Here are some things I would love to see in a church environment
1. Multicultural - members from all races joined together in worship to God.
2. Biblical - preaching the word and also relating that word into today's world.
3. Spirit Filled - expecting that the Holy Spirit will turn up in power when the word is preached, souls are saved and also in corporate worship.
4. Leaders - who are genuine, caring and selfless about those whom they have to one day, make an account.
5. Social - On all levels from the creche to the elderly. Everyone can enjoy some kind of social gathering.
I will stop there. Please add ore or create your own list....
Great question!
I am commenting on the title question purposely before even reading the things that you would love to see:
I know that we are allowed to be the way we are--that is the purpose God has created the world, that all things good and evil should be revealed before the Judgement. Which is not to say I like it, I don't. It is this very thing that made Christ weep and pray that the Father forgive us for not knowing what we do. And the thing that is now so apparent, is that God has purposed what is right and good, quite literally to every generation, and the response is always the same:
We kill of quench those whom He has sent and reject even the truth for fear that we might lose a control we never had over what may come.
The Old Testament is full of examples, the greatest of which comes in the New Testament of Israel rejecting and crucifying Christ. But even now the church rejects what He arranged for our times. He gave us the basics wherein there are many mysteries, and told His disciples “
I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now." Then coming to the end of what flesh and blood could accomplish, He told them and us, that He would continue on in the Spirit, and that He would send another Helper--that it would not even be them who spoke the things to come, but Him. And those who were documented speaking so warned that false teachers and prophets would come and turn the church away from all that He had appointed them to. Even so, instructions were given for the way we should go, but have not. We were to "
press on...leaving behind the elementary principles of Christ"--but we, the church, have not done so.
This was to be a time, an opportunity, for the gentiles to see and hear--to be silent in our churches, and let the Holy Spirit speak. But we too have fallen into a state of delusion and a type of blindness not unlike what became of Israel, and for the same purpose: until the times of the gentiles are fulfilled. But just as Israel's time came and the promises of God came upon them, we too have our time of His promises coming to fruition--to an end.
So...what I would like to see is a movement in the church to
reexamine those final instructions, to take them to heart, and to fearlessly follow them, rather than fearlessly not, as it has now been for two thousand years (to our shame). Because, that
day of the Lord is coming and even now is here, whether we heed His direction, or finish it with the same sort of rejection not unlike Israel has done.
If we reject the Spirit, we reject Him.