“A Hospital For Sinners”



I have seen this meme, or variations of it, often through the years. On the surface, it is true. We shouldn’t come to the church expecting to find perfect people. However, I truly believe this is a faulty analogy and I also believe it sets up a false dichotomy. In my experience, I have yet to find anyone who came to church expecting to find perfect people, and then who leave because they found messy people. Quite the opposite, really. They expected to find real people. Honest people. People like us. Messy people. We are told that “the church is a hospital for sinners not a museum for saints”, and yet….. and yet so often what we find is a museum where people and ideals are held up and revered, and a place where we are expected to heal ourselves. Sure, come as you are, be messy…. Just don’t show me your mess or get it on me. Don’t make me uncomfortable. And please don’t make me get in the mess with you. Sure, God loves sinners, but then He changes them, and well…. You aren’t changing enough or quickly enough. Or you aren’t changing in the way I think you should be… change, grow, learn, but not like that. 

Brad and I have been binge watching the tv show, The Resident. I love it. It is a new favorite show. I love how it shows a side to our medical system that we don’t normally get to see- doctors fighting for their patients against a system that sees them as a commodity not as real people, doctors and nurses who cry when their patients are given bad news or die, doctors who are  feverishly working against time to diagnose and treat their patients, and who continually say “every person deserves proper medical care, no matter who they are or what they have done”, and who take seriously their oath to do no harm. They genuinely listen to their patients, do any tests and push hard for a diagnoses so those patient can get the proper care they need and begin to heal. I watch the show and constantly say that one of the main characters constantly looks at every patient as if he is in love with them. It’s strange and yet comforting… like, he really cares. He shows genuine compassion for each of his patients, as if they were people who mean much to him. 
While the show is obviously simply a fictional drama, we do have certain expectations of doctors. We expect good bedside manner, to be listened to, to not be dismissed, to be taken seriously when we say something is wrong, we expect that they know what they are doing and can be trusted, that they will treat us with the utmost care and knowledge that the years of training and schooling has supposedly given them. We expect a doctor to act like a doctor. Nothing more, nothing less. 

We are told a church is a hospital for sinners… and so we come to church expecting to be heard, comforted, to be known, to be treated with care and compassion. We want a pastor who is like a doctor- kind, compassionate, someone who listens, cares, and does his best to give the help we believe he is capable of giving. We need the sweet salve of the gospel. And we expect that the congregation will understand our mess, our pain, our struggles, our suffering, because they are patients, too. 

Just as we do not anticipate walking into a hospital and being told “wait here…” and help never comes; or telling our doctor our ailments and being told there is nothing wrong and it must all be in our head; crying out in pain yet being told we just need to work harder, do more, serve more, be more selfless and less self centered, lower our expectations and grit our teeth and bear it, we also do not imagine walking into a church and being told the above. Yet all too often that is exactly what happens to people when they come to church. They are given law- things to do in order to be accepted and loved, rather than giving the Person Who will accept and change/heal them. They are given hoops to jump through like a carrot on a stick- do this and be accepted- but too often more carrots are just added to the stick and the sense of love, being known, accepted, valued, seen, and heard that we crave are always kept just out of reach. 

I have been dismissed and ignored and made to feel stupid by doctors. I have come into the ER writhing and moaning in pain and been told nothing was wrong and they sent me home with glorified tums. I had a doctor put Vaseline on my 18mo son’s 2nd and 3rd degree burns. In other words, I have walked into a hospital and had expectations that the doctors knew what they were doing and would care about me, listen to me, figure out what was wrong, and help me feel better. They would do what doctors are supposed to do. 

And unfortunately, I believe too many walk into the church having these same expectations and find a place where they are dismissed, used, seen as a commodity not people, a nuisance, a bother, or many other things besides the Imago Dei. 

Is this meme really implying that people expect to find perfect congregations, or is it a way to dismiss others by claiming that when we are hurt, it’s because our expectation was simply too high…? 

If we are going to use the analogy of the church being a hospital for sinners, then let’s do our best to make it actually be a hospital and not a museum where we are afraid of touching anything or breaking rules, and where we are only there to look and not touch.

(This isn’t a sweeping generalization of all churches. I know there are great churches and am not trying to mischaracterize. Just writing from experience and through speaking to so many others about their experience as well.)