Please Model our Church after Drug Dealers

Most people who know me, know that I don’t drink coffee. In fact, when people ask me if I would like a cup of coffee I often respond, “I don’t do drugs!” Some people smile, others are confused, and others have heard me say this enough to butt in and say it for me while rolling their eyes. Part of my disgust for coffee is the taste, but the real issue I have is shelling out $4 to $5 for a drink. Call me a cheap skate but to spend $1,116 a year on a drink is ridiculous (5 days a week X 4.50 a day). This is before you add in the accessories, complementing items, spouses drink, gift cards, and other miscellaneous items that people buy at these modern day crack houses. I use the term crack house because crack houses are where addicts congregate to get high. Coffee, like crack, is a highly addictive drug that changes the mood and being of a person. Just ask an addict if he hasn’t had his morning coffee fix. And despite all of this I still want to model our churches after these crack houses.

You are probably asking why? It has to deal with the drug king pin Howard Schultz(Starbucks CEO). Recently, Schultz gave an interview to NPR regarding his new book Onward: How Starbucks Fought For Its Life Without Losing Its Soul. The title alone was to catch my attention, but NPR titled their interview “Starbucks CEO: Can You ‘Get Big and Stay Small’?” These two titles ripped my attention from what I was doing (solid marketing). As I see it, these two questions could be posed to the Church. On the larger scale: Has Christendom lost its soul by becoming Christendom? Is Christendom fighting to retain its soul amongst the power it holds? To a smaller scale: What is the correct size for a church? Can a church turn into a mega church without affect? Can a mega church stay small and committed to its core ideals?

Indirectly, I have been questioning these two themes over the last couple years (power and influence verses Christ's calling). Arguments can be made for both sides and I would argue that both are pretty convincing. However, as I read Schultz interview he brought to the forefront the issues that arise when growth happens. Values, core ideas, principles, and mission statements can be lost when power and prestige are given. What makes a company/church succeed at a smaller level can easily be lost. It takes a continual commitment to hold fast and/or return what made you great. I can’t help but see this delimma in the church today. Listen to his comment and ask yourself if it doesn’t relate to something else within the church:


“Pouring espresso is an art, one that requires the barista to care about the quality of the beverage. If the barista only goes through the motions, if he or she does not care and produces an inferior espresso that is too weak or too bitter, then Starbucks has lost the essence of what we set out to do 40 years ago: inspire the human spirit. I realize this is a lofty mission for a cup of coffee, but this is what merchants do. We take the ordinary — a shoe, a knife — and give it new life, believ¬ing that what we create has the potential to touch others' lives because it touched ours. Starbucks has always been about so much more than coffee. But without great coffee, we have no reason to exist.”

WOW!!! How many people in culture, let alone the church, talk with this much passion and conviction? As the Church, called to make disciples, do we put this kind of love and attention into people? Do we see the ordinary and give it life? Do we see every moment as the potential to touch others’ lives because someone has touched ours? Do we seek to create much more than followers or a church, but true passionate disciples for Christ? Do we believe that without this purpose that we have no other reason to exist?

Schultz in his belief that Starbucks had changed from who they set out to be did something drastic. In order to gain perspective and show the corporation how serious he was to holding to their mission statement and passion, he shut the company down for 3 ½ hours. The estimated loss was 6 million dollars in revenue. The media, his company, competitors, and the team around him all questioned his decision. And yet in the midst of all the doubt and negative impacts he believed that Starbucks “had to restore the passion and the commitment that everyone at Starbucks needed to have for our customers. Doing so meant taking a step back before we could take many steps forward.”

Later, when asked about his decision he gave this response:

“There are moments in our lives when we summon the courage to make choices that go against reason, against common sense and the wise counsel of people we trust. But we lean forward nonetheless because, despite all risks and rational argument, we believe that the path we are choosing is the right and best thing to do. We refuse to be bystanders, even if we do not know exactly where our actions will lead. This is the kind of passionate conviction that sparks romances, wins battles, and drives people to pursue dreams others wouldn't dare. Belief in ourselves and in what is right catapults us over hurdles, and our lives unfold. ‘Life is a sum of all your choices,’ wrote Albert Camus. Large or small, our actions forge our futures, hopefully inspiring others along the way.”


If the Church answered the questions I listed above honestly I think that they would respond negatively. We don’t have the passion, love, and belief to endlessly pour into people. We don’t believe that our purpose really matters. We don’t strive for excellence in all that we do. We look at the drastic steps that we need to take to get us on track and think it is too difficult or unpractical. We look at Jesus’ commands on the Sermon on the Mount and say "not possible. It would be easier to lose 6 million dollars." Schultz responds to us “acting ethically (and purposefully), even if it costs more” is what we are called to do.

It's the tall order that has been given. Our job is pour out our lives as it has been modled for us, no matter the cost.