When we moved to the Olympic Peninsula, we hoped to meet a few brothers and sisters in the Lord and decided to visit a small independent country church. Before going, we talked about our intents and purposes and resolved to keep mum about our history, gifts and callings. The very first service we attended, the new pastor was introduced and within 5 minutes of hearing him boast, I said to Karen “he will destroy the sweet fellowship here”. When the service was over, I chided him about a gross contradiction between his message and the men’s program he promoted. He threw his head back and laughed, dismissing what I said by the Spirit of Truth. In hindsight, that should have been our first and last visit, but we decided to check out the Bible study prayer group meeting the following Wednesday.

The leader was spirit filled and conducted the Bible study with learnedness and sensitivity for every person’s participation. Her devotion and preparedness was obvious and we regarded her a genuine sister. Midway, the study broke for refreshments, where my dear wife boasted to the woman who asked about us “my husband is a songwriter and worship leader”. “Ooooh!” said the woman as she rubbed her hands together “we’ll have to put him to work right away”. So much for keeping mum and avoiding church work.

Soon we found ourselves ensnared by church politics and involved in a number of church programs. The political stuff sought us out as gossipers and busybodies tried to enlist our support for their church issues. Church programs were something we saw the need for and volunteered while others were at the pleading of church leaders. It was after all, a small church and the few members who did do the bulk of church work, often wore multiple hats.

Several times one of us had to inform the other that our weekend plans were canceled because we’d been roped into performing a church job. Overnight it seemed that the peace and contentment we’ve known in home fellowship for nearly 15 years turned to strife and contention with each other as various church jobs regularly trumped our time together. Our retirement quickly turned to labor as people used scripture in manipulative ways or pleaded on our emotions to conscript us. Admittedly, both of us were reluctant to say “NO!” and thereby helped create our own trouble.

The issue came to a head 1 week before our wedding anniversary weekend when we realized we couldn’t go away to celebrate like we do every year because we were signed up for 4 different church jobs between us.

“We’re stuck” Karen said. “Nope” said I and fired off several emails “UN-volunteering” us from every church job that weekend.

It’s difficult to describe the spirit of contention that brought such strife into our marriage home. Who were these people, this gossipy busy-body church, who could insert themselves between my wife and I, effectively putting the sheep of Jesus pasture to work in support of man’s traditional church? We experienced nothing like that when we followed Jesus alone and knew the joy of His easy yoke and light burden. There was nothing easy and light about the church work and politics that had ensnared us.

To restore the peace of our marriage relationship, we went to the Lord in prayer with fasting. He brought to mind Ephesians 5 which says Christ is the head of the husband and the husband is head of the wife. He also reminded us of the pastor’s homily when we were married, referring to the strength of the 3 stranded cord (Ecclesiastes 4:12), while admonishing us to cleave to one another, and us to Jesus.

Nowhere in scripture that I can find does the church come between Christ and a husband and wife, yet man’s traditional church often tries to assert itself as an authority over or between married couples.

If the church were to honor marriages and practice the precepts of Ephesians 5 like they teach and admonish married couples to do, should they not ask every potential volunteer to pray and discuss their service with their spouse before accepting? To assign one spouse to service without consent of the other is to dishonor the other spouse. How can that be anything other than a kind of spiritual adultery when the church inserts itself between man and wife whom Paul refers to as “one flesh”?

When the Lord had shown me this, I became jealous for the devotion of my wife which these uninvited suitors were encroaching upon. I was reminded about a call Karen received from the pastor to argue with her and demand her submission over the wording in a presentation she had created. About the time I loosed my inner “Rambo” on the vain works that sought to ensnare and divide me from my wife, Dad called to relate a dream God gave him about the church we were attending. In it God instructed my Dad to warn me “do not repeat the mistakes of the past … and … get out of the way and let it fail”.

I was stunned by God’s warning because I had never told Dad about my similar dream and very same instruction God gave me 15 years earlier. Immediately I backed away from every church job and involvement while asking God to show me what getting “out of the way” was supposed to look like.

My only issue was whether or not it was possible to continue attending “worship services” without getting more involved? I pondered the question with prayer and concluded it was not possible, since regular church attendance implies submission to church teaching and leadership together with the expectation of financial support. In fact, the churches ‘Constitution and Bylaws’ convey that very understanding by referring to those who attend but do not become full members as “associate members” – aka – membership by association. The Father gave me a mental picture to help understand the absurdity of what I was asking. Simply, going to a man’s church, while at the same time refusing to become a paying member, was like going to a restaurant and using their facilities to eat a picnic lunch we brought for ourselves. Consequently I decided to leave that church altogether.

All things considered, it was for the cause of fellowship – breaking bread with a brother or sister – that we abandoned all hope for that church. When we and one other couple expressed the desire for home fellowship during the week, tone-deaf church leadership responded by implementing a program of pot luck meals led by the pastor in the too-small basement fellowship room, after church, twice a month. The program was in deference to the pastor who commuted to the church on weekends from 2 hours away. Whether the leadership was being accommodating to the pastor, controlling, or both I don’t know. We were simply hurt that no one there engaged in fellowship except as an official church program in their building. As for the other couple who desired home fellowship during the week, they abdicated to the new church program.

As quickly as the turmoil had invaded our marriage home, it fled when we left the church and resolved to follow and submit to Christ alone.

Of course our decision has left us alone to each other again, save for Christ Jesus and a few precious friends where we “Break bread from house to house” (Acts 2:46). We can only pray that the Lord provides for fellowship and hope that people are hearing the Lord’s call to “Come out of her, My people!” (Revelation 18:4) unto genuine relationship with Christ Jesus and the sons of God in Christ.