What happens after last call?

Are you watching The Chair on Netflix? Sandra Oh is the first woman of color to become the chair of a department at a major university. You feel empowerment with her for the first 30 seconds until she sits in her broken chair which falls over and sets the tone for what her experience as department chair will be like. At one point in the first episode she confides in a co-worker, “I feel like I arrived at the party after last call” and those words have been haunting me ever since.

In the show, you sense her desperation. In my own life, I’ve been wrestling internally with why this won’t let me go. It feels like more than the typical Enneagram 3, do-big-things-better-and-sooner standard I’m usually chasing. It feels tangible in a larger sense, the way we all collectively “feel” the epidemic of covid. I feel it in a communal sense for those of us in the church world. And I don’t mean ministry leaders or church staff. I mean all of us.

With deconstruction, people exiting church or leaving their faith in bigger numbers than ever before – or at least for the first time in our lives that we’re aware enough to see it – it feels like everyone’s already made up their mind. Church was the party and it’s over. Last call. Time to go home or, like the old adage goes, at least just don’t stay here. Evangelicals on Twitter have become exvangelicals. Anything you see about Christianity on social media is a meme, highlighting flaws. There are podcasts and books and accounts galore to explain why the church is toxic, lame and over. And sometimes it feels like screaming into the void to get anyone to hear or see anything different. It feels like arriving at the party after last call when everyone has had their fun, assessed the situation and decided it was time to go. Not laughing as they pile into their cars until the next time but setting the place ablaze on their way out. You can exit with them or you can stay and get burned.

Super hopeful, I know. I’ll get there. But I want to recognize this moment for those of us still left in the building. It’s easier to jump on the bandwagon of anything that’s going down. It’s harder to be the ones left with a dripping hose, trying to salvage the damage that’s being done. It’s sad and it’s hard and it’s discouraging and it feels like we’re alone, the only ones left in a place we loved where people connected and life happened before it’s inevitable demise.

There are people in churches who have been abusive. There are people in leadership and power positions who have taken advantage of the people who were entrusted to them. There are people on religious pedestals, who should have never been put there to begin with (because no one in the church should be) who do whatever it takes to stay there and uphold their image and influence no matter what the casualties are. There have been terrible things done, taught and allowed to happen in the church. I am not denying any of it or invalidating anyone’s experiences or feelings. These things should not happen and for the ones who have been mistreated or manipulated, I am sorry.

But just as we can’t look at any one people group as a monolith, the church - the body of Christ - isn’t either. Making assumptions about every church, pastor or Christian based on past experiences with others (even more than one) is just as unfair as making snap judgments on any other people group or organization. There are good churches and pastors and Jesus followers out there.

So for those of us who are left, what do we do? What options do we have?

We can leave, too. We can clean it up, close the doors and leave people to their new lives.

We can sit in the empty bar, looking around at what was, being sad that it’s over. Where things are messy and our feet hurt and we could probably use a snack and some sleep. But then what? Throw another party that only a few people show up to? Go to all the effort for something that won’t feel the same anyway?

Or we can change the party and bring the people back.

Sandra Oh’s character knows she can’t let the department fall apart. She knows it’s her responsibility to fix it. And that’s why she feels defeated. Because while it’s going to be more work than she anticipated when she signed up for the job, she was chosen to do it. She knows it can be better. She knows she can make a difference if only she can convince the other people on campus to see her department in a new light.

As Jesus followers, if we have the same feelings, our action steps are the same. If we were meant to watch the church fall down around us, we wouldn’t continue to be bothered by what it has become, or is depicted as becoming. If a stirring sadness that things can be better continues to prevail, then we get up from our broken chairs, clean up the mess and keep opening the doors. We change the way we’ve always done things. We keep inviting people to the party and we show them how it will be different.

But we keep going. We figure out how to do it better. We rely on the God we’re speaking for to do what only He can do.

Your lives light up the world. For how can you hide a city that stands on a hilltop? And who would light a lamp and then hide it in an obscure place? Instead, it’s placed where everyone in the house can benefit from its light. So don’t hide your light! Let it shine brightly before others, so that your commendable works will shine as light upon them, and then they will give their praise to your Father in heaven.
Matthew 5:14-16 TPT

We stay resilient and don’t get stuck in defeat. We stay open to allow God to shine through us and show the world that He is still good and still found in the church. We can’t control their RSVPs but we can control our influence. We can talk about Jesus and live our lives in such a way that people stop and reconsider - once again - this Jesus and His church. We don’t let the collective voice of those who are no longer in the church control the narrative. We’re not in a battle against other people and we don’t cause division by living in us vs them groups. We don’t speak out against or in reaction to other voices. But we keep using ours.

If you believe in the church and the potential of what it could be, what it already is in so many places, then you keep using your voice. Keep throwing the party. Keep lighting up the darkness - brightly, not hidden away - so the people around you will see that He is still hope, He is still worthy and His people are still good when they live lives surrendered to His good character.

If one person pauses on one meme, podcast, post or message to reconsider who Jesus might be, we’ve handled our responsibility well. It’s not our job to save every person in the world. It’s our job to show them who Jesus really is and to keep showing up for the ones who want to know Him.

Because last call can’t happen as long as the party is still open for people to come in.