Follow Jesus Christ

What keeps so many people in church, in the Christian community? The answer is simple—and a little sad. For some, it’s family and social ties. “My whole family’s in church, so of course I’m there too. Wouldn’t want to be the odd one out.” Family is like a spiderweb: tug one thread and the tremor runs through the whole thing. In those cases, faith isn’t really a choice—it’s more like a collective habit.

Others are held there by fear. The kind you absorb in childhood, alongside fairy tales about witches and monsters lurking in the dark. Only here the boogeyman is more serious: leave the church, and you’ll end up sizzling on the devil’s frying pan. Not a metaphorical one, but a very real, red-hot pan, with oil popping and the smell of charred flesh. Grown-ups explain it to kids in ways that are easy to picture, and those pictures stick. That frying pan ends up living somewhere deep in the back of the mind, and a person spends their whole life going to church just to make sure they never wind up on it.

And then there’s a third category—a rare breed. These are the people who came to church after a personal spiritual search. Not because “that’s what you’re supposed to do,” not because “it’s scary not to,” but because they were honestly seeking meaning. They asked themselves uncomfortable questions, read books, listened to silence, picked up hints from their own dreams. And at some point, the church became a kind of harbor for them. But there aren’t many like that, and they aren’t the ones holding up the community.

Because what really holds up the community are donations. Money. Without it there’d be no shining domes, no air-conditioned halls, no professional choir in elaborate robes. Money is the oxygen of the church. And that oxygen comes in through new members. Which is why newcomers matter not just for “keeping the faith alive,” but also as fresh wallets. That’s why the entry process is simple: agree to the dogmas, make friends with a couple of active parishioners, and you’re in. Nobody’s going to tell you, “Sorry, you don’t fit.” The church is built for the masses; it thrives on scale, not selection.

But with Jesus, it was different. His community looked more like a special task force. He personally chose whom to call and whom to pass by. In the Gospels, those moments seem almost casual: Jesus makes a decision, walks up to a fisherman, for example, and says, “Follow me.” And that’s it—the man follows. But how many people did He not say that to? Far more. He “weeded out” most of them, because He knew: they couldn’t handle it. They didn’t have the heart for service, weren’t ready inside.

Here everything was flipped: it wasn’t people going to the church, but the church going to the people—and turning most of them away. What came out of it was a tight-knit brotherhood: teaching, loyalty, friendship, a shared road. And it worked. The strength of that small group outweighed the power of the crowd.

And rejection from Jesus wasn’t a death sentence. “You’re not ready” didn’t mean “you’re lost.” These folks could still believe, still listen to the preaching of the apostles, still ask their questions. They just stayed on the sidelines until they ripened, like green fruit on a tree. Jesus didn’t pick them too early, because He knew the taste would only be bitter.

The modern church is still a long way from that ideal. Today it’s more like a Sunday supermarket. Anybody can walk in, grab a cart, and roll down the aisles. Everything’s convenient, everything’s open. But from that kind of crowd, you rarely get a real spiritual team.

Maybe one day, though, the church will circle back to that path. Someday, in some not-so-distant future, it may start choosing hearts instead of wallets. It may learn to hear those who are truly searching, not just those scared of the frying pan. And then there will be small communities again, tied together not by habit, not by fear, not by profit—but by something deeper.

Maybe that’s where we’re all headed in the end. The road is just long. And for now, everyone has to choose for themselves: go to church out of family duty, out of fear, or out of longing. For some, the frying pan is still waiting up ahead. For others—the road to the absolute ideal.