirious?-style abandonment.

It was a season of “coming back to life”.

Some things I noticed during this part of the detox:

It’s not a return to “business as usual”. You don’t just happily re-integrate with the existing structures as if nothing had happened. You’re different and like Neo in The Matrix, you realize, “I can’t go back, can I?”

“No,” responds Morpheus (the prophetic voice), “but even if you could, would you really want to?” So, even as you find yourself reintegrating into some iteration of church gathering, you are also more at peace with being "in the system but not of the system".

You begin to recognize that some of those around you appear to be aggressively committed to Crabby Detox, and while you don’t avoid them altogether, you realize that you need to pull back somewhat in order to pursue life. (They may or may not understand or like you as much if you break the unwritten but monolithic Rule Of Perpetual Crabdom.)

At the same time, you begin to see (the worship tour was very helpful for me in this regard) that there are “people of the Spark” in almost every configuration of gathering, across many denominational lines. Your focus shifts and you start seeing healthy trees (people of the Spark) instead of only the forest (the “system” of church).

You find a greater freedom to affirm what God is doing through the imperfect vessels called “church”, blessing people at whatever point of the journey they find themselves at, while still being an advocate for change.

After all, at some point, all of us were part of “the system” – perhaps even defending and enforcing it – and we have to show the same grace to people still in it as we would like them to show us. (And recognize that, as imperfect people ourselves, we haven’t arrived yet, either!)

And very significantly, you begin exploring and advocating – from a REconstruction motive – for a Christo-centric, Spirit-empowered missiological/ecclesial vision, for the sake of the King, and to partner with Him in the advancing of the Kingdom.