Today – I choose to die.

 I have heard too many people say that. Oh, they didn’t come right out and use those words, but they made a choice to die none the less.

What it boils down to is that they chose to do nothing to change the course, thus they made the choice by not making a choice.

Let me give you an example. My dear mother whom I love dearly, who died almost a year to the day that I write this, died and the cause of death listed on the death certificate reads – “Breast cancer.”

 

She had been diagnosed many months earlier, but once told that she had breast cancer she chose to do nothing. I mean absolutely nothing. Not just “no” to any treatment, but an emphatic NO to anything… no MRI, no CT scan, no Ultrasound and definitely no surgery. She didn’t even want to discuss the fact that she even had cancer.

Yet it was ultimately the cause of death.

I know that the whole discussion of quality of life and effects of the treatment are part of the discussion. BUT, the bottom line falls to the fact that she made a choice. She knew she was dying, she knew what was going on under the surface but refused to acknowledge it. I didn’t agree with her decision, but it was her life and I could not make the choice for her, I could only love her with the time we had until the inevitable.

Now, I see and hear of too many people, too many churches that make the same choice. They loudly proclaim that today they choose to die. Again, not that they actually use those exact words but they say it loudly and proudly when they refuse to discuss that there might be a “cancer” of sorts causing a slow wasting away of it’s body.

They don’t want to discuss it, they don’t want to even acknowledge it, they don’t want to even think about and there is no way, no how that they are going to allow a radical surgery to make the desperately needed changes to ensure not just survivability but “thrivability.”

 

Thousands of churches across the country are declining – one researcher notes that – “Approximately 80% of all churches in North America have reached a plateau or are declining.” (Daniel R. Sanchez, Church Planting Movements in North America (Fort Worth, TX: Church Starting Network, 2007)

Let me define “declining” for you – it really just the nice way of saying – YOU ARE DYING! In my opinion there is no such thing as “negative growth.” You are either growing or you are dying… Thom Rainer is quoted as saying – “According to my estimates, about one in four American churches, or around 100,000 churches, fit the definition of a dying church”

 

I am a young 50 years old. I can tell you that if I went to the doctor and they told me that I had some disease but that if I went through the treatment, as difficult as it might be, and that if I did I could continue to have a life with my family and my grandkids – well, I would ask they how soon can we start!

Yet, in his book “Autopsy of a Deceased Church” Thom Rainer talks about churches who actually get EXTREMELY ANGRY when told they are dying and need change, maybe even radical change. They (the churches) seriously refuse to admit or change – right up to the point that they lock the door and fold the flag.

Rainer, as well as many other church consultants, have said – if you just make some changes you can have a long healthy very possibly thriving life ahead of you… YET they still get angry and refuse the treatment, and instead say – TODAY I CHOOSE TO DIE.

 

I am not suggesting what the changes might be; they are different for every church. What I am suggesting is that every church has to look at itself honestly, even when difficult, and be not just ready and willing to make changes but to actually go ahead and make the HARD choice to LIVE! Even if that requires radical surgery.

Let me leave you with another example. I have an uncle who I love and respect. He was diagnosed with cancer, and might I add not at a “young” age. They (my aunt and uncle) didn’t try to pretend he didn’t have it, they didn’t stick their heads in the sand… they accepted the fact but then CHOSE to go through together whatever it would take to live.

He had treatment, he had surgery, he had more treatment… it wasn’t easy… I am sure that it was scary at times and they had a lot of people praying… but he in essence said – “Today I choose to live!”

And he is enjoying life even today, sure things changed some but he chose to live.

 

I guess the question I would leave you with is this – what will you choose?