“The neighborhood bar is possibly the best counterfeit there is to the fellowship Christ wants to give His church. It’s an imitation, dispensing liquor instead of grace, escape rather than reality, but is a permissive, accepting, and inclusive fellowship. It is unshockable…You can tell people secrets and they usually don’t tell others or even want to. The bar flourishes not because most people are alcoholics, but because God has put into the human heart the desire to know and be known, to love and to be loved.”
Chuck Swindoll, in Dropping Your Guard
This quote absolutely breaks me. Because it is so true. And because so many people are trying to fill this need in bars and not in our churches.
Oh that our churches would truly exhibit this kind of God-designed community.
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