I am looking for church. An LCMS church, because I have been convinced that the LCMS is closest to Scriptural integrity. There are faults, yes, but the closest.

I am a baby-boomer. Late end boomer. I grew up in the Seventies, had shoulder length hair, wore loud silk shirts and elephant bell-bottoms. I listened to Zeppelin, Hendrix, Dylan, and even some James Taylor. I was, and still am, typical for my peer group.

I own a home, two cars, I have 4 kids and pets. My wife and I both work and commute away from home every day. We get paid well for our college educations, and we are both looking at career advancement opportunities.

We have time for church every Sunday, though. Even when we don't feel like it, we go. We like to think we were taught well about our response to God in Worship, and we teach our kids the same. The whole family literally rests in the Lord for a few hours on Sunday.

Again, I am looking for an LCMS church. We have visited some and are not impressed. We come away shaking our heads and wondering what it was we had just gone through. We aren't being delivered the goods; forgiveness of sins. We are experiencing congregations that are trying to out-Methodist the Methodists and out-Pentacostal the Pentacostals. What has happened to the Lutherans? Why are we caught up in the fickle winds of a world that has, quite literally, grown into the term "disposable"?

I want my kids to grow up as Lutherans, real Lutherans. Not some watered down American Evangelical that determines someone's needs and changes their personality to match it. My kids call people like that "posers." People who "pose" as other types of people to be accepted. In the Seventies we called them "plastic".

The CTCR report on Evangelism and Church Growth states, early on in the report, that "From the beginning years of its history to the present The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod has been characterized by a strong commitment to mission outreach." What I have seen lately is a characteristic of inreach; altering the personality of the congregation to make oneself look attractive. My Mom used to have an old "proverb". Something about the amount of make-up not changing the reputation of a girl.

We are still looking. We want true reverence, not false modesty. We want respect for God's Real Presence not moralism. We want the Gottesdienst of the Church Catholic, not a smarmy camp sing-along. We trust God, in His Grace and Mercy, will provide.

Jim Heap

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